F**king scammers

What is it with these f**king people? Why do they feel the need to f**k with your otherwise-normal day? Seriously, why don’t they just F**K RIGHT OFF?!?!?! I wish I could meet these people in a dark alley. Maybe I could bring scamming to an abrupt end.

My regular readers will know that last year, I broke my toe – quite seriously, in fact. I needed surgery to repair it, and they inserted two tension bands and a wire to hold my toe back on. Well, about two months ago, I had the wire removed – FINALLY. I can’t tell you how good it is to be free of it.

Anyway…. while I was on leave after the surgery, I got a random SMS telling me that I won £900,000 in a Global Telecom Prize draw thingy. Considering I was laid up for a few weeks, I thought I’d have some fun with these guys and lead them along for a bit.

It was all good until I honestly just got sick of the idiot and sent him a rude e-mail. But not before I reported his details to about five different fraud and scam agencies in both Australia and the UK.

But tonight I just got another SMS from a c**ksucker “offering to buy the couches I have for sale”. To be fair, I do have couches for sale right now, but they send you a text, asking to send photos.

I replied and told him that photos are part of the ad. Then he SMS’s me again, asking when can he pick them up. Not come see them – pick them up. So I ask him how much they were advertised for and the price he gives me is a little short of my negotiable price. So I asked him where he saw the ad. He tells me that he’s looked at so many he can’t remember, but he wants MY couches.

So I sent him the price I wanted – telling him almost double the advertised price. Then he asks me for photos again.

So here’s my questions: Are scammers so F**KING STUPID that they think they’ll get something out of their texts? And if they DO, just what is it they expect to get? My home address – maybe from the geo-thingy if I send them a photo?

OR……are some people so stupid, that they can’t spot this kind of shit as a scam?

You know what? I’d happily send these people my address. If they turn up at my houose with nefarious plans, they’d learn what a can of whoop-arse REALLY f**king looks like. I can’t stand arseholes who think they can scam innocent people. I think they are the lowest f**king filth on the planet.

Have YOU been approached by one of these arse-clowns? Did you give in to them and suffer some detriment? Or do you have a way to get back at them? Leave some comments and tell me your story – I really would LOVE to hear it.

Leave after Kapooka

Strange title for a post? Yes indeedy. But it’s actually a search term used quite a bit lately that has brought people to my blog. So I thought I’d throw up a quick post to explain it.

Basically, it all depends. It depends on the time frame between when you finish Kapooka and when your IET course starts. The general process is to get you to your IET course location as soon as possible, and then you wait there. That could be a couple of days, it could be a couple of weeks.

So the Army has this thing called Holding Platoon. If you arrive at your IET location, and there’s a bit of a wait until your course, you get posted in to Holding Platoon and they look after you until the course starts.

Generally speaking, you’ll be given random administrative tasks to complete during the day. You could be helping out at The Mess preparing meals, or you could be working in the Orderley Room (the HR office) helping file paperwork, or you could be out there painting rocks and doing some gardening.

In VERY rare cases, you may actually be able to take REAL leave and go somewhere else. But like I said, that is VERY rare. There would need to be an extended period of time before your course AND you would need to have been hanging around long enough to accrue some leave AND you would need a pretty damn good reason not to stay where you are.

Once your course starts, you probably won’t get any real leave until the course ends. You may get the occasional weekend off – again, depending on how long the course is and how intense it is – but you won’t be able to go anywhere further than the local town.

Once your IET course ends, the intent is to get you to your new posting as soon as possible. Generally, you’ll be sent there within a couple of days of completing your course. And then, depending on what’s going on in your new unit, you might get leave – or you may not.

Another thing I should point out – as raised by “Joel” – at the bottom of my “What happens at Kapooka” post, is what happens with people who are married when they join the Army.

Defence is really quite open-minded these days when it comes to relationships. We no longer talk about Married or Single, we talk about a Member (soldier/sailor/airman) that either does, or does not, have dependents. Defence recognises that you might be a single parent, you might be a step-parent or even have adopted kids. They even recognise same-sex relationships these days, as well as common law de facto marriages.

So, if you are “single” and have no dependents (kids, spouse, person you care for, etc) then you are known as a Member Without Dependents (or MWOD). If you DO have a dependent, then you are a Member With Dependents (or MWD). Easy enough?

If you join up as an MWOD, then life is simple. If you’re an MWD, then things get a bit more complicated. When an MWD is separated from their dependents FOR SERVICE REASONS, they are considered “Unaccompanied” – so now you become an MWD(U). During Kapooka, you obviously need to leave your family at home, so you are an MWD(U) member during basic training.

If you go to a “normal” IET course, then this will continue to be the case throughout your course. If you join a Corps with an extended IET course (and some can go for a year or more), then you may be allowed to bring your family and be an MWD again. There are a few entitlements for MWD’s, and you can read about them here.

If you remain MWD(U) during your IET course, then either immediately after your course – or shortly after arriving at your new posting – you will be given the chance to “reunite” with your family and arrange to have them move to your new posting location. Naturally, all this is at Government expense. If this happens to you, your admin staff will guide you through the process and tell you what to do.

So does that answer more of everyone’s questions? If not, drop me a line – or keep those funky search terms coming – and I’ll post more info to clarify what happens to you when you join the Army.

More driving woes

I hate reverting to posts about bad drivers, but you know what? Sometimes it’s just not possible to avoid. After all, I started this blog just so I could rant and rave and get things off my chest. We all need to vent to someone, don’t we? Sometimes, there are things in life that shit us to tears, but there’s nothing we can do about it. And when that happens, we reserve the right to bitch about it.

So here it is: the Stop Once Concept. Even the name tells you what it’s all about. And when you consider that I’m writing about drivers, I’m sure that most of you can work out what I’m talking about.

You know when you’re driving in heavy traffic? You might be on your way to work, on your way home, or maybe trying to get out of the city on the weekend. The traffic is moving at a snail’s pace as it is and it’s driving you crazy (no pun intended there).

You approach a red light and gradually the traffic comes to a halt. You stop your car at your preferred distance from the car in front of you and begin the wait. You’ve been sitting there for a minute or so, and then it happens. The car in front of you rolls foward about a metre. F**KHEAD!!

And he’s a f**khead because now YOU have to make a choice – and no matter what you do, you can’t win. It’s a f**king lose-lose situation. Your options are following along with this ARSE CLOWN and roll forward a little bit – pissing off the guy behind you; or you can stand your ground – and leave a full car-length in front of you, attracting the anger of everyone behind you.

So my rant is simple: STOP ONCE, for f**k’s sake! When you approach a stopped vehicle, get as close as you feel comfortable and then stop. And then STAY WHERE YOU ARE. If that means you get a little closer than usual, then f**king do it.

I hate the media

They sensationalise every f**king thing. God forbid they wrote an article praising emergency services or the military. There is a story on www.news.com.au this morning about a South American man who “allegedly” stole a packet of biscuits, got tasered three times by police – and then died. You can read the story here.

But as always, I ask my standard question: What was this guy doing, that saw police need to taser him? The answer in this case is that he resisted arrest, then ran from police. They tasered him, but he recovered and was able to fight off up to five policemen before running away again. So, he was tasered again.

I see this as completely legitimate reasons for tasering. Police are empowered with catching criminals and seeing that charges are laid. And that’s exactly what they’ve tried to do in this case. If we were in any number of other countries, the guy would have been shot. But because of all our civil libertarians, the cops have to use tasers. And when they do – they get interogated by beaurocrats.

There’s a line in the article that asks why the man wasn’t just crash-tackled or over-powered. If Mark Morri (the author) read his own work, he’d see that the cops TRIED that. But despite being tasered already, the crim was able to fight these guys off.

And there was a story on the same website a few days ago where police tasered another guy – who subsequently died. There was a call from civil liberties groups to put a suspension on tasering. But you know what? It’s because of these groups that we have tasers in the first place! THEY are the ones that wanted a “less than lethal” alternative. But it seems that if someone with a bad heart dies from a taser – that’s the police’s fault.

It’s all well and good for the public, or these groups, or politicians to sit back after the fact and analyse every second of the incident and seek explanations as to why police followed the course of action that they did. But when you’re THERE, and shit is going down – you don’t have that luxury.

If a guy is able to fight off FIVE cops, he deserves every f**king thing he gets. If a crim continues to resist, the cops need to put them down. I don’t mean that in the euthanasia way, but in the sense that they need to bring the struggling to an end. Thanks to the civil liberties groups, they can’t just draw their weapon and shoot – they have to use a taser. And if the crim is uneffected by the taser, then the cop needs to decide AGAIN – do we taser or shoot?

In my opinion, regardless of who you are, where you’re from or what your background is: if a cop draws a gun or taser and tells you to stop – YOU STOP. And if you don’t – then face the consequences of your actions, champ. I have no problem with cops tasering anyone until they comply. If death comes as a result of bad choices by the criminal, then so be it.

Really, that means one less person we taxpayers have to pay to keep in jail. I am behind the police 100% on this. I think these guys (and gals!) do an amazing job in a world that is going mad. We want the police to do a better job, but the government cuts their funding, gives them bullshit payrises, continues to impose tougher and tougher restrictions, and then complains when things go wrong.

It’s the same in the military – our budgets get cut, our training gets cut, our powers get taken away. But the government expects us to do a better job than before – and then hangs us out to dry when things go bad.

I think the media should be singing the praises of these guys and girls. It wouldn’t have been hard to write that article, stating that police had to defend themselves to bring the guy down, or to state that they were being overpowered and potentially had their lives in danger. But no, it has to be negative about the police, doesn’t it.

Arseholes.

Our bodies are so vulnerable

How easy do our lives get turned upside down? Sure, there’s tragedies like losing your job or a loved one, but when a simple little thing ends up in serious bodily harm, that’s when we realise just how feeble life is.

Last year, I was putting out my recycling bin and broke my toe. How sad is that? You see, our front yard is on a pretty drastic slope and the road is on a significant perpendicular slope. When I tried to maneuvre the rubbish bin, it over-balanced. I put my foot out to balance myself and it clipped the edge of the gutter and rolled.

The pain was excrutiating. The injury is known as a Jones Fracture and is most common in basketball players. My break was one of the more intense versions of the fracture and required surgery. I had to have two tension bands inserted into my foot to hold the toe back in place AND have a wire inserted.

I needed six weeks off work and spent about the first five of that on crutches, finally graduating to a walking stick for another four or five weeks.

Following the surgery, I had a hard lump on the side of my foot which meant I had to get larger boots for work, and it meant that I couldn’t sit in any position that had the outside of my right foot against the floor – like sitting cross-legged (when playing with my kids). Having pressure against the side of my foot caused the wire inside my foot to move, poking from INSIDE my foot. Ouch!

That was almost a year ago, and last week I had the wire removed. The site has been healing quite quickly and only 6 days after surgery, I can walk short distances on it already. I now have two weeks off work, plus there’ll be a period of sedentary duties, followed by a lengthy return to fitness program.

And it all happened SO easily and SO quickly. The last year of my life had turned upside down in a fraction of a second. I don’t think I’ll ever forget laying on the road in absolute agony, unable to get up or even to call out for help.

And my Stepfather has recently realised how quickly things can go badly. Yesterday was his 65th birthday, and he spent it in hospital. Just recently, he and my mother built a house, and after they moved in they were making finishing touches and doing a few things here and there.

My Stepfather hurt his back and like most of us do, he figured he just lifted something wrong and that it would fix itself after a few days. But it didn’t. And it got worse. After a few days, he was still not able to stand up, have a shower, or walk anywhere. He spent about two days on his knees at home, unable to do a damn thing.

So my mum called an ambulance and off he went to hospital. Initially, he was diagnosed with a bulging disk in his spine and sent home with some pain killers and told to rest. But after a few days, it wasn’t getting better. He was back on his knees, and couldn’t even manage to get to the radiologist to have a scan done.

So mum helped him get there, and even then she had to help him get into the room for the scan. After the scan, he still couldn’t walk himself to the car and ended up in excrutiating pain once more, so an ambulance was called again and off he went to another hospital. This time they worked out that he had a slipped disk, and was admitted immediately.

He is currently undergoing pain relief and rest, which is the base treatment for this injury. If it doesn’t resolve itself after about 5 days, they will try giving him injections near the injury site. And if THAT doesn’t work, they have to consider surgery.

So once again, his life has been turned upside down after a simple little accident. He could be facing a long, drawn-out period of treatment, followed by easing back into his normal lifestyle. It’s amazing just how quickly everything can change.

So what about you? Have you had an injury turn your life upside down in the blink of an eye? Tell me about it!

Food for thought

I read a news article today that got me thinking along radical lines. The article stated that NSW has implemented a law (apparantly already in practice in QLD) that when witnessing someone’s signature, there is now a legal requirement to confirm the identity of the person.

All this came about due to an incident in 2011 where a policeman pulled over a muslim woman wearing a burkha. Some kind of incident ensued and the woman accused the policeman of racism. At some point, the woman was required to sign a document, but when it came to the court case, the police couldn’t confirm who it was that signed the document – because the woman never revealed her face.

And all that got me thinking – as it usually does.

We’re always hearing about the muslims, and how they seem to think that they’re not subject to Australian law, because they have their own (Sharia Law). So, I thinks to meself, if the muslims want to behave like muslims, why don’t we let them behave like muslims?

So that means women can’t drive. They can’t vote. They can’t go to school. And they can’t go outdoors unless they’re escorted by a male. They’re not allowed to eat at the same time as the men – nor in the same room. When they “misbehave”, they’re allowed to be beaten or stoned (to death in the worst cases).

Would that make the muslims happy do you think? Here I was thinking that they came to Australia to ESCAPE that kind of life in their own countries, yet when they get here, they argue that our law isn’t applicable to them.

I get sick of people coming to Australia “for a better life” but then expecting to be able to behave in the same way as when they were in their own country. If you come to Australia, you live by Australian law – or get the hell out.

Let me at ‘em

This post contains a vast amount of profanity. Read on at your discretion.

Funny how things go, isn’t it. I had to reboot my laptop today and when it restarted, it brought up the Yahoo homepage for me so I could log into my e-mail. Yahoo shows some news headlines, and one in particular caught my eye:

Girl allegedly run to death had a tumultuous life

In a nutshell, a nine year old girl from Alabama who lied about some candy that she ate was made to run by her grandmother. She ran for three hours while her stepmother also watched on and did nothing. Eventually, the poor girl collapsed and died.

In my most sarcastic voice, I exclaimed “Yay legal system. The grandmother and stepmother are being charged with murder”.

And as I read that story, I came across this story as well:

Boy ‘punished for wetting bed’ dies of dehydration

In this story, a 10 year old boy from Dallas who wet his bed, was punished by his parents who denied him water for 5 fucking days. He eventually died when he got peanut butter stuck in his throat, his parents refused to let him have water to wash it down, and his brothers were too scared to help in case THEY got a similar punishment.

He choked on the peanut butter, fell down and hit his head on the floor. And the parents are being charged with “bodily harm”, not with killing their son.

So as the title says, let me at ‘em. These people are the lowest fucking form of scum on the planet. They pick on their kids because they are fucking cowards who get no respect from other adults. They’re usually poorly educated people who focus their life on drugs or alcohol and don’t care about their families.

I’d like to say: give me five minutes with these arseholes, but the reality is that I’d need longer that. Putting a bullet in their head wouldn’t satisfy me one little bit. I’d need a good five DAYS with these people to show THEM what punishment and torture is all about. I know that there are plenty of things I could do to these people to have them BEGGING for a bullet in the head.

If you want some ideas of what I’d do to these fuckers, then by all means leave me a comment, but if you’ve seen any horror movies in the last 10 years, then just use your imagination. If you’re pathetic enough to torture a child, then you deserve worse done to yourself.

So let that be a warning to you fucking scum out there. If anyone ever hurt my kids, then I’d make the torture scenes in Hostel look like a quick, merciful death. I have no problem going to prison, especially if it’s for exacting revenge on some arsehole who touched my kids.

I’ve always believed that the law is supposed to represent the values of society. But they don’t, do they? Our bullshit legal system, presided over by our pathetic excuse for judges, let child molesters out of prison and think that sending someone away for five years for killing someone while being drunk behind the wheel is justice.

If the legal system ever failed me, and I mean EVER, then I have absolutely no hesitation in taking matters into my own hands. And as I’ve hinted at above, you’d wish you were dealt with by a court, rather than being dealt with by me. And not just for hurting MY kids, either. If you’re out walking the streets, after beating some kind of offence for harming a child, you’re on my list.

Wait, what?

When was the last time something caught you off-guard? I don’t mean checking your gas bill and finding that you’re paying a fortune. I mean when you saw or heard something that made you go “Wait. What the f**k was that?”

Well recently, I’ve had two such occasions. And I think they’ll surprise you, too. The first one is the movie Grease. It’s a classic movie, loved by many generations. Many people didn’t know this, but it was a Broadway stage show before it became a movie. Look it up on IMDB and read the trivia. Some of the facts will amaze you.

We watched it the other night, and what I discovered was shocking. I’m surprised that Grease only has a PG rating, because to be honest, I think it needs to be M. Some of the language both in the songs and general conversation is nothing short of “adult”. And if you read the trivia, you’ll see there are even more R rated references to the stage show (which was more risque than the movie) and to sex in general.

Case in point is when John Travolta is singing the Greased Lightning song and rubs saran wrap (glad wrap if you’re an Aussie) against his crotch.

But the second instance of “Wait. What?” occurred today on the way home from work. My iPhone automatically connects to my car so I can play my music instead of listening to the crap that passes as radio these days.

I was skipping through some of the superfluous rubbish on my phone, when an old Johnny Cash song came on. I like a lot of Johnny’s music, and if you haven’t seen Walk the Line, do yourself a favour and get it. It’s the story of Johnny’s life and it’s a movie with a great soundtrack and great insight into life back then. And even more amazingly, Joaquin Phoenix who plays Johhny actually does a better job with some of the songs.

But I digress. So this Johnny Cash song comes on and it’s got a pretty catchy tune, and I find myself wanting to sing along. And then the “chorus” comes on. And I quote…….

America for white. Africa for Black; Send those apes back to the trees. Ship those niggers back.

Amazing right? You can understand my “Wait. What?” moment. And the song only get’s worse. Lyrics such as:

Ring that bell. Shout for joy. White man’s day is here; Hand that chimp his ugly stick. Hand that buck his spear.

I was dumbfounded. Gobsmacked. Bewildered. Strangely, nobody has covered “Ship those niggers back” since Johnny’s passing. Go figure.

So tell me: when have you had such an intense “Wait. What?” moment??

Ripped off by car salesmen

I’ve noticed recently that in Brisbane, our car yards are ripping us off. I’m not 100% sure how they’re getting away with it, but what they’re doing is selling cars that don’t have indicators.

This could just be a fad though. I originally noticed that it was Mercedes Benz who seemed to start this new craze, but lately its spread to a whole range of manufacturers.

Which actually just caused me to realise that I need to apologise to a LOT of Brisbane drivers. You see, I was thinking that our drivers were either lazy, inconsiderate or just pushing their luck, because there are a LOT of drivers here who don’t indicate.

So if you’re one of those people, than PLEASE, accept my sincere apology for ragging on you, when it wasn’t your fault after all.

So back to my original storyline: Why aren’t these car dealers being held accountable? What’s up Ford, Holden, Mazda, Honda, Mercedes Benz, BMW, Hyundai and Kia? You all charge a small fortune for your cars, so I think we all deserve a couple of “throw-ins”, don’t you?

We already get a free stereo, spare tyre and power windows (if you think they’re NOT free, try ordering a car WITHOUT power windows!) I’m sure our brake lights and headlights are thrown in, so I think it’s about time you starting giving us free indicators.

I’m not exactly sure when this fad started, but I bought my car in 2010 and luckily, it came with indicators. Just to be sure though, I use them at every opportunity, just to make sure they don’t suddenly stop working.

Have you been ripped off? Have you purchased a car either that didn’t include indicators, or had them stop working after a period of time? Well, don’t let them get away with it! Ring them and ask, nay….DEMAND… to receive your free indicators!

Vegetarians

Vegetarians shit me. Not sure if there’s an unintentional pun there or not, but they really do.

Having said that, when my gorgeous Fiance (who is a vego) read that title, I got that look. You know the one. THAT look.

The truth is that it’s not ALL vego’s that shit me. Those, like my Fiance, have a reaction to meat. Depending on how “strong” the meat is, she will suffer anything from stomach nausea to outright vomitting. She can’t even handle eating Asian food with oyster or fish sauce in it. She tells people that she doesn’t eat anything that had a face, ergo she doesn’t eat chicken, fish, clocks or cliffs (hahaha, sorry).

And the reason that a lot of vego’s shit me is that my Fiance HAS to tell people the face thing, because whenever we go out to a restaurant or to a friend’s place, when she says she’s vegetarian, she gets asked “Do you eat chicken? What about fish?”. And why does she get asked that ALL THE BLOODY TIME?

It’s because there are people out there who SAY they are vegetarian, but they really aren’t. There’s a few reasons why they SAY they are. They say it because they object to slaughtering animals for food – and I can respect that. If you ever see an animal get slaughtered, it may very well turn you off. But when push comes to shove, they will eat chicken or fish. Particularly when they go out to eat and see that a HUGE range of restaurants seem to think that a side salad and a bowl of chips is their “vegetarian option”.

And there are people who say it because it’s supposedly “trendy” or “different” to be a vego. “Does the restaurant have a vegetarian menu?”; “Oh, you’re vegetarian?!?!”; “Yes, I think it’s horrible blah, blah, blah…” and it gets the conversation going.

Recently on one of the commercial TV channel cooking shows here in Australia, one of the contestants said she was a vegetarian. But how do you COOK a meat dish without tasting it? Especially if you’re on a show? At home, sure, you can take the chance. But if MY girl went on a show like that, she wouldn’t be able to try the dish before presenting it as her challange entry.

And although I don’t watch the show, I have been told that this pseudo-vego not only tasted her meat dishes, but ATE meat as well. And it’s THOSE vego’s that shit me. Either remove meat from your diet or don’t. It’s that simple. Don’t be one of those a-holes that claims to be a vego, but then chooses meat when it all gets a little bit hard.

The funny thing about my Fiance is that because she is a legitimate vegetarian, she has no problem cooking meat for me, or watching me eat it. But as with most things in life these days, if you’re the person doing the right thing (in this case, being a vego because of an allergy) then you’re subject to the consequences of the dickheads who “pretend” to be.

I get sick of having to “dumb down” my life because of idiots. Like when they reduce the speed limit at roadworks to 40 kph, even though what they are doing doesn’t impede on the lanes, to protect the wankers who can’t drive. But that’s a topic for another post.