Caterwauling

Today’s Gemini horoscope:

“You’re filled with positive energy, and your powers of persuasion are heightened to an insane degree. You might even be able to convince yourself of something you really want to believe!”

I live in the land of Denial, so convincing myself of what I want to be true isn’t a stretch. In fact, I’m smiling at everyone who’s there in the land of make-believe with me, who thinks these projects on my desk are going to come together soon, too. *waves*

Actually, life is all about mind over matter. And it is slowly pulling me into reality, one agonizing step at a time, making me deal with lots of stuff I thought I could avoid if I pretended it didn’t exist. Some good, some bad, some I didn’t think was even worth the effort of dealing with in the first place.

In any event, the horoscope means something to me in that things I actually did try to deny, things that could be good or maybe even blow up in my face, are starting to show on my face. And I’m not sure if hiding them is, or will always be, the right way to handle them. But for now, it’s the only way I know.

On the other hand, I couldn’t lie or hide something to save my life, so at least if whatever it is escapes my tight little grasp, there will be resolution one way or another. Perhaps this is where I try to believe in the ending I want rather than the one I expect after all. …

I just don’t get the expectation that, if I walk into a restaurant and place an order to go, that I should tip. If I were getting it delivered, I’d tip the driver. If it were coming to the table, I’d tip the server. But if I’m standing around dealing with rudeness and incompetence, NO TIP FOR YOU!

Stopped in at my favorite Italian restaurant the other day. And by “favorite,” I mean the food and not the atmosphere, hence why it’s a pickup job only. The girl behind the counter disappeared in the back (as I learned later, to put in her own lunch order and chat with the cook) for five minutes. Then she came out and proceeded to stare at the walls while I stood at the register where, gee — I don’t know, I was waiting to ORDER.

Then when she somehow became aware that she wasn’t the only person in the room, she acted surprised and grudgingly helped me. (Why I waited that long, I don’t know. Probably because it was raining and I wasn’t going anywhere else.) And the brightest bulb in the box, she wasn’t, as I ordered cheese fries and a sammich, and she said, “You need fries with that?”

Was this McDonald’s? Jesus. I said, “I already ordered fries.” And she said, “Yeah, but do you want plain fries, too?”

*thunk*

The funny part of all this is that the owner came by to charge her for her lunch order. Ironically she had ordered fries for herself and he got mad at her because fries aren’t part of the deal for employees. (I wondered whether she wanted me to order them and donate them to her.)

I guess she had to pay for her lunch, and she started whining that she was working a double shift and NOT ONE PERSON had tipped her. (She looked just past my head when she said it.) Annoying, insolent little brat — is it any wonder nobody wants to give you an extra buck for your oh-so-sunshiney demeanor?

To my delight, one of the servers happily chirped, “You might want to try being nice to the customers if you want tips!”

I don’t know. I remember working those shit jobs where they tried to make you feel lucky for busting your ass for THEM. The wages sucked, the customers sucked and the management sucked even worse. I get that. Really, I do. But even though I used to go above and beyond, when I could, I never got or even expected a tip.

I could have used tips, don’t get me wrong, but it’s sort of a rite of passage to work crap jobs so you can appreciate a good one when/if it ever comes. I used to tell an old boss that I couldn’t wait to get a “real” job. That showed up on my review every year. 😉

Anyway, I’m not above tipping. I appreciate my servers, the drivers, the cabbies, the guy who hails the cab in the rain, the clerks at curbside check-in at the airport, the people who help me with my luggage. I’m not an asshole — we’re all wage slaves. But not only am I not overly compelled to tip the person who merely talks to me 20 seconds to type my order into a register, but I’m sure as HELL not going to reward you just for showing up at your job and not giving me the time of day.

I don’t expect you to remember that you’ve taken my order 20 times in the past year (in the same surly, dismissive manner). I do expect you to get my order right (which is usually hit-or-miss, truth be told) and maybe even take it in a courteous and — gasp! — friendly way.

If you can’t even manage that, and you have the nerve to complain about it in front of me, well, I’ll come back because I like the food. But I assure you, there’s never going to be anything extra in it for you … unless it’s a kick in the ass. 🙂 And there’s ALWAYS more where THAT came from!!!

I’m contemplating having custom-printed stationery made up for when people drive me perfectly batshit.

It will look like a note that you might have sent/received in grade school, with little checkboxes a la the, “Do you like me? Check yes or no” motif.

But mine will be even better. Mine are going to say, “Do you want me to kill you now? Or later? Check one.”

Good for those days when homicide is your ONLY option!

I can’t make a better case for socialized medicine than Helen did in her “Doctor, Doctor” post.

I will say, however, that I think it’s goddamned ludicrous here in the States that you go to a dentist for some emergency work because you’re in pain, and that dentist (or whatever type of doctor) has the right to run a credit check and never call you again because you’re not worthy of treatment if you’re uninsured and have a credit score below a certain number. Even if you might just have the means to make payments.

And it’s not that these medical magicians even love the big insurance companies; they’re somewhat forced to take lower levels of reimbursement in exchange for the guarantee of being paid for services rendered. Nobody wants to put their services “on sale” but if salaries have to be paid, you take it where you can get it.

A lot of people posit whether universal health care, other than being a tremendous cost, would sacrifice the quality of services rendered. From my view, I have yet to enter a hospital or doctor/dentist’s office and leave feeling like a miracle happened or that anyone cared enough to provide more than a bare-bones level of service, if that. At least with socialized health care, you could excuse the impersonal care because at least everyone is entitled to some. Which is more important?

A lot of the health care costs in this so-called “land of the plenty” are reactive, anyway. Preventive care would save a whole lot of grief in the end, and you wouldn’t have people like me who are conditioned to avoid medical professionals at all costs because the out-of-pocket expense (even with coverage) is enough to make us wonder, well, do I REALLY need to address that?

I fear we’re all in deep doo-doo if we ever stopped feeling ashamed enough to admit we actually do care about our health. My dentist needs to do about $1,500 of work on me that’s not covered by my plan; I’ve been dodging his assistant’s calls for six months. And they’re not a big fan of payments, either — if you don’t have it up front, then seeya.

I don’t know. If the incompetence exhibited at Veterans Hospital (dig through the archives; I can’t bear to look at those posts) is an example of socialized medicine, then we’re all doomed. But one of the issues that will persuade me to vote for a candidate in the upcoming presidential election is a solid plan to ensure that every American has access to health care, because no circumstance should be extenuating enough to tell someone that their life isn’t worth anything in this world.

Hell, it’s our specialty! And we serve it on the house!

Today is a day for a chick movie, no doubt about it. But “Georgia Rule” isn’t playing anywhere local enough that doesn’t require packing a canteen and a change of clothes. Are people banning it from their crappy movie-houses because of Lindsay’s “usable amount” of cocaine? Seriously, apparently it wasn’t usable enough or the cops wouldn’t have FOUND it.

The only other alternatives look to be “Knocked Up” (I love Katie Heigl, but, um, NO) and “Waitress,” which might be the winner if the effort is even worth making. At a time when I’m wondering where the hell my own cycle even is, I”d rather not watch movies that are about shitting out babies, thankyouverymuch. 😉

I assume I won’t find myself in a guest-starring role in either type of movie anytime soon, because I’m alternating between the weepies and the bitchies with the change of each second on the clock.

To wit, I was in a store today and this woman was seriously admiring a god-awful straw hat. With red-checkered gingham trim and some flowers glued on for good measure. *huz* I nearly tweeted whether it was rude to tell someone they have no taste now before they spend the money or whether it would be better to just laugh at them when they bought the item. (She put the item in her cart, so I assume it now has a home. *twitch*)

People weren’t moving fast enough for me today, either. I blurted out to one asshole who was in my way and not leaving, “Um, MOVE!” and to another, I said, “GET!” You know, like we do to our pets. Heh.

Don’t get me wrong, though, with the next mood swing, I felt pretty bad, so don’t hate on me, here. 😉 I’m a LITTLE EMOTIONAL, people!

Also, drove thru Taco Bell, where the order got annhilated. Shocker, I know. Second car in line, and it took 18 minutes to get the order. Which they promptly threw in upside-down and it was a glorious mess. As I was taking my sweet time driving up to the window (the first car’s order took 16 of those 18 minutes), the asshole behind me blew his horn at me to move it.

Jesus Christmas. Seriously? He was already up my ass — I thought he could have pushed me if he wanted to. But not one to allow an occurrence to go by without comment (don’t ask me about my Wednesday meeting. Just, don’t. Tourette’s, anyone?), I shouted, “I’ve got a GODDAMNED TACO for you to EAT!!!”

LOL. I just don’t know WHY people don’t like to ride with me in the car. 😉

All right, both movies start in an hour. Time to start inching toward the theater and if life has it that one of the dozen distractions in-between precludes a cinema experience, so be it. …

I’d call it a day from hell, but it’s only the first circle of the inferno. (It’s those eighth-concentric-circle days that you’ve got to watch out for.) Today there was just a warm breeze and not an eternal flame up my ass, so yay for survival! 😉

* You know I complain all the time because restaurants can’t get my order right because apparently I’m too well-spoken. So tonight, I wasn’t the least bit surprised when our dinner order got screwed up … at a Mexican restaurant. At least they were cheerful enough to make the order right, so kudos there.

* Today boys and girls, we learned that if you’re going to be taping a Web video (via, say, Camtasia Studio) in which you are showing people neat stuff they can do with Teh Interwebs, for God’s sake, CLEAR YOUR HISTORY. Why the hired help was surfing SexToySex.com, however, is a question for another day. …

* The quote of the day comes in relation to someone I haven’t stopped bitching about for six months, but I wasn’t the one who came up with this. But that won’t stop me from using it. “[Dumbshit] is one of those people who thinks they can eat coal and fart out a diamond.” I’d say that’s an excellent summation for anyone who thinks they’re better than you are!