I’m sorry. That really sucks. 
You feel like you found something to really help you out and it might be the cause of another problem. Ugh!
We have a kitten. I am 63 years old, I am old enough to know that kittens and puppies are a pain in the ass. We have always adopted adult pets in the past, but I just had to go and buy a kitten. A very cute little fucking terrorist who is listening to our VeryBadCat instead of our VeryGoodCat.
VBC likes to hang out in the same room with George and will play with him for a few seconds before she runs out the kitty door to their catio. VBC is a jerk when we are folding laundry on our bed and likes to hide toys under the bed for late night use. VGK of course leaves the laundry alone and very considerately plays with toys in the living room.
George thinks laundry is so much fun that he pounces socks and drags them under the bed for later use. We fish them out and he goes looking for them just about dawn and bangs around under the bed and wakes one or both of us up. We let him have a sock for the night which didn’t help.
I’m sure I had a good reason for buying a kitten. I think it had something to do with COVID, but I have kitten brain and CRS.
My lovely parental units are in town, from thousands of miles away. I told them I have today off, and then after that, I have to work every day.
Coupla days ago, we made tentative “plans” to “do something” today. I didn’t know they meant early morning, and I missed their call. Called them back around noon, and my mother is already in full pout mode, and is insisting they’ll just stay at the hotel all day. (Cue “woe is me” gesture.)
They tell me they’ll get back to me. So now I have to babysit my phone, like some goddamn lovesick teenager, waiting breathlessly for them to deign to call me back, and make actual goddamn plans, on my ONE DAY OFF.
Keep it up, woman. I am not available the rest of the week, and you’ll miss seeing your only child, and of course, she’ll tell everyone it was all my fault.
I’m necessary at my job but I hate it with a passion. I’ve accepted another position, and due to a miscommunication, I’ll have to give a 1.5 weeks notice instead of a two weeks notice.
As soon as I give notice, all hell will break loose. My collegial coworkers will become steely-eyed enemies. What a shame.
While its lovely that your folks traveled all that way to see you, its not so nice that they are playing power games. Are they retired? I sometime find myself forgetting that my friends have to work certain hours and days but I don’t pout when I’m reminded.
@Sefton don’t worry about it. It’s not your circus anymore. Your coworkers weren’t friends to start with and you should throw your own “I finally left that sucky job” party. Its OK if you don’t invite any of them, they are behind you. You only have to put up with it for a week and a half, what are they going to do when you stop being a team player? Fire you?
@Sefton Two weeks isn’t a law, it’s a courtesy. That sometimes just doesn’t work (says the dude who gave three days’ notice…).
If there’s anyone at your work who you’d like to keep in touch with after you leave, tell them privately ahead of time. I’ve appreciated it when others did that.
Speaking of “two weeks”: I once quit a job I hated, and dutifully gave them two weeks’ notice. It was a very specialized job, and I expected them to bring in someone to be trained. Days went by, and no trainee. Finally, on my last day, the owner called me into his office and BEGGED me to stay. What the hell was he counting on, during those two weeks?
Not long thereafter, they went out of business.
What a funny coincidence!
So, yesterday DesertRoomie and I went grocery shopping. We drive into the parking lot lane that points directly at the front door of the store and look! there’s a parking space about three slots from the near end. In Arizona in July at three in the afternoon this is good to find.
After shopping we exit and start wheeling the cart into the parking lot. In the shade of the tree planted at the end of the row is an auto with a Lyft decal in the windshield and the driver looking down – I figure he’d just dropped someone off and is looking for his next gig. Considering he’s stopped about as far right in the lane as you can; I’m wondering whether to push the cart to the left or right to get around him.
Before I can come to a decision, up wheels a crossover that, despite there being plenty of room to get around, stops a foot behind him. Beep beep. No response from the Lyft driver; he doesn’t even look up. Be-e-e-p be-e-e-e-p. Nada. I’ve decided to go left for reasons. Be-e-e-e-e-e-e-e-e-e-e-e-ep!
About the time we’re even with the crossover, the driver’s door flies open and Ms Big Hair with Sunglasses tippy tips over to lean down by Mr. Lyft’s window. By now, DR and I hustling a bit to get the groceries into our car. The crossover is blocking us in a bit and I want to get in, put on the backup lights, and play a horn concerto of my own. In any event I didn’t hear whatever gems of wisdom BH might have wanted to impart. I don’t think Lyft even rolled the window down – one does not needlessly spill precious automotive cool air.
About the time I’m clicking the seat belt the crossover savagely backs up four feet, then with a chirp wheels around Lyft to get to the end of the lane, turns right and stops at the tobacco store right next to grocery store, parking the wrong way slaunch-wise at the red curb marking the fire lane running in front of the stores. BH leaps out again to tippy tip into the tobbacco shop as Lyft leaves. DR commented, “No wonder – she needed her fix.”
I go into geezer mode and slo-o-owly back out of our space, sl-o-o-owly turn right at the end of the lane and sl-o-o-owly pass by the crossover just a little too close to let it escape. Success! I took long enough I can see BH glowering at me in the rear view mirror for a few precious moments.
Two things:
- The weather. It’s winter here, and I’ve certainly lived through colder, but…the weeks of grey, damp, occasional rain but mostly just dreary, are getting to me. How about one day of sun?
We’re booked for a trip up to tropical Queensland next month, fingers crossed COVID doesn’t screw that up. - The clothes washer. Works fine, except that about half the indicator lights are not working. I’ve been getting by counting from the few ones remaining, for temperature and cycle, but it’s a a pain. I called up an appliance repair service, and got a quote on a fix - around 220AUD for a new PCB, plus labour - call it 300-ish (!) That’s around half the cost to just by a new washer; the repair guy said it wasn’t worth it and I agree. Damnit, it’s just a handful of LEDs burned out, it shouldn’t cost that much!
He did say he’d keep the job on his sheets, and keep an eye out for a junker with a good board - good service, that.
DesertDog: Great story and told well.
Dear Boss:
Yesterday you asked me how come I still hadn’t started my testing. I explained I go behind everybody else except Finance.
Today you asked what are my plans re. testing. They still are to go behind everybody else.
Seriously, which part of “I can’t cook until the ingredients are in” is hard to understand? I’m Production, which means Planning, Purchasing, Receiving, Quality Receiving… go before me. It shouldn’t be so difficult!
“Didn’t you test that?”
“Yep, it failed then, too.”
A silly problem that has absolutely no business still existing in 2021…
My iPhone uses AT&T.
AT&T has a nifty service called Wi-Fi dialing, where they provide all of their phone services over my home Internet connection, thereby giving me superb mobile connectivity in my house.
The problem: if my phone gets even a whiff of a real cellular signal, no matter how crappy, it gloms onto that signal and doesn’t use the super fast and super powerful Wi-Fi signal coming from 10 feet away. This means that when I am in my basement and I send a text that uses SMS (a “green bubble”) it finds the useless cellular signal with absolutely zero bars, tries…tries…tries…and fails.
So, I have to put the phone in airplane mode, which forces it to only use Wi-Fi–this works perfectly until I decide to go to the store, in which case I always forget to turn my cellular back on.
Seriously, between Apple and AT&T this shouldn’t even be a problem. Just use whatever signal works!
I have a Toshiba FireTV, which has been working fine until recently. For nearly the past week, however, I’ve been getting error messages when I try to watch IMDB TV (specifically Leverage Redemption); I called Amazon customer service and was told to go to the app settings and clear the cache. This worked. Once. The next day, when I tried to watch another episode I got the same error, and had to not only clear the cache again but restart the TV.
I also haven’t been able to watch anything on Disney+. In that case instead of getting any sort of error message the show just doesn’t play. I haven’t tried clearing the cache for Disney+ yet, so I don’t know if that would clear up the problem. If it doesn’t, I might try uninstalling and reinstalling the app, which had worked when I had a problem with the CBS app.
We ordered corned beef sandwiches from a new local deli. We expected them to come with some obligatory mustard, but they arrived with ketchup packets. Ketchup? On corned beef? Who the hell puts ketchup on corned beef?
And the meat was tough. We don’t expect this place to last.
Just slice the jerky really thin. Give 'em some ketchup packets, they won’t know the difference.
I hear ya - got the same problem here, only my service is through Google Fi, which I think uses T-Mobile and Sprint networks. If I am out and forget to turn cell service off in the house and someone has the temerity to call me, the call will, without fail, drop repeatedly.
Two rants in one, closely related.
Rant #1 is I’ve had it with mowing the lawn. Especially when the grass is tall and thick, fueled by apparently ceaseless rain into a sort of Amazonian rain forest tangle of impenetrable growth. I take heart medication and I’m just too old for this shit.
So (Rant #2) I call up my faithful snowplowing guy who does landscaping in the summer. Can’t do it, he tells me, completely booked up solid. But call this guy I know who can probably do it.
I tell him that I recognize the name, and he’s suggested this guy before. I called him once a few years ago and he agreed to do some gardening work, and then never showed up. Well, he says, he was just a kid looking for work then, but now he runs his own landscaping business. Which he does – he has a website and everything. So I call him this morning and he’s most friendly and accommodating, and says he’ll be by today to have a look and give me a quote, but he’s not sure what time. Well, one thing hasn’t changed. Sure enough, once again he doesn’t show up! 
This kind of lazy irresponsible bullshit pisses me off probably a lot more than it should.
I have another option that I’m calling tomorrow – he ain’t cheap, but he does show up.
Apparently the guy who failed to show up today reads the Dope and saw my rant. At least that’s what I assume. Anyway, he called me yesterday and apologized for being busy and set up an appointment for Monday. We shall see.