Tuesday, January 27, 2009

Quite Frankly

From CNN.com comes word that there are going to be restrictions on the kinds of things that will be allowed to be done with the stimulus money.

I honestly don't give a shit if they hire folks at $20 an hour (plus benefits) to dig holes in the ground with plastic spoons and then have other folks following behind them, also at $20 an hour, filling the fuckers back in.

If you are going to spend the money .. just spend it! Once you have the politicians micromanaging a pile of money this tall it is going to end up being eaten by lobbyists and other forms of vermin.

I think that Lewis Black says it best ...

Saturday, January 24, 2009

"Green" Soda

Via a regular reader ... yes I have a couple .. comes this ...
Make your own soda: It's easy, fun, and good for the planet | Yahoo! Green

I admit to being a sparkling spring water snob myself but I might just give this a try...

Sunday, January 11, 2009

Why I am no longer a Walgreens Customer

Search Results | Store Locator | Walgreens
Walgreens Store Locator
Details currently displayed
149 Deming St, Manchester, CT 06042
Map this store

Phone
(860) 644-1210

Store Hours
M – F: 7:00AM-10:00PM
Sat: 7:00AM-10:00PM
Sun: 7:00AM-10:00PM

Pharmacy Hours
Open 24 Hours

Most of the time I write about politics or the economy or sometimes even music. This time I am writing something purely to bitch about how stupid a company can be when they really put their mind to it.

I live right around the corner from a Walgreens pharmacy and since I am basically lazy this is my pharmacy of choice. I will, however not ever be shopping there, or any other Walgreens, again and here is why.

A month or so ago I ordered refills on some prescriptions expecting to pick them up on sunday evening after spending the day watching football safe in the knowledge that my favoured store was open late. When I went to pick up my prescriptions after the ball games were over I was surprised to see that the pharmacy was closed. The assistant manager was very nice about it but she said that their usual Sunday hours were to close the pharmacy portion of the store at 6PM. I told her that it would be nice if they had information matching that on their website. She was nice enough to let me show her on the site where the information for her store was and how it was wrong.

I was directed to the nearest 24 hour Walgreens store (just a couple miles away) and they filled my prescriptions quickly and efficiently. Little did I know that this would come back to haunt me.

I sent a note to Walgreens customer service and got a very nice phone call from the manager a week or so later. He was very apologetic and said that such things were looked after by corporate but that I could rest assured that it was being fixed.

So, today I went on the Walgreens website and ordered refills for the same 3 prescriptions as I had previously filled at my favorite store. They were also the same 3 prescriptions that I had filled at the 24 hour store last month. Remembering my problem from last month, I put in that I would be picking them up at 5pm and ensured that I was there in lots of time. I should have had a clue that something was wrong when my email confirmation came back that two of the 3 were ready for pickup. Silly me expected that it was just an oversight and thought nothing of it.

Just for a chuckle I checked the store locator to see if they had managed, in the previous month, to get the store hours corrected. As you can see above ... nope. Ever the helpful sort I sent a note to customer service again and I figured that I would tell the store manager when I went in later since that was more likely to actually have some impact.

When I got there at about 5 pm this afternoon to pick up my prescriptions I was surprised to see that indeed there were only 2 prescriptions ready. When I asked about the other I was told that since it was a controlled substance (Xanax) I was only allowed to transfer it once. Naturally my question was .. when did I transfer it?

Yup, you guessed it. When I was forced to use the other store to pick up my refills last month that constituted transferring my prescriptions. I explained what the circumstances had been to no avail. I guess I was supposed to magically know that this was Walgreens policy because certainly no one at either pharmacy bothered to explain this to me or I would have gone one more day to get that prescription.

The pharmacist was pleasant enough and he sent the order over to the 24 hour pharmacy and off I trundled.

So .. in the fullness of time I returned home and pondered what to do.

And thus this bitchfest.

I know that the couple thousand worth of drugs that I buy every year is no big deal to Walgreens but nonetheless I have decided to not use them anymore. The reason though is not merely because i was inconvenienced. What concerns me is that if they show this little attention to detail in customer service how can I possibly trust that they pay any more attention to filling my prescriptions or making their store brand concoctions.

Now I know that you will say .. oh rob you are just pissed off and over-reacting. That may be so but if everyone that received shitty service from Walgreens (or any other company) actually DID something, rather than just bitch and whine and then return to the same store like sheep, then just maybe there would be enough impact so that these companies would get their shit together and treat customers properly.

/rant

Wednesday, December 24, 2008

Christmas Eve Music

Just sitting around by myself on Christmas Eve missing Nova Scotia so I loaded up my collection of Stan Rogers and Matt Minglewood music in Winamp.

Somehow it helps.... of course it also makes me cry but hey .. isnt that what being away from home is for... making you appreciate it?

So without further ado .. here is Stan. If you are away from home for Christmas and this song doesn't make you cry then you have a heart of stone


And just to be complete ... here is one of Matt's most (to me) tear jerking songs



So to all of you that are away from home this holiday season or if you have loved ones that are away ...these songs are for you. Go ahead and have a good cry ... it is good for you :-)

Merry Christmas from my cats and I.

I have no words ...

Via pandagon.net comes a bit of stupidity from Dennis Prager that basically says that a wife should never "say no" to sex with her husband. It will come as no surprise to most that, as Jesse reports ...
Dennis Prager is divorced.

Saturday, December 20, 2008

Commercial Real Estate walkaways

Calculated Risk: CRE Owner "Walking Away"
As I've noted before, CRE owners are much more willing to just walk away than residential owners.
I think that this is a huge problem awaiting us in 2009/2010. The company that I work for just sold off 3 buildings for about $26 million and leased 2 of them back. It will be interesting to see how long the 3rd building will stay empty.

humour?

U.S. Says It Will Bail Out Christmas - WSJ.com
With the government on the brink of rescuing the U.S. auto industry, we have learned that the Treasury Department is drawing up plans to bail out Christmas. "We have reason to believe," said a person close to the matter, "that without an immediate capital injection, Santa Claus will fail before December 24." Mr. Claus could not be reached for comment.

The sad thing about this is that judging from the empty malls this is not too far from reality.

(h/t to angry bear)