Now, if I was at a movie theatre, it’s expected that I’m going to see the movie once.  So yea, you have one chance to advertise your upcoming movies.  But when I buy the movie on disk, well, it’s safe to assume that I’m going to watch this movie MULTIPLE times.  So if I’ve seen your advertisement once, I DON’T WANT TO SEE IT 50 MORE FRIGGIN TIMES!!!  I want to be able to just advance to the main menu screen, at which point I can either watch my movie from the beginning, or go to a particular screen.  Or maybe perhaps I want to watch the directors commentary.

But noooo!!! You have to FORCE me to watch this crap time after time, and on top of that, you want me to watch some short flick on movie piracy and how wrong it is.  You know what, I KNOW what piracy is and I bought your dvd so I apparently want to have a legitimate copy.  If you want to get the message across, create a few take torrents and put them up for download.  Just make it an endless 2 hour, 2 gig loop of this same “Anti Piracy is wrong! Don’t do it people!” message.  As for those of us who actually paid for your plastic product which costs a few cents per disc to print, PLEASE… STOP… ANNOYING… THE… CRAP… OUT… OF… US!!! Yes Disney, I’m talking to you since your the main culprit.  And if you keep on doing it, well maybe I’ll start considering copying your dvds just so I can edit out your crappy advertisements, anti piracy messages, and the annoying, mostly red screen saying that it’s illegal to copy this disc. 

From now on, how about putting it on a sheet of paper, so we can read it once, get the message and then throw that crap away.  So that the next time we sit down to enjoy the movie, we don’t have to be irritated with the same crap time after time.

So, when I started writing this post, I popped in a copy of Pirates of the Caribbean and came back to type of this post.  As of right now, the advertisements are STILL playing and I’ve pretty much finished my rant.  What was the total time?  15 friggin minutes!  15 minutes in which we can only advance, not go to the main menu, the top menu, scene selection.

Maybe if you didn’t irritate the hell out of us legitimate consumers, you wouldn’t drive us to the point of madness where we download your movies or copy just to spite your greedy hides!

Well, my sister had recently suggested that I start using an mp3 player when I’m working out to make the workout a bit less strenuous.  Not to mention that it would be good to keep me hype and energetic when the music blaring over the speakers at the gym really doesn’t do it for me.  Especially considering that my tastes in music differs from the typical white suburban residents that I share the gym with.

So I head up to Sam’s club and take a look around at the mp3 players.   I took a look at the iPods and wasn’t really too impressed, considering the price of the iPods themselves as well as the accessories.  It seems that anything that says “compatible with iPod” automatically goes up at least 50% in price when compared to accessories for other music products.  But then I found it….  The IPod Touch.

I have to admit, this little bugger is quite sweet.  I decided to opt for the 8 gig version and save the extra hundred bucks for some wireless Bluetooth sport headphones that would work with the IPods.  I’ve been playing with it since Sunday and so far, I love it.  Here’s what I like so far.

• No proprietary headphone jack
• Screen can be turned of while listening to music
• video podcast support
• Audio book support
• YouTube (for video surfing in the bathroom)
• Contacts (Great backup in case contacts on my phone aren’t available)
• Calendar
• Slick user interface
• Pictures

The main thing that I’m really missing on this thing is built in Bluetooth technology, and more pda type functionality.  I know it’s a music player, but with this thing sharing so much of the Iphone technology, they might as well should have had it double as a pda as well.  I’m quite sure though, that developers will start building some pretty cool applications for it so I’ll just wait and see what comes down the road.

So Ora, Chris, Jonathan, Aron, etc… I finally broke down and got an Apple product.  I’m still griping about the price of their stuff, but I’m liking it so far.   But I’m still not ditching my Quad core, Intel cpu.

For those of you who don’t know what the iPod touch is, here’s a link

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kj0UZjrSVLA

There is one thing that TRULY pisses me off though.  A few of you know that my dad had passed away in April.  Well, been getting things done and out the way for the past few months relating to his death, closing accounts, paying items off, undoing damage, dealing with family, etc…  So anything in that general category doesn’t really cheer me up. 

I had finally gotten the paperwork in to the insurance company (Thanks Pam, for your help) and found out that they didn’t pay the entire payout to the dealership because there had been interest accrued since his death, and they were only interested in paying the balance at the time of his death.  It’s pretty cold hearted and blunt, but I really come to expect stuff like that from insurance companies.   The general majority will screw consumers over in a heartbeat if you ask me.

But what really irks me is the dealership.  These bastards have the gall to charge interest on an account that they KNOW the person has deceased. Not to mention that they knew that I’ve been getting paperwork together and signed by various groups in order to get sent off to the insurance company. So by the time everything was done, there was around 360 dollars of interest, which by the way, the dealership NEVER mentioned to me until they tried to bill it to the insurance company and got the finger. THEN they decide to tell me.   I left them a couple of voice mails about the matter and ended up playing phone tag.  Guy never brought it up either.  I was so hot, but just decided to get it over with rather than start an argument about it.

But seriously, what kind of cold bastards charge interest on deceased accounts while the family is trying to get the insurance paperwork together.  I don’t think that I’ll be doing business with these guys.  For those of you looking for cars on the Missouri side, here’s the info.  I’d go with a dealership with better morals. Most of them are shady anyway, but dang. 

Jay Wolfe Honda
220 W 103rd St, Kansas City, MO
(816) 942-2200 

Their finance company is called Future Finance and is located in the same location.  Dirty hippies.

Not to mention that even though I paid it off, they couldn’t transfer the title or release the car in my name.  So in order to get this damn thing tagged and dealt with, I have to go through the State of Missouri’s probate courts to get this crap done on a car with expired tags.  No fault of theirs that they can’t sign it off into my name (hopefully, but I’ll look into it), but it was the icing on the cake

People – Get a will.  Especially if you have family. If you don’t, get one so your kids will have an easier time cleaning up the mess.

1. A lot of companies give their employees 3-5 percent raises per year.
2. The average rate of inflation per year is 5 to 6 percent.
3. The average amount of tax on the dollar steady increases
4. The price of consumer goods increases every year with inflation
5. The average American is $8000+ dollars in debt. And I don’t think that includes the house or the car.  Definitely not the house
6. Credit card companies are finding more and more ways to get money out of the consumer.  (Multiple billing cycles per month, etc…)
7. Banks are finding more and more ways to get fees and penalties out of consumers.
8. We are constantly being barraged by an onslaught of instant gratification and the latest and greatest of consumer products.

There are more to list, but I’ll stop there as far as the facts are concerned.  Items 1-4 go pretty much hand in hand to screw the consumer over.  Why’s that you ask? Here’s why!  With the consumer’s average raise being between 3 and 5 percent, the average salary is not keeping up with inflation.  For those that think the rate of inflation isn’t as high as 5 or 6 percent, or who are looking at the government statistics, take note that there are some items in there that are purposely taken out in order to make the numbers lower.

To add to that, the tax on the dollar has been increasing throughout the years.  Not at an alarming rate,  but at the same time, it’s never lowered either.  Couple that with the fact that the cost consumer goods rise with inflation, which of course will take more of your money to purchase.   So the amount of dollars that you’re spending is increasing, and the amount of tax you pay per dollar has increased as well.  So technically, Uncle Sam gets to double dip.   I can’t take credit for pointing that out however.  That credit goes to my coworker Robert.

Banks, credit card companies, etc…  I can’t stand these companies.  Advertising that they are out there to help the consumer.  To reduce debt, to have lower fee’s etc… yet they are the main ones screwing the consumer over.   Banks offer to help you save money, but how?  They offer you 2-5 percent on your money in a savings account, yet the rate of inflation is 5-6 percent.   They turn your money around and loan it out on high interest credit cards, or place it into securities, where they earn an average of 10% or more in stocks.   When I learned the principles of banking at Jack Henry, I found out that a bank has the majority of it’s assets in securities.  70% if I remember right.   Here’s another thing to think about.  If the consumer did not have debt, would the bank be in business? Absolutely not.  And that’s why they do the things they do and sell the things they sell.  TO CREATE DEBT!

And credit card companies.  Wow! Just wow!  I’m not going to go too much into it, but do some research on the different types of billing cycles, (average daily balance, two cycle billing, etc..) and you will realize just how much your interest rate REALLY is.