It's way to early to be this irritated.

My very first phone call this morning is from a store manager. She tells me she needs the content list of a fragrence oil. I let her know I will email it to her and she asks me to contact the customer directly since she is at the hospital. Since the customer already has established communications with the store we prefer the store to handle it so the customer doesnt feel bounced around. The manager tells me, "but you guys are customer service you represent the company, I am just a store manager." I think I died a little inside right then. This store manager doesn't think that she represents the company on a more personal level by having face to face interactions with customers, I am just a voice over a phone. You don't get to be a store manager by your management skills, you get there becuase you can provide good customer service, they train you on the management responsibilities.

She took down my name and extension so she will probably complain about me, but I am not worried the information I gave her was straight from my supervisor. So that has already put me in a bit of a mood this morning, and I have only been here for 50 minutes.

I didn't go to Kung-Fu last night and I am kind of irritated about it. My knee has been hurting a lot here lately and I am not sure what I have been doing to make it hurt. My lower back is still hurting as well but I think that is a posture thing more than anything else. I am going to look for a small pillow that I can put at the base of my chair for support. Damn, I am getting old.

I have been watching this show on the Discovery Channel called Fight Quest. I am not sure if I have talked about it before. There are these two guys who are fighters and they are travelling around the world and they have 5 days to train in the art of the week and then they have to fight someone trained in that art. The guys seem to pick up on stuff rather quickly but I do have some problems with the show. After 5 days you are not going to use what you just learned if your taking a beating your going to revert back to what you know.

I think the show is good for people who are interested in learning a martial art but don't really know anything about it. Melissa refuses to watch it she thinks that it is really stupid. I enjoy watching the training aspects of the differnet arts they are learning. I have seen shows of them studying Hapkido, Savate, Kali, Brazilian Ju-Jitsu and Krav Maga. I think that I am missing an episode but whatever. I was really excited about the Krav Maga one and I watched it last night, it was somewhat lacking. They did not really teach them technique but it was more about just straight endurance and learning how to take a beating and maintain focus. I am sure that it works over there but I don't really consider it a martial art from what I saw last night.

Bugh, all of the sudden my stomach hurts and I am not in the mood to blog. I will update tomorrow or Thursday.

Until later.

Slow day, I am bored

Well it is Thursday my least favorite day of the week. At least they are letting us wear jeans today. The poker heater that I was enjoying earlier this month is completely over. I lost 5 buy ins yesterday, the usual variance swing. I flop straight vs. a set and the board pairs. I flop top two pair and he rivers a flush. I got some software and I am going to record some sessions and have them looked at by a couple of friends. The issue I am having is my audio lags and I am not sure how to fix it.

I went to class last night and got to work on some new things concerning foot work and using it to advance and retreat and to apply pressure to an opponent. I did some touch hands with Bobby and we broke it down a little bit more and that allowed me to work on individual aspects and that helped a lot. I think I will do ok in the sparring, we will see.

I just finished "Confessor" by Terry Goodkind, it is the 10th in a series I have been reading for quite some time. It did a good job of wrapping everything up and had a good finish. I am back to reading "Preacher" graphic novels, I am on book 7 and it is one of the best comic series I have ever read. I used to really enjoy comics when I was younger but was never really hardcore. I am reading this because Matt recommended it to me and it is really very good.

It is time for the customer pet peeve of the day. I hate when someone comes on the line and I give my opening and ask, "How can I help you?" They reply, "I am not sure if you can help me but I hope you can" and then they wait for like a moment like I am going to tell them yes or no before I even know the question. Just ask me the damn question and we will find out. Also I hate people when I ask for their name they say Jill and I say ok Ji....and they cut me off to spell it. I say ok Ji...and they cut me off again to say that the last name is Johnson. I say ok ji...and they cut me off again to spell it. I am not retarded people I am pretty good at spelling and believe me I will ask if I can figure it out, stop wasting time and ask your question.

I love when people won't give their name; they say something like "I don't think you need that." Damn you found me out I was going to use your name to hunt you down and steal your identity or put you on the mailing list. What the fuck on people. When people ask me why I need their name I say, "So I know who I am talking to." I say it really slow with a 'hey your an idiot’ tone.

Well thats it really, not much else to say.

Until Later.

Fucking IRS

I filed my taxes last week and was pretty excited that I was going to be getting over $900 back. I had it all setup to go into my account and was either going to use the cash on a down payment on a new car or use it to buy my laptop. I check my account and its not there, I have a little notice saying that part of it might have been used towards a debt. I have outstanding student loans from like 7 years ago and I guess that is where the money went. I can’t even call and inquire until the 17th. So now, no car and no laptop just my fucking luck. I can't catch a fucking break it’s fucking ridiculous. I am the unluckiest guy I know, it’s really pissing me off.

On a related note I sat down last night to play some poker and was off to a great start winning 5 buy ins right off the bat in less than 200 hands. Then all of the sudden a return of my bad luck and I am down the 5 buy ins that I had just won plus another 8. KK vs. AJ on a Jack high flop get it all in and a Jack on the river. AQ vs. KJ AK3 flop the guy check raises me all in and I snap all and he his a damn jack on the river. I was up until 4AM and FINALLY made it back to even.

So now I am tired, in a shitty mood and I really don't want to be at work. Today is not the day to screw with me people. I don’t understand why people can play so fucking bad and they get my money. It really pisses me off. So many times guys would just smooth call with AA or QQ and it holds up. I do that and I get snapped off. It’s really fucking irritating.

Pretty much in the worst mood ever and I really don’t want to do anything. I realize this is a pity party for me but it’s my blog don't read it if you don't like it.

Until Later

Valentines Day

I get a call today from a woman who wants an additional discount on damaged merchandise in the store. We go back and forth for awhile. The store offered her 25% and she says that's not enough. I told her that we are not going to do more than that. She tells me, "I don't expect you to see my point, but I do expect you to understand my point." What the fuck lady, that is the stupidest comment I have heard this week. I almost said that comment makes absolutely no sense and I am more stupid for having heard it.

Last night I move up and started playing 10NL. I have beaten that level before and it was not hard but I ran horrible last night. The play was a lot worse than I remember it being from before. I played ~3100 hands and lost 7 buy ins, yea it went that bad. AA vs. J9 we get it all in on the flop that is jack high and he hits a 9 on the river. I would have like KQ and he has KJ we flop a king and he calls me down and hits a jack on the river. I really ran badly. People are playing very passive, like smooth calling with QQ when in the small blind. That is a horrible play but I couldn’t get lucky. So it is back down to 5NL for a little bit longer. I think I can be back to where I was in a few days, hopefully the next time I take a shot I will run a little better.

I skipped class last night; I just really wasn’t in the mood. I regret it today so I might go to the Friday night class tomorrow night. I hung out with Melissa and we watched "The Kingdom." It was amazing; the last 30 minutes were seriously nonstop. Very intense movie. Melissa liked it as well but it won't be a movie that we will own, we just won’t watch it enough. She doesn't like to re watch movies like that. I am not sure if we have anything else to watch currently. I recorded 25 hour with Edward Norton and watched about half of it the other day. I am going to finish that one soon it was shaping up to be really good. I am a big Edward Norton fan and have seen a lot of his movies and I am glad that this one is good so far. He is remaking the Hulk and is the lead character of Bruce Banner. I am not sure how I feel about that the last one was absolute trash, but he did some of the writing on this new one and is a comic book fan so we will see.

Today is Valentines Day the day that greeting card companies use to make guys spend money. I am really indifferent about this day; I don’t hate it or love it. I am in a bit of a quandary though. I was going to get Melissa a pea coat but I haven’t been able to find one. I told her about it so we could go shopping for one that she liked but nada couldn’t find one at all. So now it’s the day and I have nothing. I am going to stop on the way home and get her something. I know its last minute but we are off together on Wednesdays now and I can’t very well take her with me for the usual type of Valentines Day present.

I have been speaking with Kevin about careers and stuff a lot lately and he kind of got onto me for not having my resume updated and still out there. I told him that I am currently happy with my job but I am not sure about the upward mobility aspect of it. We talked at length and he said I should put up a resume that is tailored towards sales jobs because there is an opportunity to make a lot more money. So I have been doing some updating and it's such a whip. It is very time consuming and I am just not overly good at this kind of thing. Luckily Kevin has been looking over the ideas I have and giving his insight. I don’t hate my job its really one of the best ones that I have had, but I could be missing out on something.

Well that’s really it for now. I think I am going to start incorporating the stupid customer comment of the day. It will get me started and I can move from there.

Until later

Customers and updates

I don't know if it is because I am a closet dork or if is because of my age but I never choose to call into a customer service call center. I will email or a web chat before I call in that is how much I really hate it. These people call in looking for store phone numbers and address. Hello its 2008 most cell phones can get onto the internet, how do you live and not own one. I am pretty dependant on technology but that’s better than having to sit on the phone when I can find the answer myself.

I take so many calls that nit pick over the smallest shit, like the monkey we had in our ad. We had people calling in saying that its animal cruelty and other people calling to saying its degrading to humans to have a monkey in the ad. Get a fucking life, you don’t have anything better to do than call in to complain about that?

To all the Canadian shoppers who call in pissed because of the price difference I just want to say get over it. Good job on your dollar being worth like .03 more than ours but its still a United States based company. We ship it to your store for you. I will let you order from an American store and pay international shipping and see how much better off you are.

All the people who buy home furnishings and then leave them unopened for 8 months just to find out it doesn’t work in your space. Too bad, if you have enough money to buy something and not use it for that long then you should not be worried about the cost when it doesn't fit.

All the people who are totally ok with buying something but then call in when it goes on sale saying that it’s a huge difference. You obviously didn't have a problem paying for it at full price. Stop being cheap. I would love to meet the person who came up with the idea of price adjustments in the first place, do you not like money.

Last part of this rant I am tired of people who feel like they can treat people like me or associates who work retail like shit because they don't understand the concept of business. They say well this isn’t customer service, customer service doesn't mean that you get to run over people and do whatever the hell you want. The customer is not always right and is in some cases quite the asshole. End rant.

...Cleansing breath...

Ok I just had to put that out there. Poker has been sick this month I am playing very well and running decently. I am up something like 30 buy ins for the month. I will post a graph when I get home and can access my database. I am on track to be close to 25nl again maybe by the end of this month. I am not sure what I changed but its working.

The dealing on Monday's and Saturday's fell through. I got it all worked out with work and then I can't get a hold of the girl that I would be dealing for. I am a little irritated about it, but nothing can be done. I could really use the money. I hate setting something like this up just for it to fall through.

Kung-Fu is going very well also. I feel that I am picking up this new material very quickly. I have been touching hands with Bobby as much as possible and I think that is really helping me out. The senior students watch and offer tips and tricks and that is very helpful. We start another sparring class soon and I am really excited about that. I will get my clock cleaned but it will be very helpful in keeping my head and remaining relaxed.

Last week I started talking with this car lot about a car I was interested in. The car was a 2005 Subaru WRX, pretty much the only car I am interested in buying at the moment. I dealt with 3 different salesmen and none of them would call me back. I was approved for the car but I just wanted to have it all worked out before I drove to Lewisville. The sold the car on Saturday afternoon 3 days after I started talking to someone about it. Needless to say I was a little pissed off, I spoke with the sales manager and filed a complaint. He let me know that he has 2 more coming in the next 7-10 days and he would hold them until I got to look at them. I also emailed the main dealer website. Hopefully this turns out well and I can get a deal on the car that I want. If not I am going to go on a crusade to wreck this place.

I really hated calling in to complain but these guys were horrible, no one would call me back and I couldn't get a hold of anyway. You can’t sell cars and just wait for shit to fall into your lap. You need to hustle to make money. Then there is the whole service issue. I wasn’t expecting them to hold the car for me but if someone would have called me back I would have gotten the car.

Anyway that’s it for now.
Until Later.

Feb update; the first of many

Ok so it's Superbowl Sunday and I am at work, it is not a huge deal though. I like Superbowl parties but if I was at home I wouldnt be watching the game most likely. I played a little poker on Friday night and I think my Friday night curse is lifted. I had a 5 buy in session which is the biggest session I have had in awhile. The total session was less than 900 hands so my winrate for the month looks pretty good. Lets hope I can maintain for a month so I can get to a point where I can pay some bills atleast with my profits.

I think I am going to start dealing on a few Monday nights. I will be missing Kung-Fu but I could really use the money to get my laptop and to get into a new car. I will make up by going to Friday night classes at Kung-Fu. I am really tired of my truck and really want to get into a new car and just need to get some cash together.

I am going to go with a custom built laptop at HP.com as opposed to buying one from a store. I can get everything I want and its a little bit cheaper this way. I have to wait like 2 weeks for it to be shipped but no big deal. Having that will really up my monthly hand amount for poker and that should be a good thing as long as I continue to play decently.

Kung-Fu is going well, I am learning a lot of new things including; Clinch Drill, Arm-breaking drill, and first progressions in Chi-Sao. The progressions are hard because it everyone does them a little differently, but I will get them soon. Everything else is going pretty well, things are coming along smoothly.

That is really it for now not much else going on. I will update again soon.

Until later.