syntheticgerbil

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Posts posted by syntheticgerbil

  1. Posted

    The tips are part of the app, the tips are subsidizing their minimum guarantee per hour. When you go into your transaction history, it shows where they had to top you off. They pay out what you get after tips are factored in. If your tips equaled over the minimum per hour, sure, you wouldn't be giving to Postmates or Favor and instead directly to the driver, but again it will generally get buried in the average on the whole shift. Your tip might be killed by 30 minutes of no active orders two hours later, or multiple low cost orders, or some order that takes a lot of driving or waiting. These are all very likely things and at least one happens on every single one of my shifts, killing any tip overage. These companies set this up this way because it is in their best interest to make the most profit this way and then falsely advertise a rate per hour on Craigslist which you MIGHT hit. Just seems like you are ignoring the facts of the matter here because you want to feel you are doing a good job, but I am saying just save your money and do something else with it. If you want to help people, maybe throw it towards a charity of your choice instead.

     

    And you are calling me a Buscemi and yet again misunderstanding me here. I said you could NOT TIP FAVOR OR POSTMATES and they might change their business model (again for all of the math I keep doing for you and you keep ignoring). Not restaurant tipped employees or bartenders or whoever is on the $2.13/hr. scheme, it's completely different. Favor and Postmates offer an hourly guarantee independent of the federal minimum wage because they are 1099 not W2. They don't have to offer this guarantee but I am guessing it's there because no one in their right mind would work there if that were the case.

  2. Posted

    You are basically giving your money away not to the driver but Postmates or Favor themselves when you overtip if it's not a major overtip. Plus even if you decided to tip them like $15 or something for a burger, that's probably going to only happen once during their shift, so the average per hour will probably bury that and you are back at the minimum given wage.

     

    I just want to say that I hear you syntheticgerbil. This business-model seems to depend on people caring more about not looking like a douchebag to the delivery person than caring about the math.

     

    That's what I'm saying, just tip them the $5 or 15% if you just want to show you appreciated their service as a gesture of good will, I'm not saying not to tip at all (to Vader). Although actually if everyone barely tipped or did not tip, that probably would force both Postmates and Favor to change their business model because then they are paying much more to make up the difference in employee wages to hit that guarantee.

     

    And again, the only way to subvert this structure 100% is to not tip in the app and hand the delivery driver cash tips, so then the company and IRS can't track them. Then they become tipped on top of the guaranteed minimum.

     

    If this were the norm, it'd be swell because I don't care enough to report my cash tips (dishonest I know), but out of the 200 or so orders I've completed, only two people have actually given me a cash tip, and it was $5 each time.

     

    On a personal note, part of what I don't like about the insinuation about the tipping with this service is that basically it is putting blame on the customer in general, which is not fair at all. I might get annoyed when I have to go pick up a pack of cigarettes and that's it, but I have to tell myself to calm down, it's not their fault, they are using the business as it's intended and as hard as I try I'm not going to be making big money. It's really easy for the drivers to start getting mad at the customers when they have generally all have been pleasant people who say thank you and smile, and that's all I really want out of people, which is way more than I can say of restaurant staff in this job. Part of working with Favor is there's an official private Facebook group and some people start making threads blaming customers (sometimes getting in trouble for it too) and this stuff never ends well when you want to generate a bunch of overall bad will towards the customer. They can't possibly know how your business works and why it is bad and they shouldn't have to. I will text a special thank you note to people who tip over 20% when I'm on shift, but this doesn't make them a better person than the other customer just doing the standard.

     

    The best way to get into my heart as a delivery driver is not the tip, but to just come down to the front lobby of your Richie Rich condo/loft security fortress so I don't have to waste 20 minutes figuring it out. Or just live in a house and not one in a gated community. That's always pretty cool.

  3. Posted

    And I'm trying to tell you over and over, the fault lies with Postmates' payment structure not the customer. I already did the math and linked you to a similar article that details how similar the payment structure is to Favor. It seems the only difference is that with Postmates you can choose to ignore certain low paying deliveries to forfeit the minimum guarantee while on Favor you can't. Also in that city it would seem Postmates gives a slightly higher flat rate payment per completed order but these are often ultimately inconsequential because of the payment structure.  Again, unless you are very generously overtipping them or spending $30 and up on their order, you probably aren't putting them over the minimum guarantee.


    I replied here with how the payment structure works because you seem to be very confused in your original message. I'm trying to tell you that customers not tipping a lot is not the issue with the payment scheme here. You can't expect customers to egregiously tip way over the suggested 15% to make up for bad corporate decisions you have no control over. That's more than people do at restaurants even, where everyone knows tipped employees are a silly set up. I mean MAYBE you should expect more because it's basically only rich people that use these delivery services, but I am personally finding people are usually tipping 30-50% of their order anyway on smaller stuff, which still doesn't really make a dent in the guaranteed minimum.

     

    Plus this is not a hard job, it's not a ton of physical labor AT ALL. Maybe sometimes I lift over 15 pounds if I have a stack of huge pizzas? There's a lot of sitting and down time. I get a lot of Professor Layton puzzles done. In some ways it's preferable to sit in your care and wait 45 minutes for a busy restaurant to get the togo order together because you are getting paid $9/hr. to not even move or expend any gas. You don't have the grueling life as a truck driver where you are driving long distances to stay awake and are going across states alone away from your family.

  4. Posted

    Are you seriously saying that everyone who feels forced to work someplace that doesn't pay minimum wage is just being stupid/lazy and not considering all their options? Because that's a staggeringly ignorant statement to make based just on your own experience. It took me literally fifteen seconds of googling to find an article that nuances the argument a lot more than "work someplace else if you're not getting paid enough."

    That's not an article on tipped wait staff where they are being paid under minimum wage. We are partly speaking of W2 employees in that case. The drivers would be on 1099s here.

     

    If you are trying to say that drivers not getting paid a minimum wage are a problem, as I said multiple times, that is also not a problem as both Favor and Postmates have hourly guarantees over minimum wage. If they didn't pay that, don't work there,. It's an easy job to get, the turnover is high. They just want you to have a car and a phone with a data plan. I also said this multiple times and laid out the payment structure in this thread. So yes, don't work there if you are getting screwed. Don't work there ESPECIALLY if you are making under minimum wage (which you aren't). The cities where these delivery/driver app jobs are are have a plethora of other jobs, they don't exist in small cities where this would be a problem. Plus all of these people can afford to have a car.

     

    Again to repeat here, I chose the job because I can whenever I want and whatever hours I want. I realized very quickly you are barely going to make over the minimum and if I weren't needing a flexible job right now, I wouldn't do this. Also the work is so god damn easy and it's very low stress, so that is the other plus for the low pay. I am not in a situation where I need high pay at the moment, and if I cannot land a good job out of school, working full time at Favor is not a good idea to do help that situation. You aren't even guaranteed full time hours as it is. I worked at Starbucks last year for half a year and it paid $9.50 an hour on average, maybe $10/hr. with good tips some weeks and I didn't have to trash my car to do so, pay for gas, nor pay for a data plan. I made better money there but the flexibility was terrible and I was also getting way too much freelance work at the time plus my school work, so I quit. However they are desperate for full time employees plus you get good healthcare benefits at Starbucks, so if you wanted to support a family that would be a much better idea. Still the minimum wage needs to be raised.

     

    If I'm ignorant, whatever. I laid out everything in multiple paragraphs way more nuanced than you want to shit on me for. I have typed more than enough on this if you want to just disregard me. I also actually DO this job you know. I also have major financial issues for so many reasons and I am trying to get myself through school again. I've also had probably 7 other shitty unskilled jobs in my life as well. I have been in a lot of bad financial conditions a lot in my life, probably a lot more than a lot of the bleeding hearts here on this forum. I am not ignorant of what's up.

  5. Posted

    If you are getting paid under minimum wage, you can find somewhere that pays more and then have slightly more money to keep the heat on.

     

    Just trying to keep in sight of the big picture here, are we arguing about whether we should tip? Whether tipping is unfair? Whether we should support higher minimum wages everywhere?

    I wrote a lot about the math and the argument I have is don't worry about these Postmate drivers. Also as I explained earlier, because the way the business works, overtipping them probably doesn't get them over their minimum for multiple reasons, so it's probably pointless anyway. Just give them the 15% or $5 whatever is more (and you don't even have to do $5) to show them that you don't hate them, I guess. The problem lies in the payment structure of both Favor and Postmates, not the customer here.

     

    The also all own cars and nice enough phones (which I put myself on a plan for so I could do this) so it's not like these delivery drivers are living a hard life the way a bagger at a grocery store who gets a ride to work might be.

     

    It's a job where the flexibility is key AND they still make above minimum wage. The people who think they are going to be making big money per hour with Favor quickly learn they are going to be on the minimum for 75-90% of the time and leave to do something else where they might get paid more. Or they get in such a rush to complete orders they start parking illegally and got booted or towed, which is a big issue here in Austin. I don't really give a shit because I know I'm going to make the minimum, so I will park blocks away and walk and the customer can just wait.

     

    EDIT: Okay, so there is one surefire way to make sure the Postmates drivers get paid well, and it's to give them a significant amount of cash. Don't tip in the app, so the tips never get reported to either Postmates or the IRS and then they can't use that to factor in the minimum per hour. So then you will be making the minimum guarantee per hour plus cash tips you can then choose never to report to the IRS. Favor forces you to tip $2, not sure if Postmates forces a minimum, but if they do, tip twice.

     

    Also, don't do this.

  6. Posted

    Oof  :unsure:

     

    The only way to make a statement about illegal business practices or that tipped wages suck is to just not work there and tell other people to not work there and report the place if they are paying under minimum wage in tips on a W2. As long as people keep taking the job and minimum wage stays undesirable, it's not worth working there mad and screwed over all day.

     

    It's the same with Favor/Postmates if not so many took these jobs they would pay more as an incentive but as it stands now, even if turnover is high they let anyone with a car and a phone come take the place of the last person. It's just not a good job to support a family on.

     

    Every city. No market provides unlimited opportunities for unskilled laborers. Even if there were unlimited unskilled jobs out there, that doesn't mean that everyone would have access to them. In a world where some people have to walk 21 miles to get to their low wage job, it is wrong to assume that people have easy access to unskilled work.

     

    Minimum wage for everyone is important, of course. It's just that people who work for tips are more vulnerable to abuse because of how they're paid.

    Well again, if it's that dire of a situation where the company is stealing funds, they need to report it. The rest, like walking 21 miles is a public transportation and minimum wage problem. And that is definitely not a common case. Also the article states he is getting paid over minimum wage, otherwise I'm betting there's some gas station or something on the way that would pay minimum wage and not be such a walk. He's also not working unskilled labor because he's at a factory. Whatever the situation is, he needs the few more bucks an hour. It's sad, but raising minimum wage would probably bump his wage. The dude still has a choice. Plus at the end it says he doesn't want a car because his coworkers were going to buy him one, instead he likes his routine.

     

    If anything it would be easier to make the case that a person is having a hard time getting hired anywhere because they are a convicted felon and only certain businesses would hire them.

  7. Posted

    No, they don't always have that choice. That's like saying they always have the choice to work somewhere that pays more. Or that everyone has the choice to be a multimillionaire CEO.

    Yeah that's not the same at all. In what city are there not enough department stores, drug stores, coffee shops, Sonics, pet stores, and whatever else that hire anyone with a pulse on a guaranteed minimum wage? Even the most podunk of places still have these, probably even more likely than restaurants. Hell you could be a greeter at Walmart and get paid more. I think you are living in a dream world.

     

    If anything it's harder to get a waiting job. Bartending even harder.

     

    If Bob Cratchit can't afford medicine for Tiny Tim, why doesn't he simply go work for someone else who pays better? Scrooge is under no obligation to pay Cratchit more, if the market has valued Cratchit's work at the expense Scrooge is paying him.

    If I recall in Christmas Carol, Scrooge wasn't stealing money from Cratchit and minimum wage didn't come into the tale. Again worry about minimum wage for everyone, not only tipped employees.

  8. Posted

    I don't know anyone who's waited tables for a long time and not occasionally made under minimum wage.

     

    Also, I've seen enough local news stories about restaurants having to pay tons of money in back pay because they never appropriately compensated their employees when they made under minimum wage to know that it's common practice to stiff the employee. The most recent judgment against a local business was for a place called Sophia's House of Pancakes.

     

    Assuming that businesses obey the law is not a good place to start. It's standard practice to abuse the kinds of workers who live off of tips.

    If they are making under minimum wage they always have the choice to not work at a place that doesn't run an illegal operation. They can also tell on them to whatever work force commission is in their state to handle these. There are lots of other unskilled jobs that are easy to get that pay minimum wage or slightly over. Lots of times they only require a pulse. I don't see why it's so important to be a waiter if you are getting screwed. It's a minimum wage problem for everyone, not woe-is-me waitstaff types only.

     

    I just want to clarify: I'm not suggesting people tip 20-25% of their Postmate order if they are getting, like, an XBone delivered to them or something. I think I said it earlier, but 20-25% of a MEDIAN priced order of similar size/weight is I think appropriate. I would probably tip somewhere in the $10-$15 range for an order like that. Might be pretty generous, but it's not like I'm ordering XBones every Saturday.

    Because the problem lies in the math. Even if everyone were generous, the way the service is set up is that they would still most likely get under the guarantee unless they got orders that could be done quickly and orders that were worth more. If you order a burger like you started the thread with and tipped 25% it's still not a big help, they got stuck with an order for a burger for 45 minutes when they probably want an order with $50 worth of food to actually get paid well. But again, that's not the customers fault and I don't think the customer should really worry about it, because ultimately the problem lies with Postmates and Favor for not paying enough.

     

    And I looked it up, at least in Newport Beach CA, if you take all given orders with Postmates (It might even be forced to take all like Favor now) you get $12/hr. guaranteed. So if you purchase an $8 burger and I don't know what you get per delivery, let's just say $5 even though I'm betting that's high. If you tip them 50% of your burger, assuming they are delivering at 1.5 an hour your tip just was probably pissed away in the wind because the company had to up the hourly to the $12/hr. guarantee so the driver would have been getting paid the same even if you had tipped $2. So really you overtipping isn't really making a difference here unless you want to basically tip the price of the burger completely. The only way you could seriously make a difference is to not waste their time with small orders, only order big, and then tip 20% on that.

     

    I've had orders where I buy an ice cream and drive it 20 minutes away melted. One recently where I bought two McDonald's fries for a bunch of lazy girls in a dorm literally one block away, finding time to park was longer than actually walking there. These are all pointless orders that are not worth it, but again none of that is their fault on the customer end because these services allow for that and the blame lies with the company.

     

    Part of the reason I work late is because almost all restaurants are closed and fast food over and over means I finally have the possibility of making over the minimum because I can get like 5 or 6 orders done in two hours sometimes and the more high they are the better they tip. Plus I don't have to deal with surly restaurant staff. Otherwise the only actual way to make over the minimum before that time (late afternoon/early evening) is big orders only.

     

    When people say "service industry" it goes far beyond tipped employees and really the work varies and the pay is not always bad, but the pay could be better across the board because it's all unskilled work that doesn't necessarily have to mean poverty.

     

    But this is actually another reason I'm very opposed to adding tips to any service. Banning tips and requiring employers to just PAY their employees makes things less subject to abuse (part of the problem with tipping is that it is a very fluid, under-the-table kind of system, much of the time), as the paper trail is much clearer and straight-forward.

    Yes, it's just a way for the restaurants to get out of having to spend money on their waitstaff now. I salute all restaurants and bars that have finally done away with tipped employees and have started paying them a fair wage.

  9. Posted

    Really informative post synth, I'm not entirely sure how it works in the UK. I believe many of these people are on zero hour contracts, which means they get paid minimum wage but have no security. There's been lots of complaints about these sorts of contracts, but most people love them thanks to the flexibility. It's mainly people in your situation - they're students and want money when they can. The problem is when people have them and need to support a family, which is impossible and when government statistics include zero hour contracts in unemployment rates.

    Yeah it's basically so you can tell your job to fuck off when you need it to fuck off. The big problem I had with other part time jobs in the past during school is when your boss sees you are competent he/she wants you to work more hours and there's all this pressure to give in and do so because people depend on you.

     

    I hear Uber drivers make a lot more money than Postmates and Favor so I can't speak for them, but they also let strangers in their car so it makes sense. These delivery jobs are simply a bad idea if you are trying to support a family. You are better off delivering for Jason's Deli or a pizza place or just working at Taco Bell or something.

     

    There is no way in hell I would have taken this job if it weren't for the minimum $9/hr. I did the math before my first day. I really wish other drivers would have done the math because I often find myself consoling them in awkward elevator rides to rich condos that everyone else is pretty much making minimum 90% of the time so they shouldn't feel bad.

     

    But it breaks down like this. You get $1.75 to $2.50 per delivery depending on the day. The customer is required to tip at least $2. The general suggested tip by the app is $5 unless it's a far away order or expensive. Most of your orders average $10-20 of food. Sometimes you might just pick something up and there's no cash involved. Favor as a company says orders take about 35 minutes. Should you do two an hour, you made at worst $7.50. Let's say you are wasting a $1 of gas per hour with current prices. So then it's $6.50. Take down wear and tear on your car and a data plan cost and it's just pointless to do if you weren't guaranteed a minimum.

     

    But the thing is if someone is buying $10 worth of tacos, $2 is still over a 15% tip, so why get annoyed at the customer? And the reality of the situation is an order generally takes 45 minutes to an hour. You are probably driving 10-15 minutes each way and then if it's a restaurant you are generally waiting 30 minutes as well for them to make the food. Maybe add time if they hate Favor and want to ignore you for as long as they can or drag their feet on purpose. When you get to some person's place, it's generally a rich person, as that's your customer base, so they live in these condo/loft security fortresses with keycards, pass codes, concierges, and protected/limited parking, so there's a lot of wasted time there as well getting both in and out. Also sometimes there's 5-20 minutes between assigned orders where you are just sitting in your car (my 3DS time). My record is two and a half hours on a $12 order from a busy restaurant on a busy Sunday. This particular restaurant is not unheard of for other drivers, very popular and worth the wait to many customers.

     

    So if you are taking let's say a $30 order and it takes you an hour with either Postmates or Favor, the customer tips 15% that's still $4.5 plus whatever delivery amount, which is probably $4 maximum if even that on Postmates. Still not hitting that $9/hr. mark. The job only ever really pays good money if you have a super generous customer tipping way too much money, which is a silly thing to expect, or if you can somehow rapid fire orders, which is not often. If you work at a pizza place you have one place you pick up pizzas, they are ready to go when you get to motherbase, you complete way more deliveries an hour, and you know your limited area.

     

    I feel like the only way these jobs could pay better than what they do now is not if people were more generous in tipping, since the customer is not really the problem, but that these companies  should give you way more money per completed order or just guarantee a higher minimum per hour.

     

    These tech app delivery jobs are pretty much butler jobs for rich people and not really necessary to have in our society. I would never use Favor myself, I don't see the point of paying $5 plus 5% of the order cost PLUS tipping some driver 15% of the whole order, especially if it's for some chinese food or burgers. While I mentioned medication earlier, it's still to rich clientele. There are courier services for pharmacies that are way cheaper and mass deliver to people in hospice care or homes who are not able to make it because of disabilities or financial circumstances in their life. My wife used to do pharmaceutical courier job for a few months in between jobs and it was a full time flat rate an hour thing, not reliant on tips, and it helped people who needed the medication.

     

    The only time I'm not serving rich or well off people is late at night (which I pretty much always work because I'm just getting Whataburger rapid fire over and over) and I'm delivering to people stoned out of their fucking mind with bloodshot eyes and tons of weed smoke emitting from their apartment. Also I find this hilarious.

  10. Posted

    So, I may be expanding the conversation here beyond the realm of what it should be (if so, I apologize), but I did want to weigh in on a few things.

     

    I don't know how postmate works, if the drivers are employees or contractors (which works out in different ways), or whatever, but I DID want to clarify that in the US, all companies ARE REQUIRED to make sure that their employees make the minimum federal wage ($7.25/hr). While this IS a separate minimum wage for tipped workers (2.13), if an employee makes less than an average of 7.25/hr for a pay period, including their declared tips, the employer is required to make up the gap in their paycheck (ie: if you worked 50 hours and made $0 in tips (you would be a terrible waiter, but whatever), instead of getting $106, like normal for people that make more than minimum wage on their tips, you would get $362 on your paycheck). 

     

    Now, this doesn't mean that you should tip people who rely on tips--largely because the minimum wage is garbage and shouldn't be used as a barometer--but it is an important clarification, and also something that many people who know about the separate wage for service workers don't seem to know. 

     

    I do have another thing on these topics though: Tipping is awful and we need to get rid of it. Services that don't allow tipping are far, far, far better. The actual wages of the job should be what attracts people to the job, and the fact that businesses externalize their expenses into a separate system is entirely ridiculous. This does not, in any way shape or form mean that you should stop tipping people who rely on tips (don't be an ahole), because they people rely on their tips--don't punish the people lowest on the totem pole for a messed up setup. BUT it DOES mean that for new services and new jobs, etc, that don't necessarily include tipping, please dear god, DO NOT push for it. Tipping doesn't reflect service, almost ever (something study after study shows), and it's very possible and easy for systems to work without tipping (see: somehow food industries in non-tipping countries manage to exist), but it DOES create unnecessary frustration.

    Exactly this (although I'm sure Postmates are 1099). Whenever people act like tipped employees make $2.13 an hour, they are wrong, that's not the case ever by federal law. The problem all goes back to low minimum wage anyway. Most tipped employees are making a "fair" enough amount over minimum wage anyway. If minimum wage were higher I'm sure the waiting or bartending job would be way less desirable.

     

    Also I work at Favor, it works exactly like Postmates. They are most likely given some minimum an hour if they don't go over. At Favor it's $9/hr. (in Texas at least) since I barely go over because no one tips well and the orders take forever. However I blame the company and would rather just have them raise what you get an hour, not depend on the customer to give you some extravagant tip to match their bullshit advertised average of $15/hr. I don't expect someone to give me 15% tip on $125 of prescription meds. They are already paying out the ass for medicine, don't even worry about tipping. I'd rather just be of service, get the minimum $9/hr. and go home. It's flexible and so fucking easy it's stupid. I spend a lot of time listening to podcasts just playing 3DS honestly.

     

    Also if Postmates works like Favor, they aren't tipping people on togo orders, which I already yelled about in some other thread about even more tipped employees getting mad. Angry restaurant staff is the only bad part of the job.

     

    However if Postmates does not have some minimum set, even though it's the same as Favor, then it's just not even worth it. You're on a 1099 and will have to try your damnedest to deduct gas mileage from income tax the next year, because federal minimum wage laws don't help you on a 1099. People have the option to just not work there and work at Favor instead. Or really there's more than a few other easy jobs out there that pay at least minimum wage, don't require you to spend your own gas money, don't require you to buy a data plan, and don't put you at a high risk of a car wreck if they in fact stuck at working below minimum wage.

     

    I know for instance if you just deliver pizzas for Domino's or something you generally make more than either Favor or Postmates and your delivery area is not a whole fucking city you have to learn where to park and not get towed and memorize as many complicated apartment complexes and lofts as you can. Those are probably more desirable to work at in terms of money and driving around. The reason I stick with Favor is because I'm in school until June and I can just give away my work hours literally an hour before my schedule sometimes if I have to. It's ridiculously flexible and I can just make whatever hours I feel like working. Also if I have some freelance project I can just decide I don't want to work that week. That's the perks, not the money.

     

    Short answer, don't worry about these new delivery companies, they are desirable because you work whenever the fuck you want, not because you are somehow going to be taking home anything they advertise.

  11. Posted

    I moved into my girlfriend's old apartment, since she took a job in Chicago, and it's a really nice and affordable place. Finally, I feel like I have ownership of a space that I'm happy to share with people, for the first time in my life. Also, long distance does suck, but this is the first long-distance relationship that I've had where both people are making regular efforts to see each other, so that's going right, too.

    Glad to hear an update on this saga, sounds like everything is going to work out!

  19. Posted

    Aww, thanks! Yes, seems like it's been fairly successful. There's been some growling and hissing, but they both seem to share the same temperament (don't mess with me I won't mess with you. But seriously don't mess with me).

     

    This apparently happened some time after the pup went out in the morning.

    What is going on with that dark outline?

  21. Posted

    I saw the movie, thought it mostly sucked. Was really plodding and boring. The relationships didn't feel believable either. I guess it's depressing and stark to support the story, but I didn't find it enjoyable on any level besides maybe visuals, but Mark Romanek isn't really my thing.

     

    Would be interested to listen to this cast though. Wonder how much the movie is similar to the book. The extra features made it seem like a very faithful adaptation as the author is featured way more than Mark Romanek or Alex Garland.

  22. Posted

    Job application question: "What personal qualities will you bring to [organisation]? Why?"

     

    "Why"? Why would I bring personal qualities? What?

    You have to bring your penchant for deep romance.

  23. Posted

    Haha they were mostly pretty bad. I collected Sonic, Simpsons, and Animaniacs comics through most of elementary school years before abandoning all of that. They basically ate up all of my allowance for a long time. Late sold a bunch of those early Sonic comics on ebay in 2009 for about four hundred bucks total, so I'm glad there are still crazed fans I guess. My mom really didn't want me pulling them out of their attic because she felt I should treasure them, but I am never gonna read that stuff ever again.

     

    Probably the best thing part of that time in my life is I Sonic fan art in fifth grade and I just got some thanks in an issue on a big list of names. Later I realized the comic was changing from bad puns and hijinks to furry adventure stories and I abandoned the comic series so I didn't really read past issue 50. Some dude in high school showed me that the fan art later appeared in an issue three years from then and I was pretty embarrassed. He should have been embarrassed for reading Sonic the Hedgehog comics in high school but it didn't really work out that way. I guess they were running out of submissions and had to scrape the bottom of the barrel.

  24. Posted

    I had that particular issue when I collected Sonic comics in elementary school. It was awful and ugly even then.

     

    I think that's the dirty work of Ken Penders who has a whole other mess of crazy stuff with him and his bad Knuckles storyline and character rights which may or may not be worth wasting an hour of your time reading about.

  25. Posted

    Sorry for the bump here, just bringing up the deer again. Major deer spoilers:

     

    I think I didn't say this in the original message but I thought the deer was Rachel manifesting herself as Max's spirit animal, mainly because of the scene where she's looking on when Max and Chloe dig up the body.

     

    Turns out this is right according to the commentary and the deer is Rachel Amber's spirit. I have to play again to see what her presence means in a few scenes because I forget all the places the deer appeared but it's kind of cool. One big thing they note in the commentary is when you first see the deer in the junkyard when you chase her to take her photo, the deer is actually standing on the spot where Rachel Amber is buried.