Here’s a question for ya…

Without giving too many details, there is a place that I go to several times a week where I purchase the exact same thing. The people at the shop know my order and when I walk up they usually ask if I’ll have “the usual”. While it’s being prepared, I take my order slip and move down to the register. My total is the same every day so I am almost always prepared with the proper amount of cash. I leave the remainder of the coin change for their tip jar.

Because of this regularity, I am to the point now where I basically walk by the register and set the money down and the guy just knows what to charge and he knows that the changes goes in their bucket. It’s not quite to the level of everybody in the place yelling my name ala “NORM” from Cheers, but still it’s a comfortable place and I enjoy the familiarity and having the people behind the counter recognize me as a “regular”. It’s probably an ego thing, but whatever…

So, a week or two back, I thought I saw something odd happen. But, I wasn’t sure. I certainly didn’t want to accuse anybody of anything without knowing for certain that I saw what I saw. But I made a mental note to look out for the signs of a repeat offense. The next few times I went I stayed extra alert but still couldn’t be 100% certain that I saw what I thought I saw. Until today. Today, without a doubt in my mind, I did in fact see what I thought I saw. My question now is, what to do about it.

What the hell am I talking about, you ask?

As I walk by the register and set my money down in front of the regular cashier, I repeated my order to him and he nodded in agreement. I walked over to my normal spot where I wait for my order to be completed. I then observed the following:

- The cashier grabbed my money and folded it in his hand.
- He then mock-typed some stuff on the touch screen register.
- He looked around at all the other employees (including his boss who was no less than 5 feet away)
- He then reached out with the same hand that’s holding the cash and grabbed the slip of paper that had my order on it.
- He crumpled the slip of paper in his hand and put his two hands together.
- He switched the cash from one hand to the other.
- In one motion he tossed the trash from his right hand in to the waste basket and placed his left hand (with the cash) in his pants pocket.

Like I said, I had THOUGHT I had seen this happen before. One of the main reasons I thought I had noticed it before was the absence of the sound of the register opening and shutting. So today, I can say with 100% certainty, he pocketed my cash.

When I said I have a question, actually, I have a few:
- Should I confront him about it?
- Should I tell his manager?
- Should I leave only half the money next time and wink at him in a knowing way so I get a discount and he pockets only half?
- Is it my duty to stand in front of him to make sure he rings it up and hands me my change so that he can’t continue to rip off his employer?

As I try to figure out what to do, here are some things that run through my head:
- Business work on a profit basis. If they don’t make enough profit, their prices go up. That hurts me in the long run.
- I hate confrontation.
- Why doesn’t this place have cameras?
- I really hate confrontation.

So, I’m torn. I don’t know what to do, if anything. I know how I’m leaning but I won’t say just now as to not sway the voting. But please, leave me a comment and let me know what you would do.

Thanks.

Hovering at 195

For the past 2 weeks my weight has been hovering right around 195. I think part of the reason is that because of my current running schedule, I’m not burning as many calories as I was when I was riding the bike every day. I think what I need to do is keep with my 20 minute runs 4 days a week, but add in a 20-40 minute bike ride in the evenings. The main problem with that lately has been an increase in the amount of projects I have been working on. They seem to be taking up a lot of my time. But, if I’m going to reach my goal, I’m going to have to make the time. No excuses. Gotta get on the bike!


My current running pace is right around 12 minute miles. I’m doing 2 minutes of running and then a 1 minute walk. Rinse, swish, repeat. The pace has been good and I’m hoping that by this time next week I will be ready to move to a 3 minute run/1 minute walk schedule. I don’t really have a goal for where I want to be by the time the race gets here in December, but I’m thinking 8-10 minute runs with a 1 minute walk would be awesome. With that I would expect to be doing about a 10.5 or 11 minute mile. But, these are all just things I have cooked up in my head since this is the first time in my life that I’ve been running. So, what the hell do I know.

Poker lately has been pretty interesting. I have always considered myself a tournament player as compared to a cash game player, but that all seems to be changing. Part of that comes from my daily conversations with my buddy Scott who is working full time in LA as a poker player. Having somebody to discuss situations with on a daily basis is so great and it’s really helping my cash game a lot. My last 2 live cash game sessions have resulted in 2 consecutive winning sessions, but more importantly, looking back on those two sessions, my confidence level at a cash game has never been higher. In both sessions I felt completely comfortable at the table and wasn’t intimidated by anybody. I felt like I knew where I was at in every pot I played and showed down the winning hand on the river far more times than showing down the loser. I large part of that comes from tightening up my cash game a lot. I realize now in the past I normally would play a loose aggressive style that was always finding ways to put me in difficult situations. By tightening up my play and folding several hands that I would normally have played in the past, I was able to walk away with a decent profit on both sessions.

The World Series of Poker is going on right now and I’m really trying to figure out a way to play in it. I’d rather not just go plunk down $1500 to play in a 3000 player event. Even if you play your best poker, with that many players, you are going to have to run really really good in order to make the money. Just playing tight will only last so long. You need to get in and mix it up. You have to accumulate a lot of chips. You need to play your best poker for 3 full days. No 30 second mind farts where you call off your entire stack with A/J after being re-raised. Yeah, I did that last year in a big tourney. I may go down to the Rio and play in one of the “second chance” events in the evening. It won’t be a bracelet event, but getting to play in the poker room with so much action going on is really amazing. There is a great amount of energy in the room and I want to go and be a part of it. Hell, it only comes around once a year.

Tomorrow morning Chris is having Lasik eye surgery. We’ve talked about doing this for years. I’m very excited for her to finally get this done. The only problem is, if you know my wife, you know how squeamish she is. She’s pretty nervous today and I’m sure that’s only going to get worse as the day rolls on. Luckily she has 2 classes to teach today so that should keep her fairly busy. Sadly, I’m not allowed to go in and watch the procedure. You know damn well I would have shot video and put it up on YouTube. If things change, you’ll be the first to know.

No More Best Buy Extended Warranties For Me

When you are checking out at Best Buy, the clerk always says, “Would you like to get the extended warranty? It will protect your item in case anything happens to it.” Depending on what the item is, I almost always say no, but have purchased my fair share of them over the years.

Here’s a brief history of my luck with the Best Buy extended warranty:

1. Big Screen TV - Pay a couple hundred bucks for the 4 year extended warranty. Fail to renew the warranty after 4 years which would have cost about $50 bucks. About 1 year later something goes out on the TV and it costs me $450 to replace.

2. Countless small electronics like cameras, mp3 players, etc… pay random amounts for extended warranties and never use them for one reason or another.

3. Digital Camera - Figuring that it’s an item that I plan on carrying in my pocket and may end up seeing some damage, I opt for the $30 extended warranty. After about 6 months of use, I’m heading to the car in the morning with my hands full of several items. One of which is my camera. I need to run back in to the house for a second so I set a collection of items on top of my car. As I turn to walk away I get about 5 feet away and hear a noise that sounds like something sliding. I turn just in time to watch my camera slide off the car and hit the cement. I pick it up to find that the zoom no longer works and it’s throwing a nice error on the screen which makes it difficult to get to the menus and makes it impossible to shoot videos.

I take the camera back to Best Buy and head over to the Geek Squad. They take my camera and tell me they will send it out for repairs. I get a call from the repair shop a few days later letting me know that there is damage to the casing (duh, it fell 5 feet on to cement) and that this kind of damage is not covered with the warranty and it would cost me $196.00 for repairs. Luckily we received this information in the form of a voice mail or else I would have told that guy off right then and there. $196.00 to repair a $220 camera? Not to mention the fact that the NEWER version of the SAME camera is available for $199.

I then went and read through all the fine print of a Best Buy warranty. This warranty does not cover much at all. Damage due to wear? Nope. Water damage? Nope. Insect infestation? Nope. (and yes, I’m serious that it’s listed) Basically, what is covered is after some amount of time your camera just decided to stop working for some unexplainable reason, that would be covered. But, if there was an explainable reason on WHY it stopped working, it’s not going to be covered.

Oh, and if you don’t think I hold a grudge, I stopped shopping at Comp USA several years back because they chose to just out and out over charge people on every single item in their store. So, when I heard they were closing all the Comp USA stores, I drove over and went inside to take a victory lap.

Hey, Best Buy, suck my ass! I went over to Target and bought my new camera. I paid cash. That would have been your profit. Have a nice day.