Occasional Jots and Tittles

I hate being snarky. OK, I obviously don’t completely hate it, since I do it often enough, but I don’t really like myself as much when I am. Still, every once in a while I have to vent and I guess it’s better to do it here than at the object of my, well, snarkiness.

One of the good things about the Internet and all the profusion of socializing (a broadly applicable term) sites is that it enables people who can be shy in public to open up a bit and talk with strangers, something they might never do in person. Still, online or off, I think certain customs should be observed. Most sites allow a user to bookmark certain profiles of people you find hot interesting, which is fine. Many sites also allow you to tag “friends”, which is a reciprocal action; if I tag you as a friend, and you accept that tag, then each of us is listed as the other’s friend. If it’s not accepted, then… it doesn’t show on either profile.

So I keep the lists separately. The people on my “friends” list are people I’m friends with – usually offline, though for long-term online friendships I’ve certainly made exceptions. My bookmark/hot list, on sites that allow such, are separate. As they should be. And I make it clear in my profiles, on sites with “friend” type lists, that if you don’t know me already, and you’ve never even said hello online, and I get a “friend” request from you… it’s likely to be ignored or returned with a “Who the hell are you?” note. And yet I get them, over and over. Obviously, it’s people who’ve looked at part of my profile (my pictures? surely not) and didn’t bother to read most of it.

I swear, the next one that does that, I’m going to go off on.

Still, it pales in comparison to the cheekiness I had yesterday. One such “social” site allows you to sign a member’s “guestbook” with one of several pre-selected comments (I like you, you’re hot, you’re handsome, etc.). It’s a nice way to halfway introduce yourself to someone, and if the person you tag wishes, he can either sign your guestbook in return, or initiate a real conversation (or just say thank you). This one said (first words, I swear): “I’m a competitive bodybuilder, looking for sponsors. Interested?”

Leaving aside the vaguely whore-like aspects of asking people who think you’re hot to pay you money, since when did the expense of his hobbies become my concern? I know taking all those steriods supplements gets expensive, but then, whose hobbies don’t? I’m a birder; a good pair of Swarovski binoculars would set me back about $1,700. A nice Leica Televid spotting scope is another $4,000. A decent, lightweight but solid tripod and head? Add in $600 or so. And like Mr. Muscleboy, birding involves travel, so add in all those travel expenses too.

I don’t go around asking for contributions to the optics fund, and honestly I’m appalled at the gall he had in asking… but then, I guess, there are people with gall out there and some of them get what they’re looking for. I guess that’s what separates the whores from the rest of us.

Remember the scam that record clubs used to be?

As I recall, several of the major labels had them, but over the years they got consolidated into separate entities serving all the labels. They’d offer you some great deal–10 albums for $4.99, or something like that–as long as you agreed to buy, say, two more albums at regular prices during the next year. The “regular price” was always a few dollars more than you could get the album anywhere else, and you had to pay shipping and handling, but… you’d still come out ahead if you got your music, bought your requirements, and got out.

The gimmick was the monthly mailing – you’d get this nice slick catalog each month with hundreds of records listed, from all sorts of music types – and usually, most of them were marked down from the “regular” price. So while you were looking for your “regular price” albums, you’d see a lot more you wanted… and since the mark-downed ones didn’t count for your requirements, you figured you’d get an extra here or there. And in that monthly mailing was a card – listing the “Selection of the Month” – some album you almost certainly didn’t want, but which the company was going to mail you, automatically (and charge you full price for, plus shipping) unless you mailed the card back to them by a certain date.

Naturally, you’d forget to mail the card eventually. You might go two, three, six months sending it in as soon as it came in, but eventually, it would slip past you. Or you’d mail it six days before it was due, and the company would claim they didn’t get it on time, so the junk album was sent. And the bill.

Consumers wised up, and record clubs (and their later derivatives, CD clubs, VHS clubs, and DVD clubs) were in rapid decline until the Internet revived them. Suddenly, they didn’t have to print a new catalog every month – major savings. The “card” could be sent by email, and responded to via the web – again, major savings. And by promising you that you could reply on the spot, the fear of forgetting to send in the card eased. And because credit and debit cards are much more common now, people are more comfortable paying for their initial purchases that way – so the club can bill your card immediately for shipments.

And if you shop wisely, it’s possible to get some really decent deals. Last year, I got all five seasons of Babylon 5, plus all of the TV movies, for less than $200, including shipping from Columbia House. And being anal-retentive, the first thing I do each month when I get the email about the Director’s Selection is to decline it. Then, if I see something I want, either the Director’s Selection or its alternates, I buy it.

Until this past month, when Columbia House insisted I didn’t decline their selection (Law and Order SVU, Season 8), and shipped it to me. Their rules are clear: If you didn’t order something, you can call and ask for a return label, prepaid, to ship it back. (Technically, since you didn’t order it, you can keep it free, but they have your card number, so they’ve already charged you for it, and good luck getting your money back if you don’t return the item.) But I don’t keep confirmation emails for weeks on end, so of course I had deleted the confirmation that I declined the order. If you don’t open the box, you can write “Refused-Return to Shipper” and get the entire thing back, too – but I had to open the outer package to find out what it was and confirm I hadn’t ordered it. So I could only return it – and if you’re just returning something, you have to pay return shipping and when they get the product, they only return your purchase price, not the original shipping and handling ($7.99 in this case).

I emailed Customer Service and asked if they would be willing to a deal: I would pay to return the DVD’s I didn’t order, if they would agree to credit me the original shipping along with my purchase price. It seemed fair, since I knew I’d declined the order. I didn’t necessarily expect them to go along, but I figured it was worth a try. I even mentioned that there were several other TV series sets I was interested in buying.

So, email response comes back, with nothing but cut-and-paste responses from the program rules. They tell me I can return it unopened at their expense – but of course, I’d already told them I opened the box to find out what it was. They then helpfully told me they would be glad to take my order for the additional series sets I wanted via their website.

So, I wrote back, including the previous correspondence, and noting that they had not specifically addressed my question about splitting the shipping costs. I stressed that I understood the program rules, and that I was asking for an exception, given the circumstances.

Response #2 comes in: more cut-and-paste from the rules, telling me I can return the DVD’s at my own expense, and that when they arrive at Columbia House, “appropriate credit” will be issued to my bank card. Which translates to, I’m sure, once we have the merchandise back, then we’ll leave you stuck with both shipping charges. I don’t even mind that as much as I mind the fact that these goobers will simply NOT say “Yes” or “No” to the simple question – will you refund the original shipping fees if I return this? I could cope with “Sorry, we have to be firm and apply policies uniformly”. I could even handle “Sorry, but you screwed up, and it’s not our problem.” It’s the evasive, non-answer answers that have driven me up the wall.

So I’m returning the disks, cancelling the account, and spending the $500 or so on DVD’s that I would have spent there at Barnes and Noble. or Amazon. Hell, even at Wal-mart. Life is too short to deal with people who refuse to answer questions.

We haven’t eaten out in a long while, for a number of reasons – chief among them that Jonathan has mostly wanted to hibernate at home lately. But he felt more outgoing this evening so we went out to eat. Since I’ve eaten out on my own a bit lately or with friends, I let him pick, so we ended up at Macaroni Grill – which, by all rights, shouldn’t be a bad compromise between my preference for local eateries with distinctive cuisine and his hankering for predictability.

But this is Macaroni Grill we’re talking about, and it’s often a comedy of errors to eat there. Tonight was no exception. We’re seated, our waiter writes his name upside down on the paper on the table, and takes our drink orders. He returns with the drinks and takes the meal orders – we each get a “Trio”, which includes a salad, a slightly smaller portion of one of several entrees, and a dessert.

We then watch as others are seated and their waiters (including, sometimes, ours) bring them the standard bread and olive oil. When our waiter returned to refill my drink, I asked about the bread. He surveyed the table and for a moment gave us that “OK, did you eat the plates as well as the bread?” look before realizing I meant we hadn’t gotten any yet. He apologized, took my glass, and said he’d be right back with it.

30 seconds later, he’s back with the bread, but no drink. Next pass by the table, Jonathan asked him about my drink. He looked at me, snapped his fingers, and went back to get it.

About five minutes later, he comes out with two steaming hot plates of food. What he put in front of me was clearly meant for Jonathan, so he swapped the plates, and left. After about three bites, Jonathan commented, “You know, this is the strangest tasting salad…” Yep, he’d forgotten the salads. And the plates looked suspiciously large. And mine, while tasty, was awfully spicy for the fettucine alfredo I’d ordered — and I’d never known that recipe to use sun-dried tomatoes. Not to mention that mine had big penne pasta in it instead of flat noodles.

We stopped the waiter again, and asked if there was an issue with the salads. He gets that familiar “oh shit” look on his face we’ve come to recognize, and we pointed out that we think our plates are probably the full entree size, not the “Trio” reduced size. He agreed. Then as I was pointing down at my plate, he said “And I think you have the wrong dish, that’s Penne Rusticana and not Fettucini Alfredo.”

By this point, we were almost laughing at him, because he was clearly flustered (he later mentioned he’d been working since early that morning and he was a little spacey). But the bigger dishes of food, as far as we were concerned, outweighed the lack of salads, and I was just as happy with what I got as what I’d ordered. So we told him to just leave it all, and we would be happy with it.

A few moments later, we overheard a waiter at another table nearby, who’d brought out four of five entrees for that group, tell the fifth person “Your Penne Rusticana should be out in just a moment. It takes a little longer to fix than the other dishes.” Nice cover, but bullshit, I’m sure that I got her dish when our waiter grabbed the wrong one.

Still, we got our desserts, and considering the entrees we did get should have cost more than the Trios we ordered, we came out considerably ahead. But as I tell people, you never know what your’e going to get when you order there.

Once, a group of eight of us went there for my birthday. The waiter brought out the food – seven entrees. He served them around, disappeared for about five minutes, and then came back to see “if we needed anything else.” I raised my hand, pointed at the empty table in front of me, and said “Yes, food.” That dreaded “oh shit” look came over him, he scurried to the computer, and realized he hadn’t put my order in. They hurriedly worked up mine, which was marginal being rushed, and then had the gall to charge full price for it.

This time, at least, our waiter was apologetic at every step, and I know what it’s like to work when you’re exhausted. And as I said, we came out ahead, with more food and less salad, plus (essentially) free desserts, so we gave him my usual full tip.

I try to assume good will on the part of everyone who contacts me online (well, except for the bots on gay.com and spam e-mail). But here’s a message I got tonight on Worldleathermen.com (first communication ever from this person):

HELLO YOU FUCKING SLAVE

TOTALLY DAMN GOOD FUCKING HOT PICS AND 

PROFILE AND YOU TOTALLY FUCKING LOOKED 

AND SOUND LIKE THE FUCKING LOW LIFE 

BOOTS==LEATHER AND RUBBER AND 

UNIFORMS SLAVEPIG I AM FUCKING LOOKING 

FOR HERE IN MY TOTALFULL 100% DUNGEON 

TO USED AND TORTURE AS I FUCKING SEE FIT

TOTAL 100% FULL HEAVY SADIST MASTER 

BUTCH

OK… I try not to be too hung up on language, although I’ve never in my life had occasion to use “fucking” six times in one message, and I’m not sure why he did either. Still, someone who writes this poorly should spend less time online and more time learning to spell and conjugate verbs. Not to mention develop his vocabulary so that he doesn’t think “totalfull” is a word. Jeez.
And given that I’m versatile, I try not to stress out when someone assumes I’m a bottom, or looking to bottom, even though my profile there does list me as 70% top.

But nowhere in there does it say I’m looking to be a slave to anyone, much less a “slavepig”, and if he thinks, from my relatively mild profile, that I’m what he’s looking for, then he’s a fucking moron. (And I managed to say it with only ONE “fucking” in the sentence.)

What drives this kind of person? Surely 98% of his messages must either be ignored or come back with “Hey, stupid, can’t you read?”. Are these people so unconcerned about what people think of them that they can continue to spew shit like this and not care about the results?