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Author Archives: Jeff Whittle
Mt. Juliet’s Chapstick Shortage
There is a chapstick shortage in Mt. Juliet. Apparently it was caused by the city officials kissing Walmart’s butt by offering them a tax break if they would build a Super Walmart here. Walmart is already committed to building one in Hermitage, and said thanks but no thanks to the offer. We don’t need a Super Walmart here. It would just create traffic problems. No one is going to drive all the way out here to do their shopping at Walmart. There’s already a Super Walmart in Lebanon.
Mailbox baseball has hit home, literally. This afternoon I found my mailbox scuffed up. The mailbox homerun probably happened sometime last night. I’m not sure what motivates people to be destructive to other people’s property. Sewing their wild oats?
Note to self: Never ever ever ever pay full price for a Pizza Hut pizza. Always use a coupon or don’t buy it at all. Tonight I got a large meatlovers pizza for $11.90. The cost without a coupon: $16….outrageous when you take into consideration you can easily get a large one topping pizza for $7.57.
Homepage Watch
Homepage watch: Matt Folker’s webpage has been taken offline. Most likely Matt took it offline himself. Matt has pretty much taken himself out of the loop. He doesn’t answer IMs on the limited occassions that he’s online. Also Zack Bennett’s homepage is gone. Most likely it was taken offline by Geocities due to lack of updates.
I’ve noticed that Geocities has been deleting old webpages lately. On the other hand Tripod doesn’t even bother deleting pages. Example: This Tripod page hasn’t been updated since 1997, yet Tripod still gleefully hosts it.
I picked up Cracker’s new CD today. I haven’t listened to all of it. What I’ve heard sounds ok. It came with a bonus live CD which is really good. I tend to like songs more if I hear them being played on the radio. Radio tends to give a song a kind of “legitamacy.” I doubt that I’ll be hearing any of these songs on mainstream radio. I might catch it on Lightning 100.
Ski Trip Called Off
Well the proposed ski trip has been called off for now. There was too many people dropping out due to vacations. Also we were trying to work around certain airlines which some people were needing to take for frequent flyer miles. I’m not too disappointed. I know I’ll eventually get to ski out west. It just looks like this year is just too late to plan for it.
Browsers
I’ve tried using Netscape 6.2, but it’s really buggy. For example, when I type in a web address, sometimes it goes to a totally different webpage. Hit reload and the correct page usually appears, but sometimes it goes back to the same wrong page. Looks like I’m stuck with Netscape 4.7 for most of my surfing until Netscape comes out with a better product. I refuse to use Internet Explorer as my primary web browser, simply because of M$’s monopoly on everything.
I’m thinking about downloading Opera. The thing holding me back is knowing a full version of Opera will cost $39. Somehow Opera is going to have to convince me that it is worth paying $39 for it, when I can get a similar product with Netscape for free.
Commenting about Big Ski Trips
I’ve implemented the ability for readers to post comments about my weblog entries. So if you want to post your thoughts about my comments, feel free to. The link is at the bottom of each entry.
There’s a small group of us from church who are planning a big ski trip out west this February or March. We’ve talked about going to Lake Tahoe, Nevada. I’ve been there before. It was September 2000 with my work. The scenery was absolutely beautiful. I’m sure it is even more beautiful in winter. I’m a bit intimidated by looking at some of the trailmaps at Heavenly Ski Resort. It’s much larger than what I’ve ever seen. I hope I’ll be able to keep up.
A friend and I were having an email discussion about skiing. He said that anything was better than Paoli. I’m wondering if there are worse places to ski compared to Paoli. There’s Appalachian Ski Mtn. I’ve been there before. The runs are probably longer than Paoli, but there are fewer. There’s Perfect North, which I haven’t been to. It’s trailmap looks much sparser compared to Paoli. I did some internet searching and found that there is a ski place in Georgia…..Ski Sky Valley. No trailmap is posted on their site.
The bottom line is that there are far more worse places to ski at. Paoli is ok. It’s not the best and certainly isn’t the absolute worst.
Propoganda Posters – World War
Propoganda Posters – World War II…..remember, when you ride alone, you’re riding with Hitler!
Blue Light Specials
Kmart has gone bankrupt. They’re under Chapter 11 protection. They are hoping to recover by this time next year. I, for one, hope they won’t go under. I shop at Kmart. I like it because 1) it is not crowded; I can get in and out without having to wait in long lines and 2) Photo processing gets done in 1 day. On the other hand Walmart is always crowded and photo processing takes at least 2 days. Ironically one of the things that I like about Kmart is the thing that is bringing it down: No one is shopping there. The Hermitage Kmart is never crowded.
During the summers of 1994-1996 I worked retail. I worked as a cashier at Walmart during 1994; and as a Sporting Goods Worker at Kmart duing 1995 and 1996. I can honestly say that I enjoyed working at Kmart over Walmart. Walmart was pretty strict with the proceedures. Before even going out in the store, I had to take a 2 week training course and watch all these proceedure videos. Kmart was more laid back. I can remember one rainy Sunday night when no customers were in the store….I got on the intercom and said “Severed heads on sale in sporting goods!”
Since Walmart was much busier than Kmart, I have alot more interesting experiences. These include:
- Watching security personel wrestle a shoplifter to the floor. He was trying to steal a $5 stereo wire.
- The whole store being evacuated because of a bomb threat. The police actually had the nerve to ask Walmart employees to go in there with them and look for a bomb. Does employee comp cover this?
- A lady buying the entire shelf of deodorants to sell at her own store.
- Someone trying to pass a brand new $10 bill with the series of 1910. It was an obvious fake.
- Doing the Walmart cheer during training class. Give me a “double-U!” Give me and “A!” etc….
- Regularly seeing customers throw a fit because Walmart didn’t accept out of state checks.
I have much less weirder experiences while working at Kmart. Usually it was something like a customer trying to switch UPC symbols in order to get an item cheaper than what it really was. Then there was the people who would buy a stick of gum with a $100 bill at the beginning of the day. I never had enough change in my drawer. Don’t these people have checking accounts????
Mojave Desert Payphone…..story of a
Mojave Desert Payphone…..story of a payphone in the middle of nowhere.
Obscure References
Keeping a web diary (i.e. weblog) does have its positive aspects. Twice now a long lost friend has called me making some obscure reference to something I’ve posted here. So now I know that people are reading these incoherent babblings here. I do have to keep telling myself that this weblog is public and I need to be careful about what I post here. Any criticisms are public and could get back to the person I’m criticizing.
Saturday night I saw Ocean’s Eleven with some friends in Gallatin. The movie theater where we saw it at is located on the square in Gallatin. It’s nice old movie theater. The movie was only $4 and much better than the last movie I saw, Lord of the Rings. Typically I judge a movie on how good it is by the number of times I look at my watch during the movie. I didn’t look at my watch any time during Ocean’s.
Martin Luther King Day is tomorrow. At the risk of sounding racist, there are a few words from King’s “I Have a Dream” speech that have always seemed to be against racial quotas. The words are “I have a dream that my four children will one day live in a nation where they will not be judged by the color of their skin but by the content of their character.” Somehow that always echos in my mind everytime someone mentions hiring someone or giving out scholarships based on skin color. Content of character is important. Using skin color as a basis for hiring someone is just watering down the effect of one’s integrity.