You want a taste?

Harumph...

I am tired.

maybe I should just post the pictures.

Here is a taste.

I will write a bit later if I feels.

That is swell...

I will be putting together something with pictures from my outing to southern Utar, watch this space since... you care. (this is more of a reminder for me)

UCCU ... F-UCCU

I have had the same account with Utah Campus Credit Union for... my whole life. My whole family did all of our banking Credit and Debiting there. My outstanding credit score was built upon the 100$ credit card they gave me as a youngster. Always a pleasure, and always very kind and customer friendly.

Now? UCCU ain't your Pappies bank! They have places to go, and no time to lose. They will step on the necks of all of their customers to make the big bucks.

6-9 months ago my friend Veritas was going on and on about how much he hated UCCU, and how they had bent him over about some 8-10 small transactions that they held until he was overdrawn on his account, and then instantly they went through with an extra 20$ tagged onto them. Mmmmm, What a wonderful service they provide! Thank god for them letting through the 1$ charges as 21$ charges (20 for UCCU[Cha Ching!] and 1 for the vending machine.) Enjoy your fancy soda pop Veritas.

Anyway... I told him, "Hey, they treat me pretty good, but I haven't gone into overdraft. I think you are blowing it out of proportion."(SpoilerZ alert, They are the worst Credit union ever.)

Last month right before I went to Canada I started getting harassed by the credit union who gave me my student loan (Guess who: UCCU) because I was a week late on my loan payment. I received a letter (one of the days I received two, which... doesn't make any sense) for every day that I didn't pay the 50$ minimum payment. The last two payment were for 300~ dollars each, so it covered me for 6 months both times(see that college education shining through?). This caused me to forget all about the loan (They send me a letter every month reminding me it is time to pay the 0 [zero] dollars I owe them).

So a few days before I leave for Canada they start calling my home phone number every hour, on the hour. We don't ever answer that phone because we all have cell phones and everybody knows better than to call the land line. After they leave a message saying there are "Super urgencies regarding my student loan payment", so I answered the phone the next time they called.

I will paraphrase a bit here, because everything else will be perfectly acurate.
"Hey hey! Stephen? You need to pay it, QUICK it is an emergency!"
"Ok, I will transfer money tonight, you will get all 50$... The bank is saved."
"Credit union."
"Whatever. I will do it tonight, please don't call anymore you woke up my baby three times now." (I didn't say the baby part...)

So, I get on my computer, and transfer about 65 dollars to the loan. (I have to do it manually with a routing number and all that garbage, because it would be all too convenient to let me do in with my online branch).

I figure I am done with them until next month when I can put a large chunk down so I don't have to deal with them for a really long time.

Next day, the phone is ringing off the hook, they leave a couple messages saying "Oh no! you lied, we didn't get any money!!!"

I assume that I did something wrong when I typed in the super complex routing code.

I phone the Customer service people at UCCU and confirm all the data so I will know it will go through this time. I do some calculations and figure out that I can afford to put the big amount down on the account because I have more than enough money to pay for the trip (I put down 400 dollars, I still have 400~ for the trip, and I am getting paid next week... so it won't be a problem. (Foreshadowing) I wonder if there will be a problem...

So, they don't call again. I guess the second payment went through fine.
I get stuff ready for the trip, and it turns out I need to do a little work on my car (which we are taking to Canada). 120 dollars, ouch. Still, 280 for the trip. I fill up my car, 45$... I knew it was coming, but I have to sacrifice my money, because... there is a war on... so gas is more expensive, right? RIGHT?

235.

We leave for Canada... All is fine, We take turns filling up the car, some people take more turns than others, I won't go into it. I knew what they were when I picked them up. We get food, stuff, and things. First night in Canada is a blast, we meet up with our pals and have a good time. Good times.

180-170$... more than enough.

Fill up the car again, but with fancy Canadian petroleum. WOAH! its only 1$CN per Gallon! I guess they didn't know about the war... Sweet. Fillerup, fillerup... hmm... thats a log of gallons...oh... Liters. Ok... Not quite as cheep as I thought.

135$... I will have to make sure to let other people fill up the tank on the way home.

Day 2: We wake up, play video games (And have a blast) and we go out to eat.
My debit card is declined, ... I already know what happened. I can see the people at the UCCU branch now.

"OH LORD! Somebody has stolen this guys debit card and taken it all the way to Canada to buy illegal gasolines and food! Not on MY watch, this card is shut down!"



So I text my dad and ask him to go down to UCCU and tell those guys to please reactivate my card, I kind of need it. Also apologize that I didn't come and tell them about my trip so they wouldn't leave me stranded and penniless in the middle of this foreign wasteland. (This isn't the first time they have shut down my card. Last time I purchased a bunch of audio books from iTunes they shut my card off. "OH LORD! hackzers have his credit card and want to listen to harry potter while they drive/jog to crimeland.)

My dad texts me back (We are texting, which me and my dad never do, because of the cost to make a call while roaming... probably would use up the rest of the money I have... though not till my bill comes) Dad: YOU ARE OVERDRAWN ON YOUR ACCOUNT, SOMETHING TO DO WITH A $400 CHARGE. I AM PUTTING 400 IN YOUR ACCOUNT NOW.
I love my dad.
Dad: OK, YOU NOW HAVE 130 DOLLARS AVAILABLE. HAVE FUN.
... Sound like every... WHAT?!?! 130$?

I get on a computer and log onto my UCCU account to see what happened.
I see that the Energy bill, water bill, and both loan payments have gone through, and the Camera lens payment (Oops, forgot about that).
so... after those I was overdrawn by 13 dollars...
THEN!!! 6 charges for 3-11 dollars go through. (All gasoline purchased (45$+) have already been charged, contributing to the overdrawn status.)
Thaaaaats. 120 for UCCU, 43 $ for the places when I purchased things.

Ok, I am depressed because I kind of wanted to have that 120$ for ME.
Well, my credit card is off of level 14 alert lock-down, and I should try to enjoy the rest of my Canada trip with my pals. And I do, I have a really good time. I have to save every dollar I have so that I don't start giving UCCU 20$ for a bag of ketchup chips.

So far the story is just a sad one about me making a poor choice in how much to pay for my student loan.

When I get home I go over my bank account and figure out how much I lost for this mistake and I notice how all of the tiny charges are happening after the big charges. Oh man, that sounds exactly like what happened to Veritas. Huh, I guess he was right. Oh well, my paycheck will come out soon and I can pay back my dad. I will just have to be sad about the 120 dollars because I don't want to call the bacredit union.

Dodadoo, 2 days later. Hmmm, I wonder if my paycheck has hit my account yet, lets look and see.

...

WHAT THE HELL!!! (no ? mark needed)
Looks like I have overdrawn my account again. I thought every single bill had already gone through, but I forgot about my T-Mobile bill. ZING, Gotcha!

*Sigh* well, I will just have to not spend anything until tomorrow when my paycheck hits my account. Hmmm, it should have hit today though, it usually does on Thursday (night at the latest). There goes another 20$. Maybe I will call in to UCCU to see if they can reverse those meaningless charges.
Wait...

Something isn't right about this... Take a look.



I guess UCCU has invested a great sum of money in a Time Machine, and to cover the cost they go forward through time, find charges that are going to happen, and bring them back to the present so they can collect 20$ overdraft fees from starving working class heroes like me.

They made sure that it went through a day early, while my paycheck, (which I have confirmed) has had its payment sent to my account since Wednesday!!![yesterday]
OH this is AWESOME! I love it! Oh look, there is my charge from Cafe Rio, I was there... what... and hour and a half ago. There it is, already on my account.

From my understanding, the bank should have the courtesy of putting through my paycheck so I don't have to pay for the imaginary service being provided to me.
(Remember that 120$ worth of overdraft fees from Canada? Well, imagine if I hadn't been charged for that... I would have had enough money in my account to cover everything that is being charged now INCLUDING the overdraft fees... And they wouldn't have a reason to keep holding onto my paycheck)

So... I call up UCCU. They are going to have to refund these overdraft fees, this is ridiculous. Nay, ridonkulous! I get an agent on the line, and I explain the whole sorry situation to her, including the mistake with having to pay for my student loan TWICE because of their nagging collections people.

She apologized that this happened, but explains...
"We won't refund any of the overdraft fees if it wasn't the credit unions fault."
"Ok, but can't you do it as a favor to me, a faithful user that made a simple mistake?"
"Well, let me look at it," she says, clearly annoyed... rough job, "Since you haven't requested a refund for overdraft fees before I can put in a request for a refund, but you will only receive half of it back... if any, probably."

... Sigh...

"If I hadn't been charged the overdraft fees then the second set of overdraft fees wouldn't have happened. Isn't that a good enough reason to wave the fees that just happened today... Well, they are happeneing tomarrow, which doesn't make any sense at all."

"Um..." ... ... ... "Well, it looks like 400 dollars was deposited after the first set of overdraft fees, so that made everything right, then you overdrew from your account again. So it really isn't our fault."

"The 400 dollars didn't make the 120 dollars of overdraft fees right, it makes the mistaken large payment to my student loan right, but NOT the overdraft fees. If those had been refunded, even half of them, I wouldn't have overdrawn a second time."

"Um..." ... ... (Bless her heart...) "The 400 dollars looks like it made everything right again."

*sigh*

"Ok, so will you please submit that refund for the overdraft fees? thats 200 dollars caused by a simple mistake. Please?"

"Well I can submit the request but you understand that the board who reviews the request will probably only authorize half of it to be refunded. Do you understand?"

"Yeah. I get it..." (HUGE MISTAKE, I just gave them permission to only refund half)

"Ok, I will submit this ***Blah blah blah, she gets some information so she can contact me*** And I will call you when they give back their response."

"Ok. Now I am confused about the payments that are showing today, How come it shows charges that are going through tomorrow on my account today? That is really screwing me over."

"Oh, we don't have any control over when the charges go through."
[-This is bull shit. I do refunds all day long, I work with banks all the time. They have a huge amount of control over these things-]

"Well, my paycheck is supposed to have already shown up on my account, can you just have them put that through so I don't get these other overdraft fees?"

"We don't have any control over that." (She put a lot of emphasis on any... Nice.)

*sigh/frustration*

"Ok, call me with whatever happens to that refund."

"Ok, is there anything else I can do."

"Nope...Bye."

I walk around to Veritas' cubicle. "Did your paycheck show up on your account yet?"
He said, of course, "Yeah, last night. America First for the win, son."

"Yeah, UCCU... I am done with them."

"I told you, I told you..."
---
When I got home I looked for my father to see if he would loan me 100 MORE dollars so that it would show as being in my account before the time-vortex charges of tomorrow go through. He was gone, and he left his cell at home. I considered going to the pawn shop and giving them my guitar for a day, but I just got fed up and said... Whatever.

Later that night 2 more charges were charged overdraft fees. +40$ for uccu, for 4$ worth of charges.

---
Why Didn't I write this until a month later?
Yesterday I finished all my dealing with UCCU, I have transfered all of my accounts and money workings to American First Credit Union (Still not a bank...) And am washing my hands completely.

(yesterday morning my account was dollars away from being overdrawn again... I transfered a couple thousand dollars (enough to clean up my accounts) over electronically... The electronic payment just showed up today (after there was no threat of overdraft fees). I had to take a physical Cashiers check to UCCU and put it into their hands for it to show up on my account.

Also, my paycheck... No problem showing up in my account today, early... since I am nowhere close to having overdraft fees.

UCCU is the worst banking type institution in all of Utah, and probably the world.
If you credit and debit there, or know a loved one who does... please help them to leave that place as soon as possible.

Sorry this is so long.

Go Canada, Parts 2 &3 of 14

Sorry if you are checking here for something new.
I have been a little busy lately.

Let me put part 2 of 2 down of the Canadian visit.

We had a lot of fun at the border check on our way into Canada.
We pulled up and this nice young guy was our... agent? He looked pretty average... I could take him out if we needed to make a run for it.

When he asked us how we knew the people we were going there to visit I proudly said, "We are friends."
oh? How do you know them?
"From the Internet..." (Slowly sounding less proud.)
(I had to use all of my will power to not say "we are teh friendzorz from tuh intarnets.")

I guess my explanation wasn't enough,
How from the internet?
Games.
Which games?
... ... World of Warcraft.
There was a smirk on the corner of his mouth, which he was trying to hide. A real professional.
Garrett spoke up from the passenger seat, "Please do not put that on there... PLEASE?!?"

We broke him, the agent laughed and asked, "Which server are you guys from."
"Doomhammer" all four of us reported in unison.
"Ah." (Apparently he wasn't impressed)
"So you play WoW?" I asked him
His head turned slightly downwards to hide his shame, "Yeah, I have played it."
"Do you still play wacraft?"
"Well not a lot, just once in a while."
"You need to stop playing it, now." I said and the whole car started to chuckle and snort... what a bunch of nerds.

He told us we had to pull over to the side and do some things with the immigration people since we hadn't been to Canada before.

Right as I started to pull away from his window I stopped and Asked him, "Which server are you from?"
"Kel-Thuzad."
Instantly all four of us moaned "Awwwwwwwww!" as if we had been stuck by a dodgeball in the final round of the tournament.

(Kel-Thuzad is one of the servers we competed with in our "Battle-group"... and overall they had better players than we did, but our guild still won almost every time we organized and fought together.)

Part 2:
We walk up to a lovely young lady at the immigration desk.
She smiles, what a pro, and asks us for our passports and such (The other guy asked for them too, I forgot to mention that).
Then she had a few questions.
are you here for business,Have you ever been arrested (Yes, that is a painful story),
what is the main reason for your visit to Canada?
we had been trained to tell her that we were here to eat at "Tim Horten's" (the dunkan donuts of Canada) and that we would receive VIP treatment.
"We are here to hang out with friends."
How do you know them?
We played an internet game together.
Which game.
(I can't tell her I play warcraft, or she will never go out with me) [Wait, What? Why did that even cross my mind!]
We play World of Warcraft. I said, with more pride then I had shown with the previous inspection.
...
...
She was smirking.
"Don't laugh!" I protested. "You're having a laff?" I pointed at her looking back at my friends, "She's 'aving a laff!"
(This show is having a laugh)

It was also funny.
She asked for the address and phone number of the person we are staying with.
We didn't have the address (We were meeting them at a specific place)
So she needed to call Jeremy who we were staying with.
Jeremy...? Whats his last name?
We all looked at each other, "We have no idea. We know his pretend name in the game, does that help?"
She was stunned."Let me call him."
She came back with a list in her hand, "Ok, he said there where four of you, Vesco, Garret, Ross, and he didn't know the fourth persons name but said your nickname is 'kiss kiss'.
We all had a laugh.

She explained that we were all set to go and only had to take this list over to the traffic desk.

Our friend from the first window had been shuffled over to the traffic area.
We greeted us, and I gave him the paper as instructed.

He looked it over, "It looks good, Anything else?"

I leaned on the counter with a grin, "Yeah, Kel-Thuzad Sucks... Big time."

He laughed and folded up the paper I had handed him, apparently tossing it somewhere under the desk, probably into the trash.

"Noooo!" I moaned, "I was just kidding." *pretend crying*

"It was good to meet you guys, have a good time with your friends."He said. "You are all done."

We had made a friend for life.

Go Canada, Part 1 of 14[or less]. (You Are Not Prepared)

After the great success of SL-PAX 2006, All who attended were in agreement that 2007 would be a complete loss without another similar event.

After a couple months I decided to take the initiative, and get people talking about it so we could lay down some plans before it was too late. Thus was born, SLAGG.

Squirrel
Legion
A
Get
toGether

Nobody rejected the idea of Slagging off this year, so it stuck.
After deciding on the name we voted on where to go. Canada won, Texas Lost. Sorry George.

Thus ends all actual preparations made by me.

Things I should have prepared:
~The correct amount of extra clothes.
~The correct types of extra clothes.
~My passport (Thanks to my Dad for calling and reminding me before we left the state)
~Money (Which would have been fine, if it weren't for my student loan payment, which I will cover later)
~Activities. (We could have done more than we did if we had planned better)
~Maps. (just to avoid some of the unhappiness of being lost, but what road trip is any fun without being lost?)

Things I WAS prepared for:
~Vesco. Amongst these friends, I am no longer [MY REAL NAME], but I am Vesco, The easier version of Expavesco. Because expavesco is hard to say. Ex. Paw. Vess. Co.
Expresso? Expertco? Expaved?
~Canadians drive on the left side of the road.
~Marijuana is legal in Canada.
~There was going to be a lot of drinking.
~Canadians talk funny. (Apearently it is the Americans who talk funny... I dunno)

Quoted from our forums:

...Orochi (Drew), Tharwind (Ben), uh?, Invalesca (Vesco), Shargas (Norm),...

Interpret THIS dream, you hippie [CENSORED].

A man can not live on blogs alone, so I fell asleep.
(My Secret Dream Diary: August 9. 7pm to Midnight)

I am watching bizarre commercials with random people like it is some kind of game show. The last one is in german, and a german family (man dad and infant) are watching it with me. in the commercial the people are taking away parts of what appears to be an invisible version of cinderella's castle (that big disney castle, I think that is cinderella's) And I can't remember what the tag line was, but it made no sense.

I turned to the family and asked if they liked the commercial, they liked it, and everything was ok, I guess. They mentioned something about "Kintergarten." at the end so...

I turned to the little boy (2 years old maybe) and said "was ist seu nome" (which I realize is half German/half Portuguese, but in the dream it was all German, baby.)

in a rolling strong german accent the child replid "ICH HEISSA @#$@@$"(I don't recall, but it was some german sounding name)

"Gut!" I replied. "Du sprechen zehr gut..." (At this point I realized I had used up all of my easily reccolectable german phraseologisms.) "... kinder."

The mother then said in German "He knows how to (***) to four!" [*** = a word that specifically means count upwards, but it not the same in German as just counting. I don't think there is actually a word like that in German, I am pretty sure they just say count... but dreams are weird I guess]

The little boy the counted on his fingers up to four.

AUSGESIEGHTNET!(sp?) (Outstanding!) I said to the boy, the family seemed very pleased.

We all started to leave, and the boy was now a baby wrapped in a blanket (like Jesu Bambino), Which fell off of the counter and hit its head on the ground.


I was the only one to notice, and so I said to the parents in german "baby head hurt"
They turned around concerned and I picked up the baby who was starting to cry (one of those siren cries that babies do, starting at a whisper and growing louder exponentially.) When I picked up the baby is calmed down and stopped crying.

The father said "Oh good" in english, laid down on the counter, and went to sleep. The mother had disappeared.

I set the calm baby next to him and began to walk away, when it started to cry again. (At this point the baby had shrunk to the same size as my hand) the father woke up and said "mother, come get the baby"

I picked up the baby in one hand and it stopped crying right away.
the father turned over on the counter again and went back to sleep.

The room was then a doctors office and the counter was now the examining table (with the paper on top that makes it sanitary?) I walked out of the room with the baby, and when I had left the room we were inside of a walmart (it was more like a ShopKo, but it becomes a walmart later, so lets call it a walmart)

The baby was now a little kitten, who I set next to me as I fell asleep, I was exhausted I guess. I woke up and realized the kitten was gone, so I went in search of it. I saw there were some animal cages and knew it would be there. Sure enough I saw it just outside the cage of a grown skinny white cat. The white cat was showing its teeth and had its fur all sticking up on its back. The kitten pushed its face against the cage because, obviously, it didn't understand the adult cat was INSANE. It is just a kitten, how is it supposed to know?

The big cat hisses and snaps its paw at the kittens face. The kitten is starteled and backs away from that cage, walking to the next cage closer to me (there are three large (dog sized?) cages lined up side by side, creating an aisle(sp?) of sorts)

The kitten wanders INTO the second cage, and I get a horrible feeling that the other cat in it is also violent. I see the other cat is a Lynx looking cat, and I know it is violent. Luckily the kitten instantly makes it to the next cage... but that one has a small cougar/bobcat type animal in it, which instantly attacks the kitten.


(who keeps pet cougars at the walmart?)

I reach in and grab the kitten out of the last cage just before it gets hit. When I hold it up to look at it, it is shivering and it begins to cry as a little kid would. (not cry like a cat). It says in a little kitten voice, I was so scared, I... I..."

I am suddenly thinking about when the dad is going to be here to pick up his kitten.
Hmm... I remember that he was supposed to be flying in right now.

I am then inside of a airplane, high in the air.
I jump out of the plane and can see the walmart rooftop down below.

I think, oh, I am almost there, not much longer.
the kitten is laying in my right hand as we fall through the air, when we are getting pretty close to the walmart roof (which looks like a nearly empty parking lot, with a couple heli-pads scattered on the edges.)

I activate my parachute, and feel like I have done so too late, as we are still falling really fast. (the G-force from the parachute opening should have caused the kitten sitting on my hand to fall off, but it didn't)
as the roof quickly approaches I get ready to smash into it, but instead I land very softly, and realize I have to pull in my parachute, or else something bad will happen.

I set down the kitten next to the edge of the building so that I can use both hands. I start to pull in the parachute and wrap it up, when I notice there is the second (higher) chute in the air, and it just got hit with a gust of wind. I am pretty sure this is going to pull me off the rooftop, so I watch it go, since I have no power over it. The parachute flew high above me and then starts to fall quickly back towards the middle of the roof, and not off of the side.

I am saved!

Then the parachute catches more wind when it reaches the ground, and starts coming directly towards me as a blog of wind. This is ok, I think, because I can stop it by standing in the way, and I won't be pulled off the roof.

Right before it gets to me I realize that it is probably going to punch me off the building like a fist of wind. When it hits me it pushes me into the air in a sort of twisting flip, and I instantly recall being knocked unconscious in grade-school when we had an activity with a parachute. I am anxious about being knocked unconscious and drug off of the building. Who will protect the kitten?

I somehow land on my feet and not my head, and I gather up the remainder of the parachute, which has been deflated thanks to my heroics.

I become concerned again for the kitten, which I can't see anymore.

The edge of the roof is now an open street, busy with cars. Uh oh.

I run over to the street and see the kitten is sitting safe next to the road.
I pick up the kitten and realize it is brown, limp, and empty like a shell. it must have been run over by a car. I drop the kitten husk, both out of how gross the dead body is and how upset I am that the kitten died.

Then I woke up.

At least this dream was a lot calmer than usual. Though usually no kittens have to die.

uhg....

incoming post about my amazing trip to canada.

It is taking forever to censor it so that I don't break the canadian's hearts.
(A lot having to do with how much their mountains SUCK, Guess who has the greatest snow on earth? read teh (not mispelled) plates baby!)