Nothing Made By Pentax For Me, Thanks Anyway. Not Ever.

Something really weird happened tonight.

Everybody probably knows by now that I’m crazy about cameras, digital picture frames, computers, and pretty much anything in the electronics  area.  I’d rather look at electronics than clothing.  I’d rather wander around in the computers and cameras than look at shoes.

I’d been looking at Pentax cameras, so I went to their website and found their forum.  Someone had asked a question I actually knew the answer to, so I signed up, joined the forum, and answered the guy’s question.  I thought maybe I’d found a place where I could talk “electronics” with other geeky people.  Um, no.

Bam.  Some other guy mocked me, and complained about the link in my answer – which was exactly what the original poster was looking for – and the next thing I knew, I got an email telling me I was, and I quote, “banned for life” from the Pentax forum.

This does not ruin my life or really affect me in any real way, but it shocked me so much I actually burst into tears, sitting here at my computer.  I mean, what happened?  What kind of people are working for Pentax?  What kind of company is Pentax?  I guess I know the answer to both questions now.

I am no longer interested in a Pentax camera.

Update:  I just got an email from Adam, the Pentax forum administrator, informing me that he’s going to give me “the benefit of the doubt” and let me back into the forum.  Any comments I make will have to be moderated before they post, of course, because that’s how we deal with people like me.  Etc.

Pentax, why would I want to participate in a forum with people who obviously don’t believe me when I tell them I’m just a geek who wanted to talk electronics, and not a spammer? All I did on your forum was answer some guy’s question.   Why would I want to hang out with people who treated a newbie like scum and assumed the worst before they even knew me?

I don’t, that’s what.  I prefer to hang out with nice people.

Thanks anyway, Pentax, but, you know, I tend to judge a business by the people it chooses to represent it.

I will never be interested in a Pentax camera, ever again.

What The Bloody Frick Has Happened To Us As Human Beings?

Mamacita says: Watch out for the language on this one:

Justin Smythe, 44, was arrested in California a few years ago, and freely admitted that he’d given a 13-year-old girl enough booze and drugs to loosen her up so he could, and did, have  sex with her, many times and in many different “ways,” and that he’d enjoyed every minute of it.  After all, he stated to the press, doesn’t every man love to fuck young girls?  Mr. Smythe was unrepentant, and expressed amazement that this episode was the cause of any negative feelings toward him from anyone at all.  When realizing that his evening’s recreation could possibly send him to prison in the United States, Smythe hopped a plane and relocated to France, where he was received with open arms.  Once there, he again took up his vocation of making “art” films.  Many Americans claim that Smythe’s behaviors should be excused, because he’d had some traumas in his past, and because if he were imprisoned, they wouldn’t have any more of his art films to watch.  Great genius, they argue, should not be judged in the same way as ordinary people should be judged.  Nobody seemed very interested in inquiring about the little girl: was she injured by Smythe, in his determination to have his way with her?  Make that “ways.”  Was her body harmed?  Torn?  Had she been frightened?  Terrorized?  Overpowered into submission by a man almost four times her age?  Oh, well, what’s done is done.  The important thing now is to stop stigmatizing poor Smythe.  He’s been away from the States for a long time, and he wants to come home, and we’re ready for some more ART FILMS!  All’s well that ends well, you know.  Besides, it was a long time ago.  The man has suffered enough.  Leave him alone and let him go free.  Sheesh.

Does it matter what name is used?  Would your opinion change if the person’s name was “Bill Jones?”   “Khy’atta Mgomba?” “Paco Fernandez?”  “Mohammed Erim?”  “Wong Sing Kam?”  “Mary Ann Nolan?”  “Roman Polanski?”

Because it doesn’t matter in the least to me what name is used.  ANYONE who does something like this should be prosecuted to the full extent of the law, for whoever would do anything like this is a monster and a pervert.

And I really don’t care about his traumatic past or his self-control issues or his “different drum.”  I care only that a grown man raped a child, and there ARE no excuses for it.  Not a single one.

Many years have passed.  That doesn’t matter in the least.

Roman Polanski, of his own free will, laid a violent hand on a little girl, and for that, he should pay.  Big time.  And anyone who believes he should be shown leniency is as guilty as he is.

Not all of childhood’s monsters live under the bed.  Some of them are walking free.  Worse still, some of them are walking free because we as a society don’t seem to have the balls to stand up and say that our children’s welfare is more important than the self-esteem of a horny old man.

I call bullshit on this one.

Ten Things Tuesday

Ten Things TuesdayMamacita says:

1.  Ugly Betty is starting to get on my nerves.  Why can’t these people just tell the truth to each other?

2.  Scrubs is over.  It had a good ending, but I’m still sad.

3.  Waiting, waiting, waiting, waiting. . . . the phone rang all day with annoying robots and wrong numbers, and now that I’m expecting a real call, the phone is silent.

4.  My students are not afraid to bare their emotions on paper and in discussions.  This is a good and wonderful thing.  I might love them even more now.

5.  This blog is not allowing my IE friends to comment, and sometimes, not even to read.  If anyone knows what is causing this, please email me, because this issue is killing me.

6.  How can a person this tired still not be able to sleep?

7.  It’s cold here now.  I do not approve of this.

8.  My textbook is full of errors.  This is absolutely and 100% unacceptable.  Where are the editors?  WHO are the editors?  I could look, but that’s work.

9.  Eric Mabius is cute.

10.  So is Tony Plana.

Poetry Friday: Emily Dickinson, and Katie Rose Belford

poetryfridaybutton Mamacita says:  Emily Dickinson knew me; that’s the only explanation.

How else could she have. . . . known?

This first poem helped me understand faith.  The second confirmed my belief that Dickinson rocked because Katie Rose Belford and her mother both mentioned it and loved it.  And you know something; when one of a junior-high-school girl’s book heroines loved a poem, that was confirmation.  Katie Rose’s mother, widowed young, took comfort in the second poem, which amazed Katie Rose.  Whoever expects one’s MOTHER to, well, understand such things?  (And oh, calloo, callay, all of the Katie Rose and Beany books have been RE-ISSUED!)

I Never Saw A Moor

I never saw a moor,
I never saw the sea;
Yet know I how the heather looks,
And what a wave must be.

I never spoke with God,
Nor visited in heaven;
Yet certain am I of the spot
As if the chart were given.

===========================

You Left Me, Sweet, Two Legacies

You left me, sweet, two legacies,–
A legacy of love
A Heavenly Father would content,
Had He the offer of;

You left me boundaries of pain
Capacious as the sea,
Between eternity and time,
Your consciousness and
me.

All For Want Of A Strong Stud

Mamacita says:  Once upon a time, there was a lady who had two sweet little cats named Vera and Millie.  One day, it was discovered that Vera and Millie liked to pee on the carpet on the landing at the foot of the stairs, behind a big mirror which was supposed to be hanging on the hall wall but which was at that time still sitting on the carpet leaning against the landing wall because the lady had yet to find a strong enough stud to support it.

The lady thought for a while about stuffing both cats in the crockpot and serving them up for a weekend brunch, but decided to forgive them, clean the carpet, hang the mirror, and pretend nothing bad had happened at all.

After all, once a lady has found a nice, big, strong stud, any ending is BOUND to be a happy one.

The end.  🙂    🙂   🙂

P.S.  P.U.