The Manic Mechanic

Jeff and I do most of our grocery shopping at a nearby Giant Food store. Like so many large grocery chains, this one has a customer loyalty card (read, marketing and research device). In addition to the supposed discounts the card offers, it also accumulates "points" that can be used for discounts outside the store. The chain has partnered with Shell gas stations that will give you $0.10 off of a gallon of fuel with each hundred dollars spent on groceries. Fair enough, especially since we do spend a lot on food, and there's now a Shell station mere walking distance from Mayhem Acres. The point accumulate, but need to be used within a month of earning them. In some cases we've earned anout points to get 50 cents or more off each gallon. As the rules state, these can be used to purchase up to 35 gallons of fuel with a discount. Jeff is usually the one that takes the discount regularly, since he is the one most often footing the food bill (he's a chef). In order to make the best use of the discount, we've often filled a car along with several five gallon jerry cans we use to power the fleet of outdoor equipment and generators among other things, this in order to get as close to the 35 gallon maximum. My trucks also benefit here, as the tanks are bigger than those on the cars. The other day I needed to fill the big truck, knowing it would take close to 30 gallons of diesel fuel to fill. Points were set to expire soon (we've lost some before this way), and having just come home from the grocery store with enough points to drop 40 cents per gallon, it was time.

Just like anything that promises discounts, redeeming them isn't exactly easy. It's doable when you pay at the pump, but it takes a rather technical song and dance with precise key presses, card scans and such. I lose my temper when I try, because I'm not familiar with it. Jeff has come along and done the button pushing in these cases. The other issue is, when paying at the pump, the transactions are limited to $75 dollars or so per transaction. This will not buy enough fuel for the truck when it's thirsty for one, and the discount is limited to one transaction. Anything more is regular price. There is a way around this as well, you have to pay the cashier inside to ring up a big enough transaction. Okay, that's doable, but I wasn't able to walk to and stand in the store, so Jeff did this while I sat down on the pump island. It took him a while to do this, and while I was waiting, the store manager was wandering around cleaning the pumps and tidying up the place. This man is a certifiable dolt, he's been there for years, the staff hates him and quits constantly, and he's dumber than Forrest Gump but also lacking in any of the charm or lucky situations, not to mention politeness. Well, our intricate procedure needed to get cheap diesel fuel was finally in place, and the pump began beeping to tell me it's ready. I pull out the nozzle, press the start button and began fueling. Well, didn't the fool with the rag and spray cleaner decide to start cleaning the pump I was using (again!), and while doing so, he stuck his hand inside the slot where the fuel nozzle gets stored and causes the pump to immediately shut off. I stood there totally dumfounded for a second, with barely six dollars on the counter. The guy is looking at me with his hand inside the nozzle slot and a quizzical look on his face, and I realized that he not only stopped the pump, but it was the same action as finishing up filling and returning the nozzle, completing the transaction. I honestly didn't know what to do for a moment until it hit me. I just saved 40 cents a gallon on about two gallons of fuel. I slammed the nozzle into the pump and told the guy he just wasted my points for the month. Manager Guy was rambling and mumbling, I told him I am not returning here anymore and started climbing in serious pain back into the truck. He did surprise me by taking a $20 bill out of his own wallet and apologizing, which I did accept. I sat in the truck and fumed for a bit, Jeff shaking his head. I decided to go ahead and get my fuel, but my card wouldn't work in the pump. I was ready to pull my beard out and head home, but Jeff used his card to get the task done. I gave him the cash and we both went home for the night. Seriously, I have a short fuse when dealing with certain people. I am also very forgiving, and can tolerate quite a bit at first. But some people are hopeless. I also can't stand it when things are needlessly difficult. It's sad to think that both of these are increasing in number at a frightening pace.

At least one thing was almost comically easy, especially given the circumstances. That night, while I was writhing in pain laying in bed, cussing and fuming before the painkillers took effect, I was able to pull up parts diagrams on my little laptop and order parts to fix my MINI Cooper left hand window. I remember when I actually had to go get car parts from a shop during the day. Right now, that's too difficult.

It seems these days that I have to "fix" various products and tools I buy to rid them of large, sometimes multiple warning labels written in several languages. Case in point:



Here I'm holding an extension, or "whip" hose for my recently acquired airless paint sprayer. Said sprayer comes with a 50 foot hose that is reasonably flexible, but still awkward in many situations requiring lots of spray gun gymnastics. The purpose of this short (4 ft) is to make the gun easier to move and point by virtue of its thinner overall diameter and more flexible nature. The tag, as you can see, is quite large. Huge, in fact, when compared to the spray gun itself. Among all the warnings printed on both sides in English, French and Spanish is a warning not to remove the tag. If I were a good, clean, law-abiding true-blue 'Murkin and keep the tag in place, I would, among other things, look forward to it dragging across the freshly-painted surfaces, blocking my view, and being a general distraction and safety hazard. Instead, I will be a terrorist abetting heathen and remove the tag since the common-sense warnings it displays I fully understand. In a similar vein I removed a total of five large, stiff plastic tags from a rather cheap extension cord the other day. I left the tiny tag near one end that maintains the ratings of the cord. It's about the size of a postage stamp wrapped around the wire.

Now, I know what you're thinking. "But Phil, what if someone were to enter the Garage/Basement/Lab Of/Doghouse/Etc. Of Mayhem, hurts themselves with one of the objects that has had its warning label removed and as a result tries to sue?" For one, if they are so stupid and so bold to attempt such a maneuver, it will not be beyond me to beat them senseless with whatever it was that caused the issue in order to either knock some sense into them or make the suit not so baseless. Since that is not very likely to happen, I will leave the aforementioned threat as a warning. ;)

Seriously, this is part of what's wrong with this country. So much CYA bullshit appended to our daily lives because certain people succeed at bringing legal action as a result of their own carelessness and stupidity. In an earlier day and age not so long ago, such stupidity would have been so much Darwinian selection working at it's finest. The way I see it, there needs to be a lot more people using toasters while in the bathtub. Make it a requirement as part of daily hygiene before heading off to the teabagging rally or something.

I poked and hammered a bit more on the truck this evening, plus sanded and polished the gouges out of the taillight. It aint perfect, but it's at least it's less heinous than before:



I guess it's not bad for a bit over an hour's worth of work. I should invest in a good set of body picks.

I'm practically in stitches over this. Society is doomed, the tairists have won, it's all over but the crying.

The city of Boston has been thrown into a panic by an advertising campaign for Aqua Teen Hunger Force. For those not in the know, ATHF is a subversive animated thing run on Cartoon Network's "Adult Swim" segment of not-for-the-kiddies fare late at night. It seems that these LED panels were placed in various locations around bridges, overpasses, etc. With a pixellated character giving the finger, the devices were seen by some small-minded, live-in-fear people as perhaps a bomb or something. The 'authorities' arrested and charged a man hired to place the adverts with 'placing a hoax device' and disorderly conduct. From the article: "Hoaxes are a tremendous burden on local law enforcement and counter-terrorism resources and there's absolutely no place for them in a post-9/11 world".

A hoax device. It's a damn ad. And kinda clever if you ask me, though one that would really only work with the cognoscenti.

Such stupid, fear mongering people. Grow the hell up and get a damn spine. Too bad the city didnt devolve into a total panic situation. To me, that would have been comedy gold. You get what you deserve, and if living in such unfounded, unnecessary fear is how you run your life, then cower and be as dysfunctional as the fools you are.