Few things in life make me shake in my trainers.
The September birthday month does, though.
As a promoter of the birthday month, September is the big one cause there are... lets see - Robert, Kevin, Scott, David, Lina and probably two more people I don't recall offhand whose birthdays are in September.
I have started budgeting for this most expensive bday month.
Tuesday, July 31, 2007
Julie and I need this...
Duh.
Update: The aforetypedlinkage (I just made up a new word) has the bracelet on back order. It seems to be in stock here, though.
Car Crash! - - Aftermath...
See part one, here.I snapped the above-posted pics a few days ago. The car knocked out several of the vertical child-safety bars and bent several more. I am sure it will be a year before it is fixed.
Update: I have now emailed the SF Chronicle's Chronicle Watch - the local newspaper's feature on putting pressure on local official's to get things fixed. I also emailed my local supervisor - Bevan Dufty.
Neither has contacted me yet and it has been a whole hour.
Monday, July 30, 2007
My college job...
So, I needed to do some sort of work while in college in order to have some sort of income cause everything else was sucked into my $3000 per quarter tuition and books. R.I.T., where I went to school, was on the quarter system so while other schools had three semesters per year, R.I.T. had 4 quarters per year. Things were pretty intense even if some logical divisions were cut up between sequential courses.
I landed a prestigious job as a level 1.0 circulation assistant, at R.I.T.'s Wallace Memorial Library, which basically meant I shelved returned books and filled "microfiche" copy orders as those kinds of easy-to-use copying machines were yet to be on the market.
Being a technology-oriented university, the library's collection was already digitally cataloged by 1982. I got there in late 1988 and that system was already being retired in favor of an III product. I didn't know it was an III product back then except that when a problem surfaced, "the California programmers" were given a call.
Let me step back to the promotion system of students in the circulation department.
One started out as a level 1.0 which meant you shelved books and made copies.
Level 2.0 - same duties, you can now operate the computer circulation system - big responsibility.
Level 2.25 - same duties still but now you can operate the cash register.
Level 2.5 - quasi-student supervisor - one is given an occasional shift to manage the circulation desk with a full time supervisor overlooking. Also, one was then assigned to one of the full time supervisors to help out in their jobs. Translation, one was no longer required to work regular circulation desk hours unless one chose to help out someone, etc.
Level 3.0 - student supervisor. This was the big time. One got their own keys to the library, the security alarm codes, the combination to the safe and was further entrusted to supervise the circulation desk on their own.
I achieved Level 3.0 by Spring quarter of my sophomore year. I was just that good.
More on my library adventures, later.
Sunday, July 29, 2007
Only in Japan?
From Mainichi Daily News:
Worms have long copped a bit of a raw deal among the general population, but the magazine says that some researchers label the invertebrates as the creatures making the greatest contribution to humanity.
Fish, of course, have long known the culinary benefits of worms, though to the peril of many; but in fact, during the 1970s and '80s, there were moves across Japan to try and get the slimy, slippery creatures on people's plates.
There was considerable research put into turning worms into meals fit for human consumption and development of worm dishes, with even large foodstuffs companies getting involved.
Worms do actually have considerable nutritional value, being rich in vitamins, amino acids and other substances said to be good for the health, including potassium, iron and zinc.
A company in Aomori Prefecture was the first in Japan, Fushigi Knuckles says, to try and commercialize worm food with its production and marketing of the "Worm Burger."
A 68-year-old man involved in the marketing of worm foods in Tokyo at around the same time recalls the heady days of chowing down on cestodes, nematodes and trematodes.
"You'd mince the worms, cover them in breadcrumbs and put them into a drier to create worm chips. There was worm sashimi, too. You'd wipe the dirt off with your fingers, dip the worms into garlic oil and eat them whole. They tasted great, with a light flavor and no really bad smell," the man tells Fushigi Knuckles. "Worm soup was delicious, too. You'd throw about 30 live worms into a pot, boil them slowly and end up with a broth that tasted a little like lemon. It went down well, and you could choose whether to give it a salt flavoring or soy sauce flavoring. Sprinkle it with black pepper or capsicum and it also had a wonderful taste."
Worms were also used in other dishes, such as tempura, or simply deep fried. Nearly all the sample worm foods were well-received. And that's what prompted the Aomori firm to bring up their Worm Burger.
Instead of a beef patty, the Worm Burger used ground worms, cut the onions a little, added wheat flour, a runny egg and blended in milk to make it go down easier.
The magazine notes that despite the best intentions, the Worm Burger ended up as a major flop. Marketers had been targeting women and young people, but appear to have struggled to overcome worms' image as a bizarre food. Nonetheless, Fushigi Knuckles notes, Japan is undergoing a health food kick once again and worms are worming their way into the interest of nutritiously minded Japanese who don't mind the idea of gobbling down slippery, slimy invertebrates. (By Ryann Connell)
*BLINK*
Nourishing, perhaps; nauseating, definitely! Japanese worm burger a fast food flop
"Nobody likes me, everybody hates me, I think I'm gonna eat worms," goes the old children's song most would know. But Fushigi Knuckles notes that a desire to improve the health of women and young children led one Aomori Prefecture company to come up with a worm burger filled with "big fat juicy ones, long, thin slimy ones, itsy-bitsy fuzzy wuzzy worms."Worms have long copped a bit of a raw deal among the general population, but the magazine says that some researchers label the invertebrates as the creatures making the greatest contribution to humanity.
Fish, of course, have long known the culinary benefits of worms, though to the peril of many; but in fact, during the 1970s and '80s, there were moves across Japan to try and get the slimy, slippery creatures on people's plates.
There was considerable research put into turning worms into meals fit for human consumption and development of worm dishes, with even large foodstuffs companies getting involved.
Worms do actually have considerable nutritional value, being rich in vitamins, amino acids and other substances said to be good for the health, including potassium, iron and zinc.
A company in Aomori Prefecture was the first in Japan, Fushigi Knuckles says, to try and commercialize worm food with its production and marketing of the "Worm Burger."
A 68-year-old man involved in the marketing of worm foods in Tokyo at around the same time recalls the heady days of chowing down on cestodes, nematodes and trematodes.
"You'd mince the worms, cover them in breadcrumbs and put them into a drier to create worm chips. There was worm sashimi, too. You'd wipe the dirt off with your fingers, dip the worms into garlic oil and eat them whole. They tasted great, with a light flavor and no really bad smell," the man tells Fushigi Knuckles. "Worm soup was delicious, too. You'd throw about 30 live worms into a pot, boil them slowly and end up with a broth that tasted a little like lemon. It went down well, and you could choose whether to give it a salt flavoring or soy sauce flavoring. Sprinkle it with black pepper or capsicum and it also had a wonderful taste."
Worms were also used in other dishes, such as tempura, or simply deep fried. Nearly all the sample worm foods were well-received. And that's what prompted the Aomori firm to bring up their Worm Burger.
Instead of a beef patty, the Worm Burger used ground worms, cut the onions a little, added wheat flour, a runny egg and blended in milk to make it go down easier.
The magazine notes that despite the best intentions, the Worm Burger ended up as a major flop. Marketers had been targeting women and young people, but appear to have struggled to overcome worms' image as a bizarre food. Nonetheless, Fushigi Knuckles notes, Japan is undergoing a health food kick once again and worms are worming their way into the interest of nutritiously minded Japanese who don't mind the idea of gobbling down slippery, slimy invertebrates. (By Ryann Connell)
*BLINK*
Friday, July 27, 2007
GOOD NEWS!
Leonard Nimoy will be in the next Star Trek movie!
He will be playing the role of Spock.
What?
Some people don't know these things.
Thursday, July 26, 2007
Car accident!
Update: You can see it a little in the pics - the guard rail got bent. Well, it actually got bent quite a bit. It has yet to be repaired. I will now let my imagination run wild in that if the car had been going 10 MPH faster, disaster would have occurred in it going through the guard rail. Hopefully a 2nd car won't hit that same spot soon.
I will try to take a pic of the bent guard rail over the weekend.
On the way home from work, yesterday, I saw the aftermath of a most excellent car crash. It was excellent because it could have been much worse. Basically, that white car there jumped the curb on Market street - the section of Market street that is actually a bridge and that spot has a sheer drop of about 100 feet down to some people's homes. Alas, the guard rail saved the day.
After I drove by it, I decided to turn back around to get the pics.
I parked my motobike, took some pics and then came back to find that my motobike fell on its side. I guess I didn't park it securely enough on the sloping street.
The damage was mostly superficial.
Here is the handlebar:
Here is the smashed turn signal:
And here is the broken brake handle:
Of course then the bike wouldn't start, maybe the engine got flooded and then the juice ran down on the battery as I was cranking the engine.
Luckily, the motobike has an emergency, hidden tool kit. I removed the battery, walked the 10 minutes back home, charged the battery up enough, walked back to the motobike, put the battery back in and the motobike started right up.
*WHEW*
I will try to take a pic of the bent guard rail over the weekend.
On the way home from work, yesterday, I saw the aftermath of a most excellent car crash. It was excellent because it could have been much worse. Basically, that white car there jumped the curb on Market street - the section of Market street that is actually a bridge and that spot has a sheer drop of about 100 feet down to some people's homes. Alas, the guard rail saved the day.
After I drove by it, I decided to turn back around to get the pics.I parked my motobike, took some pics and then came back to find that my motobike fell on its side. I guess I didn't park it securely enough on the sloping street.
The damage was mostly superficial.
Here is the handlebar:
Here is the smashed turn signal:
And here is the broken brake handle:
Of course then the bike wouldn't start, maybe the engine got flooded and then the juice ran down on the battery as I was cranking the engine.Luckily, the motobike has an emergency, hidden tool kit. I removed the battery, walked the 10 minutes back home, charged the battery up enough, walked back to the motobike, put the battery back in and the motobike started right up.
*WHEW*
Wednesday, July 25, 2007
Lunch...
(There are stories in this post that some of my loyal readers have already heard, just to let those loyal readers know beforehand.)
The lunch options nearby my workplace are fairly dismal.
There are two deli's in walking distance, the closest is Oscar's that I used to go to fairly frequently and they always called me "their friend" but the seven flies always buzzing around never made me too trustful of the overall cleanliness of the place.
Further down the street is the Grand Seven Deli. They keep their doors open all the time, well that's a California thing I suppose - to keep a business' doors open all the time, but the Grand Seven Deli never seems to have an army of flies buzzing around like Oscar's. The thing with the Grand Seven, though, is that they put about 2 pounds of meat on a sandwich. Call me crazy, I just don't enjoy having to re-construct my sandwich to an appropriate amount of meat. I suppose I could tell them - PUT LESS MEAT ON - but they are production-oriented and it is just easier to let them do what they want to do. They also had a stale cheese issue for awhile so I boycotted them for about 3 months and then gave them another chance. They corrected that issue and I still occasionally go there.
There was a good place on Potrero Hill called Klein's which was there for 30+ years but closed last year. A new place opened up and apparently is not very good.
The other local options are the Bayshore Bevmo, when I want a liquid lunch with cheese, Potrero Hill Safeway which always has crazy people shopping there and La Taqueria which is very good but I can't eat Mexican food more than once a week. I am sure there are other nearby places that I have yet to discover but I like to have my "set" of places that are nearby and have parking.
Due to all that, I pretty much go to Whole Foods SOMA which is a few miles away but I can still get there in 10 minutes since I-280 is just down the street.
Not to worry, though, I also have my issues with the Whole Foods SOMA.
Mostly with the people that go there and the deli / deli employees.
I will start off with the deli.
They make some very nice sandwiches but at a starting price tag of $8 per sandwich, my luncheon can get pretty pricey.
The Deli employees are mostly mid-40's Filipino women who seem very bitter with their lot in life. They put on a very forced-air of being nice. Luckily, I can see everything they do as they make a sandwich. They kind of remind me of IC3.
My fellow Whole Foods customers - let's see. I have recently been getting into their prepared foods section for lunch and yesterday, well I have seen this behavior multiple times, there was a woman that felt a need to stir just about every dish as part of her selection process for her lunch. That bugs me cause I sometimes like the skin.
The other day, I got there late, for me, about 12:30, and it was pretty packed. At one point I literally had to stop walking cause of the torrent of people going in the opposite direction. One of those said peoples was on a cellphone and headed right for me. When she realized I wasn't moving out of her way, she then decided to change course and I loudly exclaimed "You are excused!" I like to stir up the shit at times.
My other beef, and I suppose this has more to do with general cashier line etiquette, is inefficient customers - fumbling with their checkbook, visa not out to be swiped, "I forgot to get a case of Pepsi, can someone grab 15 cases for me," et cetera.
There was this one guy at Whole Foods that made sure his salad was not weighed with the top plastic lid. The total, with his other selections, came out to be $12 and change.
He pulls out a change purse.
OK, what kind of guy carries around a change purse?
He carefully counts out exact change and then sees 11:15 on the display and protests loudly as he thinks he was overcharged - he thought the total was $11.15.
The cashier replied, "That's the time, sir."
Me: *EYEROLL*
Then, a few weeks ago, I was at the Diamond Heights Safeway at the express lane and a woman walked up to the cashier and felt no compunction about interrupting my transaction to ask where the anchovies were.
"EXCUSE ME!"
"I NEED TO KNOW WHERE THE ANCHOVIES ARE!"
"ANCHOVIES!"
(She literally was yelling.)
Of course the cashier then stopped my transaction and yelled to various other cashiers to get the anchovies aisle location.
Update: Jamie Hyneman, of Mythbusters fame:
owns a special effects company that is next door to the Grand Seven Deli.
I once saw him there but did not ask for an autograph.
I once also saw him driving to work and he drives like a bat out-of-hell.
The lunch options nearby my workplace are fairly dismal.
There are two deli's in walking distance, the closest is Oscar's that I used to go to fairly frequently and they always called me "their friend" but the seven flies always buzzing around never made me too trustful of the overall cleanliness of the place.
Further down the street is the Grand Seven Deli. They keep their doors open all the time, well that's a California thing I suppose - to keep a business' doors open all the time, but the Grand Seven Deli never seems to have an army of flies buzzing around like Oscar's. The thing with the Grand Seven, though, is that they put about 2 pounds of meat on a sandwich. Call me crazy, I just don't enjoy having to re-construct my sandwich to an appropriate amount of meat. I suppose I could tell them - PUT LESS MEAT ON - but they are production-oriented and it is just easier to let them do what they want to do. They also had a stale cheese issue for awhile so I boycotted them for about 3 months and then gave them another chance. They corrected that issue and I still occasionally go there.
There was a good place on Potrero Hill called Klein's which was there for 30+ years but closed last year. A new place opened up and apparently is not very good.
The other local options are the Bayshore Bevmo, when I want a liquid lunch with cheese, Potrero Hill Safeway which always has crazy people shopping there and La Taqueria which is very good but I can't eat Mexican food more than once a week. I am sure there are other nearby places that I have yet to discover but I like to have my "set" of places that are nearby and have parking.
Due to all that, I pretty much go to Whole Foods SOMA which is a few miles away but I can still get there in 10 minutes since I-280 is just down the street.
Not to worry, though, I also have my issues with the Whole Foods SOMA.
Mostly with the people that go there and the deli / deli employees.
I will start off with the deli.
They make some very nice sandwiches but at a starting price tag of $8 per sandwich, my luncheon can get pretty pricey.
The Deli employees are mostly mid-40's Filipino women who seem very bitter with their lot in life. They put on a very forced-air of being nice. Luckily, I can see everything they do as they make a sandwich. They kind of remind me of IC3.
My fellow Whole Foods customers - let's see. I have recently been getting into their prepared foods section for lunch and yesterday, well I have seen this behavior multiple times, there was a woman that felt a need to stir just about every dish as part of her selection process for her lunch. That bugs me cause I sometimes like the skin.
The other day, I got there late, for me, about 12:30, and it was pretty packed. At one point I literally had to stop walking cause of the torrent of people going in the opposite direction. One of those said peoples was on a cellphone and headed right for me. When she realized I wasn't moving out of her way, she then decided to change course and I loudly exclaimed "You are excused!" I like to stir up the shit at times.
My other beef, and I suppose this has more to do with general cashier line etiquette, is inefficient customers - fumbling with their checkbook, visa not out to be swiped, "I forgot to get a case of Pepsi, can someone grab 15 cases for me," et cetera.
There was this one guy at Whole Foods that made sure his salad was not weighed with the top plastic lid. The total, with his other selections, came out to be $12 and change.
He pulls out a change purse.
OK, what kind of guy carries around a change purse?
He carefully counts out exact change and then sees 11:15 on the display and protests loudly as he thinks he was overcharged - he thought the total was $11.15.
The cashier replied, "That's the time, sir."
Me: *EYEROLL*
Then, a few weeks ago, I was at the Diamond Heights Safeway at the express lane and a woman walked up to the cashier and felt no compunction about interrupting my transaction to ask where the anchovies were.
"EXCUSE ME!"
"I NEED TO KNOW WHERE THE ANCHOVIES ARE!"
"ANCHOVIES!"
(She literally was yelling.)
Of course the cashier then stopped my transaction and yelled to various other cashiers to get the anchovies aisle location.
Update: Jamie Hyneman, of Mythbusters fame:
owns a special effects company that is next door to the Grand Seven Deli.I once saw him there but did not ask for an autograph.
I once also saw him driving to work and he drives like a bat out-of-hell.
Tuesday, July 24, 2007
NYC Dan...
Loyal NYC reader Dan got arrested, again, last night.Please say a prayer so his next stint in rehab holds.
Monday, July 23, 2007
Slow Club...
The Slow Club hosted a private-invite dinner, last night, featuring Sutton Cellars wine. Slow Club is one of the best restaurants in SF and I additionally know the owner, Erin Rooney, who looked especially good in a berry nice dress and boots:
Here is a pic of the main entree: NY steak, short ribs, creamed corn and greens:
Emily dearest, who just got back from India, was also on-hand:
Mid-evening, Kevin Lovering tried to get it on with Emily dearest:
The Slow Club uses Boraxo soap in the restrooms which is basically powder soap that is very efficient at getting one's hands clean:
Lastly, Slow Club always has a nice floral arrangement at the kitchen counter:
Further lastly, here is a link to all the pics from the evening.
Friday, July 20, 2007
Tops...
Here is my second post on my experiences as a Tops supermarket associate, during high school.
As indicated in my previous post, I was primarily hired to do the shitty jobs - collect carts from the parking lot, sort thru returned bottles, etc.
I was even assigned to the occasional cleaning shift - cleaning the crap the usual night-time janitors wouldn't even do - FUN TIMES!
They even had this weird parking lot vacuum that didn't do a damn thing except make the user entirely covered in dust. I was told to use it once on the extended sidewalk in front of the market and I was like - I will just use a broom.
There was also a mildly retarded-man that did the same jobs as I and some other high school schmucks did. He was a nice guy but stuck in the job he had and wasn't treated too nicely by co-workers. It is kind of sad in retrospect, 17 and 18 year old guys doing their best to show up the retarded 30 year old man in the bottle recycling room. No, I did not do it myself. But I did laugh at it.
WHAT?
I had to fit in.
I digress.
My advanced intelligence was recognized fairly quickly. Well, I guess all I had to do was show up on time for them to make that realization, thus was the state of the "competition." Within a few months, I was assigned "price changer" duty and was further made a stockboy, both pretty nice assignments.
For the price changer role, I was given printouts on Friday night and Saturday of the sales for next week and had to go out to the aisles to locate the products to go on sale, scrape off the price tags, replace the counter price tag and then go to a cash register, not in use, and update the computer so the sale prices rang up properly.
On Sunday, the reverse happened, we put the previous on-sale items back to their regular price, updated the counter tag, stamped the stock with price tags and updated the computer.
The hours were pretty crappy but I had no social life back then so it didn't matter.
Basically I would work 3-11 pm on Friday and Saturday and (*gulp*) 6 a.m. to 2 p.m. on Sunday. I was young then, somehow I could do that Saturday to Sunday schedule. They wanted the on-sale merchandise, from the previous week, to be back to the regular price as soon as possible, thus the crazy schedule. Also, NY state had a law on the books that a certain percentage of a market's products needed to be marked with the price, thus my role.
My stockboy duties occupied another one or two evenings a week, back then. Not too much to say there except they had this thing called the sale-wall as people walked into the store. Basically a promenade of that week's items on sale that was immediately available for customers to peruse as they walked into the store. It was taken down late Saturday night and then re-constructed with the next-week's sale items. It was pretty gigantic. Basically multiple layers of product that required super-human (young) muscles to construct.
If I were to attempt what I did back then, today, I would be in traction for a month, due to loading up those boxes of product.
Again, this type of post is going nowhere so I will just end it here.
As indicated in my previous post, I was primarily hired to do the shitty jobs - collect carts from the parking lot, sort thru returned bottles, etc.
I was even assigned to the occasional cleaning shift - cleaning the crap the usual night-time janitors wouldn't even do - FUN TIMES!
They even had this weird parking lot vacuum that didn't do a damn thing except make the user entirely covered in dust. I was told to use it once on the extended sidewalk in front of the market and I was like - I will just use a broom.
There was also a mildly retarded-man that did the same jobs as I and some other high school schmucks did. He was a nice guy but stuck in the job he had and wasn't treated too nicely by co-workers. It is kind of sad in retrospect, 17 and 18 year old guys doing their best to show up the retarded 30 year old man in the bottle recycling room. No, I did not do it myself. But I did laugh at it.
WHAT?
I had to fit in.
I digress.
My advanced intelligence was recognized fairly quickly. Well, I guess all I had to do was show up on time for them to make that realization, thus was the state of the "competition." Within a few months, I was assigned "price changer" duty and was further made a stockboy, both pretty nice assignments.
For the price changer role, I was given printouts on Friday night and Saturday of the sales for next week and had to go out to the aisles to locate the products to go on sale, scrape off the price tags, replace the counter price tag and then go to a cash register, not in use, and update the computer so the sale prices rang up properly.
On Sunday, the reverse happened, we put the previous on-sale items back to their regular price, updated the counter tag, stamped the stock with price tags and updated the computer.
The hours were pretty crappy but I had no social life back then so it didn't matter.
Basically I would work 3-11 pm on Friday and Saturday and (*gulp*) 6 a.m. to 2 p.m. on Sunday. I was young then, somehow I could do that Saturday to Sunday schedule. They wanted the on-sale merchandise, from the previous week, to be back to the regular price as soon as possible, thus the crazy schedule. Also, NY state had a law on the books that a certain percentage of a market's products needed to be marked with the price, thus my role.
My stockboy duties occupied another one or two evenings a week, back then. Not too much to say there except they had this thing called the sale-wall as people walked into the store. Basically a promenade of that week's items on sale that was immediately available for customers to peruse as they walked into the store. It was taken down late Saturday night and then re-constructed with the next-week's sale items. It was pretty gigantic. Basically multiple layers of product that required super-human (young) muscles to construct.
If I were to attempt what I did back then, today, I would be in traction for a month, due to loading up those boxes of product.
Again, this type of post is going nowhere so I will just end it here.
Kiki and Herb...
The highlight of the evening was when they did a cover the Scissor Sister's Take Your Mama.
Here is a pic of ACT's facade:
I purposely did not center the pic for dramatic effect, I am just that good.After I took the pic, after parking my motobike, I ran into Rene and Holly who were also there to see Kiki and Herb:
They graciously agreed to pose for a pic.
Thursday, July 19, 2007
Tops Supermarket...
I quit my newspaper carrier job in the Spring of 1987 in favor of becoming an associate at Tops supermarket. Call me crazy.. being a 17 year old delivering papers no longer held any appeal to me.
I therefore opted for a job where I mostly herded buggies from the parking lot in hot sun, rain and snow; sorted dirty, dirty, dirty, returned bottles into boxes acceptable for the bottle distributors to re-process, occasionally bagged groceries when things got busy and sometimes stocked shelves.
Tops' hiring practices for high school students were fairly sexist. If you were male, you gathered carts and did other crappy jobs. If you were female, you became a cashier. I don't know if either was better, I really wanted to be a cashier for some reason but then again they treated the cashiers pretty crappily - is that a word? Basically there was a 25 year old woman who worked there full time who managed the cashier pool and pushed, pushed, pushed them to their limit to check as fast as they could. I would be surprised if any one of them made more than $10 an hour back then. For some of those folks, and in other departments, Tops was their full time job. There is nothing wrong with that, it just sucks that some youngun felt the need to push them in view of their miserable compensation.
I don't recall what my initial title was, even if I had one, except that I was in the Customer Service department and my bosses were the various managers of the supermarket - one or more was always on duty. They actually treated me pretty nicely. I was asked to do some pretty crappy things, like clean up the broken cranberry juice bottle that someone dropped in aisle 8, but even then it felt like I was their Comrade. I think it was totally a male-2-male type thing - you are of age, welcome to the club!
Well, this post is going nowhere so I will just end it there until I can post something more focused on my experiences as a Tops associate.
I therefore opted for a job where I mostly herded buggies from the parking lot in hot sun, rain and snow; sorted dirty, dirty, dirty, returned bottles into boxes acceptable for the bottle distributors to re-process, occasionally bagged groceries when things got busy and sometimes stocked shelves.
Tops' hiring practices for high school students were fairly sexist. If you were male, you gathered carts and did other crappy jobs. If you were female, you became a cashier. I don't know if either was better, I really wanted to be a cashier for some reason but then again they treated the cashiers pretty crappily - is that a word? Basically there was a 25 year old woman who worked there full time who managed the cashier pool and pushed, pushed, pushed them to their limit to check as fast as they could. I would be surprised if any one of them made more than $10 an hour back then. For some of those folks, and in other departments, Tops was their full time job. There is nothing wrong with that, it just sucks that some youngun felt the need to push them in view of their miserable compensation.
I don't recall what my initial title was, even if I had one, except that I was in the Customer Service department and my bosses were the various managers of the supermarket - one or more was always on duty. They actually treated me pretty nicely. I was asked to do some pretty crappy things, like clean up the broken cranberry juice bottle that someone dropped in aisle 8, but even then it felt like I was their Comrade. I think it was totally a male-2-male type thing - you are of age, welcome to the club!
Well, this post is going nowhere so I will just end it there until I can post something more focused on my experiences as a Tops associate.
Wednesday, July 18, 2007
Tuesday, July 17, 2007
Next...
I suppose I am done with my series on experiences of being a newspaper carrier. I am too lazy to post links except for one to the last one.
I am now thinking further out.
I have LOTS of stories to re-tell of my extended employment history.
With that in mind, I will start my digressions of my next employer that employed me as an associate of Tops supermarket.
I am now thinking further out.
I have LOTS of stories to re-tell of my extended employment history.
With that in mind, I will start my digressions of my next employer that employed me as an associate of Tops supermarket.
Monday, July 16, 2007
Newscarrier tidbits...
Since I wrote part III of my newspaper carrier series, see previous post, various tidbits have been surfacing, each one not really deserving of a post unto themselves so I will just present them as a hodgepodge in one post.
-For some reason, the local supermarket chains published their large circulars on Sunday and Tuesday. Due to that, the Buffalo News offered a Sunday and Tuesday-only subscription which was a pain in the ass for me. I could remember weekend only or Sunday-only customers easily enough but those special Tuesday people sometimes thru me for a loop. I would get halfway thru the route and suddenly remember that cheapo on the other street needs her Tuesday coupons.
-When I inherited the route from the previous newspaper deliverer, there were a couple of houses that weren't on my assigned streets. Instead they were on adjacent streets. The Buffalo News didn't track their customer names back then so a newspaper carrier was pretty much free to take on whatever customer they wanted to within reason. That's what I think happened in that case.
Well, one of those houses belonged to a retired couple who were really nice and always invited me into their home when I came to get their money to pay for the paper. The only thing bad about it, though, was that they smoked like a chimney and had trays and trays of ashes on their kitchen table. They also liked to chitchat. I put up with it the best I could and was gasping for air when I left their home.
On a somewhat related note, there was a neighbor two houses down from us, also not on my route, that wanted me to deliver papers to him. That was going to be a pain in the ass for me cause it was 30 seconds out of my way. I told him I wasn't allowed to do so even though I could. He was a really nice neighbor but was involved in some sort of accident years prior and had to go trough several surgeries on one of his legs. When he wore shorts in the summertime, he also wore.. well, pantyhose for lack of a better term, to hide the injuries on his leg. It always kind of phreaked me out.
-One winter morning in January or February 1983 or 1984, I slipped on some ice on a house's front walk-up path before 7 a.m and broke my ankle. So, I dragged myself down the rest of the path, up two to three stairs and rang the bell so I could use their phone so my father could come pick me up.
I ended up getting Workmen's Compensation during the time I couldn't deliver papers. It was a pittance but better than nothing.
-I received a bill each week from the newspaper distributor for the papers I received. I always paid about half of it in change - about $20. They never seemed to care, God bless them for that.
-For some reason, the local supermarket chains published their large circulars on Sunday and Tuesday. Due to that, the Buffalo News offered a Sunday and Tuesday-only subscription which was a pain in the ass for me. I could remember weekend only or Sunday-only customers easily enough but those special Tuesday people sometimes thru me for a loop. I would get halfway thru the route and suddenly remember that cheapo on the other street needs her Tuesday coupons.
-When I inherited the route from the previous newspaper deliverer, there were a couple of houses that weren't on my assigned streets. Instead they were on adjacent streets. The Buffalo News didn't track their customer names back then so a newspaper carrier was pretty much free to take on whatever customer they wanted to within reason. That's what I think happened in that case.
Well, one of those houses belonged to a retired couple who were really nice and always invited me into their home when I came to get their money to pay for the paper. The only thing bad about it, though, was that they smoked like a chimney and had trays and trays of ashes on their kitchen table. They also liked to chitchat. I put up with it the best I could and was gasping for air when I left their home.
On a somewhat related note, there was a neighbor two houses down from us, also not on my route, that wanted me to deliver papers to him. That was going to be a pain in the ass for me cause it was 30 seconds out of my way. I told him I wasn't allowed to do so even though I could. He was a really nice neighbor but was involved in some sort of accident years prior and had to go trough several surgeries on one of his legs. When he wore shorts in the summertime, he also wore.. well, pantyhose for lack of a better term, to hide the injuries on his leg. It always kind of phreaked me out.
-One winter morning in January or February 1983 or 1984, I slipped on some ice on a house's front walk-up path before 7 a.m and broke my ankle. So, I dragged myself down the rest of the path, up two to three stairs and rang the bell so I could use their phone so my father could come pick me up.
I ended up getting Workmen's Compensation during the time I couldn't deliver papers. It was a pittance but better than nothing.
-I received a bill each week from the newspaper distributor for the papers I received. I always paid about half of it in change - about $20. They never seemed to care, God bless them for that.
The winter of my discontent...
Here is another installment of my newspaper carrier series. Click here for parts I and II.
In 10th grade, I decided to try to be a jock once more. In 9th grade, I tried cross country running in the fall but didn't care too much about running 6 to 7 miles every day as part of after-school practice. So, I opted for indoor track, during 10th grade, which is an indoor (duh) winter sport - December thru February or so.
It was much better than cross country running, only had to run 3 miles max on any day, the team was larger, more diverse and co-ed due to the number of different events track can involve - short distance, somewhat longer distance, speedwalking, jumping over those thingies (I can't remember the name of them off hand) during a race.
I was even able to place some respectable finishes at a few meets. Nothing earth-shattering but enough to feel like I belonged to the jock-click, to an extent.
After-school practices tended to be longer, however, even though I wasn't running as much - just two coaches tending to 30 students in various events. Due to that, I had to find someone to do my paper route weekday afternoons. (The Buffalo paper, at that time, was a weekly afternoon paper and a morning paper on weekends).
Well, I found some kid down the street that said he would do it. The first few weeks went by ok, a few missed papers here and there. Then, one day, he decides he wasn't going to deliver the papers! So, I get home about 6 p.m. to a ton of phone messages about non-delivered papers. I delivered the papers late, talked to the kid and his parent. They promised it wouldn't happen again.
It happened again that same week.
I canned him and got someone else to do it for me which worked out.
I went to collect the weekly newspaper fare from the customers that next weekend and boy were they pissed. Alot of people simply wouldn't even talk to me and just threw money at me. Hardly any tips either. Even the people who were always nice to me, well most people were nice but some were nicer than others, suddenly thought I was the worst person ever.
People took delivery of their paper that seriously back then.
Well, that all happened a week and a half before Christmas and the the next weekend when I went to collect the newspaper fare, it was like night and day. People were filled with the Christmas spirit, apologized for being mean to me and gave me my yearly Christmas card with bonus.
*sniffle*
In 10th grade, I decided to try to be a jock once more. In 9th grade, I tried cross country running in the fall but didn't care too much about running 6 to 7 miles every day as part of after-school practice. So, I opted for indoor track, during 10th grade, which is an indoor (duh) winter sport - December thru February or so.
It was much better than cross country running, only had to run 3 miles max on any day, the team was larger, more diverse and co-ed due to the number of different events track can involve - short distance, somewhat longer distance, speedwalking, jumping over those thingies (I can't remember the name of them off hand) during a race.
I was even able to place some respectable finishes at a few meets. Nothing earth-shattering but enough to feel like I belonged to the jock-click, to an extent.
After-school practices tended to be longer, however, even though I wasn't running as much - just two coaches tending to 30 students in various events. Due to that, I had to find someone to do my paper route weekday afternoons. (The Buffalo paper, at that time, was a weekly afternoon paper and a morning paper on weekends).
Well, I found some kid down the street that said he would do it. The first few weeks went by ok, a few missed papers here and there. Then, one day, he decides he wasn't going to deliver the papers! So, I get home about 6 p.m. to a ton of phone messages about non-delivered papers. I delivered the papers late, talked to the kid and his parent. They promised it wouldn't happen again.
It happened again that same week.
I canned him and got someone else to do it for me which worked out.
I went to collect the weekly newspaper fare from the customers that next weekend and boy were they pissed. Alot of people simply wouldn't even talk to me and just threw money at me. Hardly any tips either. Even the people who were always nice to me, well most people were nice but some were nicer than others, suddenly thought I was the worst person ever.
People took delivery of their paper that seriously back then.
Well, that all happened a week and a half before Christmas and the the next weekend when I went to collect the newspaper fare, it was like night and day. People were filled with the Christmas spirit, apologized for being mean to me and gave me my yearly Christmas card with bonus.
*sniffle*
Saturday, July 14, 2007
Only in Japan?
From Mainichi Daily News:HAKONE, Kanagawa -- A "ramen bath" has been opened at Hakone Kowakien Yunessun, a local theme park and hot spa.
The bath, shaped like a ramen bowl, contains pepper-flavored water colored a light, milky brown, to like tonkotsu (pork bone) ramen soup. The special bath was created jointly by the theme park and a famous ramen shop, Nantsuttei in Hadano, Kanagawa Prefecture.
The bath was completed at the unveiling event, with the owner of Nantsuttei adding "noodles" made of bathwater additives into the tub.
The water contains collagen and garlic extracts, and theme park officials claim it can help produce beautiful skin and aid moisture retention.*BLINK*
Friday, July 13, 2007
The Power Lords...
I have been meaning to do this post for awhile. It is the second of a hopefully continuing, but finite, series on my experiences as a newspaper carrier from 1982-1986 in Lancaster, N.Y.
The first one can be read here.
Let me first espouse on my then self-professed title of "newspaper carrier."
I clearly recall the day on October 4, 1982 (ok, I had to look up the date but I do remember the day) when the Supreme Court effectively killed the ERA amendment. It was my habit to read the front page of the paper as I delivered papers, continuing to the next paragraph, or so, with each paper I pulled from my bag, house to house.
In my then limited experience, and it was probably the 1st time I read anything substantial on the ERA, my Polish-Mexican sensibilities were affronted.
I mean it was bad enough that the people on my route called me a tortilla-pierogi behind my back but then they called me a paperboy to my face.
It was then that I decided I would be a newspaper carrier and I have never looked back.
Now that all that is out of the way, I will now tell my loyal readers about three customers that I deemed as The Power Lords.
Basically, there were three brick houses in a row each containing active retired people and they filled their summer months by weeding their lawns and they therefore forbade me from walking on their perfect lawns, even in winter, when I delivered their newspapers. I am not kidding on this. They went thru their lawns by hand to remove weeds and had fancy mowers to achieve a perfect, even lawn height.
In retrospect, their lawns were perfect but cutting across the lawns of the customers cut my overall delivery time in half and the other 57 customers didn't care that they had a permanent indentation in their lawns from delivery of their papers, due to my preferred trail. Additionally, reruns of Cagney and Lacey started promptly at 3 p.m. on VH1, back then, my papers were delivered by 2:30 most days and I therefore had to hustle to get back home in time.
So, I always silently cursed these three homes, as I delivered their papers via their driveway and walk-up cement path, due to their power over me to miss the first few minutes of Cagney and Lacey, thus I referred to them as The Power Lords.
Anyway, they are probably all dead now and the latest Google satellite pic shows that at least two of their lawns are mostly brown:
*snicker*
The first one can be read here.
Let me first espouse on my then self-professed title of "newspaper carrier."
I clearly recall the day on October 4, 1982 (ok, I had to look up the date but I do remember the day) when the Supreme Court effectively killed the ERA amendment. It was my habit to read the front page of the paper as I delivered papers, continuing to the next paragraph, or so, with each paper I pulled from my bag, house to house.
In my then limited experience, and it was probably the 1st time I read anything substantial on the ERA, my Polish-Mexican sensibilities were affronted.
I mean it was bad enough that the people on my route called me a tortilla-pierogi behind my back but then they called me a paperboy to my face.
It was then that I decided I would be a newspaper carrier and I have never looked back.
Now that all that is out of the way, I will now tell my loyal readers about three customers that I deemed as The Power Lords.
Basically, there were three brick houses in a row each containing active retired people and they filled their summer months by weeding their lawns and they therefore forbade me from walking on their perfect lawns, even in winter, when I delivered their newspapers. I am not kidding on this. They went thru their lawns by hand to remove weeds and had fancy mowers to achieve a perfect, even lawn height.
In retrospect, their lawns were perfect but cutting across the lawns of the customers cut my overall delivery time in half and the other 57 customers didn't care that they had a permanent indentation in their lawns from delivery of their papers, due to my preferred trail. Additionally, reruns of Cagney and Lacey started promptly at 3 p.m. on VH1, back then, my papers were delivered by 2:30 most days and I therefore had to hustle to get back home in time.
So, I always silently cursed these three homes, as I delivered their papers via their driveway and walk-up cement path, due to their power over me to miss the first few minutes of Cagney and Lacey, thus I referred to them as The Power Lords.
Anyway, they are probably all dead now and the latest Google satellite pic shows that at least two of their lawns are mostly brown:
*snicker*
Mike Wade should have knitted this...
Matty (and Robert when he gets an iPhone) needs this...
Thursday, July 12, 2007
Wednesday, July 11, 2007
Ed Jew: Borderline...
You may remember my post a few weeks back on San Francisco Supervisor Ed Jew.
Well, someone decided to sing his support for him at a Board of Supervisor's meeting, sung to Madonna's "Borderline."
Monday, July 9, 2007
Rene's birthday dinner...
'Nuff said.It was a fun evening.
And here is a nice pic of Rene jr.:
I will post a few more pics tomorrow.
Update: Here is a pic of Dennis' most excellent Shrinky Dink art gift he made for Rene:
Here is the ceiling of the Front Porch restaurant:
And here are some of the decorations in the corner of our booth:
To see all the pics, click here.
I ran across this photo I took awhile back of a wrapping job I did for some presents for a DPV birthday and thought I would share it with my loyal readers.People have always complemented me on my lack of present wrapping skills. I can wrap nicely if I choose to but it has somewhat become a badge of honor to do things in haste with lots of tape and uneven edges.
The wrapped presents, in the above-posted pic, included a Dean and Deluca steel lunchbox that had various food items in it and the two side items are VHS tapes of a satirical mini-series take on Dallas, the tv show. The mini-series was entitled "Fresno," where DPV is from, and starred Carol Burnett. She was kind of like J.R. but instead of having an oil company, they had a raisin company.
So, I had that three-part present in hand and decided to make a Princess Leia wrapping job, thus the pic of her and why I attached the VHS tapes to the sides in that manner - to simulate her famous hairdo.
I also like to sometimes wrap larger toys out-of-the-box.
In 2001, I got my nephew Colin a Big Wheel for Christmas and I wrapped that as is. It took a good 2 hours to cover every surface. When I arrived with it in-hand, my then 1.5 year old niece wanted it for herself and was quite traumatized to be pulled away from the seat so it could be unwrapped.
Another year, I got my other nephew Andrew a skateboard and somehow he was able to guess what it was since I did a similar wrapping job.
Sunday, July 8, 2007
Saturday, July 7, 2007
It is time to take action on global warming...
It was almost 10,000 degrees F. in Concord, CA, yesterday!!
Friday, July 6, 2007
I have seen the future...
And the future is here.That there is a carrier strapped onto a scooter so the owner can take their dog along for the ride.
Thursday, July 5, 2007
Freedom Kitties...
Here are some kitty pics taken on the 4th of July.
First up is Elroy bravely standing guard at the window for an enemy attack:
Next is a pic of Myrna ZEALOUSLY guarding the Internet from harmful sun radiation:
First up is Elroy bravely standing guard at the window for an enemy attack:
Next is a pic of Myrna ZEALOUSLY guarding the Internet from harmful sun radiation:
Wednesday, July 4, 2007
Our nation's 231st anniversary...
Mr. Allen graciously hosted an Independence day garden party in his backyard.
I self-appointed myself as chairperson of the decorations committee and here are some pics of the magic I created:
FINE, it was Mr. Allen's idea to put the wrap around the banana tree.
Thank you to Mike Wade and Ingrid for helping me get the decorations up.
I was also self-appointed as the chair of the dessert committee.
I selected Martha Stewart's dessert of the month:
It is a two-layer shortcake with cream and fruit in the middle with star cut-outs on the top layer into which fruit is inserted.
Here is how my top layer resulted:
I had some issues with getting the stars out and it didn't look to pretty after the stars were removed.
The final dessert turned out quite nicely, though - *WHEW*
On the way to the party, I had two large bags in my hatch filled with blown-up balloons. It was quite a nice day so I had my windows down and the sunroof open.
Unfortch', I had not sealed the garbage bags sufficiently. Within minutes, my car was looking like a jiffy pop container of red, white and blue balloons.
I stopped and remedied the situation.
I self-appointed myself as chairperson of the decorations committee and here are some pics of the magic I created:
FINE, it was Mr. Allen's idea to put the wrap around the banana tree.
Thank you to Mike Wade and Ingrid for helping me get the decorations up.I was also self-appointed as the chair of the dessert committee.
I selected Martha Stewart's dessert of the month:
It is a two-layer shortcake with cream and fruit in the middle with star cut-outs on the top layer into which fruit is inserted.
Here is how my top layer resulted:
I had some issues with getting the stars out and it didn't look to pretty after the stars were removed.
The final dessert turned out quite nicely, though - *WHEW*
On the way to the party, I had two large bags in my hatch filled with blown-up balloons. It was quite a nice day so I had my windows down and the sunroof open.
Unfortch', I had not sealed the garbage bags sufficiently. Within minutes, my car was looking like a jiffy pop container of red, white and blue balloons.
I stopped and remedied the situation.
Tuesday, July 3, 2007
It seems no one is noticing my
little joke.
Look at the last pic in the chain letter post.
I added addresses for Robert, Mike, Jon, Julia and Dan.
Look at the last pic in the chain letter post.
I added addresses for Robert, Mike, Jon, Julia and Dan.
Monday, July 2, 2007
Chain letter...
I received my first ever real chain letter in the postal mail today.
It was kind of neat to receive such a vestige of a bygone, pre-Internet era.
Here is a blowup of a section of one of the pages where it says it is not a chain letter:
And, here is a list of the addresses that every one of my loyal readers needs to send a dollar to and copies of these pics:
Uhmm..
I can't break the chain, that would be bad luck.
Mr. Hendy's dead baby...
After wrapping up the operations of the Hollyloaf night, Emaleth entrusted me with Mr. Hendy's dead baby that she so graciously gifted to him but he forgot to take with him due to his quest to capture evil photos in the Tenderloin. In retrospect, I am not surprised he forgot his dead baby.
About a week later I remembered that the dead baby was entrusted to my care.
I found it in a plastic bag.
Anyway, Mr. Hendy will receive his dead baby, again, on the 4th and hopefully it won't end up in the recycling bin.
HA!
I had you fooled, I can tell.
There is no dead baby involved here.
It is merely a paper bag employed in India, I think, to instruct new mothers to go see a doctor if their babies shows symptoms of.. hmm..I guess the script is Sanskrit, one pic looks like polio, one looks like the baby won't wake up - that one seems like common sense to seek medical help, I am sure I am mistaken on what that one represents, another one is if their baby starts coughing smoke after having a ciggie then medical help should also be sought out, another is measles, another is malnutrition (again, a mother needs a reminder in this case if medical help is available?) and I think the kid with the open mouth has a cleft palate.
Oh.. Wasabi duckie is merely in the pic to add a sense of whimsy to this post.
Your favorite NPR-fan, canvas-bag type of user needs this...
It's the Nina Totenberg "Nina-tote bag."Nina Totenberg is the main legal reporter for NPR. She reports on the Supreme Court and other national legal issues.
While I like Nina's reporting style, I am much more a fan of Sylvia Poggioli, NPR's European correspondent:
I would eat Sylvia Poggioli ravioli any day of the week.
What?
She is Italian.
There is no double meaning there.
4th of July...
I am already chairing the dessert and decoration committees for a planned 4th of July garden party.Due to that, please do not ask me to ensure the perfection of your 4th of July plans.
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