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December 26, 2007
I'm a dirty polytheist...
... Run, go tell all your friends.
So, I was in a religious debate last night that I had no right to be in because my knowledge of modern religion is very minimal. That is because I'm a history buff. Particularly I'm a Roman History buff. So, I was trying to explain where some of the conventions of modern day Christmas are rooted. For instance, the holiday's modern date has little to do with the birth or rebirth of Christ, it was actually commonly believed to have been selected to compete and or replace Saturnalia. Saturnalia was a religious celebration honoring Saturn in Rome. It was celebrated on December 17th initially but was eventually given a full week of celebration toward the end of the polytheist Roman rule.
Saturnalia (which predates the Christmas holiday, and I believe even the birth of Christ) is a great deal like Christmas, but it has a few key differences. First of all, it's honoring a deity, next it was a date when children were given leive from school, small presents were exchanged, and Rome gathered to celebrate unity under Saturn with a feast. In fact, the modern nativity scene has unconnected similarities as well:
A statue of Saturn the god was very prominent in the heart of the Roman empire. During Saturnalia, they lit the statue and removed the chains that bound it the earth and humanity.
What's commonly referred to as the "Christmas Spirit", "spirit of the season", or "holiday spirit" was carried over directly from the Feast of Saturnalia. During the week of Saturnalia, Roman slave (not slaves in the Western Empire just the Mainland Empire) were exempt from punishment. Those celebrating the holiday also practiced a role reversal in which the slaves became master of the house for the week and were served by their masters. This is where the popular concept known by bible buffs as "Serve the Servants" came from. When Jesus entertained his followers and washed their feet, this is not an example of something outlandish, it was a standard of the season for the Roman Empire.
There are various other similarities of Saturnalia's clear influence on the Christian holiday of Christmas, but you know what... nobody is going to believe me so why bother. I think, at times, people get so caught up in having the "correct" religion that they tend to forget the point. History has no bearing on what you believe. If you think it's correct then celebrate it. Just don't deny that other people have beliefs that they believe to be correct as well, and though the core beliefs may be miles apart, their is unity and clear humanity in the way we celebrate and want to share our joy with others.
Posted by Decemberice at 11:09 AM | Comments (1)
December 18, 2007
27 Confessions...
... of a former Circuit City employee is the theme of this article. I witnessed a few of them during my time with Circuit. I can honestly say that working for them really impacted my enthusiasm for them. I rarely if ever buy anything from them online or in-store. Whenever I go it's pretty much to window shop as they tend to carry higher-end products than Best Buy. Nothing I can really afford, but fun to look at.
One of the problems not really mentioned is that, on top of having particular products they are pushed to sell, they are also swooned by certain manufacturers. Sony is notorious for buying the support of Circuit employees. When I worked there the training on Sony products was far superior to the training on other comparable products and if we sold enough Sony product, Sony would give us free product. LOL Now tell me, if you are earning free games for your PS2, if you sell one DVD player, and nothing if you sell the other, which are you more likely to push on the shopper?
I kept my nose clean. That's a minor one of the reasons I did poorly. I really didn't do well because I am not a great salesman. I tend to feel empathy for financial situations because I know how expensive buying the things you need can be. I really felt sorry for the people who needed a computer for their kids because schools require essays to be typed, and despite how many computers a library has, if you don't have something for your kids to research and word doc on, your kids will struggle to do as well as others. Anyways, I struggled with the salespeople who were pushing the product of the day, or the most expensive computer on those people.
It was never really about what the customer wants so much as what is profitable for Circuit. I remember one day I worked. It was a day prior to a major holiday and there was NO ONE to be seen. No last minute shoppers, no one. Our Consumer Electronics manager came out of the back room with a palette full of UPS Back Ups (if you don't speak tech, it's essentially a battery for your computer so that if the power fails you have time to shut down your PC properly, it also manages the drops and spikes in the electricity coming into your computer so power surges don't fry it.). UPS' are a great product. Except for that this model was particularly jacked up in price. There were SEVERAL comparable models that were much less with, again, the same features. He took all of the other UPS supplies off the shelves and into the back room. He basically told us that our store needed to hit a particular number to meet our holiday sales goal. The store manager had determined that this product had a high enough profit margin to boost the sales, and since PC accessories were the big push at the time, it was perfect.
So we were told to tell all of our customers that we were out of stock of the others (the ones sitting in the warehouse that he had just wheeled off the sales floor), and tell them that luckily for them, we had a better model.
I basically laughed at him and was almost fired because I called the ethics into question, but we didn't have a single paying customer the full 8 hours that I was there so I never actually had to do it, which I could live with. Nobody fell prey, no harm done. But it comes up in my mind from time to time how shady that was, and I find myself endlessly proud of my current employer for not pulling that kind of BS.
That was not the reason my employment with CC didn't work out. It was mostly my fault, I sucked as a salesman. Salespeople were commissioned at the time and my numbers just weren't up to par. I can live with that because I know it wasn't for me. I don't harbor any ill will for it not working out, but I will never forget some of the shady things I saw.
I also remember this one time we replaced the printed labels for the product prices for laptop and desktop computers with a label that displayed the price with an extended warranty in larger bold numbers and the price without in tiny little numbers barely visible below.
They would also, frequently have us place the more expensive computers out for display, and we would put the price of the less expensive models (that weren't as fast processor wise or didn't have as much ram or hard drive) directly below the display model, and the price of the one on display off to the side. Customers would ALWAYS assume the logical, that the price tag directly under the display model, must be for that model. I always pointed it out to the customers, but there were some real shady sales reps that wouldn't say a word when the customer thought they were getting the computer on display for the price below it.
There were also TONS of merchandisers (the people who stock the shelves) who would hide copies of hard to find games or movies for themselves or their families during the holidays. I remember one time when I was working there and the PS2 had just been released and was really tough to find in stores, much like the Wii is right now. They stacked up 18 boxes of them on the call floor an hour before the store opened and all of the employees whipped out their cell phones and called their families to come pick them up before the customers heard wind that we had supply. They then sold them on eBay for A KILLING, I heard for the next week or two how they came out ahead by 300 or 400 bucks after selling them on eBay. It didn't seem like much at the time, but when I see people shopping madly for the WIi's this time of year because it's the only thing on their XMas list, it seems pretty lame how the employees exploited their knowledge just to turn a profit on eBay. I didn't have the money at the time, but I can't say that I wouldn't have done it then if I had the cash, I'm glad looking back that I didn't.
I guess the theme of this story is that I really don't miss working there and having worked there I definitely don't shop their often, I just thought it was humorous when I saw this article because it hit the nail square on the head. This is exactly what CC was like!
Posted by Decemberice at 12:14 AM | Comments (0)
The Pop wars...
... rage on. Go Coke!
Posted by Decemberice at 12:10 AM | Comments (0)
December 15, 2007
Ah, the holidays...
... that special time of year I wish I were a "cutter."
I'm not really into the whole shindig. Nothing dulls the spirit like a step back to realize how human it is to take a celebration with a meaning (caring, and giving), and turn it into a big 'ol over the top greedfest.
This year I introduced the donated gifts idea. That went over like a conspiracy. All the sudden I was some big mean evil uncle, brother, and child because I planned on donating to worthy charities in their names instead of buying them expensive toys and games. Well, hey, I tried my new wave Christmas and it didn't work, thus I had to go shopping for presents.
I really should have held my ground and donated in their names. Maybe they would have come to their senses eventually. At any rate, I spent way too much money and now I'm broke and I haven't even finished shopping. These holidays are merciless. They say the biggest sales are to be had this time of year but all I've found are full retail prices on everything my greedy recipients want.
Why, oh, why am I not a Jehova's Witness. I think they have the right idea, don't make a big shenanigan out of a holiday that's supposed to mean something. We could all learn a little something from them. You know my grandma, the one who looked Korean even though she was German, she was a Jehova's witness. She still celebrated the holidays though. She called them Happy Day instead of Christmas and Special Day instead of birthday. I guess every sect has it's black sheep. I miss my asian grandma.
At any rate it's not all bad news. I got an iTunes gift card from Zoso. She shouldn't have spent so much on me. Now I feel like a bad friend. I never visit cause I'm always working. I only know what's up with her through her blog. Sad sad.
I've managed to say a lot of nothing so I guess it would be time to stop rambling. Later.
Posted by Decemberice at 11:50 PM | Comments (1)