Rant #3,756: Gotta Get It Right

I got my allergy shots yesterday.

Thank goodness for that.

The last week has been pretty bad for me and lots of other allergy sufferers 

With the fluctuation in temperatures that we have had this summer--one day it is in the 90s, the next day it is in the 70s--my allergies have gone haywire, to say the least.

And now we have Canadian wildfires again--

Not as bad as we had them two years ago, but bad enough.

I was out of the house pretty much the entire morning yesterday, and there was a pall in the air, with the sun trying to peak through. 

This past week, my nose has been dripping, my eyes have bothered me, and I have been a bit of a mess.

Air conditioning doesn't help much, and going outside just exacerbates everything.

So, this summer hasn't been too much fun yet for me, on a number of levels.

My son continues to look for a job, and yesterday, through a Zoom call,we spoke with a counselor from one of the agencies that is supposed to help him.

The woman was a font of information, and I believe that by having my son's assessment play out, we are going the right way with this mess.

Among the information she gave us was the suggestion that my son go for a psychological evaluation, since he hasn't had one in a while.

I called the place she gave me, I was told I have to call somewhere else, I did that, and I am still waiting for a return phone call.

Yes, we will wait for the assessment to play out.

Otherwise, not much else is going on at the moment.

I still have my medical problem, which i believe.is getting better, but while it is 99 percent better, I am still waiting for that 1 percent to kick in--

And as I look back, it is something that didn't have to happen.

I have been busy with work, and every day is a new day with exactly how much work I have to do.

Like the weather, it fluctuates literally by the day; sometimes, it is a little bit, other times, it can be several hours of things to do.

I guess in a funny way, it has been a godsend, taking my mind off of other problems.

Nothing is easy, and it is getting more difficult by the day.

But the weekend is right around the corner, and as I always have, I work for the weekend.

Maybe I can get a breather then.

If I can breathe at all.

Rant #3,755: Have a Nice Day

Today, I am going to write about something that interests me, makes me feel good, and is something that I enjoy writing about.

And it has nothing to do with the series of earthquakes that have hit New Jersey during the past few days.

You might remember that a few Rants ago, I wrote about K-Tel Records and their compilation LPs that were incessantly hacked on television at all hours of the day and night.

Anyway, in 1990, roughly 15 years or so after the heyday of K-Tel Records, Rhino Records came out with their own series of K-Tel-like compilations honoring the kitschiest music of the 1970s, called "Super Hits of the 70s: Have a Nice Day."

No, you won't find Elton John or Wings or Olivia Newton-John on these CDs--I don't think they ever came out on vinyl record, although they did come out on cassettes--but you will find the likes of Looking Glass, Bo Donaldson and the Heywoods, and Maxine Nightingale on these collections.

And each volume comes with extensive liner notes!

Unlike the K-Tel compilations, which featured upwards of 22 songs on each LP, the Rhino collections only had 12 songs on each CD, but they were uncut amd sounded better than just about anything K-Tel ever put out.

And the initial series had 15 volumes, so there were a total of 180 kitschy classics in this series.

I went whole hog for these CDs, and I bought each of the initial 15 volumes either new or used from probably 1990 to 1992, and they had a nice place in my collection.

You would think that Rhino would have exhausted the kitschy classics from the early 1970s, but the series was so popular that they revived the series in 1993, releasing not only 10 more volumes--adding 120 tunes to the mix, bringing the total up to 300---but a promotional CD to promote the newst volumes and a massive, multi CD set of all the songs, plus news bytes from the era--think Patty Hearst and Watergate--encased in a box that had retro-1970s carpeting on its outside!

I bought Volume 16, but to me, the kitschy factor had run out by this time.

Sure, there were some great tunes on the first 15 volumes--"Brandy," "I Believe In Music," and the entire Leo Sayer hit catalog--but the next 10 volumes didn't do much for me--Wayne Newton, Meco, Player, Exile, Orleans, stuff I was never into at all--so I didnt purchsse them.

Sorry to say, these later volumes are getting more and more difficult to find, and some go for a pretty penny if you can find them.

Looking for something different to listen to. I kind of stumbled on my stash of these CDs, and have recently archived them digitally in the MP3 format so I can listen to them in the car.

And yes, I have searched around for the nine volumes that I am missing, and have cobbled together as much of the music as possible from digital files I have from other sources on a separate, external hard drive.

I don't have all the songs on the missing nine CDs, but I discovered, to my astonishment, that i have at least five songs on each of the missing CDs from other sources, so I can make up a representative collection for those missing disks.

Let me tell you, I have mistakenly labeled all the music on this collection as being "kitsch," but I mean thst in the nicest way.

There is lots of good music here, and for every "Disco Duck" and Freddy Fender tune, there are plenty of good, almost forgotten tunes by the likes of Ian Gomm, Pilot and Jigsaw.

The early 1970s--my high school years--was a period that I, personally, lost touch on a lot of things, and music certainly was one of those things.

This collection has brought much of it all back to me, and it is nice to revisit 50 years after the fact.

I don't want to ever go back to my teenage years, but this collection allows me to take a little dip in the pool without having to dive right in.

Lots of fun, and this 25-CD collection is highly recommended.

Yes, "Have a Nice Day."

Rant #3,754: Strange Days

??????????

To pick up on yesterday's story ...

So I gave the teller at the drive-thru my deposit--check and cash--and she temporarily vanished after telling me she had to go to the front of the bank for some unknown reason.

She returned, gave me back my receipt, my driver's license, and my debit card, all nicely put together with a paper clip.

I took it, thanked her, and drove off--

But I wanted to put my license and debit card away in my wallet, so I pulled over to the side of the parking lot, parked, and took out my wallet.

I unclipped everything, and it was all there--

Including registers!

But to my surprise, something else was in this small package--

The check i gave her to deposit.

I double checked my receipt, everything was evidently put into my account, but she gave me back the check.

My wife was a teller for many years, and I know that before a teller's day is done, their draw has to balance out, including cash and checks.

If it doesn't balance out, everyone has to stay, until it can be reconciled 

If it can't be reconciled, the teller can be written up, and it gets put on the teller's personal record.

Whatever the case, and since this had never happened to me before, I stopped for a second, and decided what to do.

??????????

Not to pat myself on the back, but I decided to take the high road, returning the check to save the woman's butt--

And also, i wanted to double check to make sure the transaction was done correctly.

Since I went through the drive-thru with my original transaction, I figured I might as well go through the drive-thru again, but this time, simply walking over to this area rather than waiting on another line, wasting more time.

I walked up to the drive-thru, and there was one car there.

I tapped the window a few times, noticed that it was a different female teller, and got her attention.

"I just made a deposit here, and it wasn't you, but the previous teller gave me my check back."

"You have to wait. I am waiting on someone."

I said that was fine, and I would wait.

She was just about done with the customer, and when the car drove away, there, miraculously, was no one waiting to use the drive-thru.

"It wasn't you, but the previous teller gave me my check back."

"I cannot help you. You have to drive up to the window again."

"All I want to do is return the check and make sure that the check was deposited correctly. Why do I have to get back on the line?"

"I can't help you unless you bring your car to the window."

I have to tell you, I left there quite a bit perturbed. 

There were no cars at the window, so why she could not help me right then and there is beyond me.

So I got into my car, and--you guessed it--a couple of cars had since driven to the drive-thru, and I was forced to wait my turn.

(In hindsight, I guess I could have gone into the bank and handled this, but I figured that since the original transaction was made at the drive-thru, I could get it done quickly right there, which ended up being a wrong decision. 

And the teller told me to get back into my car and get on line, so I did what she told me, no matter how idiotic I thought her request was.)

??????????

After about 10 minutes, I got up to the drive-thru.

"Look, all i wanted to do was give back the check and make sure everything was correct. Why did you refuse to help me, especially since there was no line?"

"I told you to get back into your car and drive up."

"I did, and I had to wait, wasting time."

"I will not do anything for you unless you were on the line."

"Get me the bank manager."

??????????

The bank manager appeared, I went over the entire story again, and this is whst he told me.

"Tellers cannot serve customers at the drive-thru if they are not in a car."

"There was no line. This teller wasn't at fault, as the previous teller was the one who gave me back the check, but this teller could have taken me, rather than having me get back on a line of cars."

"We cant wait on you at the drive-thru if you are not in a car. It is a safety issue."

This is not entirely true. My wife will tell you that she served plenty of customers at the drive-thru without cars, and safety really wasn't an issue.

And I told the manager that.

"My wife helped plenty of people at the drive-thru who weren't in cars ... all I am trying to do is make sure this teller's draw equals out. It won't without the check ... and i also want to make sure the check was processed properly."

"It is human error. Everyone makes mistakes."

Lame excuse.

I handed the manager the check, and even though my receipt showed that the money was in my account, I had him make sure of that ... as cars started to get on the line behind me.

It took him about five minutes to get back to me.

"The check was scanned, so it is in your account. It was human error. Have a nice day."

"Look, I simply did not want the teller to get in trouble. And this could have been handled by the bank in a better way."

"It was human error, that's what it was."

I drove away.

I wonder if the check was actually in my account when I gave the manager the check, or whether he had to do it to fully complete the transaction.

Irregardless of that possibility, I don't think I was treated nicely.

I certainly did not get a thank you for my efforts.

Next time, I won't return the check back. Why bother when they don't seem to care.

??????????

Two simple bank transactions, which should have taken a combined 20 minutes to complete, ended up taking nearly an hour from beginning to end.

??????????

But at least i got my registers!

??????????

Rant #3,753: ? and the Mysterians

??????????

I went to my local bank to take out some money from the ATM machine.

I wait my turn, and then i put my card in to begin the process.

I put in my pin number, and then--

The card was rejected 

I did the process again--stupidly thinking that I did something wrong--and again, the card was rejected.

I thought this was strange, because there was plenty of money in the account to draw from.

I went into the bank, went up to a teller, and asked what was going on.

He told me that a lock had been put on my card--

Not that anything was untoward happening with the card, but they do this as part of the "checks and balances" that they do to ensure that no hackers are infiltrating the system.

Now, what would have happened if I needed cash in a real emergency, and wasn't in a bank at the time?

I never got an answer to that, so I assume that the stop on the card was put onto it the moment I put the card in the ATM and wanted to take out my own money.

How convenient that was!

??????????

Since I was there, and my transaction was now being taken care of by the teller himself--as the stop was taken off my card--I figured I would ask the teller a simple question:

"Can I have a couple of registers?"

The teller looked at me, and said--

"What's a register?

So to the bank teller, who admittedly was pretty young--I had to explain what a register was.

(As I am sure you know, a register us where you write down the debits and credits to your bank account, and it neatly fits right into your checkbook so you have the account's history right in front of you.)

Almost immediately, an old, decrepit teller who must have been all of 30 years of age came up to where I was conversing with the younger teller and said--

"We don't carry them anymore, because no one uses them anymore."

Funny, I do ... I mean, how do I reconcile what I have in my checking account without one?

I told this to him, and he gave me a register for a giant's checkbook (see photo)--

The register was twice as big as a normal-sized one, and the print in it was about three times larger than normal.

The last I looked, I was a giant 5 foot, 9-and-a half inches.

Not Andre the Giant.

i left this bank with the giant-sized register in my hand along with the cash in took out.

Onto the next bank ...

??????????

I wanted to put the money i had taken out of one bank into another account I had in another bank, so as I have done hundreds of times, I got my money together, and drove to the drive-thru of this other nearby bank.

There were a couple of cars ahead of me--just one window--so I dutifully waited my turn.

Finally, it was my turn, and I gave the woman teller my cash, a check I wanted deposited, my driver's license, and my bank card so my transaction could be processed.

"Please put all of it into my (I am going to leave out where I told her I wanted the deposit made, because, well, I am starting to not trust anyone when it comes to banks and my money)."

I noticed that she was counting the cash very carefully, almost too carefully.

"I have to go up front ... give me a minute," she said, and since she was going up front, i asked her for a couple of registers (kill two birds with one stone).

The gist of the story at this bank begins here.

Why did she need to go up front?

Will I finally get my registers?

What else can go wrong?

Tune in tomorrow--

Same Bat time, same Bat channel ... .

??????????

Rant #3,752: Climb Ev'ry Mountain

There is absolutely nothing new to report on my son's job quest.

No one is helping us, so we are pretty much on our own.

My son has worked half his life.

Working since he was 15--his first job was as a volunteer--he is now almost 30 years old, and i am convinced he will get something, with or without help.

He has some time to go before his assessment is completed, so we are in something of a holding pattern, but we aren't sitting still.

My son has applied for other jobs--online, unfortunately--so maybe we will be surprised, and something will come up.

I wish I had better news on this front, but i simply don't.

I am done with dealing with agencies that consist of pencil pushers, earning their pay and pensions at the taxpayers' expense.

I will not contact them anymore.

Like Popeye used to say, "I have taken all I can stand, and I can't stand no more!"

I just wish I could follow that declaration up like Popeye does, with that can of spinach. 

But I can't.

In the meantime, why not sit back and read the latest installment of my novel.

Have a good weekend, and I will speak to you again on Monday.

33

Abraham Lincoln Panim quickly took out his keys from his pocket, and opened the front door to his house. He immediately saw his mother sitting on the couch, which was unusual in itself as in the evening, she rarely sat on the couch, usually going into her bedroom to prepare for the evening.

And not only was she sitting on the couch, but an envelope was on the floor, and his mother was holding a letter in her hands. She also appeared to be staring out into space.

“Mom, what’s going on?” asked Abraham Lincoln Panim.

Mrs. Panim broke out of her stupor, but still stared into space as she said, “Son, you rushed out of the house today so quick. I wanted to tell you that we received in the mail a letter from—“

“From who?”

“From … from your father.”

Abraham Lincoln Panim stopped in his tracks, and ended up sitting on the couch with his mother.

“I wanted to open the letter with you here. He never writes letters to us, never. I thought that this was something that you needed to hear, to read along with me when I read it, but I guess you had more important things to do.”

“Mom, if I would have known—“

“It doesn’t really matter now. I read the letter myself, and maybe it was better off that I read it myself first. It was the first letter we have gotten from him, ever.”

“What did the letter say? Is he doing OK? Is he finally going to be coming home?”

Mrs. Panim did not answer her son right away, and started to shake her head, almost to herself.

“Mom, what did dad say in that letter?”

“Abraham Lincoln Panim, your father isn’t coming home. You’re father is … he is not doing too well.”

Mrs. Panim handed Abraham Lincoln Panim the letter for him to read to himself. The letter said, in Mr. Panim’s own handwriting:

“Dear Diana:

I know that you must be startled to get this letter in the mail completely out of the blue. I am not a good letter writer, so please, just bear with me. I will try to explain the best that I can.

I admit that I am a coward. You were in the hospital all those years ago, and when you gave birth, I was happy and proud, and then I saw our son. I felt bad for him. I know he has gone through a lot, because what you don’t know is that I went through the same thing when I was a child.

I had the same features that I saw in our son when I was a child. I put up with a lot of ridicule from everyone. Even when I started to shed some of those characteristics as I got older, I was still pointed out as “the rat-faced boy.”

And what is worse, and the worst thing about all of this, is that I passed on that gene—or whatever it is--to our son.

I looked at him in the hospital, and my mind raced back to when I was a kid myself, all the stuff that I had to put up with. I simply could not do it again, so I became a coward, and I ran. I simply could not go through again what I had gone through myself as a child, so I ran away from it all.

I was scared, and yes, I was nothing but a coward. What I should have done and what I did were two different things. I was wrong, and I admit it. I left you and our son hanging there without me.

I know it doesn’t mean anything now, but I apologize for my behavior. Diana, I hope that the monthly checks have come in handy, and yes, I was selfish in what I did, but I felt the checks would help our son to grow into the man I knew he could be.”

“Checks?” Abraham Lincoln Panim asked his mother as he stopped reading the letter.

“Yes, your father has sent checks to you each and every month since you were born,” Mrs. Panim said. “They were sent directly from a bank outside our area, from another state, and there was never a return address on either the checks or the envelope they came in.

“Several years ago I tried to find out where they came from, but the president of the bank told me that he could not reveal any further information about the checks and where they came from to me. I thought that maybe your father would finally come home, but he never did. I guess the monthly checks gave me hope, but he never came home,”

Abraham Lincoln Panim again started to read the letter.

“Yes, I had the same problem that our son had. I had it through my early years, and I had it during my teen years, although much of it left me by the time I was in my mid teens. By the time I was in my early 20s, I just had the problem with my face, and when I met you, Diana, I still had the problem.

A little while after, I woke up one day, and I looked like every other man around. The problem left me! I could not believe it, and it came at just the right time, because it gave me a chance to know you, and that is when our relationship really blossomed.

Anyway, you know the rest. But let me bring you up to date with the reason I am writing this letter to you.

Seeing our son grow up from afar—“

Abraham Lincoln Panim looked up from the letter.

“What is he talking about, seeing me ”growing up from afar? What is he talking about?”

Mrs. Panim looked up and turned to her son. “Keep on reading, please keep on reading.”

Abraham Lincoln Panim turned back to the letter, and once again began to read to himself.

“Seeing my son grow up from afar has not been fun. As you can tell by the envelope that the letter came in, I actually don’t live very far away from where your house is. I live on the other side of the park. I have seen you, Diana, and our son from his earliest days. I saw you from afar, and I saw him, all covered up with his scarf as I was when I was a kid.

“I hope he has outgrown his affliction like I did, as I haven’t seen either of you walking around the neighborhood together in some time.”

“Dad hasn’t seen me because I haven’t taken walks with you for a while,” Abraham Lincoln Panim said to his mother. “So he has no idea how much I have changed, because without seeing you with me, he would have never recognized me.”

“Son, please read on.”

“Diana, I am sick, I mean really sick. I have been in and out of the hospital for the past few months, and the doctors don’t give me long to live. They actually, at least initially, didn’t know why I am so sick, ruling out cancer and a lot of other things.

I wasn’t willing, at first, to tell them my background, you know, about the characteristics I had when I was younger. But I ended up telling them, and they believe that my failing health has something to do with something called ‘zoomorphism’, a very rare disease where animal characteristics are found in humans. The doctors told me that they have discovered that many more people have this than first believed, but most people outgrow the problem as they get older.

They feel that while I did outgrow it, it had some lingering effects on my body, and since they have no other explanation for my current situation, they believe that those effects are greatly impacting my health.

Me, I know that I am dying … dying of a broken heart.”

“Dad … dad is sick?” Abraham Lincoln Panim said to his mother.

“Yes, son, but please read on.”

“I am a sick man. I am not asking for forgiveness. I don’t have long to go. Just writing this letter is taking a lot out of me.

Now that you know where I live, would it be possible, would it be something that you could arrange, Diana, for me to meet our son and to speak with you?

I am hoping he is doing well, and there is nothing that I would like more than to speak with him, even if for a few seconds, a few minutes.

I know that I don’t have much more to go. I just want to meet him, in person, and tell him how sorry I was for my behavior, and really, to tell both of you how sorry I am for what I did and what I put both of you through.

Please do not call me. Simply come to the address on the envelope, and please do it soon.

I hope that I have not upset you too much with this letter. Again, I am not asking for forgiveness, but I need to see both of you, and I want to meet my son and tell him how much I love him.

Thanks. I understand if you decide that a meeting with the two of you is not the right thing to do.”

Sincerely,

Marcus Panim”

“So Mom, are we going to see him?”

His mother looked up again at him as he gave the letter to her.

“Remember what Mrs. Stottle used to say all the time … ‘Do unto others as you would have the do unto you … treat other people the way you would like to be treated yourself.’”

“So that means we are going to see him?”

“I think if Mrs. Stottle were still with us, she would recite that saying and leave it up to us to decide. So what do you think?”

“I—“

“I think that we should get there sooner rather than later.”

“How about—“

“Yes, I think we will go on Sunday morning to see your father.”

With that, Abraham Lincoln Panim got up from the couch and went into his bedroom. He sat on his bed, then laid down in it, and picked up his hand mirror, which he had left on the bed when he went to see Ariel.

He looked in the mirror.

“My father … I am finally going to meet him,” he thought while he gazed into the mirror. “Why did he have to leave like he did? He really hurt mom …

“I am sure that he will find me as good looking as everyone else does. Ariel doesn’t want me, I don’t care at this point. My father wants me, and I just know that when he sees me, he will be … “

He stopped his thought, trying to think of a word that would fit.

“Impressed. Yes, impressed. He will be so impressed at how I look.”

Abraham Lincoln Panim put down the mirror, and closed his eyes.

He fell asleep quickly.

Rant #3,751: Nowhere Man

More and more time spent on the phone yesterday morning: 

For my son, I found out, without a shadow of a doubt, that no one I spoke to can help him, in any way.

He has the next step of his assessment scheduled for next Tuesday morning, so that is what we are focused on.

For myself, I found out that the procedure I was scheduled to have on Friday is not going to happen, simply because what I was led to believe the procedure would do is not why the doctor prescribed the procedure in the first place.

I have had after-effects from the prostate procedure I had in November, and this latest procedure is completely unnecessary, at least at this point in time, so I am not having it done.

I thought that the procedure was directly tied into my problem, and since it isn't and doesn't impact me at all, why fix something that isn't broken?

And it isn't just me--other medical people questioned why the doctor was having me undergo the procedure, and I thought it had to do with my problem--

Which I was told yesterday it did not--

And by the very office that prescribed the procedure.

Like they say on the Internet, WTF?

WTF?

WTF?

Yes, this has been a very frustrating time for myself and my family, and I have heard enough double talk during the past few weeks to last me a lifetime.

So, the end result of all of this is:

My son is no closer to getting a job than he ever was.

I am no closer to finding a solution to my problem than I ever was.

And all of this is very frustrating.

People whose main function at their jobs is helping those in need are doing just the opposite, and I am at my wits' end trying to figure out why all of this is happening.

I can't figure it out, but I am through banging my head against the wall trying to do just that.

We have to push on, even if it is to nowhere, which is where it has been going lately.

I simply don't know what else can be done on either front, but we can't just stop; we have to keep on going--

Even if is a complete and total waste of time, which it truly is.

I simply want two things:

I want my son to get a new job.

I want to be 100 percent cured of what ails me.

Are those two things too much to ask?

I think not.

Rant #3,750: You're No Good

I spent a solid hour on the phone yesterday morning, trying to tie up some loose ends related to my son and his work situation.

Needless to say, I could not get anything done.

Agencies that are supposed to help us don't, people who are supposed to get back to us don't either, and several governmental entities are just about worthless.

I did actually speak to one person yesterday, and let me tell you, I got pretty much what equates to the same response that I get from those who don't get back to us, which shows me, at least, that I am on my own when it comes to this situation--

Something that i already knew, but hoped against hope that I was wrong about.

I wasn't.

When you have a special needs child, you really have to do just about everything yourself.

Agencies that are supposed to help you generally don't, and you have to do just about everything on your own.

Look, I have been doing it on my own for years for my son, but a little help would really be appreciated.

And, on an eerily similar note ...

I had a "memory" posted on Facebook yesterday, and it wasn't a good one. It was from exactly five years ago:

"The first job interview of any kind that I was scheduled to participate in this afternoon was once again postponed until next week.

It seems that I simply can't stand up for falling down.

Yes, I am a bit upset.

Running total: nearly 10 months out of work. And a grand total of two face-to-face interviews (pre-pandemic), where the job description was changed as I was being interviewed, and two phone interviews.

Again, this total was achieved during nearly 10 months, and after applying for more than 1,000 positions.

It appears that I have fallen and can't get up."

And finally, I never had the interview, as soon after, it was canceled for good.

I actually posted this on Facebook again, with a summing up of what happened then, and what is happening now:

"Five years ago ... This was pretty much how it went with me with interviews ... I never was offered any position ... I was forced to retire at age 63 ... and this pretty much continued the six--year downward spiral that I am still on, and unfortunately, my family is still on. 

"This includes that my son still cannot get a job, and let me tell you, we have tried just about everything to find him one. The agencies generally set up to help him don't do much of anything, and other governmental agencies, like civil service, are just as bad. 

Six years is six years too long to be on a downward spiral, but I do not see even a sliver of light at the end of the tunnel. Bad luck follows my family and I around, and no matter what we do, we cannot escape. 

We haven't given up the ship, but there is only so much water you can bail out of the ship before it sinks."

And there really isn't anything more to say about it all.

Retirement? 

HA!

Torture?

YOU BET!