Random Thoughts: Blockbuster

I am less than pleased with the service provided by Blockbuster for their through-the-mail rental system. Certain things are and always have been listed as "Very Long Wait" since adding them to the queue. Other things are listed as Available, but never ship. The second one is more troubling because I believe it is a form a throttling. I will have a mediocre movie in my queue that I am willing to give a chance. I put it down the list around 20 or so. I have another much more popular movie in my queue right at the top. Both are listed as Available. I end up receiving the mediocre movie, almost without fail and the wife scolds me for adding nothing but crappy movies to the top of our queue. In the end, we still get to see the good movies because we will trade in the bad movie for a good one in the store, but it's still annoying. If something is listed as available and its at the top of my queue, why isn't it the next one shipped, damn it?!? I wonder if they need some remedial instruction on the technical definition of a queue... First-in, first-out (aka, FIFO).

Anyway, I am not annoyed enough to cancel my service. I'm not even annoyed enough to call and complain, but I am real close. If one more piece of crap comes in from the depths of my queue, I might just call and bitch. Maybe they'll throw me some additional in-store rentals or something.