Ok, I don't mean to get off on a rant here, but I'm going to anyway.

Dateline California....

These little marks here mean I am quoting this,
not writing it.. ---> "

LOS ANGELES (Oct. 17) - A Southern California immigrant rights group on Friday asked Target stores and a costume company to stop selling a Halloween "illegal alien" costume it said is offensive to immigrants.
The costume features the mask of an alien with a green card and an orange jumpsuit with "illegal alien" written across the front.

Angelica Salas, executive director of the Coalition for Humane Immigrant Rights of Los Angeles, wrote e-mails to Minneapolis-based Target and Wisconsin-based BuySeasons, Inc. calling the costume "distasteful, mean-spirited, and ignorant of social stigmas and current debate on immigration reform."

" <-- this means I am done quoting and I am writing again.

I included the grammar lesson, because I would hate to offend any illegal aliens who may be reading this.

Actually, no I wouldn't.

Please take note. If you are an illegal alien, please be offended. Be very offended. Be so offended that you can't stand the thought of living in the same country as someone so offensive as me and please, take your illegal butt and haul it back to whatever country you came from.

I'm not sure what I find more outright offensive, the fact that there are entire advocacy groups and agencies who do nothing but fight for the rights of americans to be given to those who have no right to be here, or the fact that Target would actually listen to those groups and pull an item from their website.

I see those big red balls in front of the Target store, maybe its a sign that the comapny itself has none.

Maybe it's time a company took a stand. Tell the whiners that nobody gives a rat if the illegal aliens are offended by the costumes. I am offended by their very presence here, but I don't see Ms. Salas taking any measures to remove the offensive item from my country.

Offendeded?

Boo Hoo!

Southgate Computers, Customer Service Review

Ok, Many of you know that among other things, we do a bit of mystery shopping.

Sometimes, though, when I am just shopping and not 'working' I really wish that I had been mystery shopping at the time.

Recently I had occasian to visit Southgate Computers on Eyreka Road in Southgate Michigan.

We are a multi computer household, and from time to time, one of our computers develops issues.

Now, I can fix quite a few things on my own, but every once in a while I get in over my head.

We were looking for someone we could go to ewhen that happened. When I was in over my head and just needed a little bit of help. Someone I could pay a fair price for fair work, knowing that I would be treated fairly. Preferrable a l;ocal company, rather than one of the big chain stores. I really like to keep my money in the community if I can.

Computers and cars are two areas that are ripe for shams and scams. So many of us have them, we have come to depend on them, yet we are somewhat powerless when something goes wrong with one. We are at the mercy of the repair guy. Well, I hoped that I had found a company that I could trust.

My interaction with Southgate Computers began a couple months back, when I took in a laptop. A friend had soldered the power connector, but something still wasn't quite right. The employee looked at it, wiggled a few things and told me that the computer didn't need repaired, it just needed a new cord. She pulled one out, plugged it in and voila! It worked like a charm.

She could have told me it needed a new joghnson grommet in the psRI port module, and I would have believed her. I was prepared to spend up to about $150 to get that machine working, and I walked out the door with a $40 cord and a working laptop.

I was thrilled. Finally, I thought. A company that isn't going to try to cheat me.

Alas, I was sadly mistaken.

Last week our desktop started bogging down and overheating, so I opened it up to clean it. As I suspected it not only had dust bunnies, but entire colonies of dust rabbits, seemingly reproducing like rabbits do. In my zeal to clean out all the little fuzzy culprits, I unplugged the Processor chip by accident when removing the heat sink that sits on top of it.

For those who don't know, this is a small flat piece of silicon, with somewhere in the neighborhood of 350 small pins on the back, each with their corresponding hole in the motherboard, or main circuit board of the computer.

Steady hands were never my forte, that's why I didn't pursue a career in electronics, despite my interest, and why I'm probably never going to be a optical surgeon. So replacing the chip proved to be a task that was a bit overwhelming to me. No matter how hard I tried, not all 350 pins would line up with their holes at the same time.

Finally in disgust, I took the computer to Southgate Computers to see what they would charge to put the processor back in for me.

The guy at the counter gave me his best used car salesman smirk and said, "Well, you'll have to pay for a diagnosis, that's $65, but the cost applies toward any repair, and if it can't be fixed, it applies to the purchase of a new or used system."

Yeah, OK, I didn't need a diagnosis, I knew what the problem was, the processor was in my hand and not in the motherboard where it belonged, but... whatever.

Did I mention that they made me pay in advance?

I got a call a few days later from the tech at Southgate Computers.

It went something like this:

HIM--"I checked out your computer and there are a bunch of blown capacitors on your motherboard, it's really in bad shape. I wouldn't put any more money into this computer.

ME-- "Those capacitors aren't keeping the system from working though are they?"

HIM-- They probably will. I can't see how the system would work like this. It's basically shot. We can set you up with a used system if you want to come in and talk to us"

ME-- "I don't want to replace it, I have too much on that hard drive that I don't want to lose. Is there any way you can fix it?"

HIM -- Well, we can remove the hard drive and sell you an enclosure for it, so you have an external hard drive for your new machine with all your data. That would be your best bet. Frankly, I'm not even sure if I could have put the processor back in that unit, one of the pins is bent."

ME-- "wait a minute, you haven't put the processor back in yet? That was my entire reason for bringing it in to you."

HIN -- No, I wanted to wait and see what you wanted to do.

ME -- "What I want to do is have you put my computer back together. The mother board was working just fine when I brought it in, so if there are damaged components that must have happened at your shop, but I'm more interested in how you managed to run any kind of diagnosis without putting the processor back in. The unit won't even power on without that"

HIM -- "Well, I can try to put it back in, if I can straighten the pin, but it probably won't work."

ME -- Ok, just do your best and when I get back into town, I'll come over and we can talk about my options.

I picked up my computer today, the processor had been reinstalled, the computer works fine, and I am using it to write this rant.

I am $65 poorer, and learned a valuable lesson.

The next computer issue I have I don't know where I will go, but I know where I won't go.

Sad, sad, sad

I read today that President Obama has proposed that we add time to our school day and days to our school year, in order to "level the playing field".

It seems that he wants the children in this country to be more like those in other countries, although he didn't really specify which countries.

I saw an ad on TV last night that showed a seven year old girl breaking rocks. The voiceover explained that she did that for pennies a day to feed her family.

I recently read an article on the suicide rates among Japanese youth. These youth are under tremendous pressure, pushed hard in school, and into the workplace. Those who fail in school, or at their job, are considered a failure at life, and the honorable thing to do is kill themselves, so as not to be a burden on society.

A recent article in one of the news magazines, explored how young men in Afghanistan are forced to join the army sometimes as young as 10 years old.

I wonder which playing field it is we want to level?

The move to a longer school year, and longer school days is not a new concept. For years, advocates of such measures have argued that our current school year is based on the trends of agriculture, from a time when farmers needed their kids help in the fields. Since so few of our family farms still survive, the talking heads argue, it makes little sense to continue those same schedules.

Perhaps I'm just an old fashioned kind of guy, but I fail to see how further deterioration of he family, further separation of children and parents, further alienation, can possible be a good thing.

I get it. The powers that be have decided that parents are not capable of teaching their children, so the more time they can spend in classrooms ad the less time they can spend with their parents, the better prepared the children will be to face the "real world".

As proof, they point to inner city youth who spend their after school time in gangs. They point to children of illegal aliens, who struggle with English. They point to latchkey kids and children of the Playstation Generation, Alphabet Children, who spend their time in front of a video game, with fast food in one hand and the game controller in the other, playing Grand Theft Auto III. They point to the alarming number of children whose life revolves around their Facebook wall, their Twitter list, their MySpace Friends, and their buddy list.

While I agree that there are some dangerous trends among the youth of this country, I fail to see how spending more time at school will address those trends.

Perhaps, a more logical solution would be to improve the quality of the time already spent at school.

I propose instead, that there be a mandatory family time.

That instead of adding three hours to the school day. Parents should spend those three hours a day with their children. Without the interruption of work. Work should stay at the workplace where it belongs, schoolwork should stay at the school where it belongs, and families should spend time together, learning, exploring, teaching values, talking, playing, enjoying life and each others company.

I propose that if families spend more time together, and parents spend more time teaching their kids, we will see much better and longer lasting results than anything that can be accomplished by requiring students to spend more time in school.

Of course, sending the kids to school for longer hours and more days is much more convenient.

Besides that, it gives us someone to blame.

I won!

Just an update,

I finally got my money back from Fifth Third bank. It took almost two weeks after they promised to credit it, but eventually they did, including all the charges that I incurred as a result of their error.

Life is busy and hectic, like always, but I intend to return soon, for another edition of "Days of My Life..."

5th/3rd revisited

OK, This bank thing was just really bugging me.
I know it isn't a lot of money.

$39.00 to be exact.

I know people who spend more than that on beer each weekend.

But I'm not one of them.

$39.00 in Diann's capable hands, will buy enough groceries for us for two weeks.
It will buy an entire summer wardrobe for Lia.
It will buy us a night out together.
It will fill up the gas tank on my Ranger.

$39.00 is nothing to sneeze at.

So, I sat down and wrote a big long letter to the bank, and explained in great detail what had happened, and why I should get my money back. I sent it off, waited a couple of days, then called the bank. I very politely, and calmly walked the person who I spoke with through the entire incident, explaining that the bank had made a mistake, then, they had charged me a fee to pay for their mistake.
I went thorough my last few months statements, line by line with her over the phone, and she agreed with me.

The bank had made an error.

I should get my money back.

She told me that she had to check and make sure, but it sure looked to her like they owed me some money. She promised to call me back before the end of the business day and let me know if there was a problem.

I got a voice mail from her about an hour later, saying that she had confirmed that it was a bank error, and that they would be crediting my account in the amount of $39.00. This was Thursday, June 18. She told me I should see my money in my account by the end of the business day Friday, or Monday at the very latest.

Well, today was Wednesday, and I still haven't got my $39.00.

I don't know.

Do they think that if they play games long enough I will just forget about it?

Back where I came from, when you took something that did not belong to you, without permission of the owner, and kept it as your own, that was called stealing.

Some people even had fancy names for it when businesses did it, like theft, and fraud, and larceny.

Tomorrow, I guess I will have to call the bank again, and remind them that they still owe me some money.

Or maybe I should go in person. That way I can play them the voice mail message I have from last week, telling me that I should expect my money by Friday.

I feel like the paper boy in Better Off Dead.

"I. Want. My. Thirty. Nine. Dollars!!!"

Fifth Third Bank- Move over Dawes Tomes Mousley Grubbs Fidelity Fiduciary Bank

In Mary Poppins, Micheal Banks goes to the bank with his father George, who actually works at the bank. George attempts to show him where his money can be put to good use, and how it can grow over time with proper investment.

Micheal is having none of that. He yells, "Give my money back"

I visited the bank today, and I too wanted to yell: "Give my money back."

Perhaps I should explain.

Fifth Third Bank (those money grubbing leeches,) has a policy that allows two free non-fifth third bank ATM withdrawals per month. after that there is a charge for each one.

I made one in April, and was charged $2.00. I made two in May and was charged $2.00 each, for a total of $4.00. What happened to the free ones?? Who knows?

OK, I get it, their policy says one thing, they do another, not the first nor the last business to do that, especially in the banking industry. But here is the grind.

The fees they charged in May, $4.00 were applied when I had $3.97 in my account, so, of course, that cause my account to go into overdraft. I was then charged a $33.00 overdraft fee.

I went to the bank today and asked them to reverse that fee, as it was caused by an action that they, the bank took, rather than an action that I myself took.

The branch manager responded that she could not reverse the fee, because they had reversed fees for me in the past.

Now, I admit that I am not the money manager that my wife is, but I have never asked the bank to reverse fees unless I felt that the fees were a result of their error.

Apparently they have a "we only admit one error" policy.

So I have a new policy: "Sorry Fifth third, I can't pay a fee for an overdraft, because I have paid in the past."

I wonder if it would work in other situations as well?

"Yes, officer, I know I was speeding, but hey, I've paid fines in the past, so I don't have to pay one now."

I mean, what the heck, once you pay the fee, it's like a get out of jail free card. If you paid for a mistake in the past, you don't have to pay next time you make one.

I understand that with the change in the way the banking industry works, banks no longer can rely on the money that they are borrowing from me to stay afloat.
But since when do they get free rein to do what they want when they want with my money, with no accountability?

It isn't enough any more to use my money for their own purposes, paying me no interest on it, and only returning it when I ask for it.
They now have to rely on fees and charges, overt or covert, hidden or blatantly thrown in my face, to pay their bills. They somehow have decided that I am interested in paying out chunks of money on their whims, just for the privilege of doing business with them.

They have complete control over my money, and I get charged an average of $18.50 per transaction and there is nothing I can do about it.

If the bank ever runs out of money, Uncle Sam, (That's Mohama Rockabama) steps in with a fistful of dollars and an empty promise of accountability that cannot be enforced, and recharges their empty pockets.

Well, enough is enough.

I'm with Micheal Banks.

Give my money back!!