magicJack

Remember the $115 question? Well, I took the plunge and ordered magicJack via Amazon to use $60 of the giftcard. Also bought a new coffee maker since my current one seems to take forever to make a pot. They both arrived via UPS around 1pm, but I was feeding D. I got around to magicJack around 2pm, I'm porting my current number so I had a fear that those idiots at Cincy Bell would cancel my internet along with my home phone once they got the request, so I called the idiots. I'm insulting idiots, but this is a clean blog that needs not to be vulgar.
Frankly, I am proud of myself for not utilizing profanities during my hour plus on the phone with Cincinnati Bell. While I was on hold, I tweeted them and replied to an email regarding my displeasure with the lack of customer service reps able to grasp the English language.
I had massive headache. Wonder where time goes for I go from breakfast table and to my day and forget time passes. It slowed while I was on hold.
Hmmm... B's dream hasn't transpired.
No idea when I'll get around to my new Mr. Coffee. Just know today is not the day.

Surreal Sunday

Been sleeping in a bed for the first time in a year or so. D has been in the pack and play in the main bedroom, so I am triage for her noise making. I can sleep with lights on, and lights are needed on to ensure what exactly is causing D to be awake. She has the tendency to eat every two to four hours and fill her Pampers between feedings. I can't feed her, yet, but i can make sure her bottom is wet or not.

We bought Pampers back when K was a baby, but we were solely Luvs when B was a baby. Luvs are way cheaper, so the fact we bought Pampers back in the day puzzles me aside from perhaps they weren't much more expensive ten years ago. As far as I can tell, Luvs doesn't have a New Born size that will adequately protect D, so Pampers is a logical though expensive choice.

So two nights home after three nights in the hospital makes today feel like a new normal. I was not looking forward to certain elements, but I can't say for sure why I felt reservations now that the now has come.

Since J will be home an extended period of time, we have joined Amazon Prime. Compared to Netflix, we're very disappointed, so we'll probably not go beyond the free trial period. There's too many inconvenient elements when comparing the two Roku 3 channels, that we feel more comfortable with Netflix.

True, "free" two-day shipping from Amazon is nice, but the price difference isn't there when you consider variables like coupons and weekly store sales. Obviously, I could be mistaken, but being married to a like minded person gives me confidence when my reasoning concurred.

No love for Amazon, but I side with them...

DISCLAIMER: Each day, I spend way too much time online. I've drastically cut my online time with the unofficial end of baseball season, but I still check my email, banking/credit cards/401(k), and blog. Before I do anything, I check to see what's going on in the world, and one place is where I start. It might not be the best for gathering information, but my purposes it's a starting point that spirals. The site is not self-contained and links to all sorts of places that are for the most part, reliable. If I ever mention an article, 90% of the time it originates from my perusing of the news aggregation site.

Amazon is being sued by its warehouse employees that claim that are unfairly unpaid for 20 minutes a day as they are searched throughout the day by security.

Frankly, I think their having a job should make them think twice about complaining, for the routine hasn't changed to make them feel put out from a baseline of expectation. Their wages technically embed their inconvenience to the regular searches.

Living by Wright-Patterson AFB, I'm aware of the long lines to get on the base. Those people aren't paid for their time in line waiting to go through the gate, are they?

Also, the searching is necessary for purposes of retarding theft. If you are avoiding being searched, then maybe you are planning to steal. Stealing is an offense for which one assumes to be fired, right?

One of the few times I will agree with Amazon. I imagine a lawyer came up with the suit and approached the plaintiffs and stirred up their angst in hope of getting a sympathetic judge and a huge payday from the EVIL ONLINE RETAIL BEHEMOTH.

Bezos buys a newspaper

Jeff Bezos of Kindle/Amazon fame purchased a major newspaper the other day, though he believes print will be dead for all common folk come 2033. He thinks news being free online has destroyed the incentive to pay for print. Wonder if Hugh Hefner will be able to sell Playboy to Jeff Bezos, since print magazines are dying as well.
Heck, 50 Shades did well as an E-book because filthy minded housewives were able to read it openly on their tablets without anyone seeing its cover!
On a different but related matter, we just got Nook HD Plus. Sadly B&N won't make them anymore, so who is to make apps for them in future?

Garmin Lifetime Traffic Updates

I guess that hindsight is always 20/20, but I got wondering about the future of GPS companies like Tom Tom and Garmin. We have a Nuvi 1350 LT that was on sale at Target a few years ago. The power cord ceased working so it was then that I realized the lifetime traffic feature was from the cord rather than the GPS itself. Not my GPS so I claim ignorance on the matter with regards to the initial purchase being mooted by the fact it was on sale below normal Nuvi 1350 price.

Anyways, Amazon has the GTM 25 for sale after taxes and shipping for a mere $35. It's compatible with other Garmin models so I wonder if getting a cheaper Garmin with lifetime map updates would be worthwhile. Definitely something to investigate.

No wonder Best Buy is being destroyed by the internet

Our Garmin traffic power cord lost it's tip, so I went about town looking for replacement parts. I hit Radio Shack and Best Buy. Radio Shack is very easy place to get service since it rarely has customers. Dude there told me they didn't sell parts, just the units. What I needed wasn't in stock.

When I went to Best Buy, I had to wander about to find the GPS section. It was in a spot in the store where time stopped and no one could be found for help. Store must have had 7 blue shirted types in the cell phone area and there weren't helping anyone I could see. Places like Best Buy seem to hire people to be tethered to hot spots that rake most profits. No one needs a GPS when they have an iPhone, I guess.

So I left Best Buy with out being noticed by the fifty people working. There may have been at total of 10 potential customers in the store. Sad. Such a big store with nothing to offer.

Sears and the Craftsman mystic

Sears doesn't really make anything, they just brand things as though they do.
When we bought the house, we accepted a number of things as being inconveniences and worked around them.
One thing that falls under this category is the garage door opener. We have a one and half car garage, and the opener had two remotes. One remote never worked, so I  thought of buying a replacement only to see the sticker price for Craftsman remotes to be about $50.
That's bizarre given that a new chain driven opener costs roughly $129.

 

Since we only had the space for one car, we just left the matter alone since we could just take the remote with the car we wanted parked in there or just as well use the keypad.
We did this until the second remote died last month.
Seriously thought about buying a new garage door opener, but it occurred to me that Sears isn't really a maker of things and that I should looking into other brands of remotes if I didn't find a deal on Ebay.
Sure enough, I found two new remotes for less than the price of one "Craftsman." Still wouldn't mind getting a quieter garage door opener, but that's an inconvenience I can ignore until the opener dies or we move.

Support your public libraries, schools, etc...

Just saw an article updating the process in fixing something that seems to be the root of a lot of budget problems. Seems that bi-partisan support exists to help collection of states' sales tax on web purchases.
Not sure how anyone can argue that it's a tax increase by making enforcement simpler, but that's what the Amazons want to say to help their advantage over brick-n-mortar retailers.

Amazon makes more news

Financial Times Online has the headline: Amazon ‘robo-pricing’ sparks fears.

Strange article in that it states Amazon affiliates compete with themselves thus drive down their prices. Prices can change ever 15 minutes. Sounds like the opposite of Ebay. Wonder if there are profits being made. Seems to be an interesting development, nonetheless.

Does Jeff Bezos hate libraries?

Just want to re-hash my dislike for Amazon. I looked up Jeff Bezo's Wikipedia entry and found the below:

Bezos founded Amazon.com in 1994 after making a cross-country drive from New York to Seattle, writing up the Amazon business plan on the way. He initially set up the company in his garage.[9] He had left his "well-paying job" at a New York City hedge fund when he "learned about the rapid growth in Internet use", which coincided with a "then-new U.S. Supreme Court ruling [that] online retailers don't have to collect sales taxes in states where they lack a physical presence"; he had headed to Washington because its relatively small population meant fewer of his future customers would have to pay sales tax.[5]

An actual Jobs Bill

So I have a blog, I technically produce content to share with whomever stumbles upon my random commentary on simplicity of life and the happiness found within it.

I live in Ohio, so I am a target of unsolicited political calls, mail, email, radio ads, television ads, and web ads. I cannot avoid a national election, let alone a statewide election.

This election is being framed as a popularity contest as they normally are, but I've never been much about hype. I look at the issues that concern me and think of the long term goals of the candidates.

I always pick the lesser of two evils.

What are the issues that effect me most?

Only one is on my mind, for I'm unemployed. I've had a hard time keeping a job after being laid-off a couple times. My industry was never outsourced to a third world country, but the funding essentially was hijacked by the same sort of  circumstances that made sending jobs overseas practical from business standpoint.

"Loopholes" are blamed for outsourcing.

Is it a "loophole" that Amazon does not have to charge local taxes when it ships merchandise across state lines?  Yes, they deliberately look for tax loopholes and monitor threats to them. Supposedly, the sales tax loophole will end this year, but I haven't seen much about congress fixing the problem of late.

I haven't heard anyone bash Jeff Bezos in a while, but I hear about nameless Wall Street types or anything related to Wal-Mart. 

Amazon is worse than Wal-Mart. Wal-Mart supposedly destroyed small businesses, but Amazon went further and took revenue away which paid for Police Officers, Fire Fighters, and School Teachers.

If Commerce Law was implemented to make the market place fair for bricks and mortar storefronts vs virtual entities, then a lot of the tax funding problems we see will be addressed.

More funding for local governments directly related to consumption would been seamless since the price differences aren't going to jump for local merchants, while online retailers can find other ways to squeeze their profits to offset shipping costs. People will still buy stuff if it saves them time.

Seems too simple, but more local sales, means more salespeople needed locally. More people working locally along with more local sales means more tax revenue. More tax revenue means more funding for public entities, which allows for more employees which can buy more things beyond sustenance levels. Another benefit is that there is less need for the generation of tax revenue from other avenues.

Destroying Amazon's loophole will benefit all. Amazon will survive because people like Amazon for reasons beyond the sales tax aspect..

News coverage from major networks chooses to ignore these facts because they are sponsored by CORPORATIONS that exploit these tax laws and their viewers in kind purchase online to avoid taxes.