Words of Truth

I moved a few months ago, and I’m not as young as I’m used to.  We didn’t get much help moving this time, so I ended up doing the majority of it by myself.  I did too much.  My elbows have been hurting ever since.  I finally went to the doctor’s office the first week of January, and was told I have lateral epicondylitis (tennis elbow) in both arms.  Fun.

So the nurse practitioner told me to buy a “counter brace” for each arm.  I went to CVS, and the guy said they didn’t carry them.  I went to Amazon.com and ordered a set of braces for $16 each from “The Therapy Connection.”  Meanwhile, I went to another pharmacy and found a cheap set for $8 each to use while I waited for the good ones to arrive.

Fast forward a week.  The “good ones” arrived, and when I pulled them out of the box they were just about the same as the ones I had been wearing.  So I decided I would return them.  Having not used them, I put them back in the display boxes they came in, and stuck them in a shipping box to send back.  I got credited back for my return yesterday.  They gave me $23 back.

Now I’m no math genius, but I paid $32 for them, and then paid about $6 to ship them back.  I had no problem paying the shipping, because it was my choice to return them. But why did they short me  $9?  I contacted Amazon, who graciously told me they didn’t know either, so they decided to give me a courtesy credit of $9, which was nice of them.  They put me in touch with the company who sent me the braces.  I received my answer.

They said that the $9 is a total stemming from two points. The first was their claim that I ordered the braces with a shipping promotion.  Yes, I did.  I used my Amazon Prime free shipping that I get with my Amazon Prime account.  They say the promotion required that I spend over a certain level in order to qualify for free shipping.  Since my order was over that level, I qualified for free shipping.  But since I returned “something”, my order fell below the “free shipping” threshold, and so I was retroactively charged for the shipping.  What they failed to realize is that I returned the entire order so there was nothing to charge me shipping FOR.  But they decided to charge me anyway.

The second thing they charged me for was a “twenty percent restocking fee.”  Really?  You needed to charge me over six dollars so that you could accept the two braces back at your warehouse and have someone walk them over to a shelf?  Considering that this action would most likely take about five minutes at most (let’s say it’s a really big warehouse), then I want to work at your warehouse where your mail clerks make $60 an hour, assuming they restock two braces every five minutes.

But seriously, I understand restocking fees for physically large items, for expensive items, and for dangerous items (chemicals and whatnot), but I don’t understand charging me over $6 for restocking two nylon straps that weigh less than an ounce a piece and are worth $16 (but are obtainable elsewhere for half the cost).   They aren’t charging me because they need to.  They are punishing me for returning merchandise.  And so I say to you, “The Therapy Connection“, I will not buy anything else from you.  You can keep your overpriced products in that warehouse, and I can keep my money, thanks to Amazon.com.

So evidently Spike Lee, Jada Pinkett-Smith, and a few other black actors feel like they need to boycott the Academy Awards because no black actors were nominated this year for individual Oscars.

Excuse me while I go get my blankie.

“Begging for acknowledgement or even asking [to be nominated] diminishes dignity,” Mrs. Pinkett-Smith said, while begging for acknowledgement.

Actor Chris Rock, who is hosting this year’s awards show, tweeted the following, “The #Oscars. The White BET Awards.”   The irony of calling the Oscars racist for not featuring any black actors when the BET Awards don’t feature any white actors was lost on Mr. Rock.

So how do I feel about this?  I think it’s silly that this is a news story the day after we celebrate the man who said, “I look to a day when people will not be judged by the color of their skin, but by the content of their character.”  But what are Smith, Lee, Rock, and other people doing?  They are judging people by the color of their skin.  They are saying that in a country that is 72% white, it’s not possible that among the five people nominated in each category, none of them are black.   Is it possible that, somehow all the best actors were white last year?  Nope.  According to them, it MUST be racism.

It’s not enough that we have a black President.  It’s not enough that one of the richest women in America is Oprah Winfrey.  It’s not enough that there were black people nominated last year. It’s not enough that the Best Picture Award last year went to a movie about the evils of black slavery (12 Years A Slave).  It’s not enough.

So, famous black people, my question to you is this:  what exactly is it going to take for you to quit accusing us of racism?  I think I know the answer.

Whining because you didn’t get your way is not the answer. Accusing people of unfairness because things didn’t go the way you thought they should is not the answer.  Boycotting the Oscars because white actors are actually good at acting is not the answer.

Grow up already.

I had a job in market research when I was 20 years old.  I would call people and ask them to complete surveys of varying lengths.  Some were only a few minutes long, and others took almost an hour. I think the longest one was a survey where we asked farmers about their usage of a certain herbicide and whether or not it helped their crop yields.

Since I have a history with it, I always say yes when they ask me if I will do a survey. I received a phone call tonight from Bellwether Research.  They wanted to ask me questions about the upcoming referendum in my school district. Unfortunately the young man conducting the survey talked so fast I could hardly understand him, even though I asked him to slow down a few times. Also, he kept pronouncing “referendum” as “Ree-FUR-dumb,” as in ,”Would you support a local ree-FUR-dumb to raise property taxes in your area so the schools can hire more teachers?”  I said “referendum” a few times, bu he never caught on.

At the end of the call his supervisor came on to verify he had actually completed the survey (as opposed to padding his numbers by lying, which happens).  I verified that he did his job, and then mentioned to her that he needs to learn how to pronounce “referendum” as well as the fact that he needs to slow down so people can understand him.  Maybe I was his first ever survey. Hopefully he improves.

Oh, and one of the questions said there was a property tax ballot measure that passed back in 2009 giving more money to the schools. The question asked if I wanted to keep the tax going, increase it a little or increase it a lot.  There was no option to quit being taxed for that percentage.  Hmmm.

Imagine if you will, that you wake up in a jail cell. A guard opens the door and lets you out. He leads you to a long line. When you get to the front of the line, you find yourself on a stage looking out at a vast audience. You are told that you have approximately one hour to do whatever you want on that stage. You can play music, read a book, exercise, watch TV, or whatever you want. During your hour on the stage, you hear people telling you that this is no game. They tell you that, no matter what else you do on the stage, everything comes down to one thing: during your hour on the stage, at some point, you must say the words, “I love my father. ”

If, during your hour you say those words, then when your hour is over, you may exit the stage door and be reunited with your family. If, however, during your hour on the stage, you do not say those words, then you will exit the stage door and will be physically, emotionally, and mentally tortured for weeks as punishment for your crimes.

What do you do?

Some of you will deny that there is anything on the other side of the stage door.
Some of you will postpone saying the words as long as you can, even though there’s a risk that you will either forget to say the words, or that your time will be cut short before you can say them.
Some of you will not say the words because you think your crimes are not bad enough to justify the punishment.
Some of you will say the words and then spend the rest of your time trying to get the people waiting in line to understand the need for them to say the words as well.

We don’t know what choice you make. But what we do know is that when your hour is done, you WILL walk through that stage door. What is waiting for you on the other side is determined by how you respond during your hour.

So what say you?