Voted and Quoted

So in the first ever Votes on Quotes poll, the votes broke down as:

Adventure: 1 vote
Beauty: 0 Votes
Justice: 1 Vote
Popular Opinion: 3 Votes

As you can see, the winner by a huge margin, with 300% of the votes of the nearest contender, is "Popular Opinion". Thus, I give you:

I'm not sure I want popular opinion on my side - I've noticed those with the most opinions often have the fewest facts.
~Bethania McKenstry

I'm not sure where I got this quote, but it was very likely from a mail subscription to "Quote of the Day", which I used to subscribe to. It certainly struck me, though, as a very real truth. Or two, really, since this particular quote is kind of a "two in one".

On the one hand, there's the hint that just because a bunch of people hold a certain opinion, the opinion is not necessarily true. To wit:

A sample of very old (but in my opinion wrong) Popular Opinions:

The earth is flat;

The earth is the center of the universe, and the sun revolves about the earth;

Wives are the property of their husbands;

Cigarette smoke is harmless;

You can't grow without eating meat.

A sample of rather new (but in my opinion wrong) Popular Opinions:

If a person is skinny, they are therefore healthy (or at least healthier than someone who is not as skinny);

Jersey Shore is good TV;

Global Warming is the fault of human beings;

Level of education is a direct measure of a person's intelligence.

As we see, just because an opinion is popular at any given time, it is not necessarily true.

The other message in this quote is interesting to me as well: some of the most annoying people I've ever met (besides myself) are those who have opinions about everything, and ESPECIALLY about things that they've got little or no knowledge of. I think that we've all known someone like this.

One particular dolt that I worked with once was quite the epitome of this sort of person. At his height, he spent a couple of hours giving me pointers on parenting how to's and what to not do, what I had been doing wrong, and why parenting seems so hard but is really easy (it's the parents themselves that make it hard) and on and on and on. Of course, he had no kids at all, and I had four (at that time, my oldest was early teens).

The stronger a person's opinion, the more it seems like they've got a dearth of actual information.

One thing that I found really interesting with respect to this quote is that I've got no idea who Bethania McKenstry is (or was). Internet searches on her name bring up pretty much nothing other than this particular quote. It's like this lady ONCE said something that was worth capturing and repeating, and never said anything of value again. Very odd.

Thanks to those of you who participated in my little poll; hopefully we can do it all again sometime!

I've Never had any Issues with my Car

People are a strange breed; they too often make decisions based upon emotion instead of data. I'm guilty of this myself, although I like to think that I research most of my decisions carefully, and review quality and reliability data. Especially when it comes to my vehicles.

I'm a big fan of Toyota, both because of my long history with the brand, and because of what the data says with respect to reliability of vehicles. I did find, a few years ago while researching a reliability presentation, a set of data published by Consumer Reports on 14 million cars. That data said very clearly that domestic cars aren't (or perhaps weren't at that time) as reliable as Honda, Toyota, VW, Hyundai, or other imports. In fact, there were no domestics in the top ten most reliable car brands. Trucks were not part of that data set.

I have several friends who are die-hard Ford fans. They swear up and down that their cars never gave them any issues at all, and they have had numerous fords, owned any given one for hundreds of thousands of miles, and never, ever had any issues.

One tried to talk me into buying a ford truck instead of my tundra. His argument was that there was at that time a recall on the tundra, and I should not get that vehicle for that reason. The recall: a floor mat was slipping forward and interfering with the break. He said that I should buy a ford F150.

Never mind that there was also a recall on the ford F150 at the time where those trucks were bursting into fire spontaneously because of an electrical fault in the cruise control circuitry. He was ok with trucks bursting into fire, but had a problem with a floor mat that could be simply removed. I just don't understand.

I was talking to that same friend the other day, and I had heard that his 2-year-old Ford F150 had been in the garage for some work, so I asked about it. Turns out that it had a defective transmission, which needed replacement. The vehicle was 53,000 miles old (or so). But to him, it was not a problem, since it was being repaired under warranty.

The warranty must be 60k miles, I asked.
Well, said he, he had bought the extended warranty, so it was 7 years and 150,000 miles.
Good thing he bought that warranty; what provoked him to do such a thing?
Turns out that his wife's Expedition had transmission problems early, though out of warranty, and they figured that if history repeated itself, they'd rather be ready for it.

Is this not a pattern? To him, it was not an issue, as it was under warranty, but to me it's an issue: the damn things break early.

I also learned (from talking to his wife) that his wife got rid of her Expedition in favor of a Nissan Armada because she was sick of the Expedition breaking down all the time. She said that she had been having troubles with it practically from day 1. HE said it was never an issue.

Hmm....

I'm reminded of a fellow who, years ago, was trying to get me to buy his GMC Pick Up. He too told that he never had any issues. Although in his next breath he told that he did all his own work. He had changed the struts, the springs, a tie-rod, and one or two other components that had failed.

No issues?

This makes me think that the definition of a "problem" changes from person to person. My observation is that these guys who claim to have no issues despite having to do a seemingly endless amount of repair work on their vehicles are all mechanically inclined people who do their own work. It's like how a master chef might tell you that it's 'no problem' to whip up a batch of Tartine croissants.

I don't know about you, but I'd rather have a car that didn't have anything break on it in the first few years than one that, if anything *were* to break, would be covered by a warranty. I think that reliability is more value than a warranty. Of course, no car manufacturer is without error; at the end of the day it's a statistics game and for me, I lean towards the manufacturer who has the fewest issues and the longest history of corporate quality and reliability, PLUS, I factor in my personal experience.

As for Toyota's sudden acceleration problem, Toyota was thrown under the proverbial bus. All modern vehicles experience this issue, as is reported on the Sudden Acceleration website (Here). I personally am of the belief that it's caused by one electronic system interfering with the electronic speed control system of modern vehicles, although that's extremely hard to demonstrate positively.

Be sure to read this recent and informative article too.

For me, I like to consult Consumer Reports when I face making any significant purchase; being of Irish decent, I sprinkle in a bit of salt too. :)

Flash Fiction

I stumbled across a post on the Warrior Muse's site heralding a "Flash Fiction" contest. I had never heard of this thing called "Flash Fiction", and as an amateur (as in: I do it for myself) writer, I thought it might be fun to enter. Her post is Here, on her site.

Never one to look at rules, I quickly scanned the requirements of this contest, and read that it has a basic theme of "Are you devious at heart" and had a 100 word maximum. Yikes! 100 words max for an entire story? Crazy!

So I wrote a little something based on a character I've been playing with for a while. I was going to submit it, but I'm too cheap to spring for the $10 (which is a bargain, really, but I am at heart a cheap old fart...I hate to spend money on a sandwich for lunch, and I'm guaranteed to get something for that $10!).

In any event, I thought I'd post what I did here, for giggles. So:

Upon Mine realization of the vile satyr's possession of mine brother, I did set mine thoughts towards exorcism. I know not these paths, however; mine is the way of the arm: the way of axe and shield. I need must bring him unto The Academy.

Keen of the thought that he'd not of his will (which was not his own, after all) subject himself to this exorcism, I was forced to scheme about his back; although I am not devious of nature, still this thing must be done, though it did raise mine bile and keep me from mine bed.

Expiration Date...NOT

I have a certain credit card that expired this past fall. I was very happy for this, as there were a few on-going subscriptions and charges that were linked to that card, and automatically renewed. I figured that as the card expired, so too would these charges.

Oh, what a naive nincompoop I am. The date came and went, the new card showed up (the old shredded), and the charges continued to come along. I called the credit card company to talk about this, and they told me that these charges would continue to be honored despite the fact that the vendor would not have had the correct expiration date.

Huh. Or rather: WHAT THE FRIGGIN' HELL?

I know that when I go to a store with an expired credit card, I can't buy anything because it's expired. My Amazon account no longer worked, but they only charge to that card when I tell them to, not when they decide to or on an on-going basis.

So really, the only person who absolutely needs to have the correct expiration date on a credit card is me! Or more likely we, the owners of those cards. It's no problem if the 900 number book of the month club wants to continue to charge to an expired credit card, but when I go to the store to buy extra small condoms groceries, I'm hit with a decline.

If I have the expired card in hand, along with evidence that I am me, I can't access my funds. BUT, if some somewhat anonymous vendor puts in a charge, it's no problem for them to continue to charge to that same expired card.

No flippin' wonder the banks are the only ones getting richer!