Thanks for nothing

OK, confession time. We had a problem with a late payment to our credit card at "company X." We received an automated message from them instructing us to call a toll-free number and enter a personal access code to retrieve a message from our creditors. When my wife did that, It gave her options to rectify the late-payment situation. The automated service instructed, "To pay electronically, please press '1.' To pay online, please press '2.' To sent a check via mail, OR if you have already sent a check in the mail, please press '3.'"
Since we had sent out a payment (albeit late), my wife pressed "3" and received the following contradiction.
"This is not an option. Please choose option 1 or option 2!"

NOT receiving a customer service award this year is company X!!!

A little late for that

Sadly, the war in Iraq has claimed the lives of a couple of local men. The local high school has a large marquee sign that posts a nice thought, but unfortunately, whoever placed the message there used the wrong words.
"Bless those who gave their lives for the cause of freedom."

Now, for my correct interpretation, to which I wholeheartedly agree: "We are blessed by those who give their lives for the cause of freedom."

May God grant comfort to the families of those brave men.

Did I really say that?

AAAGH! The stupidity bug bit me!

I was in the process of cleaning up a disaster area in the living room after my 20-month-old tornado went through, creating mayhem wherever he went. As I was picking up numerous toys and what-nots, I felt something had been stuffed under the area rug. As I picked up the one end, my wife asked me, "What did you find?"
I mindlessly, blathered, "Number 2!"

It was a foam manipulative digit.

What made it even more hilarious for my wife is that my son had just finished playing with the diaper wipes container!

Oh, is THAT all?

I started my second job today, and the guy training me told me about all the college football games he bet on yesterday. He stops, and thoughtfully calculates, "Hey, that's not bad! All those games, and I'm only $340 down!"

Hey, next time, instead of blowing your cash on a bookie, give it to me instead. I'll do something worthwhile with it!

Another stupid question

As was established in my posting "Dark side of the moon," my supervisor isn't the sharpest tool in the shed. One thing that illustrates that clearly is her annoying habit of coming up to me, watching what I'm doing for about 30 seconds, and then prattling off, "What are you working on right now?"

Well, "Jan," I'm writing the sequel to the Magna Carta while solving Africa's famine problems and singing "Rocky Mountain High" in three keys simultaneously. What are YOU working on?

Truth in advertising

My friend Pat told me this story of an eating experience he had in a nearby city. (Pat, you've gotta start blogging again, dude!)
He sees a sign that reads, "ALL YOU CAN EAT: $1.99." So he thinks, OK, sounds good! He goes in, pays the two bucks, and sits down, eagerly anticipating a great meal. The waitress brings out a platter with 2 eggs and hash browns on it.
Puzzled, Pat reminds the server, "Um, I paid $1.99 to get the all-you-can-eat deal."
Without batting an eyelash, the waitress states, "That IS all you can eat for a buck 99!"

What a bargain!

Welcome, needy people!

It's not uncommon to enter a town and see a sign with the town's name and a brief slogan, like "PODUNK: A nice place to live." Apparently, some municipalities haven't got the catchphrase thing down too well yet.
I recently passed a sign for a local town which read, "MAYFIELD. Help us to help you."

Translation: "MAYFIELD: a co-dependent community."

And for you grammar experts out there, we briefly dwelled in a lazy little town called Edneyville, NC. On the back side of the sign (the side you'd see if you were leaving) it read, "Ya'll come back!"

Um, it's YOU ALL. Not YA WILL.

Oh, what a tangled web we read!

My wife took the children to the library today. An old, shriveled woman who never was there before was serving as librarian. As my family went about their way getting new books to check out, a college-aged gal came in and asked, "Excuse me, do you have any books on spiders?"
"Why?" the librarian responded. "Are you having problems with them in your house?"
"No, they're for a school project," said the would-be borrower.
The aged lady drolled, "Oh, that's good. 'Cause you should call an exterminator."
"I don't like spiders," she finished.

What we have here is... failure to communicate!

More WNEP follies!

America's weatherman, WNEP-16's very own Tom Clark, described an environmental trend our region has been stuck in for over a week...

"We're still looking at this stationary front, which is very... (3-second pause) ...persistent... obviously. It's not moving. It's very stubborn."

Thank you, Mr. Webster, for that eloquent definition.

The dark side of the moon

THE STORY OF A WEIRD WORK SAGA

So I go to work today, and my supervisor takes making complete hell for the lives of me and my fellow department members to a new level. (I work in shipping and receiving for a uniform distribution center.) A truck full of cases comes in, so "Sam" goes to unload it. But first, he has to spend an hour trying to wake the driver, because the dude hadn't backed the trailer all the way to the bay door yet. Meanwhile, "Al" is working with me moving the stock from the back into our warehouse locations. "Joe" is on the shipping line, and "Bart" is sticking his thumb up his butt all day. Since Bart isn't handling the receiving, Sam has to double up and do that too. Oh, yeah, and Al has to double up and help Joe on the line, because the workload in shipping is so high. That leaves me to do all the stocking, maintenance and the reports. Then my super wants to have a 25 minute long meeting with us to describe the new time/activity recording sheets, which we already knew all about.
Bart's still playing Houdini... Oh, and we received twice as many shipments as usual. Hey, only 2 hours left to the end of the day! Let's have a 45-minute session describing benefits enrollment, which redundantly reads through all the information we all have at home! OK, back to work... WHAT? "The truck's not unloaded? Why not?"
Sam replies, "I've been handling all the trucks today. Of course it's not done!"
Where's Bart???
Then comes the kicker. 15 minutes left in my shift, and the super asks me, "Did you pull that special request grey pant that I needed?"
I had had enough. "No," I yelled back. "I didn't know there was a special request in, because I haven't had the chance to check the tickets in the computer because I've been running all over the place between stupid meetings!"
Now, if you were the super, how would you respond? Anger? Apology? Promise to pass that task onto the next shift? Nooooooooooo!
She smiles, and giggles. Yes, giggles.

In the words of Pink Floyd, "There's someone in my head, and it's not me!"
(OK, I know this wasn't something someone said per se, but it's still stupid!)

Viking pillaging

Looks like another pro athlete has proven that they have the gift of denial, but not reality.
According to a printed report by the Minneapolis Star Tribune, several Minnesota Vikings team members rented a couple of boats on a state lake. Purportedly, several women joined the Vikes in varying types of sexual activity. When addressed by the media, running back Mewelde Moore responded to the allegations as such:
"Yeah, I was on the boat. But I don't know what exactly the problem is because nothing happened. [I didn't] see anything... Sex? What are you talking about? That's crazy. Sex? Come on. Look, I'm engaged. So none of that. That will put me in trouble."

Yes, everyone knows that a diamond on a gal's finger also doubles as a chastity belt for men!

It's my hymn and I'll cry if I want to...

The dumbing-down of America has apparently extended to the church... Check out excerpts from this AP story:
A church pastor called deputies to remove 16 congregants who refused to stop singing as he tried to begin his sermon, according to a sheriff's report.
Pastor [N] reported a disturbance... to the Charlotte County (FL) sheriff's office when the group would not allow the... service to continue.
All 16 church members were issued trespass warnings and left the property without incident...
"Many things are wrong in the church," [one congregant] told deputies. "We don't want him to be the pastor."
[N] declined to comment to reporters Monday.
"I don't have much to tell you, just that we are preaching the word here," he said.
[One congregant] said she and the other 15 who received warnings will attend a different church...

"Oh, yeah? Well, it's my pulpit. Get out! Nyah-nya-nyah-nya-nyaaaah-nyaaah!"

Stupid Question streak

2 days in a row! Today, Bob Schieffer on the CBS Evening News asked, "With all the natural disasters taking place in the world, we must ask ourselves, 'Are these disasters happening because the world is changing? ...And more importantly, is this having a psychological affect on the rest of us?"

Oh, yes, I feel so light and frilly that thousands are dying! Yippee!
MORON.

Fungal yams

(What appropriate timing to all my Northern friends oot there, eh!)
On a whim, our family decided to go out to eat at a buffet place. As we were being seated, we heard a couple talking about one of the choices on the bar.
"Yeah, they've got those sweet potatoes with the mushrooms on top!"
"Mushrooms?"
"Yeah, mushrooms!!!"

So the next time you make s'mores, remember, it's grahams, chocolate, and mushroom!

There IS such a thing as a stupid question!

I don't remember exactly who it was, but I had to groan when I heard an NBC reporter "teasing" his piece on the avian flu by asking,
"Is the federal government ready for a flu pandemic?"

Yes, please send a virus to wipe out hundreds of thousands of our citizens. We're ready--bring it on!

Illogical politics

Our "beloved" city of Scranton, PA -- highlighted on the NBC comedy series "The Office"-- has again seen its leadership suffering from a chronic case of brain flaccidity. About 5 years ago, after MUCH debate, the city took out a huge loan to build a downtown (Hilton) hotel and convention center at an overall cost of $390M. After being in operation for less than 3 years, the Hilton filed for bankruptcy in lieu of $23M in unpaid debts. None of those debts were tax related, however, because the mayor and his counterparts decided to grant the property tax-free status for 10 years.
The hotel continued to operate, and was recently bought in a sheriff's sale by the creditors. So then the county commissioner (1 of 3 who serve in that role) steps in to save the day!!!
"Frankly, if the building is not functioning, we are not going to receive any taxes anyway." --County commissioner Robert Cordaro on the commissioners' unanimous vote to grant the Hilton an additional 10-year abatement on its building.

That's great. Pass the bill onto us taxpayers, who are having our pockets emptied to pay for a hotel that only fills to 53% capacity, has no conventions and no place for guests to park. Meanwhile, the hotel gets to go on for free, and STILL incurs a $23M deficit!

The Granddaddy of Conspiracy Theories!

First there was the grassy knoll. Then the informant(s) at Watergate. Now comes the greatest conspiracy theory of all time: The Japanese Yakuza is manipulating the weather of North America in retaliation for the bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki in 1945!
I first heard about this absurd idea from Chuck Shepherd's "News of the weird." It told the story of meteorologist Scott Stevens, who quit his job at KPVI to pursue the "truth" about this massive environmental cover-up. He created a website @ www.weatherwars.info/ which addresses this. But I still wanted to get to the primary source of this crazed speculation. Mr. Stevens referenced the web link of Tom Bearden @ www.cheniere.org/articles/ and THERE IT WAS, under the title "Scalar Electromagnetic Weapons and Their Terroristic Use: Immediate Strategic Aspects of the asymmetric War on the U.S." Here's a small sample...
So in early 1990, the weather engineering operations over North America were assumed from the FSB/KGB by the Yakuza/Aum Shinrikyo teams... The weather engineering against the U.S. continues today under the rogue Japanese teams on site in Russia, with direct FSB/KGB supervision.
In 2004 we have entered the 2-year "final preparation phase." These operations have been intensified and will continue to be intense, wreaking great economic damage. Hurricanes Charlie, Frances, Ivan, Jeanne (and now Katrina) etc. have been no exception to the Yakuza weathering engineering, which included directly influencing and controlling each hurricane's power and behavior, as well as directing its course and speed so as to choose its targeting path. Indeed, Ivan did a 180 degree turn (no it didn't! It only turned about 100 degrees northward.), and Jeanne did a 360 degree loop before reaching Florida, demonstrating the degree of control available.
Ah, yes. we have no cure for the common cold, no plan to combat global warming and an inability to eliminate starvation in Africa. But we can use gigantic electromagnetic machines which nobody can see to change wind currents, isobars, barometric pressure and precipitation potential to an area roughly the size of Texas, all from half a world away!!!
Did I mention this Stevens dude quit his well-paying, high-profile job to tell the world the truth, which he accepts solely on the basis of one wack-job who has probably constructed this "theory" as a publicity stunt to get rich???

"Who is more foolish, the fool or the one who follows him?" --Obi-Wan Kenobi in Star Wars IV

Blitzkrieg evangelism

Today, my friend Pat--who confesses he has an incredible ability to attract wierdos-- was making a (soft drink) delivery to a local convenient store. He handed the statement of receipt to the store manager to sign. When he got it back, it was folded in half, so he unfolded it to check for the signature. A gospel tract fell out. Pat bent over to pick it up, and noticed the title, something like, "Why You Could Be In Danger of Going To Hell." The manager gleamed, "Yeah, I put that in there."
"Oh. OK," responded Pat.
The manager continued, "And now, since you accepted it, you have to read it, or you will go to hell."

As Pat said, "I didn't accept it. He hid it in the receipt!"
My response: yeah, dude, we all know how God has personally entrusted you and you alone with the power of salvation!

More political ineptness

"It's a risk, but progress takes risks."
--Carbondale (PA) city councilman Paul Browne, joining his cohorts in a unanimous vote to borrow $2.9M to put toward the construction of a parking garage in the city's [very rapidly] declining downtown.

You've got businesses closing left and right, with no new ones coming in, and a garage is progress? Oh, yes, I want to go to Carbondale to park in the garage. Never mind there's nowhere for me to go there!

--Thanks to the Scranton Times-Tribune, printed on 9/30/05

Redundant Repetition

I was forced to listen to a Country radio station at work today. (Apologies to my friends in Alberta, but Country just isn't my bag!) I chuckled when the DJ came on at the completion of a song...
"Toby Keith here on J-R 93-7, your home for new country and the legends. Coming up next we have more new country and the legends as well!"

...Say it a few more times, and I'm sure I'll understand what you play on air!