Incite Full

Now that I’ve joined the real world, there are a few things that start to bug me, and simply don’t make sense. Take the month of February for instance. It has the fewest days of any month, clocking in at about 28.25 days on average, where as there are 30 and 31 month days for the rest. This gives the rest of the months about 30.64 days per month, on average.

What I want to know is, where is my ~7.5% rate cut for services I pay on a monthly fee? Surely their operating costs aren’t as high- such as salaries, power consumption, etc. The power and water companies are the only ones that this service is ideally built into, unless you have a pay as you go model cell phone. I guess we can chalk this up to convenience of the flat rate, ‘unlimited’ usage we get of things we pay the bills for, but i wonder just how much this is costing me.

Lets say i pay about $2000 on average for everything i pay a bill for. This includes rent, cable, phone, etc. The real value is not this high, i just want a round number. the 7.5% over a year is about 150 dollars. Not bad, 2 video games, or a few meals out and some pints at the pub. awesome.

Over the course of my lifetime, which I plan on living to 82, this is about $8700. about double the down payment on a car. SO am i really missing that much? Let’s find out.

I wouldn’t keep this money under a mattress, now would I? So lets say I put it in an index fund, generating 7% returns per year: after 50 years, I’ve got about $70,000 based on the beauty of compound interest. This is a god damn college education for some, a good down payment on a really expensive house, 2 cars (as opposed to two down payments) , or approixmately 70,000 double cheeseburgers from mcdonald’s. Do i even like double cheeseburgers? Yes, but i’d rather have 11,666 #6 meals from taco bell which is 11,666 hard shell tacos, 23332 baja gorditas: all in all about 729 pounds of baja sauce.

What I’m trying to say is, February is costing me a LOT of money.

And why? Because the Romans could figure out the calendar? It’s actually (I Think) because it was the last month added to the calendar, and it ‘worked out’ this way. lame.

This is just like being born in December, and missing out on my first Christmas which I still feel I should get presents for. Only in this case, I’d like $70,000 worth of presents, please.

Anyone who has ever sent something via 1-800flowers (not linked for a reason) probably received an email sometime around, oh, today that made me scratch my head. Until it bled.

The title of this email is the same as this post: I’ll send a valentine when dogs grow wings.

I can only assume this is a marketing ploy to get me to send a dog with wing, probably a cute little furry stuffed animal. Let me check. Ok, I was wrong, it is actually referring to some pet mascot that is playing cupid this week on the site. That’s just fantastic.

Unfortunately, as many of us know, and if not stop reading now- I am probably using words too big for you – the expression is loosely taken from “When pigs fly.” I just need to know what the marketing conversation was like?

“Hey! Jim, how about ‘When dog’s grow wings’, because, you know, we’ve got a damn dog we need to use?”
“I’m not sure Larry, isn’t the expression ‘when pigs fly?’”
“Yeah, but… we’ve got to use this dog, i mean just LOOK at him”
“We’ll ask Sally, hey Sally?”
“PUPPPPPPPPYYYYYYY”

And that’s how decisions are made at 1-800 flowers.

Check out threadless if you have never, i just got this sweet new shirt:

Every once and a while I’ll be reading some article or emails on the web and need to stop and basically do a double take. Todays was the first such moment I’ve had in a while, but it was interesting none the less. I get an email from Amazon suggesting gift ideas. More curious than anything, i decided to check out the “Kitchen and Dining” ideas. What happens next tested my manhood.

Several categories are set up for one to choose from, indeed to narrow down the gifts that might apply. Imagine my surprise, and chagrin, when the most interesting link i saw was the “For her” category. I think it’s odd that the grill is still considered a man’s domain, while baking and any other type of skilled cooking (not that grilling is unskilled) is relegated to women. Perhaps you like this, you being women, with which I have such little contact that my mother is probably beginning to worry.

Who do i talk to about this? Should I write amazon a reverse sexism letter? Or is this just sexist? I don’t care- i am not, how i write, offended or anything. Just think we’ve come far enough that we could have avoided this whole thing. I mean, why not split it into baker, cook, and griller. Honestly, if you know enough about the person to know to buy them cooking wares, you probably know what they know, or at least want, to cook.

Anyways, my gift MIGHT be coming today, and you can bet your ass if it does I will be incredibly happy. Until then, though, I’ll just keep on keeping on.