Friday, August 29, 2014

Time To Vent

It's been a while since I used this forum to rant about some of life's little annoyances so I don't feel too bad about burdening the reader with these since you too might share my feelings.

Two things bugging me today.

First, the continuing saga of 'no common sense'.  I regret to report that this seems to be  especially obvious among gun rights enthusiasts.

Here's the thing. I learned to shoot a firearm when I was about 8 years-old. It was under the supervision of my father and it was on a low caliber .22 single shot rifle.  Later, about 10 or 11 years old I guess, I acquired a low caliber 4.10 single shot shotgun.

I used them to shoot tin cans & clay pigeons which were flung in the air by my older sister using a mechanical contraption.  It was great fun.

The case of the 9 year old New Jersey girl who accidentally shot and killed her firearms instructor in Arizona is a tragedy that should never have happened.  The weapon she was being taught to shoot was a high caliber, fully automatic machine gun produced by the  Israeli army called an Uzi. 

The idea of teaching a child how to use such a weapon is so profoundly over the top it simply defies description.

Common sense, ladies and gentlemen.  Where is it?

Second, the two worlds of Charter Communications.  First, there's the bizarro world of their billing department and telephone support.

Take the phone support part of it for example.  This morning I called for an appointment to have a cable drop installed in another room in our house.  When I got the automated service, the recording told me there were reported problems in my area and they're working on it.  Thanks for calling. Disconnect.

Idiots.  I called back and finally got a human to talk to.

About two hours later a service technician appeared.  Enter Charter's second world.  Their service techs are pleasant, competent people who got the job done.  He even took it upon himself to make some changes that would improve our service.

I've never had a problem with Charter's technical side but their billing and phone support stink.

Thus endeth my rant for today.  Thanks for listening.


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