The World's Highest Ranking Alien Believer

My Experience With CheapTickets.com, a.k.a CheapBastards.com

I want to first say I had to tone down my nickname for CheapTickets.com, as it was originally something more harsh, and I don't want to face repercussions for posting this.

So here's the breakdown of what happened when I was attempting to buy my brother's plane ticket:

I got an email a few days ago from my bank:




Important Notice to ******** ******** Bank Customers


May 25, 2011


Greetings!


Recently, there have been an unusual number of debit card fraud cases reported at ******** ******** Bank as well as other institutions. We want to reassure our customers that our data systems have not been breached and all data stored with ******** ******** Bank is safe. The number of accounts having fraudulent activity remains relatively small and we are taking every available step to prevent further fraud.


It is important to always monitor your account for any fraudulent transactions and report them to ******** ******** Bank immediately by calling (***)***-**** or visiting one of our branches. If you discover fraud after business hours you can call the toll-free hotline at 1-800-***-****. Fraud that is reported quickly can help us prevent further fraud and allows us to replace your funds as soon as possible.


Always be aware of people around you when using ATM machines, watch closely when an employee swipes your card and guard the numbers as you enter your PIN. Rest assured that ******** ******** Bank is committed to doing everything we can to prevent identity theft, debit card fraud and all other sources of financial crime. If you have any questions about debit card fraud or other suspicious activity, please call us at (***)***-****.


We appreciate our relationship with you and look forward to serving you in the future.


Sincerely,


******** ******** Bank



So I glaze through it, not really giving a shit. Anyway, Friday/Payday rolls around. Time to buy my brother's plane ticket. I went online to buy it at CheapTickets.com. My debit Mastercard transaction did not go through. Denied. I called my bank, and they checked on some things, and as it turns out, since CheapTickets' payment processing center is in CA where some credit card fraud happened, all transactions out of CA are being denied and flagged as possible credit card fraud, and they could not override it.

The bank tells me to come in and get a Visa Gift Card that usually costs $5.99, but they are waiving that fee for customers getting caught up by all the bullcrap. I drive up there, talk to the VP of the bank, and get a gift card for the exact amount of the plane ticket. I go to work and try to buy the plane ticket online, but since it is a gift card it has no name, address and telephone number registered to it. I tried to submit the payment 3 times, and all 3 times it was denied. So I called the CheapTickets' customer service people. They told me to call the bank and get my name, address and telephone number registered to the card. I called the bank, and they told me I would have to call the number on the back of the card.

I called the 1-800 number on the back of the card and got the balance on the card. It was $6 less than what it should have been. I called the bank back to let them know this, and was told that every time I attempted a transaction at CheapTickets.com (which was a total of 3 times), it was placing a $2 hold on the card that would go away after a few days. They told me to call CheapTickets again and get them to remove these holds. I called them. They could not. They called my bank to get them to remove the charges, and was told by the rep that they could not give them any of my information, and could not 3-way me into the conversation so I could provide my information to approve of this. They were told to give me the merchant ID and to have me call the bank back to have them remove the holds.

I called the bank and they told me that they couldn't do this. All they could do was move more money onto another Visa Gift Card and let me try to pay for the ticket using 2 cards. I was told to call CheapTickets to have them tell me if this could be done. I called them and they could not do it, that they could only process the transaction using 1 card. At this point I am about 30 notches above extremely pissed off, and I told them to transfer me to someone with stroke, like the Vice President of All Big Cock, to get this pushed through somehow, that I was buying a motherfucking ticket somehow before I got off the phone with them. After 4 attempts at being transferred, I was finally put through to a supervisor who basically told me I was screwed. He could send me a $25 travel voucher, but the airline was charging the price, not them, and there was nothing they could do to make it cheaper so that it would go through using the Visa Gift Card. The $25 Voucher would not apply to the price of the ticket either. The flight was through Delta Airlines, so I told them to get a Delta rep on the line so we could get this bullshit worked out.

I talked to the Delta rep, and after another bunch of bullshit it STILL would not go through using my debit Mastercard, and since the Visa Gift Card had those holds it didn't have enough money on it to cover the transaction, and they couldn't do the transaction using 2 cards, and there was no way to keep the flight locked in without paying for it.

Fuck. Fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck.

By this time, I had been on the phone close to 3 hours and had a massive fucking stress headache. I had cussed at God knows how many reps and I really wanted to kill somebody. I just wanted to buy this damn plane ticket and get it over with.

I called the bank, and told them I was fucked 3 ways from Sunday, since neither the bank, CheapTickets.com, nor Delta Airlines could do anything to push this through. After another bunch of bullshit, we finally arrived at this solution:

I went to Expedia.com and setup the flight on there, because fuck CheapTickets, they're never getting my business again. One of my supervisors, who banks somewhere else and doesn't have any trouble buying shit anywhere ever with his debit card, paid for the ticket. He would only do it if he was given the cash pretty much right away for it. I wrote him a check, as instructed by the VP of my bank, for the amount of the ticket - the new updated ticket cost less, but had more stops to it. The ticket I originally wanted was no longer available at the price I wanted to pay, but I still wrote him a check for the original ticket amount and told him to keep the overage as payment for helping me with this bullshit. The bank closed at 6 PM and he got off work at 6 PM, but if he hauled ass to the bank and rang the doorbell at a special door, they would let him in and cash that check for him. He took the Visa Gift Card with him to give it to the bank VP so that she could hold the card for a few days till the holds went away, and she was going to cancel the card and use it to replace the money for the check I wrote my supervisor. Since this whole thing was going to cause me to overdraft, they waived the overdraft fee in advance.

He paid for the plane ticket, and headed off to the bank. I thanked him a lot for this, and I thanked the VP of the bank a lot as well, for dealing with me as I struggled to buy this ticket.

I am still shaking from the stress of dealing with this bullshit today. I have a huge headache as a result. I will NEVER use CheapTickets or Orbitz again - I guess Orbitz is the parent company of CheapTickets, as I got an email from Orbitz for a $25 Voucher after dealing with CheapTickets' customer service people. I don't usually have stress, and I don't like having to stress over something like buying a damn plane ticket. All I know is that I cannot wait till I get home so I can go to bed and put this behind me.

I Made a Website

I made a website today for shits and giggles. Check it out by clicking here.

Final Fantasy XIII - Barthandelus Boss Battle on the Paramecia

I don't usually blog on video games, but I've been playing Final Fantasy XIII lately and I got stuck on the toughest boss battle in the game so far, the Fal'Cie Barthandelus on the flying aircraft carrier Paramecia. What sucks about this boss is that traditional tactics don't work.

I read the guides and tips online, and they all recommended Lightning / Fang / Hope as your battle party, along with various Paradigms and certain accessories. I'm here to say you need more than that. Here's a breakdown of how I finally beat this sumbitch after 3 or 4 days of being stuck on him:

Paradigms:

• Lightning: Commando / Fang: Saboteur / Hope: Synergist – (Bully)
• Lightning: Ravager / Fang: Commando / Hope: Medic – (Diversity)
• Lightning: Ravager / Fang: Commando / Hope: Ravager – (Relentless Assault)
• Lightning: Medic / Fang: Saboteur / Hope: Medic – (Perseverance)
• Lightning: Medic / Fang: Saboteur / Hope: Synergist (Evened Odds)
• Lightning: Medic / Fang: Saboteur / Hope: Ravager (Variety)

Weapons and Accessories:

Lightning needs to have 2 Tungsten Bangles. Fang needs to have a Tungsten and a Silver Bangle. Hope needs to have a Tungsten Bangle and a Gold Bangle. If you do not have all of these, buy them. At some point along the way on the Paramecia there is a treasure orb containing 3000 Gil. All weapons for this battle party need to be upgraded to Level 3, and all Accessories need to be upgraded to Level 2 at least. You can upgrade them further if you want, but this is where mine were at when I kicked his ass. And if you were wondering where some of these accessories are, check your 3 non-party characters. If you are like me you previously selected to Optimize your party due to either Defensive or Offensive strategies, chances are the Gold Bangle you can't find is attached to Snow or something. Remove the good crap from the people you are not using and give them junk.

Strategy:

Set Bully as default Paradigm, and immediately throw a Librascope to get weaknesses. The trick with Barthandelus is constant pummeling. Start taking out the left and right Ailettes and Pauldrons. You want to fluidly move between Paradigms every couple of turns to reflect the current situation, but don't let him force you into defensive Paradigms for more than 2 turns (i.e. use Evened Odds few and far between, and as little as possible). Keep pummeling on him, even if only 1 of your characters is swatting at him. This may sound laughable, but it will keep him distracted from using some of his bigger attacks if you keep him busy. If you get your party's health filled up, switch to Relentless Assault. Then switch to Diversity so you can have a medic filling up your party's health while pummeling him. When you finish taking out the Ailettes and the Pauldrons, you will start the next phase of the boss fight.

The previous advice goes for the head too, until, at some point, he will start using the Destrudo attack. This attack takes a minute to charge up - use this time to switch to Evened Odds followed by Perseverance - you will need to keep debuffing/pummeling him while taking a minute to replenish your health and buffs, and then switch to Relentless Assault as soon as possible and open a can of whoop-ass on him. This is particularly useful true later in the battle - you want to cause a certain amount of damage to him while he builds up for Destrudo because it will keep him from casting Doom. You will know if you did so, because he will grunt in pain and the "Destrudo building up" sound will become higher pitched, as if you really pissed him off and he's about to drop the world on your head. Don't get scared or discouraged, just keep up with Relentless Assault. As soon as he releases Destrudo, flip to Perseverence followed by Evened Odds followed by Bully followed by Relentless Assault followed by Diversity. At this point he should start charging for Destrudo again. All you have to do is wash, rinse and repeat. At some point you will kick his ass.

A couple of notes regarding certain things stated by other strategies - I'm not going to say that they are wrong about these things, but I'm going to state that certain things are overemphasized and not really needed:

• Fang's Sentinel role - I'm not saying it's not totally needed, but it's not needed much. Most of the time Fang will be catching the brunt of his attacks anyway, and her Saboteur role is much handier for this battle than her Sentinel role. 
• Odin - 1. If Doom is cast upon you, he can resurrect you, but from what I've read your Doom counter will stop while he is summoned. I think for me that it kept counting down, but I don't remember for sure - the next night after having my ass kicked by Doom I was going to summon Odin and test to see if he would or could resurrect me if Doom was cast on me, but that night I upgraded the weapons and accessories on my party, and he never got around to casting Doom on me before I kicked his ass. 2. Odin, as strong as he is, will not chop Barthandelus down before he can kick your ass. He can resurrect you if you die, though, as I recall a battle where I summoned Odin in a suicide style attack, and when I died he resurrected me at full health and left. Handy. I died again 3 minutes later because of Doom. Yay. The upshot of it is that if you are good enough, you will not need Odin for this battle.

This battle took me like 3 or 4 days to beat, inconsistently and nonconsecutively. When I finally kicked his ass, I flipped him off and, if I could have, I would have made Snow, Sazh and Hope teabag his corpse in the forehead afterward. Too bad he doesn't die. No spoilers, but he is a recurring boss after all. Maybe Snow, Sazh, and Hope will learn Teabaga before the last boss fight with his ass. Anyway, that's all...

Time is Relative, Ain't That a Bitch?

Today has turned into the longest day in the history of this week. How's that possible? Albert Einstein figured it out, that time is relative - meaning how it's perceived affects its flow. And, in much the same way that everything used to be black and white before color television was invented, that discovery changed everything for everyone, and not for the better. Now, time can last longer than it should - the 9 hour shift I am working (8 hours + 1 hour lunch), for instance, has taken approximately 11 hours just to progress 8 hours in. Sometimes, I think, ignorance is bliss. If someone could figure out time travel, I would like to go back and make old Al keep that little discovery to himself. This may sound stupid to you, but to all my detractors, I say that you are all ignorant. Read this poem (which I copied and pasted from here - since the author is from the 1800s, I'm assuming it's public domain now), and enrich your lives:

Childe Roland To The Dark Tower Came by Robert Browning
(1812-1889)

---

I.

My first thought was, he lied in every word,
That hoary cripple, with malicious eye
Askance to watch the working of his lie
On mine, and mouth scarce able to afford
Suppression of the glee, that pursed and scored
Its edge, at one more victim gained thereby.

II.

What else should he be set for, with his staff?
What, save to waylay with his lies, ensnare
All travellers who might find him posted there,
And ask the road? I guessed what skull-like laugh
Would break, what crutch 'gin write my epitaph
For pastime in the dusty thoroughfare,

III.

If at his counsel I should turn aside
Into that ominous tract which, all agree,
Hides the Dark Tower. Yet acquiescingly
I did turn as he pointed: neither pride
Nor hope rekindling at the end descried,
So much as gladness that some end might be.

IV.

For, what with my whole world-wide wandering,
What with my search drawn out thro' years, my hope
Dwindled into a ghost not fit to cope
With that obstreperous joy success would bring,
I hardly tried now to rebuke the spring
My heart made, finding failure in its scope.

V.

As when a sick man very near to death
Seems dead indeed, and feels begin and end
The tears and takes the farewell of each friend,
And hears one bid the other go, draw breath
Freelier outside, ("since all is o'er,'' he saith,
"And the blow falIen no grieving can amend;'')

VI.

While some discuss if near the other graves
Be room enough for this, and when a day
Suits best for carrying the corpse away,
With care about the banners, scarves and staves:
And still the man hears all, and only craves
He may not shame such tender love and stay.

VII.

Thus, I had so long suffered in this quest,
Heard failure prophesied so oft, been writ
So many times among "The Band''---to wit,
The knights who to the Dark Tower's search addressed
Their steps---that just to fail as they, seemed best,
And all the doubt was now---should I be fit?

VIII.

So, quiet as despair, I turned from him,
That hateful cripple, out of his highway
Into the path he pointed. All the day
Had been a dreary one at best, and dim
Was settling to its close, yet shot one grim
Red leer to see the plain catch its estray.

IX.

For mark! no sooner was I fairly found
Pledged to the plain, after a pace or two,
Than, pausing to throw backward a last view
O'er the safe road, 'twas gone; grey plain all round:
Nothing but plain to the horizon's bound.
I might go on; nought else remained to do.

X.

So, on I went. I think I never saw
Such starved ignoble nature; nothing throve:
For flowers---as well expect a cedar grove!
But cockle, spurge, according to their law
Might propagate their kind, with none to awe,
You'd think; a burr had been a treasure-trove.

XI.

No! penury, inertness and grimace,
In some strange sort, were the land's portion. "See
"Or shut your eyes,'' said nature peevishly,
"It nothing skills: I cannot help my case:
"'Tis the Last judgment's fire must cure this place,
"Calcine its clods and set my prisoners free.''

XII.

If there pushed any ragged thistle-stalk
Above its mates, the head was chopped; the bents
Were jealous else. What made those holes and rents
In the dock's harsh swarth leaves, bruised as to baulk
All hope of greenness?'tis a brute must walk
Pashing their life out, with a brute's intents.

XIII.

As for the grass, it grew as scant as hair
In leprosy; thin dry blades pricked the mud
Which underneath looked kneaded up with blood.
One stiff blind horse, his every bone a-stare,
Stood stupefied, however he came there:
Thrust out past service from the devil's stud!

XIV.

Alive? he might be dead for aught I know,
With that red gaunt and colloped neck a-strain,
And shut eyes underneath the rusty mane;
Seldom went such grotesqueness with such woe;
I never saw a brute I hated so;
He must be wicked to deserve such pain.

XV.

I shut my eyes and turned them on my heart.
As a man calls for wine before he fights,
I asked one draught of earlier, happier sights,
Ere fitly I could hope to play my part.
Think first, fight afterwards---the soldier's art:
One taste of the old time sets all to rights.

XVI.

Not it! I fancied Cuthbert's reddening face
Beneath its garniture of curly gold,
Dear fellow, till I almost felt him fold
An arm in mine to fix me to the place,
That way he used. Alas, one night's disgrace!
Out went my heart's new fire and left it cold.

XVII.

Giles then, the soul of honour---there he stands
Frank as ten years ago when knighted first.
What honest man should dare (he said) he durst.
Good---but the scene shifts---faugh! what hangman hands
Pin to his breast a parchment? His own bands
Read it. Poor traitor, spit upon and curst!

XVIII.

Better this present than a past like that;
Back therefore to my darkening path again!
No sound, no sight as far as eye could strain.
Will the night send a howlet or a bat?
I asked: when something on the dismal flat
Came to arrest my thoughts and change their train.

XIX.

A sudden little river crossed my path
As unexpected as a serpent comes.
No sluggish tide congenial to the glooms;
This, as it frothed by, might have been a bath
For the fiend's glowing hoof---to see the wrath
Of its black eddy bespate with flakes and spumes.

XX.

So petty yet so spiteful! All along,
Low scrubby alders kneeled down over it;
Drenched willows flung them headlong in a fit
Of route despair, a suicidal throng:
The river which had done them all the wrong,
Whate'er that was, rolled by, deterred no whit.

XXI.

Which, while I forded,---good saints, how I feared
To set my foot upon a dead man's cheek,
Each step, or feel the spear I thrust to seek
For hollows, tangled in his hair or beard!
---It may have been a water-rat I speared,
But, ugh! it sounded like a baby's shriek.

XXII.

Glad was I when I reached the other bank.
Now for a better country. Vain presage!
Who were the strugglers, what war did they wage,
Whose savage trample thus could pad the dank
Soil to a plash? Toads in a poisoned tank,
Or wild cats in a red-hot iron cage---

XXIII.

The fight must so have seemed in that fell cirque.
What penned them there, with all the plain to choose?
No foot-print leading to that horrid mews,
None out of it. Mad brewage set to work
Their brains, no doubt, like galley-slaves the Turk
Pits for his pastime, Christians against Jews.

XXIV.

And more than that---a furlong on---why, there!
What bad use was that engine for, that wheel,
Or brake, not wheel---that harrow fit to reel
Men's bodies out like silk? with all the air
Of Tophet's tool, on earth left unaware,
Or brought to sharpen its rusty teeth of steel.

XXV.

Then came a bit of stubbed ground, once a wood,
Next a marsh, it would seem, and now mere earth
Desperate and done with; (so a fool finds mirth,
Makes a thing and then mars it, till his mood
Changes and off he goes!) within a rood---
Bog, clay and rubble, sand and stark black dearth.

XXVI.

Now blotches rankling, coloured gay and grim,
Now patches where some leanness of the soil's
Broke into moss or substances like boils;
Then came some palsied oak, a cleft in him
Like a distorted mouth that splits its rim
Gaping at death, and dies while it recoils.

XXVII.

And just as far as ever from the end!
Nought in the distance but the evening, nought
To point my footstep further! At the thought,
great black bird, Apollyon's bosom-friend,
Sailed past, nor beat his wide wing dragon-penned
That brushed my cap---perchance the guide I sought.

XXVIII.

For, looking up, aware I somehow grew,
'Spite of the dusk, the plain had given place
All round to mountains---with such name to grace
Mere ugly heights and heaps now stolen in view.
How thus they had surprised me,---solve it, you!
How to get from them was no clearer case.

XXIX.

Yet half I seemed to recognize some trick
Of mischief happened to me, God knows when---
In a bad dream perhaps. Here ended, then,
Progress this way. When, in the very nick
Of giving up, one time more, came a click
As when a trap shuts---you're inside the den!

XXX.

Burningly it came on me all at once,
This was the place! those two hills on the right,
Crouched like two bulls locked horn in horn in fight;
While to the left, a tall scalped mountain... Dunce,
Dotard, a-dozing at the very nonce,
After a life spent training for the sight!

XXXI.

What in the midst lay but the Tower itself?
The round squat turret, blind as the fool's heart,
Built of brown stone, without a counter-part
In the whole world. The tempest's mocking elf
Points to the shipman thus the unseen shelf
He strikes on, only when the timbers start.

XXXII.

Not see? because of night perhaps?---why, day
Came back again for that! before it left,
The dying sunset kindled through a cleft:
The hills, like giants at a hunting, lay,
Chin upon hand, to see the game at bay,---
"Now stab and end the creature---to the heft!''

XXXIII.

Not hear? when noise was everywhere! it tolled
Increasing like a bell. Names in my ears
Of all the lost adventurers my peers,---
How such a one was strong, and such was bold,
And such was fortunate, yet, each of old
Lost, lost! one moment knelled the woe of years.

XXXIV.

There they stood, ranged along the hill-sides, met
To view the last of me, a living frame
For one more picture! in a sheet of flame
I saw them and I knew them all. And yet
Dauntless the slug-horn to my lips I set,
And blew. "Childe Roland to the Dark Tower came.''

Why I Approve of the Death Penalty

Case in Point:

Check out this shit - some f*cked up Frenchman named Nicolas Cocaign (read: Nick Cocaine), while waiting on trial for armed robbery, killed  his cellmate, and for whatever reason, decided that he "...wanted to take his soul." To this end, he cut him open to cut out his heart and eat it. However, maybe because he's a dumbass that failed at life, biology wasn't this cat's strong point, so he cut out dude's lung instead. It must not have tasted too good to this first time cannibal, because after he ate part of it raw, he fried "...the rest of it with some onions on a makeshift cooker in the cell." Lung and onions, anyone?

It doesn't matter that the other guy deserved his death, or that Mr. Cocaign had a bad childhood due to being orphaned. His foster parents weren't standing in that cell pointing a gun at him telling him to do it. His lawyer is trying to get him committed to a mental institution to try to rehabilitate the bastard. Here in America, we understand that there is a point where rehabilitation is no longer effective nor warranted. Maybe it would have helped him years ago when he was only trying to have his way with women, but at some point you have to draw a line in the sand. This far, no farther. Killing someone and eating their lung (seriously, did the moron utterly fail to pay attention in biology class as a kid?) crosses that line. Traditionally, execution used to be carried out by one of three methods: hanging, gun squad, and electric chair. Anymore, execution is done "humanely": lethal injection, which basically puts the criminal into a sleep they never wake from. If it was up to me (and it's a good thing it's not), this dumbass would face execution via monster truck.

That's my 2 cents.

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