This blog post will have a completely different tone from the one I had imagined. I know, you might be tired of hearing me rant about yeah... you know... _that_ company. I actually was going to commend them for how well they had managed during the latest weather conditions. Despite the latest snows I still haven't been more than a minute late because of them. (I've been late for a number of other reasons like 'chronological optimism bordering on naiveté on my behalf' and 'talking too long with old friends'). So in a fit of uncomparable fairness I decided to write a blog post about how well they did. I mean if i reserve the right to moan and whine about them when they do wrong, I feel, at least a little, like I owe them a nice word when they exceed my expectations.
I started writing it yesterday with the intent of publishing it some time during the weekend or so. Then today happened. In the post where I described my latest enounter with the collection of navel-lint formerly known as Cave-mongo Inc, formerly known as Västtrafik I told you about how they managed to fuck up my auto-renewal. Last week I got a text from Aardvark Ltd telling me that my buspass was about to expire but it will autorenew on thursday (today).
'Neat, so it's working properly again then! Even with the auto-renewal.' I was a bit worried since the first renewal was most likely done manually that there might still be something wrong with the real auto-renewal process.
Then I got another text from them telling me that my buspass was about to expire but it will autorenew on thursday (today). And then another.
'Lol, they can't even do this right. They must have messed up the notifications somehow so I'm getting three notifications each time my buspass is about to expire.'
Today I got a text telling me that 75$ had been withdrawn from my account to renew my buspass. Then I got another. And then another.
'Lol they still haven't fixed the notification bug'
Yes, my dear reader I really am _that_ gullible. Or maybe it's that I'm so cheerful and loving that I always think the best of people. Or maybe, just maybe I expected that someone would do their job, properly. Obviously that was too much to ask from Invertebrates'RUs. Of course my imaginary world came crashing down around me. Of course they had triple-billed me. Not double-billed me. Triple-billed me.
I contacted customer support and of course I was greeted by a girl with a nice voice. I swear they do that just to throw me off track when I'm ready to tantrum. I'm such a newbie-rager, I let my rage subside if I'm confronted with things like kindness, professional treatment and understanding for my situation.
Unfortunately she was as about as competent as a door knob and had to go fetch another girl. They both reached the conclusion that something wasn't as it should be. I audibly slammed my fist into the sofa, it was all that I could do not to scream out:
'YOU THINK?!?!?!?!' out loud
'We have to pass this on to the economics department. They'll look into this tomorrow...
'OK.'
'... or within three days. Definitely within three days.'
I'm not making this up to make this sound like a bad movie dialogue. That is literally word for word what she said to me. Last time I got the 'Definitely within three days' I had to contact them after four and a half day. Let's just say that I'm restraining myself from optimism. At least she told me that she had all my details there so that the economics department doesn't have to ask me all that stuff again.
Pro tip: If you're buying food to have for dinner and decide on bratwurst because you're certain that you have one pack of instant mashed potatoes in the cupboard at home because you can picture that exact pack in your mind, make sure that that pack that you're picturing really really is mashed potatoes and not, say, a pack of bread crumbs.
Thursday, February 16, 2012
Tuesday, February 14, 2012
Valentines day, Whine-Horny and Sell-out
Yes, I have 'Every rose has its thorn' on repeat this Valentine's day as well. Starting to become bit of a tradition. Still I wish everyone a happy valentines day.
I read something this morning that made me all warm on the inside. Someone commented on a news article I read, writing something like 'That woman is really whine-horny'.I decided to pick up the term right there and then. Unfortunately I almost immediatly realised that my blog posts some of the time come across like I too might have an erotic fascination for complaining. Well my only excuse is that I don't do it for the sex.
Now a confession, if you look around this blog post you might notice that I've gone 'sell-out' on you all, my dear readers. Yup I let google in and let them display their fillthy capitalistic ads here. Apparently the ads will be based on your surfing habits and what I write about on the blog. That mix sure will be interesting to see. I'm guessing that you'll be seeing ads displaying Bitter-lemon, naked ladies and the latest Neanderthal exhibit, featuring life-size cave-men with bus driver uniforms. I'll let you draw your conclusion which of the ads are connected to my blog posts and which of them are related to your surfing. Actually, who am I kidding, they're all mine.
I don't have many reasons for taking on the ads. It's not like I'm going expecting to get rich from this. (better not, with my posting frequency). It was just one of those 'why not' things. If I'm met with violent protests and molotov cocktails through my living room window, I will remove them again, I promise. I can also be swayed with flatter and hugs. I actually prefer that to the violent approach, god knows my living room is cold enough as it is even with intact window panes.
I just have to point out that now I'm listening to a Lullabye version of 'Every rose has its thorn'. I suppose you really can find anything on the internet.
Pro tip: If someone that you interact with on a regular basis, say a good friend, boss or co-worker sends you a picture of their relatively newborn girl, keep in mind that not everyone automatically equates newborn baby with 'cute and beautiful', hence taking the following glib remark directed at the father 'I see she has her mothers looks and your intellect' to an entirely different level of disrespect.
I read something this morning that made me all warm on the inside. Someone commented on a news article I read, writing something like 'That woman is really whine-horny'.I decided to pick up the term right there and then. Unfortunately I almost immediatly realised that my blog posts some of the time come across like I too might have an erotic fascination for complaining. Well my only excuse is that I don't do it for the sex.
Now a confession, if you look around this blog post you might notice that I've gone 'sell-out' on you all, my dear readers. Yup I let google in and let them display their fillthy capitalistic ads here. Apparently the ads will be based on your surfing habits and what I write about on the blog. That mix sure will be interesting to see. I'm guessing that you'll be seeing ads displaying Bitter-lemon, naked ladies and the latest Neanderthal exhibit, featuring life-size cave-men with bus driver uniforms. I'll let you draw your conclusion which of the ads are connected to my blog posts and which of them are related to your surfing. Actually, who am I kidding, they're all mine.
I don't have many reasons for taking on the ads. It's not like I'm going expecting to get rich from this. (better not, with my posting frequency). It was just one of those 'why not' things. If I'm met with violent protests and molotov cocktails through my living room window, I will remove them again, I promise. I can also be swayed with flatter and hugs. I actually prefer that to the violent approach, god knows my living room is cold enough as it is even with intact window panes.
I just have to point out that now I'm listening to a Lullabye version of 'Every rose has its thorn'. I suppose you really can find anything on the internet.
Pro tip: If someone that you interact with on a regular basis, say a good friend, boss or co-worker sends you a picture of their relatively newborn girl, keep in mind that not everyone automatically equates newborn baby with 'cute and beautiful', hence taking the following glib remark directed at the father 'I see she has her mothers looks and your intellect' to an entirely different level of disrespect.
Tuesday, February 07, 2012
Sofas and Thingies
It's been a while since last. Sorry about that. I'm sure you've all missed me like a tooth ache. Because I'm so sweet! No that didn't make sense, I know.
Let's get the usual stuff out of the way so we can focus on more important stuff later. My rant about CaveMongo Inc. They've implemented a new business plan. It's called 'Take Peters money and still don't let him ride our vehicles'. It started with a beep too many. When I show my buspass to the thingy on the bus/tram it goes 'beep' and shows a friendly green light. A couple of weeks ago the thingy instead it went 'beepbeep' accompanied with an angry red light instead. I didn't think anything of it and figured that it just hadn't scanned my pass properly. (because that's the most common cause for getting ze old 'double-beep-red-light'). As time progressed I started noticing a trend. Every time I showed my pass I got the red light. After a day and a half I actually bothered to read the display:
'Expired'.
'AHA!' You all think, 'this will be a story about that fat retard not renewing his buspass in time.'
But no. I actually have my buspass on auto-renew, connected to my credit card. So I logged into my online-bank to check if any payments have failed. To my utter astonishment it had not. I'm as surprised as you dear reader, all signs point to the unlikely theory that CaveMongo Inc had fucked up. Me being a strong admirer of the worlds first private detective and his axiom 'When you've ruled out the impossible, whatever remains, however improbable, must be the truth' so I called customer service. The girl who answered had a friendly voice and asked me a lot of questions just like customer support usually do.
'Hi, my buspass isn't working, when I show it to the thingy on the bus it says 'expired'.
'Have you logged onto our webpage and checked the status of your card there?'
'Yes, it says expired'
'What's your card number?'
'123456789' (no not really)
'Ah yes I see here that your last renewal was in december. So everything is in order, you just haven't paid us. The auto-renewal must have failed somehow, sorry about that. I'll set up a new one'
'Hold it hold it hold it! We are going to hold it here. Here is where we will be holding. Holding is what we are going to do and 'it' is going to be what we are holding. You've taken money from my account on Jan 4th.'
'Uhhmm, well... I see'
'Yes'
'But then the renewal should be on its way, you just need to show your buspass to a reader and everything will be fixed, nothing to worry about.' (apparently 'reader' is the technical term for 'thingy'. I will continue to use the term 'thingy' not to confuse the blue and yellow gizmos with you guys. Now I have a mental image of people reading my blog while attached to the fixtures of a public transport vehicle)
'Do you remember the beginning of this conversation when I said that it said 'expired' when I showed my buspass to the thingy? One could say that it actually was one of the motivational forces for me to actually enter this conversation with you.'
'Yes... I'll have to transfer you to the economy department to see what went wrong, but they've already went home for the day. They'll be back on monday. What was that sound?'
'Nothing, just me carving a chunk of flesh from my thigh, have a nice weekend!'
'I've written down everything about your case here so you don't have to answer any questions.'
Come monday, I had a long electronical conversation with another customer support-person (not the economy department as promised), having to explain pretty much everything above again. Two days pass and nothing happens, not a word about anything. On wednesday evening I write an addendum to the conversation I've been having with 'other customer-support person':
'I realise that it's not very fun or motivational to listen to peoples complaints all day so I'll remain civilised. In exchange, can you please walk over to the economy department and pretend that I just called you and chewed your ass off'
After an hour a reply came back:
'We will be sending you a replacement card'
See? It pays off to be nice.
I've also bought a new sofa! It's very comfy, and large. I'd found a nice sofa on the internet for just about 1300$ and went to the furniture store to take a look at it in person and, you know, get acquainted with it, perhaps take it out to dinner and a movie if we hit it off. These kind of relationships you don't just rush into. After a couple of minutes we were interrupted by a sales-girl. She asked me if I had found something I liked and I asked her if this sofa was available in any other colours. A little away from the sofa of course not to hurt the sofas feelings. She had some samples for me to look at and I picked a colour I liked. We went downstairs to her desk and she started doing the paperwork and calculations then turned to me with a friendly smile.
'There, then it'll be 2500$'
I squinted my eyes suspiciously. 'Did you by chance perhaps sell used cars before you landed this job? Or maybe suspicious underwear subscriptions over the phone'
She then explained to me that the colour that I had found on the internet was on sale and it normally costed 2000$ and that the fabric I chose was a more expensive one.
'Oh ok. Well 2500$ is a bit steep for me. I'll get back to you.'
She gave me her phone number if I had a change of heart, but looked very disappointed. I got back home and pondered, gave the walls a good look. Picturing the sofa with the original colours, trying to make a mental image of what it would all look like together and decided that it probably would look pretty well together. The next day I went back and told the girl
'Yup the guy you never thought you'd see again is back.'
I've never seen anyone _that_ happy to see me. I suppose she really needed the sale or something. Or she thought I was handsome. Toss-up in my mind.
(here there would be a picture of the sofa if blogger hadn't gone all sofa-nazi on me and refused to upload it)
Pro tip of the day:
If you're sitting on a bus and have decided to shave your beard because it's starting to look 'above average sleazy' and is pondering what to say to the cute cashier at the store where you're buying your razor-blades to charm her and have finally settled on 'I've gotta get rid of this whole taliban-thing I've got going'. Then it's extremely crucial to make sure that you're just thinking it inside your head and not just blurting it out for everyone else on the bus to hear.
P.S. Today the thingy 'double-beeped' again stating 'Balance too low' as a reason. 'I don't need to have a balance! I've paid to ride for free the entire month!'. I swear I'm considering getting a car again, happily paying gas, insurance and taxes just to spite the motherfuckers. Fuck you, environment! If these retards are your ambassadors you should be shopping for new ones. I hear George W Bush is looking for a new job.
Let's get the usual stuff out of the way so we can focus on more important stuff later. My rant about CaveMongo Inc. They've implemented a new business plan. It's called 'Take Peters money and still don't let him ride our vehicles'. It started with a beep too many. When I show my buspass to the thingy on the bus/tram it goes 'beep' and shows a friendly green light. A couple of weeks ago the thingy instead it went 'beepbeep' accompanied with an angry red light instead. I didn't think anything of it and figured that it just hadn't scanned my pass properly. (because that's the most common cause for getting ze old 'double-beep-red-light'). As time progressed I started noticing a trend. Every time I showed my pass I got the red light. After a day and a half I actually bothered to read the display:
'Expired'.
'AHA!' You all think, 'this will be a story about that fat retard not renewing his buspass in time.'
But no. I actually have my buspass on auto-renew, connected to my credit card. So I logged into my online-bank to check if any payments have failed. To my utter astonishment it had not. I'm as surprised as you dear reader, all signs point to the unlikely theory that CaveMongo Inc had fucked up. Me being a strong admirer of the worlds first private detective and his axiom 'When you've ruled out the impossible, whatever remains, however improbable, must be the truth' so I called customer service. The girl who answered had a friendly voice and asked me a lot of questions just like customer support usually do.
'Hi, my buspass isn't working, when I show it to the thingy on the bus it says 'expired'.
'Have you logged onto our webpage and checked the status of your card there?'
'Yes, it says expired'
'What's your card number?'
'123456789' (no not really)
'Ah yes I see here that your last renewal was in december. So everything is in order, you just haven't paid us. The auto-renewal must have failed somehow, sorry about that. I'll set up a new one'
'Hold it hold it hold it! We are going to hold it here. Here is where we will be holding. Holding is what we are going to do and 'it' is going to be what we are holding. You've taken money from my account on Jan 4th.'
'Uhhmm, well... I see'
'Yes'
'But then the renewal should be on its way, you just need to show your buspass to a reader and everything will be fixed, nothing to worry about.' (apparently 'reader' is the technical term for 'thingy'. I will continue to use the term 'thingy' not to confuse the blue and yellow gizmos with you guys. Now I have a mental image of people reading my blog while attached to the fixtures of a public transport vehicle)
'Do you remember the beginning of this conversation when I said that it said 'expired' when I showed my buspass to the thingy? One could say that it actually was one of the motivational forces for me to actually enter this conversation with you.'
'Yes... I'll have to transfer you to the economy department to see what went wrong, but they've already went home for the day. They'll be back on monday. What was that sound?'
'Nothing, just me carving a chunk of flesh from my thigh, have a nice weekend!'
'I've written down everything about your case here so you don't have to answer any questions.'
Come monday, I had a long electronical conversation with another customer support-person (not the economy department as promised), having to explain pretty much everything above again. Two days pass and nothing happens, not a word about anything. On wednesday evening I write an addendum to the conversation I've been having with 'other customer-support person':
'I realise that it's not very fun or motivational to listen to peoples complaints all day so I'll remain civilised. In exchange, can you please walk over to the economy department and pretend that I just called you and chewed your ass off'
After an hour a reply came back:
'We will be sending you a replacement card'
See? It pays off to be nice.
I've also bought a new sofa! It's very comfy, and large. I'd found a nice sofa on the internet for just about 1300$ and went to the furniture store to take a look at it in person and, you know, get acquainted with it, perhaps take it out to dinner and a movie if we hit it off. These kind of relationships you don't just rush into. After a couple of minutes we were interrupted by a sales-girl. She asked me if I had found something I liked and I asked her if this sofa was available in any other colours. A little away from the sofa of course not to hurt the sofas feelings. She had some samples for me to look at and I picked a colour I liked. We went downstairs to her desk and she started doing the paperwork and calculations then turned to me with a friendly smile.
'There, then it'll be 2500$'
I squinted my eyes suspiciously. 'Did you by chance perhaps sell used cars before you landed this job? Or maybe suspicious underwear subscriptions over the phone'
She then explained to me that the colour that I had found on the internet was on sale and it normally costed 2000$ and that the fabric I chose was a more expensive one.
'Oh ok. Well 2500$ is a bit steep for me. I'll get back to you.'
She gave me her phone number if I had a change of heart, but looked very disappointed. I got back home and pondered, gave the walls a good look. Picturing the sofa with the original colours, trying to make a mental image of what it would all look like together and decided that it probably would look pretty well together. The next day I went back and told the girl
'Yup the guy you never thought you'd see again is back.'
I've never seen anyone _that_ happy to see me. I suppose she really needed the sale or something. Or she thought I was handsome. Toss-up in my mind.
(here there would be a picture of the sofa if blogger hadn't gone all sofa-nazi on me and refused to upload it)
Pro tip of the day:
If you're sitting on a bus and have decided to shave your beard because it's starting to look 'above average sleazy' and is pondering what to say to the cute cashier at the store where you're buying your razor-blades to charm her and have finally settled on 'I've gotta get rid of this whole taliban-thing I've got going'. Then it's extremely crucial to make sure that you're just thinking it inside your head and not just blurting it out for everyone else on the bus to hear.
P.S. Today the thingy 'double-beeped' again stating 'Balance too low' as a reason. 'I don't need to have a balance! I've paid to ride for free the entire month!'. I swear I'm considering getting a car again, happily paying gas, insurance and taxes just to spite the motherfuckers. Fuck you, environment! If these retards are your ambassadors you should be shopping for new ones. I hear George W Bush is looking for a new job.
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