So it's too hot for a July minirants thread?

The BBQ Pit
21

You’ve been missed, that’s for sure.

Sorry to hear about Steve. My own old man kitty has recently developed hyperthyroidism on top of the IBD he’s been dealing with for the last 3 or so years and the heart murmur he’s had since kittenhood. The vet’s a bit puzzled, though, because his levels dropped from 7.8 to 0.5 in the 3 weeks he’s been on the medication. The first is far too high, the second is weirdly low and they don’t understand how he could have dropped so fast. So I get to take him in again in a couple weeks.

So … what sort of litter box are you getting Mr. Huge? I’m trying to figure out something that would be large enough to accommodate him and still be small enough to get through the doors and to clean out. No luck so far. Or are you going to try and train him out of thinking he’s a cat? (Have you ever named Steve’s Kitten, or is that her official name?)

22

Fucking fuckers and their fucking fireworks! I have 4 psychotic cats and they are only going to get crazier as the night progresses. Rot in Hell, assholes!

23

Why, oh, why do people bring dogs to fireworks?? The critter hates them and his/her barking makes everybody nearby miserable.

24

Agreed. In years past, they’ve been far enough away that the cat hasn’t been freaked out. But this year, there’s a new crop of renters down the street who jus’ loves them some loud noise. Our poor cat was slinking around so low that her belly was brushing the floor, desperately looking for somewhere to hide. She ended up under the bed until all the racket abated around eleven.

25

Sorry to hear that Steve passed away, flatlined. I’m glad Steve’s Kitten has found another animal to care for. I can’t believe that you are complaining because it’s a puppy, or because it uses the litter box. Remember how you were trained by Steve? Steve’s Kitten has taken over the training. Just follow orders and everything will be fine. Yeah, and don’t stay away so long next time.

26

Welcome back, flatlined! Sorry to hear about Steve. I’ve currently got a 10-year-old cat with chronic kidney disease. Almost lost him last year but so far keeping him as healthy and happy as possible with special food, periodic IV fluids, and CBD oil.

Can you get one of those plastic kiddie pools and fill it with cat litter for the puppy? Sounds like you might need it! :stuck_out_tongue:

My neighborhood sounded like a war zone yesterday from about noon until sometime after midnight. Glad I decided to take this week off from work so I didn’t have to get up this morning. The cat was OK up until the city’s show started; I live close enough to hear but there’s too many trees in the way to see. Couple of window-shakers and the cat was under the bed.

27

Just in case there is any question of it, the internet has an awful lot of sleazeballs out there.

“Duh!” you say.

“Kinda stating the obvious”, you say.

Well, all true - but the most recent example is that my daughter - who is job hunting - created a basic LinkedIn profile on Wednesday.

By Friday, she had received numerous requests.

From men.

Asking what she’d be doing all weekend.

Now, she’s 22 - i.e. not born yesterday. And a legal adult. And pretty savvy - in theory - to the evils of the world (the kid can out-crude me sometimes and that’s saying something).

But she was pretty shocked and upset that people were hitting on her on what is supposedly a “professional” site.

We told her to report the people to LinkedIn - not that they’re really who they say they are, but at least their sock puppets might get banned (or will they? Does LinkedIn even police bullshit like that?).

28

I agree with you though for different reasons. Some moron nearly burned our house down some years back - on New Year’s Eve, not J4, mind you…

We were at home, near midnight, and heard a whooshing sound. It reminded me of the sound if you drag a cardboard box across concrete.

Then the smoke detectors went off.

After our first task (running around screaming), I called 911 while my husband investigated - and found that there was a fire in our backyard. A small one - it had rained recently, and this was in the mulch just outside the back door. We clobbered it with the fire extinguisher, and were able to tell the firemen that it was dealt with, when they arrived a couple minutes later.

The next day, we took another look - and there was a large dent in the aluminum siding where the thing had bounced off the wall. If it had gone one foot to the right or two to the left, it would have blown right through our walkout basement windows, into the finished basement, and we’d have had a very different story to tell.

We asked a fire marshall to stop by to document what had happened so we could file with insurance. He took one look at the device and said “Huh. That’s not legal here The closest place it might be legal is South Carolina” (we live just outside Washington DC).

So some asshole drove a minimum of 400 miles after having procured some truly scary stuff, decided to combine alcohol and gunpowder (or whatever makes those things fly), and nearly wrecked our lives.

Luckily, we just got a story out of it, and a bill for several hundred dollars for the siding repair. And we found out that there are benefits to poorly-built, leaky-walled construction, as the smoke from that small fire got into the house and was sufficient to set off the alarms. We were also lucky that it had rained recently, which kept the fire from growing too quickly. Had it gotten bigger, it still might have done a lot of damage even though it started on the outside.

29

Wow. I’m always uneasy around the 4th of July just for that reason, especially during dry spells and its effect on shrubbery, grass, pine needle beds. Much more flammable.

I too had an incident during New Year’s eve ( whereby they’re as nutty with the fireworks as July 4th around here )

Heard a loud "Whack! hit the house. Thinking it was a rocket, and having found none, I’d wait till daylight to look more thoroughly. None noted.

It turned out to be a bullet! I only found out months later due to finally calling a roofer to find an elusive leak I developed but could not find. He called down to me from the roof and peeled back a shingle to reveal a large hole in it. We could could not find the slug in the attic. From the diameter and trajectory, it was plain it came from a 20 or 16 gauge shotgun ( firing a solid “slug” ) fired upright in to the air. We have some yahoos around here.

The roof was repaired but I still shudder with the major “what if”, as in what if it fell a few yards short and what if I was on the back patio?

30

I live less than an hour from the SC border. There were no legal fireworks set off in my neighborhood. Even the ones we set off were illegal. We*, however, had enough sense to make sure that we set them off on flat land with open space above not pointed at the neighbors houses and we soaked the boxes with the hose after they finished going off.

We may be crazy hillbillies, but we’re *safe *crazy hillbillies.
*my roommates and I

31

Seems like a simple way to identify the stupidist employees!
Add them to the list of first employees to be laid off in bad times.

32

There is apparently a conspiracy afoot to have me save my money, which is probably a good thing.

Example #1: While I was out today I thought I’d stop by a place that makes really good takeout burgers, and while I don’t like their fries, their onion rings are great. Yeah. There was nobody there except a couple (of customers) inside, who eventually left. Shouting “hello? Does anybody work here?” brought no results. The place was fucking deserted. I should have emptied their cash registers before I left. So I went home and had a better dinner there, involving only a bit of effort.

Example #2: Then Amazon refuses to sell me a small item that I ordered. “We have yet to receive a valid method of payment”, said the email. The “method of payment” was a perfectly valid credit card, and when I called the issuing bank, they said they had no record of any decline and there should be no reason for one. The card expires at the end of this month and I do have a new one, but the new one hasn’t been activated yet. The current one works perfectly fine for everything else. Both cards need to be inserted up Jeff Bezos’ ass sideways.

33

Customer, looking at five cops standing in our store, eating their lunches and talking;

Cu: There’s our tax dollars at work!
Me: They get to take breaks, sir.
Cu: Oh don’t get me started on that!
Me: We want them in our store, sir.
Cu: <stomps off>

Dude, go fuck yourself sideways. Don’t get ME started! Civil Servants get to take lunches and breaks. Taxes are not theft and real patriots don’t whine about how their taxes are too high and are only being wasted. So five cops stand around in a store eating and talking for 30 minutes instead of going to a fast food place… or wait, would that be a problem for you too? Are they not allowed to eat food while on duty or visit restrooms? Or should they be forced to return to the police station to do this, out of sight of the public? I mean, I know WHERE the problem is, and it is in your head, but what exactly is your idea of how this should work here?

34

Yes they do. Also using their site to sell stuff, pyramid schemes, people copying CVs…

35

Computer update: corporate IT has admitted that they sent the wrong computer. My supervisor says they’ll send me the right computer if I send the loaner back. Another manager here who also functions as our in-house computer guy says the only way corporate IT will be getting their loaner back is if they buy a plane ticket and come down here to retrieve it. As of now, I’m still running two computers to have access to all of the software I need.

:smiley: This is a company that doesn’t think twice about retaining an employee who’s been busted for stealing company property, so long as the employee in question has been working here for decades…I can’t imagine that their list of “first to go” employees would have such a practical basis.

36

Patrol cops do not get scheduled lunch breaks like other jobs do. The cops have to radio in for permission to take a break and that break can be denied or terminated when something goes down. That customer is a bigoted moron.

37

Our local pyrotechnical idiots extended fireworks right on through the entire weekend. Complete with dynamite and tree stump removal material. Our dogs are still recovering.

A guy I ran into described how his dog trembled and whined nonstop due to fireworks. I commiserated and suggested he call the cops. Turns out the fireworks were his and he didn’t want to disappoint his kids!?

38

So according to Nissan, the front seat passenger is an idiot who is incapable of doing any navigation functions.

Their navigation software which appears to have been programmed by drunks WILL NOT let anyone enter an address while the car’s shift lever is set anywhere but park.

So when Mrs. BD and I are en route to an unfamiliar location we have to pull over and put the car in park to enter an address.

And while we’re at it Nissan, why did you move the sound system’s fucking volume controls on the steering wheel? They used to be easily controlled with my thumb without my need to change my grip on the wheel. Now the volume buttons are in a recessed area that causes me to move my grip (and divert my gaze to find the little fuckers).

The old location still has the familiar rocker button in it and it happily changes the information screen on the driver’s console every time that I try to adjust the volume. (I know, first world problem) But it’s a first world distraction that I have to overcome multiple times daily.

39

Twice in the past 24 hours I’ve been attacked by stranger’s objects, and received no apologies for it. Last night, while waiting at the bus stop a guy walking his small dogs goes by me. One of the dogs jumps my leg. I control myself and don’t send said dog flying into the busy main street. Guy pulls at dog’s leash and goes out into the night without saying a word.

Today at the library the woman sitting next to me watches as her cane falls over and hits my leg. She moves it without saying a word.

Don’t people apologize any more? I know I do if I bump into you. What’s up with that?

40

So, I took last week off and stayed at my brother’s house in Ga, where I grew up. A few hours after I go tin, I got a call from my friend Joel, who told me his son Jeremy died earlier that day.

Jeremy was born brain damaged, and lived for 29 years. He didn’t have the ability to talk, so he mainly screamed and threw things. He was the boy that never grew up. He required constant medical care such as oxygen tanks and numerous medications. Joel lives with his parents, and they helped care for Jeremy as well. He was surrounded by continual love, and each day he survived was a miracle. His whole family are UGA fans, and he picked up on that instinctively. He would scream for the Bulldogs during their games, and give the opposing coach a Thousand Yard Stare whenever the camera showed him. Jeremy was buried in a UGA jersey and had a Bulldog license plate on top of his coffin. I love being from the South.

His funeral went OK, in that I got to reconnect with people I hadn’t seen in a minute, but the minister was one of those stereotypical Southern Baptist preachers who bloviated about Gawd’s Wrath, and how we can only avoid it by accepting Jayzus. Jeremy was completely innocent and didn’t deserve that kind of sanctimonious diarrhea. Plus, his mom’s side of the family is Jewish, and here they are getting pelted by Jayzus nails. I wanted to throw that fat bastard out with extreme prejudice. I’m still pissed about it. Jeremy’s mom was a complete basket case, and it didn’t help that these zealots were trying to save her soul, using Jeremy’s passing as leverage. There are some things about being from the South I don’t love.

I stayed around to give Jeremy’s parents my condolences and drink a toast to him, but I just can’t handle mourning. I don’t know what to say and I feel like I’m not grieving enough.