Ok. I know this is corny, but I have to do it or else I’ll end up snapping and killing someone. Probably online, in a video game, but still.

GET ME OUTTA HERE!

I’m serious. I’m stuck in what seems to be a dead-end job at a retail store. I have no degree because I have immense difficulty in classroom situations (being a hands-on learner, combined with the 2 facts of Fellow Student Idiots and Idiotic Required Courses [why any sort of public speaking course should be mandatory for any sort of technical field is beyond me]), I have no certifications because of lack of funds from working said dead-end job, and I’m not really into the whole ‘the customer is always right’ craze, because most of the time, they’re not. Customers, by general definition (not specific people, but customers as a whole), are idiots. They don’t KNOW what they want or need, and that’s why we’re here. Then they say “Well, that’s too expensive, so I’ll get $crap_that_won’t_do_anything_I_want instead.” Then they come back complaining that it, gasp, didn’t do what they want.

Unfortunately, the only real things I’m decent at are computer repair/support, and webdesign (and even that one is sorely lacking in both content and practice lately), and there’s no market in this area really for someone who doesn’t have some sort of corporate backing. Plus if I got caught, I’d get fired, which would make things hella worse.

So I appeal to nobody, everybody, and even the great and powerful Anonymous. Just to make myself heard, you know.

Well, here I am again. It seems like this is going to be a habit for me, now. Just returned home from work a few minutes ago, decided I’m gonna order a cheesesteak but I’m trying to decide where to order from. Work, being work, was painfully slow all day long. The store had barely any people in it, and this makes for a LONG day for us menial floor workers.

I also received my feedback from my interview for our open Agent on Deck position, which I sadly did not obtain. Not that I thought I would, mind you. There seems to be a pattern here. I’ve interviewed for at least 5 positions in the store over the past 2 years, and I haven’t gotten a single one. And do you know where most of the problem lies? Or at least where they SAY the problem lies? My appearance.

Yes, folks, it’s mostly the hair. For those of you who don’t know or have never seen me in person/picture form, I have longish hair (reaches to just below my shoulders), which has a nasty tendency to curl/twist/snarl itself, making for a rather unenjoyable experience trying to tame it. The other major problem is that, being that my body is the way it is, a lot of deodorants and antiperspirants tend not to work for me. Now, I don’t know about anyone else, but there’s very little I can do about THAT situation. I’ve tried different brands, I’ve tried both spray/roll-on, I’ve tried praying to dark gods under a new moon. Nothing works, so far. I’ve still got a few brands to go to try, but if they don’t work I really don’t want to have to check into prescription deodorants.

So it seems like I’ll be stuck on the sales floor of Best Buy for yet another undetermined amount of time, unless Ray can find some way to actually get me an interview down at his store for their Double Agent spot. It seems like any time he can interview me, I’m scheduled at our store. I’ll have to see if he can do something like a phone interview or some such.

I think this is where I’ll end this for now, maybe I’ll post something tech-related later tonight. Peace out, y’all.

Wow, I just (well, not really JUST) discovered this site, and decided to put something here. Leave my little mark on yet another social distortion, y’know?

Anyway, I’m thinking this will just be my general rant site, besides my Twitter account for more small stuff, I can post big rants on my thoughts, hopes, dreams, crushed realities, visions, hell, I could put D&D game transcripts here if I really wanted to. It’s my own little world!

Let’s see, where to start…Ah! I know. Kvetching about computer/electronic equipment.

I purchased, not too long ago, the Pinnacle Systems PCTV HD PCI card (model 800i, if memory serves, which it usually does half-assed), and it kinda works. I mean it kinda works like a moped is kinda a motorcycle. First, the CD wouldn’t work in my computer, but I found out later that that was caused by my DVD burner (the only active ROM drive in the Tor) suddenly refusing to read CDs of any kind. DVDs, fine, CDs, nothing.

Second, the Vista support is relatively lacking. Yes, it has a Vista/XP MCE installer utility. Yes, the card is recognized by Media Center. Yes, video and audio both show up, and channels do appear. However, the audio lags about a half-second behind the video. Looking on Pinnacle’s support forum, I am about one in 300 people who have this problem and actually are saying something about it.

Now, this card DOES come with Pinnacle’s own TVCenter Pro application, but this application seems to have been spawned in the bowels of something I’d rather leave to my D&D side of my imagination. The program is a serious resource hog, the UI is not exactly intuitive (although it’s not extremely bad, either…), such as having the up and down arrows reversed from what common sense would define as ‘up’ and ‘down’ when scrolling through channel listings.

Many on the Pinnacle site have pinned the Media Center problem down to the software encoder that the card uses, and this has been proven by them switching encoders and the audio/video sync problem goes away. Now, they posted this information on a Pinnacle Support forum, with Pinnacle support reps watching said thread, a few months ago. Not one peep from the support lackeys since this information was uncovered, and no new updates/patches to the software have come out since October of last year, well before the problem was identified.

My second hardware gripe lies not in the realm of PC per se, but in the realm of console gaming. My Xbox 360 recently decided it had had enough of my mediocre musical ability in Rock Band and had a seizure, resulting in a rather amusing (for a few seconds) checkerboard pattern on the screen during the unit freezing up, followed by the infamous Red Ring of Death appearing upon subsequent reboots of the console.

I do have the replacement plan from Best Buy. since, y’know, I work there and all, and it IS a good idea, especially in this case. Unfortunately USING said replacement plan usually entails there being another unit in the store to replace the dead unit with. There was none. There have been no 360s besides the bastard child of the family, the 360 Arcade Edition, since Christmas time, and apparently we are not alone in this. No store in our DISTRICT has had these things since then. Microsoft, WTF?!

I think I’m done for the night ranting here, and if I can keep this up, I can make this into a regular place where people can actually find out what’s going on in my life! …not that I’m entirely sure that that’s a good thing, anyway. We’ll see.