# The Rants Came Marching One By One (March minirants) **URL:** \ **Category:** The BBQ Pit\ **Created:** [March 1, 2014, 1:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-rants-came-marching-one-by-one-march-minirants/682588 "2014-03-01T13:23:18Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 5
**Author:** ![Cat\_Whisperer](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/cat_whisperer/32/4839_2.png) [@Cat\_Whisperer](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Cat_Whisperer)\ **Post date:** [March 5, 2014, 8:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-rants-came-marching-one-by-one-march-minirants/682588/81 "2014-03-05T20:27:00Z")
We’re meeting with a new real estate agent for the first time today, so I have to clean up the house and get it all tidy and organized - apparently every single thing in my house is in the wrong place. As a real estate agent, I’m sure he understands how houses that are in the preliminary stages of packing and moving look, though. It will look _spotless_ when we’re ready to start showing it. And I’m a little nervous about how much he’s going to suggest we list for - houses in our neighbourhood are selling for a LOT of money, but I’m afraid our house is going to be the cheapest in the neighbourhood because we don’t have a finished basement. ---
**Author:** ![a35362](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/3da27b/32.png) [@a35362](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/a35362)\ **Post date:** [March 5, 2014, 8:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-rants-came-marching-one-by-one-march-minirants/682588/82 "2014-03-05T20:31:30Z")
> [@Jackmannii](#): > > …Now I need to go check the coldframe to see what my traps out there have caught. Can you compost mice? Erm… my understanding is that you never put meat, bones or grease in a compost heap (you’ll get rats and raccoons). Not sure if you were being serious. ---
**Author:** ![a35362](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/3da27b/32.png) [@a35362](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/a35362)\ **Post date:** [March 5, 2014, 8:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-rants-came-marching-one-by-one-march-minirants/682588/83 "2014-03-05T20:48:01Z")
Fifteen more days! Fifteen more days! Come on, Spring! ☹ ---
**Author:** ![Filbert](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/filbert/32/3433_2.png) [@Filbert](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Filbert)\ **Post date:** [March 5, 2014, 8:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-rants-came-marching-one-by-one-march-minirants/682588/84 "2014-03-05T20:52:51Z")
> [@a35362](#): > > Erm… my understanding is that you never put meat, bones or grease in a compost heap (you’ll get rats and raccoons). Then when you compost the rats and racoons, you get wolves, and when you compost _them_… Anyway, yeah, rant- skin. Again. It’s crap and it doesn’t work properly. I’m back to the shouting ‘unclean’ standard, it’s flared up massively, and got infected. Again. ---
**Author:** ![LavenderBlue](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/e95f7d/32.png) [@LavenderBlue](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/LavenderBlue)\ **Post date:** [March 5, 2014, 8:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-rants-came-marching-one-by-one-march-minirants/682588/85 "2014-03-05T20:59:03Z")
> [@a35362](#): > > Fifteen more days! Fifteen more days! Come on, Spring! ☹ oh please oh please oh please oh please oh please ASAP! ---
**Author:** ![Lacunae\_Matata](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/8491ac/32.png) [@Lacunae\_Matata](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lacunae_Matata)\ **Post date:** [March 5, 2014, 9:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-rants-came-marching-one-by-one-march-minirants/682588/86 "2014-03-05T21:23:31Z")
> [@slalexan](#): > > My shins look disgusting for the same reason. I can’t keep any moisture in my skin. > > In other news, one of my student loan creditors has recently decided to send me an email 10 days before my bill is ready. This would normally be nice but the email looks really scary and urgent. Every time I get it, I near shit myself wondering if I forgot to pay them last month. It’s like if the mortgage company sent all their bills out in red envelopes stamped with “NOTICE” in big letters. You open it up to find a friendly reminder that you owe them money in 20 or so days but not until after you had a heart attack thinking something had gone wrong. My bank does almost exactly that with my mortgage notices: that perforated envelope with three tear sides that always means bad news. Every month I panic, thinking that we’ve somehow bounced a check, but no: $$$ due by xx/01/201x. Which seems especially silly, because I have an automatic payment set up to pay $$$ + $16.44 (rounding up to the nearest hundred dollar increment) by the 27th of the preceding month, straight from checking to loan account, same bank for both. Stupid waste of paper and panic! Incidental rant: my bleeping heater still won’t work. The flame keeps going out, and the gas company dude says “not enough pressure,” while the HVAC dude says “too much gas pressure.” I’ve seen these guys often enough lately that I know how they take their coffee! ---
**Author:** ![purplehorseshoe](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/purplehorseshoe/32/2996_2.png) [@purplehorseshoe](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/purplehorseshoe)\ **Post date:** [March 5, 2014, 9:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-rants-came-marching-one-by-one-march-minirants/682588/87 "2014-03-05T21:40:34Z")
> [@Jackmannii](#): > > … one that made it to the top shelf of a plant stand, nearly six feet off the ground. [Groucho]How it got up there I’ll never know[/Groucho]… It shimmied up the legs of the stand, or whatever else you have supporting the shelves. Probably no harder for a mouse than for you to climb a flight of stairs. ProTip: finely ground black or cayenne pepper sprinkled onto the soil surface can help reduce or eliminate the digging. You’ll have to replace it after a heavy watering, though. Bonus points if you capture a wee little mousy sneeze and post it to YouTube. ---
**Author:** ![EmilyG](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/emilyg/32/364_2.png) [@EmilyG](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/EmilyG)\ **Post date:** [March 5, 2014, 10:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-rants-came-marching-one-by-one-march-minirants/682588/88 "2014-03-05T22:09:34Z")
People… stop sending me stupid game requests on Facebook. One of the reasons I don’t play games on Facebook is because they seem to send requests to people without the player’s knowledge. ---
**Author:** ![Doug\_K](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/b5ac83/32.png) [@Doug\_K](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Doug_K)\ **Post date:** [March 5, 2014, 10:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-rants-came-marching-one-by-one-march-minirants/682588/89 "2014-03-05T22:14:12Z")
> [@EmilyG](#): > > People… stop sending me stupid game requests on Facebook. One of the reasons I don’t play games on Facebook is because they seem to send requests to people without the player’s knowledge. I go into settings and block every game that sends me a request. There were a lot when I started, but now that I’ve got the most popular games blocked I only have to do two or three a month now. ---
**Author:** ![EmilyG](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/emilyg/32/364_2.png) [@EmilyG](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/EmilyG)\ **Post date:** [March 5, 2014, 10:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-rants-came-marching-one-by-one-march-minirants/682588/90 "2014-03-05T22:15:21Z")
Yeah, I think I have the most popular games blocked too. I don’t get game requests often enough to be a problem, more just a mild annoyance. ---
**Author:** ![Catamount](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/catamount/32/2840_2.png) [@Catamount](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Catamount)\ **Post date:** [March 5, 2014, 10:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-rants-came-marching-one-by-one-march-minirants/682588/91 "2014-03-05T22:16:48Z")
> [@a35362](#): > > Fifteen more days! Fifteen more days! Come on, Spring! ☹ I saw a crocus blooming today. Spring, she is a-coming. ---
**Author:** ![EmilyG](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/emilyg/32/364_2.png) [@EmilyG](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/EmilyG)\ **Post date:** [March 5, 2014, 11:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-rants-came-marching-one-by-one-march-minirants/682588/92 "2014-03-05T23:46:11Z")
I know expecting warm temperatures around here at this time of year is unrealistic, but I wish it would just get up to 0 degrees Celsius (32 F.) Then maybe I wouldn’t have to wear multiple layers of clothing everywhere and sleep with 2 blankets and a hoodie at night. ---
**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:** [March 6, 2014, 12:03am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-rants-came-marching-one-by-one-march-minirants/682588/93 "2014-03-06T00:03:57Z")
We got notices yesterday that all of our w-2’s were wrong. They’ll get corrected ones out asap, but no telling when. They promise to have any that have to be mailed sent by 3/31, but I download mine from the intranet and I’m hoping that they get those reposted sooner. I’d have been more miffed if I had already done my taxes, or if I was low on cash. ---
**Author:** ![WolfpackJeep](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/wolfpackjeep/32/2921_2.png) [@WolfpackJeep](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/WolfpackJeep)\ **Post date:** [March 6, 2014, 12:21am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-rants-came-marching-one-by-one-march-minirants/682588/94 "2014-03-06T00:21:42Z")
> [@Lacunae\_Matata](#): > > My bank does almost exactly that with my mortgage notices: that perforated envelope with three tear sides that always means bad news. Every month I panic, thinking that we’ve somehow bounced a check, but no: $$$ due by xx/01/201x. My current mortgage holder (I’ll name them because I can’t stand them…NationStar) pulls crap like that. One time, they sent me a FedEx Red Urgent envelope that was nothing but a notice about my eligibility for a refinancing deal. My mother happened to be the one who found it on the front porch; it scared the hell out of her (she thought it was going to be something horrible like a foreclosure notice). > [@EmilyG](#): > > People… stop sending me stupid game requests on Facebook. One of the reasons I don’t play games on Facebook is because they seem to send requests to people without the player’s knowledge. Aren’t most of those games “pay for play” or something like that? In other words, the game is free but you have to make in-game purchases to make any progress in the game. I hate that shit. ---
**Author:** ![SeaDragonTattoo](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/df705f/32.png) [@SeaDragonTattoo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SeaDragonTattoo)\ **Post date:** [March 6, 2014, 1:15am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-rants-came-marching-one-by-one-march-minirants/682588/95 "2014-03-06T01:15:27Z")
I’m an asshole. I chucked someone’s dirty plastic lunch container in the recycling bin and proceeded to unpack boxes and cover it up with the packaging. They left the dirty container on my desk. Gross. Who wants to have to deal with someone else’s dirty lunch container? I could have taken it to the kitchen. Well, so could they. So should they. Who leaves their dirty dishes laying around someone else’s office? I don’t care if people eat lunch in here when I’m gone, it’s a useful spot with a computer they can use, too. But leave dirty crap behind and I’ll make it disappear. Oops. Too bad. If anyone wants to make be feel really guilty about it, I suppose I could resurrect it sometime tonight and make it reappear in the kitchen, where it will sit with its dirty self and someone else besides the dirty person will end up dealing with it in the morning. Seems like it should stay where I tossed it the more I think about it. Meh. ---
**Author:** ![chizzuk](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/e36b37/32.png) [@chizzuk](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/chizzuk)\ **Post date:** [March 6, 2014, 1:37am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-rants-came-marching-one-by-one-march-minirants/682588/96 "2014-03-06T01:37:43Z")
> [@Rick\_Kitchen](#): > > I filed my federal taxes online, and am expecting a refund. The filing said that I should get my refund automatically deposited into my bank account in about 21 days. After 22 days and no refund, I went to the IRS website and looked my refund up, and they said the refund was sent to my bank on February 20 and I should get it into my account by the 25th. > > It’s still not there, so I went back to the IRS website to print out the page which said that I should have it by now, and it now says my bank rejected the refund and the IRS will be mailing me a check by March 7 and to expect it by April 4. What the hell, Bank of America? > > And why should it take a month to get to me via mail? California did this to me. I filled out one set of direct deposit info when I submitted my taxes via TurboTax. It worked fine for both the feds and Maryland. California? Invalid. I don’t get it. ---
**Author:** ![Cat\_Whisperer](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/cat_whisperer/32/4839_2.png) [@Cat\_Whisperer](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Cat_Whisperer)\ **Post date:** [March 6, 2014, 1:40am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-rants-came-marching-one-by-one-march-minirants/682588/97 "2014-03-06T01:40:03Z")
Okay, meeting with agent over - we didn’t get a price set, but he did suggest some (expensive) renos that we might want to think about doing - re-shingle the roof and replace five out of seven windows on the main floor. We have to really think about it and run the numbers once we get some quotes - if we’ll get $25,000 more for $10,000 worth of renos, that makes sense, but if we’ll just break even, I don’t want to go to all the trouble of doing them. Was there a rant in there? Oh yeah - I thought our house was ready to put up for sale, but we might have a month or so of expensive renos to do. ---
**Author:** ![flatlined](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/eb9ed0/32.png) [@flatlined](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/flatlined)\ **Post date:** [March 6, 2014, 1:44am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-rants-came-marching-one-by-one-march-minirants/682588/98 "2014-03-06T01:44:37Z")
OMG **SDT**!!! Don’t you know what you did? Your overworked and underpaid co-worker brings her lunches from home to save money so she can pay for her crippled mother’s dialysis. Now that she can’t bring lunch from home, her poor blind mother will have to make due with once monthly treatment. You evil, evil person!!! Nah…leave it in the trash. Anyone who leaves dirty dishes around the workplace deserves to lose them. I pit people who don’t secure their loads. That includes idiots who toss a bunch of rocks into the back of a pick-up with one of those nylon strap things instead of a tailgate. Crap, I don’t know what to call those stupid things, but I know that someone here does and will tell me. Anyhow, the asshole was dropping rocks and gravel all over the road and onto cars as he jackrabbited out of the stop light. ---
**Author:** ![Cat\_Whisperer](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/cat_whisperer/32/4839_2.png) [@Cat\_Whisperer](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Cat_Whisperer)\ **Post date:** [March 6, 2014, 2:14am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-rants-came-marching-one-by-one-march-minirants/682588/99 "2014-03-06T02:14:30Z")
> [@flatlined](#): > > \ > Nah…leave it in the trash. Anyone who leaves dirty dishes around the workplace deserves to lose them.\ I once snagged some tupperware from the garbage at work - they had been left in the fridge for God only knows how long, they finally got tossed, so I took them home, bleached them out good as new, and started using them. The inconsiderate asshole who had left them in the fridge until they grew new life wanted them back then - I told him to get stuffed. ---
**Author:** ![Rick\_Kitchen](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/rick_kitchen/32/522_2.png) [@Rick\_Kitchen](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Rick_Kitchen)\ **Post date:** [March 6, 2014, 3:20am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-rants-came-marching-one-by-one-march-minirants/682588/100 "2014-03-06T03:20:48Z")
> [@](#): > > Incidental rant: my bleeping heater still won’t work. The flame keeps going out, and the gas company dude says “not enough pressure,” while the HVAC dude says “too much gas pressure.” I’ve seen these guys often enough lately that I know how they take their coffee! We had that problem for quite a while, every time the wind blew hard the pilot light would go out. We have the louvres changed to a different direction and it never happens now. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-rants-came-marching-one-by-one-march-minirants/682588.md?page=4) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-rants-came-marching-one-by-one-march-minirants/682588.md?page=6)