Calm This

Traffic calming measures, or so they call them here, are just fat speed bumps that are becoming more and more popular as the number of vehicles on the road grows. They’re placed anywhere that is affected by heavy a traffic flow in residential areas mostly, yet they seem to have become more of a game to the motorists in which they are intended.

These rather minor inconveniences are set in place to slow the vehicles in those designated areas for the safety of other motorists, pedestrians alike and children playing even.  Go figure. Like the yellow sign with the kid chasing a ball into the street wasn’t enough. Where the hell was that kids parents anyway? And who the hell was he to merit his own sign? You would think that if it was a horrific story it would be one that our parents told us in order to scare us away from chasing balls into the street and have that sign become an omen. “Oh my God, don’t be like (let’s call him Jimmy Stark for no apparent reason) that Jimmy Stark boy. He was horribly crippled and maimed (things were never fatal then) when he was hit by three cars at the same time when he ran out into the street chasing after a ball his dog threw out there for him. The dog was ok though”.

All of these types of stories sounded like the base classic that everyone has heard from their parents.  At least anyone within a reasonable proximity of my age has heard more than just a few times. It goes something like this. 

“When I was your age we walked ten miles to school in the morning and ten miles back home again, up hill both ways, in a snow storm without a hat, mittens, or winter boots. We just added extra cardboard to our sneakers”. 

I don’t think I’m far off for anybody here. Feel free to add anything I may have missed.

I seem to have drifted a wee bit. Sorry. Let’s regroup shall we?

There are plenty of these fat speed bumps in my neighbourhood and for the most part they do their intended job rather well. The comical part of this is the people that drive over them at the normal speed limit or faster, without slowing, seem to be completely surprised with this all too obvious yet unexpected outcome. I can see it in their wide eyed expression as they drive past.

One of these so called traffic calming measures is not far from where we live at a corner intersection. Just down the road and around the corner, literally. Coming up to the stop sign you must either turn left or right, there is no straight through traffic. The cars coming from the left and right have the right of way and no stop sign. While waiting at the stop waiting to turn you can see the bump in the road not 50 feet from you on the left. I hope this gives you the mental image I’m going for here.

Normally cars would slow down for the bump giving you plenty of time to make the right turn into traffic without disruption to the flow. But every once in a while you will come across an individual who doesn’t want you to pull out in front of them, so instead of slowing down, they actually speed up a little to ensure their rightful place in flow and “BAM”, their car is launched over the speed bump with enough force to make you almost feel the impact from within your own vehicle. The look of surprised terror on their face always makes me shake my head and grin, thinking, that poor car. What other unsuspecting abuses have you been put through in the course of you soon to be short existence?

Is it just me or do people fuck with you more in traffic these days? They seem to here.

Entry Level

So in my web surfing one day I happened upon a literary website that has an annual contest for writers to submit very short written entries. By short I mean that the suggested limit is 50 words or less. Wow. Not much you can say in that short of wordage (is wordage a word?). Right up my alley I think. Even when I read the criteria it seems to be for me.

Every year they field thousands of submissions based only on the standard rules that have been applied since 1983 if my research is correct. There are minimal rules.

To quote from the website:

The Bulwer-Lytton fiction contest challenges entrants to compose the opening sentence to the worst possible novels.

Each entry must consist of a single sentence but you may submit as many entries as you wish.

A single sentence? Challenge accepted. Holy crap. Right up my alley right? My only issue is the whole 50 words thing. Pffffft. But I digress. So going over the 50 word rule here is my entry that I feel could not have happened with only 50 words. And yes, I submitted it anyway. I think this works.

*

Looking up from the bottom of the stairs it would appear that Petunia, somehow finding a box big enough for her svelte 425 pounds, had been deflected, no, careened,  back and forth off of every rail and stanchion that was available on the way down, left a plethora of cardboard shrapnel on pretty much every stair possible, while doing her best impression of a jelly filled spandex avalanche, proudly announced megaphone like, with a single gulp of air as she presented herself splayed at the bottom almost breathless and totally exhilarated, “Oh my god, holy crap that was loud, haven’t done that in years, is everybody else ok?”

*

Please comment below on…well…your opinion. Thanks.

I Got Gas

It’s always exciting when you see a drop in the price of gas when you need to fill up. Especially when you’re actually due to fill up. The feeling comes close to winning something like a church raffle, or bingo. Not as extreme as winning a lottery but exciting all the same. Hoards of vehicles flock to the pumps to save what would appear to be mega bucks at the newest lower price per litre. And this euphoric feeling can continue as long as you don’t think about it too much. Or do the math.

Gas prices for no logical reason whatsoever, rise and fall without warning or definable reason, regardless of what the world market seems to dictate. If the price of a barrel of oil goes up today, why does the price of gas at the pumps go up as well that very same day? The gas that is here at the gas station is already the lower price gas right? It’s from a previous price at the very least being here prior to the unexplained ridiculous market elevation isn’t it? So why are we paying more for the same gas that was here yesterday before this unexplained increase?

Most of the time, and after a few days of this wonderful lowness they surprisingly increase the price by ten cents per litre overnight. This usually happens on a Thursday night just before the weekend rush. This is when it becomes a complete shock to the system. Even more so if you waited too long, like Friday morning to fill your tank. It’s a snooze you loose kind of situation that makes you want to smack yourself in the forehead like you should have had a V-8. Those who get it will laugh. Those who don’t get it…ask someone who’s laughing to explain the V-8 thing to you.

The thing that is curious to me is the people that will drive across town to fill up because they heard that there is a gas station with the cheapest gas in town over yonder. I don’t get it. How much cheaper is it than the gas station that is closer to you? It would have to be substantial.

In a world that seems to aspire to nothing further than average yet expects astronomical results, let me explain this within the laws of average. Now don’t get all bent out of shape here and start an argument saying “my car gets better millage than that”, or, “my tank takes more (or less) gas than that…gawd. My averages are not based on any make or model in particular. My numbers are for example purposes only. K?

You drive an average car with average gas mileage give or take right? Your average gas tank holds 50 litres of gas. Your average gas mileage is 15 litres per 100 kilometres. Yes it’s high but I drive a pick up truck. Sue me. You need to fill your tank because it is empty. Not realistic that your tank will be completely empty I know, but for this scenario let’s just say it is. It’s just easier to explain this way. So let’s do a little math shall we?

The gas across town is 2 cents a litre cheaper and is 25 kilometres away. Depending on what you paid for the gas already in your car, this little trip will burn 3.75 litres of gas at an average cost of $4.00.

This is the part that gets interesting kids so listen up. The cheaper gas you are bound and determined to purchase works out like this. For the 50 litres of gas you need at a savings of 2 cents per litre, you are saving a grand total of $1.00 on the entire tank. Woohoo! If you take into account your fuel economy and the mileage involved, your trip across town just cost you $3.00 to give yourself the illusion of purchasing cheaper gas. That’s correct. It cost you that $3.00 just to drive across town to get to the cheap gas. But wait. Now you have to drive back across town to get home. So how much did you really pay? Or save for that matter?

I don’t get it.

New Tools

Buying new tools is a thrilling experience for most men. The excitement builds before I even leave the house. Buying new tools on sale is almost orgasmic. This is the best thing ever. And yes ladies, it happens to us with every tool purchase. One piece of very important advice is to always check out the latest store flyers. I refer you to a previous blog entry regarding finding something on sale after the fact. Not fun.

The thrill of walking through the tool section of my favourite hardware type of store brings an inner feeling that can only be described as a warm glow. Yes really. Walking up and down the various aisles of hand tools, power tools, tool boxes, accessories and the ever popular “clearance” section is an excitement all in itself. I just like to see if there is anything new, different or even an in store special not listed in the flyer. Those are the best finds.

I don’t go directly to the item that I came here for, oh no. I take my time making my way around, while savouring the entire atmosphere of this section of the store. It even smells different over here. I almost always find something else that I didn’t know that I needed until I saw it. It’s mood dependant really. I can’t seem to leave the store with only what I came for. There is a support group for this type of behaviour. Usually a small group of similarly affected individuals gather together on weekends at a well publicized location where they discuss such tools and build, assemble, repair and create stuff with them. There may also be beer involved. Or so I’ve heard.

While driving home with my purchase safely beside me I repeatedly glance at the box and envision the multitude of things I can accomplish with this newly found equipment, when it hits me. That table we acquired the other day needs to be assembled properly. Let’s call that job number one.

Arriving home I take my new cordless necessities from the packaging and begin the narration to my wife about all of its advanced features and how this is going to make ease of all the little jobs, not just around the house but everywhere. She tends to roll her eyes when I drift into tool speak.

Now pumped full of ambition I spy the table, clear the needed space around it, gather the bolts, load the appropriate bits into the driver, assemble the pieces loosely and begin the power tool assembly. This part takes little more than about twenty seconds to complete. Now we stand back and admire the job well done. I do anyway.

The tool rush now slowly drains from me because I now realize that my new tool playtime has ended way too soon. I just stand there pulling the trigger repeatedly while looking around the room.

What else can I fix?

Alarming

The fire alarms in apartment buildings seem to go off more often than anywhere else in the entire world. At least it is where I live. Whether it’s the testing of the system (which happens monthly), glitches in the system, power surges and outages or just plain old drunken idiots pulling the alarm at 3 a.m. because they think it’s funny. This alarm usually happens late in the evening or early morning on a weekday and not the weekend. Which would be more expected as this is when these chuckleheads imbibe mass quantities and tend to inconvenience people.

Just in case any of these drunken idiots are capable of reading anything beyond text message spelling, it’s really not funny, k? U r not being smrt. All been dun b4.

The even more interesting thing about this is how the people that live in the building react when it happens so often. By often I mean at least every couple of weeks as well as the monthly test of the system. You can quickly see who is new to the building by how they promptly and orderly they evacuate the premises during one of these events.

Tenants gather around outside and inspect the area for evidence from the safe distance of the curb. This imaginary safe distance is just at the end of the entrance walkway on the sidewalk in front of the building. This apparent flame free zone is a full twenty feet away from the building. Ain’t no way the sparks will fly that far right? We’re good here, we can see perfect.

The speculation begins when someone is overheard saying that they had smelled smoke in the hallway on their way out of the building. Certainly couldn’t have been the cigarette in your hand as you parade though a no smoking area. What the hell does it matter now right? The building might be on fire so what’s one cigarette now anyway. Who cares, gawd.

Another tenant can be heard on their cell phone to friends, apparently still inside their apartment, attempting to convince them that there really is a fire this time. “I swear it’s, like, real this time. Like, really. We’re all, like, out here waiting for you guys”.

Excitement builds as the fire trucks arrive with howling sirens and lights flaring. Now we get to see some action. It must be real this time, the trucks showed up and everything. Seeing them enter the building with no apparent urgency brings you back to reality and a slight disappointment wafts over the crowd. This disappointment is short lived and becomes frustration when everyone realizes that we are all wide awake in the middle of the night for no good reason. We didn’t even get to see a fire either. What a jip.

The firemen gather at the alarm panel in the lobby and seem to discuss strategy. At this point you would think that they would at least turn the alarm off if for nothing else but to hear each other or anything broadcasted over their radios.

Right when you start to wonder why they’re not doing anything, a couple of them are off to do a quick walk through the building. They must have drawn the short straws while in the huddle. Within a few minutes they all gather around the alarm panel again and finally reset the system. The buzzing of the alarm comes to a halt leaving a ringing in your ears.

The all clear is now given and we all head back into the building listening to the various comments of the ever vocal. “I really did smell smoke you know”.

Of course you did. Don’t forget to put out your cigarette.

More Flies with Honey

Looking through some old emails from some months ago I came across one that had been completely forgotten about. I read through it thoroughly and had to chuckle as it reminded me of the situation as to why it was written in the first place.

          It was about a year ago, and not too long after finishing my last rounds of treatment at the Cancer center when my taste buds first began showing minimal signs of functioning again so I decided to attempt a morning cup of coffee. The first one in a considerable amount of time I might add, and rather anticipated. This is when our coffee machine took a turn for the worse and I took it upon myself to craft a well worded letter to the manufacturer asking for their assistance. Without the usual finger wagging.

          Fielding customer complaints for a living must be one of the most thankless jobs on the planet. Having a constant barrage of blame and rage expelled upon you both hourly and day after day must take a toll on a person’s perception of the general public. I can only assume that it takes a rather strong person to not allow that amount of negativity into their own personal space.

          With that in mind I generated my letter with a touch of levity as to, at the very least, not be one of those irate dissatisfied customers, but also give them a break from it all and possibly make them smile a little.

          Here is the email as I sent it. Ok so I changed the name of the town for this blog entry. Sue me.

Keurig B70 Brewing System with a bad attitude

Dear Sir or Madam,

A little more than a year ago I purchased a Keurig® B70 Platinum Brewing System from Costco here in Happyville, Canada. The price seems to have dropped considerably from what I had paid at the time which was around $159.00 if I remember correctly. But that in itself is not the main issue of my concern but troubling all the same.

We had enjoyed using your coffee machine for the many conveniences and reasons we had purchased it in the first place. Unfortunately that was short lived.

Not long after, I was diagnosed with cancer in my neck and throat. I will not go into great detail regarding this but needless to say that the machine went unused for some time due to my inability to swallow properly as well as other throat sensitivities. 

About a month ago we decided to turn on the coffee machine and brew what was to be my first cup of morning goodness in about 7 months.

Well, the machine performed perfectly as expected for the first week and then began a rapid nose dive into an unstoppable spiral of demise. I must state that we would brew anywhere from 2 to 6 cups of coffee per day.

Over the course of that week it would brew slower each time to the point of taking longer than 3 minutes to complete a cycle. By the end of the week the "Descale" display was suddenly present. Following the "Keurig Brewer De-scaling Instructions" directions from your website, the machine was, or so we thought, systematically descaled to the satisfaction of all concerned. This proved to be untrue.

The machine in question began to perform worse than previous. It would only brew half of a cup and take a considerable amount of time doing so. I should also mention that the brewing cycle was considerably louder than before as if the machine was begrudgingly doing the task at hand. We then repeated the descale process as suggested in the instructions to no avail. 

Presently our machine is no longer cooperating and refuses to dispense anything resembling a drinkable cup of coffee.

Returning it to Costco appears to be out of the question as we no longer have the original packaging and the receipt seems to have been misplaced. Probably was in the box we no longer have.

Is there anything you may be able to help with in this situation?

Thank you in advance,

          By the afternoon on that very same day I received a phone call from a customer serviced agent with regards to this email. She actually said she “was calling to discuss the coffee machine with a bad attitude”.

I was informed that she and a few of her coworkers got a bit of a chuckle from my submission and had to respond to it right away. I thanked her and also expressed my delight and surprise for replying so swiftly. It’s rather unusual to get such a quick response over a negative situation.

          This now led to images of my email being forwarded around as giggles are heard intermittently from various cubicles within the office space. Insert your own visual here.

          After a short comment and introduction session she handled my issue with the courtesy, respect and professionalism that anyone would welcome. Within a matter of minutes she not only had addressed the issue but also in a knowledgeable fashion explained possible causes and future solutions to these and similar issues. She then went beyond that and offered a replacement machine in exchange for the faulty one, postage prepaid no less.

To make a long story short, the replacement arrived in less than a week to our delight and surprise.

          I have to say that I was truly taken aback from the friendly and prompt service that I experienced through this. It makes me wonder if this transaction would have been handled any differently if I had written an irate complaint letter instead. I like to think it would have. You do catch more flies with honey.

Regardless, my hat is tipped to the Keurig customer service team for exemplary service. A job very well done people. Thank you.

           

Upon Reflection

First off I would like to apologize for taking so long to post another addition to this blog that now appears to have readership in nine countries.

Sorry Jason but I was wrong when I told you seven. These countries are Canada, USA, France, Russia, Netherlands, Ukraine, Japan (thanks Mel), Germany and now Denmark. Please promote and pass along what you like or dislike about this blog. And I thank you very much. I value all opinions and comments whether they are positive or negative. So keep them coming Bobby, or anyone else for that matter. Spread the word.

That said, I was sitting on the patio of a local restaurant with my beautiful wife and inspiration a couple of days ago. It was a restaurant that we had wanted to visit for some time and finally we were able to do so.

I say “able” for the reason that this particular visit was for my birthday this year. For us to do this last year on my birthday falls into the unable category. This is to say that we sort of passed over my birthday as a celebration. For those who do not know, at that time I was very recently out of my Cancer treatment and not capable of enjoying an afternoon like this, or any wonderful afternoon, let alone being present and participating in much of an outdoor function at all.

If you are unaware, you need to read earlier blog posts that let you know what some of us went through. I have not asked them if I could reference them regarding this but I call us “The original six”. But I digress.

While sitting on this patio watching cars and pedestrians pass by on a beautiful sunny day, observing the beauty of the downtown architecture, being close to the waterfront, in the company of a beautiful woman, sharing great conversation, and of course drinks, I could not help but reflect on where we were a year ago and drift off momentarily, or so much that my wife asked quite frankly “where are you?’. I guess I drifted a little further than I thought.

It was a combined realization that I could not do this last year, physically, mentally or any other “lly” for that matter. I know for a fact that I would not be here to be able to write this blog if it were not for her support and love. Had It not been for her I don’t know if I could have braved the road that was before me at that time. It was hell by the way and well worth it, if for nothing else but to be able to wake up and see her face every day for the rest of my life.

I am here, I am alive, and I can taste food again finally. Also, had I not gone through the hell that I did, and many more than five of my friends did, I would not be here to enjoy the privilege of sitting and enjoying this beautiful sunny day, eating a lobster wrap, crab dip with fresh made chips and tequila shrimp with the person that means the absolute most to me.

And that feeling is good.