Bits and pieces of my day

[thatcrazycajun]

The other day I was listening to American Public Radio's excellent weekday business-news program Marketplace and heard this story about the British supermarket chain my dear friend telynor was having so much trouble with a month or so ago (see her LJ for details). Tesco, it seems, hopes to do well by doing good, opening a number of stores as a first foray into the lucrative U.S. grocery market—including at least one in an underserved area of a major city, Los Angeles. Where most retail supermarket chains only see a poor part of town not worth even bothering with (or if they do, not worth properly stocking with actually edible food), the Brits see an untapped gold mine. I hope the folks in Compton enjoy better service than the Harper got...

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After a second visit by a Comcast technician, it has been determined that I cannot get a signal on the cable television hookup without them or someone else approved by the apartment complex's owners ripping out the walls in not only mine, but possibly one or more other tenants' units in this building. Seems there's a break somewhere in the line, and the break is hidden Ghu-knows-where in the walls between my apartment, on one end of the block, and the cable tap on the other end.

After more than a month of these clowns being unable to hook me up with actual service, I am just about ready to say "fuckitall" and go for the AT&T/BellSouth cable/DSL/phone package. At least I know their wires work.

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On the upside, thanks to craigslist's Atlanta site, I finally got a decent coffee table of my own without having to pay an arm and a leg. All it took was $35 cash, a short drive to midtown and a bit of elbow grease. Pics when I can get hold of some sort of digicam.

Comments

[wolfette]

here in the UK Lidl and Aldi - European "discounter" supermarket chains - seem to specialise in building stores in low income areas, selling good food, if not big name brands, at incredibly low prices. In the last few years their stores have spread like a rash - they've even opened stores in Orkney and Shetland.

And they're all over Europe- one day they might decide to conquer the New World too!

[starmalachite.livejournal.com]

Aldi has at least 2 US locations in the suburbs of Washington, DC. I don't think they'll really catch on until they ditch the strange European custom of charging for the use of a shopping cart (AKA trolley). I have seen people say "Screw this!" and simply leave.

[filkferengi]

There are some items we regularly buy at the Aldi [sort of] near us. I suspect my spouse feels something of a rugged pioneer by bringing his own bags.

[filkferengi]

Yay for the coffee table! Is it cat-approved yet? [personal note: our coffee table used to be buried one-foot deep on a regular basis. We've been keeping at least half of it clear for the last year or so, much to the feline's approval. Work-in-progress, & all that.]

Will you be at the filk this Saturday?