Here's another example of a frivolous lawsuit that was brought simply because the plaintiff couldn't find an easier way to try and make himself wealthy. This guy lost his lawsuit over finding flies in his bottled water.
It's too bad he lost this lawsuit, because it's pretty clear that God sent this poor bastard a sign that he was destined for greatness. Maybe he'll sue God next for not moving the courts to find in his favor. After all, being suddenly wealthy was supposed to be God's great plan for him, that's why he sent him a bottle of water with flies in it, right? Damn courts, damn government, damn God!
What I think should happen, now that he lost his lawsuit, is the bottled water company should send him a lifetime supply of the same water before it goes through the treatment and purification plant. If he lost his desire for sex because he found a couple of flys in his water then he should be forced to drink it straight...lets see what that does for the ol' love machine. Dysentery is so very sexy.
This is also proof that there are too many lawyers. This guy probably opened the Canadian Yellow Pages and called the first ambulance chaser he could find. Imagine this conversation with me.
"Law Offices, how can I help you?"
"Hello, I'd like to sue the people that make water?"
"Why?"
"I found two flies in my bottle of water."
"Well, sir, I think you have a very strong case. I believe we might be able to get you an award of at least $343,000."
"Are you kidding? That's it? I want a couple million, how can I get a couple million dollars out of this?"
"Well sir, we can say you suffered some kind of terrible trauma. What would be the worst thing that you can think of as a result of finding flies in your water?"
"Ummmm, I haven't had sex since I found the flies?"
"Good, good. When did you find the flies in your water?"
"An hour ago."
"And you haven't had sex in the last hour?"
"I haven't had sex for eight years!"
"Because of the water?"
"No, because I'm too poor to afford a prostitute!"
"Excellent sir, I think we can make this work. You were just an impoverished every-man's man and you needed a refreshing drink of water to lift you up out of the gutter, dust off your wounded spirit and get you back into the springs of life. You were one swig of thirst-quenching H2O away from a life of prosperity and good fortune!
And then there were flies. Flies that trickled away your hopes and dreams. Flies that drained your enthusiasm for sex. Flies that rained on the very vision of your future!!
Yes sir, I think we can make this VERY profitable for you. By the way, what brand was the water you were drinking?"
"It's called 'Spanish Fly'."
"Oh my sir, I'm positively drooling. Not only does your water have flies, but it is named such that the disgusting contaminates are right on the label! We are going to make you a very rich man. Come by my office this afternoon and drop off my retainer and we'll get you on your way to the good life."
The part that gets under my skin, I mean really just sets off my fuse, is that the plaintiff claims he found it hard to take a shower. I know I'm being judgemental here, but from the sounds of it this guy wasn't exactly intimate with the shower before the bottled-water-with-flies incident.
Oh yeah, and he had visions of "flies walking over feces". Excuse me Mr. Waddah Mustapha, but if you didn't sleep in the damn street you wouldn't see feces, with or without the flies. Those aren't visions, you actually just passed out drunk in a gutter!
Geez, this stuff gets me all worked up.
...read more ⇒
Labels:
RANTS
|
0
comments
|
Rampant Greed #1
If you have ever brought a lawsuit against a company claiming emotional distress caused by rainwater dripping on your 2008 Lexus or persistent depression after finding a small chicken bone in your freshly prepared roasted chicken dinner...DO NOT READ THIS POST! It will only piss you off.
Why?
Because I think people like that are greedy, selfish bastards that have an over-inflated sense of entitlement. If there is one thing that is ruining our civilization, it's the asinine belief that we are just one small mishap away from a lifetime of privilege and luxury.
Every time I run across one of these stories I'm going to post it here and force you to read my opinion about it (too bad I can't make the dorks that bring these lawsuits read my rantings, but I suppose they've suffered enough emotional distress already, right?) This is one of the two articles I found today:
A twin, separated at birth, sues the hospital for the mix-up. Now, don't get me wrong. That kind of sucks. I know if I found out I had a twin brother that I had never known existed I would have a lot of feelings about it. I'd be nervous, excited, curious and even happy. But would I be so emotionally traumatized over it that I felt I was owed 4.7 million dollars?
No.
Look, every few years a movie is put out by the major Hollywood studios that teaches us how to deal with this exact kind of situation. The one that comes to mind is that awful Danny DeVito/Arnold Schwartzenegger movie "TWINS". If you ever find out you have an unknown twin, just rent this movie and take notes. You'll realize that this is not supposed to be a bad thing, learning of unknown and long lost relatives is supposed to be elating, uplifting and maybe a little wondrous (unless you find that you are related to Danny DeVito or Arnold Schwartzenegger, of course).
But to sue a hospital for 4.7 million dollars assumes that you missed out on something in your life that you should have received if only you'd known you were related to your real family. Say, for example, that you suddenly learned you were the twin of Paris Hilton. In this example it would be fair to say that you were deprived your 35 years of living with a silver spoon. The best schools, the 'round the world jaunts, the cars, friends and benefits of being in the top-tier social status.
According to the story, this twin was deprived of 35 years of life with her "real" family. By the math that means she was deprived of $134,285 a year of wealth. The story doesn't say what kind of wealth her "real" family has, nor does it mention the social status of the family that raised her. But I'm guessing neither family was very well off, if they were then she probably wouldn't need to sue a town hospital for such an exorbitant sum.
Besides the blatant greed displayed by this person, I also have to wonder about her family values. After all, by stating she has suffered "emotional trauma" at learning the family that raised her wasn't her real family, what does that say about the people she called parents for 35 years? Must not have been a good childhood if you're traumatized to find out it could have been different. Nice lady.
But then she's obviously a product of her upbringing rather than her genes. I'm sure her "real" family is simply fantastic. Or maybe not, maybe that's where the emotional trauma comes in. "You mean...I'm related to THEM?!?!" ...read more ⇒
Why?
Because I think people like that are greedy, selfish bastards that have an over-inflated sense of entitlement. If there is one thing that is ruining our civilization, it's the asinine belief that we are just one small mishap away from a lifetime of privilege and luxury.
Every time I run across one of these stories I'm going to post it here and force you to read my opinion about it (too bad I can't make the dorks that bring these lawsuits read my rantings, but I suppose they've suffered enough emotional distress already, right?) This is one of the two articles I found today:
A twin, separated at birth, sues the hospital for the mix-up. Now, don't get me wrong. That kind of sucks. I know if I found out I had a twin brother that I had never known existed I would have a lot of feelings about it. I'd be nervous, excited, curious and even happy. But would I be so emotionally traumatized over it that I felt I was owed 4.7 million dollars?
No.
Look, every few years a movie is put out by the major Hollywood studios that teaches us how to deal with this exact kind of situation. The one that comes to mind is that awful Danny DeVito/Arnold Schwartzenegger movie "TWINS". If you ever find out you have an unknown twin, just rent this movie and take notes. You'll realize that this is not supposed to be a bad thing, learning of unknown and long lost relatives is supposed to be elating, uplifting and maybe a little wondrous (unless you find that you are related to Danny DeVito or Arnold Schwartzenegger, of course).
But to sue a hospital for 4.7 million dollars assumes that you missed out on something in your life that you should have received if only you'd known you were related to your real family. Say, for example, that you suddenly learned you were the twin of Paris Hilton. In this example it would be fair to say that you were deprived your 35 years of living with a silver spoon. The best schools, the 'round the world jaunts, the cars, friends and benefits of being in the top-tier social status.
According to the story, this twin was deprived of 35 years of life with her "real" family. By the math that means she was deprived of $134,285 a year of wealth. The story doesn't say what kind of wealth her "real" family has, nor does it mention the social status of the family that raised her. But I'm guessing neither family was very well off, if they were then she probably wouldn't need to sue a town hospital for such an exorbitant sum.
Besides the blatant greed displayed by this person, I also have to wonder about her family values. After all, by stating she has suffered "emotional trauma" at learning the family that raised her wasn't her real family, what does that say about the people she called parents for 35 years? Must not have been a good childhood if you're traumatized to find out it could have been different. Nice lady.
But then she's obviously a product of her upbringing rather than her genes. I'm sure her "real" family is simply fantastic. Or maybe not, maybe that's where the emotional trauma comes in. "You mean...I'm related to THEM?!?!" ...read more ⇒
A Letter to the A##hole That Drove By Me Today
THE FREEWAY IS NOT A RACETRACK!
You are not Jeff Gordon!
No one is impressed with your amazing driving skills...
Mostly we're just wondering what your god damn hurry is!
Where the fuck do you have to be so soon? Don't you think we would like to arrive at our destinations sooner, too? I'm not going 65 mph because I have all flippin’ day, I'm going 65 mph because it's the safest cruising speed. "Safest", did'ya catch that word?
I'm asking you this because I know you. I know you think your driving is safer than mine. Your idiotic rationale is that by weaving in and out of lanes, accelerating up on my six so you can squeeze your idiotic ass between me and the car that I just passed, you are somehow safer. It’s called offensive driving. And it is.
You act like somewhere behind us all is Mario Andretti driving his street legal Formula One car. And he’s gunnin’ for your spot, buddy! He’s coming for you!
So here’s what I think you should try. Cause it can work for all of us, if we all do it…
Maintain a minimum 1.5 – 2 car length distance between you and me. It’s safe, it’s courteous. I know you believe your lightning fast cat-like reflexes will allow you to stop safely even if you’re only a foot off my tailpipe. But this little universal construct called “physics” suggests something else. Barring tremendous advantages in technology (like your car comes from the future) you don’t stand a rats chance in hell of NOT ending up underneath my pickup truck if we both have to stop suddenly.
Try not to change lanes. It is unacceptable to change lanes because you hate the car in front of you. Just because you would never drive it, doesn’t mean it’s a piece of shit. Stay behind it for awhile. You’re both headed in the same direction and you both want to get there without hitting traffic. See? You have something in common with that ugly piece of shit and the stupid moron driving it. Make peace, and just drive.
When you are ready to change lanes, TURN YOUR FUCKING SIGNAL ON, please. Give me at least five seconds to slow down, and you'll find that I actually let you into my lane! Trust me, I am not here to win the race.
Each lane, starting from the right-most lane, is for different tempos. Ya got your slowpokes and trucks on the right, then each lane to the left is designed for progressively faster traffic. If you’re weaving in and out of the lanes, the slowpokes get slower, the medium-speed people get confused and change lanes a lot and the people trying to go faster in the other lanes get cut off by all this mix up in lane speeds.
By swerving to and fro, swooshing up and into small cracks in the flow, by cutting into on ramps so you can slide around those slow and “unsafe” drivers and then cut the whole lot of them off when you run out of onramp, you're just creating the very traffic you bitch about and want to avoid.
Go Speed Racer, GO! ...read more ⇒
Old Man Dog In the Car Next to Me
I was driving home today. I rolled up to a stop light and saw this old man dog looking at me. I just had to take his picture.
Dogs seem to have this wisened look in their eyes, don't they? This old guy is reflecting the weary look that I must have had in my eyes after a long day at the office.
I just wanted to share his picture with everybody. ...read more ⇒
(In)Convenience Fees
Many of the services available on the Internet have started charging "convenience fees". The DMV, Ticketmaster, theme parks, theaters and other such venues are all charging convenience fees.
Why?
Why do we, the consumer have to pay a "convenience fee" for using their web-based service? The whole point of putting a service on the web is so that the business can reduce their overhead and cut staffing. If they don't have to pay someone to stand at the counter then they are saving money. If they don't even need a counter then they are saving a lot more money.
It seems to me that conducting these transactions online is more convenient for them then for the consumer. So why do we have to pay for a convenience fee?
Are we paying for their convenience? I recently bought tickets online for a show, while it was cool for me to be able to buy the tickets at half-past one in the morning the real convenience was realized by Ticketmaster who did not have to pay someone to talk to me at half-past one in the morning.
The beauty of being an online vendor is that it opens up the business to a 24/7 model that was not financially practical before the Internet. Clothing stores used to have set hours. Bookstores were only open until 8 o'clock. You had to wait in a hideously long line to get tickets to the Duran Duran concert. Don't even ask me how much time I wasted in line to buy a ticket to Star Wars!
Now we have Fandango and Ticketmaster, Amazon and Gap - all online. Their web-presence has enabled them to sell more, to a broader range of people (like vampires, agoraphobics and night owls like me) during every part of the day from any part of the world.
That seems bloody convenient to me. So why is that convenience being charged for?
For me, this all started with the DMV. I had to pay a $4 convenience fee to renew my registration online. Granted, in the case of the DMV it is considerably more convenient to do my transaction online. But I know that those sloths down at my local DMV office aren't working for free. The sheer volume of bad karma created by unhappy people waiting in outrageously long lines to be told by bored ignorant assholes to fill out this form then start another line all over again would be enough to make it worthwhile to FORCE people to transact online.
Yet, the DMV's "convenience fee" feels more like a punishment. If they didn't charge the convenience fee maybe more people would do their transactions online. They could reduce the number of unhappy employees they hire each year. They could cut back on the training that the unhappy employees seem to ignore. Think of the savings in wasted forms that were filled out at the insistence of unhappy, under trained employees! My God, we could probably feed the homeless from the savings.
But instead, we have to pay convenience fees. The whole thing is damned inconvenient. Perhaps we, as consumers, could charge a convenience fee to retailers when we actually walk into their brick and mortar buildings. After all, we just saved them the cost of paying some web developer thousands of dollars to build a website.
I'll try this next trip to the DMV. I'll wait in line for three hours, and when I'm leaving I'll collect my four dollar convenience fee from the Information Desk. After all, I saved them the convenience of running a website just for me. I'll let you know how that works out. ...read more ⇒
Why?
Why do we, the consumer have to pay a "convenience fee" for using their web-based service? The whole point of putting a service on the web is so that the business can reduce their overhead and cut staffing. If they don't have to pay someone to stand at the counter then they are saving money. If they don't even need a counter then they are saving a lot more money.
It seems to me that conducting these transactions online is more convenient for them then for the consumer. So why do we have to pay for a convenience fee?
Are we paying for their convenience? I recently bought tickets online for a show, while it was cool for me to be able to buy the tickets at half-past one in the morning the real convenience was realized by Ticketmaster who did not have to pay someone to talk to me at half-past one in the morning.
The beauty of being an online vendor is that it opens up the business to a 24/7 model that was not financially practical before the Internet. Clothing stores used to have set hours. Bookstores were only open until 8 o'clock. You had to wait in a hideously long line to get tickets to the Duran Duran concert. Don't even ask me how much time I wasted in line to buy a ticket to Star Wars!
Now we have Fandango and Ticketmaster, Amazon and Gap - all online. Their web-presence has enabled them to sell more, to a broader range of people (like vampires, agoraphobics and night owls like me) during every part of the day from any part of the world.
That seems bloody convenient to me. So why is that convenience being charged for?
For me, this all started with the DMV. I had to pay a $4 convenience fee to renew my registration online. Granted, in the case of the DMV it is considerably more convenient to do my transaction online. But I know that those sloths down at my local DMV office aren't working for free. The sheer volume of bad karma created by unhappy people waiting in outrageously long lines to be told by bored ignorant assholes to fill out this form then start another line all over again would be enough to make it worthwhile to FORCE people to transact online.
Yet, the DMV's "convenience fee" feels more like a punishment. If they didn't charge the convenience fee maybe more people would do their transactions online. They could reduce the number of unhappy employees they hire each year. They could cut back on the training that the unhappy employees seem to ignore. Think of the savings in wasted forms that were filled out at the insistence of unhappy, under trained employees! My God, we could probably feed the homeless from the savings.
But instead, we have to pay convenience fees. The whole thing is damned inconvenient. Perhaps we, as consumers, could charge a convenience fee to retailers when we actually walk into their brick and mortar buildings. After all, we just saved them the cost of paying some web developer thousands of dollars to build a website.
I'll try this next trip to the DMV. I'll wait in line for three hours, and when I'm leaving I'll collect my four dollar convenience fee from the Information Desk. After all, I saved them the convenience of running a website just for me. I'll let you know how that works out. ...read more ⇒
Things That Suck (Part 1)
A few months ago my friend Chris' little puppy died. The dog's name was Hula Girl. She was the daughter of his older dog Boomba (which I think is one of the greatest dogs I've ever known).
Hula was a little red Australian Cattle Dog, she wasn't even a year old. She had the sweetest little personality. She loved everybody and spent most of her day licking, nibbling and eating everything. Then a few months ago she ate something that poisoned her to death over a 48 hour period.
That really sucked.
Last night another friend of mine told me that he came outside morning before last to find that his old-man cat had been torn in two.
That really sucks too. ...read more ⇒
Hula was a little red Australian Cattle Dog, she wasn't even a year old. She had the sweetest little personality. She loved everybody and spent most of her day licking, nibbling and eating everything. Then a few months ago she ate something that poisoned her to death over a 48 hour period.
That really sucked.
Last night another friend of mine told me that he came outside morning before last to find that his old-man cat had been torn in two.
That really sucks too. ...read more ⇒
The Art of Cool
I've noticed that the art of being "cool" usually involves sacrificing personal comfort. For example:
- Cool guys wear baseball hats at odd angles. I've tried this, and it hurts my head.
- Cool guys think it's "cool" to wear long sleeve sweatshirts during mid-July heat waves. That seems to be the opposite of "cool".
- Cool guys wear the waistband of their pants down around mid-ass or lower. How do they keep their pants from falling down? Easy. They cinch their belts so tight that it cuts into their flesh.
Watch one of these guys walking some day, they don't have that odd gait because they are cool, they walk that way because the blood flow to their lower half is severely restricted. - "Super-cool" guys (i.e. gangstas, hoodlums & homeys) wear excessive jewelry. Either excessively large or just too much of it. I blame Mr. T for starting this trend. Jewelers probably love these guys. But honestly, how many necklaces does it take before they realize they're risking their life every time they walk past a protruding object?
- Many cool guys these days think it's a good idea to wear super-dark shades indoors. Why is this cool? I figure they are more likely to bump into some unseen object (like another idiot in shades), how cool will that be?
- The "Jackass" show made it cool to subject your body to painful experiences. Pain is not cool. Shoving condom-bound metal objects up your rectum is not cool. Lighting your farts or bottle rockets out of your asshole is not cool (unless your in 2nd grade). Jumping off a 30 foot staircase is not cool, even when you do it with a skateboard under your feet. If anything, the skateboard increases the risk of real harm. How come this is cool?
- Why is it cool to wear lace up sneakers WITHOUT the laces? Is it cool when your shoe gets stuck in gum and your foot keeps walking? How are you gonna out run 5-oh if your sneakers fly off after your first two paces? That's not cool at all.
- Piercings are the ultimate in cool nowadays. Some of them look downright painful to me. Why is it cool to have the business end of a drywall screw pushing out of your lower lip?
(I should be nice about this, I think my own nephew has one of these piercings.) - Of course, I do think that tattoos are cool. If there were any part of my physique I felt proud to show off I might just put a tattoo on it. Guess that makes me hypocritical.
I grant you, I am not "cool" by the current definition. I'm not fashionable at all, I'm basically three seasons behind the current fashion trends. But by God I am comfortable!
...read more ⇒
|
1 comments
|
Welcome to RoCTalk
Who's gonna read this crap anyway? Huh?
It seems like a blog is just self-indulgent. The way I figure it, I'm probably the only one who's ever going to read this blog. I'll sit here, proud as a peacock at my own creativity, chuckling at my own wit and humor, admiring my own pictures, every day until I get bored with it.
But for now, I'm not bored yet. Now it's new, it's exciting, it very much fills my need to express certain aspects of my personality, so I'm enamored with it.
We'll see how I feel next week.
So, if you are anyone else but me, and you're reading this, then I say "welcome", "thank you" and "come by often". I'm leaving the ability to add comments open, so if I say something you feel compelled to comment on, please feel free. I may not agree with you (I hope I don't, disagreements make for more interesting discussions), but I will very happy to find out someone else is reading this. ...read more ⇒
It seems like a blog is just self-indulgent. The way I figure it, I'm probably the only one who's ever going to read this blog. I'll sit here, proud as a peacock at my own creativity, chuckling at my own wit and humor, admiring my own pictures, every day until I get bored with it.
But for now, I'm not bored yet. Now it's new, it's exciting, it very much fills my need to express certain aspects of my personality, so I'm enamored with it.
We'll see how I feel next week.
So, if you are anyone else but me, and you're reading this, then I say "welcome", "thank you" and "come by often". I'm leaving the ability to add comments open, so if I say something you feel compelled to comment on, please feel free. I may not agree with you (I hope I don't, disagreements make for more interesting discussions), but I will very happy to find out someone else is reading this. ...read more ⇒
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
