Yeah, I know the title of this blog post is harsh, but I've had it with UPS and I need to vent. They're on my shit list along with Starbucks (Click Here to read why I hate Starbucks) and Circuit City. Long or short, here's the story...

I've been wanting a new MP3 player for some time, but the prices have just been too high. Since they've finally started to come down I decided to order one from Amazon. Since I'm an Amazon Prime member I get free 2-Day shipping which meant I would have the MP3 player in my hands when I got home on Wednesday evening. Well, it's Friday and I have no MP3 player.

Wednesday evening Erin and I got home from picking up Sophia to find one of those lovely door tags from UPS waiting for me. I was annoyed, but not angry. It had been marked off on the tag that the driver would attempt delivery again the next day after 5pm. With this knowledge in hand I decided that I would drive separately from Erin and come home a little early so I could be there when the UPS guy showed up.

The next day...

I left work early to make an "appointment" and headed home. When I arrived at the complex I saw the UPS truck leaving. Could it be? Did he leave the package? Nope...I got another FUCKING door tag! I looked at my watch...4:14pm. WHAT THE FUCK!?! What is use of marking on the door tag that you will make an attempt to deliver a package at a certain time if you're going to show up an hour early?

Needless to say, I was out of my mind with anger. I immediately got on the phone with UPS customer service. I don't think it will come as much of a surprise when I tell you that it was a complete and utter waste of my time. They proceeded to tell me the driver doesn't guarantee times of delivery (BULLSHIT! When you mark it on the fucking tag that is exactly what you do!) and that the best they could do was to have the package dropped at the distribution facility so I could pick it up that night. Never mind that I had plans to go out and that the distribution facility is smack in the middle of the city where, yes I can pick up my package, but I won't have a car to bring it home in by the time I get out of there. (Please don't send me angry emails about how safe the city is...the corner of Joseph Avenue and Nassau Street is not a pleasant place...I have friends that have been hassled and had cars broken into down there.) I proceeded to tell the poor woman on the phone that I had already taken time out of my day to be home to get there at the designated time and now they want me to toss out the plans I had for that night...FUCK OFF! I asked her if that was the best she could offer. She said it was. I told her that I was through dealing with UPS and asked her to mark to package for return. She didn't believe me. I reasserted my position and told her to return the package. She got my information and began to thank me for choosing UPS...I hung up on her.

I calmed down and called Amazon to ensure that I would not be penalized for the return. They assured me that I wouldn't be and that I would be issued a full refund once they received the package. They apologized to me and explained that they have received complaints about UPS's shipping policies before. Unfortunately they advised me that they're shipping system is set up so that when a package is ready the system chooses the carrier who is best able to pick up the package and get it to the customer as quick as possible. They suggested that the only way to guarantee a specific shipper was to have the package sent to a PO Box. That way it would be shipped via DHL or USPS.

So here I am, no MP3 player and still very angry at UPS. I did a search on the internet and found countless stories of individuals who have had the same or worse problems over and over with UPS.

Do get me wrong. This isn't the first time UPS has pissed me off. The biggest problem I have with them is their inconsistencies. Sometimes they leave the package. Sometimes I get a door tag the first day and then they leave it the next day. Sometimes I'm home all day and their tracking information on the web shows that they attempted to deliver the package when the UPS truck never showed up on my street. There's no rhyme or reason to it. It has nothing to do with the value of the package or required signature. I've had a $200 printer left on my door step and then had to wait two days to receive a $50 DVD boxed set. I've run into times where they leave a tag and mark it that it requires a signature and then the next day the just leave the package on my doorstep.

So here's the deal. I will NEVER EVER AGAIN do any business with UPS unless I don't have a choice. I don't care if I have to pay a high shipping cost to send Fed Ex or DHL or USPS. It's worth it because at least then I know that I will get my packages and not get dicked around in the process. The biggest stumbling block for me is going to be shopping with Amazon. I love them. They usually have the best prices on stuff and I can't see giving up that savings simply because UPS sucks. I might invest in a PO Box or I might have packages shipped to my parents house...I don't know yet.

What I do know is that I am boycotting UPS as much as possible. I would encourage anyone else that has had similar issues to do the same.

- Jeremy

A young cowboy walks into a saloon. He sees an old cowboy sitting at the bar staring at a big bowl of steaming hot chili. He sits down, orders a drink and after several minutes he notices that the old cowboy hasn't touched his chili.

"Hey, you gonna eat that there chili?" He asks.

"Nope." Replies the old cowboy.

"You mind if I have it?"

The old cowboy glances at the young cowboy out of the corner of his eye, slides the bowl of chili across the bar and says, "Be my guest."

The young cowboy grabs the spoon and hungrily begins to devour the chili. He quickly reaches the bottom of the bowl only to find a dead mouse. He promptly vomits all the chili back into bowl.

The old cowboy glances at him again. "Yep, that's 'bout a far as I got."

NYC to Paris

Be sure to check out Step 24

This morning at 10am, I decided that it was time to head to the bathroom after a couple of hours of holding it in. I went to the men's room that I normally do on the second floor. I walked in unassumingly. The first stall was taken so I moved on. I opened the door to the handicap stall and was horrified to find that someone hadn't flushed! The stench hit me and I felt like I was going to puke. Worse than that there I was standing in the stall staring at the biggest piece of poop I'd ever seen in my life. It looked like a dead sewer rat stuffed face first into the toilet. I swear to god this thing must've been a foot long and as big around as a coke can! I hurried back out of the stall and exited to the hallway in horror.

Still needing to make my own deposit I rushed to the men's room on the first floor. Moments later, sitting there, quietly contemplating, I tried in vain to shove the horrible image of the giant elephant sized poop out of my mind. Then I began to wonder...

Who could've done it? Why didn't they flush? and sweet Jesus that must've hurt like hell!

After a moment or two I determined the following...

1. Whomever did it must be walking funny because there is NO WAY someone can take dump of that magnitude and not manage to feel like they just had colonoscopy.
2. I'm not convinced that I would have flushed either for fear that the toilet would overflow or worse yet violently reject the enormous turd.

In any case I don't think I'll be able to use that bathroom again today...or tomorrow.

- Jeremy

I promised a more detailed update so here goes...

It's been pretty crazy at Casa de Thompson for the last few months. Erin got a new job working full-time for EDS. She's enjoying it and loves the people she works with. Yes, she does work for the same company as I do, but we don't work for the same manager. Fortunately she does work in the same building so we get to carpool together which is saving us a ton of money on gas. Of course the only reason it's saving us a ton of money on gas is because gas is so freakin' expensive! Can you believe I paid $45 dollars to fill up my tank the other day. What a racket that is. Big oil is posting record profits? Well, duh! It's because they've jacked up the price. I firmly believe that it's all a big scam. They just jack up the prices to $3 to make us feel relieved when they drop it to $2.60. F*CKING COMMIES!

...anyway...I got off topic there, sorry.

Where was I?

Oh yeah...!

We've been trying to adjust to our new lifestyle with both of us working 8-5 everyday. It is nice to have a regular schedule and Erin has been soooo much happier.

Sophia is wonderful as always. She's getting taller...can you believe she's almost 3ft. tall? 31 inches of Pee Wee goodness. She started giving kisses a couple of weeks ago. I was holding her at the sitters in the morning when we were dropping her off when she stopped and looked me straight in the eye, popped out her binky and leaned in and gave me a kiss. She got all excited and wrapped her little arms around my neck to hug me. I was so surprised. I think we all were. I looked at Erin in disbelief and asked, "Did she just do what I think she did??"

Erin was beside herself from the cuteness and Sophia, in her impish glee looked at me and did it again followed by another gleeful hug. This time there was no mistaking it. My little girl had just given her daddy a kiss. It made my week.

She's still a little chatterbox only now there's real words in there. It's funny to listen to her. You only catch a single word here and there, but you know that she's only a single synapse away from making complete sentences. She was in her high chair one night eating her french fries and chicken nuggets when she ran out of fries. She started bouncing in her seat and yelling, "FRA FRY...FRA FRY...FRA FRY...FRA FRY..." until I put more on her tray.

I'm telling you this kid is scary smart. She grabbed Erin's car keys the other day and tried to "unlock" the front door. I caught her standing in front of the door reaching up with the keys attempting to stick the keys in the door knob. Just the other day I was calling the cat over to me so that Sophia could pet her; Sophia was on my lap and I started saying, "come here Lily..." and snapped my fingers. Sophia proceeded to mush together "come here Lily" and was making the motion with her hand as if she was attempting to snap her fingers.

As for me...I'm fine. Just trying to enjoy my family as much as I can.

Ooh! Almost forgot. Erin and I went out on a date yesterday afternoon. My in-laws were kind enough to take Sophia for the afternoon so Erin and I could go to the movies and go out to eat.

We went to see Hot Fuzz. It was awesome. It rips on every single cop movie convention and it takes itself completely seriously which made it even funnier. I would recommend this movie to people who love action movies and to people who hate action movies. It was done by the same team that did Shaun of the Dead (another must see) a couple of years ago. Go and see it...you'll thank me.

Anyway...I've got to get a move on with my day. I'm going to try to make posts with a little more regularity so I will be back soon with more fun.

- Jeremy