Hey gang, I know it’s been awhile. Anyway, I have a bunch of old computer crap in the basement that is available to a good home. There’s a monitor, two towers and innerds from said systems. The hard drives are fried. If you want them, email me or Facebook me or talk to Lisa. If not, anyone know a place that can recycle all that stuff and not charge me. Thanks.

Hey all…I hate to be the bearer of bad news, and I know some of you have probably talked to Lisa.  One of Ameristar’s former dealers, some of you probably knew him, Matt Rog, suffered a massive stroke yesterday.  He is not expected to survive.  Those of us who knew him always relished his sense of humor and his “war” stories about being a cop.  This is especially sad news for me, as I have known Matt for a long time, and he was my Dad’s supervisor on the KCPD. 

Please take a moment to say a prayer for his family.

Thanks,

Jay

What little love I have for that company has now gone away…completely.  Some of you might know that my step-mom, Cindy, passed away last week from cancer.  The memorial for her is Monday evening.  However, upon notifying the company of her wanting funeral leave, D.T. informed her that my step-mom is not covered by the company bereavement policy.  So now, she is, for all intents and purposes, being penalized for attending the memorial Monday evening.

I’m still completely aghast of the callousness of Ameristar, but then again, I shouldn’t even be remotely surprised.  For those of us who are out of there, all the better.  However, for those of you who are still there, you have my complete sympathy.

UPDATE: Well, they gave Lisa the night off…but it isn’t gonna be covered under the bereavement policy all the same.  Fortunately, it’s not gonna cost any money as she has to work Christmas Eve.  I still think it’s a bunch of crap, as it still is an inlaw.  If it SHE had a step parent, it WOULD be covered. 

Jay

On May 1, it was announced that Blizzard has obtained the domain name Diablo3.com.  Previously, it was dedicated to those who were huge fans of the Diablo series (myself included, but didn’t even realize the fan site til I went to Diablo3.com).  So, are we going to see an announcement soon of the continuation of the Diablo series?  Me, personally, I hope so.  I loved the game, and there were still some questions to be answered at the end of the game.  Now, my opinion might change should it go MMPORG though.  I don’t care for those types of games, nor do I have the time to play those type of games (I don’t have the time right now to even play Oblivion, The Game of the Year Edition).  I thought that Blizzard went the wrong way using Warcraft as the basis for their MMPORG instead of Diablo, but that’s a different rant.

 So, what do you folks think?  Has Blizzard set up a major announcement coming soon…or are they just continuing to tease those of is who thought that Diablo is one of the best (PC) video game franchises of all time.  After all, it was Diablo that put Blizzard on the map. 

The impossible has happened.  I got a job outside the business.  This afternoon, I was officially hired by Burlington-Northern-Santa Fe Railroad, starting on April 15.  I’m not working on the trains…yet…perhaps down the road I will.   But for now, it’s a start.  Will I miss the business?  I don’t know…it’s hard to say after doing this for over 11 years.   I’ll miss the people I work (and have worked) with.   I won’t miss the smokey enviornment, hustling for tokes or the rude people.  I’m looking forward to the challenge though.  So after dinner…it’s off to the printer to do what I thought I’d never do, give notice to get out of the business.  I wish nothing but success to all y’all and I will be by.

Jay

Got this from a co-worker at Argosy (and I thought gaming geeks were only at Ameristar).  But, this was too ridiculous to pass up and NOT post it here.  Read some of the comments as well.

http://gizmodo.com/361539/chocolate-master-chief-penis-helmet

OK, I have a conundrum.  According to my video card info, I have a Nvidia GE Force 7300LE card, 64 mb.  But yet, I run dxdiag, the approx total memory is 825 mb.  What the heck is the difference, and why can I run games at 128 mb if indeed my card is only running at 64mb?  What can I trust?

Well folks, it looks like my days at Ameristar are over.  Approximately 1 pm on October 17, I was officially terminated.  Yes, I ticked someone off….I cussed on a game so on and so forth.  This wasn’t how I wanted to go out, but, I’m out all the same.  I’ve already had an interview and have another one tomorrow, so things are already starting to pan out.  Where it’ll all lead, I don’t know.

Gang, it was a pleasure knowing you and working with you.  I’m sure somewhere down the path we will see each other again one way or another.  I will still frequent this board, so keep the WIT and the humorous stories flying. 

I won’t miss the business…I won’t miss the b.s…..the sleeping during the day.  I will miss you guys though.  We all fought in the same trenches together.  I truely valued our time together.

 Again, good luck all, I will miss you.

Jay

OK, y’all a brand new WIT.  Hopefully it’ll last more than 24-48 hours.  Good luck!

Well, Wynn had their union vote.  Not surprisingly, the union passed overwhelmingly (444-149).  I’m interested to see what happens.  There’s no guarantee that the union can get all the tokes paid back to the dealers, and if they do actually get tokes back to 100% for the dealers, what concessions the dealers will have to make.  Now that Trump Marina, Ceasars (both Atlantic City) and now Wynn have unions (so does the Argosy for that matter, but I haven’t heard about their influence) as well as the casinos in Detroit, will we start seeing a push in smaller markets such as ours to go union?

In all honesty, I don’t think there’s a damned thing a union could do for us.  Period.  I would just think it’s just another layer of apathy in a long line of it at work.