Category Archives: Rants

Revenge of the Argh: In Which She Gnashes About Traffic

Feel free to move along; I’m whinging. Most local people were probably affected by these same problems.

Liam and I spent a total of six hours in the car yesterday, most of it not going very fast at all. The only time we spent at home was the forty-five minute wind-down to a two-hour nap.

We wanted the car yesterday so that we could go visit the Preston-LeBlancs, and HRH had a reno job out in west Kirkland. So we drove him out, then drove back through traffic into the city for our (now-brief by necessity) visit, then went home for the nap (2-4 PM). Then, at 4:20, we left to go pick HRH up. What should have taken twenty minutes took an hour and fifteen minutes. And then it took three hours to get home. We pulled off and had cheeseburgers at 6:00, and it was a good plan, too, because if we’d waited till we got home at 8:20 PM Liam would have been ballistic. As it was, a half-hour off the road in Harvey’s was a huge adventure for Liam, and fun for us too as we watched him enjoy his first eat-in burger experience. And this ludicrous travel time was clocked taking the Lakeshore to avoid the horrifying traffic on the eastbound 20 that was backed up to the Dorval Circle.

We were at a loss to explain the traffic everywhere, in all directions. There was snow falling, sure, but it was nothing compared to what had fallen before. There were no obvious accidents; the roads were mostly clear-ish of snow and all lanes were open. (Although looking it up in the news, there were a couple of accidents that affected the eastern parts of the highway system, which may have affected the volume of traffic further west.) We kept as calm as possible; there was no point in blowing up. But we were tired, and achy, and bored, and irritated, and there was a two and a half year old in the back seat who couldn’t understand that we couldn’t just “ready, set, GO!” when he commanded us to, or why there was no more milk, or no more crackers, or why he couldn’t get out of the seat to curl up with someone. We pretended it was a relaxed drive to look at the Christmas lights along the river.

So, the plan for Thursday has been redacted: Liam and I are staying home instead of shopping, because otherwise we’d have to drop HRH off again and there’s no way we’re battling theoretical traffic there and back twice. This means HRH and I have to shoehorn everything in on Friday morning after dropping the boy at his grandma’s, and before HRH goes to the office holiday party. We’ve reassigned the essential gift-buying so that everything comes from two stores, which simplifies matters somewhat. I have a couple of little things for Liam tucked away in my office cupboard for rainy days, so those will be his gifts; with the things he’s getting from grandparents he’ll never know we didn’t get him something more substantial. He’s still young enough that we can get away with it.

I received an e-mail from the accounting staffperson I spoke with yesterday, confirming that my cheque had been written and sent out this morning. That was pleasant news. Depending on the volume of holiday mail I may even get it Friday, or Monday. And today’s mail yielded a surprise cheque from my dear grandmother, as well as a little parcel for Liam.

I hate being this behind on gifts and general Christmas preparation. I like to be done weeks before the insanity hits.

Cranky

Not one — not one — of the clerks I dealt with today while shopping wished me some form of holiday joy. A couple of them didn’t even say hello or thank you or goodbye, or tell me the total I owed aloud.

Now, I’ve done my trenchwork in retail; I know how bone-wearying this time of year is. But this was a Friday morning, and it’s only mid-December. And I don’t care how tired you are, you talk to your customers. Pretend to smile, damn it. My trenchwork allows me to sympathize, but it also allows me to disapprove of how you aren’t holding up your end of the clerk/client relationship.

I wished every single one of them a good holiday season, as sincerely as I could. One of them looked up at me in astonishment, a tremulous smile appearing on her face. “Thank you,” she said, “thank you so much. And you, too.” And she’s the one that I have the most sympathy for, because the client ahead of me was giving her a hard time and she was having trouble recovering. I was polite to everyone, I made eye contact, I smiled, I was as warm as possible, because this is a thankless time of year. But I really, really hate not being met halfway by sales staff, particularly when I’m not the one being paid to make the experience a pleasant one.

Then I came home and wanted to get my ergonomic chair up from the basement, which I couldn’t do because there’s an immoveable trunk in front of it downstairs and it’s wedged in behind it, hooked under something. And none of the lights work down there for some reason.

And, of course, no cheque in the mailbox.

Also, despite the snow last night, I did not see a single snow removal vehicle anywhere on the slippery roads today.

So yay! I am cranky again!

I did remember to buy antihistamines, and multivitamins, and intensive skin lotion, and Q-tips. I also got my ink cartridge refilled. And I bought vitamin C as well, because HRH brings all sorts of fun little colds home from school.

Now, to finish vetting the Track Changes in the last third of the YA manuscript, and print the bloody thing out.

On The Lack Of Common Courtesy

There are times when I really, really wish I could turn the ringer on my phone off completely. And I think people who don’t identify themselves when they say hello should be given a good hard smack. I just had someone who called the wrong number get mad at me for saying ‘obviously’ when he asked if he had the wrong number. The conversation went like this:

A: Hello?

STRANGER: Hello.

[PAUSE; SILENCE]

A: Hello?

STRANGER: Hello. [WAITS EXPECTANTLY]

[PAUSE; SILENCE]

STRANGER: Do I have the wrong number?

A: Obviously.

STRANGER: [AGGRESSIVELY] Oh, I’m sorry, I’m sor-ry —

A: [HANGS UP]

Now, I’ve had many pleasant wrong number calls, calls where the person is very polite or warm and genuinely distressed because they’ve bothered me, and those callers I reassure and even wish them a good day. I am as polite to them as they are to me, or more so.

Nine times out of ten I know exactly who’s calling when they start talking if we’re acquainted, before they’ve identified themselves. That doesn’t mean the person on the other end of the phone should deny me the common courtesy of identifying themselves. I don’t care if you think the person you’re calling has call display or if they were expecting the call, you still say “It’s So-and-So” after your initial hello. All my friends do it; I do it. That’s also how I knew you had the wrong number. No one I know who calls me would ever be so discourteous.

So don’t get mad at me when your discourtesy earns you a short response, stranger. Especially when the wrong number was your error to begin with. You get what you give.

Gnarr

This has been what is known as a Bad Day.

The boy has been simply crazy. I have managed to make soup, and cupcakes, and bread all from scratch in an attempt to keep myself sane. I’m trying to find comfort in that. But there were laundry issues that threw my daily plan out of whack, and that potential client still hasn’t gotten back to me to confirm a contract that begins tomorrow. There has been no reply to my last two messages. The former outlined my fee and delivery bid; the latter reiterated the information and also courteously pointed out that I required confirmation, as I have the rest of the week to schedule. Still nothing. At this point, I am severely tempted to send them a polite message saying that as they have not replied to me I can only assume that they will not be availing themselves of my services, and that I have taken another contract that came up instead. (Granted, the other contract consists of paying work next week, but I may also be on the verge of selling a book; I’ll know tomorrow.) My week is in a holding pattern; their last communication was on Friday, to which I replied Monday morning. I am not a fan of freelancers being ignored until they’re suddenly needed yesterday. Particularly for a three-day deal with a ‘we must have it by this date’ deadline.

On the brighter side of things, HRH had good payroll news today: they’re treating each year of animation experience as equivalent work experience, and each year of education beyond the required level as two years. He just needs declarations of term of employment from his past employers. And once it’s all settled, he will receive a retroactive cheque to cover the deficit beyond the base salary the job offers. Very nice indeed.

The boy may have a Hallowe’en costume tomorrow, more for his entertainment than anything else. We shall see how creative I can be tonight. No stress, just fun.

PSA

Dear everyone:

Next time you have a question about what I might want or how I feel, please ask me instead of someone else. I’m likely to have a more clearly defined answer.

Thanks.

Grr and Bus Rides

I have a bee in my bonnet about getting a particular gift for an upcoming child. I want this toy because Liam adored it, and every parent who saw it thought it was great.

I cannot find it in stores to save my life. I have been looking for a month.

Now, when I first started looking for Liam’s I had a similar problem, but I eventually found it. This time? Nada. Actually, it’s worse — I finally found one at a TRU last week but the box had been badly destroyed, and it’s for a gift, so no way. Went back today thinking that I could ditch the box and do the gift bag thing — and it’s gone. Fisher Price has a whole new line out, and I think the toy I want has been discontinued, replaced by something similar but annoying with batteries in the new line. I can’t even find it listed on the FP website. (The Link-a-Doos line seems to have been replaced by Miracles & Milestones — have I mentioned my resistance to battery-powered toys?) Even eBay is failing me.

I hate it when things like this happen. You think and think and think and you come up with the perfect idea, and then boom — your solution vanishes due to circumstances beyond your control.

Back to the drawing board.

On the other hand, I already have one of the gifts for a baby who is not scheduled to appear for another six months. So I suppose these balance one another out.

In other news, Liam and I took the bus out to shop this morning, and he loved it so much that he asked throughout the shopping trip, “Bus? More bus?”. On the ride over he called it a “school bus”, and when I corrected him he told people importantly as they got on, “City bus. Hello people.” He pointed out the light above the back door every time it went on, and told me that it was green; he told me people were sitting, riding the bus; he pointed himself out in the mirror and made faces at me and laughed. And again I am astonished at how helpful some people can be when strollers are involved on public transport, and how understanding they are when the bus is full and your stroller is pretty much blocking the door because there’s nowhere else for you to go. Thank you, anonymous patrons of public transport, for your patience and understanding and willingness to inch your way around the stroller, and for leaping to help dislodge jammed wheels. Mothers and their stroller-bound children everywhere are deeply grateful.

Okay; the boy’s been napping for two and a half hours. Either the trip out this morning tired him more than I thought, or he’s plotting something.