My most recent text message (sent to Toney): “Humanity is a shithouse.” I can’t tell you what prompted it, because Big Brother is watching, but it had something to do with soft pretzels. In any case, I like the ring of it. It might make a good book title. You know, after I finally hole up in a cabin somewhere and crank out my thousand-page manifesto?
Stay tuned. The pressure is building. Humanity is a Shithouse has been many years in the making.
I’ve mentioned that our bank is located in Hollywood, California. It’s a credit union for people in the entertainment industry, which we joined shortly after relocating to SoCal in 1996. It’s the best bank we’ve ever encountered — few aggravations, and low fees. We loved it, and decided to just keep it when we moved here.
It’s not a problem 99% of the time — your bank no longer needs to be down the street — but occasionally it’s a little inconvenient. Like when we receive an actual paper check, for some reason. We have to mail it to California, which seems ludicrous.
So, a few years ago we opened an account at a local credit union. It’s almost never used, but if we need it… it’s there. Our paychecks still go into the California joint account, and I have another California account for my website/book stuff. I basically live off website/book revenues, and my regular pay goes into the general fund, and is managed by Toney. It works for us.
Anyway, on a whim I checked the local account a few days ago, and was surprised to see there was $112 in there. Interesting. Usually it’s something like $4.16. I decided to buy lunch off this new-found fortune, and extend my pocket cash a bit.
I went to Wendy’s, ordered a chicken samblich combo, and handed the woman the appropriate bank card.
“Uh oh,” she said, after swiping it. “It only went through for $2.36. There’s a balance due, for some reason. I’ve never seen this before.”
WTF?
She called over a grizzled veteran of fast food wars, and this new woman said (real loud), “Oh, yeah. This happens when the person DOESN’T HAVE ENOUGH MONEY in their account! HE JUST DOESN’T HAVE ENOUGH MONEY!! It’s not a problem, he’ll just have to pay the balance some other way.”
Um, could you ease back on the volume, bitch? Is that possible? Jesus. It felt like I was on stage at Radio City Music Hall, in a production of the Giant Loser Jamboree.
I got an idea. “What?” I shouted, in an indignant tone. “There is over three thousand dollars in that account!” A blatant lie, but it felt good.
Then I pretended to be irritated, but resigned to the inevitable idiocy I’m forced to endure. And I whipped out three $20 bills, so everyone could see them (I was practically waving them around), and handed one to the cashier. “That should cover it,” I said.
I feel my performance was a bit over-the-top, but effective. The setting did not call for a nuanced approach. I was ordering deep-fried chicken across a counter.
Sheesh. It was humiliating, but I think I saved a little face. It turned out that Toney deposited a mileage check in that account (she has to do some driving for her job), and happened to withdraw $110 between the time I looked at it on my computer, and my visit to Wendy’s.
Has anything like this ever happened to you? If so, please share the pain. Use the comments link below.
And I’ll be back tomorrow.
Have a great day, my friends!
Now playing in the bunker
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Why, hello there.
Humanity is a Shithouse sounds more like a Kickstarter project than a manifesto, but it’s a effing fanfuckingtastic title nevertheless…
I was once pissed at Regions Bank and told the wife about it. I opened the account before we were married and added her to it. After one of my philippics she went down and closed my account. Didn’t bother to tell me about it. I found out when I tried to use my defunct debit card to close out a bar tab. She had to drive down to the bar and pay the bill. Of course then it was, “What are you doing spending $120 in a bar at 3:00 in the afternoon?” I wasn’t having that shit so I yelled, “You don’t go closing bank accounts or selling the house out from under us, or things like that, without talking to me first. For fucksake!”
Ah, love.
I learned a new word today — philippic. Thanks !
ditto!
I had to google it.
I used a good old fashioned dictionary. (It made me look like I was engaged in real research at work). Cool word.
Fantastic! Try to work it into a conversation in the next day or two and let me know how it works out. Almost nobody knows that word, except us, and it’s time to change that.
I’m not ashamed to admit that not only did I have to look it up, I had to click on the speaker icon to find out how it’s pronounced. Now I’m armed, and ready to unleash a phillipic on some poor sap’s ass!
Let us be clear, boys ‘n babes: knowing obscure words doesn’t make you more intelligent. However, being able to pass yourself off as intelligent is valuable beyond measure. Consider my younger brother – he dropped out of high school a year before graduation. Seven years ago he applied for a job with Boeing. The job required a degree. He lied and was hired. He says it took him less than a week to master what he responsible for. He works there to this day, six figures.
Moral is, fuck the uppity. They really don’t know shit. And they’re $100,000 poorer for the privilege. Who’s the “dumbass” now? HAHAHA
Sounds like the moral is that it’s a good idea to lie on job apps, especially if the employer does a significant amount of work for the DOD. I don’t think that using an obscure word sort of correctly (to be generous) makes anybody sound more intelligent, but I’d proceed with caution. Committing fraud at a huge company is pretty easy. To a certain extent, these companies rely on people’s integrity. In answer to your question, clearly, they were the dumbasses for doing so this time.
jtb
I don’t think there’s a moral in that story, nor is there morality in evidence. The story just ends with a disjointed conclusion that the “uppity”, whom I assume are defined as college grads (ergo the reference to being “$100,000 poorer for the privilege”?) are to be fucked; they “don’t know shit” and, because the brother holds a six-figure job at Boeing at least in part because of a fraudulent resume, they are dumbasses.
OK.
I had to google philippic twice. Once for meaning and once again for pronunciation. And then I had to google pronunciation for spelling just to post this reply. Sweet mother of pearl, I love the internet.
The “moral” is that there’s lots of pseudo intellectual assholes out there. Maybe look at yourself and then fuck off? Just a suggestion.
By the way, the word was used correctly.
I’ve worked for six companies in the last 38 years, first as a computer programmer in 1974, and most recently as Chief Information Officer of a bank. There wasn’t one of those jobs that I ever “mastered”, because tomorrow will be pretty different than today, but I’d say I managed to get my feet on the ground in each of them within six months to a year. If you can “master” your job in a week, there’s a pretty good chance you have a boring job, although I suppose the six figures will keep you coming back.
I still don’t think any job is worth committing fraud over, but people have certainly sold their integrity for less. (see also, Powell, Colin)
Jesus Christ. Degrees are mostly worthless, that’s the point.
Hey now, jtb. General/Chairman/Secretary/Strategic Limited Partner/Director/Speechgiver Powell has received well into 7 (maybe 8) figures in exchange for his integrity. You can’t really compare what he’s been able to garner to the spoils of a regular resume fraudster.
And just keep in mind that in a world where those who are duped by a fraudulent resume are uppity dumbasses, degrees are mostly worthless.
-Dude
No, but as a cashier, I’ve had to decline cards hundreds of times. I’ve been told how rich people are, how they could buy a house on the card, one guy said he could buy the entire store on the card, it had no limit. As I can just poke the register with a cattle prod and make it magically authorize, and accept the card.
*”As IF I can just poke the cash register…”
Two tales, the milder one first: I had a coupon for 10 free prints at the kodak machine at Walgreens. Went in, got my prints, the guy told me to get in line, turned out I still had to pay sales tax on it. Literally a quarter, and I’d left my everything in the car because FREE. The guy in line behind me didn’t want to wait for me to hit the car so he gave me the 25 cents.
Second: We’d graduated college & gotten jobs a few states away. Friends came to visit for a few days & I got the big-shot idea I’d take us all out to dinner. Naturally I forgot which card I’d already paid off that month and my card (with the $500 limit, because I was 23) was declined. A fun conversation to have with the waiter when you’re trying to look competent in front of 6 friends. I was an idiot.
“Humanity is a Shithouse.” If that wasn’t a Kurt Vonnegut novel, it should have been.
Either that or one by Harlan Ellison.
This probably wouldn’t have happened if you had just stuck with the #1 no pickles.
I bounced a check to my landlord and he called to tell me about it. Said he’d drive by to pick up a new check. I barely had the phone back in the cradel and he was knocking on the door. (This was 1987 – no cell phones – hell, not even a bulky ass car phone). I wrote another check and literally sweated the next 24 hours because I wasn’t sure I had enough to cover.
After we got married, Beloved and I kept our own separate accounts. It works for us but then again, we got married a little older than most couples so there was no point in changing our established habits.
Doh, the wife giveth and the wife taketh away! 🙂
Jeff, Check with your Calif credit union – they likely have an app that you can just snap a pic-scan of a paper check and deposit it electronically. You can then shred the original. No stamp, envelope or schlepping out the mailbox involved.
Many credit unions are also part of the “CU Service Center network,” which allows you to use another participating credit union to cash checks or make deposits:
http://www.cuservicecenter.com/CreditUnions.aspx
“The more you know,” tinkly music, etc.
We are pretty much into what is called “unmarried banks” in our family, so we got an account at the only one locally with that distinction when we moved out of state for a year. Things went well until one morning–like all the other mornings after payday–I went to the drive-in window to deposit my husband’s check. The new loud-mouth at the window–with the volume cranked on her little mic (having control over such things goes right to people’s heads sometimes) demanded, “WHO ARE YOU? THIS ISN”T [my husbands] SIGNATURE!!” I could feel the heads turning at the other drive-in windows as everybody within a block radius heard the idjut. I simply told her I was his wife and she wisely decided to take care of the deposit after insisting, “WELL, THAT’S NOT HIS SIGNATURE!”. It was fairly embarrassing, however, because since we had lived in WV or even further south most of our lives, we were accustomed to my signature being accepted as much as the actual person designated on his paychecks. She carried on so that I half expected a patrol car to come rushing up, lights and sirens ablaze. It unnerved me to such an extent that when I got home, I called the bank and complained. Lo and behold, a couple of days later, I actually got a cut flower arrangement and a note of apology from the bank president delivered to my home. And it’s not like we were their biggest depositing customer, either. Yep-unmarried banks are the best.
The most entertaining banking incident, however, was the time I made out our deposit ticket for most of the money in our checks to be deposited, and a little bit of it in cash back. As we pulled away from the window, I noted that the envelope felt kinda fat. About that time, I noted our teller had run to the nearest window in their teeny tiny building and was looking forlornly at our car as it headed for the parking lot exit. I told my husband to go back through, that the teller had written up the deposit correctly but had given us the deposit in cash and only deposited what we had wanted cashed. The teller maintained the whole time he was straightening it all out that he knew what he had done and he knew who we were, as if we had tried to pull a fast one on him. heh. And that was all back before unemployment figures made em hire anything that walked off the street for those positions.
One more time…
Is there an echo in here?
We are pretty much into what is called “unmarried banks” in our family, so we got an account at the only one locally with that distinction when we moved out of state for a year. Things went well until one morning–like all the other mornings after payday–I went to the drive-in window to deposit my husband’s check. The new loud-mouth at the window–with the volume cranked on her little mic (having control over such things goes right to people’s heads sometimes) demanded, “WHO ARE YOU? THIS ISN”T [my husbands] SIGNATURE!!” I could feel the heads turning at the other drive-in windows as everybody within a block radius heard the idjut. I simply told her I was his wife and she wisely decided to take care of the deposit after insisting, “WELL, THAT’S NOT HIS SIGNATURE!”. It was fairly embarrassing, however, because since we had lived in WV or even further south most of our lives, we were accustomed to my signature being accepted as much as the actual person designated on his paychecks. She carried on so that I half expected a patrol car to come rushing up, lights and sirens ablaze. It unnerved me to such an extent that when I got home, I called the bank and complained. Lo and behold, a couple of days later, I actually got a cut flower arrangement and a note of apology from the bank president delivered to my home. And it’s not like we were their biggest depositing customer, either. Yep-unmarried banks are the best.
The most entertaining banking incident, however, was the time I made out our deposit ticket for most of the money in our checks to be deposited, and a little bit of it in cash back. As we pulled away from the window, I noted that the envelope felt kinda fat. About that time, I noted our teller had run to the nearest window in their teeny tiny building and was looking forlornly at our car as it headed for the parking lot exit. I told my husband to go back through, that the teller had written up the deposit correctly but had given us the deposit in cash and only deposited what we had wanted cashed. The teller maintained the whole time he was straightening it all out that he knew what he had done and he knew who we were, as if we had tried to pull a fast one on him. heh. And that was all back before unemployment figures made em hire anything that walked off the street for those positions.
Great stories! I want to read ’em again!
You can kiss your un-married banks goodbye once the Supreme Court gets done ruling. Any damn bank will be able to marry any other damn bank, no questions asked!
That, my friend, is fucking funny.
Went to the gas station before I went grocery shopping (I know… stay with me here.) At the gas station I put the “main” debit card in my back pocket after swiping it at the pump. Later at the grocery store checkout I mistakenly gave the clerk my “secondary” debit card (which probably had about $3.00 in it) and promptly got declined. I realized my error and took out my wallet frantically looking for the main debit card. While I wasn’t locating it, the POS grocery clerk looks at my wallet and announces (not in his indoor voice) “Oh, but she’s got her casino card!”
I’m not sure about the look that I gave him, but he immediately shut his pie hole.
Found the main card in my back pocket, paid, then continued to glare at the clerk for about a second short of him calling security. *%#@!
Are you a member of the Wampum Club? I sure am.
.
Part-time coin dealer here, lots of messed up bank stories.
A couple of years ago, a local bank called me to look at a bill they thought was bogus. Turned out that a man had died, the wife was cleaning out the safety deposit box, and found a $1,000 bill from 1934, and wanted to deposit it in her checking account.
The bank called the IRS and Secret Service and both told the bank teller to call a coin dealer.
I went to the bank, looked at the bill, and declared it legitimate. The branch manager begged me to buy it for face value and get it out of her bank, and I gladly did.
Sold it for $1,250 to a local collector who was looking for one. That was easy money.
Only two credit cards… Amex for everywhere that takes Amex and another points MasterCard for any place that does not take Amex. I stopped using a debit card after my senior year in college when my card number was stolen and my bank account was drained of my tuition and rent money that had just been deposited with my allowance. They authorized $30,000+ in transactions on an account with less than $10,000 in it. I spent a month sorting that thing out and will never use a debit card again for anything other than getting money out of an ATM.
^^^ This. If you use a credit card for everything, you have that company’s anti-fraud division looking out for their, and by happy accident your, interests. Not so for a debit card. Several times in the last decade I have been called on my mobile phone by my provider asking to confirm if an unusual purchase was authorized by me. Twice it turned out my card had been cloned, they stopped the charges and sent new cards out. Result.
Back in the days before the ubiquitousness of computers (1997) I was driving back from Marietta, OH to Atlanta after Thanksgiving and went to get gas and there was no money on my card (I should have gotten paid the previous day or so , Black Friday).
Turns out some bitch stole some checks from me a few weeks prior and got new checks drawn on my account and went Christmas shopping on my dime.
My credit union (Delta Employees CU) made me sign some forms and write my signature a bunch of times (which clearly didn’t match) and promptly gave me my money back.
That’s a credit union story and a missing money story. I am a member of 2 credit unions and with credit union service centers and shared branches it’s never an issue.
Looks like you have a few shared branches in the area.
https://www.deltacommunitycu.com/ATM/Branch-Locator.aspx
Yes indeed. The ex-wife, let’s call her Satan, went to child support services to complain I was behind on child support (I was out of work for 18 months). The CA court system and in infinite wisdom, took EVERY LAST PENNY I had from my accounts and left $0.00 checking, $0.00 savings. Then they charged me $175 for the transactions. No one ever said a thing to me.
Pretty fucking scary when you can’t even put gas in your car.
I need to update my resume…
“Do you have another card you could try?”
.
Using a debit card is just asking for trouble. Like Adam, I have an AMEX card (the blue card) for the majority of my purchases and my bank issued Mastercard for the times it is not accepted.
Pay it off every month online, never carry a balance. I use less than ten checks a year. Everything else goes on the cards including the majority of my bills. I get a lot of cash back every year and really never have to deal with my bank at all.
I hate spiral cut ham.
For the record, prior to meeting my husband, my dating life was also called “Giant Loser Jamboree”.
Jeff, you are a comedic genius. “There’s over $3000 in there” made me spit out my coffee
Because ‘over $3000″ is where you get to the big money.