PennSilverTaco's "Perfect 5-Lug Regular Cab" Build, Aspergers, and General BS MegaThread!

@shakerhood

On the day I got my driver's license in May 2011, my mom gave me her credit card to use. Except for putting gas in the Tacoma and doing grocery shopping for the family, the credit card was to be used for EMERGENCIES ONLY unless I was given explicit permission to use it for something like dinner with friends.

I strictly adhered to these rules and never got in trouble with my parents. One day in 2011 or 2012, I got a call from Geek Squad telling me that my Fujifilm point-and-shoot digital camera was beyond repair and I would be getting new one for free under my Black Tie "Shit Happens" warranty. I had my eye on a slightly more expensive Fujifilm model, and the price difference combined with a new "Shit Happens" protection plan amounted to about $60. This was like right after my birthday or something, so my mom told me that the camera and the new protection plan were on her. I hopped in my Tacoma, drove out to Best Buy, and picked out the camera I wanted. Thinking nothing of it, I swiped my mom's credit card. I was asked for my driver's license, and I asked why. I'd seriously never been asked for ID when using my parents' credit cards before, so this was new to me. The woman behind the counter said it was policy, and I told them the truth. I had no credit card of my own, this card was my mom's, and I had permission to use it for the purpose of buying a new camera. The woman went and got her manager, who upheld the policy, and then a heated argument ensued. I had just driven 20 minutes from my home in another county (I live Bucks County; My go-to Best Buy was and still is in Montgomery County). I had maybe twenty bucks in my wallet and no credit card of my own, and even though I had money in my account, if I remember correctly my ATM card wasn't working properly or I'd lost it, and I was still waiting on a new one to arrive. My only option if these bureaucrats didn't listen to reason was to get back in my truck, drive 20 minutes back home, get cash from my mom, drive back out to Best Buy to pick up the camera, and then drive back home again. That's like an hour and a half of local driving! I called my mom on the phone while this was happening and explained the situation, then asked if she convince them. The said that the person on the other end of the phone could be anybody. I told my mom I was coming back home for the cash, hung up, and stormed out of the Best Buy.

I really needed that camera that day, so I hopped in the truck, drove all the way back home, got cash from my mom, and drove back. The same woman was still working there, and I apologized before explaining why I'd gotten so upset. She accepted my apology and said she totally understood, but again gave me the whole "store policy" runaround. I bought my new camera and left. It is my opinion that if people made exceptions every once in a while, other people wouldn't be as angry and the world would be a much better place.

 

After the Best Buy debacle, I gave my mom her credit card back and my dad gave me one of his. My mom has a very common woman's name, but while my dad has a different name than I do, our first names both start with the letter "C." Whenever using his card, I sign only the first letter of my first name and my last name. 99% of people do not question it.

Still didn't work with Best Buy though. I had at least one other argument with a best buy cashier in 2012-2013 when I tried to make a purchase of less than $100 and they still wouldn't complete the transaction because my name didn't match the one on my dad's card...

I finally got my own credit card almost a year ago, and my very first Best Buy purchase with that card was a spur-of-the-moment (emergency) purchase of a brand new $700 Nikon SLR camera at a store in Wyomissing in July 2016, when my 2012 Nikon D5100 quit working at the Super Chevy Show at Maple Grove Raceway in nearby Mohnton. My card has the chip and Best Buy had chip readers by then. I was not asked for ID when I bought the camera! WTF?

 

@Plain Jane Taco
@LocoLocal
@Iamraiderpower

The other thing that annoys me is being carded to buy M-rated video games! Unlike alcohol or tobacco, it is not against the law for adults to purchase violent/sexually explicit video games for minors. I've been hooked on Grand Theft Auto since I was 13, when my uncle got Vice City for Christmas in 2002 and let me play it when he, my aunt, and my cousins came to visit us in February 2003. My parents got me Vice City for my 14th birthday in March 2003, and I credit that game for getting me through 8th grade without seriously injuring even one school bully. Blaming GTA when a teenager shoots up his (or her) school is like blaming a gun for killing a person or banning Pit Bull-type dogs from an entire county because a few such dogs attacked people. It's all on the person... I played entirely too much GTA in 8th, 9th, and 10th grade, but I could never fathom harming innocent people. Believe it or not, I didn't even like killing innocent bystanders in GTA and still don't! I only kill the people who I feel deserve it, even when playing as a certain meth-dealing Canadian-American psychopath in GTA 5!

8th grade was the worst! Few things felt better during the last few months of middle school than coming home at the end of a miserable day, heading down to the basement, switching on my PS2, and instantly being transported back in time to 1986, where I could steal vehicles and drive those vehicles around a fictional city in Florida, blasting rock music on the in-game car radio (V-Rock, Wave 103, and Emotion 98.3 were my favorite stations) while causing limitless mayhem.

What I did on Vice City, described in emoticons...








Anyway, I am flattered when I get carded by a bartender or a bouncer at a bar or restaurant I've never been to, especially since I am almost 30!

When it comes to M-rated video games, however, I know I don't look like I'm under 17. And like I said above, it's not against the law to buy such a game for a minor. It's also not against the law to bring a little kid to an R-rated movie if you are legally an adult. The only exceptions to the rule are NC-17 and X-rated movies. Some video games are rated above M as "Adults Only."

The reason I am so annoyed is that I may look under 21 to some people, but there's no way in hell I look like a 16-year old kid. My mom and dad never got carded when buying these games for me, even when they were younger. My parents are both in their late 50s and could pass for being 45 or younger! On top of that I rarely use a credit or debit card to pay for video games. I pay in cash.

My name's Charlie. I'm almost 30. I like to buy violent video games that I play by myself and with my friends who are the same age as me. I'm paying in COLD HARD CASH. My money is green. It's bad enough that older cashiers (typically women over 45) make it obvious they don't approve of my purchase and probably form an unfair opinion. My name, address, and other info is already in the system at Best Buy and Game Stop. Why the hell do you need my license?

 

@Plain Jane Taco
@LocoLocal
@Iamraiderpower

And then my most recent beef with regards to business transactions is when I am running an errand for work and I'm using either a business check or my female boss's credit card. Actually, it's not that recent. It's been going on as long as I've had this job, and it generally does not happen at smaller/family-owned and/or well-established businesses my employer does regular business with. Nor does it happen at most local businesses within 5 minutes of where I work. Even Best Buy has been a pleasure to do business with (for both work-related purchases and personal ones) since they started using those damn chip card readers.

I encounter the biggest problems at stores that are part of a national retail chain (Home Depot, Staples, Kohl's) and typically have high employee turnover rates. A high employee turnover rates means that it seems like there is a new person there every week, a new person who doesn't who you are or where you're from...

One thing that annoys me to no end is employees who have no idea how to work the check reader. They don't question the validity of the check, or whether or not I am who I say I am; They are just clueless. If I mastered driving a stick shift in less than 20 minutes, then a high school student should be able to master the check machine in an hour or less!

And then my absolute biggest pet peeve would be people who don't know that a business check and a personal check are totally different things, and become suspicious because the address on my driver's license doesn't match the address on the check. I regularly use business checks. I have no problem showing you my license to expedite the process! What annoys me is that I've lost count of how many times a cashier has become suspicious because the address on my driver's license and the address on the check don't match. NEWS FLASH! The address on the check is the address of the bar where I work. Nobody, not even the owner, has that address on their driver's license!

I also HATE when they write down my driver's license number or photocopy my license. I'm just the middle man; the errand runner...

The phone number, address, and all other crucial info are on the check, and none of those are mine. My biggest fear was having the feds or the local police show up at my door or pull me over to question me about why a check bounced. Some employees at various places have assured me that this will not happen...

 

@Plain Jane Taco
@LocoLocal
@Iamraiderpower

In the winter of 2015-2016, we got almost no snow...

However, in January-February 2016, we got a whole damn winter season worth of snow in one weekend!

These are some pictures of my parents' old house with my truck and my parents' vehicles in the driveway during that snowstorm!

 

This is sometime in the summer of 2016, hours after the very first time I ever had a blowout... In October 2013, my truck had about 31K miles on it and the factory Dunlop tires were starting to show their age. My dad bought me 4 new Platinum Apex 16-inch rims wrapped in BFGs (shipped to my house from Tirerack.com). The factory 15-inch spare remained. For more than 2 years, I never had a flat and it didn't matter. In April 2015, I had to replace one BFG because I somehow took a chunk out of the sidewall. Then, I blew out a tire on the way home from Puck. I made it home, but had to AAA the next morning at like 6am-7am. What you see in the picture is the AAA guy trying to mount one of my factory wheels that had been sitting in the garage since 2013. We tried to get the spare tire down, but the crank thing was rusted. Me and the AAA guy then discovered that the stock 15-inch wheel wouldn't fit because of the wheel spacer. The AAA guy put the flat tire back on, and dispatched a flat bed to take my truck like 3 miles to STS. I got a new tire under the road hazard warranty...

When I brought my truck to Butch's so he could repair the damage done by the drunk driver, he installed a new spare tire mount...

 

August 6, 2016...

One of the perks of entering your truck in the show (even the non-judged section like I did) is that you are free to drive it around certain parts of the showfield. It was like 95°F that day, so getting to explore the show in my air-conditioned Tacoma was pretty much heaven on earth! By the way, my Taco's A/C blows 41°F at the vents!



More pictures from that day:

This is one of the only times I'll be flattered if someone touches my truck:

 

These are the pictures I took at the same place a few months before I posted this...

 

They might not be 1st Amendment friendly but store says nothing about 2nd Amendment. Just use your the camera on the phone. If anybody says anything just point and say the sign doesn't say anything about phones.

 

Take a look at my signature LOL...

Here's my "spin" on it...

Democracy is two HOA board members telling the owner of a pickup truck he can't park his truck in his own driveway because it has a company logo on it...

Liberty is the same truck owner demonstrating his truck's posi-traction rear end in the HOA president's flower garden!

 

I don't see "no shirt, no shoes, no service" stickers

 

When I first read your title, I thought this was related to PINAC filming cops. Wow I never knew photography was such a big deal like this, I've never had anyone tell me I could not take photos of something. There is no law against it, they can't stop you...its not like Korea. Take your photos and if anyone says anything tell em to pound sand

 

Rather ironic, isn't it?

 

What's even more ironic is the cops in my area are pretty freakin' awesome when it comes to photography...

 

Like I said, cops in my area are pretty cool as long as you don't interfere with the investigation... They didn't care when I took these pictures back in 2015...

I was walking Tully in Doylestown when I happened up on the aftermath of a multi-car accident on Main Street...

An old woman was driving that black Ford Fusion. She clipped the left rear corner of that grayish brown Infiniti, which almost ripped the left rear wheel off and pushed the Infiniti into the back the Buick Century. The Buick was pushed into a black Lexus SUV (hidden behind the cop with the red and white stick). The Fusion then flipped over and landed on the windshield of a parked GMC Envoy.

The woman had been cut out of the Fusion and taken to the hospital by the time I got there...

 

Guitar, Jimi Hendrix-style!

 

Uhhh.. not quite how it works.

 

The worst thing I've ever done when someone had a problem with taking pictures of their truck is floor it... Some asshole demanded to see my camera and seemed like he was gonna reach through my window... I floored it. Nothing happened...

All that shit over pictures of a 2001 GMC Sonoma!

 

Assholes can think they have whatever authority they want.

But I meant, going into a privately owned business that displays its rules for service and then telling them how we do things in America and to pound sand is a sure fire way to both become the asshole, and if the owners had any balls, wind up having a sit down with an officer.

If it says no, it means no. They're protected by law, visitors are not.

 

Yeah, I can respect the rules... Just don't expect me to be happy...

The one thing I can't help but wonder is if I was the cause of the no photography policy...

I do not remember seeing that sign there the day I took pictures of the octopus tank...