Not a big deal (9/9/2021)
A mistake is a big deal and surely is a reason to be angry and upset. That is, if someone else made it. If you are responsible, it is nothing to worry about and why don’t we just forget about it. A mistake only counts when you are not the one making it.
Many years ago my boss rushed into the office telling us in a loud tone of voice that an administrative error had caused the company to loose several hundred dollars. “Mistakes like that should not be made”, he said. “We cannot afford it and it is totally unnecessary”. He went on ranting and raving for a while and he wanted me to find out what had happened and who was responsible.
“And?” he asked when I came in to report. He still had this angry tone of voice and I could hardly suppress a smile since I knew what was coming next. “It was you, you did the administration on it and you signed for it as well”.
Selling online (9/29/2021)
Craigslist, Facebook, OfferUp and other platforms are basically great tools to buy and sell stuff.
Unfortunately, they also have become places where you can easily lose some of your hard-earned money to scammers who sell faulty products or who make you pay in advanced for a service that will never be provided. Frauds witch checks and money orders are common and some of the scams are quite elaborate.
Now I’m not here to warn you about scams, plenty of other people have done so already. There are some other things that bother me and one of them is that very often I have to deal with people who are just rude and inconsiderate.
A while ago I offered some items in the ‘free stuff’ section and I got replies that said something like: ‘Where can I pick it up?’ They didn’t ask if they could have it and in most cases there was no name either. Another type of response I got was: ‘Call me’, followed by a phone number. I don’t have to call anyone and I certainly won’t do it if you can’t say ‘please’.
It's in the computer (10/12/2021)
Many years ago, I would get a catalog in the mail from software company Borland. I believe they sent it every 3 months.
I wasn’t a regular customer but just a browser really. It was in the early days of PC’s and I was interested in seeing what was on the market. I did order something from them once, it was C++ for DOS that came on 25 3,5-inch floppies.
After that they sent me two catalogs which was a waste. They were nice little booklets which must have cost quite a bit to produce and distribute. And since I don’t like wastefulness and throw one in the garbage right away, I tried to alert Borland.
We were some years away from Internet and email, so I just called them, on my landline phone. The lady was very friendly but told me that she couldn’t help me. “I’m sorry sir but it is the computer, I can’t change it”
Littering & Recycling (11/25/2021)
A few weeks ago, on a Sunday morning, a husband and wife were riding their bikes through our street. I saw them stop a few times and pick something up and put it in a plastic bag.
I suspected they were looking for aluminum cans, so I went outside and asked them about it. They confirmed that once week they go through the neighborhood looking for cans, not for monetary reasons, but to have them recycled.
I gave them a bag with cans I had saved, I’m pretty big on recycling too. A week later they showed up at around the same time and I handed them another bag.
The week after that I just put a bag on the curb, but it stayed untouched and a week later I didn’t see the couple either.
Last Sunday they rang our doorbell and asked if we had any cans, and we did. In addition to our own I had picked some up from the side of the main road. We had planned to take a place where the county has bins for citizens to drop off their recyclables.
