City of Stately Elms? No, City of Feckless Dickweeds.

Here's where it started for me on Tuesday last week:

http://dailygleaner.canadaeast.com/search/article/553681&p=2

I went to the Postal Outlet at King's Place to cash one money order and get another done up for a CD order I'd done... only to discover that the Postal part of the corner store had been removed. As the article makes clear the owner was found to be conducting her business in a haphazard manner counter to Canada Post training. I would not argue with that... though most of the counter people who'd worked there for some time were nothing but helpful and pleasant to deal with... the woman herself seemed slow and confused, so to find out she was the owner... well, it actually makes some sort of sense.

The comments on the story are the usual brand of inane that online articles seem to attract. There are a few that seem to hint that bringing hapless East Indian work habits to N. America is wholly unacceptable and that we [Canadians? New Brunswickers? Frederictonians? Whites?] would never go to India and fuck up their mail system.

I propose that bad service knows no racial boundaries. What's more it's really what we [Frederictonians especially] deserve. Sure we wait in long lines at Tim Horton's and don't get what we ordered... but why did we have to be carrying on a cell phone conversation taking down orders for two dozen people at our office in the Centennial Building? Sure we're pissed off when we find out the interac is down at the restaurant after we finished our meal, but why don't we have $20 on us... it might come in handy (or at least $2 for a coffee at MacDonald's you Visa-carrying moron).

Friday afternoon I was at the laundromat and bracing for the blank stare I usually get when I describe the change I want back after buying detergent. However this time there was a woman just ahead of me at the counter who smelled of lavender and hard candy bringing back a jacket for an alteration of something for what was obviously the second time. This is how the coversation went:

Counter Person: Sorry about that. Here is your tag to claim it next week. If you could sign here it'll show that it's been paid for.

Dried Up Lady: I'm not paying for this a second time.

Counter Person: No, you're signing it to show that you'd already paid for it... that way you won't have to pay a second time.

Dried Up Lady: I'm not... signing... anything.

Counter Person: Well I hope I'm the one who's working when you come back in, otherwise it'll be confusing.

Dried Up Lady: Hmmmph.

So, was the DUL justified in being upset with the job she'd had done? Probably. You pay for a service to be rendered and you expect it to be done fully and properly. Does it give her license to be a shithead? Why should it? It's not like someone left a surgical sponge in her lung. Lighten up.

Back to the post office thing.... What bugs me most about it is that it's one more service that downtown loses... like a phone payment centre, and a power bill payment centre, bottle recycling centre and a liquour store. Why not push people into their cars to run every errand? Why not send everyone up to the mall or to the outskirts of town? What does the term city centre mean?

Aside from that the weekend was pretty cool. Went down to Saint John with 3/4 Piper Perabo for a Backstreet SJ instore. Had a great meal at Taco Pico. The show was great (though the crowd was small), acoustic Piper is a different beast, but a relaxed and fun one.

Watched Quarantine when I got back, which was kind of a kitchen sink blend of handi-cam stuff like Blair Witch or Cloverfield, zombie (sorta) craziness ala 28 Days Later and haunted house survival in the Alien mold. It's a remake of a Spanish film called [Rec] done by the original's film director. If the original is even better than the remake that'll be something.

On Saturday I bought myself a small ceramic heater for my bedroom and a copy of Bruce MacDonald's first film Roadkill. Need I say more?

Then this morning I dove into my Extending the Table cookbook and made some flat bread... so easy, why haven't I been doing this all along? And also something called Groundnut Stew, a Kenyan recipe. It's essentially a beef stew prepped with onion, garlic, ginger and pepper but with a second stage where you add peanut butter. It's pretty tasty, but I think it could use another solid beside the beef to chunk it up a little. Maybe a sweet potato?

So in conclusion, Fredericton... don't take your bad mood out on others. If someone pees in your soup you'll be partly to blame.