Post by pitbulllady on Aug 31, 2009 21:34:20 GMT -5
First, I want to apologize for blowing up about the "Save Randall" campaign, but I want everyone on here to know, there are few things, short of someone trying to take away my animals, that piss me off worse that for someone to suggest that I have nothing to do besides sit around twiddling my thumbs all day. I have had to deal with this since I first started teaching, this perception that my job starts at 8 am and ends when the school bell rings for students to get on the bus to go home, and that all I have to do is sit and watch a bunch of little angels smiling and beaming from their seats with pure joy of being there. One of the reason I can relate to Randall so well is because of all the crap I have to put up with, for so little pay, and my paycheck has been cut to the bone. I bring home less now that I did six, seven years ago, thanks to budget cuts and increases in insurance, which I have to carry, being a diabetic. I work with ZERO budget for my supplies and classroom needs, meaning I have to purchase 100% of whatever is needed for my students, out of my own pocket, and I have to complete endless stacks of paperwork that would make Wazowski's eye pop out of his head. My Principal, while fair and intelligent, is nowhere as forgiving as Roz when it comes to late or insufficient paperwork. The District is clamoring to find a reason to fire teachers to save money, even after massive lay-offs(which I was fortunate enough to avoid...THIS time), so I do not need to give them a reason to boot me out the door. I live in a state with the third highest unemployment rate in the country, INCLUDING the US territories, so my chances of finding work if I'm fired are less that the survival rate of a snowball in Hell. It is now after 10 PM, after usual bedtime, and I am JUST now finding time to sit down at the computer, so that should tell you how busy I am. On top of that, I'm involved with a legal matter-back in July, I purchased an adult, pregnant female Florida Green Water Snake off the internet from a dealer in Ohio, and paid for overnight express shipping via FedX. This was a five-foot-long, massive animal, the size of many adult Blood Pythons or a really, really big Ball Python. The guy crammed this poor animal into a 9 x 9 x 5-inch box, with no padding such as Styrofoam, and shipped her second-day air, which meant that it took two days to arrive. He did not put any cool packs in the box, and this was in 90+ degree heat. I received a rotting corpse, a dead, decomposing animal that had already bloated and burst open. You can imagine what that smelled like. I have been trying, since July 27, to collect reimbursement from this guy. On Saturday, a personal check arrived in the mail from him. Of course, I called his bank today to have it verified, and was told that there was NO money in that account, and had not been any action on that account in weeks! He deliberately, knowingly sent me a bad check, so now I'm having to pursue legal avenues to have this guy arrested on internet fraud and check fraud. On top of that, my normal female Banded Water Snake miscarried her babies and delivered them all dead, and I somehow lost a hand-made Navajo sterling silver and amber bracelet I've had for years.
On the topic of the letter writing, I'm going to pass along information that was given to us on the Foster's forum by Craig McCracken, regarding people who send letter after letter to studios or individual people who work for studios. They might read your first letter, or two, but after that, the letters go straight to File 13 when they start getting letter after letter from the same person or address. It's basically considered a form of stalking/harassment. The Pixar people aren't politicians who are elected to office. They do not need our votes to keep their jobs. If every single die-hard Randall fan quits buying Pixar stuff right now, that studio will hardly feel it. I would like to believe it would be their integrity that would be hurt, but I'm honestly not sure if they really have any at this point. A lot of people love Pixar and support everything they do JUST because they're Pixar, and they can do no wrong in the eyes of these people, who make up a LOT of the movie-going public, so they are not going to be concerned with a handful of people each sending them a lot of letters. This isn't like USARK's letter campaign, where each reptile owners sent in many copies of the same letter to many different US Representatives and Senators, depending on how many your state and district has, and where we were trying to sway politicians who depend on our votes. What WILL hopefully matter is a lot of individual people each sending in ONE letter, and this is where, hopefully, the "viral" aspect of the internet comes into play, with one person seeing something, and telling someone else, who passes it along to three or four other people, and so on. Somewhere down the line, the key is for people WE don't even know exist will find out about the campaign and if each one writes a letter to Pixar, then they will realize that Randall's fans are NOT a tiny but vocal little minority, but are many, all over the place, and THAT is what it will take to POSSIBLY make a difference.
I can only do so much, as I said, due to my lack of time, and even when I DO have a moment, the muses aren't necessarily going to cooperate. I refuse to create something half-ass for any cause. When I'm not at work, or doing things for work, I have a lot of other things on my plate to deal with, mostly negative things. I've told you about the guy who sold me the rotting snake carcass. I am also flat-broke, again, due to severe pay cuts, so I have to figure out how to feed all my animals for the next two weeks, so I have to establish priorities when it comes to what I do with my time. IF I can think of some other way to help with the campaign, I will, but right now, it's going to be difficult to do so. I just know that bombarding Pixar with a bunch of letters from the same people over and over will NOT accomplish anything.
pitbulllady
On the topic of the letter writing, I'm going to pass along information that was given to us on the Foster's forum by Craig McCracken, regarding people who send letter after letter to studios or individual people who work for studios. They might read your first letter, or two, but after that, the letters go straight to File 13 when they start getting letter after letter from the same person or address. It's basically considered a form of stalking/harassment. The Pixar people aren't politicians who are elected to office. They do not need our votes to keep their jobs. If every single die-hard Randall fan quits buying Pixar stuff right now, that studio will hardly feel it. I would like to believe it would be their integrity that would be hurt, but I'm honestly not sure if they really have any at this point. A lot of people love Pixar and support everything they do JUST because they're Pixar, and they can do no wrong in the eyes of these people, who make up a LOT of the movie-going public, so they are not going to be concerned with a handful of people each sending them a lot of letters. This isn't like USARK's letter campaign, where each reptile owners sent in many copies of the same letter to many different US Representatives and Senators, depending on how many your state and district has, and where we were trying to sway politicians who depend on our votes. What WILL hopefully matter is a lot of individual people each sending in ONE letter, and this is where, hopefully, the "viral" aspect of the internet comes into play, with one person seeing something, and telling someone else, who passes it along to three or four other people, and so on. Somewhere down the line, the key is for people WE don't even know exist will find out about the campaign and if each one writes a letter to Pixar, then they will realize that Randall's fans are NOT a tiny but vocal little minority, but are many, all over the place, and THAT is what it will take to POSSIBLY make a difference.
I can only do so much, as I said, due to my lack of time, and even when I DO have a moment, the muses aren't necessarily going to cooperate. I refuse to create something half-ass for any cause. When I'm not at work, or doing things for work, I have a lot of other things on my plate to deal with, mostly negative things. I've told you about the guy who sold me the rotting snake carcass. I am also flat-broke, again, due to severe pay cuts, so I have to figure out how to feed all my animals for the next two weeks, so I have to establish priorities when it comes to what I do with my time. IF I can think of some other way to help with the campaign, I will, but right now, it's going to be difficult to do so. I just know that bombarding Pixar with a bunch of letters from the same people over and over will NOT accomplish anything.
pitbulllady
