JOURNAL: HOUSE: It’s about fucking time!

The motherfucking pool table is finally moved to the motherfucking basement! Finally!!!  The endeavor took a whopping 63 days (timeline below), though it only took 4 days from calling the right people  (Higgins Billiard Supply).

The job — finally finished. It’s about time. I called Higgins Billiard Supply, and the job was done in 3 days. They knew what they were doing, and they did it. No cancellations or dicking around. Compare this to calling J L’s Pool Table Services (Justin Lawrence), where the table was still not moved 33 days after my intial contact (full timeline below). Thus, this post has the tag “Companies That Screwed Me Over” — for J.L.’s Pool Table Services untimely manner in dealing with me. If you need a pool table moved — Call Higgins Billiard Supply instead! Tell them Clint’s Blog sent you there

Ball return. I retrieved about 6 blue cubes of pool chalk, as well as a 9-volt battery with built-in water meter (WTF).

Refelting (it’s not actually felt, BTW) in progress. They were impressed that I used the correct term of “spray adhesive”, but I use that stuff all the time to decorate (for example, speakers with neat magazine clippings and such). They also had these $200 suction cup handles that seemed like something Catwoman would use. Those, dollies, and blankets were used to move it.

The pool table had to come out of our main room, down the hall, out the front, across the front of the driveway, down the side yard, stepping down from 2-foot retaining wall, across the back of the house, into the kitchen back door, through the narrow hallway that connects the kitchen do our rec room, and across the rec room. Of course, moving it was only about half the time — the other time was spent re-felting. And they gave me a good deal too — so they definitely get a plug on my blog! That’s Higgins Billiard Supply.

Oranjello liked their tools. He had to spend a lot of the time locked in the bathroom. He actually had at least one opportunity to escape, too — but he didn’t take it. Both the pool table guys were from Woodbridge, so we actually ended up discussing which high schools and middle schools we went to — among other topics such as 2 Girls 1 Cup, crazy people at parties, fisting, and kittens (but not fisting kittens). It’s nice when people have real personalities and are wiling to bring the conversation to any topic at any level. It’s nice when people aren’t stuck up.   Full timeline below, after the jump:

 

LINKS: Wonder Years “Winnie Cooper” in lingerie photoshoot, my builder gets a $500 fine from VA DPOR (underly-harsh punishments!!), Jaxx for sale, cops tase guy for laying on his couch

“Legendary” Virginia Heavy Metal Club JAXX For Sale - $1,200,000. The comments say the bidding is already closed, but I don’t care. It’s interesting because I go to so many shows there. I hope it doesn’t change TOO much! Silent alarm sends police to man’s house, police tase him 3 times because he was “laying on his couch and wouldn’t move”. I love how they justify it. “We don’t just go up & tase them.” That kind of sounds like its exactly what they did! And not charging the guy for the pot they found was probably actually because they knew they had already messed up, and it would increase the eventual lawsuit settlement if they fired even more charges. Gerard Kraly,Lukas Lauricia: Keystone Cops. CELEBRITIES: Wonder Year’s - Danica McKellar pictures and bio on Stuff magazine. People probably saw this when it came out, but i just saw it now. so someone else had to have missed it. Winnie Cooper from Wonder Years in lingerie! PERSONAL: Virginia Design Builders sole propriety Dan Lopez - person who built the addition to our house in 3 yrs on a 3 month contract, and for 12% over - fined only $500 for complicating the Espeys lives as well They plaintiffs are busy suing my builder for over $400,000. I so totally saved the PDF.

 

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JOURNAL: Victory! If you want something done right, DO IT YOURSELF. PS2 FIXED!!

Well, goodbye Starland. I will never deal with you again. You suck. You refused to fix my PS2 because it was modded, even though you used to mod them. Hypocrites.

Then, without notice, you close your store down and move my playstation, without calling me, to another location. I was lucky enough to wander into your store at the last minute (you forgot to lock the door, but I saw you lock it behind me when I left), find you in the back, and get the number of your other location.

I did not appreciate having to drive 10X farther from my house, nor did I appreciate trying to find your obscure turn, accidentally running a red light, beeping at everyone (both lanes were kind enough to slam on their brakes despite having the right of way), swerving across a lane with no anti-lock brakes, and making a fool out of myself. All to get a PS2 back that you didn’t even try to fix. Fuck you Starland. First you ditch your anime, then you ditch your repair services, then you ditch your nearest store to me. What good are you? Starland is dead to me.

SO ANWYAY — I DOWNLOADED A PS2 REPAIR GUIDE. 10 screws, a couple q-tips, and some 91% isopropyl rubbing alcohol, and within minutes, Carolyn & I were playing Guitar Hero 3 for the first time in weeks. Yay me! If you want something right — just fucking do it yourself. Rely on no-one else. Community means nothing unless you’re a conformist sheep. All I needd to do was clean my laser! The pussies at Starland couldn’t even clean a laser for money! (I got charged $0.)
I’m damn tempted to tag this “Technology War” — because the corporations are the ones who put the fear of modchips into the Mom-And-Pops such that Mom-And-Pops now refuse to touch modded consoles. Fuck you Sony! Starland could have made money off me, and I could have saved several hours free time. But nooo…. You drive us underground. Guess what? Those of us who care, and who bother, can still do whatever the fuck they want. And I will continue to do whatever the fuck I want. Eat me, Sony.

Tomorrow: Use the Sharkport to backup all my memory cards (while I still can). Order the HDAdvance module so I can start playing games off of a harddrive, thereby preserving the life of my questionable laser. Find old useless IDE harddrive from old computer parts box (60G? 40G? 80G? 120G?), check against HDAdvance compabitility list, and put into PS2. YAYYYYYYY!!

 

JOURNAL: Kaiser-Permanente sucks

22 minutes to make an appointment. 13 of which they verified that my doctor quit.  I received a letter 5 weeks ago saying this. But they woudln’t believe their own fucking letter!  My last doctor died…

 

JOURNAL: HOUSE: Heat broke again. System installed by Virginia Design Builders / Dan Lopez, of Laurel, MD.

So, since getting the system up in 1/2005, the air conditioning broke twice in the summer of 2005,  the heat broke in the winter of 2005, the heat broke again in the winter of 2006, and the air conditioning broke in the summer of 2007, and now the heat broke again in the summer of 2008.  Now, this system was installed by people hired by Virginia Design Builders/ Dan Lopez of Laurel, MD.  The contract price was $10,000 for the upgrade (as one stage of a $72,000 job that cost $84,000 or so).  It pretty much took 3 or 4 men a week to install it.  For multiple repairs, the repairman has not understood what has gone wrong, but just happened to make it work again.  Supposedly Dan Lopez has retired, but his children are running his company in Maryland.  Beware. I expect such incompetence in managing a project to be hereditary.

 

GAMES: Rock Band

So, I have played Rock Band (Thanks Chris!), and it is awesome. It’s like a summation of all the efforts made in Frequency, Amplitude, Karaoke Revolution, Guitar Hero — plus drums. If you’ve played all of the above games, no review is necessary. It’s exactly what you’d imagine. But with square notes. Very narrow square notes. You have to be more spot-on with your rhythm, compared to previous games. The drums are 4 drums + a single “bass drum pedal”. They are quite hard; I was only getting 70-80% in Medium, the 2nd of 4 difficulties.

Anyway, I really enjoyed playing The Pixies‘ Wave Of Mutilation. This was like.. the best game ever Maybe not, but damn fun with 4 people!

 

JOURNAL: WORK: Vacation time rules can be changed like that? I want my 86.25 hours back!

So, a years or two ago I carried over about 160 hours of vacation time.  This was July.  All of a sudden, our next paychecks were cut, and I only had 47 hours of vacation time.  They decided employees could only carry 80 hours over, and reset mine, retroactively, to 80.  Of course, thinking I had 160, I was very liberal with my vacation time, taking far more vacation than usual (I usually take the minimum amount, keeping my balance as high as possible).  So I had used up 33 hours by July.  80-33 = 47.  So in one day, I went from 127 to 47.  That really pissed me off.

Now I am finding out that the 80-hour carry-over wasn’t company policy.  They just decided to implement the policy, retroactively, taking away vacation.  I don’t even think that should be legal — and it wouldn’t for normal corporations — but this is an under-50-person company.  Being under 50 persons complete changes the rules of business, and my company has gone close to 50, but purposely never exceeds 50 people.  So anyway, I am displeased by this.  Originally I thought they had failed to implement policy, and were simply fixing 6 months of mis-stated balances.  But now I see that it was just a plain money grab, to reduce the amount of vacation used/paid-out to people.  It reeks of bullshit.   I want my 86.25 hours vacation leave back… that’s over 2 weeks of my life that I will never, ever get back.  And I will indeed remember this 50 years from now.

 

JOURNAL: COMPUTER: The Birth Of Hades - part 4 - I hate XP and I’m forced to run it!

My new computer is coming along quite nicely, but I still think Windows XP blows compared to Windows 2000. Change is bad when you already have everything you need and just want to continue using the same hardware and software you’ve been using for 10+ years. If I want to do new stuff, I’ll get another computer for that. Leave my main computer alone. Also: Micro-review of Shrek 2. ** WARNING: SUPER-LONG POST **. You might want to ’star’ this for lunch. Click for the rest–>

 

JOURNAL: Kaiser-Permanente sucks! If you get a job offer from a company using it, DON’T ACCEPT.

So, at the request of my doctor, I switched medications. I had to wait for my old medication to stop working (a few months), then when problems started, I made my appointment to get new medication. That was about 5 weeks ago. It was over a month wait for a damn specialist appointment. Then, yesterday, they called me to inform me that my “doctor wont be there that day” (they only have one specialist per area?) and that I could get an October appointment. TWO fucking months. NO fucking way. I told them that was unacceptable. They told me they would find an outside referral and call me back. They never did. I emailed my primary doctor and informed her that the system isn’t working; get me back on my old medication, this isn’t worth the hassle. DO NOT USE KAISER BENEFITS. IF YOU ARE AN H.R. REP, THIS IS THE WORST THING YOU CAN DO FOR YOUR COMPANY.

 

WORK: What the fuck? And Fuck Kaiser-Permanente too.

Seriously — if an employer is offering you a job, and their insurance is run by Kaiser-Permanente — insist on getting extra money. Or just go to another employer. It is NOT worth dealing with their bullshit.

So, my company had a big meeting with PayChex, who is handling our new benefits, effective July 1st, 2007. They gave us a handout stating “HMO plan: $83.07 per paycheck for employee plus spouse”.

When Carolyn quit her job around July 1st, I set paperwork to get her benefits in motion, effective August 1st, 2007.

Now that she is on the benefits successfully, only now am I being told that oops, they got the number in half, it’s really $166.14 per paycheck for employee plus spouse.

Do I have legal options here? I’m guessing no.

 

CONTRACTOR REVIEW: Ace Flooring — missed apopintment.

Ace Flooring - Sun Kang.  2925 Stillwood Circle, # 303, Falls Church, VA 22042
work: (571) 214-1100

Appointment for flooring estimate at 2PM today.  Did they come?  No.

They also aren’t listed on BBB or DPOR.  We wont be doing busines with them.  I would not advise anyone to make appointments with a company that can’t keep them.

The snow is no excuse.  At least call.   Now, Chase Flooring did indeed show up today and were very helpful.  But Ace Flooring?  Never showed up.   These Asian flooring companies really need more original names….

 

links for 2006-12-09

I added a lot of links today.  Included in the full list:  

• My bad review of Lightning Bolt DSL

• The Abu Ghraib whistleblower lives in fear of his life

• Germany wants to pass a law that could put you in jail for playing Halo

• where to find FM transmitters for your PC

• how to look up the zip code of an old address

• how to file a complaint with Fairfax County

• how to view traffic cameras in Northern Virginia

• programming VML, Section 508 Flash accessibility.

 

TW Perry employs rude drivers.

So, after my tirades on LiveJournal about driving, the very thing I complained about happened yet again, the 2nd time this week.

I got flicked off for u-turning on Braddock Rd. The u-turn is the only way I can get to my house; there is an island blocking it from direct left turn. When people beep at me, I quickly do another u-turn, chase them down, and give them a piece of my mind.

I did this with the TW Perry people. The license plate of the vehicle was 82M 844. I will be calling Carol McConaughy, member of their their Marketing Department ( http://www.twperry.com/Press/ ), at 301-670-2445 just to give her a piece of my mind too.

In looking at this company’s webpage, they clearly care about customer relations. Why they would employ drivers who make a habit of flicking people off is the public relations mystery-of-the-day for me.

 

LOCAL: Springfield Roofing sucks! Avoid them!

Springfield Roofing sucks! Avoid wasting your time with them!

 

Social Experiments at their finest! (Best Buy chaos!)

http://www.improveverywhere.com/mission_view.php?mission_id=57

This is what happens with 50 people wear Best Buy-like uniforms and walk into a Best Buy semi-pretending to work there, but not actually doing any work.

Pictures were taken. Hidden cameras were used. Police were called.

This is absolutely wonderful!

And Best Buy deserves this too.  They are arresting people for trying to purchase items at their internet-advertised prices and in one case for paying with $2 bills, even though they are legal tender.

Boycot Best Buy!  They screwed me over on my warrantee, refusing to fix or replace my $400 cd player, but not before wasting over 12 hours of my time with me bringing it in for repairs that they later said were only cleanings (they never fixed the unit, not even once).  I have since refused to buy any items from Best Buy.   I listened to skippy music for over a year.

(And Mom & Dad, I still have no use for those Best Buy gift cards, does anyone want to buy them back from me?) 

 

Be forewarned: The beef stew-flavored tennis balls at the dollar store DO NOT taste like beef stew.

‘Nuff said.

 

I just thought I’d share this insane rant with the world.

On 2/14/06, Becky L. (my mom) wrote:

Happy Valentines Day!! Have fun!!!

oh it’s no fun, Carolyn was at a seminar for work all day, despite being on vacation (And still not back), i left to get my passport, and the lazy fucks at postal don’t open the passport office til 11:30am (so i got there at 10:30am and got to stare at their “save time by getting your passport at postal” poster for an hour),

then went to an endodontist and used up my entire fucking annual dental coverage in one visit, and it was the shortest dentist visit ever, and a half-finished root canal, and then i had to spend 1hr40mins at the office figuring out the bullshit rules with my insurance companies, because i have to get a biopsy, but as it turns out, the results of the biopsy determine who pays — if it’s an abcess, it’s dental. if it’s a cyst or tumor, it’s medical. so i had to find some random dentist named Amad Amin (and, honestly, i prefer my medical personal to be of my same race, but oppositte sex, because i can read them more easily and make my own conclusions on if they are bullshittng me much more easily, and because women are more gentle) …. who accepted both insurances. and i had to get a referral from Kaiser, my HMO, to get this biopsy done, even tho it’s going to be at a dentist…

and of course, at thi point, i’m HOPING it’s a cyst or tumor and not an abcess because i’ll get more coverage that way.
and of course paying $500 over this vacation wasn’t fun either

neither was having no power ALL sunday until 10:30PM. spent a lot of money at olive garden ($22) and drafthouse ($40) seeing ‘the producers’ which wasn’t the greatest thing in the world bgut was the best thing we could find given the circumstance. plus i had a bad hangover from an aborted party not happy.

2 more appointments. 2nd half of root canal is free.

i know the companies are going to screw me. and i need to buy supplimental dental insurance (and cancel my current one, once i’ve extracted my annual maximum from them there’s no fucking reason to keep paying them $33 a month if i can’t get any ROI on it)

so lemm eknow if you know anything about supplimental dental insurance packages. apparantly people are having to privately cover themselves, even ones with jobs with benefits, because the benefits nowadays are sad illusions of benefits that don’t really exist. my co-worker nancy already has one for her daugther despite working.i tend to think on the ‘capitalism has failed in america’ side, especially with medicine. it’s just a competition for dollars. if this was, dare i say, france, i could have had a doctor come to my house, even as a non-citizen, and it wuold be cheaper. and honestly? I’d choose the easier-to-get care over the more-technologically-superior care. the insurance situation is a runaway out of hand rollercoaster. it was over $1000 for them to do about 20 minutes of work. this is not reality, it’s the fucking matrix

 

Bush and Vioxx?

How about that Vioxx scandal? Official estimates that as many as 100,000-150,000 people unnecessary had heart attacks due to the risks that were never disclosed to the public. And of course, business interests pressure scientists to give results that are in the interest of the business, as a news item this week mentioned.

How could the situation possibly be worse? I didn’t think it was possible to make such a situation worse — selling people poison that kills them, marketed as medicine. But now Bush has made it harder for class-action lawsuits against companies by passing a bill limiting such power.

Of cousre Bush cowtows to big business. Expect many more needless deaths due to the corps hunger for power and profit.

It’s funny that there are people saying “those many people didn’t die”.  You don’t know.  The whole point is that nobody knows, because the science was faked!

P.S. I’ve been prescribed Vioxx in the past and have a pre-existing heart condition.

 

Avoid using the new Napster service. IT REEKS.

Dear Napster:

Here is why I am cancelling my one month free trial. Let’s review:

1) Tracks claimed to be 12 minutes are really 30 seconds. That means an overpayment by a factor of 24.

2) Paypal partnership encourages customers to use paypal instead of their credit card, thereby removing customer fraud protection becuase paypal does not cover immaterial goods.

3) Your email support is non-support. You waited 10 days to answer me.

4) Your email support is impotent: You simply told me to call on the phone. I had to wait 10+ days for that wonderful email advice.

5) Your phone support was slow. It took me 15 minutes to get my issue resolved. 13 of those minutes were being on hold. The hold music was the worst music I’ve ever heard in my life.

6) I found out I would have been charged monthly if i didn’t cancel my service. I NEVER AGREED TO THAT. I DID NOT KNOW ABOUT THAT. THE ONLY WAY I FOUND THAT OUT IS IN THE HOLD MESSAGE WHEN I CALLED TO COMPLAIN!

I don’t do business with those that charge me without permission.

You are the weakest music provider.

Good-bye.