August 13, 2007 by Hawk.

Last month my sister sent my mom a couple gift cards for Outback. We decided to get curbside takeout from them instead of sitting down in the restaurant. We’re not big on going out to eat. The experience was less than optimal. It took them ten minutes to even notice I was in the parking lot. Even though it’s only a 10 minute ride to the restaurant the food was cold and nowhere near worth their prices. I of course subscribing to the ‘Power of the Bitch‘ wasn’t about to let this go so I sent them a calm, factual letter describing the experience. They replied promptly and arranged for the store (district?) manager to contact me by phone. He called the next day exactly when they said he would. He was, I feel, sincerely apologetic and offered us a gift certificate so we could try their restaurant again. It took two week (to the day) for that to arrive. I had been about to email them about it when it arrived via certified mail (cost them almost $6 to send!).

So we decided to give them another try. Hey, free is better than paying for it, right? WRONG! Here’s a copy, verbatim, of the letter I sent them after we ate and my rage mellowed out a little…

“To say that I’m irate would be a gross understatement. I placed my order
at 12:30 in the afternoon and set my pickup time for 6:30 PM. I arrived
shortly before 6:30 and one of your servers was out in a couple minutes
to tell me my order would be right out. I then sat waiting in your
parking lot for TWENTY FIVE minutes in 90 degree heat for my order.
TWENTY FIVE MINUTES. When I expressed my displeasure to the server as
she delivered my order at 6:55 PM she said the manager wanted to talk to
me and he would ‘be right out’. I then waited several more minutes and
of course your manager didn’t show up. I told the server I wasn’t about
to wait any longer while my food got cold, I then left. This is perhaps
the most deplorable service I have ever received at any restaurant. I
sat for a total of nearly half an hour in sweltering heat waiting on
your employees. I am NOT at all happy about this.”

If the damned manager wanted to talk, read apologize, to me HE should have been the one to bring the god damned food out to the car. Expecting me to wait while my food got cold on the seat next to me was just icing on the rudeness cake. I’ll never visit their restaurant again. They could plate their food with solid gold and I wouldn’t give a shit. Service like that is totally unacceptable.

Hawk (going back to McDonalds)

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August 11, 2007 by Hawk.

The History Channel’s been running a bunch of their UFO programming lately and I’m scratching my head. How can anyone believe this bullshit? Are we alone in the universe? I highly doubt it. If this backwater, edge of nowhere planet can spawn (semi) intelligent life I have no doubts it’s happened elsewhere as well. Is the speed of light something we’ll never exceed? I dunno, it’s possible, anything is really… But honestly, listening to these people there’s more UFO traffic every day on the planet that JFK, O’Hare and Orlando International handle combined.

The question(s) I’ve got for all these UFO nutjobs is…. WHY?! Why are they coming here? Is it them and us? Are our planet and one other the only source of life in the galaxy? With the reports of the variety of ships and aliens being seen around the planet you’d have to seriously doubt that there’s only one other source of life out there. The latest theory I saw was not only are the UFOs flying in our skies they’re also surfing the waves and have giant bases in the deepest parts of the oceans. WHY?! Imagine you’re a race of beings so technologically advanced that you can cross interstellar distances. What possible reason would you have to fill our skies with visitors? What does this little po dunk planet have that seems to attract every alien with an anal probe to it? You’ve developed effective, speedy, safe, interstellar travel. What’s here that could possibly interest you? If we were being farmed as food you’d think they’d improve the health of the herd but we’re not getting drastically healthier as a race. Spacial Anthropology? Perhaps… but hundreds or thousands of visitors a year? That’s be like erecting a Vegas sized hotel in every primitive village we’ve discovered. I don’t buy that. They’re not mining us for rare metals. Space is full of things to mine you don’t need to come here for them.

Have we been visited? Could be. I don’t discount the possibility. We are after all blasting and transmitting quite a lot of content out into space. Have alien spacecraft crashed onto planet Earth? Yeah, give me a break. That’d be like driving from New York to California and wrecking your car on a cockroach that’s crossing the road. INTERSTELLAR travel, people!You don’t develop that and go “SPLAT!” into little planets out in the middle of nowhere. Have our or other military fighter planes shot down UFOs? Again, give me a break. Anything that can cross vast reaches of space full of untold numbers of rocks of all sizes, radiation that would fry us dead in seconds, anything that can move through our atmosphere, in and out of orbit, changing directions like a cartoon character is going to shrug off anything, other than nukes (and maybe nukes), that we could throw at them.

I’m with Douglas Adams. We got, at best, a two word entry in the Encyclopedia Galactica, “Mostly Harmless”, and that was the end of that. There’s absolutely nothing I can see that could possible draw aliens by the thousands to build bases in our oceans, mutilate our cattle and anally probe our Rednecks. If given the choice between driving up and seeing the horse head nebula or the Hourglass ‘Eye of God‘ Nebula up close and personal and visiting our planet. I know which ones I’d pick.

Hawk (not, Not of this Earth)

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August 9, 2007 by Hawk.

Found the following question in the local section of our newspaper: 

“If a hurricane were to hit Brevard County and you could only take three items with you (excluding family members), what would they be and why?”

Here’s what I sent them: 

This is a patently stupid question. How can anyone be expected to choose just three items from a household to save from a hurricane? Item in and of itself is ambiguous. Does one CD count as an ‘item’ or can I put all my CDs in a box and call that an ‘item’? is there a limit to the size of the items? I mean we’re being asked a ridiculous question why not give a ridiculous answer? My first reaction, which made my mother laugh, was “The house, my car and her car.” Those count as ‘items’ don’t they? If I were going to evacuate before a hurricane I’d like to bring along a change of clothes, a book to read and my mother’s medication. Are those the only three items we’re allowed to save? The question is ridiculous. I find nothing amusing or insightful about it. My honest answer is; If I could only take three items from my home if a hurricane were impending, I’d stay put and hope for the best.

Hawk (is my sanity an item?)

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August 8, 2007 by Hawk.

Blast! I didn’t zoom in enough. It’s so hard to tell what’s going to be a good video and what’s going to be too far out or too close in. You get the idea. I must admit, living near one of the world’s few spaceports is pretty cool. There’s a Delta 4 Heavy launch coming up soon. I’ll try and get a better video of that when it happens.

Click here for video

Hawk (Spaceman!)

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August 8, 2007 by Hawk.

So I’m watching the news the other day and they’re doing a story about air conditioning bills, power use and the dangers of leaving things like fans running when you’re not around. They were interviewing some fireman (firechief?) who actually said “Air conditioning isn’t always the best way to keep cool. You can just go stand under a tree in the shade.” Yes, that’s right. It’s NINETY FOUR degrees outside, the humidity is at 85% and the heat index is somewhere around ONE HUNDRED AND SIX degrees and they want you to go stand under a tree? Of course this interview was taking place in an air conditioned office and not out standing under a tree in the shade. Other brilliant ideas they offered; “When you go to work in the morning, turn the A/C off.” OFF! In 2004 after the 2nd hurricane when the power came back on the temperature INSIDE our house was ninety two. They want you to come home to this every single day. Are they smoking crack?! They also warned that you should turn your ceiling fans off when you leave the room or the house. Fans that circulate air and cut down on your cooling costs (our electric bill was over $250 last month) should be turned off because of the infinitesimal chance of a fire. I’ve got two ceiling fans that have been running since I moved down here twelve years ago (was it 12?) and other than the occasional odd noise they’re still working fine. Idiots on TV, not all that surprising, huh?

Hawk (feeling better!)

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