Creampuff Revolution

Creampuff Unsure How the Karma Points Were Awarded

Back in Toronto, Katr and I lived dangerously near a 7-11. I'm not going to lie to you - I spent a lot of time at that same 7-11, rocketing towards adult onset diabetes with my frequent Slurpee consumption.

One time, I paid for a Slurpee with a $10 bill and the clerk, who was new and nervous, gave me change for a $20. I was all "Oops! Only gave you a $10!" and handed the extra money back.

It was like I had handed her the fucking Hope Diamond. This woman LOST IT - she COULDN'T BELIEVE I had given her the extra change back. She was practically in tears, falling all over herself to thank me for not just taking off with the spoils of her innocent mistake. She came out from behind the counter to HUG me. And every time I went in there after that, she would remind me that she remembered that I had given that money back and she would tell the story to anyone else who was there.

It was pretty hilarious how smug I felt, considering I was essentially being congratulated for not being a selfish, possibly criminal, douche for 5 whole seconds of my life.

Was the clerk's reaction ridiculously over the top? Sure. But I have to say that my experience with the 7-11 clerk has certainly encouraged me to continue my honest ways in retail situations.

So last week I was shopping in another convenience store with another new, nervous but friendly clerk. I bought some snacks, a magazine and a book and the total only came to $16, which seemed kind of low. I checked my receipt on the way out and sure enough, she hadn't charged me for the book.

I hesitated. I like free books. But I remembered how good it felt to be honest and also thought that it would be nice to help out this young person who was clearly new to the workforce and also, I'd forgotten to buy gum.

So I headed back into the store and said "Hey there! You forgot to charge me for this book!" and waited for the adulation to pour down upon me.

When no adulation was forthcoming, I downgraded my expectations to a "thank you!" from the clerk. I didn't get that either. But I did get "Oh. Okay. Here."

She acted like I was kind of bugging her by coming back.To PAY FOR MY BOOK. Like she was doing me this big favour by charging me for the book I could have had for free. No "thank you" - no "sorry" even.

Huh.

I came away kind of confused. Going in, I thought I was adding a few more karma points to my coffer. On the way out, I thought maybe I was paying OUT karma points. Like I OWED the universe $19.99 and I'd finally cleared my debt. Or maybe it was just the universe balancing things out after the 7-11 clerk treated me like I was Warren Buffet for six whole months. I ... don't know how these things work. What do you guys think?

The book I bought - The Quality of Mercy by Faye Kellerman (which is kind of Alanis Morissette ironic, really) - is pretty good so far, by the way. Certainly worth paying for - although the author seems to have a personal hate-on for fat people which is perhaps striking only to me, a person who is fat.

The book is just filled with descriptions of fat, nasty, stinky, fat villains who are nasty, stinky, fat, disgusting, evil, greasy, saggy, stinky, constantly eating like pigs, taking big dumps, fat fat fatty fat fat. I was like "Lady, I get it. They're fat. Move on." But otherwise, pretty interesting stuff.

Creampuff Can Still Learn New Tricks

NB: This post is a little bit about software. If you don't give a shit - and I don't blame you if you don't - just skip to the end and enjoy being creeped out by the audio clip. Thank you.

I'm going to be teaching Berin the Bintern about Windows Live Writer today.

I don't usually have strong feelings about software one way or another, but I would totally take Windows Live Writer behind the barn and get it pregnant.

Unlike my actual blogging software of choice - Typepad - WLW  never eats my blog posts - it lets me see exactly what my post will look like while I'm actually working on it - it lets me resize photos and video players without me having to poke the html anywhere - and it's FREE. I could go on...but I'll refrain in case children are reading and you don't feel like explaining what "scissoring" is.

In preparation for my tutorial this morning, I thought I should give myself a challenge and try something new with Windows Live Writer - embedding an audio file.

Every year, my brother Jaro calls me on my birthday (in March) and leaves me a message using this creepy pedophile voice. The first year he did it, I was SO creeped out that I actually thought about calling the police because I didn't know it was him. And every year, I threaten to record it and put it on my blog and every year, I end up erasing it - UNTIL THIS YEAR, when Katr made me a copy! And today, I wanted to share it with you. I just needed to figure out how. But I know that WLW would help me figure that out! Right? Right, WLW?

My first moment of malaise occurred when I learned that WLW doesn't have an "insert file" option. Malaise turned to frustration after I conducted an exhaustive search for the right media player plug-in, which needed to be supported by the right freeware, which I couldn't find for PC and which also would have required me to start a Google sites account and become friends with someone called Dr. Knockin' Boots on MySpace.

The above took about an hour. I KNOW. As a total last resort, I typed my conundrum into the Typepad Knowledge Base. Where I was rewarded with the answer to my question in less than a second.

I'm not going to lie to you. I felt betrayed by WLW. Like I'd caught it behind the barn with Tracy Jordan. I don't want to cut it out of my life completely - but I think WLW and I might need to take a break. And maybe this afternoon, I might let Typepad get to second base.

Anyway - here's the clip. Enjoy - especially if it's your birthday!

Photo credit: Just another barn on Flickr by Grant MacDonald