Archive for August, 2012

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Jesting, INFINITELY!

August 5, 2012

My boyfriend and I are on vacation up in northern Michigan, so I will be MIA for a few days and not doing my usual 18 posts of nonsense every day.  My boyfriend won’t be doing much of anything except gobbling up the book he brought, no doubt influenced by me: yep, you guessed it, Infinite Jest!  I love it when I can relive the Jest via another (not in a position for a re-read just about now.)

Below is a picture of a poster I have which is a massive chart of all the characters in the tome.  It’s been on my to-frame list for a year or maybe more.  I’m going to start a Kickstarter fund: “Help ID Frame Shit and Decorate Her Apartment So That She Has a Chance of Being Featured On The Selby.”  Won’t you donate to this excellent cause?

Wow, so many characters! Created by the excellent Sam Potts.

Posted in Buy Me This!, Image Craving, Jesting, Infinitely | Leave a Comment »

MONEY

August 3, 2012

I am terrible with money.  Just straight up terrible.  When I was in college, it made sense, because I would do super irresponsible things like shop at Barney’s every week because I couldn’t possibly go without a pair of shoes that I just realized my life had always been incomplete without, or I’d go to dinner with friends and pay for it all on my “emergencies only” credit card and then have them give me their portion of the bill in cash money and then I’d go spend that cash on gum and magazines and sushi and dry cleaning.  Now, though, I don’t really understand exactly where my money goes, aside from bills and dinners out (a weakness)… okay, and dry cleaning, but seriously, I never buy myself clothes anymore, and that used to be my biggest expense bar none?  Also I pay for my own doctors usually, and that’s a tough number when you see a psychiatrist every so often.  Who knew it was so expensive to STOP taking medication?  Seems counterintuitive, but then again, it’s expensive when someone dies, too, so absence doesn’t always equal lack of cost.  Life!

In any case, today I finally heeded my boyfriend’s and other good friend’s (separate) call to look into a credit card and I went on the Capital One website and inquired about a credit card.  I ended up chatting with a “specialist” because I really just wanted to ask if they could give me the card um, right now?  But I sort of danced around the topic and never got an answer (I think the answer is no.)  I’ve pasted the conversation below because I’m still trying to figure out if this is a real person, and I’m wondering if people ever, for fun, go on to websites with live chat helpers (J. Crew has personal shoppers now I think?) and try to make them talk to dirty or ask them deep questions like, “Why are we here?” or the like.

So: Ryan: real or robot?

BEGIN

Hi there. Please hold for a moment. One of our specialists will be right with you.

Hi and welcome to Capital One live chat! One of our specialists will be right with you. Your chat may be monitored and recorded.

You are now chatting with Ryan.

you: Hello?

Ryan: Thank you for visiting Capital One’s website. My name is Ryan, what questions can I answer for you about our online credit card offers?

Ryan: Hello, how can I be of help today?

you: Well I’ve never had a credit card before, so I’m a little bit *dull* when it comes to the rules

you: first off.

Ryan: Just to clarify, is this is going to be your first credit card?

you: yes

you: i have a debit card

you: i pay rent

you: etc.

Ryan: Thank you for choosing Capital One for your first card of choice.

you: but i’ve never had a credit card only

you: Oh you are welcome.

Ryan: Have you already selected a card to apply online or would you like me to help in finding a right card for you now?

you: i found one

you: my main question is about the process

you: and if it is faster if i go to a bank branch

you: or if it takes the same amount of time regardless

Ryan: That’s great! Can I know the full name of the card that you are applying?

you: let me see

you: The website recommended platinum

Ryan: Okay.

Ryan: I understand that you are referring to the Capital One Platinum Credit Card listed under average credit, am I correct?

you: Yes

Ryan: Thank you for sharing! I can help you with your online application. The process only takes about 5-10 minutes to complete. Plus, if you apply online you’ll get a response in as little as 60 seconds. Is that okay?

you: Sure. So you’re saying there’s no advantage to doing the application at the physical bank?

Ryan: Just to let you know, you can apply for our credit cards over phone or online.

you: oh ok

you: cool

Ryan: Before you proceed to the application, I’d like to inform that you can enroll for Online Banking to manage your account online for free and you can also add an authorized user to your account. By enrolling yourself to Online Banking, you can view your account information, pay online, change the image on the card and get hands on many more services without having to wait for a customer service representative on the phone line.

Ryan: Let me provide you the link to apply for the card now online.

And that’s when I closed the chat box because he just gave me the link to the website where I initially found him, and my question wasn’t at all about the application process –– which was basically TYPE YOUR NAME HERE –– but rather about whether I can have money today.  Ryan, do you hear me?

Posted in Conspiracy Theories, I Hate Writing | Leave a Comment »

So Maybe My Writing Career Is Going Better Than It Ever Has

August 2, 2012

… but, ever the pessimist, I realize I may have awkward moments like this to look forward to:

“[Holt’s] accounts of his visits with various intellectuals tend to provide comic relief as well. The Oxford physicist David Deutsch, for example, reminds Mr. Holt that he’d once reviewed one of Mr. Deutsch’s books negatively (‘arrogant in tone and marred by leaps of logic’) in The Wall Street Journal. He generously speaks with the groveling Mr. Holt regardless.”

~ from today’s NY Times article about Jim Holt’s Why Does the World Exist?

Posted in I Hate Writing | Leave a Comment »

This Book is Fucking Amazing

August 1, 2012

“Just then a young girl stopped us and invited us to partake of her.  My friend asked at once: ‘How much?’

She mentioned a sum.  ‘That’s too much,’ he said.  She came down.  Still he shook his head.

‘Come,’ she said finally, with a weary expression on her sallow face.  ‘I don’t want any money.  I just want you.’

Whereupon he took his watch out and said: ‘It’s too late.  Sorry, some other day, if you don’t mind.’  And taking me by the arm he started to move off.  She caught and held me.

‘For nothing,’ she repeated with despair in her deep-sunk eyes.  See, I’m rich.’  She opened her purse and pulled out a roll of bills.  Rolls of bills mean nothing much in France, but indeed she might have been rich.  She was well dressed, I noticed.  Nothing extravagant, but certainly not poorly.  Her whole body trembled as if in fever.  And the tremors coursed through her hand and communicated themselves to me.

My friend tore me away.  As we hastened on, I looked back and saw her standing where we had left her, her hands covering her face.

‘Why did you do that?’ I asked.  The action of my new acquaintance had disgusted me.  He had meant only to tease her.

‘I wanted to see how far down she would come.  I’ve had them come down to two francs, but never to nothing.  But her case can’t count because she wasn’t after money.  She’s a pathological case.'”

–– Guy Endore, The Werewolf of Paris

Posted in It Could Be Worse..., Really Awesome Insults | Leave a Comment »

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