Get Off My Desert Lawn!

Tag: life

  • E-Death

    This topic is a big deal in Las Vegas. It seems a young person, anyone from a child to young adult, is getting killed almost every day. The cause? An e-bike or an e-scooter.

    It’s gotten to the point where I don’t even have to read the articles anymore. I see “e-bike” and already know what’s coming next.

    If I turn on the news, it’s the same thing. Only the news will go out and talk to an officer. They will then explain the importance of safety.

    Safety?

    How do you talk to someone who refuses to listen?

    Unfortunately, we live in a time where everyone can be seen, and everyone wants to. Everything is me, me, me. The world revolves around me and no one else.

    I’ve seen multiple kids on e-bikes and e-scooters ignore traffic and dart across streets without any regard for their own safety.

    When I was a kid, I had a ten-speed bicycle and one time I sped across my residential street and almost got hit by a car. That scared me enough to slow down and look both ways from that point on.

    While it’s easy for me to think ‘these kids need to get hit so they learn their lesson,’ the truth is I can’t because they have motors. All I had to propel myself were my legs.

    Should we make kids go to driver’s ed? Take a test? Get a license?

    It’s easy to say yes, but everything is always easier said than done.

    Tons of people that pass their driver’s test don’t drive the same way after their picture is taken. Myself included.

    Every Gen-X’er will tell you they did stupid shit as a kid, and a teenager, and a young adult. We were lucky though because whether we were alone, or with our friends, when we learned a lesson, we were able to walk away from it.

    Today, everything is automated to “make life easier.”

    That’s true. Today, you don’t need to learn.

    You live or you die.

  • The Invisible Tip Jar

    I went to the Pantera concert last night (8/29) here in Vegas. Great show. Side note – I was extremely impressed with Amon Amarth. In all my years I had never had a chance to see them. I liked them so much I actually bought a shirt after the show, and I never buy an opening act’s shirt.

    Which brings me to my annoyance.

    Tipping has gotten out of hand as everyone knows. Being from Vegas I understand tipping helps, and by no means am I a cheap tipper. Most times I tend to overdo it.

    BUT

    This was the second time this has happened. The first one being the Ghost show a few weeks ago.

    Last night I bought 4 shirts at $40 a piece, along with a poster and tote bag. $200 plus tax. My total bill was $278, as I was told.

    In years past, the shirt guy would turn his iPad around to show me the itemized receipt, then I would be offered a screen to ask if I would like to leave a tip.

    Now, there’s nothing shown. It’s take it or leave it, you’re holding up the line.

    Like I said, the same thing happened at Ghost. A little more – $280 – but only three shirts and a tote.

    What is one supposed to do? Wait in a Disneyland type line of people, then question everything at the end of the transaction?

    I’m all for tipping, but as far as I could see, neither place had a sign that said “Whatever percentage will be added to each transaction.”

    I’m just supposed to assume that the concert shirt tax rate in Clark County is now 50%?

    That’s how they get you to not question anything. Show was great. You’re pumped up. You want that $40 shirt.

    $100 please.

    No problem. Here’s my card.

  • Fast Food Government

    Went to the McDonald’s drive thru last night. I thought my order was simple enough – three combos and an extra order of fries. When I pulled up there was one car at the order window on my left and nobody in my lane. I pulled up and ordered. Everything looked great on the screen. I paid and got my food. The bag looked okay, so I drove home.

    Once I opened up the bag, I discovered that two of my cheeseburgers were missing. Normally, I wouldn’t care but I was starving. That of course made it a complete disaster. I called the McDonalds to see if it was possible to get that order refunded.

    $8 is by no means a life or death amount, but I didn’t have a Snickers bar handy so I was extremely grouchy. Of course, they wouldn’t refund me. They told me they’d write my name down and whenever I was in the area I could speak with a manager about it.

    Of course that means, good luck buddy. We took your $8.

    This morning it dawned on me just how dangerous it is to not only use a drive thru, but to eat fast food to begin with.

    Not only is it bad for you. I, like everyone else, could care less about that.

    How many times has an order been wrong, and no one has gone back to complain?

    How hard is it to read an order?

    Most times, very difficult. That makes me laugh because most receipts will say NO KETCHUP, NO ONIONS, etc. It’s not like it’s written in small legal disclaimer mumbo jumbo on the back of the receipt.

    Still orders are sent out wrong.

    Sometimes you can even order a burger and get home and find a chicken sandwich.

    The part that boggles my mind is that most of these items are given numbers. So not only can’t people read. They can’t count to 10.

    And whose fault is that?

    Ours.

    Because, like God, we get home, forgive them for their errors, and eat what was given.

    In my case, I didn’t eat at all. I did get my soda if that’s any consolation. Still, $8 for a soda is more expensive than a soda at a steakhouse.

    There should be some kind of recourse, because if we added up all the fast food orders that were messed up, forgiven, and never refunded, I’m sure it’s some astronomical amount that has been stolen from the American people.

    Sounds familiar.

  • Brain Dead

    I went to the Weird Al concert this past weekend. I’ve never seen him perform before. While he is extremely entertaining, there was a part of the show where I had to stop and wonder.

    Not wonder about what song he was making fun of, or why I had never gone to one of his shows before. I had to wonder about me.

    When it was time to sing FAT (Michael Jackson’s BAD), Weird Al came out in a fat suit complete with a fat mask. If you’ve seen DODGEBALL, Weird Al’s face looked exactly like Ben Stiller at the end of the movie, when he’s eating chicken.

    Since coming on to the music scene, Weird Al has always been a symbol of harmless fun. While I don’t follow his career closely, I’ve never seen or heard him say anything disparaging about anyone. I don’t even know what political party he sides with.

    So, what’s the problem? Is it that Weird Al was in an outfit that was four times his body size, singing about fat people?

    No.

    The problem was that as soon as he came on stage, I thought OH SHIT.

    Twenty, thirty years ago I would have been laughing my ass of at his theatrics. Instead, all I could think of was how many people he was going to piss off.

    That’s when I realized I was brain dead.

    Millennials, Gen Z, the woke, cancel culture, stupidity, whatever you want to call it, has obviously embedded itself in my brain. As much as I make fun of those groups, they have a tight grip on my head.

    While I should be amazed at how skillful Weird Al is in a fat suit, I’m looking around the audience to see if anyone is shaking their head.

    I felt like I had lost the battle.

    The funny part is I didn’t feel bad for me. I felt bad for Weird Al.

    While I hope to God I’m wrong, I know there will be many more who watch the song the way I did. No one is ever alone in their thinking. All I can do is hope no one says anything because that’s when the trouble starts.

    Unfortunately, someone, somewhere will.

    It’s a shame we can’t just enjoy comedy for what it is. Or anything for that matter. What pisses me off the most is that subconsciously I’ve allowed the stupidity to take control of my brain.

    Has my independent thinking gone by the wayside?

    Am I brain dead?

  • You’re Stupid!

    Why not just come out and tell us?

    I just watched a commercial for Starbucks. It was closed captioned, which we all know (hopefully), is meant for the hard of hearing. It makes life easier by letting them read what’s going on when they can’t hear it.

    Starbucks should be commended for closed captioning the commercial, right? No. Not when you put Baba O’Reilly between music signs.

    If you can’t hear, how do you know what Baba O’Reilly, or any song for that matter, sounds like?

    It makes zero sense.

    But someone approved it.

    Which brings me to the Aquasana commercial.

    They have one where their spokesman has two glasses of water. He states one is Aquasana and the other is dirty tap water.

    Yuck.

    He goes through his pitch of how great Aquasana is, but at the end can’t figure out which glass has the Aquasana water. He even says, “Wait, which one is it?”

    if you want me to know how safe your water is over regular water, shouldn’t you know which water is bad to drink?

    Now that I think about it, it doesn’t matter anyway. We need to drink water to wash down the pills we need to take.

    You know the ones. The pills that will make us look good but are killing us internally.

    You want to lose weight? No problem.

    Get rid of itchy skin? Again, no problem.

    You can clear anything up. Hell, you’ll even be able to dance in the streets with like-minded people. So what’s the problem?

    Nothing. Unless you want diarrhea that makes Mt. Vesuvius look like a 3rd grade science project. If that’s not enough, you’ll probably want to kill yourself.

    They do warn you not to take the drug if you’re allergic to it. That’s good because that might kill us.

    I don’t think we’re that stupid.