# August August minirants! **URL:** \ **Category:** The BBQ Pit\ **Created:** [August 1, 2012, 4:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/august-august-minirants/630068 "2012-08-01T16:21:17Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 27
**Author:** ![Chefguy](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/chefguy/32/138_2.png) [@Chefguy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chefguy)\ **Post date:** [August 31, 2012, 5:12pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/august-august-minirants/630068/521 "2012-08-31T17:12:06Z")
Fucking fuckity FUCK! Our goddamn credit card has been compromised AGAIN! This one is only two fucking weeks old and now we have to change all the goddamned accounts again. The fraud people and the issuer just have no ideas at all other than someone out there may be using a roulette program of some kind. I don’t buy it. I think there’s somebody with the issuing people who is selling numbers. We’re very careful with our card and all the charges we’ve made in the past two weeks have been at places where we see the card swiped or swipe it ourselves. Online purchases are from secure servers. Cocksuckers! ::throws self on floor in a John Belushi tantrum:: ---
**Author:** ![Silver\_Tyger](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/fbc32d/32.png) [@Silver\_Tyger](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Silver_Tyger)\ **Post date:** [August 31, 2012, 5:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/august-august-minirants/630068/522 "2012-08-31T17:18:57Z")
> [@overlyverbose](#): > > I sit in a cube farm on the end of a row of six. So I have four people behind me, one across the aisle. For some reason, everyone behind me feels compelled to pat my cube when they walk by. I don’t get this. Why are you patting my cube, dammit?? Are you making sure I’m awake? Do you not notice that I spend a good six hours a day on conference calls? I get that I have no expectation of silence working in a cube farm, but knock it the hell off! I’d kill people. I’m at the end of the cubicle block and every now and then I get somebody hitting my cubicle (or stumbling and catching themselves against it). So annoying but not that bad compared to one of my old jobs, where one of the salesmen would pound on my monitor as he walked by. So glad I don’t work there anymore. ---
**Author:** ![LavenderBlue](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/e95f7d/32.png) [@LavenderBlue](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/LavenderBlue)\ **Post date:** [August 31, 2012, 5:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/august-august-minirants/630068/523 "2012-08-31T17:21:27Z")
I don’t really have time to pit **Magellan** properly right now. I wish the asshole would actually read what I wrote instead of what he thinks I wrote. The thread in question is [here](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?t=663681) ---
**Author:** ![Chefguy](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/chefguy/32/138_2.png) [@Chefguy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chefguy)\ **Post date:** [August 31, 2012, 5:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/august-august-minirants/630068/524 "2012-08-31T17:30:30Z")
> [@LavenderBlue](#): > > I don’t really have time to pit **Magellan** properly right now. I wish the asshole would actually read what I wrote instead of what he thinks I wrote. > > The thread in question is [here](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?t=663681) The guy is a republican shill and a putz. Ignore him. ---
**Author:** ![Chimera](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/8e8cbc/32.png) [@Chimera](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chimera)\ **Post date:** [August 31, 2012, 5:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/august-august-minirants/630068/525 "2012-08-31T17:49:03Z")
My mother and father call me this morning at work. Since they know I don’t take personal calls at work and tend to be annoyed by them, they have the good sense to only call when it is an emergency. My father got an email from me containing nothing but one sentence telling him to click on a link. His virus scanner went nuts. Which email account was it from? “Yours!” Yes, and which one of my accounts was it from? “It was from your account!” I got that the first time. I have several email accounts. Which one was it from. “Oh I don’t know. I deleted it. But you should check all your contacts to make sure they didn’t get it!” Thanks ever so much. My contact lists vary wildly depending on the account. Would have been helpful to know which one. Immediately changed all my passwords, checked my bank and CC balances, etc. Nothing lost, no unauthorized charges so it wasn’t through my iCloud/iTunes account. Don’t see anything in my sent folders anywhere. ---
**Author:** ![LavenderBlue](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/e95f7d/32.png) [@LavenderBlue](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/LavenderBlue)\ **Post date:** [August 31, 2012, 5:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/august-august-minirants/630068/526 "2012-08-31T17:50:49Z")
> [@Chefguy](#): > > The guy is a republican shill and a putz. Ignore him. His behavior in that thread is just obviously trolling. Jeez. If you’re going to troll at least do it with some wit and style. Instead all we get is him repeating the same fucking stupid accusations and attacks on my character over and over again. He doesn’t address a single one of my points. He makes up wildly idiotic claims. His basic argument is that Ann Romney has had breast cancer and MS. Therefore any implication that her wealth helped make that path easier for her, let alone any attempt to draw any attention to the fact that her husband’s policies would make life harder for her fellow cancer and MS patients so that her husband and friends can get more money is somehow not allowing her to be a human being. Oh and it’s okay for her to pretend she was ever poor or financially struggling. Because well I don’t know but that’s what he thinks. I swear he almost makes Rush look sane. Almost. He wasn’t on my radar before but if this is his style of “debating” it’s a wonder he isn’t pitted half a dozen times a week. ---
**Author:** ![Cheez\_Whia](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/d26b3c/32.png) [@Cheez\_Whia](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Cheez_Whia)\ **Post date:** [August 31, 2012, 7:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/august-august-minirants/630068/527 "2012-08-31T19:15:26Z")
**Chimera** , your email address was probably spoofed. I just went through this BS with my sister last week. Tell them if they receive any more of them to just hover their cursor over the address they think is yours. It will show the real sender’s email address. If it ain’t you, it gets deleted. ---
**Author:** ![eulalia](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/eulalia/32/457_2.png) [@eulalia](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/eulalia)\ **Post date:** [August 31, 2012, 7:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/august-august-minirants/630068/528 "2012-08-31T19:17:49Z")
> [@Chefguy](#): > > Fucking fuckity FUCK! Our goddamn credit card has been compromised AGAIN! This one is only two fucking weeks old and now we have to change all the goddamned accounts again. The fraud people and the issuer just have no ideas at all other than someone out there may be using a roulette program of some kind. I don’t buy it. I think there’s somebody with the issuing people who is selling numbers. We’re very careful with our card and all the charges we’ve made in the past two weeks have been at places where we see the card swiped or swipe it ourselves. Online purchases are from secure servers. Cocksuckers! ::throws self on floor in a John Belushi tantrum:: Could one of the places you swipe have one of those number harvester doohickeys attached? Those can be hard to spot. ---
**Author:** ![Yllaria](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/yllaria/32/3452_2.png) [@Yllaria](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Yllaria)\ **Post date:** [August 31, 2012, 7:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/august-august-minirants/630068/529 "2012-08-31T19:33:48Z")
> [@Cinnamon\_Imp](#): > > When she’s out, can you sneak some chlorine, or diluted bleach or something, that will kill the larvae into the pool? . . . From the post, I don’t think the larvae are in the pool. I think that the neighbor has a pool cover that sags and the shallow depression is holding water in a puddle, above the pool. If I were considering sneaking bleach into the puddle, I’d worry about the bleach degrading the cover. They’re usually plastic. That wouldn’t apply to the Mosquito Dunks, or other non-corrosive products. ---
**Author:** ![Chefguy](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/chefguy/32/138_2.png) [@Chefguy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chefguy)\ **Post date:** [August 31, 2012, 7:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/august-august-minirants/630068/530 "2012-08-31T19:47:44Z")
> [@eulalia](#): > > Could one of the places you swipe have one of those number harvester doohickeys attached? Those can be hard to spot. We don’t use ATMs, so the places we use the card are groceries, etc. where we’ve been going for several years. I’ve decided to remove my card info from Amazon, but that still leaves the auto-pay places, although none of those payments were made during this two-week period. It’s infuriating. ---
**Author:** ![flatlined](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/eb9ed0/32.png) [@flatlined](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/flatlined)\ **Post date:** [September 1, 2012, 2:59am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/august-august-minirants/630068/531 "2012-09-01T02:59:26Z")
> [@Cheez\_Whia](#): > > How about [Mosquito Dunks](http://www.amazon.com/Summit-111-5-Mosquito-Dunks-20-Pack/dp/B0002568YA)? You can just chuck one of those into the pool. I honestly didn’t know about those. Thank you so much. I stopped at a hardware store on the way home and bought something that is supposed to work like those. While CNL was distracted by watching the news (I could tell because I could hear her yelling at the TV), I tossed a couple in the pool cover. Offers you a big sloppy bikerhug in gratitude. > [@kaylasdad99](#): > > Do they have vector control in your town/county? If so you could drop a dime on her anonymously. > [@purplehorseshoe](#): > > Good idea, **K’sdad.** Not to mention, if she doesn’t have a good fence with a lockable gate, it’s a drowning hazard, and there might be something in the local ordinances about that. This was Bill’s advice as well, but I don’t want to do that. It will still turn her into a screaching CNL, and I’m enjoying watching the kids fly their kites in the street without flinching when they run by her house. Sidetrack: I never really got to fly kites when I was a kid, but shouldn’t kites have tails? When I see the boys running around and the kite crashing I seem to recall that the tail gives it stability or something. > [@Yllaria](#): > > From the post, I don’t think the larvae are in the pool. I think that the neighbor has a pool cover that sags and the shallow depression is holding water in a puddle, above the pool. If I were considering sneaking bleach into the puddle, I’d worry about the bleach degrading the cover. They’re usually plastic. > > That wouldn’t apply to the Mosquito Dunks, or other non-corrosive products. You are right about where the water is. Monsoon season is almost done, so the sun will dry that water up in 4 or 5 days. I tossed some stuff that is supposed to work like Mosquito Dunks in the water and expect that the problem will be gone soon. I learn so much here, thanks everyone 🙂 Oh, wait…I’m in the Pit…I hope the dunks cause the mosquitos to die in a lot of pain! ---
**Author:** ![digs](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/digs/32/14889_2.png) [@digs](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/digs)\ **Post date:** [September 1, 2012, 3:00am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/august-august-minirants/630068/532 "2012-09-01T03:00:28Z")
> [@Yllaria](#): > > From the post, I don’t think the larvae are in the pool. I think that the neighbor has a pool cover that sags and the shallow depression is holding water in a puddle, above the pool. If I were considering sneaking bleach into the puddle, I’d worry about the bleach degrading the cover. They’re usually plastic. > > That wouldn’t apply to the Mosquito Dunks, or other non-corrosive products. We’ve got a neighbor who’s an etymologist. She’s been known to prowl the 'hood (it could be a goodly woodsy 'hood). With a spray bottle full of vegetable oil (maybe some additives), and spray any stagnant water. So maybe there’s a solution that’s organic and easy to apply surreptitiously. ETA: Oh, I see you did the surreptitious deed already, _ **flatlined!** _ Congrats on your ninja skills. ---
**Author:** ![Chimera](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/8e8cbc/32.png) [@Chimera](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chimera)\ **Post date:** [September 1, 2012, 3:11am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/august-august-minirants/630068/533 "2012-09-01T03:11:52Z")
> [@Cheez\_Whia](#): > > **Chimera** , your email address was probably spoofed. I just went through this BS with my sister last week. Tell them if they receive any more of them to just hover their cursor over the address they think is yours. It will show the real sender’s email address. If it ain’t you, it gets deleted. Yeah, I got nothing and no one else has said a word. A year ago their email was hacked when they unwisely used a “public wifi” in an airport in Europe\* and we all got those phony “Help we’re trapped in Europe, please wire money immediately!” emails. I half suspect that they got targeted by that scammer, who had gotten ahold of their contact list. - Don’t ever use a “public wifi” in an airport. They’re seldom legitimate networks. They’re scam networks set up to trap your signal and read the information you pass through it. T’would be nice if the police would set up stings, but that would require hardware, software, planning and computer skills. ---
**Author:** ![kaylasdad99](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/kaylasdad99/32/3398_2.png) [@kaylasdad99](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/kaylasdad99)\ **Post date:** [September 1, 2012, 3:57am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/august-august-minirants/630068/534 "2012-09-01T03:57:44Z")
> [@digs](#): > > We’ve got a neighbor who’s an etymologist. See if she can find out where the word “claymore” (meaning a large-ish sword) comes from. ---
**Author:** ![digs](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/digs/32/14889_2.png) [@digs](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/digs)\ **Post date:** [September 1, 2012, 5:58am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/august-august-minirants/630068/535 "2012-09-01T05:58:56Z")
> [@kaylasdad99](#): > > See if she can find out where the word “claymore” (meaning a large-ish sword) comes from. Oh, crap. As I was typing it, I was thinking “Wouldn’t it be great to have a job where your specialty was the origin and derivation of names of insects? So you could be an entymology-etymologist?” Someone who loves words should be more ept with them… maybe in the morning, when I’m ebriated. ---
**Author:** ![The\_Vorlon](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/d07c76/32.png) [@The\_Vorlon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/The_Vorlon)\ **Post date:** [September 1, 2012, 12:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/august-august-minirants/630068/536 "2012-09-01T12:34:53Z")
> [@flatlined](#): > > Oops, sorry for the double post, I forgot my rant. > > Everytime I go outside at home, I get swarmed by mosquitoes. I’ve been watching **purplehorseshoe’s** thread so of course I don’t want to get West Nile, even though it hasn’t gotten here yet. Paranoid is me! > > I also don’t like getting bit by those things anyhow. I hates being ichy. I am very careful to not have standing water, after the summer storms, I always walk my yard and check to be sure that everything is draining. > > Last night, I remembered that Crazy Neighbor Lady has one of those above ground pools for when her grandkids visit. The grandkids rarely visit and never use the pool. When I asked her about it, because we live in the middle of the desert and have water rationing, she told me that she was willing to pay to keep it filled because it entices her grandkids to visit. > > So…this morning, I drove up the last road on the mountain and looked down at our homes. CNL has a cover over her pool that is filled with greenish brown water. I just know that is where the mosquitoes are breeding. Oh great. If I say anything, she will get upset and start doing her screaming thing again. Its been so nice and quiet lately. **flatlined** , hav a word with the local board of Health, they will have a ‘come to Jesus’ talk with her about the swamp over her pool. I’m at the point where the watering can for the planters on the railing is being kept indoors. About a month to the Killing frost. ---
**Author:** ![Lynn\_Bodoni](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/e47c2d/32.png) [@Lynn\_Bodoni](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lynn_Bodoni)\ **Post date:** [September 1, 2012, 4:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/august-august-minirants/630068/537 "2012-09-01T16:44:13Z")
People, if you have a fairly common name like “Susan Smith”, and you have an Amazon Wish List, it would be immensely helpful if you included SOMETHING to distinguish you from the 274 OTHER Susan Smiths that have an Amazon Wish List. A birthday, a location, interests, a picture…SOMETHING. Yes, I’m trying to get a birthday present for a friend, but I don’t want her to know that I’m gonna get her something from Amazon until it actually arrives. It looks like I’m going to get her a bottle of amaretto, though. I KNOW that she loves that. ---
**Author:** ![pinkyvee](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/6de8d8/32.png) [@pinkyvee](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/pinkyvee)\ **Post date:** [September 1, 2012, 5:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/august-august-minirants/630068/538 "2012-09-01T17:33:46Z")
Prednisone. Now that you are no longer a necessary evil in my life … I want to tell you what a drag it was to meet you. You made me fat. You clouded my vision. You made me anxious and verbose. You lowered my immunity and got me hospitalized. You are poison. You stole two years from me and I am thrilled we never have to meet again. These past 3 months without you have been a breath of fresh air. Go to hell prednisone. ---
**Author:** ![Cheez\_Whia](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/d26b3c/32.png) [@Cheez\_Whia](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Cheez_Whia)\ **Post date:** [September 1, 2012, 7:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/august-august-minirants/630068/539 "2012-09-01T19:26:23Z")
**flatlined** - glad I could help! ---
**Author:** ![flatlined](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/eb9ed0/32.png) [@flatlined](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/flatlined)\ **Post date:** [September 1, 2012, 9:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/august-august-minirants/630068/540 "2012-09-01T21:17:39Z")
> [@Cheez\_Whia](#): > > **flatlined** - glad I could help! They worked great! Thank you so much! I’ve been in and out all day and I haven’t gotten bit once. I can’t see over my fence, so I just tossed the cubes in the general direction of her pool until I heard them plopping in water. It rained last night (probably the last storm of the season), so the ones on the ground are probably disolved as well. CNL will never know. My rant: Bill and I have finally found something that we totally disagree on. Bill is afraid of Steve the feral housecat and doesn’t want to move Steve to Texas. I think that Bill is afraid that Steve will wait until we are sleeping to escape his safe area and sneak downstairs to eat our faces. Feral cats don’t do that. Cats don’t attack people unless they are cornered and even then, they only use their claws and teeth to escape. Bill is being a butthead. He knows that I know a lot more about wild cats then he does. He supports my rescue efforts and loves our cats. All of them but Steve. Its NOT Steve’s fault that Bill has scars. Bill is the one who caused that. Besides, Steve has been a housecat for too long to just release again. He’s lost his place in the colony and his body is used to air conditioning. It just wouldn’t be fair. (yeah, yeah…I know…Bill needs to be able to sleep without fear of having his face eaten. If it comes down to that, I can give Steve to a wildlife rehab place. She has feral cats and cares for them. She’s so overloaded, though. I’d hate to do that to her when Steve is such a good housecat.) [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/august-august-minirants/630068.md?page=26) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/august-august-minirants/630068.md?page=28)