Dave
Staff member
Remember that phenomenal comedy show we had a couple weeks ago? Well, we had round 2 last night. It went...poorly.
Don't get me wrong, we did our best. But the crowd was vastly different than the last one. For example, the first one we did had a bunch of adults at it. The suggestions were fun and the crowd was there to laugh and have a good time. "Can I get a Profession?" would bring things such as "Carpenter!" or "Policeman!"
Last night the average age was about 21 and a half. They were all young. They were all drunk. They were all morons. Let me give you a couple examples of the things we had to do last night.
Don't get me wrong, we did our best. But the crowd was vastly different than the last one. For example, the first one we did had a bunch of adults at it. The suggestions were fun and the crowd was there to laugh and have a good time. "Can I get a Profession?" would bring things such as "Carpenter!" or "Policeman!"
Last night the average age was about 21 and a half. They were all young. They were all drunk. They were all morons. Let me give you a couple examples of the things we had to do last night.
- "Can I get a profession?" "MIDGET!!"
- "Where did they bury the body?" (This was a detective game where you had to guess who was killed, by what, and where the body was hidden.") "Brandon's mom's house!"
- We had a game where we brought someone up on stage. When we touched him he had to say something. He repeatedly said, "Fuck this shit."
- "Can I get a profession?" "COCKSUCKER!!"
Finally got my new work laptop all set up, got all of the programs I needed installed, got through all of the MSFT corporate IT rigamarole, was finally able to get back to something approximating my normal work flow and suddenly discovered that they've given me a laptop without a DVD burner. My job requires me to burn approximately 5 DVDs or CDs per day, 5 days a week. My engagement manager, who ordered the laptop for me, knows this. This is how bad internal IT support is getting at my company.
Philly traffic. Nuff said.
North_Ranger
Staff member
Dammit. They were looking for players for a Pathfinder campaign, specifically the Kingmaker adventure path. I've wanted to play that for quite some time, but I didn't get in this time.
Take the above, apply to my sister at this given moment. I haven't been this mad since I lived at home and she has a party while I was out to see V for Vendetta and my shit got stolen.
Black Label Society is playing tonight. Steves friend won a box with free food and drink, only 50 bucks per person. I have no interest in BLS but Steve does so he jumped on a ticket along with a few mutual friends. April, also a fan, mentioned she wanted to go.
So we started texting. She kept giving dismissive answers. "Let me check my bank account." "I might be busy.: stuff like that. When we told her she didn't have to go she responded, "Oh I wanna! Just give me a few!" only to never text back.
I finally call her and ask her flat out. "Tuesday is date night BUTif there are two tickets get them for me and<her boy friend>."
There are two tickets. We tell our friend to hold them. Text Sis...no answer. Text her more time. No answer. Call her 10 times, including at her work, with no repsonse.
I finally get ahold of her this after noon. Oh! I sent you a text saying not to bother last night!"
One: Last night is WAY to late.
Two: Bullshit. BULLSHIT. We both have iphones. She can SEE if we received a message just like we know that she has been getting all our messages right on up until this morning.
So now we have 100.00 orth of tickets. We have to pay our friend, it isn't fair to him...and mysister is claiming no repsonsibility. She says Blue and I took her words wrong and she meant that "she'll check with her boyfriend" if they have two tickets free not yes.
Rasge. BUIlding....cann't...ty[e....
At this point, the doctors have no idea what it is, just that it's not good. They're going to start at the worst case scenario and rule each scenario out until they find the one it is. Today we're starting with various forms of cancer.
When people ask me why I still bother to shop at brick and mortar stores instead of just buying everything off Amazon , it's shit like this.
I ordered two books off Amazon on Wednesday. I checked the free shipping because I qualified for it, so why not. It was to take 3-5 business days. Cool. No option for delivery method, I assumed that like every other time I have ever ordered on Amazon it'd be through Canada Post/ The United States Postal Service (if necessary). Received an e-mail the next morning while at work saying that it was shipped by UPS.
It was not only shipped Thursday, but according to them also delivered at 11:40am.
I don't have it. It was apparently left on my doorstep by their description (I live in a basement apartment; my door is in the backyard, behind the garage and completely out of view from the street. There is a high fence directly across from the door seperating our yard from the neighbour's, and another high fence that is the gate to the backyard. Nobody could have seen the package from the street or another yard and taken it). But it wasn't there when I got home. It wasn't there this morning either. I checked with the guys that live upstairs, they haven't seen it. So I called UPS and gave them the tracking number "Yup. Delivered. Bye" was basically what I got. I want either my books, or my $35 back.
So that's the kind of crap that happens maybe 1/3 times I order something online. Conversely, you know what happened last time I went to Chapters to buy a book?
I walked out the store with it already in my hand and was able to read it on the bus ride home. You know what happened the 30 times before that? Same damn thing.
I ordered two books off Amazon on Wednesday. I checked the free shipping because I qualified for it, so why not. It was to take 3-5 business days. Cool. No option for delivery method, I assumed that like every other time I have ever ordered on Amazon it'd be through Canada Post/ The United States Postal Service (if necessary). Received an e-mail the next morning while at work saying that it was shipped by UPS.
It was not only shipped Thursday, but according to them also delivered at 11:40am.
I don't have it. It was apparently left on my doorstep by their description (I live in a basement apartment; my door is in the backyard, behind the garage and completely out of view from the street. There is a high fence directly across from the door seperating our yard from the neighbour's, and another high fence that is the gate to the backyard. Nobody could have seen the package from the street or another yard and taken it). But it wasn't there when I got home. It wasn't there this morning either. I checked with the guys that live upstairs, they haven't seen it. So I called UPS and gave them the tracking number "Yup. Delivered. Bye" was basically what I got. I want either my books, or my $35 back.
So that's the kind of crap that happens maybe 1/3 times I order something online. Conversely, you know what happened last time I went to Chapters to buy a book?
I walked out the store with it already in my hand and was able to read it on the bus ride home. You know what happened the 30 times before that? Same damn thing.
That's not Amazon. That's your neighborhood.
But I know what you mean.
But I know what you mean.
North_Ranger
Staff member
For me it's a more tangible thing: I like to leaf through a book or read the back page before I buy it, to get a sense of it. I mostly buy Pathfinder source books and comics these days, admittedly, but the situation still stands. You can't really do that on Amazon.
Yes you can (at least, on the US Amazon), just not physically. You can still browse pages and look at the back cover. It's just not in your hands.
Continuing the subject of books on Amazon, I'm getting frustrated with the indie publishers. Either the premise is garbage (Twilight rip-off, Harry Potter rip-off, LOTR rip-off, waaaay too many paranormal romances, or just vapid shallow daytime TV type plots) or an interesting premise/story is hindered by either a writer who can't write or a writer whose editor doesn't have the spine to say "No, not like this! Bad author! Bad!" and thwap them on the nose with their own manuscript. That's if they even have an editor.
I got into indie publishing myself because the traditional publishing system is going down the toilet for any authors who aren't household names and I don't want my intellectual property held hostage by anyone. Yet these are my peers? Many of them can hardly punctuate properly. I've read three good independently published books this year: Tinwhistler's A Touch of Magic (which wasn't really my thing, but was still good objectively), Nightworld, and Sparks, and Sparks doesn't really count because the author has been writing British TV shows for years.
Of course, I've purchased books published by the big publishers in book stores and there have been crappy ones. A lot of them, in fact. And they were more expensive. So maybe I'm just being touchy.
I'm contemplating starting an editing service. Not sure how I'd get my name out there or what I'd charge, but I'm just tired of seeing all this unfiltered crap with no one taking the time to make it better.
And my old neighbourhood.
And the neighbourhood I lived in before that.
And the one before that.
...And before that.
Not always the same problem, but similar problems. Senders who don't send the item, and then file complaints on ebay and harass you in messages to give them a review even though they haven't sent the damn thing, UPS leaving packages at the door when there's clearly no one home, FedEx and Purolator just not even bothering to try the door and instead just marking it down as "Not Home" so you have to go to their closest, distribution centre...
Honestly while it's much slower, the only issue I've had with USPS/ Canada Post is when Canada Post went on strike and my books took twice as long to arrive, and when Hurricane Isaac postponed the arrival of my package (It was still within the estimated delivery date range, though. Just at the very end of it)
These books I bought off Amazon because they were half the price as at Chapters. I've seen them at Chapters and flipped through them. Also they are both by an author who I've read 4 other books by and enjoyed.
Might be a good idea to get a "mailbox" service then. Gives you a physical address to have stuff shipped to that always will have someone there to accept the package and placed in a drop box that you can get to. I know that our (US) Fedex/UPS Store do this type service at almost all locations. I had to do that for a few years because the house we were living at didn't have a neighborhood that could be trusted to (started as a good place, but some not so good people moved into the area...) leave a package on the porch.
UPS in Hawaii isn't so bad. The regular USPS delivery, though, is on what we call "island time".
I've used Amazon for 10+ years, and I've only had a problem once. A package mysteriously disappeared in transit, and no one could tell me where it was or when it was going to be delivered. Amazon eventually sent me another copy at no additional charge. All other times the package arrived without incident.
Really my only problem with Amazon is if you use the non-Amazon sellers. They can sometimes take a while, really its the luck of the draw for me.
I think this is because they wait until they've got enough orders to qualify for a bulk shipping rate.
I went to get some pho the other night and I was about to order the tofu pho when I decided to ask to make sure it was a vegetarian pho. I figured it would be seeing as it was tofu pho but I decided to ask anyways. And they tell me no it is not. They are using the same beef broth for the tofu pho as they do for the rest of the pho. I am happy that I asked but also saddened because I ended up not getting any pho. I am also perplexed as to why they would have tofu pho and still use beef broth in it?
Never order vegetables in East Texas... they are half bacon down here.
The thing about pho is that you have a to have a kick-ass broth, or you may as well just not eat it. A lot of places do make different broths for different proteins - beef for beef, chicken for chicken and veggie for tofu - but sadly, I've never had good pho at any of those places, because the broth always seems to be an afterthought and it has no flavor, dragging the entire soup down. If it was a smaller pho place, they may only make one pot of broth that they use all day for all of their soups, and if it's a good smelling broth, they probably do it right, starting with beef bones, roasting them off, etc. We have one little pho place in Kent that does that, and they are far and away the best pho place I've found in the entire Seattle-Tacoma Metroplex. Unfortunately, that takes a lot of work and beef bones can be pretty expensive around here, so they devote their time and money to that one broth and don't do a vegetarian broth at all. I'm sure they'd make an excellent veggie broth, if they tried to, but it can be difficult to develop the depth of flavor that you want for pho from a veggie broth, sadly.
And yes, as strange as it is, some people do legitimately like tofu. Like my wife. Who is weird. Personally, I'd rather have steak and tendon.
And yes, as strange as it is, some people do legitimately like tofu. Like my wife. Who is weird. Personally, I'd rather have steak and tendon.
I understand that not every place is going to have a vegetarian pho option but it seems silly to have a tofu pho with beef broth. They should at least make a note on the menu or something. As far as the flavor goes I have gone to several places that have had a very tasty vegetarian pho but I decided to try a place closer to my house this time. And also for the record I do truly enjoy tofu and would eat it even if I wasn't a vegetarian.
My brother's buddy makes the BEST Seitan you will ever eat. Tastes just like chicken.
I love my brother's shows and all....but dear lord his shows can bring some of the whiniest pseudo-punks you will ever meet. Yeah the basement is cramped, its a fucking house shows you wusses! If you don't expect some version of discomfort than you have never been to a freaking house show.