Author: The Centaur

Potential XBox Outrage

Gather ’round boys and girls, I wish to tell you about a great injustice that befell me years ago… (cue harp music and waving-fade camera effect to signify a flashback is beginning…)

It was the summer of 1999. It was a simpler time then. Our days were spent stocking our fallout shelters for the inevitable Y2K disaster. Nobody thought Arnold Schwarzengger would ever take the oath of office (click for audio). And everyone was convinced that in five years nobody would go to the store for anything. Hence, pouring your life savings into an Internet company that sold cat food online was considered a shrewd investment.

Also, cell phones were not yet mainstream, meaning people had to deal with the hassles of long distance plans with numerous hidden fees and restrictions.

The phone company MCI had just sent me a huge bill for some long distance calls. Naturally, since this predated sending anthrax through the mail, I decided to call and complain. After being on hold for about nine hours, I finally got to begin explaining the problems with my bill. Unable to adjust the billing herself, the operator attempted to rectify the situation…

Operator: “Sir, you can mail a letter to our customer service complaint department to further assist you… I’ll give you their address…”
Me (stunned): “Write a letter? Don’t they have a 1-800 number?”
Operator: “No, I’m sorry, they can’t be reached by phone. You need to write them a letter.”
Me (outraged): “What? This is MCI! You guys are a (expletive) phone company! What do you mean they don’t have a phone number? That’s your whole (expletive) business!”

Needless to say, the lines of communication deteriorated rapidly after that exchange. MCI banked (wisely) on laziness impeding any action on my part. It was a risky gamble, but one that seems to unwaveringly pay off when the American public is concerned. So, like everyone else, with clenched teeth I paid my bill in full, shook my fist in the air, and vowed revenge. Had the company not gone bankrupt four years ago, that revenge would have come today in the form of this angry manifesto. Seems kind of petty now, so I’ll just talk about my XBox 360.

Which brings me to my current problem: (cue wavy camera effects, signifying a return to the present day…)

Last night, my 360 froze up. I’m not feeling good about the situation one bit. My experience has taught me that companies that base their business in advanced technology usually don’t possess the most basic technology to actually deal with customer complaints. I have a feeling that when it comes time to helping a customer, all of a sudden, Microsoft has never heard of email.

So, I can’t wait to call Microsoft’s XBox support hotline tomorrow and have the “customer service” representative tell me she doesn’t have Internet or a computer and the only way to submit a complaint is via passenger pigeon. Wish me luck, I feel a potential outrage developing…

Debunking Email Forwards

I have a hobby that few people know about.

I like to disprove, contradict and generally spoil the fun of email forwards. For instance, here’s an actual forward I received yesterday:
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Interesting fact……
At three minutes and four seconds after 2 AM on the 6th of May this year, the time and date will be 02:03:04 05/06/07.
This will never happen again!
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After reading this, I hit “reply all” and typed up this response:

What about 2107? Or 2207? They would read 02:03:04 05/06/07 as well.
This “phenomenon” occurs every 100 years. Please don’t forward me this same email next century.

Satisfied, I then hit the “send” button.

I can never resist pointing out inaccuracies in a forward. And I always include everyone in the distribution list in my response, even though half of them are total strangers. I’m willing to live with their first Internet impression of me as being a smarmy know-it-all.

I admit, sometimes I struggle internally with whether to reply or not. There is something inherently wrong about doing a reply-all to a forward. Since a forward is the Internet’s version of junk mail, hitting reply essentially created another round of junk mail into everyone’s inbox. It’s sort of like two wrongs don’t make a right.

So why do I do it? Boredom at work, for one. But more importantly, my goal is to introduce some accountability in sending out a forward. When you send something out to everyone in your contact folder, you are essentially deeming this item to be so funny or so interesting that everyone you know absolutely must read it. People shouldn’t be so eager to blindly forward things along. Their reputation should be at stake.

And that’s where I come in. I provide virtual public humiliation. If I receive something forwarded to me full of incorrect or illogical statements I will respond in a condescending and sarcastic manner to the entire distribution list. Sending a forward now puts you at risk of being openly discredited in front of everyone you hold dear. It is the ultimate Internet de-pantsing. Just as some people are afraid of speaking in front of a group, I am hoping to introduce a little anxiety into emailing a large group.

Maybe, over time, we might see an end to these types of forwards altogether. You’ll know who to thank.

Finally, just for fun, here’s another forward I received a while back. See if you can debunk it.
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UNBELIEVABLE MATH PROBLEM! Who came up with this and why is that person not running the country!
1. Grab a calculator. (you won’t be able to do this one in your head)
2. Key in the first three digits of your phone number (NOT the area code)
3. Multiply by 80
4. Add 1
5. Multiply by 250
6. Add the last 4 digits of your phone number
7. Add the last 4 digits of your phone number again.
8. Subtract 250
9. Divide number by 2
Do you recognize the answer?
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I’m not going to post my response to this, but I assure you it was long-winded and smarmy as hell. This is not an unbelievable math problem, but yes, perhaps I should be running the country.

The Office Variety Pack Donut Draft

Whenever someone brings in a prepackaged variety pack of donuts into the office it is always interesting to watch the selection of donuts unfold one by one. Since this time of year coincides with the drafts of all three major sports, I thought it fitting to provide coverage of the “draft” that takes place everyday in offices across the country. On that note, I’m pleased to present the first overall pick in the 2007 Office Variety Pack Donut Draft…

Donut
(Thanks to Mr. Shizzworth for the graphic.)

1st Overall Pick: The maple bar.
No surprises here. This is probably the safest pick in the draft.

2nd Overall Pick: The other maple bar.
Now the draft will get interesting, as there are no more maple-style donuts left on the board.

3rd Overall Pick: The Bavarian chocolate donut with creme filling.
Easily the most unhealthy selection available, which is really saying something. Believe it or not, I’ve actually seen a Bavarian crème donut with sprinkles on top as well. Personally, I think only a hummingbird could safely ingest that much concentrated sugar.

4th Overall Pick: Mystery-filled glazed donut.
Wow, this is a very risky selection this high in the draft, considering that there are many attractive options still available. However, if the mystery filling turns out to be raspberry, this will be regarded as a good selection. In the event that the filling is lemon, this pick will be viewed as a colossal mistake.

5th Overall Pick: The seasonally themed sprinkled donut.
In this instance, since we are close to Easter, the sprinkles are pastel colored. If this draft were to take place around Christmas, the sprinkles would have been green and red. At Halloween, black and orange. Just like the changing colors of leaves on trees, apparently people like to be able to identify the season by the sprinkles on their donut.

6th Overall Pick: The old-fashioned cake donut.
For some reason, it can’t just be called a cake donut. The “old-fashioned” is part of the name. It’s not like there are “new fangled” versions of cake donuts available.

Also, we just got an update on the 4th overall pick: The filling was indeed raspberry, and was described as delicious.

7th Overall Pick: The apple fritter.
The fritter is the true wild card in the draft. Some people love them, while others can’t stand them. Let’s dissect the pros and cons of the fritter…

Pros: For starters, the fritter is always the biggest donut in the box. For some reason, a fritter cannot be made smaller than a mouse pad. It’s just not possible. Because of that, the fritter is the one donut that could be classified as a standalone meal. Also, when making your pick, you have the ability to say something like “Well, I’m not going to fritter away this selection, I’m going with the fritter.” Depending on how dry your office is, you might actually get a laugh or two.

Cons: Appearance is the biggest downside. The fritter looks like a misshapen pile of donut batter, compiled from the leftovers of all the other donuts in the batch. In addition, they always make sure it is really dark brown and lumpy. In other words, it looks the same going in as it does going out. Not a good quality for a food to have. Also, while a fresh fritter can be delicious, once it has sat out for a while the texture of the fritter basically hardens from a soft pastry to that of petrified wood. As a general rule, you should always avoid a day-old fritter, as you will likely end up breaking your jaw trying to eat it.

8th Overall Pick: Plain glazed donut.
Not a bad pick. But, like the apple fritter, a weird chemical reaction seems to happen to the plain glazed donut after about 24 hours. The glaze starts to bead up, then liquify, almost as if the donut were perspiring. All of this occurs while the rest of the donut inexplicably dries up. At this point, it is completely inedible. I would seriously hate to see what would happen to this donut under a full moon.

9th Overall Pick: Half of a powdered sugar donut.
This seems to happen in every office donut draft: Someone actually took a plastic knife and cut the donut in half, and left the remainder in the box. It will be interesting to see how far the remaining half of the donut will slide in the draft.

10th Overall Pick: Chocolate donut with crushed peanuts.
I’m a little surprised that this donut didn’t go higher in the draft. Since this variety pack lacked a maple bar covered in almond slices, this is probably the healthiest donut on the board, at least in terms of protein content.

11th Overall Pick: The glazed donut with coconut shavings.
This is a good value pick right here. True, nobody wants coconut on their donut. However, if you are willing to scrape off the coconut shavings, you are left with a quality donut that has mid-first round value at a late first round pick. As an added bonus, you can put the coconut shavings in an envelope and leave it on a coworker’s desk. And voila, you’ve got an instant fake anthrax attack.

12th Overall Pick: The other half of the powdered sugar donut.
At this point in the draft, there simply aren’t many attractive options left in the box. This pick clearly involves a lot of deliberation.

First, you need to factor in how the donut was halved. Did someone just eat half a donut and leave the bite-marked remainder? Was it broken in half by hand, and if so, does it appear to have been excessively handled? Thankfully, in this instance, the plastic knife was left sitting in the box, creating the assumption that it was halved in the most sanitary way possible.

Second, the classic quality vs. quantity debate must be examined. Do you want half of a serviceable donut, or the entire amount of something disgusting? I guess it depends on how hungry you are.

13th Overall Pick: The glazed donut with a messy dollop of lemon filling on top.
Clearly, this was the least desirable donut in the variety pack. And this is always the case, regardless of how the variety pack is constituted: The lemon donut will always be picked last, if at all. Seriously, most men have thrown away more uneaten lemon donuts in their lifetime than pairs of underwear.

And sadly, the lemon filling is usually spread pervasively around the donut, making it too difficult to eat around or scrape off. Also, even if you could scrape it off, it’s not like lemon filling can be cleverly disguised as a biological weapon.

So if nobody likes lemon donuts why do they continue to make them? And why is there unfailingly a lemon donut in every variety pack?

I have a theory. A conspiracy theory, no less. I think businesses across the country like to have lemon donuts in the variety pack so they can subtly monitor the people that choose to eat them. Maybe it’s a warning sign of clinical depression or mental illness. Perhaps it’s a way to spot the workers in the office that are on drugs. I don’t know. Just be careful if you select the lemon donut. It might show up on your quarterly review.

Final Results of the Zillionaire Bracket Pool

The NCAA tournament is over, and the results of the Zillionaire pool are final. Here are some noteworthy scores:

14th Place: (Dead Last): My Wife, score of 150.
13th Place: Logan, score of 195. Keep in mind, Logan is eleven months old, and his parents helped him fill out a bracket by having him point to various toys representing teams in the tourney. This process resulted in Albany (a #13 seed) making it to the Final Four in his bracket. Somehow, he still demolished my wife. Kind of puts her bracket in perspective.
11th Place: Moira, score of 234: An early leader in the tourney, her downfall was putting faith in the WSU Cougars to overachieve in a pressure-filled environment. Silly girl.
7th Place: The Captive Lion, score of 242. Nothing remarkable here, I just want to illustrate who finished one spot ahead in the standings…
6th Place: The Centaur, score of 244. Sixth place never tasted so sweet.
5th Place: Maleah, score of 257. (Incidentally, her husband, Krusty, finished 9th. He is currently hiding in shame.)
4th Place: Amy, score of 268.
3rd Place: Leigh, score of 278. Leigh caps off a nice showing by the ladies in the tourney. Thanks for playing ladies, you really helped class up this event.
2nd Place: Booth, score of 280.

And the winner, Jon Solo, with a score of 321. Amazingly, he correctly picked all of the Final Four teams, and the outcomes of all three Final Four games. This was truly a remarkable performance by Solo. One for the ages.

Solo, as promised, I do hereby bestow upon you bragging rights for an entire year. Also, I grant you permission to be an insufferable braggart whenever the topic of the tourney comes up. And if you desire, I will address you by a nickname befitting your bracket-related skills, perhaps something like “Professor Bracketstein” or “The Amazing Bracketini.” Your call.

Finally, there is one other award to present: “Best Impromptu Rap Lyrics Posted in the Group Message Board.”

Here is the lone entry, by The Captive Lion.

when was the last time i balled?

rain on the blacktop
means no game
the laws of nature
silence the swish of the chain
fold up my FILA shorts
and put away my hightops
peel off my extra-thick
double-layered sweatsocks
no dunkhoops today
no shake n’ bake for the sport
the only move i’m gonna make
is a stopoff at the foodcourt

On that note, let me wish a final congratulations and thanks to Jon Solo for teaching us all the true meaning of March Madness. And thanks to everyone that played along. We’ll be sure to do it again next year.

Sleeping With The Enemy

As all married men know, sharing a bed with your wife can be a harrowing ordeal. A nightly harrowing ordeal. Here is my story:

Unseen Obstacles: On most nights, my wife goes to bed much earlier than I do. However, before going to sleep, she likes to take a moment to craft an assortment of booby traps in the pathway between the bedroom door and my side of the bed. And when I come to bed, I must trek through her obstacle course in the dark. And naturally, just like an unsuspecting burglar in a Home Alone movie, I walk blindly into each household booby trap and suffer a nightly barrage of cartoonish blows to the groin and head before reaching the bed. Sometimes her traps are simple, like traversing through 14 pairs of shoes on the ground, all with the heels turned upwards. Other times, she may place an open suitcase in my path, positioned in a way for the lid to instantly clamp down on my leg like a grizzly trap when stepped on. And sometimes, she’ll put our lamps and nightstands in weird places and reconfigure the walls of our bedroom so that I crash into them. Of course, most nights I am usually stumbling to bed completely drunk, so that could be part of the problem as well.

Defensive Stance: My wife is a hard-nosed defender. When sleeping, she crowds my side of the bed and positions herself to not allow me any movement whatsoever. I am seriously stymied. In basketball terminology, we would refer to this as a defensive lockdown. And as the rules state, once a defender has established position, any contact made by the opposition is clearly an offensive foul. Consequently, because of her lockdown, I can’t rollover or move my arm without drawing contact. I think she hopes is that I’ll eventually foul-out and be ejected from the bed.

The Night Auditor: I have been awakened many times by my wife talking in her sleep, usually asking an accounting question like “Why doesn’t the general ledger match the data in the cost report?” Fantastic. She is conducting an audit in her sleep again. With a marriage of an actuary and an accountant, you can say that there is always a dull moment in our house.

The Alarm Clock: My wife ambitiously sets her alarm for very early in the morning. Unfortunately, she rarely has the same ambition needed to actually get out of bed when it goes off. Perhaps one day a month she’ll actually get up with her alarm. The other days she simply hits the “snooze” button, and I am treated to a completely unnecessary wake-up, an hour before I need to get out of bed. While being awakened prematurely is never enjoyable, I try to put the extra hour to constructive use. For instance, I can spend the hour endlessly rolling around, desperately trying to get back to sleep. In addition, I have an extra hour now to stew about how much I dread going to work everyday. Needless to say, both of these options are great ways to start the day.

Tall Tales: In the morning, I get a rundown of the agonizing events my wife had to endure the night before. Her tales of hardship center around things like getting up to console a crying baby, or having to cope with the theft of blankets by her husband. Of course, I can usually manage to sleep through the sounds of a crying baby so there is no way to know if her account is totally fabricated. We’ll just assume it is. As for the blankets, while I would love to point out her many annoying sleeping habits, I am usually too delirious from exhaustion to muster a defense for myself.

As you can imagine, I look forward to the day when it is socially acceptable for a married couple to sleep in bunk beds. And just in case that day does arrive, let me get this in print: I call bottom.