blather

blather

I can do slouchy!

I need a slouchy hat. Adventure awaits in the comfort of my own home.

I am launching an archaeological expedition to unearth the mystical digital camera. Legend and rumour lead me to believe it may be on a deep strata of the mesa-shaped structure colloquially referred to as "the coffee table". Although there is anecdotal evidence of the existence of the digital camera, this investigator feels that the widening gaps of time between sightings indicates a strong possibility that the digital camera never existed in the first place; or if it did, it may never be found again.

I hope there's no snakes.

Hi, I'm Stimp (hi, Stimp!) and I don't have a problem.

As we all know, the cure to any addiction is to find a new addiction. Through a wild series of cosmic, nay karmic, events, the "all right already, universe, I'll check it out!" kind, I've discovered a new, fascinating evil. Time suckage (thanks, lolcats!). That's bad enough. This, however, is time and money suckage. It's not gambling- not really. It's not drugs, although you do get all twitchy if you haven't done it in a while.

A friend mentions to me casually "have you looked at Etsy.com?"

Me, walking right into the cleverly-laid trap: "No, what's etsy?"

She: "A website where you can buy all sorts of things, made by people."

Me, still not paying much attention to the looming disaster ahead: "Like ebay?" (personally, I can't stand ebay, never got what all the hoo-ha was about, and the only things I've ever purchased from there were on behest of my mom. Seriously. Ask her.)

I was then informed that, no, it was not like ebay, but individual shopowners selling their handmade wares at set prices, and there were all sorts of neat things, and that I should "check it out". Which I have since learned is obviously some kind of cult-recruitment technique (thanks, Kim!). I then went home and looked at a blog I check out now and then. The topic? Etsy.com. Hmmm. I then perused a new magazine I had just purchased. An article in the magazine? Etsy.com. Okaaaay, getting freeeeeky now.

If you're like me (and most days, I sure am) and you like handcrafted, artisan-type stuff (like me) and you like supporting indie-type crafters when they aren't inflating the prices for their "art" to some laughable level (like me- the inflation part, not the laughable part, just so we're clear) then don't, for the sake of his holy noodleness, go to etsy.com. I'm saying this for your own good. If your mom or your auntie or your friend likes hand-thrown stoneware, don't go there. Okay, you can go there, but approach with caution. And don't say I didn't warn you.

Don't be like me: "Oh, I'll go have a look at all the quaint handcrafted items on there" while picturing the local farmers' market offerings of plastic needlepoint canvas tissue-box covers. Don't think to yourself: "what's so dadblamed dangerous about some of those acrylic crocheted creepy doll-type toilet paper cozies? I can resist those, no problem!"

Oh no, no, no, no, my friends (and any sworn enemies who may be looking at this- shout out to ya!)

If, like me, you have a dear relation who is having a baby in a couple of months, don't, don't, don't, go look at all the baby stuff on there: "maybe I'll see if there's any gift-type objects here in these baby clothes- aaaaaagh!" Don't buy the baby t-shirt that says "Mommy drinks because I cry". That's just wrong. Wrong on soooo many levels. I'm still laughing.

And so, dear reader (Crabber), I hope you will learn from my mistakes. And not get a whole boatload of packages of really neat stuff, some of which is intended to be gifts. Really. That's the intention. It's okay if they are to be gifts to other people. I am in charge. I can quit whenever I want. Until I want to quit, however, there's a really cool toy that I have to go look at. Despite rumours to the contrary, it is for my cat.

Golly, I do tend to go on and on.

I’ve been buying quite a lot of things lately from internet stores. Some of them are located in Canada, some in the U.S. The things I’ve been buying are things that I could most probably buy here at home, supporting local businesses.

But I don’t.

I’ve been feeling a niggling guilt about this, in a vague sort of “I should be supporting my local business owners more, or we’ll soon be overrun by giant, boxy WalTargetBuy stores.” All goods manufactured for my purchasing convenience by children in some Third-World factory.

I know perfectly well that changing my purchasing habits to support local businesses will have zero effect on the inexorable tide of giant boxy multi-shoppy places. I don’t have the kind of purchasing influence of say, one of the Hiltons, plus I usually wear underwear. So that puts me out of the running.

The internet shops have what I want. That’s why I buy from them.

Using the power of the interwebs, and my stellar sleuthing skills, I can dig up some site, somewhere, that offers what I’m looking for. Quite often they offer free shipping as well. Whee! Yeah, I’ll spend $100 to get free shipping. Shipping is expensive! Plus, I get more stuff. It’s pretty much win-win for me.

By shopping on the web, my choices are expanded to an astronomical degree. I don’t have to settle for “what’s hot” or “best-selling” at my local store.

Prices are quite often lower than they would be in a local store, and that makes sense, when you consider that many of these stores only have an online presence, not a bricks and mortar store with all those pesky things like rent, heat, light, snacks, employees, and so on. They can afford to offer a lower price for their goodies, and pass the savings on to me!

But the convincing factor, what will make me return, again and again, in a guilty pleasure sort of way, is the customer service I have received from these faceless internet shopowners.

For example: I walk into a store here in the city and get the attention of the helpful staff. Sometimes I have to walk into a rack of things and knock it over to have any human intervention arrive on the scene. Once we’ve (well, me, mostly) picked up all of the stock from the floor, the conversation may turn to my particular reason for coming into their store in the first place. I’m looking to purchase something. Trade cold hard cash for something they are selling. The money is burning a hole in my pocket, and I know just what I want to buy.

“Hi,” I say, “I’m looking for X, and it’s made by Y. Do you have any of that?”

I start to feel a bit of trepidation when they stop making faces at all of the stock they now have to neaten. I know perfectly well that they are not there to work, but to text their friends and play with their iPod and check which Pokemon they need to collect next, or whatever those crazy kids are into these days.

They sigh deeply, tell the person on one of their cell phones to hold on (they quite often have several going at once) and say “No, we don’t have that.”

Awkward silence follows, as I can see from their appliance-like stare that they have just exhausted their entire repertoire of customer service.

Back to checking their investments or the moon phases or whatever on their hand-held communication device(s). Maybe they are really the mission commander for the latest shuttle launch, and are just moonlighting in their auntie's store to help her out while she has her bunions adjusted.

Anyhoo, long story short, and call me crazy (go ahead, nothing new here) at this point I am foolishly expecting that a sales clerk, a sales person, someone who is in sales, in a store, where they are selling stuff, stupidly I assume...

That they will sell me something.

They could perhaps say “No, we don’t have any of that X made by Y, but we do have this B, which is very nice also. Let’s go have a look at that, and see if that’s something you’d be interested in.”

But noooooo, ***SPOILER ALERT*** they don't.

In comparison, I have received excellent selling, and customer service, from faceless internet shopowners. They provide prompt customer service responses. They apologize sincerely if it turns out they actually do not have in stock what I want, and suggest alternatives. They offer to sell the alternative to me at the same price, and to throw in an extra item to make up for my “inconvenience”. Wow.

They package their wares nicely, sometimes with ribbon and tissue, and often include swag, Easter candies, recipes and handwritten notecards.

Amazing.

So I think I will continue to drop obscene amounts of my disposable income on internet shops. If it is a Canadian site, all the better. At least I’m supporting the Canadian economy. In my own non-Hilton way. Any economist worth their over-priced degree could shoot my justifications down in a heartbeat. I'm not gonna share any of my internet loot with those party-poopers.

This blogging thing.

I’ve been thinking about it for a while now, and being one of those non-conforming types (frequently referred to as “eccentric” or “an enigma”, can you imagine?) I resisted following along with all the other sheeple typing their way to their grisly death via their blogs. And telling the whole freakin’ world about every dang thing they do every freakin’ second of their freakin’ lame lives.

Then I actually read some blogs.

That’s how I operate. Deal. I still have never seen “Titanic” and I’m darn proud of myself. Maybe if James Cameron had decided to throw in some wacky twist ending (do the M. Night Shamalamadingdong thing) I would be tempted, but nooooo, ***SPOILER AHEAD*** the ship sinks.

Some blogs certainly lived down to my assumptions of the bloggers, and their freakin’ lame lives. As well as their inability to go two seconds without blogging about it. Seriously. And don’t get me started on the comments sections of these.

(There was one that almost made me have a seizure (if I were epileptic) because of all the blinky boinky flashing wriggling (did I mention blinky and flashing?) doo-hickies on it. What is wrong with people?)

The ones I didn’t like, I didn’t read. I have that ability. It’s pretty nicely honed after all these years. I see something on TV I don’t care for; boop! I change the channel or turn it off. I see a badly written blog with annoying flashing buttons; boop! I close the window. It’s a gift, really.

Other blogs actually seemed interesting, written by reasonable, thoughtful, and thought-provoking persons. The blogs were well-laid out, interesting to look at, and had handy links to other interesting, reasonably well-written blogs.

I’ve decided that I mainly like blogs that are about something. I don’t care what the subject is, really, just that it be about “something”. As opposed to those blinky barfy dump-my-miserable-life-out-on-the-interwebs types. I have my own (blinky barfy) miserable life, thank you very much. Don’t need to hear about yours.

And you don’t need to hear about mine. You will, however, get to enjoy my squawking about this and that.

The universe does not revolve around me, but it certainly does not revolve around any other person, especially lame freakin’ bloggers. The universe revolves around a fiery ball of gas and stuff, and if you don’t behave, it will expand and kill us all. Something like that. Maybe I’m thinking of Al Gore. Or penguins. I could see the universe revolving around a fiery ball of gas and penguins. Works for me.

Don't get me started!

Note to self: don't write anything in here you don't want your mom to see.