The rant thread.

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Re: The rant thread.

Postby cmsellers » Fri Feb 15, 2019 9:05 am

My smoke alarm had been going off every ten minutes for the past three hours. I really, really, hate this thing. When I first moved in, it needed its battery changed, but since my ceilings are like fifteen minutes high it's not reachable without a latter. And it's wired to the wall, so even when the battery is completely dead it will still chirp at you. I had three awful days before my mother found a handyman with his own latter to replace the battery.

I wish he'd just cut the wire, because it's right next to my stove and always goes off if I use the front burners, always goes off if I open the oven, and always goes off if I cook anything high in fat on the back burner for too long.

So any rate, now it's beeping instead of chirping, and at more frequent intervals, and of course it started doing it basically right after Home Depot closed. Googling, the best-case scenario it's the humidity, which is at 80% in Austin right now, which means that I don't have to do anything about it but also means I can't do anything about it and I'll probably have this problem everytime humidity goes above 70.

The other possibilities are that there's dust in the sensor or that the ten-year-old alarm is dying. Both of which mean I have to go to Home Depot and rent a ladder and probably a truck to carry it, but at least it's fixable. Except Home Depot doesn't open for another four hours.

In the mean time, I decided to open all the windows and run the fan, figuring that if it's dust, fresh air might help, and since it's cooler outside it's probably dryer outside. Now the alarm is going off every two to three minutes, so either it's a dying alarm that's dying faster, or it's more humid outside and I made it worse. I turned the AC on and set it to 58 which is a ridiculous temperature especially considering that I'm going to run the heat to get it back up, but my hope is that at some point, the AC will drop the humidity enough that the alarm stops.
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Re: The rant thread.

Postby IamNotCreepy » Fri Feb 15, 2019 1:47 pm

Texas has very strict smoke detector regulations, so you might want to consult with someone before messing around with it. It could cause headache down the line if your mother wants to sell the place.
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Re: The rant thread.

Postby Tesseracts » Fri Feb 15, 2019 3:24 pm

I generally have a good relationship with my neighbor. He has a wife, a son and a dog. Usually he is friendly. He has chickens and he offers us free eggs. However sometimes he gets drunk and angry. I recall one time years ago when my Mom was walking the dog and the dog walked up to him with a toy and dropped it at his feet, expecting him to throw it. He shouted "get that fucking dog out of here" and threw the toy at my Mom. My Mom thought they were friends because they frequently interacted and allowed their dog to play with mine.

Our dog Ginger used to love playing with their dog Mia. Unfortunately they got stricter and stricter with Mia for no reason and don't let her come to our house any more. It would be better for both of our dogs if they got more social time. They are so harsh with Mia that she doesn't seem to have much interest in anything any more.

Last night my dog Oliver was outside barking at something at around 11 PM. Normally I put him in the house when he's barking but I was depressed, sick, and lying in bed so I did nothing. My parents were watching TV so they didn't hear the barking. Suddenly I heard someone outside screaming "get the fuck in the house!" I thought it was my Dad at first but he has never talked to my dog like that and also he was watching TV. I got up and my neighbor was screaming at my dog. He grabbed my dogs collar, opened the door and put him in the house. Oliver had his tail between his legs because he was scared. Then my Mom started screaming at the neighbor, and when he left she started screaming at me and threatening to move to California and give away Oliver. She apologized the next day.

I feel like I should do something about this. Oliver is my dog. I want to write a letter saying it is unacceptable for him to grab my dogs collar and open my door. He could call us or knock on our door. I expect an apology from him.
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Re: The rant thread.

Postby iMURDAu » Sat Feb 16, 2019 6:02 pm

Keep a copy of what you send, just in case there's a dispute. Idk if sending it certified mail is worth the trouble but it's a thought.
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Re: The rant thread.

Postby Fun With Mr. Fudge » Sat Feb 16, 2019 9:55 pm

Sorry about your neighbor, Tess, and how your mom reacted at first.That must not have helped. I agree with MURDA -- not the act, the person. Keep a record. I hope everything works out.

Neighbors are tricky, sometimes terrifying things. I just had to speak with the cops today about my downstairs neighbor because she pounded on my door and threatened to "bust" my lock. It sounded like she accused me of following her around her apartment from inside of mine somehow, even though that makes no sense, and I was sitting down at the time. In the past she's banged against her ceiling, seemingly screaming at me for something. I thought it was just because she could hear me walking. Our floors are thin, and I can hear the people above me walking as well, so I just ignored it because I didn't want to have an argument with a woman who responds to two seconds of sound with screaming and banging.

One of the cops I spoke had a look on her face that screamed, "Oh no, not again." As it turns out, the police have had to pay this resident a visit before, and the officer told me the neighbor is "suffering from some kind of mental illness." This worries the hell out of me because I don't know if this woman is going to snap and attack me if she sees me outside because she has convinced herself that I'm magically tracking her movements in her apartment from upstairs in mine. I don't even normally hear her unless she's slamming her door or arguing with/cursing at people.
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Re: The rant thread.

Postby NathanLoiselle » Sat Feb 16, 2019 10:29 pm

She's probably cursing at the wind. Crazy people do that ya know. I should know. Used to do it all the time.
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Re: The rant thread.

Postby iMURDAu » Sat Feb 16, 2019 10:50 pm

She shouldn't be able to attack you.

I mean since you're aware of her every movement you've got quite an advantage.

I suggest taking up tap dancing and basketball, practice both simultaneously in your apartment unless the lease specifically prohibits it, and if she doesn't like it then she can move. The Camp 1 Crazy downstairs will be gone and you'll have some slick skills on a b-ball court.

Also Tess' neighbor is kind of lucky that Oliver didn't bite him. Would've totally been his own fault. Maybe (actually don't) add something like this to the note: Don't put your hands on my dog. He doesn't bite. But I do.
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Re: The rant thread.

Postby cmsellers » Mon Feb 18, 2019 4:07 am

So an update on the fire alarm situation:

Right after I wrote that, the fire alarm started going off nonstop for 2-4 hours. I called the non-emergency number for two fire stations (who never called me back), went to the fire station, found there was no parking, parked two blocks away, walked to the fire station, rang the doorbell and banged on the glass, waited, gave up, went back to the apartment, put my birds in the carrier (which they were really upset about and didn't want to do), put the carrier in the car, drove two blocks away, and resigned myself to going to Home Depot first thing in the morning.

I spent two hours in the car before my mother got my texts and suggested I flip the circuit breaker so it could wear itself out. I have no idea if that would work, but figured I'd give it a try. Got back, and it had stopped, so I put the birds away and went to bed. The next day I had my mother order two new smoke detectors on Amazon. The next night it went off about every half hour for three beeps, so I slept with earplugs.

Last night, it started going off again, so I put in earplugs, turned off the circuit breaker labeled for the fire alarms, discovered it was mislabled and that was the one for my bedroom, turned off the circuit breaker labeled for my bedroom, removed the fire alarm which is still working but I can reach (since it's connected to the malfunctioning one), had a Three Stooges routine attempting to get the flustered birds into the carrier, put the birds in the car where the sound is at least muffled, then climbed on a ladder and whacked the alarm with a mop in an attempt to break it. That shut up the constant beeping, but it went off a few more times in the night.

Well, today, the smoke alarms were supposed to be delivered. My mother contacted me this evening to see if I got them. I went down and they weren't there, and so she checked the tracking. The tracking says it was delivered to me in person at 2:22. I was here at 2:22, so apparently while I was sitting her, not twenty feet below me, some rando saw the UPS guy, claimed to live at my house, and took the package. I've never had a package stolen before, and this was a really brazen move, so now I'm really concerned.

Edit: So my mother contacted Amazon customer support and apparently a lot of carriers have been marking stuff as delivered prematurely. So it may not have been stolen after all. If this is what happened, Amazon said it's usually delivered within 24 hours.
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Re: The rant thread.

Postby iMURDAu » Sat Feb 23, 2019 1:27 pm

The last Ghostbusters film would have been better if the cast would have either written the script or ad libbed the entire thing. It isn't what I'd call a bad movie, I've got plenty of those I could begin listing, I'd say it's meh but it did make me laugh a couple times. My sense of humor is kind of broken as you'd imagine and most "comedies" barely get me to crack a smile let alone literally lol.

True, a lot of jokes don't land very well but do yourself a (it's not a favor) favor and watch Ghostbusters 2 again and tell me how many times you feel an obviously "written by Dan Akroyd" dad joke roll over your pinky toe and make you cringe. It's too many times.

So now we're getting Ghostbusters 3, damn the excellent video game to the fires of Hades, and all is well? Oh Jeebus it appears we have to choose sides to talk about it online. So when it finally comes out and isn't as good as we all believe it deserves to be due to nostalgia, can the internet calm down a bit? I could also begin listing for people bad movies that are the third in a previously well regarded series. Even ones that came out decades after the previous entry. Anyone ever seen Terminator 3? Yeah..... yeah.
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Re: The rant thread.

Postby iMURDAu » Thu Mar 07, 2019 10:01 pm

A driver for SolarCity (a Tesla company) almost ran me off the road, doubled down by offering to fight me over it when I told him he was on camera, then I get home and find out that not only is this incident not captured on my dashcam but apparently nothing has been captured on my dashcam since we got a new car. I guess the "rec" light is just a cool red diode.
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Re: The rant thread.

Postby IamNotCreepy » Wed Mar 13, 2019 1:04 pm

So we are in the market for a new (to us) car. It's been a very frustrating process so far.

First, we found a great car through an independent dealer. It was in perfect condition, few miles for its age, and a great price. We went and did a test drive, and told the dealer we wanted to buy. We just wanted to arrange a third-party inspection first.

We contacted a franchise dealership and scheduled an inspection. Then we get a message from the dealer saying someone else wanted the car because they totaled theirs and he sold it to them.

Now, I get that someone willing to buy on the spot would get priority, but it's frustrating because that was the best car we had found.

So, we began the search again. We found a couple of potential cars for me to check out. I went to a different used car lot, but that whole process was a nightmare. Usually, the second you pull on the lot you get swarmed with people trying to sell to you. This was a ghost town.

I went in the office, and they seemed very indifferent. They told me all the cars were unlocked and I was free to go look at them. Ok, thanks for the help? So I found the ones I wanted to look at, and decided to do a test drive. I went back in the office, and the guy took a picture of my ID and handed me the keys. Didn't offer to come with or help in any way.

So I went back to the car, and it wouldn't start. In fact, the whole car was dead. Great. I told the guy in the office and he looked really surprised. He said he would look into it, but I just left.

I went to another lot, and they also had a very hands-off approach, but they didn't even have prices on any of their cars, so I had no idea what anything cost. I left without bothering to go to the office this time.

We've been searching online and have a couple leads on cars that are really far away. This whole situation sucks because we were hoping to get a new car before we drive the 8 hours to New Orleans in a couple of weeks.
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Re: The rant thread.

Postby iMURDAu » Wed Mar 13, 2019 1:37 pm

I really dislike the practice of not putting a price on the window of a used car that's for sale. We all have internet access. We're all able to find out car model prices based on make/model/trim quite easily. Some dealers even have wifi so it isn't like the internet is a secret.

They should just be human, set a price they feel comfortable negotiating from and go from there. I mean that's what they do with new cars.

I feel bad for used car salesfolk. They have to be pretty well versed in almost every car that ever came out because who knows what inventory will arrive next week. When I was looking for a specific make/model/trim of Jeep Cherokee back in the early aughts I knew details that sales people didn't. Because they don't have time or brain space to know what kind of slight differences there are between model years and trim levels on a vehicle that looked about the same for a few decades. There's no training program that could cover those things.
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Re: The rant thread.

Postby IamNotCreepy » Mon Mar 18, 2019 1:09 pm

So I had a weird day on Saturday. Drove about 10 hours, finally bought a car, almost got murdered at a gas station.

After missing out on the car we wanted in town, we found another one in Plantation (just north of Miami). I could have had the car shipped up to me, but it would have cost $400. Instead, I drove down with my friend in my wife's car, and he drove it back while I drove my new car.

Once we got to about St. Augustine, which was at about 8pm, we had to stop for gas. Now, it had been raining off and on the whole drive, and it was coming down pretty hard at this time. There were a lot of motorcycles out on the road because of Bike Week down in Daytona.

We pulled into the gas station, and which had a weird set-up. Here's a pic from Google Maps:

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It's hard to tell exactly from the picture, but you come in from the left side, and there's not a lot of room to maneuver there. At the time, there were a bunch of motorcycles that had pulled in there to refuel and shelter from the rain, and they kind of blocked most of the way through.

I managed to squeeze by on the right side by the fruit stands and parked. My friend pulled into the only empty spot, and I walked up and paid for the gas and started filling up while my friend went inside to grab a couple of items. When I finished, I went in to use the restroom and give my friend the keys.

After I came out, I got back in my car and backed up into a newly opened spot. As soon as I got out of my car to fill that one up, this older white guy (probably in his 50s or 60s) with tattoos and a leather vest walked up and started screaming.

"Are you going to move your fucking car?"

I stared at him blankly for a moment before I realized he was yelling at me. He pointed to his SUV.

"I've been stuck behind your car for 15 FUCKING minutes!"

I thought about trying to explain that we were taking two cars that we needed to refill, and that we had only been there maybe a total of 5 minutes, and that if anything, it was all of the motorcycles that were blocking the way. They had been done fueling up and were just waiting out the rain. The area that I had squeezed through was now blocked by a tow truck loading up one of the motorcycles.

I tried to brush him off and just go on with my day, but by this time my friend had come out of the store and saw this guy yelling in my face. He started explaining the situation, and when that didn't work they started arguing back and forth.

I saw the situation escalating, and so I tried to calm him down and just convince him to let it go.

The guy kept on yelling, and he stuck his hand down as if reaching for a weapon in a way that would have gotten him shot by police if he was a black guy.

"You want to go? 'Cause I will FUCK YOU UP! Do you want that? Do you want me to fuck you up?"

Either me or my friend could have handled this guy in a fight, but my friend didn't see him reaching for a weapon. I finally convinced everyone to calm down.

"You need to be more FUCKING COURTEOUS!" He yelled at me.

"I'm sorry you feel that way, sir."

It's funny, years of customer service prepared me for this moment. I am used to assholes yelling at (albeit over the phone) for stupid shit, and having to remain calm and not letting it affect me.

I didn't care about my pride or letting him leave thinking he had "won" the encounter. All I could think about was how I was only about 10 or 15 miles away from where Jordan Davis was killed in a similar encounter.
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Re: The rant thread.

Postby Absentia » Mon Mar 18, 2019 8:30 pm

Part of my job is that when somebody needs to collect information from our hundreds of stores all over the state, I'm the guy who does the collecting. In the past, this meant sending out mass e-mails and manually filling out spreadsheets, which is a slow and arduous process.

Lately we have been using a web-based solution that is much more efficient. So much so that I have been fielding more requests from various people who are excited that I can get them useful information in a timely manner. In a TV commercial, this is the part where they cut to me being applauded at some big meeting. (This is government, so nobody actually cares that much, but I've gotten a couple of nice thank-yous.)

However, the store managers have begun to complain about being asked to take two minutes to fill out a form once or twice a week. According to my boss, their complaint is that "if they need to know about the stores, why don't they show up in person?" Instead of filling out a web questionnaire while they dick around on the back room computer like they do all the time anyway, they want somebody to show up to all 375 stores in person to ask them who picks up their trash.

And due to the fact that there are 375 of them and only a few people in my department, their whining is louder than our common sense and we are "temporarily" discontinuing the efficient data collection. If something is really important we can send e-mails, otherwise we'll just sit here in the dark because it's the path of least resistance. This is what libertarians mean when they complain about government not being able to get anything done.
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Re: The rant thread.

Postby cmsellers » Mon Mar 18, 2019 9:11 pm

While I am still morbidly obese, I have always been able to fit in my car, even if someone parks right on the line on the driver's side. Well, today, someone parked over the line on the driver's side. I had to climb over through the passenger side, which as a fatass with a tiny car, was not a particularly easy thing to do.
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