The Vent and Rant Thread

[zelda_pinwheel]

Originally Posted by Sparrow

It'll be an interesting test of evolutionary theory.
Another few decades of unrestrained free jazz, hip-hop and country music, and we should start to see the emergence of ear-lids - unless Darwin was wrong .

hey ! what have you got against free jazz ?? ornette coleman is a genius, man ! "the circle with a hole in the middle" is pure gold.

[nekokami]

Originally Posted by Sparrow

It'll be an interesting test of evolutionary theory.
Another few decades of unrestrained free jazz, hip-hop and country music, and we should start to see the emergence of ear-lids - unless Darwin was wrong .

Sounds more like Lysenkoism to me....

[Sparrow]

Originally Posted by zelda_pinwheel

"the circle with a hole in the middle" is pure gold.

Is he trying to express something? 'Cos I have no idea what he's getting at.

The annoying thing about free jazz is that I don't understand it!

[slayda]

Originally Posted by Sparrow

Is he trying to express something? 'Cos I have no idea what he's getting at.

The annoying thing about free jazz is that I don't understand it!

Most of the Jazz I've listened to and like wasn't free.

[zelda_pinwheel]

where in the name of all-powerful and cranky evil elders is cthulhu when you need him ??? because i am hoping that if i bat my eyelashes at him he will devour (slowly, with extra pain) every last one of the godforsaken crackhead drunken sadistic monkeys responsible for scheduling flights and managing online reservations, since i've just spent my entire evening (and a good part of the night) wrestling with online reservations trying to find flights which will not make me 1. arrive at the airport at 3 in the g*dd*mned farking morning (as if that were even materially possible) (or sleep overnight there either, i'm not even sure which is worse) 2. spend SIXTEEN FARKING HOURS to get to toronto from paris (it's 8 hours away !!! what the hell are they doing with EIGHT FARKING EXTRA HOURS ???? are we just flying around in circles up there ? do we head east instead of west and take the long way around ???? that's eight hours of my LIFE for god's sake) 3. ruin definitively my already slim hopes of having ANY MONEY AT ALL left over to eat or pay rent for the next few months.

i first found one flight which looked like it would be convenient. but then like an idiot i tried to look at the *other* flight (i have to schedule FOUR FARKING FLIGHTS FOR THIS WOEBEGOTTEN TRIP THAT I REGRET EVER AGREEING TO) to see if they would work together, and in the interim the first flight disappeared.

and then there were no more decent flights AT ALL for those dates so in desperation i started looking at other dates and lo ! i actually found a flight that was BETTER than the original one (if we don't count the fact that it was the wrong dates and more expensive, that is, and that i have no idea whether the still hypothetical flights 2 and 3 would work with the flights 1 and 4 i had found).

so i got out my visa card, and i filled in all my info, including my credit card number, and the three digits from the backside of my credit card, and the date of expiration, and i clicked "i permit nouvelles frontières to debit my visa card" and it smiled smugly and replied "we're sorry, there has been an error, and we were unable to complete your reservation. please call us at this overtaxed number at your earliest convenience with this 15 digit internet dossier number and this other client number and this other hyper-long id number and we'll see if we can figure out what the problem was and sell you probably a completely *different* ticket at even worse dates and preferably three times more expensive." (okay so that last bit wasn't actually in the error message but i'm sure it was implied.)

i swear to god it's a good thing i don't have some kind of evil genius death ray because right now i would KILL ALL THOSE SADISTIC BASTICHES WHO RUN THE AIRLINES AND THE TRAVEL AGENCIES AND PLAN THOSE INHUMAN SCHEDULES EVERY LAST ONE OF THEM DEAD DEAD DEAD (but really slowly so they would suffer like they make me suffer, first) !!!!! AAAAARG !!!!

and on that deeply frustrated and infuriated note i am GOING TO BED.

[nekokami]

Oh, poor Z-chan! I am sending dreams of chocolate your way.

It may be helpful to read Pratchett's Thief of Time, which does not involve airlines in any way, but does involve chocolates being used as an offensive weapon against the Auditors, who would be good stand-ins for the evil ones who have tormented you so.

[Mindy]

Originally Posted by zelda_pinwheel

BASTICHES

Never heard that one before. I like it.
Maybe you could drug and kidnap the shums and leave them outside their offices. 2 for 1.
Much sympathy your way.....

[zelda_pinwheel]

Originally Posted by nekokami

Oh, poor Z-chan! I am sending dreams of chocolate your way.

It may be helpful to read Pratchett's Thief of Time, which does not involve airlines in any way, but does involve chocolates being used as an offensive weapon against the Auditors, who would be good stand-ins for the evil ones who have tormented you so.

thank you nekochan for your support and your sympathy. i will take your recommendation under consideration. this problem may actually go beyond the scope of chocolate but it can't hurt. as a corollary to your recommendation, i would add that this is probably absolutely the WRONG time to reread "the long dark tea-time of the soul" by douglas adams which opens in heathrow (and things do not go well).

this morning i called the overtaxed travel agency number and they explained that the problem was due to the fact that there is a ceiling on my visa card (apparently this happens to people all the time when they try to buy an airline ticket, because the words were coming out of the lady's mouth before i even finished my story. since i've never reached my ceiling before it was news to me) and since obviously i use my card for other things in life (groceries, and soon large quantities of valium or some other opiate i think, which i am going to need after this experience), i didn't have enough left before my limit (also, have i mentioned this stupid trip is going to cost me a bloody fortune ?).

i called my bank and they are going to unblock the limit, but of course this will only take effect tomorrow.

so i called back the overtaxed agency number and said "can you just reserve the tickets until tomorrow when my limit is raised, and then i'll pay ?" and they said no, sorry, they can only reserve until the end of the day (bastards !!). "there's nothing we can do, the system is programmed that way, and dossiers which haven't been paid for by 9pm are automatically cancelled."

so i called the physical travel agency instead and i said "can i come in person and pay you by check ???" and they said "sure ! as long as your departure is more than one month away, because we don't accept checks for departures less than one month away."

which of course it is not.

so i'm just waiting until 2 to get confirmation from my bank counsellor lady and then i'm going to go to the agency with my checkbook and my visa card and the soul of my unborn first child and beg them on my knees to fix this mess for me because otherwise i will go INSANE, and i don't want to wait until tomorrow because what if the new ticket disappears by then ??? huh ??? THEN what am i supposed to do ????

arg. a curse be on all of them and their families and their friends and their unborn children for the next 70 generations.

[zelda_pinwheel]

Originally Posted by Mindy

Never heard that one before. I like it.
Maybe you could drug and kidnap the shums and leave them outside their offices. 2 for 1.
Much sympathy your way.....

actually i think i learned that from pshrynk...

kidnapping the shums and leaving them outside their offices is a tempting plan for revenge. i will wait however until AFTER i am clutching my tickets in my sweaty palms to do this.

also, when you say "drug", i assume you mean with something like cocaine or crack or something, right ? not anything that would send them into some sort of brain-addled stupor, which would rather defeat the purpose.

[acidzebra]

Originally Posted by zelda_pinwheel

actually i think i learned that from pshrynk..

As far as I know "Bastich" is a Loboism, after the "hero" of the comic Lobo.



On a side note, I only just clued on to the fact that it is a contraction of bastard and bitch. I've only known about Lobo since, oh, the early 90s? Yes, I am a little slow sometimes, thanks.

[pshrynk]

Originally Posted by zelda_pinwheel

actually i think i learned that from pshrynk...

kidnapping the shums and leaving them outside their offices is a tempting plan for revenge. i will wait however until AFTER i am clutching my tickets in my sweaty palms to do this.

also, when you say "drug", i assume you mean with something like cocaine or crack or something, right ? not anything that would send them into some sort of brain-addled stupor, which would rather defeat the purpose.

I first heard it in Johnny Dangerously, a movie that should definitley be placed on the Infinite Loop Movie Marathon List. Omar Sharif's character swore in strange fashion "Farking Bastiches!" "Ice Hole!"

Not sure if Lobo came first or later, though.

[Mindy]

Originally Posted by zelda_pinwheel

also, when you say "drug", i assume you mean with something like cocaine or crack or something, right ? not anything that would send them into some sort of brain-addled stupor, which would rather defeat the purpose.

Just long enough to get them there, then you can pump them full of whatever seems most appropriate.

[Greg Anos]

Originally Posted by Mindy

Just long enough to get them there, then you can pump them full of whatever seems most appropriate.

I vote for a strong laxative and a locked room......


(Note to the Texas contingent. If Zelda ever comes to Texas, we'd better handle the arrangements...)

[nekokami]

Two days to get your credit limit raised? Around here, you could get a new card with a ridiculously high limit in about 10 minutes, I think.

I agree, now is not the time to re-read The Long Dark Tea-Time of the Soul. Nor, probably, anything by Kafka.

[zelda_pinwheel]

Originally Posted by nekokami

Two days to get your credit limit raised? Around here, you could get a new card with a ridiculously high limit in about 10 minutes, I think.

I agree, now is not the time to re-read The Long Dark Tea-Time of the Soul. Nor, probably, anything by Kafka.

oh god, tell me about it. i think i may actually be channelling kafka right now.

in fact the people at the bank lied to me.

i called back at 2 to talk to my "real" counsellor because that first jackass claimed to be unable to help me (lie number 1). my real counsellor wasn't there yet, because in fact today she only starts at 3 ; but the very nice lady i got that time said of *course* she could help me with that, and would 5000€ be enough or should she make it 10000€, just to be sure ? and i choked a bit and said let's not go crazy, 5000 should be fine. but, she reminded me, it will only be effective tomorrow morning at 6 o'clock.

so i went rushing off to the actual physical travel agency (where, have i mentioned this ? everything is more expensive, because you have to pay the price of the ticket and the airport taxes AND THE AGENCY COMMISSION too) because i was terrified that this new ticket would also disappear before tomorrow morning if i waited that long, and told my sad story and then explained my itinerary (i think could see the travel agent lady start to salivate at this point). so she put in all the dates and the cities and said "ok this is just a simulation for the moment, that trip will cost you 5000€." farking incompetent travel agents now, as if my life weren't complicated enough.

so i explained to her the little trick that HER COLLEAGUE had explained to me the last time i had gone in there for information, about how you have to call it a round-trip, not one way, even though it's not the same cities... and we finally found the tickets i had in mind at the correct prices (approximately 20% of the original price she quoted me, by the way). *except* for the flight between toronto and edmonton, which i had seen online for around 200€, and she could only find at 400€. she said, "why don't you just reserve all the other bits, and then if you can find that one cheaper online get it there, and if not come back here tomorrow ?"

so she reserved the first round-trip and a half, and added on the extra-expensive insurance without asking me (as if i'm not already spending enough money), and then she said "let's just try your visa card *just in case*." and i said, "well if you really want to but i'm telling you right now it won't work."

and guess what, it went through with no problem. ("not active until 6 tomorrow morning" ? LIE TWO !!!).

whatever. at least i now have 75% of my tickets, and in exchange for the higher agency prices and commission i paid they gave me a hideously ugly "travel wallet" to keep all my documents in. i'll be very suprised if i actually use it for anything because seriously, really ugly.

now i'm trying to get that farking last ticket from toronto to edmonton. i do the search with the dates and the cities, and about 50 results come up for around 200€, and one by one i click on them and every farking one replies "we're sorry, that flight is no longer available." WHY THE HELL IS IT STILL ON THE SITE THEN ???? just how far is it from toronto to edmonton ? maybe i should leave a day early and just walk there.

ralph sir edward, not only will i gladly allow you to manage my travel arrangements should i ever go to texas, but if by any chance you wanted to take over for this trip that would be fine with me, because i have really had it. i swear to god, i never want to see another flight comparator in my LIFE and probably by the time i get back i'll feel exactly the same about airports. just find me a cheap ticket between toronto and edmonton for the 7th of october (or the 6th at the worst, but preferably the 7th), ideally direct, preferably around 200€ but at this point i will go up to 300€, leaving anytime after noon and preferably arriving not too late (because i don't know what time my cousin goes to bed, but she's technically my father's cousin and might not want to stay up too late).