I admit it… I’m a dork.

Every day, I go home to eat lunch.  I get my food, sit down on the couch and pop in a DVD.  Even though I don’t watch television, that doesn’t mean that there aren’t older television shows that I enjoy.  Those shows, I pick up on DVD so that I don’t have to sit through commercials and they make perfect lunchtime viewing.

For the last week or so, I have been watching Firefly again at lunch.  Today was the episode “Trash.”

It doesn’t matter how many times I see it, I still laugh and shake my head at one particular scene.

If you have never seen Firefly, shame on you.  If you have and you are familiar with the episode “Trash,” think to the scene where Serenity is hovering under the trash bin and Kayleigh is reprogramming it to go to a different destination.  Just below where she is working, there is a monitor screen.

On the monitor screen, there is a display of the “Add New Hardware” Windows XP screen displayed.

Of course, beyond the obvious silliness that comes from seeing a Windows screen there in the first place, just think about it… Windows… Trash… Windows… Trash… Too many jokes come to mind.

Wake up, Mr. Cranky-pants!

Ugh!  I definately did not want to get out of bed this morning.  I was in a semi-bad mood for most of yesterday and I think it bled into my sleep, caused some really fucked-up dreams and just made me want to destroy my alarm clock and go back to sleep.

A few days ago, I got a letter in the mail from my bank offering me a really good rate for a debt consolodation loan.  I have been under fairly crushing debt for a long time.  However, this wasn’t due to reckless spending.  Without going into too much detail, let’s just say that things were interesting for me when I was growing up.  The day I turned 11, my “birthday present” from my father was being informed that it was time I started learning financial responsibility.  I had to start paying rent, buying my own clothes, and paying for my own food.  When I went to college, he gave me a credit card and told me to put my school on the card and he would pay for my school.  The day I graduated, he handed me an envelope.  Inside was the credit card bill.  Then, there were the 2 emergency surgeries that fell during a window when I didn’t have any medical insurance, and you can just kind of do the math.

Anyway, when I got this letter, I jumped at it.  The loan won’t reduce the total debt amount and it won’t decrease my monthly payments at all, but what it will do is put a light at the end of the tunnel.  Right now, with what I am paying, I will be paying for the rest of my life.  With this loan, the majority of the debt will be gone in 5 years.

So, why did that put me in a bad mood?

I did much of the paperwork for the loan online.  I reached a point where I need to go in and sign the loan papers and pick up the check.  The bank e-mailed me and told me to call and make an appointment.  That was 3 days ago.  I have called no fewer than 8 times, been transferred straight to someone’s voice mail each time, and have yet to get a call back.

Considering that we live in a society that is largely customer service based, we sure do suck at customer service.

So, when I got home last night, I was feeling quite cranky.  I logged on to EQ2 and sat there staring at the screen for a good 20 minutes trying to decide if I even wanted to bother.  Finally, I checked my auctions and headed off to knock out a few quests clogging up my quest journal.  The first 2 went off without a hitch.  On the third, I was just supposed to catalogue some critters in the Feerrott. 

Now, I had already done most of this quest, but I had 2 left.  One was Bouncer Hurd who is rarely up… and when he is up, he is generally killed quite quickly.  Still, I ran out to the area he paths in and was pleasantly surprised to find him on track.  I quickly catalogued him and moved off to get my final bad guy.

I found him across the zone near the entrance to the Obelisk.  I targeted him, got as close as I could, and hit the catalogue icon.  The process completed and there was no update.  I double-checked to make sure that I had the right mob.  Sure enough, I did.  I tried again and again, no update.

I followed him at a distance for a time trying over and over to get an update, but it never happened… and with the mood I was in, the words I was shouting at the monitor probably worried the normals who live in the apartments around me.

Finally, I decided it was silly to play when I was obviously going to be angry at everything and not enjoy it no matter what happened, so I left and logged for the night.

I’m giving the bank until lunch to call me back.  Then, I’m going to just go up there and explain the finer points of a concept I like to call “Returning your damn messages.”