ATM Weirdness…

Posted Wednesday, February 28th 2007

ATM cash machines can be the weirdest ever..

Yesterday, as I was getting off work, I decided to grab some money out of an ATM belonging to the bank where I have an account. I walk up to the ATM, put in my card, enter my pin, and I’m taken to the screen where I select the amount of cash I want. I enter the desired amount, and the ATM tells me that I have insufficient funds in my account.

Fairly confident that I should have at least 5 times of the desired amount in my account, I try again, to the same reusult. Okay, I try half the amount I wanted, and I get the money. A bit confused, I take my money, my card, and the bank slip (which does not give an account balance when you take money out), and make a mental note to call the bank at the morning and ask what’s going on.

I called my bank this morning, and asked for a statement by e-mail (they are still working on their Internet-accessible features - should be done by the end of March I’m informed). A few minutes later, I get a scanned page from a printout by e-mail, informing me that sure enough, I have money on my account.

After a call to the bank again, I was informed that the ATM was out of money, and that it most likely uses the same error message to inform users that it’s empty, that it uses to inform users that they’re out of money.

Fucking amazing.

Oh, and don’t get me started on the time when I was in Athens, trying to take the last 100 euros out of my bank account, and the ATM decided to take the money out of my account, but not give the cash to me. So there I was, in Athens, about to board a train, broke. Fun times..

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Did you hear my horn?

Posted Thursday, February 15th 2007

I just came across this post about idiot drivers. I’ve had my fair share of contact with idiot drivers, and this post manages to convey my feelings quite nicely.

Lanes, pick one and stick to it.

Follow those little dots and dashes on the road and stay between a pair of them, it’s not that complicated. When making a 2 lane turn into a 2 lane road, stay in the lane you started in unless you want to explain your incompetence to the mechanic, insurance company and the Dept. of Motor Vehicles.

Even if a road jogs at a funny angle as you cross an intersection, and the markings aren’t too clear, it’s not rocket science. If you’re on the far left or right in a 3 lane road, stay to the far left or right. If you’re in the middle lane it can’t be that complicated to figure out where the middle is in the road across the intersection but sure as shit, 9 times out of 10, you end up in the far right lane with people honking (often me) and screeching brakes to avoid your dumb ass.

Aren’t the cars in the lanes next to you any clue that it’s unsafe to change lanes at this time?

Read the whole thing here.

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My trip to Moscow + Pics!

Posted Saturday, February 10th 2007

As I said I would, I’m writing a story on my trip to Moscow, and I’ve even included some pictures at the end of the post.

Anyway, time to get on with it.

A bit of background information. I started working as a junior software analyst & project manager at a software company, and I had my first business trip at the end of January / beginning of February. My first trip was to Moscow, and it was exciting in many ways.

We left on January 29 - we flew from Skopje, Macedonia to Vienna, Austria. After about an hour, we boarded our flight to Moscow. Being on a plane for the first time, I was quite excited. Turned out to be pretty cool. We arrived at Moscow’s Sheremetyevo airport around 1 am, and got to our hotel - Ukraina (2nd pic) around 2 am. After a drink at the bar, we went to bed.
The days were mostly similar - wake up at 8, down at the restaurant for breakfast at 8:30, at the office by 9-9:15 am. I talked to various people during the 4 days I was there, in order to gather all the information I needed.

Anyway, Moscow. It’s huge. I still cannot fanthom the large scale of everything. Buildings are big, roads are big, everything is BIG. The main road going into Moscow is 20 lanes. 20 lanes! I saw some great things that I’ve only seen on TV or in movies before. St Basil’s Cathedral (pic 4), Lenin’s Mausoleum (pic3), the Beli Dom (pic 10) - all great and impressive things that have left me in awe.

I also took a few rides in the metro, which is filthy and old, and hardly anything remains of what it used to be. The streets are really dirty too, and as a result, so are all the cars. The people are reasonably nice, though service in restaurants and such (even in expensive ones!) is questionable. Went to a number of different places - a great Casino/Hotel with a bowling alley, various resturants - including a Japanese place where I tried unfiltered Japanese draught beer, which was amazing. I also tried Russian beers, which were quite good indeed. Oh, and it was really cold - it was -26 C at one point.

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Back from Moscow!

Posted Wednesday, February 7th 2007

I’m back from Moscow! Well, actually, I’ve been back since saturday, but due to lack of bad sleeping habits, work obligations and well, all around laziness, I haven’t been able to write something. I will update this post later today though, with a recap of things that I saw and did, and maybe even post some pictures.

So watch this space, comrad!

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