Entry 638: Bad Vibes Only

Being that next week is Thanksgiving, I figured I could do a post this week about some things for which I am not thankful. I call it Gripesgiving, and I'm thinking about making it a new annual tradition -- by which I mean I'll do it in this entry and then never think about it again.

The main thing I'm not thankful for right now is that the Orange Menace, Tangerine Idi Amin, announced he is running for president again. Ugh... can't this dude just die already? With the Dems not performing horribly in the midterms, political news was just becoming tolerable again, and then we dive right back into the cesspool. It's possible he doesn't even get the nomination (I have no idea what will happen on that front and don't believe anybody who says they do), and he probably won't win the presidency even if he does, but no sound-minded American will be hanging their hat on that probably. Hopefully all this Ron DeSantis noise turns out to be for real. He's awful in a lot of ways, just as petty and vindictive as the small-handed vulgarian himself, but at least he doesn't seem like the type to inspire a mob to try to hang the vice president and prevent Congress from certifying an election he lost.

In other news of ungratefulness, I had to swallow my pride, cut my losses, admit defeat, and trash my treadmill. I literally threw it away. It broke for the third time in nine months, and this time the company said they weren't going to fix it for free. I called them, and after being on the phone for literally (and I mean that literally) two hours, a combination of being on hold and relaying the same information over and over in different ways, the denouement of the conversation went something like this.

Her: Okay, sir, I can set you up with an appointment to have a technician come out to service your machine.

Me: Thanks.

Her: However, because [company-specific mumbo jumbo about service codes and policies] there will be a charge of...

Me: No! Hell no! There's not going to be any charge!

Her: Well, you see, for this type of service...

Me: I don't care. I'm not giving you guys a single cent more of my money. You guys are the worst company I've ever dealt with. You sold me a treadmill that's broken three times and I haven't even had it for a year. Each time it takes two hours to set up a service appointment and then that doesn't even work. And now you're telling me you want me to pay you to fix it. Hell. No.

Her: Well, you see, for this type of service...

Me: I said I don't care what the type of service is. Look, I know this isn't your fault, and I'm sorry you're the one who has to hear this, but I'm so frustrated, and there is no way I'm paying you for a damn thing. Either you guys fix this for free or I'm just gonna hang up and... I dunno... trash you guys on social media or something.

Her: I understand your frustration...

Me: I don't think you do. Do you have a manager? Can I talk to your manager?

Her: Yes, I will transfer you to her.

Then I got put on hold for another few minutes, and then i just hung up. I actually didn't even really want to talk to a manager, anyway. I doubt it would've done any good. I talked to a manager before when they wrongly charged me for their monthly service, and it was hell just to get her to give me a $16 refund. I probably wasn't going to get shit from the manager, and even if I did, even if they agreed to another round of free repairs, it would likely just break again.

I called a repair shop not affiliated with the manufacturer, just to see if a (presumably) more competent company could salvage things, but they told me it was going to be almost $200 just for the diagnosis. No thanks. That's what they call throwing good money at bad. It's the sunk cost fallacy. So, I got off the phone, disassembled the sumabitch, and booked an appointment with DC bulk trash. This is the last I saw of it.

 

I think I actually know the problem. I'm too fat for it. All treadmills have safety devices in them so that they will automatically slow down or stop if they get too hot internally. I've had it happen at gyms before, and every time just before mine would die completely, it would get really temperamental whenever I got on it -- to the point I usually couldn't go above 5 mph without it stopping (and sometimes I'd smell a slight burning odor when I was done) -- but it would work fine whenever the kids got on it. I think I was just flat-out too heavy for it. This is very annoying, being that the stated weight limit is 250 pounds, and I am well below 250 pounds, but I do think that's the explanation.

Whatever the case, do not -- I repeat, do not -- buy any equipment that is NordicTrack or that is affiliated with the company iFit in anyway. They are the worst.

It sucks too because I actually really liked using the treadmill when it was working. I need something inside that gives me a good ass-kicking cardio workout, especially now while the weather is turning. I really struggle to find the motivation to run outside when it's 45 degrees, dark, and blustery. And I'm also not the type to just bust out a body-weight WOD in my basement without somebody leading the way. (My Krav Maga gym stopped doing Zoom workouts some time ago.) But maybe that's what I'll have to do. I also could join the gym up the street for like $10 a month, but then I still have to go somewhere, and one of the big reasons I got the treadmill was so that I could work out when I wasn't able to go anywhere.

It's a real tragedy.

So, I gotta log off now, but I wanted to give you all one more gripe: my eyesight. It's terrible now without my glasses. I feel like it's gotten way worse just in the past year or so. I can still see decently far away, but anything up close is super blurry without my specs. I've never had good eyesight for reading, but it used to be at least passable. Now, I struggle to read the tags on the fruit when I'm at the self-checkout machine at the grocery store. The other day, I actually took a picture of a tag on my phone and zoomed in on the number to read it. I mean, I could have just searched for it by name on the machine, but my way was a little bit faster and much more clever. But getting old is a bitch.

By the way, how old can you be before you have to stop complaining about getting old because you should just be happy to be alive? I'm thinking somewhere around 85, so I still got four decades of grousing ahead of me.

Until next time...