The biggest problem facing society nowadays, and I'm not talking about financial or security stuff, is the rise of the Entitlement Whore (EW). I didn't make up that phrase. I got from the people here. An EW is someone who thinks the world owes them everything, that their stupid demands should always be met, and cannot handle the slightest grievance like an adult.
I believe it started when 100% Customer Satisfaction became a thing. The whole "The customer's always right" mindset, which is complete and utter BS. The customer is not always usually wrong, but has no concept of how stores are run, what back rooms actually contain, or who is at fault (which is often no one), not to mention the wildly unreasonable demands they have as assumptions.
I could talk about that at length. But I won't, today. It's just a necessary backdrop to my main topic: Overdone Apologies.
Let's say I go to a restaurant. I order a chilled yak's blood latte, and it comes out differently than how I ordered it. I'm sure the waiter(ess) will fall over themselves letting you know how incredibly sorry they are. "I'm SO, SO sorry, sir. SO sorry. I'll get that fixed immediately. I apologize for the state of your drink, sir, and I'll personally get it fixed right now, just as soon as I continue to apologize to you for another 2-3 minutes. Did I mention how utterly sorry I was? I'm finding that the English language is lacking words for me to express my sorryness at this small situation here. I'm feeling as close to 100% pure sorrow as any human in the world has ever felt. I'm SO..." Etc.
So someone messed up. Maybe they used goat's blood instead (a common occurrence). A "whoops, I'll get the right thing," from the server would suffice. For me, at least. All I want is the correct blood in my latte. I don't want to hear how sorry you are. It's not even necessary. No one - especially not the server who didn't even make the thing - purposefully spiked my drink with bottom-shelf goat's blood. It's totally fine, just bring me the correct drink.
But these people serve customers that will totally blow their top if their blood latte comes out a little on the warm side. EW's are not able to react to things in a calm manner. They believe it their right to live a life free of inconvenience, and thusly, explode like a caffeinated hippo-infant throwing the tantrum of its life.
Because of this ridiculously common event, service people need to fall over themselves apologizing. They must let you know how COMPLETELY AND TRULY SORRY they are that you were mildly inconvenienced.
If they don't? The EW will get them fired, because destroying someone's livelihood over a small mistake is totally reasonable.
September 24, 2011
July 3, 2011
Doubt
There's something terribly wrong with me, all the time. It's not something I can see or feel, but other people can, at least unknowingly. This can happen across the web too, so it's not completely my body language, although that surely is part of it. Maybe people imagine me when reading my emails.
Anything I say is met with either disbelief or questioning. Here are numerous general examples.
Trivia:
I know a LOT of useless things. Here are some: Rats cannot vomit; they don't have the reflex. Dolphins are the only other animal (besides us) that have recreational sex. A tesseract is a four-dimensional cube. Viking helmets never had horns. The electronegativity of Chlorine is 3.16.
Now, while you were reading that list, I'll bet you questioned me at some point. To the best of my knowledge, those are all true. However, it doesn't matter, because I said them, so you'll question at least some of them.
Orders:
Anything I tell people to do for any reason must first be questioned. It doesn't matter a lick how mundane or unimportant the order is. Let's say I'm moving, and people are helping me. I say, "Hey, Person, take that box out next."
Could said person just take out the damnable box? Hell no, of course. They must first inform me that there are other boxes that could be taken out first. No matter that they're all just full of the same shit. No no, whatever one I suggested is probably the wrong one. Maybe they'll take it out anyway, but first I must be questioned.
Advice:
Now, everyone knows that humans are by and large incapable of taking advice, especially advice they asked for, but this is still very obvious when I give advice. People will say something like, "Hey Apathy, should I eat this plate full of jagged metal shavings?"
"No," I reply.
"I dunno... it looks really good."
"Sure, but it will cut up your throat and you will drown in blood, which I think we can agree would be an unpleasant situation."
BOOM. Shavings, blood, unpleasantness.
.
Anything I say is met with either disbelief or questioning. Here are numerous general examples.
Trivia:
I know a LOT of useless things. Here are some: Rats cannot vomit; they don't have the reflex. Dolphins are the only other animal (besides us) that have recreational sex. A tesseract is a four-dimensional cube. Viking helmets never had horns. The electronegativity of Chlorine is 3.16.
Now, while you were reading that list, I'll bet you questioned me at some point. To the best of my knowledge, those are all true. However, it doesn't matter, because I said them, so you'll question at least some of them.
Orders:
Anything I tell people to do for any reason must first be questioned. It doesn't matter a lick how mundane or unimportant the order is. Let's say I'm moving, and people are helping me. I say, "Hey, Person, take that box out next."
Could said person just take out the damnable box? Hell no, of course. They must first inform me that there are other boxes that could be taken out first. No matter that they're all just full of the same shit. No no, whatever one I suggested is probably the wrong one. Maybe they'll take it out anyway, but first I must be questioned.
Advice:
Now, everyone knows that humans are by and large incapable of taking advice, especially advice they asked for, but this is still very obvious when I give advice. People will say something like, "Hey Apathy, should I eat this plate full of jagged metal shavings?"
"No," I reply.
"I dunno... it looks really good."
"Sure, but it will cut up your throat and you will drown in blood, which I think we can agree would be an unpleasant situation."
BOOM. Shavings, blood, unpleasantness.
.
February 10, 2011
Free Energy AND Public Health Bonuses
It's a well known and largely documented fact that I'm a genius.
"You sound like an arrogant jerk," you might be saying to yourself. And while that might or might not be just as true, it doesn't change anything.
The other day, as I was engaged in boring work, I had a revolutionary idea. Even I was impressed with myself, and as a pompous and arrogant jerk, that's saying something.
Coal is obviously not a great way to generate energy. Yes, it totally works, but from an environmental standpoint, it's not the bee's knees. Nuclear power, is, from what I can tell, pretty good, but there are, of course, some downsides, which I don't need to elaborate on. Wikipedia will tell you what you want to know.
Solar power would probably be the best by far and away if solar cells were up to snuff (and they're getting there). Wind is what we're doing now. It's good, but I hear a lot of complaining about it, but that's the case with everything. Oh, and hydro power is awesome. Let's keep doing that regardless.
Anyway, here's my idea.
The power company/gov't/whatever builds a gigantic gym or whatever you want to call it. Membership is free. When you join, you are given a card, which you swipe when you use a machine. When you get on a treadmill or bike or use a giant crank, they all spin turbines that generate power. "One guy on one bike isn't generating much energy," you say, because you're a nay saying complainer who finds fault with things. Fine. Let's get twenty bikes all working together to power one gigantic turbine.
This gym would be open twenty-four hours a day, every day. When you swipe your card on a machine, it logs how much you use it, and you - get this now - get paid for the energy you create. Sure, it'll only be a few cents probably, but look at it this way: You can join a gym and pay a high membership fee and all those types of costs. OR, you can go to this gym and get paid a little bit for going. It's more motivation to exercise, which, if most people are like me, they totally need. You'll be running on a treadmill and instead of thinking, "this sucks, I paid to do this when I could be at home having fun," you'll now think, "Just a few more miles and I can get that bigscreen I've been saving for."
People will probably also tell me that we couldn't generate all our power this way. Maybe, maybe not. But if not, are you telling me that, "If we can't do 100%, we shouldn't do it at all?" Because that's a stupid argument. Let's generate some power this way.
Besides, what electric company isn't going to want to do this? Sure, there's a large initial investment (which can probably be subsidized), but after that, all there is is maintenance. People come in voluntarily and generate power for you. You don't need to buy coal, or uranium.
As an incentive, let's say the gov't won't tax the money you get from doing this. So you can exercise, and get tax free money. (That's a pipe dream, I know.) They can still tax the power company, of course.
A google search just now tells me that this isn't a new idea, but apparently generating wide-scale power is.
So there it is. Free energy and public health. Let's get started on this right away, shall we?
.
"You sound like an arrogant jerk," you might be saying to yourself. And while that might or might not be just as true, it doesn't change anything.
The other day, as I was engaged in boring work, I had a revolutionary idea. Even I was impressed with myself, and as a pompous and arrogant jerk, that's saying something.
Coal is obviously not a great way to generate energy. Yes, it totally works, but from an environmental standpoint, it's not the bee's knees. Nuclear power, is, from what I can tell, pretty good, but there are, of course, some downsides, which I don't need to elaborate on. Wikipedia will tell you what you want to know.
Solar power would probably be the best by far and away if solar cells were up to snuff (and they're getting there). Wind is what we're doing now. It's good, but I hear a lot of complaining about it, but that's the case with everything. Oh, and hydro power is awesome. Let's keep doing that regardless.
Anyway, here's my idea.
The power company/gov't/whatever builds a gigantic gym or whatever you want to call it. Membership is free. When you join, you are given a card, which you swipe when you use a machine. When you get on a treadmill or bike or use a giant crank, they all spin turbines that generate power. "One guy on one bike isn't generating much energy," you say, because you're a nay saying complainer who finds fault with things. Fine. Let's get twenty bikes all working together to power one gigantic turbine.
This gym would be open twenty-four hours a day, every day. When you swipe your card on a machine, it logs how much you use it, and you - get this now - get paid for the energy you create. Sure, it'll only be a few cents probably, but look at it this way: You can join a gym and pay a high membership fee and all those types of costs. OR, you can go to this gym and get paid a little bit for going. It's more motivation to exercise, which, if most people are like me, they totally need. You'll be running on a treadmill and instead of thinking, "this sucks, I paid to do this when I could be at home having fun," you'll now think, "Just a few more miles and I can get that bigscreen I've been saving for."
People will probably also tell me that we couldn't generate all our power this way. Maybe, maybe not. But if not, are you telling me that, "If we can't do 100%, we shouldn't do it at all?" Because that's a stupid argument. Let's generate some power this way.
Besides, what electric company isn't going to want to do this? Sure, there's a large initial investment (which can probably be subsidized), but after that, all there is is maintenance. People come in voluntarily and generate power for you. You don't need to buy coal, or uranium.
As an incentive, let's say the gov't won't tax the money you get from doing this. So you can exercise, and get tax free money. (That's a pipe dream, I know.) They can still tax the power company, of course.
A google search just now tells me that this isn't a new idea, but apparently generating wide-scale power is.
So there it is. Free energy and public health. Let's get started on this right away, shall we?
.
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