Universal Subscription Agency, Inc: Scam Artists? Or Just Poorly Misunderstood?

Remember this guy? The American Idol Wannabe? The nice young man (named Desmond, or Nesbit, or something) who was selling magazine subscriptions door-to-door?

Remember how he sang for me and I video taped him and showed it to you guys? Remember how I gave him $75 for a subscription to Discover Magazine? I wrote all about it in a blog post entitled "I Can't Afford to Answer the Door".

I was thinking about him the other day and wondered whatever happened to him. Did he make it onto American Idol? Has he been staying off the streets? I hope he's continuing to avoid his brother's fate of getting shot down by gang members. Did he win that subscrition selling contest based on points? Did my contribution of SEVENTY FIVE DOLLARS (oh, did I mention that already) help him win?

I also began to wonder: Did he ever turn in my subscription order? Because oddly, I haven't seen a single issue of Discover Magazine yet. And, you know, it's been five months, so I'm beginning to get a little concerned.

So I dug out my receipt and called the company (Universal Subscription Agency, Inc.) at (757) 818-9497 in Chesapeake, Virginia, and would you believe no one answered the phone? I got two different recorded messages both times that I called asking me to leave a message.

So I Googled "Universal Subscription Agency, Inc."

Unfortunately, they didn't have a website, but they are mentioned a lot by others on the internet. In fact, they're famous! See?

Rip-Off? Complaints? Scam? I'm sure there must be some misunderstanding, so I clicked on a few of these links, including one where a Former Employee Tells All. He talks about how Universal Subscription Agency, Inc. is a virtual cult and that they lure in, brainwash, and bully them into selling magazine subscriptions. How the sales people are just as much a victim as the customer and how Universal Subscription Agency, Inc. are just a bunch of highway robbers. It's quite a story, really. You should read it. [dramatic pause] Seriously.

This can't be true though, can it? I think I'll just try calling them again later. By the way, did I mention that the name of this company is Universal Subscription Agency, Inc.? And that their phone number is (757) 818-9497? I'm sure there's just a mix-up in the subscription department or something. I mean, my receipt even has an address and a FAX number, so it must be legit, right? RIGHT???

Because if this turns out to have been a rip-off (perish the thought), I might have to bad mouth them (Universal Subscription Agency, Inc) on my blog or something. I would have to keep saying their name (Universal Subscription Agency, Inc) over and over so that anybody else encountering these people (Universal Subscription Agency, Inc) will know what they're in for and not fall for it the way I did. I might have to start up a website about them (Universal Subscription Agency, Inc) and all the other scams out there to help educate people so that they wouldn't be able to do to you what they did to me.

But until then, I'll just go on about my business and blog about puppies and rainbows.

And goats.

Goat Thing of The Day

Faithful NGIP reader, Wayne (aka Architectcritic), sent in this photo from his trip to Kenya...

(from Wayne's Flickr page)

Cantankerous Landlords and Crotchety Old Men (Who Yell at Cars)

For the last ten years or so, I've been waking up in the morning, not sure at first which bed I'm in. If you don't know who you're going to wake up next to each morning, it's time to simplify your life.

And I thought I was. Of course, when you live in two cities, four hundred miles apart, owning two of everything doesn't exactly have a minimizing effect. In fact, anything you do to simplify your ridiculously overstuffed existence is a joke as long as your TWO HOUSES and WEEKLY PLANE TRIPS are beating you about the face and neck. What is that you're doing? Donating a bag of books to the library? HA! I laugh at your silly gesture of reduction. Why not try laying off the Southwest Airlines commute? Or hey, I know! What about moving in with your husband after 9 years of marriage and getting rid of half your stuff in one fell swoop, huh? Is THAT simple enough for ya?

What I can't (or shouldn't) do right now is sell my house in Los Angeles. And so I must rent. Blech.

"Landlord" is a four letter word. It conjures up images of Eddie Murphy wanting to kill one. Where did that word come from, anyway: Landlord? It sounds like some medieval concept from England where one is Lord of the Land. Yes, I am Lord of my Land and I command thee to hand over thy hard-earned farthings for the privelege of living on this land of mine of which I am Lord lest I throw ye in the dungeon!

I just want the people to pay the rent on time and not break my stuff. Is that too much to ask? Will I have to put signs all over the property like this one that I saw on the Passive Aggressive Notes blog?




And don't you think I should be worrying about finding a tenant first, before worrying about how they are going to destroy my brand new kitchen? And how they are going to let their over-the-size-limit dog pee all over my brand new floors and let pee puddles sit there for days, staining in the shapes of various US Presidential profiles?

Oh, and please do tell me all your landlord/tenant horror stories so that I can lose as much sleep as possible.

I'm going to be one cantankerous SOB when I grow up.

And speaking of Cantankerous people...

I ask you: Who stops to blog while waiting for the ambulance to arrive? Talking about "If I don't make it, it's been nice and all." Who opens their next blog post from their hospital bed with "I'm in renal failure"? And then writes another post that unfolds the drama of what happened after the ambulance arrived?

Joe from Crotchety Old Man Yells at Cars. That's who! And for such dedication and blogger bravery in the face of renal failure, I am giving him the Purple Kidney Blogger Award.

Joe, you've got a whole internet fan base (plus the HBDC community) behind you right now wishing you and Mrs. C the best. Get well soon, buddy!

If you don't know the Crotchety Old Man, go over and say hello and wish him a speedy recovery. And I'll let him tell you the ambulance waiting story HERE.  (Tell him Nanny Goats sent ya!)

Goat Thing of The Day

Okay, kids. Brace yourself for this next picture. It was shown to me by Mike from Mike's Mixed Memories.

How To Create Your Twitter Handle in Two Easy Steps

So this spammer  person on Twitter with the very legitimate sounding name of Fulton604 started following me. Like a trenchcoat-wearing dark alley hoodlum who says, "Psst! Hey, buddy" kind of following me. Fulton604 is following 1,299 people, but only has 67 followers. I wonder what that means.

Actually, it makes me want to change my name to Plexus437. It sounds so cool. Like an alien space ship / area code mashup. Or, HEY - I know. This will be a new thing like How To Create Your Twitter Handle in Two Easy Steps:

1. Take the make or model of your first car.
2. Guess how many Jelly Bellies are in this Elvis portrait:

Put the two together and you've got your next Twitter handle! Mine would be Datsun18. No wait! Datsun19.

Fulton604's last tweet wants to know if I'm an older guy looking for a hot girl to take out and treat me right.

Why, yes. Yes I am. How did you know? Was it my masculine first name that made you think I was male? Was it all my twitter messages about adult diapers and cryogenic head preserving that clued you in to the fact that I'm "older"? And who isn't looking for a hot girl? You are SO smart. You're my hero, Fulton604. I wish I was just. like. you.

Then Fulton604 broke my heart. When I checked his Twitter page a couple days later, it was gone. GONE! I panicked. Where was I going to find "easyurl" hot girls now? I hyperventilated as I felt my new twitter buddy slip right out of my hands. I cried. I sobbed. I bawled.

Then I got this email:

 

Whew! I thought I'd lost him. And Velva? Yeah, that doesn't sound sexual or anything.

       Follow me on Twitter!

Goat Thing of The Day

 

(seen at the Surfing Goat Dairy on Maui)

Teh Keyboard HAtes Me, But What Cn I Do Abou Tit?

I have a drinking problem. No wait - that's not it. It's a typing problem. My "the"s always come out "teh" and I keep losing Ts to the subsequent word, like when I'm trying to say "about it" or "thought it", it always comes out like this:

abou tit

though tit

What IS that, a Freudian slip? What is my obsession with tits? Oh sure I'll catch one now and again and correct it <--- including this one right here.

So if you are a blogger and I've left a "tit" on your blog somewhere in the comments section, I'd like to apologize right here and now.

Yeah, I've probably dropped some "tits" everywhere. How embarrassing, the thought of leaving them stranded like that out in the blogosphere. I've been typing since high school, when I had a typing class - boy THAT class sucked big you-know-whats. The teacher was awful. Here's how awful she was: It was a TYPING class and the VALEDICTORIAN of our class couldn't get an A out of her, virtually smudging his perfect 4.0 (except we had these things called AP classes whose grades counted one point higher than a normal class, and I'm sure he got As in those and thereby graduated with more than a 4.0, which should theoretically be impossible, but since when does any school district run on logic?)

So this "tit" thing. Does it somehow imply that I'm a sex addict, like Russell Brand? Or Bill Clinton? Or, whatever the female equivalent of that would be? Samantha Jones, I suppose.

Or maybe it's less disturbing than that and I'm merely dyslexic. Because I also often type "your" as "yoru", and you'll also notice that my "tits" are actually formed by swapping the "t" and the space, right? Right?

Hey, did you hear the one about the dyslexic who walked into a bra?

So anyway, with my previous post eluding to Megan Fox's upper quadrant and now this, one might think my blog has taken on a new theme. That's right - It's Boobs Week at Nanny Goats in Panties. Tune in next week when we'll hear Nanny Goats say: "So I was in Stockholm the other day with Olga, the Traveling Bra..."

All right, this ends our show for today, thank you for coming. Exit doors are on the right. Also, for the men, we have forehead-dabbing cloths on the tables out in the hallway to help you recover from all this "tit talk". For those needing further assistance, you will find cold shower accomodations down the hall - just follow the signs. Please leave in an orderly fashion and you may now turn your cell phones back on. And don't forget to stop at the gift shop counter on your way out for your free key chain or whatever crap they're giving away out there.

Ta ta! (or is that Tatas?) Sorry, okay, I'm really done with that now.

Goat Thing of The Day

One of my blogbuds, Cheri, of Insignificant Ramblings was at the Sequoia Zoo, up in Eureka, California, where the goats have issues. Like this guy, who thinks he is a flamingo.

Or a drumstick.

Necklace? What Necklace?

Entertainment Weekly has this page called "News Style & Notes Hunter" where readers allegedly see some fashion item on a celebrity and then write in asking where they can get the same thing. Because people can't dress themselves without emailing a magazine inquiring about fashion and then waiting 3-6 months for a reply, at which point said fashion advice is no doubt, no longer fashionable. But I'm veering off the road here.

A woman wanted to know where she could get the necklace that Megan Fox wore in the Transformers sequel.

 

(click to enlarge - all right, i know how that sounds, but it's not like i said 'click to augment')

OK, the last thing I'm going to notice here is her silly necklace. Am I right, people?

Goat Thing of The Day

I'd like to thank DG of Diary of a Mad Bathroom for sending this one into NGIP...

 

(what is that, a backpack?)

Now if only I knew which website this came from so I could properly credit it....Hmmmmmmm.... I don't suppose any of you know? Oh never mind, I'll figure it out later, after I've located my garage.