rustynickel's Blog

Anyone else as amazed as I on the number of roll over accidents that occur on our freeways?  It seems that each time we see a picture from the Fox4 Chopper,  there is a SUV on it's top or side that has been involved in an accident.  Is it the design of the vehicles or could it just be the fact that there are that many people who drive our freeways that just do not  have control over the vehicles they drive?  Many times it seems that it is a one vehicle accident!  How does this happen?

No proof of insurance  -- car gets towed.

What's the consensus on this issue?  I, for one, do NOT feel that towing a persons car for failing to have insurance is a just cause.    Giving the driver of the vehicle a ticket will move traffic along much, much quicker than to have the bald headed, muscle bound, egotistical, arrogant occifer sitting in his squad car doing nothing but holding up traffic for one to three hours waiting for a wrecker.

I'm a WEATHER FANATIC...........love springtime.  Chasing storms just for the fun of it.    Love to watch lightning, hear the thunder and watch the wind and rain.  

Wondering if one of our great meteoriologist or program directors could explain WHY all t.v. stations have the weather at the same time and the commercials at the same time?    And, how do you guys coordinate that sort of thing??  Don't you think that we might want to change over to see what the other guys at station XYZ are lying about?

It never fails that when Channel 4 goes to a commercial, the other stations have commercials also.......As you might tell, I'm not a fan of commercials.   But, would rather compare the stations in their weather forecasting and delivery.

     Anyone other than me have a problem with the fund raising car washes?  Saturday afternoon, while driving from one mall to another, I bet that my wife and I passed no less than fifteen different organizations holding "car washes."    Skimpily glad young girls of ten, eleven, twelve (in matchbox size bikinis) strutting around with signs, whistling, yelling and stepping out into traffic in an attempt to catch your attention.  Young boys horseplaying into traffic and making just getting around an intersection rather difficult.

     Should one of these young people be injured, or God forbid, killed, would the proceeds from that one day of being stupid be worth the outcome?

     First off, I have a real problem with beggers.  And this is exactly what I feel these organizations are doing.   They are "begging" me to help in their financial needs.  Well!!!!    No one helps me or my family with our financial needs.   And, I'm not going to stoop so low as to go on a street corner and harrass or beg someone to help me.    I have a little too much pride for that sort of thing.

     Also, where are the sponsors, parents, guardians or the police?   These actions are dangerous, if not to motorist, to the participants who act like they just came in from the monkey gage.

     Am I alone in this?  Or, is this something that others have questioned?

Wonder if this campaign might have caused a few chuckles??

Whatever happened to the idea of QUICKLY removing minor accidents from the Interstate Highways in and around Dallas/Ft. Worth?  Sunday there was a minor accident in the canyon on I-30.  The damage was barely visible to the two vehicles.  It had been pushed off on the right shoulder, yet the Dallas Police officer had the two right lanes blocked with his squad car!  It took us over an hour to move the two or three miles of the backup.  And, there was only one officer at the scene.  Another officer who could help to direct the flow of traffic would make some sense.  I think, sometimes, that they do this just to cause delays.  Surely there must be some logical reason.  Oh, is it that I just live in hope of better times?

If there seriously is concern over wasted energy - why is it that there are numerous commercial properties that are allowed to keep huge neon signs lit all night?  I can see the need for hotels, gas or convenience locations that are open -- and I'll even give in to having "security lights" (lights that allow the criminals to see better) but to see all of the huge neon lights lit at 2am on stores like Mattress Giant, Hooters, Sears, etc., etc., just seems like a gigantic waste of our energy.  Some of these companies have two or three large signs which are lit all night long.  Why?

I understand that these people pay less for their energy needs however I just still see it as a huge waste of our energy.  Sure, they can afford the cost, but it is still a waste.

A short while back there was some talk of limited this, but if I heard correctly it didn't make it past committee or something.

Sooner or later we are going to have to bite the bullet when it comes to our energy - why not start now and hope it gets better?

     Have you ever noticed that when it comes to traffic in the Metroplex most drivers drive without any common sense?  Signs posted that state, "Left lane ends"; "merge right" are there ONLY for the other driver.  These signs never are meant for them.   

     It's the idiots that drive up to the end of the line that cause most of the traffic tie ups.  When they have to stop and force their way into the lane of traffic which is moving, it only causes delays.  If, just once, all drivers would drive with courtesy we wouldn't see near as many traffic jams.  I would be willing to bet my small check against their big check that traffic would flow much better if they would go ahead and move over when they first notice the signs.....then the traffic could continue at 50 or 60 or 70 mph.   Of course this is never going to happen because most of them are too dang busy talking on their cell phones and refuse to pay attention.   No wonder we have some of the highest vehicle insurance rates in the nation.

Driving down 635 during the rain on Saturday a car in the HOV lane lost control and hit those stupid BUMPER BARS that are to placed between the HOV lane and the other lanes to keep drivers in the lane.  Those things went in every direction!   Luckily none of them hit my car.  However,  there were others that were guided missiles into several other cars on the freeway.  Now, my question is this -- if one of those stupid bars damages your car, who's insurance is responsible for the damages?    It shouldn't be my insurance carriers responsibility to pay for the damage, as I've done nothing wrong, except I was just in the wrong place at the wrong time.  The other driver will probably never slow down enough for you to get their insurance information or as has been posted many times -- probably doesn't even have insurance.  Dart should have known the things were dangerous.  After all it doesn't really take a rocket scientist to know that a flying projectile could cause harm, but it would help to be one in this case.  The company that manufactures the dang things surely should have to shoulder some of the responsibility.  I'm just wondering.  I was lucky this time.  Next time I may not be as lucky.

Banking Woes?

This seems to be a pretty good cross section of ideas and thoughts.  I’m wondering  about something.  Am I the only one who seems to be having trouble with a bank or credit union screwing me out of my hard earned money?  As stated in my bio, I really don't have two nickles to rub together.

Recently, I’ve taken to having an automatic withdrawal for my automobile insurance taken out monthly rather than writing a check each month.   This is not a paltry amount.  It comes to over $400 each month. 

The first month that they deducted this – on the fifteenth of the month as agreed in writing with the insurance company – everything went fine.  The second month, the amount was recorded as being taken out on the twentieth by the bank.  Then I noticed that there were seven small checks, all for about $30 or so, that bounced.  Each with a charge of $33.00.

I questioned the bank and was told that sometimes these things just get crossed and they agreed to charge off the return check fees.  This amounted to $231.00. 

When I questioned why the amount was being deducted on the twentieth instead of the fifteenth as had been originally arranged, they explained “that it sometimes took a little extra time for them to get around to making the automatic deductions.” 

The third month, the same thing occurred.  Unfortunately, I failed to catch it the first week or so and the same thing happened to me.  When I noticed, I went to the bank to straighten things out.  Same excuses, except they refused to ignore the return check fees, stating that this was a recurring situation and they just couldn’t ignore it again.  This time the fees amounted to $330.00, they forgave $100.00, but still charged me $230.00.

I feel that they arranged it to happen this way so they could charge late fees.  And, if these are actually “automatic deductions” why in the world are they having to manually process them in the first place?

Has anyone else had this problem or is this just an isolated incident?  Or, do I need to change my bookkeeping procedures or just change banks?  So far this change in my paying for insurance has cost me over $230.00 in fees.

Why can't we have more complete coverage concerning grocery stores and retail outlets that sell expired or outdated foods?  Just recently spent a few hours in a local grocery store checking some expiration dates and was shocked to find several hundred boxes of cereals and snacks with past due dates.  Some of the so called "dollar stores" are notorious for such actions.