Irmageddon Approaches

Posted by on September 9, 2017 No comments

Storm arrives tomorrow.  All prep is done.  Everything is stowed away and vehicles are strategically placed to avoid the inevitable fallout from my neighbor’s shitty trees.  People have been contacting me non-stop.  There’s nothing to report yet.

I went out to get mail for the last time and my neighbors were out and wanted to chat.  They all consider themselves prepared as well.  One has his windows boarded up.  Another has what looks like painters tape x-ing his windows.  I finished installing shatter-resistant film on my front window.

Gas in my area isn’t as difficult to find as I thought it would be.  My car and motorcycle are topped off and the GF’s car is also topped off.  We also have 10 gallons of gas in cans.  I don’t know how much good it will do us now, since I was unable to get the generator started.  The old gas has apparently killed the carb.

Last night we went out to Lowe’s to get paint, since we’ll be stuck inside for a couple days.  It was rather what you expect.  The line for plywood went from the front to the back of the store.  The three people in front of me each had a window AC unit.

Today was a stop at Target for a few supplies, and a last meal at Olive Garden.  The hostess said they had a lot of employees bail on their shifts.  No rush crowd by noon, just a few tables.  We sat at the bar and let the Weather Channel explain how death was coming, but during commercial breaks, “Trust the Weather Channel”.  Kinda creepy when you think about it.

The cat was been acting super weird on Friday, very clingy and agitated, but today has been more calm and reserved.  So now it’s just a waiting game.  Oddly, Friday delivered the first rain band – a far, far outlier, but it still behaved like a tropical downpour.  Today, nothing.  it was nice and sunny, sometimes overcast, but no rain.

I’ve Got… Aunt Irma Visiting

Posted by on September 5, 2017 No comments

Prep day 1 for the natural disaster, Hurricane Irma.  Recently upgraded to a Category 5 hurricane, which is supposed to be death from the sky, probably will be Cat 4 or even 3 when it gets here.  But hey, 3 or 4 cats can make a significant mess of things.

I was here in 2004 when we had four hurricanes cross over us.  I remember at the time it became a joke – another weekend, another hurricane.  At the time, I was living in an apartment in a newer apartment complex on the middle floor.  So I had no potential for roof damage and no potential for flooding.  The events were all pretty easy going.  The balcony was always to the back of the storm, so I just sat out there and watch thing go by.  I saw part of a metal roof get ripped off and I saw a displaced alligator walking around.

When I got my house in 2005, I was fully prepared.  I got a generator, a chain saw, a chest freezer and a dorm fridge.  That should keep me going for as long as I needed.  And when did the next hurricane come along?  It never did.  Until now, 12 years later.

Today, I dug the generator out of the shed where it hadn’t been used once except for a test of the electrical output.  It was surprisingly clean, but its functionality is still unknown.  I need to change the oil and get some gas in it.

Speaking of gas, there’s a general hysteria going around now.  Of course, when I’m out of gas in my car right now.  So I stop at one station.  I tried a pump and it didn’t work.  Odd.  I went to another pump and waited for a guy to fill 6 five-gallon gas containers.  That pump didn’t work either.  But it was just working!  It dawned on me that the station was out of premium gas.  So I went to another station.  As fate would have it, they were out of regular gas and only had premium.  So I got my car filled up.  But in both places, there were cars everywhere.  Luckily, everyone was civil (so far).

I also noticed that people were eating out a lot.  Everything was crowded.  I guess people didn’t want to deplete their stock at home.  After eating, I went to a small store and found pretty much what I expected:  no water, no bread.  I bought other things, like pop-tarts and canned tuna fish and chips.  My idea of survival is different than others.

And you know what, there will be more shipments.  I’ll get some bread eventually.  I have cases upon cases of Coke and drinks.  One paranoid thing I did get tonight?  Cash.  Can’t use credit cards when there’s no power.

Farewell Half.com / Dream On

Posted by on September 1, 2017 No comments

Yesterday, I learned half.com is closing.  I had one day of notice, essentially.  I had just purchased two things the previous day.  How did I not know this beforehand?

Today, I’m searching for news stories about the closure.  There aren’t any stories of significance.  Maybe 2 or 3 in second-tier tech news sites.  Then there’s a few stories about 6 months ago when the announcement was first made.  Included in those stories is a posting about someone who only found news of the closing in the help section of half.com, and no contacts at half or eBay would confirm the closing.  How weird.  Supposedly, the sellers were notified of the closing, but for whatever reason, the users and buyers were not.

So, the expected plan is for everyone to move their listings to eBay.  But as far as I can tell, eBay is not designed for the sale of media.  The whole design of half.com was that you searched for media, then you see who is selling it.  On Ebay, you would search for media and you get a bunch of listings selling that media.  Every listing would be created by each person, so there would be little to no consistency between them.  Amazon is better suited for sales of that nature, since they have a product, then they have sellers of that product.  It’s the same way that Amazon is not well suited to sell things that eBay excels at, like collectables and one-off unique items.

At some point in the future (not near or far future, somewhere in-between), I was planning on opening an online presence to sell my excess CDs.  Half.com was the frontrunner.  Now I have to choose between eBay and Amazon.  Or maybe Discogs, but I think the buyers would be more discerning there, which would require more effort.

Well, in the meantime, I have plenty enough going on to not worry so much about it, but it is sad to see one of the few physical media marketplaces close down.  You know what would be cool?  What if… Barnes and Noble, who isn’t doing all that well themselves, resurrected the Borders brand (which they bought in bankruptcy court) and re-launched it as a used media outlet. (I hate the word outlet in this instance, but juggernaut is a word that has to be earned).  I’m going to call this idea “Boarders” to prevent any confusion or lawsuits.

So here’s how I would see it operating.  We have to recognize that used media, whether it be books, CDs, DVDs, VHS, or cassette, has a low value – except to collectors.  So, understanding this, margins will be low across the board, no one is going to make a real killing at this.

So you’d start with an online store, structured mostly like half.com.  That’s the cheapest way to get things started.  People make their listings, sell their products and life goes on.  Admittedly, getting the momentum started so it looks like you have lots of items will be difficult.  To help in this, the tools to create listings will have to be top-notch.  Something like having a pre-populated database of UPC codes with product descriptions and stock photos.  Maybe have automated imports of structured files to batch add items.

That’s all well and good, but it’s just another vanilla ecommerce platform.  How’s that going to be an Amazon?  So let’s go to phase two.  Amazon is already at phase two, so nothing earth-shattering here.  Phase two is having Boarders warehouse the inventory.  The sellers use the site’s control panel to create a shipment of product to the Boarders warehouse.  This submision includes the item and the price at which they want to sell the product.  Then they box everything up with a printed submission sheet and send it.

When the shipment arrives, the warehouse worker scans the code on the submission sheet, then begins scanning barcodes on the incoming products.  The items get added to the sellers listings immediately.  I’m no logistics expert, but I’d assume the warehouse manages the inventory in the most efficient way.  The warehouse also gets notified when items sell and would ship them out efficiently as well.

I’m not going to downplay the expense of shipping and processing hundreds of books or CDs or DVDs for both the seller and Boarders.  That’s something that would need to be overcome by the beancounters.

Since we’re still having fun with this, let’s move on to phase three.  Phase three is physical storefront.  These could be built into existing B&N stores or could be standalone.  Stuff that was sent to the warehouses is bundled up and sent to various locations.  Why would the seller care where the product actually is?  All brick and mortar stores become warehouses.

Since these are low-margin sales, you need low-margin maintenance.  You also need to know your potential customers.  So for CDs and DVDs, what is needed is a clamshell container that holds the CD/DVD case and the disc separate, so they can both be inspected for condition without needing an associate to assist.  I would have to think about how books would be handled because buyers would want to see inside the book.  But anyway, back to disc-based media.  You also don’t want to have cashiers deal with opening clamshells and ringing customers up, so you would have a self-checkout machine that accepts the clamshell in a slot, scans the barcode, completes the sale, then releases the unlocked clamshells for the customer to remove and bag up their purchases.  The money goes off to the original seller and life goes on.

It’s just kind of a pipe dream.  Realistically, there isn’t enough potential profit to engineer a checkout machine like that, plus manufacture tens of thousands of cases to hold media that is selling for $1.00 or so.  Not to mention the cost of processing other people’s inventory and shipping it to storefronts.

Or maybe there is, somewhere.  Or maybe, there can exists a company that makes enough money to survive, and doesn’t have to make its owner a multi-billionaire.

A World Without Stereotypes

Posted by on August 15, 2017 No comments

The concept of stereotypes has been around for a very long time.  It’s only fairly recently that “Social Warriors” have taken up the fight to eliminate the use of stereotypes using the universal weapon of shame.  I’m not saying that I’m in favor of keeping or eliminating the use of stereotypes.  I’m saying that the point is moot.  There are no stereotypes anymore.

Stereotypes have historically been a “bad thing”, because they encourage prejudice.  They allow you to assume the behavior or personality of someone based on external factors.  I certainly don’t need to bring up racial stereotypes, we all have plenty of examples for that.

Stereotypes provide a slightly less offensive use, also.  They are coping mechanisms, where one can sort of explain away behavior that they find objectionable.  Like I say, that’s only slightly more offensive, since all you’re doing is reinforcing the stereotype in your mind for future prejudice.

Anyway, like I said, there’s no reason for any of that anymore.  I’ll provide an example and you can build it out from there.  Long ago, you could make an educated guess (which is just a polite term for prejudice) as to how a driver would behave on the road based on the vehicle they drove.  BMW drivers?  Women in minivans?  Old, beat-up, rusty Toyotas?  Little foreign cars with fart cans for mufflers, lowered to the ground?  Are you developing mental images for each of these?  Well, those images are all outdated.

You used to be able to see a car swerve on the road and say, “Typical (stereotype).  No surprises there.” Or pull up behind a vehicle covered with bumper stickers and think, “Yup, pretty much what I thought” when you analyze the stickers’ content.  But no more.  Any car can surprise you.  An “old-person Buick” goes weaving through the lanes; you get honked at by a fleet of micro-sized cars; middle fingers from corporate vehicles.

The reality is, everyone is an asshole.  It doesn’t matter what car they drive, they are going to be an asshole on the road.  Taking that a little further, it doesn’t matter what their gender is, what their race is, or what their religion is.  They are going to drive like shit and put everyone at risk for their own selfishness.

Now, can this logic be applied outside of the highways and interstates?  Maybe, but probably not yet.  Over time, maybe we can eliminate our differences in the non-driving world and we can all be a common humanity of assholes.  I can see progress being made on that front every day.

But more seriously, there are so many goddamned people now, it is not possible to be prejudiced.  You simply cannot predict what any one people will say or do.  You will consistently be surprised, for better or worse, and usually for the worse.  If you try to create stereotypes, you will have so many distinctions that it becomes useless to try and refine them any further.  It’s part of the individualization fashion, started when Windows 3.1 came out.  Yes, I blame Windows.

They Robbed Me Blind

Posted by on July 31, 2017 No comments

Saturday morning, I went to get in my car and noticed the door wasn’t latched.  Weird.  I got in the car and my glove box was hanging open and my center console door was open.  Really weird.  Then it dawned on me.  My car had been broken into.  I use the term “broken into” loosely because I rarely lock my car doors.  I figure there’s nothing really of value for anyone to steal, and if they do steal something, it’s just an excuse to upgrade.

I looked around and nothing was missing.  This puzzled me.  My CDs were still there, my GPS/dashcam was still there, my MP3 player was still there.  A card wallet with probably $150 in gift cards in it was still there.  Yeah, I don’t expect anyone to steal my CDs, and yeah, they could have grabbed the MP3 player and said, “Oh, it’s a Zune”, but hey, doesn’t everything have some value to a pawn shop?  Are these smart thieves that only steal things of real value?

So whatever, I closed everything up and went about my day, puzzling over the experience.  I didn’t feel violated or anything, just confused.  Like I had such shitty stuff it wasn’t even worth stealing.  As I think about it now, maybe someone just wanted to know what it was like to sit in a car like mine?  But why wouldn’t they close up the storage areas before they left?  By Sunday evening, it didn’t even really mean anything to me.  As I was driving home, I needed to put on my glasses.  I wear glasses only for distance viewing and I need them especially at night to reduce the halo effect of lights.

Where’s my glasses?  They’re not in their usual place.  Seriously?  That’s what they stole, my prescription glasses?  What good will my glasses do them?  What a stupid criminal.

So now, I have to get another eye exam (which is overdue anyway) and get a new pair of prescription glasses.  Like most “disasters” in life, it’s just an inconvenience.

He Who Controls The Spice

Posted by on July 24, 2017 No comments

This weekend, I picked up a couple of other CDs from my prime musical era: the 80’s.  It would probably be interesting to poll people and find out what they consider the best music of their life.  Based on anecdotal evidence I’ve seen, it would be the era in which a person became an adult, about when they were 18-21.  But that’s not really the point of this post. 

The thing I have discovered is that although we have all these eras of music: 50’s/oldies, 60’s/hippy, 70’s/classic rock, 80’s/glam/pop, 90’s/depression, and onward, each era has so much more than those generalizations I just assigned to them.  And even when you explore those other genres, they are still consistent with other genres of that era and also different than the same genre in other eras.  For example, Jazz in the 70’s sounds different than Jazz in the 80’s.  But Jazz in the 80’s still has that production sound of pop music the 80’s.  So the point I’m trying to make is that you can explore many genres within your prime musical era.  The amount of music just within your preferred era is staggering.  Believe me, I’ve been getting more and more daring and buying artists I only had a faint memory of.  The best way to describe the result of that effort is like filling in a puzzle of the entire musical landscape of the 80’s.  You see (hear) each album all in context and relation to the others and the era as a whole becomes more defined.  But that’s not really the point of this post, either.

I had to put those thoughts out first because I am curious abut the future (and a little about the past).  The 80’s could be the premier music moment in recorded music history, all due to the creation of the CD.  Because of the mad rush to upgrade past recordings to CD, then because of the eventual low cost of CD production, there is an overwhelming amount of music physically available on CD, both past and present (present meaning 80’s).

However, as we know, streaming is becoming the new standard.  Proponents of this format claim that it will encompass everything, where any music ever made will be available at a moment’s notice.  But will it?  It’s been shown many times over that an artist can simply refuse their catalog to be offered on a streaming service.  Not only an artist, but maybe an entire label.  If a label goes bankrupt, where do the rights go?  The music is only available when everything is working perfectly – and I wasn’t even meaning the technical bits working perfectly.

With our massively analytical society and our ROI-driven corporate environment, what are the odds that a streaming service would look at some particular music and see it isn’t being accessed enough or isn’t generating enough revenue, so it is just removed from the service.  It’s no longer available.  It’s not lost, just unavailable, which is pretty much the same thing to an end user.  I have seen news that some albums are no longer being released on a physical medium, therefore there is no way to own a copy of the music.  If this pattern accelerates, then there will come a time in the future where music can be lost.

Of course, none of this matters to me, because I’m still filling in the gaps of my era, but future generations will end up having a very spotty image of what music was like in their prime.  That would be a shame.

What’s Good For Us Is Good For You

Posted by on July 13, 2017 No comments

It was a while ago that I had gone to Pollo Tropical and ordered my usual, with a large drink.  The cashier replied, “We only have one size of drink now.” Ok.  But that is a medium cup.  Right.  That change, which I considered kind of significant, made me think about the whys of such an unannounced change.

For the company, the change would mean reducing the number of items they had to stock and order, which has benefit.  Also, it’s less drink walking out the door, because who wouldn’t refill before leaving? So, there’s that savings. And finally, I assume it’s a preemptive move when the pressure comes on for the death of soft drinks.  Kind of, “Hey, we’re not even allowing people to buy more than 20 ounces here.”

Although I was pretty displeased with the change, I accepted it and moved on.  Then, yesterday, I went to Firehouse Subs and got a meal combo.  I was given a 20 oz cup.  Wait, didn’t this used to include a 32oz drink?  I looked around and saw 32oz cups on other tables, so I don’t know what I did wrong.  Oh well, I don’t eat here that often anymore, so I sucked it up and got on with my day.

Today, I go to Sweet Tomatoes.  I get to the cashier and ask for a large drink.  She hands me a 20oz cup.  No, I want the large size.  “We only have these now.”  WTF.  Just like Pollo.  But, Sweet Tomatoes only ever had 32oz to-go cups, not the 20oz.  So something’s afoot here.  It’s not simplifying stock items, it’s shrinking things.

Fountain drinks are the biggest profit makers for a restaurant.  It’s under a quarter for a cup, lid, straw and the drink itself.  Considering many places I go charge $3 for a drink, you better believe I get refills and to-go cups whenever I can.  And now, they’re shrinking the available cup sizes so you can’t leave with an extra 10 cents of drink?

For future reference, Boston Market still only has one drink cup – a 32oz cup.  They’ve recently changed from a plastic cup to a paper cup.  Let’s see if they shrink it down to a 20oz.

New Frontiers

Posted by on July 13, 2017 No comments

As an old customer of Verizon FIOS, I was transferred with many others to Frontier.  I never had any significant issue with the transition.  Yeah, their web portal sucked for a while, but my service was uninterrupted and my rates didn’t change.  I had renewed my contract just a couple of months before the changeover.

A lesson I’ve learned, but will probably never be able to apply again is, don’t make any changes to your grandfathered account.  Recently, I decided to change my home phone number.  I never used it, but my ex-wife used it everywhere and all the phone line did was fill up the voicemail with her collection agency calls.  So I wanted a fresh start.  I called Frontier and over a couple of calls, I had a new number.

The next month, I got a bill in the mail from Frontier.  That was odd, because I didn’t think I had any real service done.  The bill was my monthly statement.  That is odd, because I had paperless billing activated.  Further the bill was not for my usual amount of $106, but for $165.  That’s no good.  As I was scanning the papers, I noticed my new phone number was now my account number.  I was suddenly a new customer to them, one with no promo pricing.  That’s no good at all.

I logged in to the web portal and saw that all my past bills were inaccessible (since they were under an old account number) and my autopay was deactivated.  So I got on the phone with billing support.  The guy was pretty confused about the whole situation and eventually gave up, saying the department that needed to handle problems like that was gone for the night.  They would call me the next day.  Unsurprisingly, they didn’t.

I called back during normal business hours and got someone more experienced.  She understood that all that was needed was to restore the discounts on my account.  So after a bit of work she said she couldn’t get it back the way it was.  The reason is that my cable package was migrated from Verizon and there was no Frontier equal.  My bill would go up by about $10/mo.  I kept my mouth shut and the rep said she would transfer me to “retentions”, who would have more power to change the billing.  Ok, then.

The retentions rep also understood the problem and worked to put the discounts back in.  Unfortunately, she still didn’t have any access to restore my cable package.  However, she explained that my cable package was going to change from about 20 channels to 75 channels.  And that’s not so bad.  I rarely watch TV, but the one time I checked it all out, the online channel guide was useless because I couldn’t filter it to only my subscribed channels.  So I always got “this channel is unavailable”.

So, for the privilege of changing my phone number, I had to upgrade to their lowest cable package, which was more than my existing package.  To be fair, that change was inevitable.  I would have to bite that bullet when my renewal came about.  In the end, I got a $25 credit, 75 channels, and the ability to stream cable through my Roku devices.  All for an extra $120/yr.  Oh, and a new phone number, which is really all I wanted.

Inmates Running The Asylum

Posted by on June 15, 2017 No comments

Ha, you think I’m talking about the current political environment.  Nope, I’m talking about my workplace.  I’ll be honest.  I’m a bit old-fashioned.  I’m in a different generation than most of my co-workers and some of the things that are important to them are absolutely ridiculous to me.  For example, the company dress code.

Years ago, one of my co-workers lamented to me about how he couldn’t wear “a hoodie and flip-flops” every day at work.  This is important to him.  The fact he has to wear business casual clothes (which does include jeans) is a problem.  And strangely, employers now have to cater to their employees despite an overwhelming labor force eager to take those positions.

Recently, my employer conducted an experiment.  You could wear anything you wanted to work as long as it wasn’t revealing or offensive.  Personally, I didn’t change a thing, but many others broke out sandals, flip-flops, shorts, tee shirts, hats, and more casual dresses and skirts.  The workplace went from business casual to resort casual, and in my opinion, became more slobby.

The experiment went for 2 weeks and when it was announced that it was going to end, “hoodie and flip-flops” wrote to the HR director asking why it was ending if there were no complaints about how people abided by the rules.  The answer was “we’ll see.”

On the first day after the experiment’s conclusion, “hoodie” came in and announced loudly, “Fuck this place!”  He didn’t get fired or even written up for that, but did get counseled on his behavior.  He had to write an apology letter to the HR director saying he wouldn’t do anything like that again.  His letter also mentioned it was the loss of the relaxed dress code that caused the outburst.  It was a great way to make the case for keeping it, for sure.

But here we are, a couple of weeks later and great news!  For a limited time, SlobFest has returned to our workplace!  For the rest of the summer (excluding days where clients will be visiting), dress down, be comfortable (since that’s so important to you), act like you’re on vacation.  But please, if there’s anything else we can do for you, don’t hesitate to just shout out, “fuck this place!” and we’ll see how we can accommodate you.

Me, I’m outta here.  Fuck this place.

Get Off My Lawn, And My Beach, And My City, And My Country, And My Planet

Posted by on June 5, 2017 No comments

Over the weekend, I got to spend some time at the beach and it was pleasant.  The key to that pleasantry was going early in the morning, before the large families arrived.  As I was basking in the silence, actually able to hear the waves, I thought about how nice it was right then and how it wouldn’t be so nice in a few hours.

I thought about these groups of people with screaming children and boom boxes and thought it would be really nice to not have to be around them.  But obviously, they have just as much right to any public space as I do.  It’s just that my quiet presence wouldn’t intrude on them, but their boisterous presence would intrude on mine.  Somehow, that doesn’t seem fair. 

I thought up a label for these people.  They are “environment modifiers.”  Wherever they go, they modify their environment to suit themselves.  Natural beauty?  The sound of nature?  Unnecessary. We have children and portable stereos.  It’s just like being in our house or our back yard, only the visuals are different.

I mulled over different ways to handle this.  One idea was segmenting the beach into noisy and quiet zones.  Of course you don’t say it like that.  The beach is divided into “those who love the sound of children playing” and “those who love the sound of the sea”.  And those are truly mutually exclusive.

And sadly, this little microcosm is applicable to our society as a whole, when the loud and obnoxious drive out the polite and quiet.  When decisions are made based not on merit, but on amplitude.  Where resources are acquired sorely through aggression.  When acquired resources are resold to others at a profit, when the justification of that profit is solely getting there first.

“And the meek shall inherit the earth.”  What a wonderful, ruinous place it will be to inherit.