Salad Is Slaughter

One of my jobs on my “off Friday” was to cut a hole in to the back of the new TV stand and move the DirecTV HD-DVR and the DVD/VHS player to the two center shelves, eliminating the table where the two had been sitting and opening up some space in the family room.

It didn’t take long to cut the hole I needed to unhook everything, route the cables through the new opening, and reconnect it all. I powered everything up, waited for what seemed like forever (but was in reality less than 10 minutes) for the DirecTV HD-DVR to reboot, and tried everything out. It looked good - I could watch TV and the signal strength on both receivers looked normal.

About that time Mrs. Salad Is Slaughter informed me that the DSL was out. Since she telecommutes this wasn’t a good thing. I did the usual troubleshooting; basically powering off then powering on the DSL modem with no results. We were cut off from the net. I called in to tech support and after going through their checklist got an appointment scheduled for today. I figured that the problem was outside the house so I left for work.

Turns out it wasn’t. After several phone calls from home requesting various information, I called and reminded them that I had done some work on the DirecTV receiver that involved unplugging and reconnecting the phone line. On that phone line is a line filter, the same kind that’s between every phone and outlet in the house. I was surprised to find out that when it goes, it can take DSL with it. From http://www.homephonewiring.com/dsl.html

Interference on any phone jack may impact DSL speeds or could cause DSL to stop functioning entirely. Because the filters are connected to the line cord for each device, their connections are subject to damage by someone just tugging on a phone line cord and a single damaged filter connection could result in problems with both your DSL and telephone services.

Oh well, it’s fixed now.

Merlots don’t normally make me notice them, but the St. Supery Merlot is an exception. It was smooth and subtle and stood up well to spicy pasta sauce.

We’ve ordered furniture from Woodpeckers Furniture at 942 Blossom Hill Rd in the past. We purchased a nice display case for our glassware as well as the butcher block in the kitchen from Woodpeckers and we were pretty happy with those. We also bought another display case from them that was of lesser quality and we’re not that thrilled with it.

A couple of weeks before we bought our new television we decided to get a nice wooden console for it. We went to Woodpeckers, found something we liked, and ordered. Since we wanted a particular stain we were told it would take 6 to 8 weeks for it to arrive. We paid for our purchase and left, hoping that it would arrive before the parents did so we would have it set up. We didn’t want to take time out while they were here to move furniture around. Little did we know that this wasn’t going to be an issue.

Six weeks go by. No call. Seven weeks go by. We call them and ask if our furniture is in. The guy answering the phone was extremely rude and didn’t bother looking up the status. Just said no.

Eight weeks go by. Nothing. Nine weeks. We call. The extremely rude asshole answers again. Apparently customer interaction isn’t part of their training program.

Ten weeks. Nada.

Eleven weeks. We’re resigned to the fact that these clowns can’t keep their commit dates and start to wonder if we need to file a fraud claim with the credit card company.

Twelve weeks. Zip.

Last week we finally got the Mrs. Salad Is Slaughter called and found out that our furniture had finally arrived.  We were told that they would deliver it Wednesday (yesterday) and would call Tuesday with the delivery window time.  If she hadn’t called, would we still be waiting?

Tuesday comes and goes with no phone call.

They finally called Wednesday morning with a delivery time yesterday afternoon. Surprisingly they showed up with the furniture.

The quality of the furniture is fine, but we’re never going back to Woodpeckers. Their employees are rude, abrasive, confrontational, inconsiderate assholes who have no business being in retail. And lest you think this is an isolated incident, a friend of mine had the exact same experience earlier in the year. He bought a TV stand, it arrived a month after it was promised, and the salespeople he contacted were real pricks. He also will never return to Woodpeckers.

Other complaints about these clowns can be found here and here. I don’t understand how they stay in business. I know they’ve lost us as a customer forever.

The new kitten is almost integrated in to the new family.  She has no fear of the dogs even though each of them outweighs her by a good 50 or 60 pounds.  She also plays well with Peek-a-boo.  Nala is still trying to decide if Georgia is a playmate, a toy, or a meal.

Yesterday I looked at my phone to get an accurate time.  The guy standing next to me did the same thing.  The clocks on our phones were 3 minutes different even though they’re both Verizon phones.  That’s not something I would expect.

The temperature outside on Saturday was over 100F.  I took the windshield shades from the cars and put them in to the skylight and it really made a difference in that part of the house.  I’m going to have to hit the store and find a couple of large sun shades to replace what I’ve got there now.

The Toyota dealer adjusted my XM antenna on the Prius a couple of months ago to try to fix my dropout problem.  It improved somewhat going north but now if I’m just east of south, even with no obscura I get dropouts.  I was told that the antenna lead is too short to move it to the roof.  I consider this a design flaw on Toyota’s part.  For my next servicing I’m going to bitch some more then have them move it back to where it was.

James Dobson accuses Obama of ‘distorting’ Bible

As Barack Obama broadens his outreach to evangelical voters, one of the movement’s biggest names, James Dobson, accuses the likely Democratic presidential nominee of distorting the Bible and pushing a “fruitcake interpretation” of the Constitution.

-snip-

Dobson took aim at examples Obama cited in asking which Biblical passages should guide public policy — chapters like Leviticus, which Obama said suggests slavery is OK and eating shellfish is an abomination, or Jesus’ Sermon on the Mount, “a passage that is so radical that it’s doubtful that our own Defense Department would survive its application.”

“Folks haven’t been reading their Bibles,” Obama said.

If more people actually read their bible instead of just listening to preachers reading and interpreting selected passages, there’d be a lot more atheists and agnostics around, that’s for sure. Or to quote Reverend Lovejoy of The Simpsons, “Marge have you ever sat down and read this thing? Technically we’re not even allowed to go to the bathroom.”

Dobson and Minnery accused Obama of wrongly equating Old Testament texts and dietary codes that no longer apply to Jesus’ teachings in the New Testament.

You mean the same Old Testament texts where you get your opposition to equal rights for homosexuals and your opposition to abortion? Love the way you pick and choose which verses you want to believe, Dobson.

He said Obama, who supports abortion rights, is trying to govern by the “lowest common denominator of morality,” labeling it “a fruitcake interpretation of the Constitution.”

Obama is a former constitutional law professor at the University of Chicago Law School. And he’s read more than one book. Dobson is a religious nut job who wants to replace our secular government with a theocracy. I know which opinion I trust more.