On the insiduousness of certain chemicals.

I had a craving for gum.
Lunch had just been consumed and the desire for something to wash away the taste of food was desired.
Altoids or other mints are usually reserved for that purpose, but something different was wanted.
A quick inspection of the vending machine revealed a suitable gum source: Juicy Fruit (tm).
(Which neither tastes like nor contains anything even remotely connected to any known fruits.)
(But that's irrelevant.)

40 cents went into the machine and a 5-stick pack was my reward.
I popped 3 sticks into my mouth, started chewing, and went back to QA Lab #1 (The Bat-Cave).
And you know, the gum tasted the same as always at first, but it had an odd aftertaste.
No further thought was given to this for a while as I went back to work.
But still, it nagged me a little.
I prize myself on my tastebuds. They're quite sensitive.
I can actually do a decent job of differentiating between brands of bottled water just by taste.
(Penn & Teller, or anyone else, would have a hard time fooling me, like they did those dumb rich
folks at the New York restaurant during their "Bullshit" TV show segment on bottled water.)
So I grabbed the Juicy Fruit (tm) package and read the label.

And I saw those 3 dreaded words: "Phenylketonurics: contains Phenylalanine."
Yes, y'all, there be Nutrasweet/Aspartame in Juicy Fruit (tm) now!
Not only that, but the label also indicates that it's got sugar, corn syrup, AND Sucralose!!
JESUS CRISPIES!!
Why not stick saccharine in there too while you're at it!!
I want normal gum, not diet gum! I hardly ever chew gum, so when I do, I want the REAL stuff!
ARGH!!!!
And if you look at the face of the package, it looks normal. Nowhere does it say "lite" or "diet" on it.
They did the same thing to Bubble Tape (tm) a while back, the gum that's one continuous strip and comes
packaged in a flat, circular box. You only know it's got Nutrasweet in it if you read the label.
They're poisoning the kids!!



Weekend Update to follow.
Taco Bell, The Citadel, and B.J.'s swell!!

Reasons I Hate UPS: #723279640863420853082365

I bought some underwear online on September 30th. The company only ships via UPS. Argh.
So I made to provide a detailed and accurate shipping address for my workplace.
I also ordered some criminally-cheap music CDs from Overstock.com.
I gave them the same address. They shipped my order via USPS Media Mail (cheap!).
I proceeded to wait.

2 days later, I get an e-mail from the underwear company that my order has shipped. Okay.
I resume waiting.

The CDs from Overstock.com arrived yesterday (October 12th). Media Mail takes a while, so my underwear
should have been here by now. But it's not here. Dammit.

So today, I went to the UPS website, punched in my tracking number and tracked my package.
It was delivered on October 8th (last Friday). Buh?!?

So I called the Imageworks mailroom to see if they had it. They handle the mail for our cluster of buildings.
They don't have it. They give the number of the Main Sony Lot Mainroom.
I call over there and talk to a very professional fellow who tells me that the package was rerouted by
UPS to a different address. BUH?!?!

I punch this address into Google and it comes up as the local CompUSA store.

BUH!??!?!

What the hell is UPS smoking?!?!?
I called the CompUSA but the only manager on duty is swamped. I'll have to try again later.

Why did UPS ship my underwear to CompUSA!??!?!!?

UPS MUST DIE!!!