Thursday, August 6, 2009

Ling and Lee

I dunno, maybe it's me, but with all the happiness and joy over the return of Laura Ling and Euna Lee from North Korea, there seems to be one wee little technical detail that hasn't been fully explained...

How the fuck did the North Korean authorities get hold of them?

If they did, in fact, sneak across the border then what the hell made them think that they were somehow going to be immune from NoKo rules, regulations, and laws? Just because they were "journalists"? Why should that could for anything? I've spent no small amount of time travelling around while in the Navy, and I can't think of ANYPLACE that would tolerate anybody violating local laws, no matter who they are. If those two did sneak across the border into a totalitarian military-controlled regime, I figure they got off damn lucky with only 140 days in the clink; it would have served them right if they'd had to serve half the sentence before getting out for good behavior...

Tuesday, August 4, 2009

Terrorist strikes at McD

Every now and then, I give in to the temptation to enjoy the fine dining at McDonalds -- I'll admit that there are a couple of things on the menu that I actually like.

This morning, I stopped in for breakfast. Being a Troublemaker, I like to order what I want, versus their default manufacturing process. Accordingly, I wanted a quantity of TWO Snausage McMuffin sammich meals -- except that instead of two small cups of coffee, I asked if they could just put them into one larger cup.

Now, you might think that my request was simple and straightforward, but such was not the case. You see, McDonalds doesn't apparently grasp the concept of customer convenience or doing anything outside their Established Procedure.

From the reaction from the counter-person (something like an anti-person, I'm thinking), you'd have thought I asked him to solve a twelve-variable calculus equation in his head. After much brow-furrowing, he had to ask for help in trying to enter my request into the picture-screen. It wasn't working, and they finally had to get a blue-shirt to supervise. Before all was said and done, I was half-afraid the computers at McD Corporate were going to asplode.

I did get my one large cup of coffee, but it necessitated that they enter the order as:
  • ONE meal with no drink
  • A large coffee
  • A separate Snausage McMuffin sammich
  • A separate hashbrowns
Whereas two Snausage McMuffin meals would have cost me $8, the order they had to enter ended up costing me $8.40. That's right, folks -- I paid MORE money for LESS food (instead of 2 12-oz coffees, I got 1 20-oz; they "saved" 4 oz of coffee).

This is why jobs that require no thinking ability are referred to as McJobs, methinks...