Was It Too Much To Ask That You Handle The Fries?

This past weekend, we headed up to Myrtle Beach to give my brother a little help with his car, which has completely shit out on him. It's not the first time this has happened. But since it's about an hour away, it was no big deal. Just an impromptu road trip.

The car, as it turns out, is completely dunzo. So we spent Saturday afternoon searching around for vehicles on used car lots. Didn't see much worth buying. Most of it was crap and the stuff that could pass for less than crap was kind of overpriced. I'm sure he'll figure it out but I feel for the kid, you know. We've all been there and feeling like that is not a fun thing.

Him and his girlfriend had to work Saturday night so Steve and I hung out. I poked around on the Interweb and updated my Flickr pictures (I know, shocking!) while he played XBox. That game console has become a serious addiction in our house. I even bought a strategy guide for my Elder Scrolls game. I know, geek alert, but you know what - that's a huge game and I need some help ya'll.

(On a side note, I'm a retard because I can't stop saying strategy like stragedy, rhymes with tragedy. Seriously, I get tongue tied and don't realize I'm saying it. Anothey Kristy-ism apparently.)

To make matters worse, Steve went ahead and bought a years subscription to XBox live, a headset and a 50-ft CAT-5 cable (so we could hook it up - paying a C-Note for the wireless adapater just ain't happening right now). I spent the past two evenings attempting to get it wired correctly to our network. On Sunday night, it just keep dropping the connection. We had five minutes on and then boom, nothing. Last night, we had a solid connection, but couldn't get into any matches. After a ridiculous amount of configuring on my router and a firmware upgrade, things are gold and working beautifully! The configuring wasn't for the light of heart, as my devices were intially all static IP's because of my Vonage modem. Seriously, don't ask with that. That was another pain in the ass to set up.

Eventually, I was able to turn DHCP on and now my laptop and the XBox pull their IP's while my desktop and the Vonage router have the consistent static IP. And it all works, something it didn't do before. I'm assuming the firmware upgrade helped that but I'm not going to complain because Steve can play XBox while I surf the web and anyone who wants to can still call in.

So yes, I'm an XBox Live widow now. Apparently, you need to separate Live accounts if two people are going to use their own profiles. I did not know this. I thought I'd be able to sign onto mine and he sign onto his. Since he bought it, he uses it and now he sits there playing with the headset in his ear. And it's funny because I can't hear the people he's talking to so it's like he's holding a conversation with himself. Every few minutes or so he'll bust out laughing or yell 'I keep it real, son!' or some other mantra like that and I have to control my laughter because it is too funny.

This weekend, we also had one of the worst fast food experiences ever. I don't know how many of you have ever been to a Hardee's but their whole selling point is that they bring your food to the table. It's like any other fast food restaurant where you order at the counter and fill your own drinks. But the workers bring out your food.

Well, we stopped at one in Conway and after placing our order, waited close to a half an hour for our food. And when the girl first brought it out, the order was completely messed up, despite the fact that I saw it being inputted correctly into the register when I ordered. After finally getting our correct order, we sat around livid and wondering who had spit in our food.

But seriously, I think of the fuss caused by K-Fed's SuperBowl commercial where he's in that music video rapping and acting all bling-bling but in reality, he's flipping burgers and only imagining it. And some fast food workers association got all hyped up about it because it's degrading to fast food workers. Because who even know there was an association for fast food workers?

And here's an idea. K-Fed's commercial doesn't degrade you nearly as much as you degrade yourselves. And I don't say that to mean you make yourself look bad because you work in fast-food. I say that with the meaning that it's very, very rare these days to go to a fast food restaurant and get anything but sub-par service. I can count on my hand the times in a year that I've gotten the correct order, as specified. Every time I walk into a place like that, I'm faced with a cashier who either ignores me, is rude to me, acts like I'm wasting their time by frequenting their establishment and doesn't even bother to listen to me when I order.

I was in a Burger King once and witnessed as two customers complained that their orders weren't right and the women behind the counter started an argument with them. And I'm not talking a spat. I'm talking an all out yelling and screaming match that caused the entire restaurant to stop what they were doing and watch. I seriously thought they were going to start ripping off earrings and pounce on each other. But it's like, come on, how are you going to start an argument with a customer because they pointed out that you fucked things up?

I'm not the biggest fan of the "customer is always right" saying, because frankly, I think that gives people way too much liberty to act like assholes. But at the same time, I don't like being treated like I'm wasting people's time or like I'm bothering them just because I want to get some food. And okay, maybe you're only making minimum wage and who really wants to put that much effort into a minimum wage job. But think about this - it's your job. You're getting paid to do it. If you do it well, you may not have to work at a minimum wage job all your life. Shitty employees don't go anywhere in this world.

And to those of you food service workers who have made my visit friendly and enjoyable and gotten my order right, I say a million thank you's. Because while you are few and far between, you redeem my faith in mankind every once in awhile.

Ending rant. Sorry, I meant to write just about the shitty service at that Hardee's but ended up going into a rant that's been brewing for days.

I think I'll leave it at that. Time to calm down, surf the web and listen to Steve chatter with his newfound friends.