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What a week it has been. I was out of town for nearly a week and also started a new job (working at the same place, just a new department). Longer hours and the learning curve is steep. So I apologize for not blogging for a while. Just trying to get used to my new schedule.
(Congratulations to the New Orleans Saints on a GREAT season and their first Super Bowl Championship.)
VIENNA, Austria-
It doesn’t really matter where in the world you live, if it’s even somewhat civilized, there will be bureaucratic bullshit. Sometimes things I hear about here in the Untied States really anger me, and I know they anger you too. But I guess the reality is that bureaucratic bullshit is here to stay.
And here is a perfect example of how ridiculous a bureaucracy can really be. Bills are bills and without the risk of destroying ones credit, the bills must be paid. It’s a part of life that everyone over the age of 18 must deal with. In Vienna, Kronen Zeitung actually did pay his trash collection bill on time, however, he misread the amount due and underpaid it by 36 euros cents, about 50 U.S. cents. But instead of tacking the underpayment on to his next bill, the trash company took it to the courts, who sent a debt collector to the man’s house to collect it.
I wonder how much it cost in gas and salary to send a debt collector to Kronen Zeitung’s house, all in the hopes of collecting the measly 50 cents? This is not the first time I have heard of something this ridiculous. It seems to happen all too often, someone or some company spends a small fortune in the attempt to collect a small amount back.
The moral of the story: All too often people and companies get caught up in bureaucratic bullshit and don’t take the time to really look at a situation and ask if it’s really being handled in the correct and most efficient manner. After all, isn’t that what a bureaucracy is really supposed to be about?
© 2010 StrangeRush.com
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NEW YORK-
God only knows how many times in my life I have said, “It’s about principle.” If you buy a product or service and do not get what you were supposed to or promised, it’s well within your rights to fight it. I’ve done it myself, and I’m sure I’ll do it again. Like many people I know, “The principle of the matter,” mean a lot to me.
I recall being a kid in the 1980s and watching the People’s Court with my great grandparents. The People’s Court originally ran from 1981 to 1993, producing a staggering 2,484 ½ hour episodes. The very popular show was presided over by the admired and respected, Judge Joseph A. Wapner. A specific episode from so many years ago stuck in my mind, but because the details were so vague to me I had to use keywords in Google to track down the specifics of the case. In that case a man purchased what he claimed was a flat can of beer from a small liquor store, and the store in question refused to replace it or refund his money. So out of what could only be called principle, the man took the liquor store owner to court and Judge Wapner awarded the plaintiff the 80 cents he sought, the cost of the beer. This is the only People’s Court case I have any memory of and I know it stuck in my memory as a 10 year old because it was probably my first lesson in principle. At the time I could not comprehend why someone would waste so much time suing someone else for a mere 80 cents; nor could I understand why the defendant would go to court and waste their own time when all they had to do was replace the damn beer. Nowadays, we are used to ultra customer service oriented businesses like Costco who will take back just about anything, at any time, and for nearly any reason. What I didn’t understand at the time is what lengths people will go to to stand up for their rights and what they believe is right. Obviously both parties in the People’s Court case were consumed with pride and did what they did for the ‘principle’ of the matter. So, taking matters of principle to the extreme likely doesn’t happen too often like the example sited above, but it does happen.
Jumping out of the 1980s syndicated TV show and into a more modern time, an example is not hard to find. In November of 2006 a 63 year old New York City man named Simon Belsky was ticketed and fined $115 for parking in front of a Brooklyn fire hydrant. Belsky, a retired VP of a hardware firm, said he had nothing better to do than to fight the ticket, but also insisted that there was no hydrant anywhere near his parked van, the nearest one was down the block. In the three years since the citation the $115 fees jumped to $200 because of penalties. Still, Belsky was not paying up. He would see it through to the end, costing him a whopping $7,500 in all to fight the $115 ticket. If that is not a case of principle, what is? Belsky eventually won his case and said he would sue the city to recover the $7,500, and if he won any of it back would donate it to education.
The moral of the story: If you’ve been wronged and you know it, don’t take it lightly, and if you’re gonna go down, don’t go down without a fight.
© 2010 StrangeRush.com
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This will be one of those rare posts that does not directly relate to some strange, weird, odd, unusual, bizarre, or crazy story. I guess you could say this whole thing started for me back in April of 2008. One afternoon I was at work on my cell phone, killing time, flipping through news stories as I usually did on the mobile version of CNN. There it was, the one story that caught my attention and held it tightly for several weeks, as it did the rest of the internet and drama hungry segments of the world.
As sick and disgusting as it was and still is, Austrian ‘Father Of The Year’ nominee, Josef Fritzl (more on him later) started this obsession of mine into the strange world that surrounds us. On that day in April of 2008 I had the idea that it would be fun to collect the strangest stories I could find on the internet and post them in a blog. So I watched the news and started collecting…..and collecting……and collecting. A thousand to fifteen hundred stories later here I am with enough material for two to three years of this website. And the great news is there is no shortage of fresh material rolling in hot off the presses, with stories of the baffling things our fellow human beings continue to do each and every day.
Originally I was going to take the stories and just post them as they were on the news sites. Then I started thinking that so many other news sites had already done that and the only way I was going to really entertain anyone was to wait long enough so that the story was forgotten, then rehash it again. Copying and pasting really isn’t my thing and it didn’t seem to have too much redeeming entertainment value. Then I had an idea. What if I took every strange story out there and wrote them in a way no one had ever done before? With the passage of time and a different spin on the material there would be a whole new level of appreciation for it. Don’t get me wrong, when I say appreciation I mean that strictly in the form of entertainment. Some of these stories are funny, but others are downright hideous. But each and every one is strange in its own way. Some sort of strange and others just about completely unbelievable.
So here I sit with tons material for this site that has to get rewritten. It will take time. I have a running start with a dozen or so and plan to post 2-3 a day. Please be patient with me getting it rolling in the onset. I do have a family to attend to and unfortunately, a day job too. If you come across any stories you would like to see posted please email them to me at Ryan@StrangeRush.com. (Odds are I have the story somewhere, but it could take me time to get to it. But I don’t really have anything older than April/May of 2008 ) If you email it to me I will know there is interest in seeing it written. I also welcome your comments below the posts. I will try to be PC most of the time, but in some cases, I’ll have to let it all out and tell you how I really feel.
I am really looking forward to getting this rolling. I have an odd fascination and obsession with all things strange and weird plus I love to write. So what better place for me to spend some quality time?
© 2009 StrangeRush.com
In fact, I have over a thousand (and growing) very strange stories from around the world to share with you. You see, for the last couple of years I have been collecting every strange, odd, weird, and bizarre story I can get my hands on. I have amassed quite the collection, if I do say so myself. Some of these stories will amuse you and make you chuckle, while others will absolutely BLOW your mind.
Some you have undoubtedly already heard about through standard media, but most will be entirely new to you. The good news is even if you have heard a certain story before, odds are you will have forgotten about it, but if not, I will add a new dimension to the way the story is told to give it renewed entertainment.
Here’s the twist: I am not going to merely copy, paste, and rehash what other media outlets have written. I am going to write each and every story in my own way, in a way that you have never seen before, in a way that traditional media cannot do, in a way that will amuse you, entertain you, and astonish you. You may find some stories hard to believe, but rest assured, they are all true.
I want to ensure you have many hours of exciting reading ahead of you that will leave you scratching your head, laughing, and in some cases shedding a tear. I believe you will find this one of the most entertaining websites on the entire internet and I welcome you.
Please, grab a cup of coffee, sit back, relax, and even kick up your feet. Have a good time.
© 2009 StrangeRush.com
