Totally Me» money

Nationwide Insurance

Jim — Thu, 24 Sep 2009 09:43:50 +0000

Larry Thursby, who is apparently Nationwide’s vice president of Personal Auto, is an asshole. During one of their radio commercials, he’s talking about accident forgiveness and specifically teenagers when he says it’s not a question of if but when they get in an accident (paraphrased because I couldn’t find the commercial online anywhere). This is how insurance people think. I, for one, was never in an accident as a teenager. My brother was never in an accident as a teenager.

As far as he’s concerned rampaging teenagers are out there running around crashing into things and fucking up his bonuses. But they’re such great people that they’re willing to let the first one go. That’s how Nationwide is on your side.

I don’t think I’ll be giving them any of my money.

Shop Class as Soul craft

Jim — Mon, 08 Jun 2009 14:07:02 +0000

Mark wrote a pseudo-review over on Boing Boing of Matthew Crawford’s book Shop Class as Soul Craft. I was a network guy for a significant part of my adult life and felt the same sort of disconnect that he talks about about was afraid to talk about it with anybody for fear of seeming ungrateful. I mean, I was being paid stupid amounts of money and when a large portion of the world’s population aren’t sure where their next meal is coming from it seems kind of pissy to whine about not feeling fulfilled at work. What he says is true though. I remember one time a co-worker and I were doing some consulting for a metal fabrication shop and the IT guy was taking us through showing us what they did. Both of us were taken by the production of real things since neither of us actually produced any tangible things of value in our regular work lives.

If you read the comments below the Boing Boing post you’ll see that I’m not the only one that feels that way. I’m taking steps to correct the absence of actual creation in my life. If it’s something that’s missing from yours I suggest you do too.

Paul McGuiness – Douchebag with an audience

Jim — Sun, 07 Jun 2009 05:29:18 +0000

Stan Schroeder posted an article on Mashable titled If Free is the Enemy of Good, Then Color Me Bad a couple of days ago about Paul McGuiness and him being a bitch. That’s not what Stan said because he’s considerably more cultured than I am. Paul McGuiness, for those of you out of the loop on such things, is the Manager for U2. I’m going to make the first of what will probably be many ugly comments now and ask —have you ever noticed that the bands or band apparatchik or clingers-on that are constantly bitching about the Internet or peer to peer file sharing or people stealing music are from bands that haven’t been relevant in 20 years? Bono is as swell a humanitarian as they come but how many people can name a song they’ve recorded from this century? Metallica–ditto.

The problem is that all of these people have stopped making music (if they ever were) and become part of the general whoredom that is the “recording industry”. They have been at it sooooo long that they believe they are entitled to drink Cristal poured over the breasts of $10,000 a night hookers. So they don’t want people to listen to their “music” unless they’ve been paid for it. When the actual music in the world is almost completely made by people who would gladly give it away just so people can hear it (BTW, Thanks, Trent. The Slip was the bomb). I’ll bet there are 50 bands in Raleigh that would pay to have people hear them play*.

At any rate, this is not the first time Paul has opened his hole and said something stupid. The funniest part is that he’s the fucking manager which means that he doesn’t have any talent and he’s basically sponging off U2′s success.

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*In fact, I knew a guy in a band a few years ago in Raleigh and that’s essentially what they did… after paying for the rentals on equipment and assorted expenses they were lucky if they split enough money at the end of the night to cover their bar tab.

Dear Governator, This is beyond stupid

Jim — Sat, 28 Mar 2009 15:08:37 +0000

Let me start I by saying I love California. I’d seriously consider moving there if it weren’t for goofiness like this reported over at TechCrunch. The short version for those that don’t want to read is that CARB is considering regulating the color of cars sold in California to minimize the increased energy requirement of cooling black cars. Because black paint doesn’t reflect sunlight well. Really. The best and brightest of the California Air Resources Board. That’s what they came up with.

See, the problem is (for anybody who has every worked around bureaucrats*) that they feel like they have to “do stuff” to justify their continued feeding at the public trough. Apparently that’s what they’ve done. The chief of the Paint Reflectivity Studies Section, Heating and Cooling Branch, Research Division of the Office of Living Like Cavemen (sorry Cavepersons) has convinced somebody that black cars contribute to air pollution in some way. So they got a grant to study the problem which means more money and personnel for the PRS section which will eventually mean a cushy new job as branch chief for something or other for the PRS section chief.

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*As I’ve mentioned in previous posts, this also applies to middle managers and politicians.