Spazzmanda

I had fun on Halloween (but let’s face it, I always do.) Check out my photos at flickr- it is sort of a hodge-podge of the events that spanned over two days. On actual Halloween I tagged along with the boys to witness the debut of this:

Yes. That would be the tiniest storm trooper costume ever made. He was very cute. Er- I mean- scary. Storm troopers are BAD guys so he was fearsome. Yes. very, very intimidating. I was quivering in my Ziggy Stardust boots (I threw Ziggy together at the last minute because I didn’t want to wear my other costume yet and to see if I could.)

Here is my costume from Saturday- I was Jackie O. (My hat is a padded oatmeal box because that’s how I roll.) Mom helped me sew this last week.

There were many other good costumes this year. I saw two girls dressed as Richard Simmons (?) and my mother made a Cher costume.

Could you die? How funny is THAT?! Yes, my pop was Sonny complete with furry vest. I could go on and on about this, but I won’t. Being pressed for time and all.

Oh, so that brings me to the scary news. I’ve heard through the grapevine that my gym is closing. Wait! It gets worse! My gym is closing and merging with another gym nearby AND the teachers of the classes I love can’t teach at the new location because they don’t provide Les Mills classes. Which is a load of crap, but whatever.

Wait! If you can take it, it gets even worse. A certain unsavory individual that I have been fortunate enough not to run into (…yet) I believe is a member of the gym where mine is expected to “merge.” My biggest fear is that there will be much hair-pulling and potential blood shed if I am ever faced with a scenario where I would be confronted with her, particularly while adrenaline is pumping. I would like to think that I could rise above the situation -folks, it would be much more likely to end with an eye-narrowing contest- but the part of me that is still royally pissed (the part that believes I’d be fully justified in whooping some ass) would rather simply avoid the situation all together if at all possible.

I have no idea what sort of rights I’ve signed away or what this merging will ultimately mean to me, but I do know that the gym has been my sanctuary and I will not risk it being tainted by having to submit myself to the presence of… well… someone icky. Any creative ideas for getting out of a gym membership? I know they charge my credit card monthly and I can simply cancel the card and be done with it but I’d prefer to be released from my contract free and clear. I might have to go to the doctor and develop some sort of “condition.” I sure hate to lie but I may be without options here.

The good (from Craft):

“Thank you for your email.  I apologize that you have received a damaged issue.  I will have a replacement sent out to you.  It should arrive within 7-10 days.”

…and then the generic (from RCA):

“Thank you for your inquiry concerning the design and quality of your product.     Consumer satisfaction is very important to us and we continually strive to provide the best consumer electronics products available. We regret you are not pleased with your product. We invest substantial resources in market research to develop products that meet consumer needs and expectations.     We are continually finding ways to improve reliability, designs, product quality, and professional service.     Your comments are appreciated, and we thank you for taking your valuable time to contact us.”

Well, at least customer satisfaction is important to them and my comments are appreciated.

I’ll sleep well tonight knowing that. And I’m sure Mamama will rest assured that her money was well spent a year ago on that crappy t.v. because they’ve invested substantial resources to meet her consumer needs.

Oh, and Happy Halloween!

So, I didn’t take a full lunch break today (and let’s be honest I never do) in part to write some very well deserved nasty grams. Now I’m a firm believer in the rights of the consumer when being thwarted by big business, but I’m not much of a complainer, really I’m not. I don’t like to send things back in restaurants and I abhor people that complain seemingly for the purpose of getting something for free. (Although I did get a free month of internet service from Charter because of the power of the blog… but I digress.)

I believe it isn’t fair being mad at someone and not telling them why and I believe this to be equally true when dealing with giant corporate monsters too. You don’t get to have a beef if you aren’t willing on giving someone some opportunity to do the right thing, and honestly, if I were a business owner I would like to know if there were a complaint. I like to take care of the little guy. This time the little guy is my grandmother. I’ll let this nastygram speak for itself. Read the rest of this entry »

I got a STACK of self-help books and I’m not afraid to use them!

I took down some posts about cheating and whores- evil, bashing and cruel- that although I felt better at the time of posting- it was tacky, inappropriate and excessively hurtful. Not that he doesn’t deserve a world of hurt and punishment, it’s just I’m much better than that.

So. Still feel like crap. Work is harder than ever and I lack focus. I can’t eat. I can’t sleep. I can’t talk to my best friend without a river of bitterness welling out of me. I have awesome friends that bring fried chicken and Dr. Phil books (thanks Fox!)

She gave me some good therapy last night. About moving forward, finding myself again and deciding for myself what relationships are worth fighting for.

Am I capable of forgiveness?

I don’t know. Right now, certainly not, but what about later, much, much later?

I still don’t know.

Today (and several more as far as the eye can see) is going to suck. But I know it will get better.

I don’t know where to start. I suppose I may have cracked open my heart for the world to see my pain, but that will make it so much easier not to backtrack and lose the ground I’ve gained. What a difference 24 hours can make!

My day yesterday started much as usual and ended in a river of tears. My boyfriend, Mr. X, has been having a full-blown affair with another woman. I believe them both when they say that it started innocently enough, he just needed a female friend to talk to - but personal talk to a single woman is an invitation, an open door for illicit behavior, and they both damn well should have known better. Especially since I had been showing him where the door was for the past year if he continued to be unable to commit to me, our relationship and our future.

You guys, I had this woman and her son over to my home and I didn’t see this one coming.

But he says he was unhappy. Well, tough toenails pal. I’ve been mighty unhappy too on occasion throughout our relationship, but I didn’t take it as a reason  to justify infidelity.

Infidelity, such a small word for having your life totally ripped apart in the matter of an instant. So many things are clear now, in my clarity I have reviewed the last month, things that he said to me to make me feel like our “issues” were my fault. His gloomy attitude and quickness to get angry. I commented on how he never answered the phone right away when I called, how he was staying out later a lot lately with the “guys” asking who he was hanging out with… he had the nerve to get offended and protest that he obviously couldn’t have any female friends when I got onto him about sharing our secrets with a woman he hardly knew, and that I didn’t trust him, this was all before I had him backed into a corner with my “proof.”

He loved her. He told her he loved her and then he made love to her. At least once (that he’ll admit to but probably more, but does it really matter?) There is no going back from this- this is the worst thing that has ever happened to me.

My bitterness and betrayal have no end.

So today is where it begins. Day One. Ground Zero. It can only get better from here, or so they tell me.

I don’t know if I’ll continue with ye olde blog here with any regularity. I don’t know if the content will be anything worth reading. There is a lot of stuff I just don’t know.

I have much love for this blog, Franklin over at The Panopticon is truly a delightful read (for knitters and non-knitters alike.) He is a master craftsman as equally with a sentence as he is with heirloom lace.

Today, he outdid himself with a post about the world/society not understanding of knitters. Read it, you’ll thank me.

I went to the lake this weekend in the beautiful Blue Ridge Mountains with my lovely and adoring parents who had been on vacation at their cabin on the lake for about a week. I had an extra day off on Friday since we worked on Memorial Day so I was going to float and read and get my drink on with my Mom and Stepdad. We had a wonderful trek to Young Harris to this phenomenal vineyard, beautiful view, tasty wine, just a delight- and that is when they sprung it on me. Their recently divorced friend (divorced after 25 years) had invited himself (and a date) up for the weekend. I was a tad tipsy and as my mother’s daughter was going to make the best of it. But dudes, the cabin is cozy and accommodates the fam quite nicely, but who is this woman? Is she cool? Is she fun? Not to mention that I felt that “our” time was being infringed upon- I don’t get to spend so much time with the parentals to have them all to myself, you know? But, I’ve known the man since I was a child (let us just call him “Dick” for the sake of the story) and Dick was a tad wounded. Wounded, lonely, newly-divorced man. A nice man that probably hasn’t had the opportunity to get a word in edgewise for going on 25 years, so we felt like Dick needed some friends and support. So enters Dick and date “Jane” (and that is only because even after two days, I still can’t remember her name.) So, there we are in this tiny cabin.

Warning: Content Below not recommended for anyone under the age of 18.

Read the rest of this entry »

Why Ross Sucks and I won’t be shopping there ever again and “Pllllllbbbbbbttttt” to them.

Here is my letter to customer service of Ross: Dress for Less

To Whom It May Concern:

I recently visited the Ross located at XXXXX on Friday, May 23^rd at approximately 6 PM. I would be remiss if I didn’t report my experience as by far the WORST encounter with customer service personnel store-wide that I have ever had. First of all, the store was in shambles, racks of clothing looked ravaged, shoes were missing their mates, stuff on the floor, just overall dingy and sloppy. Now, I don’t really mind so much as I was bargain shopping but the experience only got worse from this first impression. I went to the dressing room to try some things on, the lady manning the station was irritated (I gathered that she was supposed to get off work soon) and she handed me my number while on the phone with her boyfriend (who was to picking her up.) I went into a fitting room. I could hear her complaining to herself loudly as she entered each booth, CURSING, and directing anger at previous customers that left items in the room. Angry, filthy language was spewed as she slammed the doors in booths adjourning mine. As I left the dressing room with items I was going to purchase and a few that didn’t work, I asked her if I should put the unwanted dresses on the loaded rack nearby. She scoffed, only if I could find room, and that she had been telling people to put their own unwanted dresses back on the racks where they had gotten them. (I declined as I found space on the rack and felt that this was, after all, her job.)

I proceeded to check out after a brief glance at shoes, and I previously mentioned that many pairs were strewn on the floor and even more were missing their mate entirely. I waited in one of only two open lines with about thirty other people. I waited quite a long time. When it was just about my turn the woman working the register stopped talking to the woman at the CLOSED customer service desk long enough to ask me if I was paying in cash. I said, no, I will probably write a check to which she stated that the system probably wouldn’t take it. I then suggested my card, which the system was apparently not taking either. No apologies. No excuses. No announcement or warning to the fifteen people in the line behind me that unless you carried cash (which by the way most people don’t anymore) you weren’t going to be able to make your purchase. At this point she began to reprimand another worker for being late and I was appalled to discover that she might actually be the person IN CHARGE at this store.

There were no apologies for the inconvenience to ANY customer, and by now people had been waiting for quite some time. If I didn’t like the dress I had found so much (and the price) I probably wouldn’t have scraped out the cash that I mercifully happened to have on me at the moment. I have never been so ill treated as a customer by service and sales associates in an entire store before- it was almost as if they would have been happier we had all simply cleared out, customers in this particular instance were treated as if their very presence was a nuisance and the staff was totally inconvenienced to have to be dealing with us. I do not think I will ever return to Ross, but I did believe it to be the right thing to do to report my experience so at the very least someone at the corporate level would know why.

Thank you for your time.

Hey, sometimes they respond to this type of stuff, and sometimes they don’t, but at least I didn’t just bend over and take it. Ok, well since I did purchase the items anyways, I guess I sort of did, but the dress was under $20, with polka-dots!!! Well, I’m still mad and letting someone know, so there.

UPDATE: I was contacted by customer service AND the store manager very soon after I sent this. They were both very lovely and professional and said that the staff had been written up (and that it didn’t sound like a strange complaint.) I will probably go back (they offered me a 20% off coupon- but I probably won’t take it.) The principal was to make sure that someone noticed and at the very least cared.

Well, if you are me, you normally lose more than you win. I’m not so much lucky when it comes to competition- I blame the Girl Scouts for destroying my competitive spirit. Now, many may view the scouts to be a little fascist, paramilitary regime, but I enjoyed it for a time- saluting and all. You see, when I was a scout (like 22 years ago) was the last time I WON something.  I must begin this tale with the cookies. I did NOT enjoy selling the cookies. You see, the prizes you got when selling the cookies were so very enticing, but they only went to the power sellers, and I lived in a neighborhood that was going through the cycle of having mostly old people and they didn’t take to kindly to me peddling my sweets (diabetics.)  It broke down something like this: sell 50 boxes get the patch (no, not everyone that participated got the patch, you had to sell lots and lots of boxes) then sell 150 and get a stuffed toy, 250 boom box, 1000 new car…. whatever, the point is I rarely broke 100. My mom, who is a saint, was pissed about the entire system of awards (she would be correct into thinking it wasn’t fair for a Dad to take his kid’s sales sheet in to a big corporate office and make her sales for her and that everyone that participated should get the freakin’ patch at the very least.) So she bought something like 100 boxes from me each year then put me in uniform out in front of her Hallmark shop and I’d sell them from a card table (very wise my mother- I was very fortunate she used her mad marketing skillz to ensure that I would get that little scrap of fabric for my sash at the cookie awards ceremony.)

Then came the year of the dog. This stuffed dog that you only had to sell a billion boxes of cookies to get. Well, the dog had velcro on his belly concealing a hidden chamber, and when you are 8- you are all about the little girl secrets that could be concealed within the belly of a stuffed weiner dog. (You know, in actuality, this memory is a little more disturbing than I recall.) This particular year they had some prizes for the troop for randomly selected girls. (Which meant that Allison, the little nazi power seller, might not make off with every single prize that technically DADDY got her by intimidating his corporate minions into buying her smack. ) I won’t ever forget her. She was a smug little girl scout. Well, long story long, I won the dog that year and it was the sweetest, sweetest, most unexpected victory in the world.

Which (finally) brings me to the fact that I actually won something after a 22 year drought. One of my favorite bloggers is Cass at Shut Up I’m Counting. I won some darling little stitch markers with little sheep on them. (This is perfect for the girl that up until recently was using old wine glass charms, stray earrings and washers as stitch markers.) I entered the contest because this lady is damn funny and was asking for advice for her daughter’s birthday and for a suggestion for a pleasurable knit project, so I thought what the heck, I’ll type up a response- I’ve got something to say on all of that. Well I did and I won. Sweeeeeeeeeet - thanks so much for having the contest Cass!

And now to what I lost- I entered the Interweave Magnetic Poetry Contest about a million years ago with my little haiku. I didn’t win, but I’m okay with that because I never claimed to be much of a poet. However, I do have an observation, does any one else notice that all three winning poems make significant use of the word “rhythm”? Just an observation, not a qualitative evaluation or anything but the word positively screams out at me when reading each poem. Personally, I don’t care much for the word rhythm. I don’t hear “rhythm is going to get you” like most people, I tend to let my mind wander to “rhythm method” or “rhythmic gymnastics” or something sort of dirty and pulsating. Is it just me?  Really? Well I don’t much care for the words rumba or rhombus either (but I do so like rum) I suppose it is some kind of weird, personal word association thing. Now I fear I’ve revealed too much.

Oh, and I had that stuffed dog for years until I took him to camp with me and filled his body cavity with jolly ranchers (not my most shining moment) and his insides became a sticky sweet feast for ants and I had to dispose of him. But the memory of my gigantic victory over Allison stays with me always. (YAY for victory!)

Hey, I’m one for two today. I think I’ll go and purchase a lottery ticket on my lunch break- tomorrow’s Mega Millions is up to 166 Million!

I had a Dirt Devil I purchased in 2001 for around $75. It followed me to four apartments and it finally gave it up in the fall. I was dismayed, but understanding- I mean six years and moving and kitties and crap- yay Dirt Devil! Unfortunately, Lowe’s no longer carries the brand so I bought a Eureka Vacuum cleaner in October. Let me tell you, Eureka blows donkey balls. I upgraded to a $150 model thinking I was due for an upgrade. It had a pretty orange color and some neato, nifty attachments (like this static brushy thing for dusting) and it sucked adequately for about a month or two. Then it started making noises of the not so good for a vacuum cleaner type. Jeff, who informed me about said noises as he is the head honcho vacuum master, replaced the belt. It was quieter-ish. But it churned my rug something awful (I suspect it actually melted it or something…) So Jeff went to the one repair place in town to see if they had parts. Come to find out, Eureka was bought out or something by a craptastic Chinese company and has been producing shiteous vacuums ever since. Luckily, I filled out the warranty card and kept the receipt, Jeff was able to return the steaming piece of… well, I think you might get where I’m going with this one, for store credit. (Thank you Lowe’s.) But now, he is back in the vacuum aisle, dilemma, dilemma, dilemma. What to get? We would really like a Dyson (although we’ve heard they aren’t so awesome from the vacuum repairman.) My pal Shari sings the praises of her Kirby (they have been in a committed relationship for, like, 18 years or something.) Glad Jeff is handling this one, what a fine man I have!