Omnibus Stupid MFers in the news thread (Part 1)

The BBQ Pit
8771

I work from home, and am alone all day. I also have tricky stairs to navigate to get to my home office. They are very steep. I don’t go anywhere without my phone because to do otherwise could be dangerous, even at home.

I also use it for alarms for cooking, and doing laundry. And stuff that is time sensitive. It’s simple.

Perhaps this woman has a serious ADHD problem (that can be fixed with alarms). Or perhaps she’s just a self entitled flibbertigibbet that blames her issues on others.

I know which one I will pick.

What ever the cause, I will agree that she has problems.

8772

Remember the “millennials would be able to buy homes if they stopped eating avocados” guy?

He’s now declared that the proles are “arrogant” and aren’t sufficiently grateful to their Betters, and unemployment needs to spike so they experience pain and will take what they’re given.

8773

Also, this woman does not have a clear understanding of workplace accommodations.

The time blindness events that is keeping her from getting to work on time is not occurring at work, it’s occurring in the morning before she gets to work.

A workplace accommodation for time blindness might include the ability to set multiple electronic alerts for meetings and other events and possible even some additional forgiveness for showing up late to meetings. This is a response to time blindness events that occur at work.

But the employee is fully responsible for managing her own time blindness when she’s not at work, and that includes learning to get to work on time.

I read a similar discussion on another forum about an employee who occasionally suffered crippling anxiety over her driving commute and was looking for an accommodation to allow her to work from home on the days she had those anxiety attacks. The consensus was that it wasn’t a situation for a workplace accommodation because the attacks that kept her from driving weren’t happening at work.

8774

This seems like a reasonable place to put this. Apparently Boebert thinks that musicals are audience sing-alongs.

8775

The mother might be trying to keep her daughter’s shooting herself in the foot to a bare minimum.

8776

Maybe she wanted her mom to confirm her ‘conditiion’.

I have a little bit of compassion for this person. She at least seems to have come up with a reasonable alternative. Depends on her duties of course.

IMHO and anyone that can work from home should work from home. That’s the gift that COVID gave us. It showed managers that it works just fine.

8777

FWIW, the consensus about the woman with the anxiety attacks that kept her from getting to work should use what’s called intermittent FMLA (Family Medical Leave Act). This would let her take time off without penalty.

It wasn’t a lack of sympathy or that she didn’t deserve help with her employers, it was just that the appropriate help wasn’t a medical accommodation.

8778

AAAAAAAAAAARRRRRRRRRRRGGGGGGGGGHH!

Headline on cnn.com this morning:
" Law enforcement found Danelo Cavalcante laying down in tall grass and he appeared to be asleep on top of rifle"

“LIE”! Not “LAY”! For Og’s sake, CNN, have you no proofreaders on staff? How the hell did an editor let this get by?

Yes, yes, I know the language is morphing to make this a common usage, but I will NEVER accept it!

8779

“Lay” when “lie” should be used became very frequent years ago – but it still to me often gives a sexual connotation when none was intended. (“Lay” is active. You’re doing it to something. Or to/with somebody.)

I strongly suspect that most proofreading these days is done by running a spellchecker. “Laying down” and “lying down” are both spelled correctly.

8780

I blame Bob Dylan.

8781

My gf has told me that good proofreaders are hard to find. She works in advertising and they often have to rely on freelancers.

8782

Maybe he just wanted to do his stuff.

8783

Tuberville told reporters on Tuesday that he was sure that Joint Chiefs of Staff Chairman Mark Milley would remain in the role, even after his official Oct. 1 departure date, until a replacement was named.

“I’ll call Milley and wish him good luck, but I don’t know whether he’ll go anywhere until they get somebody confirmed,” said the Alabama Republican.

The reporters explained that Milley was required to leave by law.

“He has to leave?” Tuberville asked. “He’s out. We’ll get somebody else to do the job. But hopefully, it’s done by then.”

Wallace couldn’t believe the exchange.

“Hopefully what’s done? You’re the problem,” she said on Tuesday.

8784

I had a strong reaction to this yesterday because we were dealing with a specific memory of abuse related to my mother’s inability to handle having a child with ADHD. My mother did not know I had ADHD and just expected me to do the thing and listen and perform perfectly without support. I had been left alone at age 16 when they left the house to live somewhere else and my Mom came back maybe once a week to check on me. She had a list of every chore I was expected to get done and because I was dealing with a lot of crap, not the least of which was coming to terms with the fact of my own abuse from both my parents, it didn’t get done. So one day, she came home and laid into me as usual and I fucking snapped. Maybe something about the experience of largely making it on my own made me realize I didn’t actually have to stay. She wouldn’t let me take my car, so I walked to the nearest payphone, called my grandmother, and never returned until months later, with a police escort, to get my things. Within a few months I would be legally emancipated and trying to manage shit on my own.

Despite the devastating effects of my ADHD on my childhood, I was not diagnosed until age 34. I flew under the radar for many reasons, one of which was my excellent performance at school. And that was one of my mother’s favorite bullying tactics. You do so well in school, you have no behavioral problems there, surely, surely you are not paying attention on purpose. Surely you are careless and forgetful on purpose. Surely you are lazy, entitled, selfish, nauseating, and a failure who will never make it in life, and surely I’m going to kill you one day if you don’t get your shit together.

Once I was diagnosed, it cast my childhood in a different light, and I was able to get medication and start addressing my problems. But it has taken me years of concerted effort to learn to manage my symptoms. I am wildly successful at my current job because of the flexibility of my schedule. I honestly don’t know how I would be able to handle the typical strict rules of a workplace. But right now I can do my work whenever I am able to as long as it gets done, and I am highly respected in my field. My CEO, who does not know about my disabilities, recently told me that she used to be skeptical of flexible WFH schedules, but my success has changed her mind.

I think there are a lot of people who cannot work full time or who cannot work a regular 9-5 who are sitting on disability benefits because the system will not really accommodate them. I think it is better for these people to have generous accommodations than it is for them to sit around doing nothing. I understand that not every job can accommodate every disability, but many can. I think a person arriving 15 minutes late to work sometimes is better than a person who can’t get a job and is doing nothing but sitting at home.

I think alarms do help some people with ADHD but for me personally they are not a foolproof measure. I’ve found the most effective ones are the ones that vibrate strapped to my wrist. I notice that one probably 75% of the time. What works best for me is keeping to a specific morning schedule so that I am ready the absolute earliest I need to leave on any given weekday. My schedule is different every day but my mornings are all the same. Calendar reminders have saved my ass more than once.

All that said, I was talking to my husband and he said my mother was a tyrant and even a neurotypical child wouldn’t have satisfied her. And I thought about it and realized my Mom made everyone miserable whether they had ADHD or not. So maybe my ADHD didn’t cause my abuse. I am feeling better about it today.

I know this is long but I don’t know how to better lay out exactly where I’m coming from.

My son who is autistic almost certainly also has ADHD and while I sure as fuck am never going to attend a job interview with him, I’m not going to shame him for the way his brain works. Yes we have to teach our children that the world will not bend to their issues all the time, but there are good ways and bad ways to do that. My Mom chose the bad way. I will choose the good way.

I think this woman is mistaken for expecting understanding and compassion from the world at large, specifically for such a stigmatized and misunderstood disorder. But one thing I have learned is that I can extend compassion to myself and my son in my own private universe, because I really have no problem creating a “safe space” for my son, if he’s going to be safe anywhere you can bet it’s going to be at home.

8785

Of course not. No child ever causes the abuse they suffer. I didn’t cause the abuse I went through as a kid either. We were victims.

I always thought the silver lining for what I went through is that having seen what it’s like to be a kid who had a parent that terrorized and beat them, physically and emotionally, I know what not to do. I think it makes me aware of myself if I get mad or frustrated and I try hard to avoid being like that.

You clearly turned out to be an awesome mom so you seemed to have gotten that message too.

8786

Thanks. I have thought maybe I am a better mother because of my childhood. That helps give meaning to it all.

The big challenge for me right now is that whenever I feel frustrated with him, it triggers this cascade effect of childhood flashbacks. But I am learning that frustration with your kids is just a part of parenting and to just chill out a little bit and be okay with imperfect parenting. The word of the year is “grace” - for myself, for him. He is doing so well.

The other night at bedtime he told my husband “Don’t forget to like and subscribe!” (He watches a lot of YouTube math videos while brushing his teeth.)

8787

That’s adorable!

8788

There are conflicting studies, some showing that working from home is more productive, some less. To state the obvious, it probably depends what type of work it is.

8789

And of course what type of worker you are, and if you have a good set up at home to do it. That can be a real problem. Some co-workers want to go into ‘work’. My office is a loft over our bedroom. It’s perfect.

And communication with co-workers is key, but sometimes that can get out of hand.

I’m hard of hearing, the written word is much, much better. I mis about 50% of what people say in face to face meetings.

Working from home now, I work more hours. The thing is, I can work any hours of the day any day of the week, and it saves 50 miles of driving and 1.5 hours a day. A huge bonus.

My wife may start working from home a day or two a week. We also have a perfect set up/office for her. She is a bit reluctant. But when we get a foot of snow, umm, just work from home.

8790

I really wasn’t making any sort of comment regarding the validity of the woman’s condition.

I was just pointing out that the legal definition of “reasonable accommodation” may not fit with the what seems to be the obvious and common sense meaning of the word.

Any employer is free to make any arrangements they want in order to help an employee with ADHD, an I think they should do so whenever possible. They don’t have to require forms or doctor’s notes. I just won’t be a “reasonable accommodation” as defined by the laws that require employers to make reasonable accommodations.

“Hostile workplace” is another similarity misunderstood term. You can work at a place that is driving you to mental illness because you are constantly berated by the boss and bullied by the other employees, but unless this is happening because you are a member of a protected class, you are not the victim of a hostile workplace, legally speaking.