The rant thread.

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Re: The rant thread.

Postby iMURDAu » Sat Jun 15, 2019 5:57 pm

For the past couple months we've been receiving mail addressed to a mystery person. This person shares our last name apparently. From the research I've done, because it aggravates me to no end to receive more mail for this person than anyone that actually lives here, this person is a high school student in our town.

Our mail carriers are a snarky bunch. Any attempts to write "not at this address" or anything similar get replies like "same last name = same address" or "file change of address!". Well we've done that. For crying out loud we've also filed COA's for my mother and she filed one herself because we've been getting mail addressed to my mother since we moved in our house. Strange how we change our address from the apartment where we weren't getting anyone else's mail and now we get all this random crap.

So I'm filing yet another change of address for this person. Hopefully it sticks.

Today we get another parcel addressed to yet another mystery person who does not share our last name but apparently is using our address. I get one more of those and I'm emailing it in as mail fraud. Which I'm sure does about exactly nuffin.

I almost feel like conspiracy theory guy because it's like we're being pushed to get a PO Box. Which I guarantee would just get flooded with 42 other people's catalogs and bills.
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Re: The rant thread.

Postby cmsellers » Mon Jun 17, 2019 5:14 am

iMURDAu wrote:oday we get another parcel addressed to yet another mystery person who does not share our last name but apparently is using our address. I get one more of those and I'm emailing it in as mail fraud. Which I'm sure does about exactly nuffin.

Not if this high school kid is doing it intentionally.

USPIS does not mess around.

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Re: The rant thread.

Postby Twistappel » Mon Jun 24, 2019 10:01 pm

I have been sick for approximately the last month. I am very much fed up with being sick. It's not like I've even been sick with the same thing. Different bits of my body just seem to take turns getting bacterial infections, because apparently my immune system hates me now.

On the upside, it turns out that vicodin-based cough syrup is a thing that exists.
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Re: The rant thread.

Postby Malfeasinator » Thu Jun 27, 2019 1:06 am

I hate moving. I really, really hate moving. This will be the 21st time that I remember, and there will definitely be a #22.

"Here's this custom object, made just for me, by relatives who have passed on that I also loved very much. It is the only one of its kind, and the world will never see its like again. It has been with me for decades, and survived hurricanes and a house fire."

*throws it away to save space*
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Re: The rant thread.

Postby Twistappel » Thu Jun 27, 2019 1:11 am

Malfeasinator wrote:I hate moving. I really, really hate moving.

You have my sympathy. I've seriously considered moving into an RV or one of those tiny-homes-on-wheels for more or less this reason.
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You say "New World Order" "communist echo chamber" like it's a bad thing.

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Re: The rant thread.

Postby cmsellers » Thu Jul 18, 2019 5:03 am

I applied for a job which isn't great, but isn't horrible, is ten minutes from my house, and for which I am way more than qualified. It wanted an Excel assessment, and I thought "great," because every job that's had an assessment I've done great, and it was my hope it would shortlist me to an interview.

But I knew literally none of the twelve functions it tested me on, and I had ninety seconds for each, so I couldn't google it. Eight of them, I could figure out from context what they did. Three of them, I guessed at an answer. One, I ran out of time. I'm pissed because I know how to do way more complicated shit than those other four functions, just not in Excel. And yet, I could figure it out in Excel and quickly, just not always in ninety seconds.

I'm pissed, because this test is designed to select for people who have used the specific things they want to use Excel for for years. And yet, I bet you that within days, I could be doing better than most people who've used Excel with those functions, with the added benefit of I can figure out other stuff they need me to do, in and out of Excel, well beyond those functions.
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Re: The rant thread.

Postby Malfeasinator » Fri Jul 26, 2019 3:45 am

cmsellers wrote:I applied for a job which isn't great, but isn't horrible, is ten minutes from my house, and for which I am way more than qualified. It wanted an Excel assessment, and I thought "great," because every job that's had an assessment I've done great, and it was my hope it would shortlist me to an interview.

But I knew literally none of the twelve functions it tested me on, and I had ninety seconds for each, so I couldn't google it. Eight of them, I could figure out from context what they did. Three of them, I guessed at an answer. One, I ran out of time. I'm pissed because I know how to do way more complicated shit than those other four functions, just not in Excel. And yet, I could figure it out in Excel and quickly, just not always in ninety seconds.

I'm pissed, because this test is designed to select for people who have used the specific things they want to use Excel for for years. And yet, I bet you that within days, I could be doing better than most people who've used Excel with those functions, with the added benefit of I can figure out other stuff they need me to do, in and out of Excel, well beyond those functions.


I feel your pain. Job hunting is so weird these days. I took an assessment for a delivery job and they quizzed me on things like obscure Hazmat symbols, things that they usually teach you after you get a job where you need to know that sort of thing. The job was to deliver flowers, in like, a regular van.

I had another job posting as a dishwasher ask me really in-depth stuff, like what my career goals were going to be in 10 years. Dude, I have no idea what the world is going to be like in ten years, let alone 5. My goals by then might be "Run Bartertown" for all I know.

I can tell you though from my own experience, based on a lot of applications, that I have had much better luck with Craigslist ads vs. official job hunting sites like Indeed and so on. Craigslist ads at least tend to actually respond, and fewer people are trying out for them. I mean there are always tradeoffs, but that's been my experience.

The other side of that though, is be wary of jobs that just take anyone right away. I found that out after I'd signed on to be a garbage truck helper. It turns out the "helper" does most of the work and they're not really keen on things like "training." And, it also turns out that I'm too damn out of shape to be starting a physically demanding job in the Florida Summer. Winter might have been fine; I might have been able to adapt. July was too much for me.

Gnarly smells and writhing maggots weren't that hard to deal with. The hardest part was just holding on to the truck. The driver was going past the supposed limit (10 mph) and around 15, and we hit a lot of bumps, which, strangely, garbage trucks don't handle well.

The handles are at awkward angles. I tried hooking my arm in, thinking that would save me from having to rely just on my grip, but if we braked too fast, the grip bar would bang against my forearm. I went home early my first day and I was still pretty bruised. I also had cramps in my arm, because even though I was guzzling Gatorade, I didn't consume enough potassium.

I guess I got to cross something off my bucket list, though.

My current job is so weird and out of my element that I'm just bluffing my way through it. It's working so far, but I keep being reminded that I need to finish school, because I'm getting too old for this chaos.
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Re: The rant thread.

Postby NathanLoiselle » Fri Jul 26, 2019 10:19 pm

So, Malfesinator are you a sub or a dom? I only ask because that's all I ever find on Craigslist.
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Re: The rant thread.

Postby Malfeasinator » Sat Jul 27, 2019 12:36 am

NathanLoiselle wrote:So, Malfesinator are you a sub or a dom? I only ask because that's all I ever find on Craigslist.


That might be another site that starts with the letter C.
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Re: The rant thread.

Postby SandTea » Wed Jul 31, 2019 10:25 am

Just found out a close family member is a trump supporter. I knew they were conservative but I thought they were at least 'smart right' leaning and not...

Anyway, I better understand those articles about how trumps election has split up marriages now. There really is no path to consensus on anything with the mentioned family member. All facts are dismissed and all lies embraced. Holy shit is it frustrating but I guess I still have the ability to ignore them, even if that will lead to the detriment of the world.

Thank god Rum exists.
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Re: The rant thread.

Postby cmsellers » Wed Jul 31, 2019 2:35 pm

My uncle by marriage is a reluctant Trump supporter who supported Rubio in the primary. He said he didn't like Trump, but Johnson was a waste of his vote and he couldn't support Hillary because she'd drive up the national debt.

I pointed out that while both parties have increased the national debt in recent history, Republican presidents have consistently increased it more, because Republicans usually increase the deficit while Democrats usually decrease it. The only president to actually decrease the national debt was a Democrat, and the one recent Republican president who worked to reduce the deficit lost re-election partly as a result of "conservative" backlash over tax increases. I also pointed out that Trump is a known profligate, especially when it comes to other people's money, making it unlikely he'd buck that trend.

To which he said something to the effect of "well, your generation are the ones who will be paying for it, so if you want to wrack up mountains of debt under Hillary, it's your funeral," proving he hadn't heard anything I'd said, yet had somehow heard me say "I don't care about the national debt."
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Re: The rant thread.

Postby Windy » Wed Jul 31, 2019 11:36 pm

I was having a great day, then I read something written by someone with different opinions on the internet. What a mistake that was.
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Re: The rant thread.

Postby Krashlia » Thu Aug 01, 2019 7:09 am

cmsellers wrote:My uncle by marriage is a reluctant Trump supporter who supported Rubio in the primary. He said ... he couldn't support Hillary because she'd drive up the national debt.

I pointed out that while both parties have increased the national debt in recent history, Republican presidents have consistently increased it more ....

To which he said something to the effect of "well, your generation are the ones who will be paying for it, so if you want to wrack up mountains of debt under Hillary, it's your funeral," proving he hadn't heard anything I'd said, yet had somehow heard me say "I don't care about the national debt."


How does one deal with such people? Jeez, its like Cathy Newman moments on steroids when stuff like that happens.

Windy wrote:I was having a great day, then I read something written by someone with different opinions on the internet. What a mistake that was.


Did it touch you in the Twitter or in the Salon? Or, did you get tickled in the Federalist?
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Re: The rant thread.

Postby Pedgerow » Mon Aug 05, 2019 11:37 pm

Do you ever feel like curses are real? Do you ever suffer a catastrophe that is not just unfortunate, but ironic too? Terrible, but simultaneously epically hilarious?

My bike's had a fair few problems of late. I cycle everywhere; it's my main form of transport and I love this bike enormously. I don't know if it's the best bike I've ever owned, but it objectively is and the only question is whether that's enough to overpower the emotional bonds I've felt with other bikes I've owned. It was really hard to find a bike that has all the features I want, but I did it. Here's a picture; isn't she beautiful?

But you need to fix bikes, and because bike shops are all crooks and highwaymen, this can sometimes be harder than it needs to be. A few weeks ago, I started having some minor issues: the wheels squeak, the gear shifter didn't show which gear I was actually in, and the rear gears were getting worn down because I go everywhere in the same gear, in 21st out of 24 for 50-60 miles a week, every week of the year. So having ridden about 5000 miles total in the same one gear, I decided to remove the gear cassette (the cogs on the back) and replace it with the one I bought for my previous bike, which I never got to attach because the old one had rusted on and couldn't be removed. Well, actually that was the bike before the previous bike: the previous bike was stolen a couple of months after I bought it. That's another rant for the rant thread. Fun fact: the UK is well-known for its thousands of security cameras and ubiquitous CCTV, but most businesses have CCTV for insurance purposes only, and the footage cannot be used to solve crimes like bike thefts. Also, legally, you can't share CCTV footage with anyone, not even the police, without a warrant. Also also, the police back in 2016 were so underfunded that they openly told me they weren't going to bother watching the footage anyway, because they had more important things to do. Thanks for the taxes; now fuck off.

But like I say, today's rant is the hardship of replacing a gear cassette (plus further hardships - this is going to be a long post). You'd think I could just replace it because they'd all be basically the same, right? Bikes made five years apart should still be made from the same parts, right? More or less?

Haha, nope!

"You can't remove the gear cassette with that tool; you need this very slightly different, but otherwise basically identical, other tool that you need to buy separately." So I bought that.

"Dude, you can't just unscrew it! I know you could last time, but now you need a chain whip!" That's very handy for you, people who sell bike tools. Guess I'll need to go back the following Saturday, after riding my knackered bike for another week.

This happened three or four more times. It really was a pain in the ass. But if it happened weeks ago, why am I ranting now? Well, this most recent Saturday, finally, I had all the parts. I removed the old gear cassette...and could not attach the new one. Great. Now I'm bikeless. So I had to go back to the shop again, on a Sunday, the Lord's Day, and take the whole damn wheel with me because the guy had insisted that they are indeed interchangeable and I should be able to attach the other one as long as they're both Shimano cassettes, which they were, and I needed to prove him wrong.

"Oh, bro. No. That one has a screw fitting and the other one doesn't. You'll need to buy a new gear cassette." You know, part of the reason I was doing all this was to use up this spare one that I had. You utter bastards. Like I said above: bike shops are all crooks and highwaymen.

But I did it! I replaced the gear cassette, I replaced the chain, I re-indexed the gears, I reinflated the tyres and I oiled the wheel axle thingies (still no idea what they're actually called) and I positively flew to work today. Calloo, callay; what fabulous news. Triumph at last. I should definitely post this in the Not A Rant At All Thread.

Boy, it sure has been a long time since I started this post with a rhetorical question about ironic catastrophes, hasn't it?

I work in a datacentre; it's a very high-security place. It takes forever to get through all the doors we have. But at 6:30pm, I got a call from someone reporting that there was an issue with the gates to the car park; they weren't opening and were jammed. I don't know how to fix that, but our security team said they'd switch them off and on again to see if that worked (it usually does). I had a closer look when I was going home at 7:15pm, and indeed, it would appear that some dildo had crashed his car into them and now one was jammed open and the other was jammed closed. Some guy from another company in our building was trying to leave, and I wound up having to open the delivery gate for him so he could drive out. Now, to get on my bike and pedal swiftly to my home, for an evening of absolutely no online ranting.

That's funny. WHERE THE FUCKING HELL IS MY FUCKING BIKE?!?!?!?!? The fence I chain it to had no bike chained to it now. And, upon closer inspection, the bike lock was on the ground, snipped with bolt cutters like a cartoon drawing of what a bicycle theft would look like. Lying right there, right where my bike now wasn't.

Like I say, I work in a very high-security building. There's CCTV everywhere, so that's nice, and the security is a nice touch because we're in a pretty scabby ghetto, location-wise. Such a total shithole, in fact, that within just 45 minutes of someone bumping our gates open, a swarm of skanky meth-head parasites just fucking strolled right in there and stole the bike I had spent weeks repairing. The bike I need for everyday life. The bike that might be the best bike I've ever owned. The bike that ruined my weekend with inconvenience, but rewarded me with the many years of comfy riding that would follow. They fucking took it. And I know what the police are like because I had a bike stolen once before. My taxes can't afford the fucks I need them to give. I called them anyway, but FUCK.

You fucking snakes. You thieving fucking parasites. You worthless deadbeat scrotes. You walk right in here and rob me of potentially my single most expensive possession. You fucked up my whole day. You despicable pieces of shit. Now I have to get the tram, that takes a ridiculous detour past all the harrowing slums you animals live in, and takes twice as long to get me home as literally pedalling under my own power. That, or the bus which takes about the same time but does not come very frequently.

I am so, so, so mad. I accept that it's a little bit funny that I should work so hard on my bike, for weeks, just to have it stolen on the very first day after the renovations were completed. That shit is hilarious. And perhaps, if the thieves are caught, and delivered to me, and the police agree that I have suffered immensely and cannot be blamed for any retribution I might hypothetically commit against these perpetrators, then maybe I will laugh too as I go full Hostel on these fuckers, graphically and repeatedly.
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Re: The rant thread.

Postby Malfeasinator » Tue Aug 06, 2019 2:23 am

Note to self: come up with a bike lock that explodes when it's cut.

edit: screw it, someone already did it.

https://newatlas.com/bike-mine-explosive-alarm/43300/
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