Zel-kun’s Words

Working in electronics.  I did it once, and I’ll never do it again.  Strange thing is, I LIKED selling electronics.  I liked offering sound advice on computers, sound systems, video games, and televisions.  There’s nothing quite like seeing someone come in, intimidated by technology they’re unfamiliar with, and leaving with just a bit of understanding.

Its a good job that deserves to be done well, and if deserving of respect.  It truly is a sad thing that the lowly salesman does not get this respect.

The idiot customers that came in from time to time I can deal with.  Some of the more angry ones are actually pretty entertaining.  Its when the idiocy strikes you from your managerial staff, the people who are supposed to be in charge, picked because they supposedly have more knowledge, more skill, more charisma, that things can get pretty frustrating.

When the department manager of electronics doesn’t understand what a video game console is, and doesn’t understand why a Playstation game isn’t the same as a GameCube game, there’s a problem.

When the department manager doesn’t realize that the DVD release of Spiderman on a Friday wouldn’t generate a higher volume of customers, there’s a problem.

The management seemed to walk around with ther heads up their ass all the time.  They really seemed to have no idea what was going on.  And they covered for this lack of knowledge by abusing and undermining their staff as much as possible.

Example:

It was a late night, about a quarter after 1:00am.  I was scheduled until 11:00, but stayed to clean up the electronics department, by myself.  I lurched towards the front doors, which were locked, and I motion over the nearby manager.

“Could you let me out?”  I ask.

“Why?”  He replies, as if its an abnormal thing for employees to leave after their shift is over.

“Because its time to go.”

“The store isn’t clean yet,” says the manager who had, until a moment ago, been doing absolutely nothing, just sitting by the front door.

“My department is clean.”

“But there are other departments you could clean, like toys.”

“What happened to the three people who were working toys?”

“They were here until close, so they left.”  He said.

I had finally had it by this time, “So the people responsible for the department left when they were supposed to, and I, although I have already stayed over two hours past my shift to clean my department, am expected to pick up after them?”

He was silent, he knew I called his bluff, and knew he had nothing else to say about it, “I’ll let you go, but don’t let it happen again.”

“Uh… okay.”  And I left.

They pulled stuff of the like all the time.  And people were expected to roll over and take it.

And I wondered why the managers didn’t seem to like me too much.

Zel-kun out.

Just before first grade, my family moved to Calumet City.  Which, as I understand it, was a nicer neighborhood then than it is now.  My mother and father had seperated, and my future stepfather had moved in with us.  I suppose moving to Calumet City was the start of a new life for them.

My mother’s house had always been a boarding house of sorts.  I can remember several people living there from time to time.  A couple of my stepbrothers… my uncle.. my cousin… There always seemed to be someone else living in our house, and I can say that the trend continued to this very day.

I have no complaints about my family during this time.  I had as loving a mother as anyone, there was always good food, clean clothes, and a clean home.  I had everything I needed.  We weren’t exactly wealthy, I remember that the back lawn was nearly dead, the paint on the house was cracked and peeling, and my fellow classmates considered my family to be poor.

This may have been the case.  I honestly can’t say I remember, I have no idea what jobs my parents held at the time.  I know that I didn’t have a whole lot of toys, but I had enough.  I had what I needed, and I am grateful for that now.  Had I had all the toys I ever wanted I may have grown spoiled, expecting everything in life ot fall in my lap.  I’d likely be a very different person.

School wasn’t the easiest thing I ever did.  I was either lost in my own thoughts, or lost in the ritalin-induced thoughtlessness.  The first couple of grades I got by on creativity (and reading, I could always read with the best of them) alone, but third grade actually expected me to learn something.  So my grades began to fall from the A average I had, and that trend continued through the years.

In fourth grade, I was pulled aside from some of my classes to go and do some special tests.  I’m not exactly sure who requested these tests, whether it be my parents, the school, or my doctor, and I suppose it doesn’t matter.

I was asked various questions, asked to recite strings of words, given colored blocks and asked to make specific patterns, and given various logic and comprehension exercises.  Later in life I learned this was an aptitude and IQ test, and that I scored well above the IQ of the average adult.  I’m sure this confused people even more, what with my falling grades and all.  It was also around this time that I began trying out different types of medication that was supposed to treat ADD.

Aside from this, my social life was very active.  Every day after school, I would meet someone from school, and he would then proceed to beat the crap out of me.  I’m not entirely sure WHY I got into a fight on a daily basis.  All I know is I would be walking, and then I get a punch in the mouth.  I remember for a time when a whole group of older kids would jump me on the way home (and they had ample opportunity, I lived eight or nine blocks away), and take turns.  I guess I reminded them of their drunken father or something…

I won some fights, I lost others.  I have never thrown a punch to the face though.  Don’t really know why, I just could never bring myself to do it.  Now punches to the stomach, throwing to the ground, or throwing against the wall, that I could do.  I spent quite a bit of time in detention for defending myself.

That is the odd thing about the school administration: you are guilty for defending yourself.  To be right in the school’s eyes, I would have to sit and take my beating, tell the teacher later, and hopefully a tiny sentence that would not prevent the event from recurring would be passed.  So if you’re a victim, you’re doubly the victim, no matter what choice you make.

I’ve started one fight in my entire life, and that was in second grade.  A kid by the name of Richard, despite my warnings and protests, continued to make fun of my mother.  So I punched him in the gut as hard as I could, and he crumpled onto the ground in the fetal position.  I have never been a violent man, but I remembered feeling pretty satisfied after that.  For a little while after this, my walk home was clear.

As though it wasn’t obvious at this point, I wasn’t the most popular kid in school, quite the contrary.  My little brother, Josh, on the other hand, had a bit more popularity.  People liked him.  My brother and I were pretty good friends back in the day, we would routinely take trips to ‘Winkler’s,’ which was a store that sold candy by the piece.  You could give them fifty cents and get fifty pieces of candy.  Give us a couple dollars each, and we were the happiest kids alive.

After we bought our food, we would go to the schoolyard, which was the closest playground, eat our candy and drink our Kay-O chocolate drinks.  Sometimes we’d meet other kids who wanted to make fun of me, but hang out with my brother.  Josh’s response was always to tell them to screw themselves…. maybe in not so many words.

He was always like that, possessed of a type of nobility that I was years away from recognizing, let alone possessing myself.  He brought me to friends’ houses, we’d hang out, he on more than one occasion beat someone up because they were speaking ill of me, whether or not I was present at the time.

I didn’t realize it at the time, but Josh was the best brother a guy could ask for.

We lived next to a forest preserve, where I spent most of my time.  I tended to be a loner, and deep in the forest was the best place to escape.  The forest also bordered the far end of Lincoln Field, which was a large expanse of grass, one the other side of which was the part of town I didn’t like, the part where the school was.  But in my little corner of the field, about five minutes away from home, was a lone tree, and that was my thinking spot for a number of years.  One day, I’d like to visit that tree again.

In the middle of all this, was a summer I went to camp.  Which is a story in and of itself…

Saturday I installed The Sims 2.  I did so because I had a marginal enjoyment of the first one, and a friend let me borrow it, so the price was right.  I love Sim games, from the beginning when it was just SimCity, the odd SimAnt, the horribly programed yet somehow intriguing SimEarth, and of course the needlessly complex SimCity 4.

The Sims is one of the strangest games I’ve ever played.  Its a game where you build a house, have a person, then you live his life.  That’s right, you eat, sleep, talk to friends, watch TV, and even let your “sim” know when he needs to use the toilet.  That’s right, instead of ACTUALLY taking a crap, you can tell a little virtual man to.

Ain’t life grand?

Nothing interesting happens in The Sims, yet it is remarkably addictive.  You want your sim to be happy, to do well, and you become engrossed in this quest.  If left to himself, your sim would be an unemployed, filthy, out of shape bastard who routinely pees on the floor and cries in piles of his own filth.  You are the only thing keeping this neanderthal civilized and intelligent.

What’s the goal?  Why are you virtually living the mundane life of a mentally-challenged invalid?  To buy more stuff, get more friends, and maybe get some action.  Sounds….. exciting.

For all of my trash-talk of the game, it actually IS fun.  I can’t explain it, but finding time for friends, work, and actually bettering yourself through activities, is pretty addicting.

The Sims 2 is very much like its predessessor.  In fact, its ALMOST a clone.  But, there’s a few key differences that make it worth it.

1. There actually IS enough time in the day to do everything.  In the first one, you either worked, or were reasonably happy.  Never both.  Just wasn’t enough time for both work and a social life.

2.  The creation system was vastly overhauled.  Its comperable to Oblivion in the sheer complexity involved in changed your character’s face.

3. You get old.  And you DIE.  That’s right, you get old and die.  That’s not depressing.  But this is a plus from the first game because if you had a kid, he was a kid FOREVER.  Talk about a parent’s worse nightmare.

4. It doesn’t work for some people.  I popped it in my computer and it worked fine.  I stopped, then I decided to play a little later, and my computer crashed during the startup.  I cursed, restarted, and perused my error logs.  It claimed my video card crashed.  This surprises me being as I play more system intensive games than The Sims.  And I play them often, and this is the first time this video card has given me any trouble.  I start The Sims 2 again, it works.  The next time, a crash.

What the heck?

I start looking online, and sure enough.  Its a known issue.  Apparently, it doesn’t like some types of CD drives.  The obvious fix, a no-CD crack.  I installed this and it starts up perfectly, and much more quickly.  Problem being, the crack has a known issue, you can’t use the Build Mode in the game.

Well that’s just great.  So I can either roll the dice and HOPE my game starts, or use the crack and not have access to one of the game’s main functions.  My luck with computers remains the same after all these years: If there IS a possible problem, then I WILL experience it.

Legend has it there’s another CD crack out there that’s fixed this issue.

I can only hope.

Zel-kun out.

Its been a busy day, I’ve barely had time to think.  The day flew by and I actually was able to leave a bit early.  It was snowing, as it has been for the last week, so the boss let us beat the traffic.

I pull into the driveway, and get out.  A kid, who seemed about twelve or thirteen, smiled at me and said, “Hello!”

I smiled and offered him the greeting in return.

I’m not sure how it is in other parts of the country, but hellos aren’t normally exchanged anymore.  I remember when I used to greet passersby and I was returned with funny looks.  So it was very refreshing and sincerely made me smile at the end of my day.

So, to all of you, hello.

Zel-kun out.

My plane landed in Oklahoma in early March of 2004, where I was about to embark on my first job as a travelling contractor.  I got off the plane, waiting at the luggage carousel, tired as can be.

I had received the call the previous evening, asking if I’d be willing to leave the next day.  I was to replace someone who had been sleeping on the job, and they needed someone immediately because the project had already started.  I had been unemployed for about a month at this point, so I was not about to turn down an offer for work.

I woke up at three in the morning, so I could be out the door by four, and arrive in Peoria by seven.  I got to the address, which had no markings, it was a small building with a communications tower, I had no idea if this was the place or not.  I pulled out my cell phone (a parting gift my old job kept active for me for quite awhile), and called my contact.  Sure enough, it was the place.

The guy’s name was Steve, who can best be described as easygoing and neurotic all at the same time.  Steve gave me the crash course in what I would be doing during the project, all the while lamenting on the status of the project at the time.  I could sense his frustration when one of his techs called, who was sitting outside a site in California because no one was there to meet him.  So there was a tech, on the clock, doing absolutely nothing during a project where already the time constraints were apparent.

After a few hours of training, he gave me the information I would need for my flight and rental car and all that.  At three in the afternoon, I arrived at the Peoria airport.  I parked my car in the back of the lot (as if I had a choice), and began walking to the airport, lugging my luggage (appropriately named so, it would seem) across the chilly parking lot.  I was very grateful when halfway there a shuttle bus came to pick me up.

I’m not certain if its custom to tip the shuttle bus driver, but I handed him a five, I was grateful to avoid the full walk.

I got to the counter and handed my ticket to the attendant, who informed me that since the ticket was just bought this morning, they couldn’t approve the credit card without the holder being there.  SoI call Steve, who promises to compensate me on next week’s expense check.  I hand the lady my card, who swipes it and says, “I need to inform you that since the ticket purchase was made today, you will be getting the full security search.”

Well isn’t that dandy.

So I take off my shoes and watch some aging security guard with a fancy TSA badge root through my bags.  He swabs the fabric with q-tips and places them neatly aside.  He runs his hands over my clothes, checking for hidden items I assume, then pauses at the CD spindle I had on one of my bags.  I knew I would have a laptop on this trip, so I packed a few games and DVD’s.  Apparently, this interested the TSA guy, who proceeded to open the spindle and examine the CD’s individually.

I’m just glad he didn’t find my CD labelled, “101 ways to bring down the American Capitalist Society of Infidels with Homemade Bombs.”

So he closes my bags, takes the swabs and tells me to head on to the next step of security.  There is a lady who hands me a large plastic tray and asks I remove all metal items from my person.  I remove my belt, wallet, keys, cellphone, pen, ring, glasses, 9mm semi-automatic pistol, and put them into the tray.  She sends the tray through a scanner and I see a man at the other end snapping on a white latex glove.

Oh, hell no.

Fortunately, he just put it on to closely inspect my pen for the concealed superflu vial I hid in there.  Another man took me behind a glass screen and asked me to stand along a line with my feet apart.  I then explained that he was going to pat me down, and assured me that only the back of his hand would come near my genetalia.

Reassuring.

So, finally, with my shoes back on and my dignity fully lost, I wait in the terminal for my plane to arrive.  I was a little nervous, I hadn’t been on a plane since I was seven, and I had a fear of heights.  I sat there looking out the window as a small propeller-driven plane pulled up.  The door opened and a man announced, “Flight to St. Louis, now boarding.”

I stood there in disbelief for a long moment.  I’ve seen larger SUV’s than this thing.  I pictured a dozen scenarios with that plane spiraling out of control and slamming into the ground.  But as much as I didn’t want to, it was time to board the plane, so I boarded.

The inside of the plane was even smaller if that were possible.  The floors were metal, the walls and the ceiling were metal, and the chairs looked like they were ripped out of a van, leading me further to believe that this was just a car with wings glued on.

I sat in the tiny seat, my elbow crammed against the window, and my head against the luggage rack above me.  I saw the other passengers filter in, there were seven (including me) in total.  Then came the steward, hauling a little case with him, which he put next to him as he took his seat, facing the passengers, smiling away.

The plane started moving, the little propellers spinning.  I gasped as the ground fell away and things such as houses and cars became smaller and smaller.  I don’t know how high we were, but I can’t imagine it was all that high, everything seemed too big.

But then, I don’t really have a point of reference.

In the middle of the flight, the steward picked up his case and opened it, “Would anyone care for something to drink?”  He pulled out plastic cups and began filling them with ice.  He then lined up a row of sodas and began pouring the orders.  He handed me a Dr. Pepper, which did quite a bit to soothe my nerves.  I kept expecting us to fall right out of the sky.

But, the plane landed safely in St. Louis.  Despite my fears, the ride was smooth and the service was exemplary.  If the plane had been built to house a tall man like myself, I daresay the ride would have been downright pleasant.

I spent the next two or three hours at the St. Louis airport, waiting for the flight to take me to Tulsa, Oklahoma.  It was dark by then, so I wasn’t able to see the St. Louis cityscape out the window.  Which was a pity because I love cityscapes.  I also love the word cityscape.

My plane finally pulled up, and I was relieved to see it was much larger than the last one.  I boarded the plane, took my seat, and rested easy.  This plane did not have Dr. Pepper, so I settled for a 7up.  I then proceeded to fall asleep and spill it on myself.  The stewardess, a comely southern lady who appeared to be in her late thirties, helped clean up the mess with utterances of, “Oh, you poor dear.”

I might have been more embarrassed if I wasn’t too tired to care.

The plane landed and I stood there by the carousel, waiting for my luggage to come by.  I knew I could spot mine easily because I attatched red zip-ties to the zippers.  So a bag with red zip-ties came down… and it wasn’t mine.  It seems a lot of people shared my idea, so I had to closely examine several bags in hopes of finding mine.

The luggage carousel seems like a bad idea.  There’s no administration involved.  There’s no way to prove or disprove which bag is yours (at least not that I could see).  What would prevent me from taking the wrong bag?  Would I get to the hotel and find my bag full of women’s undergarments?  Would my bag suddenly have eight severed heads?  And if I wanted to take an extra bag, what would stop me?

I walked to the attatched rent-a-car place and gave them my information.  Unfortunately, they had no full-size vehicles left, which meant I had to drive a mid-size.  While it wasn’t the smallest car I had been in, it wasn’t the largest, either.  When I put the seat all the way back, I could sit somewhat comfortably, even though my knees were up against the steering wheel.

But it was enough, and I was finally on the road to my hotel, at ten in the evening.  It was a tiring day, and I was glad to be done with it.  Oklahoma was an ordeal in itself… worthy of retelling, I should think.

Zel-kun out.