Complaints Department

I started out Saturday annoyed over the issues with my Internet connection. In the morning the cell phone WiFi hotspot thing was working considerably less well than it had been before I’d gone to bed, and all of my Googling was for naught, as I couldn’t find any solid information on what I needed to do to get the Linksys router to work. I would have settled for just getting a direct connection from Hugin to the wall outlet to work, but I really wanted to restore connectivity to all of my computers.

Most of the information I found focused on getting a non-FiOS router to work with the FiOS router – essentially using the FiOS router to keep the Set-Top Box working while connecting another router with a better wireless signal to that and using that second router to feed connectivity to the computers on the network. That didn’t do me any good.

I kept thinking about how I needed to do some kind of workout – whether lifting/ab work or time on the elliptical – but also really not wanting to because of laziness and because of wanting to get out into the world and get my weekly shopping misadventures over with.

I was going to stop at Best Buy before going to the comic shop, but, distracted by my annoyance – which was rising due to all of the traffic – I breezed past the turn and, out of habit, headed to the comic shop.

Now that I’ve started working on building muscle I’ve stopped weighing myself. Even though I know that it’s because I’ve put on muscle and muscle weighs more than fat, there’s this gut-level reaction to seeing my weight going up – even as my waist goes down – that’s kind of discouraging. Discouragement is the last thing I need.

In any case, the results of diet and exercise have made me a little vain. Not terribly so – I’m prone to thinking that I still look fat, and the areas in which I see improvement make the areas that still need improvement stand out – but I do spend a fair amount of time in, quite frankly, amazement as I check out my reflection. There’s no way around it: while there’s a definite need for a qualifying statement*, I look awesome.

This has, of course, given me a little more confidence about my appearance, to the extent that I’ve started wearing tighter clothes, and if I see a woman looking at me I at least entertain the notion that there’s a possibility – however slight – that she likes what she sees**.

In particular, I’ve noted that the cute girl who works at the comic shop has been a bit friendlier of late. Not overly so – and not to say that she was unfriendly before – but just enough that I’ve found myself thinking “Hmm…”

Of course, there’s usually at least one other employee besides her working at the store, and multiple customers there, so I don’t really get a chance to have a one-on-one conversation with her. Given that I’d gotten underway a bit later than usual, I’d hoped that maybe I’d get that opportunity this time around.

However, there were two other employees there, and multiple customers. Still, I took note of how she – in my perception – almost pushed her co-worker out of the way and blocked him from going in the back to get my books for the week so that she could be the one to get them for me, which seemed promising. (Though it may have been my imagination. But then, she did seem annoyed when the co-worker kept trying to tell her which box was mine. Of course, that probably had nothing to do with me and was just her being annoyed about him assuming she didn’t know what she was doing. I don’t know.)

Beyond just saying, “There you go” when she handed me the books, though, she didn’t seem especially inclined to talk to me. I took my stack and did my usual giving the place the once-over to see if there was anything else I wanted to buy, and then got in line, planning to strike up a conversation with her once she started ringing me up.

And that was when I got treated to one of the clearest instances of The Universe just straight-up cock-blocking me.

As she was finishing up with the person in front of me, one of the other co-workers, a new guy, asked if he could ring me up so that he could get more practice on the register.

She said okay, and proceeded to walk away from the register while Cockblocker McNewguy cheerfully began ringing me up.

Mother fu-

…

It was all I could do to not just lose it, cast my hateful glare upwards, and scream, “Are you fucking kidding me?”

I mean, seriously, this sort of thing happens all the time – if I go to a restaurant with a 15:1 ratio of waitresses to waiters, I’ll get the waiter ever time – but somehow this just seemed so over-the-top ridiculous that, amped up as I was on murder juice***, I could barely restrain myself.

As I’ve mentioned many times in the past, my continual references to “The Universe” – by which, I suppose, I’m basically saying “God” – are a rhetorical flourish. I don’t actually believe that there are cosmic forces conspiring against me, but sometimes…

Honestly, whether there is some sort of guiding intelligence behind everything – whatever you want to call it – or not, effectively, given our inability to communicate with it in any meaningful way, it doesn’t exist. You can hedge your bets and live your life as though it does, following whatever belief system works for you, and you can kind of squint and see ways in which this force is “communing” with you, but the results you’ll get, apart from how your beliefs make you feel, won’t be any different from what you’d get if you lived as though it didn’t exist. Bad things happening to good people and etc. I mean, you can’t call God on the phone and have a conversation in the same way that you can call your Aunt Petunia on Yancy Street or whatever.

Sometimes, though, I really wish you could. At the very least I wish there were a complaints department. “Yeah, first of all, WTF is with suffering? Second of all, did you seriously need to have that guy swoop in and cockblock me like that?”

Not that it did any good – it didn’t even make me feel better – after that fiasco at the comic shop, some really annoying drivers on the road, failing to find the router I needed at Best Buy, and all of the other crap swirling around in my head, I had a “last straw” moment when I got stuck at a light thanks to the aforementioned annoying drivers who seemed to be doing their best to make sure I got stuck at that light, and I looked up and said, loudly, “You know what? Fuck you.”

After angrily completing my grocery shopping, I headed home and angrily ate lunch, then angrily mowed the lawn. Then I angrily took a shower, angrily got dressed, angrily drove to Wal-Mart to look for the router, angrily discovered they didn’t have it, angrily drove to the other Best Buy near there, angrily got the same result, then angrily drove home.

I wasn’t quite so angry when I called Verizon tech support, and I was less angry after my Internet started working again.

Today I was less angry still, but I’m not in the greatest mood. Still having issues with the touch screen on the laptop, and with the Baltimore Comic-Con coming up this weekend, and the whole point of trying to get touch in working order being for the purposes of coolly showing off my artwork at the Con, my annoyance level keeps hovering dangerously high.

And I’m still mad about that new guy at the comic shop, but who am I going to complain to, other than to you?

*That statement would be, “For me, at least.”

**Last month I went to the eye doctor, and the office manager there – an attractive-ish woman my age or slightly older – commented on how much weight I’d lost. Later, as she was leading me over to the corneal mapping machine, she gave me a full-on elevator stare, and made no attempt to hide it. I have to admit that, much to my surprise, it actually made me kind of uncomfortable.

***That’s what I call testosterone. The increased levels haven’t had any discernible effect on my libido, they’ve mostly just made me really, really angry. Despite calling it “murder juice,” it’s extremely unlikely that I’d ever do anything violent, but my fuse has gotten considerably shorter, and I often feel on edge. Also, I just like saying things like, “Well, I’m whacked out of my mind on murder juice.”

Yes, Because I ALWAYS Keep My Teeth In The Refrigerator*

Even though I have tomorrow off specifically for the purpose of going out into the world while there will be fewer people congesting the streets and store aisles, for some reason, after talking to my mother this morning, I decided to venture out.
I credit masochism as the primary reason for making this decision.
In any case, while I was out and about I figured I’d head to Circuit City to check out their going out of business sale.
That carcass has been pretty well picked clean, but there were still quite a few scavengers slurping up its marrow.
The ads – and the signs people were holding up on the roadside – said that there were savings of up to 60%, but I didn’t see anything like those numbers. Most things were at about 30% off (though I suppose it’s possible that they’d already been marked down by 30% before being further reduced).
As I said, there really wasn’t much left, and what was left was still too damned expensive even after the markdowns.
I did see some good deals on digital photo frames, and considered picking one or two up, but then I thought, “Meh.”
If I were more into photography I would have been interested in the markdowns on the few remaining DSLR cameras, as there were some bargains to be found there. But I barely take any pictures with the camera I do have, so I couldn’t justify dropping $400+ on a camera that I’d be unlikely to use, even if it was a hell of a bargain.
After leaving there I swung by Wal-Mart and was dismayed by the filled to overflowing parking lot, until I saw that huge sections of the lot are actually closed off for some sort of construction project. Still, while the store wasn’t as packed as it at first appeared it would be, there were far too many people there, and I quickly picked up the few things I’d gone there to get.
I came thisclose to saying to someone, “Really? You really need to stand right there with your cart turned sideways while you just idly stare off into space? Really?”
The lady who decided that blocking off the cleaning supplies aisle while arguing with her husband on her cell phone narrowly avoided a similar stinging remark, if for no other reason than that the orange track suit she was wearing made her look like a pumpkin.
I neglected to mention in any of my earlier posts that Wednesday saw the return of Riff Trax Night, though Scott and I didn’t actually watch a Riff Trax movie.
Instead we watched Marvel’s latest animated offering Hulk Vs., which had two separate features, Hulk vs. Wolverine, and Hulk vs. Thor.
Overall it was a damn sight better than most of Marvel’s other animated offerings, which, while generally okay, are considerably weaker than DC’s (despite DC’s maddening – and perplexing – insistence on not producing the animated feature based on The Judas Contract), and even held up pretty well in comparison to their Distinguished Competition.
Hulk vs. Wolverine, in particular, was damned entertaining. Much moreso than Hulk vs. Thor, though that’s not really a slight on that feature, which was also pretty entertaining, it’s just that Hulk vs. Wolverine was especially good.
After that we watched an old episode of MST3K featuring the Edward D. Wood, Jr. classic Bride of the Atom Monster. I’d wanted us to watch that one for a while because it is especially entertaining, but also because it gave me the opportunity to show off some of my knowledge of Ed Wood trivia (“That chick was Ed’s girlfriend at the time and she was supposed to have had the lead female role.”).
It will be Riff Trax all the way next time, though, and I’ll take this opportunity to warn inform Scott that he’s in for a real treat.
Also, does anyone know if Pizza Hut – or “The Hut,” as they seem to be calling themselves of late – has changed their pizza sizes? Because I have difficulty believing that what we were presented with was actually a Large.
Speaking of food, while I grabbed lunch at the McDonald’s in Wal-Mart, my stomach did that whole “Now that you’re trying to actually feed me I’m not hungry…but I will be as soon as you get rid of the food I don’t want right now” thing, so I suppose I should start looking into my dinner options.

*I said this earlier today when I was getting ready to take a shower. I was intending to grab my partial plates to put them cleaning while I was taking a shower, but for some reason I went to the refrigerator to grab them, rather than the downstairs bathroom where I’d set them on the sink...which is where I really do keep them when not wearing or cleaning them.

Living In The Shadow Of Adam West

I woke up sometime early this morning – it was still dark out – and thought that I should roll over and look at the time, figuring that it was, as had been the case all week when I found myself in the same situation, probably five to eight minutes before my alarm was going to go off. Then I remembered that it was Saturday and promptly went back to sleep.
I ended up getting up sometime around 9:30, at which point I sat around and did nothing in particular for about 45 minutes before deciding that I should shower, dress, and head out into the world. I ended up sitting around doing nothing in particular for an additional 45 minutes.
The new cell phone I’m planning to buy was released on Tuesday, so I decided I was going to head to an AT&T store to see if it was available. In particular, I decided to go to the one at the Dulles Town Center, as I had a yen for the bourbon chicken they sell at the food court and I wanted to swing by Wal-Mart as well.
I decided that I wasn’t going to take 7 to get there, deciding instead to take the reverse of the route I usually take home from work, which meant driving through Ashburn. Once I got to Ashburn I noticed that I was low on gas, so I went to the Safeway, as with the Safeway Club Card discount gas is usually cheaper there. While I was filling up the car, the Universe decided that it wasn’t going to be stymied in its efforts to drench me with rain by the fact that I was covered overhead, so the wind whipped up and the rain went horizontal.
However, I noticed that there was an AT&T store in that plaza, so I decided I would just go there and forego the trip to the Town Center and Wal-Mart.
The AT&T store was closed when I got to it, though, and I’m assuming that it’s permanently closed, as it looked pretty abandoned.
So it was back in the car and off to the Town Center, which was positively teeming with people. They’re already doing the whole picture with Santa thing.
Making quick work of my lunch so as to get away from the filled to overflowing food court as soon as possible, I headed to the AT&T store, which, despite actually being open, looked just as abandoned as the one in Ashburn.
They didn’t have the phone, and, having no other reason to linger, I left the Town Center and headed to Best Buy to see if they had the phone or some other shiny piece of gadgetry that I could waste money on. They didn’t have either, so I went to Wal-Mart, which was even more congested than it was last Sunday.
I thought the whole economy thing meant that people don’t have any money and as a result wouldn’t be out shopping. Other peoples’ loss is supposed to be my gain in this regard, so what’s the deal?
I suppose that’s what I get for living in one of the wealthiest counties in the country.
Deciding I couldn’t take it any longer, I took off, planning to head to Super Target in Leesburg to do my grocery shopping, figuring that it probably wouldn’t be as crowded.
Along the way, though, I decided that I just wanted to go home. Still, I did need some groceries just to get through the night, so I stopped at the Shoppers in Ashburn and bought milk and bread, deciding that I really didn’t absolutely need anything else.
At different points during this overcast but fairly warm day it’s been slightly rainy, very rainy, almost sunny, and positively nasty. It decided to go the positively nasty route as I walked back to my car, and remained so for the duration of my drive home.
Once I got home, I couldn’t think of anything finer to do with my time than to take a nap, so that’s what I did.
My real world aggravation and agitation decided to follow me into the dream world, so while I slept I had a bunch of stressful dreams in which really irritating things happened. As an example, at one point I dreamed that I was driving somewhere, though I had no idea where I was headed. Deciding that wherever it was I wanted to go was in the opposite direction, I made a sharp turn into a parking lot so that I could turn around. As I tried to get back on the road, though, I found that I couldn’t shift gears and was stuck partway on the road, unable to move.
But now I’m awake – though I still feel like I’m stuck in neutral – writing this, and trying to figure out how I’m going to feed myself with just bread and milk.
Last night was largely spent dozing on the couch and watching a bunch of TV – both recorded and live.
Among the shows I watched was the new Batman cartoon on Cartoon Network, Batman: The Brave and the Bold.
The basic premise of the show is that each week Batman will team up with some other hero – or maybe even villain – from the DC Universe’s stable of characters.
Like the current Brave and the Bold comic series, the cartoon takes its name from an long-running comic.
In its earliest days B&B was simply an anthology series, featuring stories about characters like The Silent Knight, The Viking Prince, and the Suicide Squad. In fact, the Justice League of America had its debut in the pages of B&B.
However, somewhere along the line it became a team-up book, that, like the cartoon, featured Batman paired with other – usually lesser-known – DC characters.
When I was a kid, team-up books were fairly popular. In addition to B&B, DC published DC Comics Presents, which featured Superman teaming up with a different guest star every month.
On the Marvel side, there was Marvel Team-Up, which paired Spider-Man with a rotating stable of guest stars, and Marvel Two-In-One, which did the same with The Thing.
(Marvel can be forgiven for calling a book Marvel Two-In-One, as in those days porn was not nearly so ingrained into our culture.)
The current B&B comic doesn’t limit itself to Batman and..., but has an ever-changing lne-up, with pairings such as Superman and Catwoman, or Green Arrow and Deadman.
Anyway, to get back to the cartoon, as has been the trend in recent animated series based on comics, the target audience is very young children, so it’s much goofier and more light-hearted than, say, Batman: The Animated Series, or Justice League Unlimited.
However, it was not as cutesy and insultingly goofy as that abominable Teen Titans series from a few years back.
Overall the episode, despite being geared towards such a young audience, was entertaining, and at least it doesn’t go the anime route in terms of style, which is always a plus.
I was also intrigued by some of the familiar faces displayed in the opening title sequence, as it seems likely that at some point they’ll be appearing on the show to team up with Batman. I can’t help but think that, no matter the circumstances, it would be cool to see an animated version of Kamandi, the Last Boy, for example.
I’ll probably watch a few more episodes to see if it hooks me, so clearly it wasn’t as utterly off-putting as the aforementioned Teen Titans, the recently-canceled Legion cartoon, or - *sigh* - Krypto the Super-Dog.
While I’m not bothered by the light-hearted approach, I can’t help but wonder why that’s such a trend lately. I mean, what would be so wrong with doing a more straightforward and serious approach geared toward a slightly older audience?
Also, as I watched it I couldn’t help but think that despite the success of The Dark Knight, the character of Batman will never be able to get out from under the campy shadow of Adam West. The campy, pudgy shadow of Adam West.
(I will concede that he is awesome on Family Guy, though.)
Anyway, I suppose that’s more than enough to write about a kids’ cartoon.
I’m not sure what I’m going to do with what remains of my evening. I still need to eat something, but that probably won’t take long.
Maybe I’ll watch some of the R-rated Riff Trax movies that Scott can’t watch.

(Not) On Thin Ice

So Kathleen and I went to the skating party.
Neither of us actually skated – Kathleen doesn’t know how, and I haven’t skated in probably close to 20 years.
When I was a kid there was a local community recreation building – known most commonly simply as “The Building” – which in the non-winter months was used for things like basketball and roller skating, and in the winter was frozen over and used for ice skating and hockey.
And yes, I did play hockey. I was a decent goalie, as my head would naturally draw any slapshots straight toward it.
Of course, it’s worth mentioning that my brother Stuart was one of the few people who could actually manage a decent slapshot, and, if he was on the opposing team, he generally aimed them for my head anyway, so my cranial magnetism was kind of irrelevant.
For the record, even a soft puck can hurt if it hits you hard enough.
Lacking natural grace, I was never a terribly skillful skater, but I could at least manage to remain upright most of the time.
I remember one night of skating in which we were playing “It” or, if you prefer, “Tag,” which is considerably more challenging on ice skates, and all of the other kids decided to gang up on me to insure that I was always “it.” Little did I know that it was the pale harbinger of torments to come.
Anyway, tonight’s outing did not involve breahtlessly chasing after my cruel and vicious peers in an effort to no longer be it, but it was kind of marred by the fact that it was cold and rainy and that it was held at an outdoor rink.
We talked to David, of course, and a few other people, but for much of it we were standing sort of off to the side near the hot cocoa and cookies. Eventually we moved over to where other people were standing after Kathleen said that we looked like we were anti-social. I pointed out that we are anti-social, but we still moved over anyway.
We hung out long enough for the raffle drawing. Kathleen actually won one of the prizes.
Even though it was his party, David didn’t seem to know what the prizes actually were. When Kathleen told him it was a gift certificate he asked how much it was for and said, “That’s so cheap!” when she told him.
He asked if I was going to write about that here. I told him that I pretty much had to.
In introducing me to a few people he talked up my talent and Heroic Portraits, saying that I could probably make a living off of that alone. When I pointed out that I’ve never had any actual customers, he said that it’s because I don’t market it. Kathleen agreed.
When we were leaving, he asked if I was serious about wanting to develop Heroic Portraits.
Honestly, I don’t know. I mean, sure, it’d be cool, I guess, but the one problem I foresee is dealing with unsatisfied customers, in particular people who would give me the vaguest description of what I want, then complain when I failed to bring their vision to life.
It would be kind of difficult to keep from responding to any complaints with an angry “Draw your own damn portrait then!”
Kathleen suggested some strategies for dealing with that sort of thing.
The biggest problem with marketing the site, though, is that it sucks. I don’t really want people to go there because I know they won’t be impressed, and I just don’t seem to have the wherewithal to make it any better.
Anyway, the point is that it’s a question I’ve asked myself and I’m just not sure what the answer is.
But that was my big adventure out in the world.