With the impending arrival of Category 42 hurricane Felicia just days away I needed a couple more cans of CRE (chili, ready to eat) for the survival kit so I headed to Safeway during lunch. I also happened to have a $1 coupon off a Safeway “Signature” Sandwich of the Day so I figured I’d be all sustainable and do two errands at once. (Yes! Karma points!)

When I got to the register the clerk defiantly pointed out that my turkey panini plus cans of emergency chili didn’t make the minimum $20 purchase required by the fine print on the coupon. Actually, she was pretty nice about it but I felt guilty for not fully studying and reviewing the terms and conditions of the coupon. I didn’t think I could eat 8 more cans of chili, even during a hurricane, so I pocketed the coupon.

When I got back to the office to eat my un-couponed sandwich, I noticed that the deli artisan had also mismarked the deli sticker, charging me the full $5.99 instead of the Sandwich of the Day price of $5.49. Curses! Foiled again!

Good thing I took all the add-ons for the panini, including the pepperoncinis, so that it tastes like a $6 sandwich instead of a $4.50 sandwich. At least that’s what I’m going to keep telling myself.

On the return leg of Saturday’s bike ride we happened upon an bike vs. car “almost-accident”. The cyclist was heading ewa in the bike lane on Kalanianaole Hwy and was crossing W. Hind Drive. She had the green light but a car rolled out from the side street to make a right turn without stopping at the red. Even though the cyclist saw the car and moved as far to the side of the bike lane without going into the traffic lane, the driver ran into the bike anyway.

The cyclist said she actually felt the wheels slide sideways but amazingly managed to avoid crashing and was able to pull over safely. (It turns out she also rides a motorcycle so her mad handling skills probably saved her). She could have easily been pushed into moving traffic.

While we were making sure the cyclist was okay, I saw another near miss at the exact same spot, exact same circumstances. During the morning ride I had not just one, but TWO similar close calls. In each case drivers turning right onto the highway from a side street have the red light but blow past the stop line, through the crosswalk and into the bike lane before looking to see if things were clear.

I’ve got other whole entire rants about both motorists and cyclists alike (because there are a lot of idiot cyclist out there too), but I’ll save those for future posts. Today I’ll keep it simple – when you’re turning at an intersection, please:

Stop at the line – pretty sure it’s the law and not just a recommendation.
Look around – look for things other than cars (cyclists, pedestrians). I’ve also almost been run over while running.
THEN roll forward to see if it’s clear to make your turn.

The 2 seconds it takes to stop and look is infinitesimal compared to the hours a traffic investigation will last if you hit a cyclist or a pedestrian because you were lazy.

Thanks for reading.

(Admin note: I’ve added a couple plug-ins that should allow easier reading on a mobile phone as well as Twitter avatar support in the comment section.)

Before I go any further, let me say that I love Twitter. I live on Twitter. I think Twitter is amazing. I wasn’t sure about writing this post initially, something about “biting the hand that feeds you”… But the story has such a “Hanh?!” factor that I had to share, if for no other reason than to share some baffled amazement.

Two days ago I contacted Twitter for assistance deleting an account I had tried to delete but somehow managed to get suspended instead.

Yesterday I got an email back from Twitter:

Friendly reminder: your request ‘I was getting ready to dele…’ is pending and awaits your feedback. The latest comment to your ticket was:
(The text of my original ticket)

Huh? I figured it was an automated acknowledgement since it didn’t say anything other than my request. No follow up questions, no instructions.

Today I got another email from Twitter:

This is an e-mail to inform you that your request ‘I was getting ready to dele…’ is now closed because we did not receive feedback about your issue. The latest comment to your ticket was:
(You guessed it: My original ticket!)

Wha?! My ticket was closed because I only submitted a ticket? What else do they expect?

I’ve sent them a follow up, and I’ll let you know what happens next.

This whole auto industry bailout thing has been bugging me lately. Some up front disclaimers: First, I live in Hawaii – there are no automobile manufacturers here, except the guys that build drift cars in their garages. Second, I have never owned an American automobile – the ones that I have driven as rental cars convinces me that this is not likely to change anytime soon.

Accountability is a big thing to me – you make a mess, you fix it or suffer the consequences. (The shorter version of that is one of my mantras: “Plan ahead or suck it up”.) It seems to me that these companies screwed themselves up by designing and building vehicles that people don’t want. Even though gas prices have fallen, people have realized that rolling behemoths aren’t sustainable and are a bad idea in the long run.

For any other company, if you’re selling something no one wants to buy, you go out of business. Instead, the big three American auto makers are asking the government for $34 billion dollars to allow them to keep on doing what they’re doing, just for the sake of staying open. Even if they get the money, they still need to sell cars to make money to pay the loans back. Last time I checked, economy still sucks – who’s going to buy any cars, especially ones the public has already shown they don’t want?

I get that there are a lot of jobs on the line, but how is that different from everyone else’s risk when they choose a profession? Say you’re an accountant and your firm goes under – you find another job. Same thing if you’re a mechanic, or a pilot or whatever.

So anyway, my simplistic solution to rescuing auto companies is this: Instead of handing over money to the companies that have already demonstrated poor business sense, the government offers rebates to people that buy vehicles that meet some fuel efficiency standard from said automakers.

To put it in perspective: For $34,000,000,000.00, the government could rebate $20,000 per car for 1.7 million cars.

This would incentivize people to buy American cars, make purchases that they may have been putting off, as well as make more sustainable vehicle choices. While not getting free money, the auto companies in turn should see increased sales and have incentive to design and produce more fuel efficient vehicles.

Yes? No? (Putting on my asbestos suit…)

Since I carry my phone with me everywhere, I figured I’d better get a case to protect my shiny new toy so I headed over to the Apple Store. The variety of cases available for the iPhone (for every iProduct, actually) is pretty mind boggling so I spent a long standing in front of the display. I have the good fortune to be going to Macworld Expo in January so I finally settled on a basic silicone jacket, figuring that I’ll look for the case of my dreams there at Mecca of all things Apple.

Clutching my case, I headed to the back of the glowing cavern but discovered there was only the “Genius Bar” there. Oookay… looking around it took me a couple moments to realize there were no registers anywhere in the store. A passing Apple employee in a blue shirt took pity on me and let me know that anyone in a blue shirt could help me check out – except her, since she was helping someone already.

I headed towards the nearest blue shirt, but he was setting up an iPhone. There were a few other blue shirts scattered around the store, most of them hustling back and forth busily. Trying to catch someone’s attention was like a three year old trying to play professional soccer. Unsure what to do, I followed blue shirt that looked like he was actually checking someone out and once he stopped moving, hovered hopefully. Once he finished that sale, I would buy my case and be on my merry way.

But no… After a couple of minutes waiting, he too hustled away, not even acknowledging my presence. Was I supposed to follow him? Wait there for him to come back? Find another blue shirt and start stalking all over again?

Aren’t stores supposed to sell you stuff? It doesn’t work if you’re so “innovative” that you confuse your customers and make the process as difficult and demeaning as possible.

I gave up and walked out. I’ll stick to shopping at places that actually want to let me buy something.

I went to fill up gas at Costco this morning. Costco has always had the best price on gas but during the recent declines the price gap has widened to the tune of about $0.65/gallon less than most other stations.

Of course with savings like that, Costco looks like Walmart on the day after Thanksgiving. Everyone and their brother wants to fill up at rates cheap enough to drive around the island for fun again. The line just to get into the driveway at Iwilei backs up Ala Kawa onto Dillingham. Which brings me to the beginning of my litany of rants:

Line jumpers
Everyone can SEE that the line in the right lane is solid around the corner, and yet dumbasses still make the turn down Ala Kawa in the left lane then proceed to block then road by stopping and trying to wedge in. Hell no! I’ve been sitting in this line for 10 minutes already. Pay attention and plan ahead!

People making left turns
I’m a little conflicted. Legally, people can make left turns from Ala Kawa into the driveway, but it sure feels like they’re jumping the rest of the line and by now I’ve been waiting for 20 minutes so I’m already cranky. Someone (Costco? City?) should prohibit left turns into the driveway.

Driveway of the Dammed(sic)
Speaking of the driveway, who the hell designed an offset entry that’s 2-3 cars wide for 10 lanes of pumps? Can you say “gridlock” boys and girls? I knew you could! I can see that you need some means of preventing cross-traffic from blocking lanes, but somehow Waipio manages without a Funnel of Frustration. Would it have been so hard to center it, or make it wider, fer crying out loud?

Non-existent attendants
Okay, so Costco is stuck with moronic infrastructure. The least they could do is staff the facility appropriately. Sometimes I’ve seen attendants directing cars near the entrance to ameliorate the effects of all the other screw ups by directing oblivious drivers (“Duh…I think I’ll block the driveway instead of moving up into the shortest line”). Not today though. There was ONE guy walking around the pumps. I’m surprised no one has cited Costco for blocking city streets.

Pump campers
Once you’ve waited in line for half an hour, fended off line jumpers, and managed to find your way to the front of the pump line you get to watch someone who’s apparently just unfrozen from prehistoric times try to figure out how to get gas. Somehow I’m always behind the person that doesn’t know how the pump works, needs to study each line of instruction on the display, doesn’t have their cards ready, inserts the cards in upside down or in the wrong order, and manages to fat finger their PIN.

EPILOGUE
ANYWAY… I eventually got my gas, saving almost $10 in the process. Now that I’m away from the chaos, all is good with the world so I’ll close with some suggestions in case you feel the need to use up half an hour of your lifetime getting gas at Costco:

• Go to the bathroom before you set out. Either that or bring an empty bottle.
• Bring a snack.
• Bring your laptop so you can blog about how waiting to fill gas sucks.

The new original recipe strip combo meal (is “new” and “original” an oxymoron in this context?) includes a biscuit so I asked for honey to go with it. Here’s the ingredient list for the Colonel’s Honey Sauce:

• High fructose corn syrup
• Sugar
• Honey
• Corn syrup
• Natural flavor
• Caramel color

What the hell is wrong with this picture? Okay, okay… I know I’m not going to get health food at KFC, but c’mon! Is it too much to ask for some honey in my honey?

The packet says that there’s 11% “real” honey. Remember, ingredients are listed in order of percentage of volume so figure the packet is at minimum 66% HFCS and sugar, probably more. Is honey not sweet enough?

One of the reasons I’ve heard for using high fructose corn syrup is that it has a longer shelf life which is why it’s used in so many pre-packaged, highly-processed food items. Even that’s a load of crap – honey is one of the most non-perishable naturally occurring edible substances known to man. Archaeologists found honey in Egyptian tombs that was still edible.

How’d you like to be the team that discovered that by the way?

“Hey, that looks like honey!”
“You think it’s still good?”
“You try it.”
“No way, you try it!”
“I’ll give you a dollar if you eat the mummy honey”
“Shoooots!”

By now you’ve seen the propaganda by the Corn Refiners Association on television that HFCS is “made from corn, doesn’t have artificial ingredients, has the same calories as sugar and just like sugar, it’s fine in moderation.”

Now I’m no scientist, but if that’s true, then why not use oh, I dunno…sugar? Because it’s cheaper, and BFCs like cheaper. They make more money that way.

Oh, and the part about it being fine in moderation? What’s moderate? How can you tell how much you’re getting when HFCS is in everything? Next time you’re shopping, take a look at the ingredient list ofall the packaged goods in the supermarket (except maybe in Whole Foods – see Kendra’s Adventures here). You may be in for a surprise – juice, yogurt, bread, breakfast bars, salad dressing, BBQ sauce…

And now, apparently it’s in honey as well.

The thing that gets me is that the Big Fat Corporations (BFCs) are likely to kill off entire revenue streams in the quest for the Big Bucks. By leaning on all the little guys to try to squeeze every possible dollar out of them, they’ll force innovative players like Pandora out of business. Let’s see… less income at reasonable rates vs. no income at Greedy Bastard rates… gee tough call there.

Oh well, this geek update actually turned into one those rants where I really have no idea how to change the way things are. Any thoughts would be appreciated.

In any case, check out www.pandora.com while you still can!

I can see if you’ve got kids that you need to keep captive, if you’re picking up for 12 people or if there’s no queue at the window but otherwise: Park the car, go inside, save time, save gas.