Friday, January 25, 2008

Tha Intarnet Is Surrrrius Biznaz!

WOW. I get to be on the periphery of ridiculous high school poo and fucktardery on the internets, which I guess (?) is being perpetuated by people in their thirties and above.
And I am being chivvied to Take Up Arms and Play Along with the meaningless shite.

Ok, here it is.
THE INTARWUBS ARE MOSTLY MAKE BELIEVE. Internet people are essentially IMAGINARY FRIENDS. No offense, I intellectually know there are real people typing, but this a giant fucking masquerade ball, don't kid yourselves. It's a slightly less entertaining MMORPG, the whole blogging and posting world.
Do note, I was always polite to my imaginary friends, especailly Punky Brewster because she was so rad and we had awesome adventures and whatnot. I was an only child from the sticks, I couldn't risk being a dick to my imaginary friends - I needed them to stick around!

My advice to sufferers of blog "stalkers" and "vandilizers":
DO grow up. Seriously. There is a little trash can icon on commentor's posts, use it. If it's on someone else's blog or board, hope they like you enough to trash it, or IGNORE IT. Or don't. Get a grip though.

Everyone has a piddly, meaningless, jokey blog for the most part. Don't like what someone's commented? DELETE IT. Or reply back and start a flame war, but do remember the saying about fighting on the internet being much like the special olympics. Do.
Also, blocking people, comment verification and privacy filters are fantastic tools for dealing with creeps! They are! Any fucktarded 12 year old with a myspace account knows this...why doesn't anyone I encounter? I understand that sometimes the way of the web are lost on anyone who remembers the 70's and 60's, but my oh my. If you're posting on a decent enough site, you CAN and SHOULD block assholes if that is your wont. This goes back to Personal Responsibility, which I am a gigantic fan of. I really am.

However, it does seem like people have such dull fucking lives that they need to spam people and send gossipy consiprational emails around their little circles of Imaginary Intarwub Friends creating maaaaaaaaaad drama. If that is your thing, cool. I was not that kid in high school, despite being a drama and art geek. I was an ANGRY drama and art geek but also a redneck metalhead stoner kid (I realize that must be hard to imagine), and beat up kids who did that sort of thing when my name was involved in it. I did. Please don't tell my mom. This is retarded. Get cable, or a vibrator, or a good book and maybe something constructive to do whilst you're bored off your ass at work.

And that has been another exciting installment of She Who Does Not Suffer Fucktardery Ever At All Whatsoever (TM).

Tuesday, January 22, 2008

Phone etiquette


I have had this really weird thing happen lately on my phone.
My phone rings, it is a number I do not recognize or that isn't stored in my mobile's little memory chip. I answer the phone, "hello?"
"yes May I speak to D please?"
...."May I ask who's calling, please?" (I get loads of telemarketers and survey people calling me, even though it is illegal to do this to someone's mobile phone.)
In response to my query, however, I get silence, surliness, or just plain confounded asshole behaviour.
Such as:
"well, who's this? *chortle*"
"who am I speaking to?"
"um, *excuse* me...?"
"I'm sorry, what? Who is this?"

Woah. Woah. Woah.
Okay.
For starters, dear reader, this is not how one calls another person. At all. I am certain you know this, though, being the lovely bunch you all are. Har.
Unless you are intimately acquainted with the person you are calling, the appropriate response after they pick up their phone and say "Hello" is
"Hello/Hi/Hola/Bonjour/etc, this is/it's _______(state your name)". If you are calling on behalf of a company you follow your name with the company you are calling for. Is so easy, as Vlad would say.
Very simple. I do it all the time. I like to eliminate awkwardness like that, crazy me. Also I am wary of phone solicitors, and assume everyone else is, so I I say who I am right away because I do not want to get cussed at and hung up on.

You would think people like HR leads and secretaries and other such professionals would know this shit, but no. And they are extremely rude 9 times out of 10. Even when they are calling to give me a job interview (which I am politely declining, being home is fine, thanks, especially if the company hired someone so crappy at their job. I am not working for someone like my ex employer again thx).

For fuck's sake, did no one else's mommy give them etiquette lessons or teach them any damn manners? And why would I want to work for someone's company who let their HR people talk to *anyone* like that? Ugh.