Wednesday, July 11, 2012

Ouch...


All I wanted to do was make some dinner. Some easy, simple, not from a box dinner.

That also involved using a knife.

OWIE OWIE OWIE OWIE OWIE OWIE


And then I cut the tip off my finger. It’s my favorite finger.

I point with it.

It’s the finger I use to hold down the string when tying knots.

Being my left hand (I’m right handed) I also use it in certain situations when I’m unsure whether I’ll get it back or not.

It’s my nose-pickin’ finger too. Just sayin’.

On that note, using my right index finger feels a bit like what I’d imagine driving a car in England might feel like. Familiar territory, but upside down.

It also throbs. In a bad way.

It’s goddamn pizza night tomorrow.

Friday, July 6, 2012

I Have No Idea What I'm Doing


Today my wife reminded me for the 923rd time since June 6th that I need to write our cancellation notice to Terminix.

Terminix bought the company we actually contracted with to come out regularly and spray around the house. That’s right. Six goddamn weeks after we signed our contract we get a note in the mail saying, “Congratulations! You are about to get completely screwed!”

Apparently when you sign up with Terminix, it’s forever. The contract is good for only a year, but unless you say in writing you don’t want them stopping by anymore, they’ll continue to charge you whether they show up or not.

As it happens, they actually served as promised over the remaining year. Notifying us in advance as to when they were scheduled to come, contact info if we needed them to come inside, showing up on time. At their last service the dude came by and it was just beginning to rain. He was like “Dude. If I spray today it will be totally useless. How ‘bout I come by next week?” Whoa. That was unexpected.

Don’t care. I didn’t sign a contract with Terminix. I didn’t want Terminix. So now I’m done with Terminix.

I know what yer thinkin’, “So, you got what you paid for, got good customer service and you don’t like it?” Yes. That’s exactly what I’m saying.

Here’s why. I’m 100% convinced that for a fraction of the cost I can treat my own house and yard for bugs.

And there’s the infinite contract extension thing. Now bug companies aren’t the only one to do this, but to have to actually write a letter? I can’t just call or email?

My wife had July 4-5 off for the holiday. She cleaned the house from top to bottom. And now I can’t find a damn thing. I wrote and printed and signed the stupid letter. Then I searched and searched for an envelope. Couldn’t find one. I had to text her at work:

Me: “Ok, I wrote the letter. Can’t find the envelopes.”

Her: “Should be a box on my desk”

Me: “The only box on your desk says Puffs Plus.”

Her: “On the desktop there should be the envelopes, if not look in the built in for a new box”

Me: “Pool time”

So I found a new box of envelopes. Then I realized it may have been about 15 years since I’ve mailed a letter. I had no idea what postage costs nowadays. She has sheets of stamps in a folder, some say 44 cents. Some say 45 cents. Some say 1 cent. So I asked the Google. USPS said it was going to cost 86 cents to mail this. And I was like, “No it’s not.”  So I searched some more.


It’s 45 cents.

By the time I got the *!%^#! letter out to the mailbox the mailman had already come.

And we have a spider infestation. Tiny ones. Weird white striped jumping ones. Their white puff ball egg sacs are under all the furniture and undoubtedly behind things I can’t get behind.

"Hi! Wanna see my parlor?"


I have no idea what I’m doing.

UPDATE:

Just before going on vacation to visit the grandparents last week the Terminix robot called to say they were coming out to spray as scheduled. I called them and calmly explained I had written a letter and blogged about it to terminate our contract. So she terminated it. I was supposed to get a call the next day to confirm. Didn't. I called them again. They said, "Yeah. Says right here. Cancelled." And then while on vacation they came anyway. I had to call them back. Guess what?! They were 'sorry'. At least they credited me back and I didn't have to threaten them with anything homeland security would water board me for.