skip to main |
skip to sidebar
Now i don't know if this has happened to anyone else, in times of economic depression why has it become increasingly difficult to give money in exchange for goods and services....
Let me begin by stating the following, I had begun my day like any other Sunday, slightly hungover from Saturday night, searching for food to squash the demon in my head causing a nauseating pounding like a jackhammer on the sidewalk. My roommate was up and around the house getting ready for work, at this time he was working 2-10 Sunday through Thursday. He apparently had killed his iPhone while on a friend's boat the day before. The phone was no longer charging, and this man is INCAPABLE of existing without his iPhone. He woke up first thing in the morning and had gone to Ft. Lauderdale to go to an Apple store with an "appointment." They inform him its water damage and he would need to pay $200 to get a new iPhone, using his warranty, and the $200 is a Co-Payment, so to speak. However, he's informed there are no phones in that store. He returns home and tells me what's going on. I said if you can find a store that has a phone, I will go by and pick it up for him. We find out through AT&T that the Dadeland Apple Store has an avilable 3Gs. My roommate leaves for work, gives me the money and I begin my trek through Customer Service Hell!
Upon arriving in the Apple Store, I laid eyes upon one of the best examples of Capitalist Carnage, EVER! The store on a Sunday at 1 PM in the middle of September, looked like something you'd see during the Holiday Season. Kids running around screaming, parents making zero effort to control them, and the store security guy looking at every woman, regardless of age, as if they were cuts of beef. The last point not withstanding, i knew this was going to be one hell of an experience. I walked up to the "Genius Bar" and said, "Sorry to bother you, I am here to pick up an iPhone." Mind you, I had the paperwork from the other store that said all i needed to do was give money and i receive an iPhone. The guy behind the counter says, "oh! That's Great!, go see our Concierge and Check-In." When the fuck did this become a hotel? Secondly, don't i need to grease the concierge to get good seats at the opera or symphony, what the fuck does he have to do with iPhones....
I replied, "Uhmmmm, where do i find this "concierge" he laughs and says, turn around, its the girl with the earpiece standing in front of the big screen apple. I turn around and it occurs to me that all the employees have ear pieces and mics as if they were special forces in the military. "Wonderful" was my reply, glad to see that Apple planned on invading the Mall just in time for X-Mas.
I walk up to the concierge, and i say "Hi i am here to pick up an iPhone." She replies "Okay lets check you in, what time was your appointment." First off i didn't have an appointment, because both apple support on the phone and AT&T informed us, that all we had to do was walk in and pick a phone up. "I dont have an appointment, I was instructed to-" Before i could complete that sentence, "I'm sorry without an appointment i can't give you and iPhone" I was trying to keep myself under control. This 17 year old overweight reject from urban outfitters was already starting to bother me. "I said okay let me see if I can explain this, I am -" Boom cut off again... "Sorry, sir, without an appointment i cannot sell you an iPhone." at this point I'm pissed, I replied curtly, "Do me a favor, let me finish my sentence before you cut me off. I am here because this phone in my hand," i held up my hand, "died, and i was instructed to come here and pick up a replacement phone for $200. I have the money and I just want the phone." She looked at me like i just told her that if you divide by zero, the answer is ostrich. She started stammering, trying to figure out a away to nicely tell me to leave, so i say "Do me a favor, and let me speak with a manager." At this point she sighed and said "Wait here." My only thought was, what happened to the word "Please."
The manager arrives, and has already started his dissertation on policy and procedures concerning iPhone purchases. I held my hand up, "I came here at the instruction of your company and AT&T, now if you don't want to take my money for something that I WANT TO BUY, then fine, i'll leave and never buy another Apple product and talk shit to corporate about how this store sucks. Or you can hear me out and tell me if I am wrong." The manager said "Go ahead" So i begin calmly, "Okay, i have this iPhone that is not charging and wont turn on, i went to the only Apple store in the tri-county area that had an appointment, they informed me i could BUY A PHONE(now in this free market economy, we call that business), they told me because the water damage to the phone i was not eligible for a replacement, that i had to pay $200 for the new phone. I agreed. They then informed me they didn't have any new phones and that this paper in my hand here would entitle me to an Apple 3Gs at any Apple store NATIONWIDE. So can you please for the love of everything holy, please explain why you and your employees are making it hard for me to give you my money." The manager said, "well sir the phones we have in stock are for the people who have appointments." i said "That's fine and dandy, but AT&T knows you have 2 extra's based on your appointment schedule of being booked solid, so someone is lying" The manager at this point looked like i spit in his over-gelled hair, "How do they know what we have?" I said, "Looks like someone allowed them into your inventory system so they can send people over here in an effort to help apple sell more iPhones. I think that's sound business practice considering their exclusivity contract with apple." So the manager walks over to the concierge and says, "Add him to the stand-by list to see a tech" After 30 more minutes, my name was finally called, i handed over the old phone, the paperwork and sat down, they guy was like, how'd this happen, i said i was on a boat yesterday while it was raining, i didnt think any water got in it but whatever, he's like, "Okay, i'm going to start activating it, go over and pay for it, so that way when you are done, i'm done and you can get out of here." WOW there is a smart man, they actually hired someone smart. Hurray for apple, but alas i was not free from the clutches of stupidity just yet. I am standing in line, and when i reach the cashier, she says can i have your invoice, i said sure here you go, she asks where is the phone, i said "the technician named, Danny, the smart one, is activating it while i pay for it." She then says, oh no i Can't let you pay until you've received the phone." I then threw my hands up in disgust and said "Can you go talk to him please, he's the only smart person in the place!" Retardo walked over to the tech and he was like Yes, let him pay so i'm done and he's done and he can go home."
You would think that at this point its over right.... WRONG! Retardo goes to talk to the manager from earlier to make sure its okay to let me give her money.... SOMEHOW THIS ISNT MAKING MUCH SENSE!!! but after another 10 mins i finally was able to get the phone and give them money for said purchase. Why was this excercise so fucking difficult....
Well I have a couple different topics that I am working on for future blogs, and those require some serious thought, so as a result I've decided to give you a list of things to think about, because they rattle around in my head all day long. I call it
1. I'd be the first to admit that I am firm in my stance on issues in politics, but I also allow people to speak their opinion. Asshats that just start screaming and tuning you out when you are bringing up points/ideas, make me want to punch infants... stop being so gosh-darn closed off you Turd!
2. I thought about this the other day when talking to a single friend... When I was younger, I got a lot of my more "unsportsmanlike" moments out of my system, the excitement of cheating on a girlfriend, the debaucherous nature of a fraternity guy, binge drinking, etc. The guys that don't do it when they are younger, obviously never got it out of their systems, so they are doing it later in life. That's why these guys that were picked on in high school and college, you know the type, cops, firefighters, state troopers etc, now that they have some semblance of power, are doing it to wives and as a result, giving us normal guys, a bad rap. Honestly I wish I could convey how frustrating it is for a nice guy to have to swim upstream against all this negative publicity these guys give us, its like trying to train a lion with a pellet gun, just completely ineffective.
3. Uninformed sports fans that don't know a touchdown from a home run. I can understand being a homer fan, shit this town is crawling with them.... But some people that just cheer for the team and cant even name like 3 people on the fucking team... Okay so you can tell me who they played last week, can you tell me what their record was last year, hell, even this year? There is nothing more frustrating than hearing women scream, "Throw a home run Todd" when the quarterback's name is Chad.... Seriously go jump out of a chopper from 3500 feet without a parachute. On this same note, the cocksucker sports-fan. The guy who knows about sports, knows that healthy rivalries lead to great games, yet is the asshole that says, "I Hope someone kills (insert opposing player's name here), so his career is over!" Like okay I'm a Jets fan and by nature we're supposed to be assholes, but I was a former coach, and as much as I hate losing, I have to accept the loss as either they were better or we fucked up... Just because the Dolphins beat us twice this year doesn't mean I want the entire team charter on its way to Jacksonville to crash into Lake Okeechobee. I admit, I do have one person I despise with a fervor reserved for the 9th ring of hell, but its not a player, its a coach, more importantly Bill Bellichek... But seriously, these fans bug the shit out of me, like they only root for their team, and are complete cunts about any success their opponents/not-their-team may have. Enjoy sports for what they are, COMPETITION. I understand being a die-hard fan, but show some fucking respect to the other teams trying their hardest just as your team is. Basically, these sports fans need a humbling, preferably by one of players they hate so much... wouldn't you like to see Brian Urlacher unload on a 165 lb douche who wished him dead....
4. Bosses that suck... like seriously, do you need to check what I am doing every 20 min? If I'm one of the best employees you've ever had according to what you've said, fuck off and and don't double check all of my work. Go crash into an AIDS tree or something.
5. I hate it when you get a bag of chips and I'm excited to open it and when I do, its three-quarters air in the bag. Fuck!!! its such a let down....
6. It's December.... Can someone tell the weather that!!!!! we've been experiencing record highs for the past week, while the rest of the fucking country is freezing its butts off....
That's all for now. I expect that this will be the regular Thursday blog, just the snippets of a life spent fighting stupidity... with rage....
From the Director of "Strange Days" and "Point Break" comes The 2008 hit action-thriller-drama, "The Hurt Locker." "Iraq. Forced to play a dangerous game of cat-and-mouse in the chaos of war, an elite Army bomb squad unit must come together in a city where everyone is a potential enemy and every object could be a deadly bomb."
I went into the movie expecting a war movie. That's not what i got, but i was not disappointed, and definitely pleasantly surprised. The style of the movie made you feel like you were right in the middle of the whole movie, at times, feeling just as lost and just as scared as the soldiers in the situation.
Jeremy Renner as Staff Sergeant William James was a fine portrayal of how war can get to someone. He definitely surprised me with his acting ability, having done bits and pieces here and there in other movies, and finally showing he could act in "The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford" However, his versatility was still in doubt in my eyes. This proved to me, he's got at least 3 more great performances before Hollywood takes him seriously, and that's a damn shame!
Cinematography was top notch, the sound editing was great, and the score added to the drama perfectly. The only thing that i would have worked on is the pacing of the film, a bit slow at times, and other times a bit too fast... other than that, I have no complaints about this movie.
Ralph Fiennes, Guy Pierce, and Evangaline Lilly all are in the movie in small roles, and they add in their own way to this story. I can honestly say that this movies' portrayal of the the War in Iraq is so gritty and edgy, that Kathryn Bigelow, Director, can boast she just directed the "Platoon" of this Generation.
Judgement: 
So since the last time I wrote, a few things have happened and the results of which is me writing this. Let's get mooooving... shall we?
A week after my previous blog, I met someone, we started dating and i totally fell in love with this person in no time. We could finish each others sentences, we spoke in meaningful and intelligent conversation and we both cared for each other deeply. Obviously not enough because she did break up with me not too long ago, One of the main reasons I'm back....
The more I travel this town called, Miami, Florida, the commonly referred to "305" by its douchidents, the more i realize our future is rather dim.... I walked into Doral Ale House this past Tuesday, in an effort to get off the grid. None of my close friends travel into this Coven of Doucheness willingly, so the exercise had merit, as far as getting off the grid, at least. I managed to grab a seat at the bar, when it occurred to me i was older than about 60% of the patrons.... by at least 8 years!
I was sitting there, looking around and realizing, "Do these people even think about what they are doing before going out???" About 90% of all the women, under the age of approximately 24, were dressed to the 9's! They are aware that its a Tuesday? And it's a sports bar right? That not withstanding, i began looking at the male-douches that were roaming the quiet countryside of a Tuesday Ladies Night at Doral Ale House.... This did not make me feel any more confident on our future.... Now i know, without a shadow of a doubt, that i am by no means the best looking guy; however, i have to question the thought process of these guys. That having been said, do men(and i use the term loosely) actually think that wearing a white v-neck t-shirt and a pair of baggie jean shorts with flip flops makes them look good? I can understand if a few were in this garb of douchness, but it was a common happenstance, as if they all received a memo and decided to follow the dress code to a "T". I rarely leave my house in anything but jeans, only because i like to look good for myself, i feel like a bum if i go out and am not in at least a Polo shirt. People can call me vain for that, but the reality is i don't give a shit if me making sure i am at least presentable qualifies me as vain.
I think what really irked me about this whole situation was that the women there were actually paying attention to the members of this Coven. What was worse, they were drawn to it... Like a moth to a lamp... I sat there for the duration of 3 or 4 beers quietly observing, as i normally do when i am trying to understand human nature, and honestly i felt like my brain kept getting Blue Screens of Death while trying to do the computations!
I ended up leaving early around 1030 and all that was going through my head is how screwed up this town will be in 4 years when these leaders of the axis of ineptitude try running the town, most likely into the ground.
Released to the theaters in April, Dito Montiel gives us his second attempt at directing. "In New York City, a young counterfeiter is introduced to the world of underground street fighting by a seasoned scam artist, who becomes his manager on the bare-knuckling brawling circuit." Let me begin by saying one thing about this movie... "Don't!"
Maybe I went into the movie expecting a bit better story, maybe a better plot, or maybe just better fight scenes. The fights were filmed in the latest style of being so close to the action you can't really tell whats happening, let alone who's hitting who.... until the final fight scene, in which case, they zoomed out and we saw a semblance of more realistic action.
I think part of my problem was that I went in thinking it would be more MMA style fighting and not so much bare knuckle brawler type fighting. I was so impressed with how Jeff Wadlow had turned "Never Back Down" into this generation's "Karate Kid," I went in thinking maybe they can do this one with the same delivery and yet still make it "edgy." Boy was I wrong, I basically saw this generations "Lionheart," without the cheese of Van Damme. or the spectacular fighting. This was more like two 10th graders in the gym locker room between classes.
Let me talk about Dito Montiel for a bit here. The man tried hard to give the regular feeling of a "heart felt" story. Having given Channing Tatum's character a similar conflict with his father like that of the Sean Faris' character in Never Back Down, i was instantly turned off by this theme of "angry at my father"... Maybe being writer and director of the film was too much for Dito. I do believe that Dito did a great job of casting Luis Guzman as Martinez. He plays smarmy underworld criminal very well, and he gives you that flamboyance and panache you only get from Male Latin Actors.
The main female character, Zulay Velez, portrayed by Zulay Henao, was one bright spot in the movie...
And at first I couldn't figure out why they named the character after her... Till i saw the scene where they turned her into the stereotypical NY Puerto Rican Girl, living with "Abuela," being a single mom and, of course, washing her hair in the sink..... WOW... really? To make it worse they gave her the big hoop earrings with her name across the hoop... I think in order to save money on props they asked her to bring her real ones, and they renamed the character after her. She was smoking hot, and possibly the most believable of all the actors in their roles.
Channing Tatum as Shawn MacArthur was.... horrid. He's a terrible actor, completely incapable of carrying a movie. Now i know why they brought back Dennis Quaid for more scenes in GI Joe in order to put him more towards leading man. Channing Tatum couldn't lead a wet dream staring him. He may look good with his shirt off to the ladies, but seriously he was so systematic in his acting it was hard to believe he was anything more that a BTWDG. Big Tall White Dumb Guy. Granted his character was a wrestler and that helped his believability, but his range of emotions was never believable to me. The one thing I've always looked for in actors is whether they make their character have a weakness, something that almost anyone can relate to. Tatum had nothing of that, Terrence Howard did, but his role wasn't really necessary after he introduced him into the fighting circuit. they could have had him text him all the info and that was that. There was no need for him to be in the movie, except to parallel Lionheart a bit further.
Overall it was a total non-thinking movie. Fights, "underworld bare-knuckle fist fighting", and a hot chick. On a scale of 4 stars i'm giving it 1/2 a star as i should have watched whales humping for an hour and 45 minutes as opposed to this garbage.
Judgement:
