Nothin' Special

I explained very clearly to the manager my issue with the meat section not having the price tags listed, and they claimed it was only going to be for the meat, since meat is by weight, and the price of each item is printed on the packs of each item.

Sure. That’s how they get their foot in the door. Fast forward not even two weeks, and here we are:

Bar codes. No prices, no item descriptions. No price stickers on the individual items. Heck, not even the name of the item that is SUPPOSED to be there.

No. The only way to see the price is to scan it on your phone app, which is also recording what you looked at recently, as a way of gauging what you might be looking for in the future.

So here’s what we’re gonna do gang:

Every time you go into a store that has implemented these price-less tags:

Take 1-3 items up to the cash register. Ask the cashier for the price, or hit the price check item on the self checkout, which will likely call over the attendant.

Express that you didn’t actually want it, you just couldn’t see on the shelf how much it was.

POLITELY, AND WITH A THANK YOU FOR THE PRICE CONFIRMATION, Give the items to the cashier or attendant to put back.

When they inevitably try to push the app, politely decline. If pressed for why not, say you don’t want to have to carry your phone in-hand the whole time you are shopping in order to see how much things cost. (Not having cell service or data to use the app is NOT a valid excuse, as stores already often have complimentary WiFi AND more stores will provide WiFi rather than give up on this push for surveillance pricing)

If it’s a shelf-stable item, the cashier will have to set it aside, taking up room in their limited operating space, and eventually pass it off to someone to put in a holding area to put back later. If it’s a fridge/freezer item, it might have to get tossed due to food product sale regulations.

In either case, you are making it a pain in the ass for them to have these digital bar codes. Tie up the checkouts. Give the employees more busywork that the company has to pay them to do. Hurt their bottom line having to toss the pint of ice cream you carried around in your cart for 20 minutes before giving it back to the cashier.

they HATE dealing with “petty” complaints

complain about what an inconenience it is and how much you hate it waste managements time

and if the store manager refuses to speak with you use your inner karen to email and complain

email complaints are huge nonos for stores to receive

In Claudia’s version of events, Lestat was being cruel by making her watch Charlie burn. Grabbing her with his hands and forcing her to gaze as his face melted. His face is serious as he tortures her with this lesson.

In Lestat’s memories, he was holding Claudia’s hand the entire time as she watched Charlie burn in front of her. His face is melancholic and tearful as he likely recalls Nicki being burned by Armand. He was enduring the pain with her in real time.

Tiny houses.

Not the concept, the notion, the Platonic ideal of a low-cost low-impact high-efficiency dwelling. That’s great. That’s awesome.

What really imagines my dragons is that in practice about 9 times out of 10 tiny house communities are just a way for rich hipsters to finally fulfil their greatest fantasy:

OpenAI scraped the entire web. All of which had been a labor of love from humans. Wikipedia is the backbone of a lot of LLMs, and that was volunteer human labor. They stole it and now they're selling it back to us.