Don't Get Me Started

I am dealing with some genuine, real anger, and it has to do with my experiences over the past few days with businesses. I have been trying to find out what’s going on with a package that is coming through both UPS and the Post Office. It’s like a double whammy of “Oh no. Please no.” And I have been trying to buy groceries and do the normal things of life. But things have decayed to the point that you almost don’t want to leave the house or ever talk to one of these companies ever again. It is more becoming more true than ever before in human history that people are just numbers.

The only thing worse, these days, than not getting any customer service is actually getting it. Through the use of our wondrous technology, every company in the world is eliminating that dreaded problem of actually having to talk to the actual customers who are actually trying to use their actual products and services. For the customer it’s all actual. For the companies, it’s becoming more and more virtual. They put a virtual human beings voice on an answering machine, and if you don’t tell that virtual voice what it wants to hear, it says, “I’m sorry, I didn’t get that.” And they try to make the voice sound really sorry that it “doesn’t get that.” But the reality is that you either do it their way or you don’t do it all.

I have found that if you scream really loud at the virtual voice, “I want to talk to a real person!!!” then that sometimes trips a menu that they don’t tell you is there and a real person comes on the line. And this is where your problems really begin.

This real person does NOT want to talk to you. They know you were not happy with the virtual voice, they know your problem has some actual complexity to it, and they are now a mediator between you and their virtual, computer based problem solving information systems. Now it’s their job to deal with the virtual voice and they don’t like it. When you tell them what your problem is, they click on the virtual voice on their own little computer. The virtual voice tells them “I didn’t get that,” and so the real person says to you, “Hmmm. Well, that’s not supposed to happen.” So now you’re dealing with both the annoying virtual voice and an employee of some big company who is working hard to get you off the phone without really helping you, but hoping to make you feel better about it somehow than you did with the virtual voice.

And don’t get me started on the grocery stores (too late), where you are expected, more and more, to behave as if you are an employee of the store.  Last night I was at Meijers grocery, and as I was walking to the one and only human operated checkout, the girl turned off her light. When she saw me, two seconds later, she just shrugged her shoulders like, “Oh well.” I said, can’t someone ring these up for me?” I had quite a few groceries. But she just shrugged. Do it their way or you can just leave. You get to ring up your own groceries, solve pricing issues, bag your groceries and do it all with a disinterested employee watching from a distance, treating you like an idiot if you have a problem with their computer system. Pretty soon they’ll have us stocking the shelves and sweeping the floors for them and they’ll still act like they’re doing us a favor. And don’t think for a second that this is just at Meijers. K-Mart, Walmart, restaurants, gas stations, it’s all becoming the same beast.

Whatever. I’ve complained enough. But, seriously, it’s about to put me out of my mind.

Peace to you.

© LW Publishing 2011

The Chip and the Shoulder

 In the days of my youth, you’d hear this expression pretty often. People would say: He’s got a chip on his shoulder. Sad to say, this expression is being lost. You hardly hear it anymore. But that doesn’t mean the chips are gone. Oh no.

The phrase apparently goes all the way back to the 1600's, and the “chip” was a piece of wood. But the way I understood the expression back in the day was informed by a very popular TV commercial featuring an actor named Robert Conrad, who played tough guys in TV shows. He was selling batteries by putting a battery on his shoulder, looking into the camera, and saying, “”Knock it off. Go ahead. I dare you.” He was playing with the idea of the expression. If you want a fight, mess with my battery, the idea being the same as the chip on the shoulder. You can bug me about a lot of things, but if you bug me about this particular thing, my chip, my sensitive issue, the thing in my life I don’t have any patience about, you will get a fight. Or an angry response. Or I will pour out all my insecurities and frustrations on you. Or I’ll just get snarky.

Do you have a chip? Or chips? Is your shoulder getting tired yet?

If you want a clue as to what your chip might be, just fill in the blanks:

One thing that really gets on my nerves is ______________.

If there’s one thing I really hate, its _______________.

I just can’t stand people who _______________.

The thing about these chips is that they’re kind of like another kind of chips. Once they’re off your shoulder, and on the ground, they’re kind of like...

Cow chips.

If you get my drift.

We have a tendency to step in them and, well, you know how it goes. We spread the chips all over the place. We make a big mess. Smelling up the place. Because of that thing that gets on our nerves, that thing we really hate, that we can’t stand.

That thing which reveals how little we really believe in grace and forgiveness.




Peace to you.



© LW Publishing 2011

Hate

I admit it. I’m a little tired of people using the word “hate” for things that are unimportant and insignificant in the grand scheme of things. I’ve done it myself. You hear it all the time:

“I hate that song. I hate broccoli. I hate that movie. I hate it when people do this, that or the other thing. (Why? Because it inconveniences us in some way. Because it annoys us in some way.) I hate my job. I hate having to clean up my room. I hate homework. I hate losing money. I hate cows.” Whatever.

There is actually a website set up for people to talk about what they hate. And boy do they. Everything from Brazil to Windows Vista to parents and ex-girlfriends. Nothing is out of bounds, and sharing your hate with the world is encouraged.

Nothing is beyond the hate of a human being.

It’s really out of control. We’ve taken an extreme word and used it in petty ways, which makes us petty to the extreme.

Consider, by comparison, what God hates. It’s in the Bible. Read it for yourself and see. God hates:

Sin and evil. Arrogant, bloodthirsty people who deliberately work against God to bring evil and pain into the world. Taking advantage of the poor. Religious hypocrisy. Those who lie and deceive for personal gain. Divorce. Idol worship and the sinful things it causes people to do. Violence and those who love it. People who arrogantly look down on others. A lying tongue. Hands that shed innocent blood. A heart that devises schemes to hurt the innocent. Feet that are quick to rush into evil. A false witness who gushes with lies. A person who stirs up dissension among brothers and friends.

Some people trust that God exists. But they hate a lot more than he does. They are very free with their hate. Other people don’t believe God exists. But they do seem to believe in hate. Like a religion.

It seems to me that if we could reserve our hate for things that genuinely deserve it, our world would be a much more gentle place to live in.




Leviticus 19:17-18
Peace to you.




© LW Publishing 2010

Godzilla vs The Hulk

Hey!

In the monster noir wanted-to-be-but-couldn't-be-a classic film Godzilla 2000, one of the characters said something like, "There's a little bit of Godzilla in all of us." We laughed so hard at that.

Personally, I believe there's a little bit of the Incredible Hulk in all of us.

Here's a Bill Bixbyish verse from the Bible...

James 1:19 My dear brothers, take note of this: Everyone should be quick to listen, slow to speak and slow to become angry, 20 for man's anger does not bring about the righteous life that God desires.

Here's a Lou Ferrignoish verse from the Bible...

Romans 7:15 I do not understand what I do.


Can I get an amen bruthas and sistahs?


Peace to you.

© LW Publishing 2010