by on April 9, 2009

American Idol Top 8 Results Reaction

scottI didn’t get a chance to pound out a post before the show, but I did Twitter my prediction:

@themanregistry Scott – @jpetersen
11:08 AM Apr 8th from Nambu in reply to themanregistry

There’s my proof and the links verify the voracity of my correct prediction this week. Finally!

We missed Adam Lambert’s performance on Tuesday due to the show running late AGAIN and we were too far in delay to catch it on the DVR once we hit the end of the recording. So we did what everyone does when they do that: YouTube the next day. I was so surprised to see Simon give a standing ovation, which is claimed as his first ever on the show. I remembered him doing one before, but recalled today that it was for a guest performance.

For coming weeks, I think Lil needs to figure out who she is and who they want her to be. They’re the producers, so getting work later is a given if she just meets those expectations and stops this foolishness. Stop with the wigs, strange makeup, and the horrible karaoke songs.

Filed Under: American Idol Tagged With: , , , , ,
by on April 7, 2009

In Business for Myself – Overload

Tax Time!It’s been a heck-of-a couple of weeks around here, but I don’t think I’ve been this excited about things in a good while. Then again, I don’t think I’ve also been this wracked and torn and broken, either. Makes for a great story for the grand-kids if I can remember details like this. Never mind – I’m writing it down here!

On March 30th, I filed with the State of Florida to create a limited liability corporation: Petersen Media Group, LLC and immediately applied for my EIN to get a business bank account to bring stuff out of my PayPal account for easier accounting and purchasing. That was very exciting and we are still on a high from all of that. I’m following in some pretty solid footsteps with my family, since my grandpa ran a John Deere dealership for decades and both my aunt and uncle run their own businesses and my mom ran a home business for quite a while when I was younger. None of them are here to help, but things are rocking anyway.

I got a book on small investments and it had a chapter on when to save money and do your finances during the year. I choked when I saw the section about filing estimated taxes on April 15th and dug around to discover “unemployment taxes” and all kinds of other penalty-inducing crap from the IRS. This was one of the wracked and torn bits from my opening. [Read more…]

Filed Under: Business, Personal Tagged With: , ,
by on April 6, 2009

Switching Back to Brighthouse from FiOS

Today is a big day for the Petersen household, as silly as the reason is: getting Brighthouse back. When we bought our townhome last May, I called to get our service moved to the new address, and they told me that the address was marked as a “non-serviceable address” and that we couldn’t get Brighthouse because cable is included in our Homeowners’ Association fees through Century Communication. We were pretty sad, but we made the switch to FiOS to get digital cable and a faster Internet connection than Century offered.

After a big installation fee for adding 2 more outlets that involved adding a contuit to the outside of our brand new building, we had a bill roughly $90 more per month and we were NOT happy about that at all. To make matters worse for them, when we signed up for service, we were told that we got a month free after 90 days. After calling several times to get that free month, we finally had a phone person tell us to go to such and such website to sign up for their referral program! We’d already been customers for over 6 months and it didn’t look like we were ever going to see that money at this point.

Last week I called Brighthouse because we’d seen so many service vans in the neighborhood, something was amiss about the information we’d received earlier. Apparently, all they have to do is “unmark” our address to be serviceable. On top of that, I almost fell over when he quoted me a price about $40 less than we were paying when we were in the apartment and learned that we get a “discount” for the price we’re already paying to the HOA for basic cable, so it’s like a credit. Basically, we’re going from $200/mo for triple-pack service to $120, which is an incredible savings “in these tough economic times” (that’s just for you, @Jordan Raynor!).

I just hope it goes smoothly, but we’ll know at 4pm, because that’s when the technician is coming. Yes, same day service.

Filed Under: Personal Tagged With: ,
by on April 5, 2009

Get the Junk Out of Isles

Anyone who knows me pretty good knows I experience “freak-outs” in crowded areas, regardless of whether it is people or things doing the crowding. I’ve had episodes at amusement parks, malls, grocery stores, church, etc. A quick anti-anxiety Xanax helps rather quickly, but it’s pretty embarrassing to need to resort to such extents just because of the environment I’m in. Today we had a new experience at the grocery store for a completely unnecessary reason: junk.

lou-ferrignoNot all stores are created equal, as there are clearly some clothing stores that are 80% inaccessible to shoppers in wheelchairs. If I can’t walk through a section without angling my shoulders, the walkways are not wide enough. I’ve got wide shoulders for my height, but I’m only 5’4″; we’re not talking about Lou Ferrigno here!

The problem today arose from the isles being about 6-8″ too narrow and way too many areas that had displays, racks, or mounds of items in the walkways. For example, between the end of the isles and the refrigerated section along the back wall, there was finally enough room to get 2 carts and a person alongside each other BUT they put a one-foot wire cart with bananas in the middle so only one cart could pass by at a time. If I had a dollar for every time today I had to stop to let someone go first or be a butthead and charge through because I was pissed at getting no where, our groceries would have been free.

Get the junk out of the aisles, read about the ADA walkway regulations, and try pushing a cart around your own stinking stores, or I’m going to shop at Sam’s Club for everything, because they have 8′ aisles.

Filed Under: Common Sense, Humor, Personal
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