BEWARE OF GEEKS BEARING GIFTS
Jan 12 '05 (Updated Feb 23 '05)
The Bottom Line Now taking bets on how soon they pull my hat(again) after this one.
There's an old saying that surprises are only nice on your birthday. Well from where I sit on this cold wet miserable January, my birthday is still several months in the future. Therefore surprises received today are "not nice."
Back in 2003 just before Christmas (can I still say that here?) I received an interesting e-mail from the common sense challenged in Brisbane. In a nice gesture it was announced that some of us poor galley slaves were receiving a year-end bonus. Now to be honest I was touched. My daytime employer's version of a Christmas (or whatever Politically correct holiday term/whatever you prefer) bonus is to be allowed to come back to the gerbil factory I slave at after ODing on turkey.
Us hatted peons were to receive a small stipend in my (and other Top Reviewers) case $50.00 added to our income share. Nice gesture to be sure. Mind it would have been nicer if they had let me know it was coming a couple of days earlier. I had again finally surpassed (barely) the $100.00 minimum that those of us not blessed to live/reside in the US of A must reach to redeem our pitiful (or should that be pitiable) income share.
Had I known that this was coming I would have held off pushing the magic redeem button that starts the journey through enough time consuming and totally unnecessary paperwork and bureaucracy to make a Canadian Federal Government employee green with envy. Hey I could have, eventually, had a cheque for $150.00 to help pay down my post holiday Visa bill.
As it was I had to wait the five or six months it took to watch my I/S creep ever so glacially back over the three-digit mark again. Of course it didn't take quite as long as I was starting at the half waypoint this time. Besides a Christmas bonus is ever so much meaningful when you receive it the following June.
Fast forward to December just passed and I began to wonder if perhaps the staff at the Brisbane school for the demented would be having a pre (insert non denominational, non offensive, politically correct holiday term here) party and while under the influence of hallucinogenics from south of the Rio Grande would once more dish out some greenbacks to the unwashed masses before sobering up and realizing what they did.
Mind I had an ulterior reason for hoping so. My IS was sitting once more just below the tantalizing hundred buck mark and hopes of passing over it and cashing out were dancing through my head like sugar plums or some such crap.
Nope not this time at least not for the venerated red hats that actually write the drivel the site seems to subsist on. Everyone else got cash, but like the poor orphan from a Dickens novel our bowls were to be empty this year. Well not quite I received a little cryptic e-mail telling me that instead of cash us TRs would be receiving a special super dooper gift.
Great another frigging Eeeps doll I figured. I was surprised that they'd send me another one as I used the last one as a BBQ implement (I have pictures). Well it could be worse it might be an autographed 8 by 10 glossy of long gone but never forgotten Unca Nirvy.
Then I read a little further and realized that it may be something else because the lifeboat monitors on the good ship Eeeps were actually hoping us TRs would actually use and gasp review our gifts. Well that meant no Eeeps dolls. Even Brisbane would not be dumb enough to want a couple of hundred doll reviews would they? Well one hopes not.
I promptly forgot all about the coming "gift" perpetuated the regional stereotype I am and went about abusing both my liver and credit card although not at the same time. After a week or so of this I crawled back to work and spent the next two weeks as looking busy, until yesterday.
Last night when I got home the little woman (hey I'm not being sexist she's a couple of inches shorter than I am) handed me the days mail to peruse. After tossing all the bills in the neighbours mail slot I noticed one piece left over.
It was a notice from Canada Post that there was a parcel for pick up at the local post office. Actually it was one of those "we were here how dare you be at work instead of at home/this damn thing is too big to slide through the slot in the cardboard box you call an apartment/ come pick it up ASAP or it's ours" notice.
Now neither of us were expecting anything so my curiosity was piqued. So was my paranoia as thoughts of exploding packets of anthrax all over the College Park Postal Outlet ran through my mind as I drifted off to sleep.
Today at work I called the Postal Outlet to confirm there actually was a parcel and this was not some sort of demented prank on their part. Yup there was and there was customs duty due on it I was informed. They wouldn't go so far as to tell me whom it was from but did offer to ship it back if I didn't want it.
Well it was close enough to lunch and the computers at work had gone down for the umpteenth time that morning so I figured live dangerously, grabbed my coat and shuffled down to College Park.
Once there I was presented with not one but two additional little surprises. The first was whom the parcel was from. Yup this was the mystery appreciation gift from the bubble heads at Brisbane. It even said "Happy Holidays" from Epinions on it (some poor clerk is now going to get a stern talking to or even a tine out for such un PC language). Mind it didn't go so far as to tell me what was in the package.
Surprise number two was the total owed customs duties and taxes were close to $40.00 Canadian. Nice to know that NAFTA thingy is really working there eh hoser. Of course I couldn't find out what was in the box until I shelled out the cash. By the way cash literally. Canada Post outlets are firmly stuck somewhere in the 17th Century (as are their delivery times BTW) and have yet to hear of plastic.
Naturally I had no cash on me, while not $40.00, so one quick trip to the ATM and the parcel was mine. This meant I could open it and finally discover just what my sooper dooper mystery prize was. Considering some of my previous public comments here re Epinions Management (look in Websters under oxymoron) my theories on anthrax were a possibility.
Nope no white powder, it was a camera. Not just any camera but a spanking new digital camera. A Hewlett Packard PhotoSmart M307 Digital Camera for you technophobes who actually give two of something.
Now as a travel writer (honest I really am one, ask my accountant, I even have business cards, ok card) I need and use a camera in my line of work. Unlike some travel writers who I could name I have this perverse belief that you should actually visit the places you propose to write about first instead of surfing the net and cutting and pasting facts in word perfect.
As I'm basically too lazy to take notes I take pictures instead. It also comes in handy to show Revenue Canada I actually was in (insert the name of your favourite undeveloped third world country here) and therefore my plane tickets are legitimate deductions.
However I already have a camera. Actually I have several. There are at last count three 35mm cameras gathering dust in various crevices at Chateau Smith, including a cheapy I bought in Bangkok last year when mine got a roll of film jammed in it and I needed a replacement quick.
I even have a digital camera, two in fact. After a $300.00 plus developing bill for last year's Asia trip I said screw this and bought the wife a nice new 3.2 mg Digital for her birthday. (They were out of
Bowling balls). Sometime this year she may even get to use it. Seriously we were so impressed with it that the film cameras were banished to the dust bunny outer regions of the cardboard box. we call home.
Taking advantage of the post Christmas (there's that word again) sales I splurged and picked up a new camera and with the money saved all the cool accessories that come with it. Someday I might even learn to use them all.
Actually this camera looks like it will meet all my needs for the next couple of years. It’s from the same manufacturer as the wife's so a lot of the accessories are interchangeable, including software, and memory cards. Taking both on future trips should work out well.
Basically this means I'm all-cameraed out these days. A fact that had Eeeps bothered to enquire about could have saved them some effort and me some grief.
Now it's not that I'm not grateful for this gesture. Hey when it comes to being rewarded for my work I’m as mercenary er I mean grateful as the next guy. Personally even with the pounding it’s been taking against almost all other world currencies (Moroccan Dirhan, Honduran Lempira and Cuban Peso aside) I still prefer said gratitude be expressed in a nice pile of Benjamin’s, hey I’ll even settle for a pile of George Washington’s.
What I’m saying is that if you intend to offer some non-monetary gift, check to see if it’s warranted or wanted first. How hard would it have been to e-mail me a little “hey want a new camera” message. For that matter why was I given a camera in the first place, aside from the fact as already noted I could practically open my own camera shop these days. I don’t write in photography or rarely other electronic gadgets for that matter. I’ve had my new cell phone over six months now and have yet to consider writing a review on it here. Not because I don’t like it or think a review would be useful, but I still haven’t figured out all the buttons yet. Same with the camera, the one I picked out and bought that is. Maybe I’ll write a review on it here, but only after I’ve become fully comfortable with it and all its pros and cons.
Hey I’m mainly a travel writer here, so trip would have been nice “present.” No scratch that with my luck Eeeps would expect reviews on the Falluja Ramada and Air Yak Business class.
How about telling me what’s available and what may have wanted. CDs, DVD, or even gift cards if cash was too crash to consider. Maybe I didn’t want anything at all. Actually I don’t think its that anyone on Marina Blvd feels cash is tacky they’re just against handing it out to the peons on general principle. Add to that the difficulty of actually shipping a cheque to somewhere outside Murrica.
Why by the way is it so hard for Eeeps to reimburse us poor foreign writers? I have an editor in Shanghai for crying out loud whom with a couple of keystrokes can deposit my fees for written drivel into my paypal account. You’d think a company that is based around the Internet could at least pay its contributors using the same convenient means. Or is it that they don’t want to?
No maybe I’m just a cynic but rather than a legitimate token of appreciation from a benevolent employer to a trusted employee this is looking more like the proverbial bone tossed under the dinner table. Why do I get the feeling that HP tossed out a few of these cameras to Eeeps in exchange or payment for advertising on the site. Could that be why I’m supposed to review the damn thing?
Oh yeah I checked. As of today there are four reviews of this particular camera here. The standard appears to be that it’s not very good. Translated it’s a piece of junk that ain’t selling well. Now even if I already didn’t own more cameras than a planeload of movie cliche Japanese tourists, and the fact that this one is not compatible with any of them and therefore pointless to drag along even as a back up, the fact that it sucks probably does not translate into me using it and writing favourably about it here.
Then there’s that whole getting dinged for the customs fees on it. To me that reeks of just not thinking prior to doing something, usually a hallmark of good gift giving (pun intended there). The same reason we don’t buy Granny a thong or anything from Victoria Secret, and if you do keep it to yourself please. It’s just not practical let alone appropriate.
No one thought of that little obstacle like foreign borders and that maybe for those of us dirty furreners here maybe “gifts” weren’t practical for this reason unless of course they were green cards so we could redeem our income share, participate in contests, write offs and other reindeer games and not be treated like second class citizens.
Again I do want to see grateful especially if you are one of the camera disadvantaged (and if you are have I got a deal for you). My mother always told me to say thank you when I got a gift, and I always did what she asked (or I got smacked around).
So thank you Epinions.
Thank you for the wasted lunch hour spent in line at the post office, the ATM and the post office again.
Thank you for the wet socks and shoes I got walking in the freezing rain and probable pneumonia I’ll end up with.
Thank you for the service charge I incurred at the ATM and the $40.00 in customs duties I’m now out.
Thank you for the fact that having just done my 2004 taxes I’ll now have to redo them and declare this as income in lieu or some other thing that will tick of my accountant.
Thank you for the extra 10-point raise in my blood pressure all this has caused me.
Now all I have to do is figure out what to do with the stupid camera. Wanna bet there’s nothing under the tree for moi from Santa Nirvy next year now.
UPDATE
Well it appears that there is something to be said about
b!tching, whining and generally acting like a 4 year old in the cereal aisle of the Grocery Store.
I have recently received an e-mail from Garrett Gonzales at Epinions apologizing for the fact I and others had to pay duty for our “gifts” and offering to reimburse us.
It really hasn’t been about the cost per say as I think I’ve made clear, and it’s not that I’m ungrateful. My concern was that well meaning, this idea could have benefited from some serious preplanning.
That said and done credit where credit is due. Thanks Garrett.
SECOND UPDATE 31/01/05
As of today $30.00 was added to my account here to cover postage. Thanks Garret
THIRD UPDATE 23/02/05
My IS cheque arrived with the extra $30.00 on it to cover postage. Funny enough I've actually earned 8 cents I/S on this little rant to date. Go figure.
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Epinions.com ID:
JAMES23
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Member: James Smith
Location: Toronto Ontario CANADA
Reviews written: 450
Trusted by: 222 members
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