Complaint Thursdays

[Sabres Fan in NS]

6 minutes ago, Eleven said:

Ok let me ask for recommendations in Halifax.  His children are going to need an estates attorney.

Thank you.

[Weave]

Have today and tomorrow off for vacation days.  that's not the complaint.

the complaint is, I left an Outlook out of office message indicating that I am on vacation until Tuesday.  A customer emailed me this morning, which means they received the out of office message.  They followed up with a voice mail at my desk phone which also has the same out of office message.  So, not content to stop there, they called my cell and left a voice message.  They want me to arrange to come into the office tomorrow so they can come in and do some product testing.

I don't think so.

People in business settings suck.

[darksabre]

1 minute ago, Weave said:

Have today and tomorrow off for vacation days.  that's not the complaint.

the complaint is, I left an Outlook out of office message indicating that I am on vacation until Tuesday.  A customer emailed me this morning, which means they received the out of office message.  They followed up with a voice mail at my desk phone which also has the same out of office message.  So, not content to stop there, they called my cell and left a voice message.  They want me to arrange to come into the office tomorrow so they can come in and do some product testing.

I don't think so.

People in United States business settings suck.

Fixed that for ya. This country is so problematic when it comes to taking time off from work. If you're not working then you're a terrorist. 

[nfreeman]

This is a first-world problem, to be sure, but I'll mention it anyway:  we took my son to college 2 weeks ago for the first time and he's lonely and homesick and we miss him terribly.

He's a smart and funny kid, but shy, and it takes him a while to make friends.  His roommate sounds like a decent guy and roommate, but they don't have anything in common and aren't going to be friends.  He's signed up for IM sports, but they don't start until next week, so he hasn't met anyone that way.

It's also been pretty hot and humid and his dorm isn't air-conditioned.

Anyway, I am pretty confident it will improve over time, and he's said that he'd be fine there if he had some friends.  In the meantime, though, as a parent, it saddens me to think of my son, away from home for an extended period for the first time, feeling lonely and unhappy (and that goes at least double for my wife!).

And the house is too quiet without him.

 

 

3 hours ago, Weave said:

Have today and tomorrow off for vacation days.  that's not the complaint.

the complaint is, I left an Outlook out of office message indicating that I am on vacation until Tuesday.  A customer emailed me this morning, which means they received the out of office message.  They followed up with a voice mail at my desk phone which also has the same out of office message.  So, not content to stop there, they called my cell and left a voice message.  They want me to arrange to come into the office tomorrow so they can come in and do some product testing. 

I don't think so.

People in business settings suck.

Calling you repeatedly on your vacation with a request to come in on the Friday before Labor Day?

Whoever is making that call is a major league DB.

[Randall Flagg]

I relate to your son quite a bit, nfreeman. (Besides the being smart/funny part)

The time away from home sucks, but man does it make those holiday/general visiting moments with the family that much sweeter. 

 

[Randall Flagg]

But when he gets a handle on everything and has met people he jives with, he's gonna thrive, I'm as confident in that as can be without having met him.

it took me until probably October of that first semester in undergrad to really settle in and be comfortable 

[nfreeman]

Thanks Flagg.

[jsb]

1 hour ago, nfreeman said:

This is a first-world problem, to be sure, but I'll mention it anyway:  we took my son to college 2 weeks ago for the first time and he's lonely and homesick and we miss him terribly.

He's a smart and funny kid, but shy, and it takes him a while to make friends.  His roommate sounds like a decent guy and roommate, but they don't have anything in common and aren't going to be friends.  He's signed up for IM sports, but they don't start until next week, so he hasn't met anyone that way.

It's also been pretty hot and humid and his dorm isn't air-conditioned.

Anyway, I am pretty confident it will improve over time, and he's said that he'd be fine there if he had some friends.  In the meantime, though, as a parent, it saddens me to think of my son, away from home for an extended period for the first time, feeling lonely and unhappy (and that goes at least double for my wife!).

And the house is too quiet without him.

 

Hang in there nfreeman, I feel your pain, I still miss mine and he's been basically gone for 6 years. One day he'll come around and still be your son but you'll be dealing with a man instead of a boy. You'll see it in his eyes. That's when you know you did a great job raising him. Mine still comes around once a month or so for the weekend to visit. Savor that time to. 

 

To stay on topic, I'm starting Call tomorrow at work. I HATE being on-call. 

Edited August 30, 2018 by jsb

[biodork]

This one is two weeks delayed because I've been so crazy busy that I've forgotten to post it.  I'll try to give the Cliff's Notes version since it would take way too long to go into all the specifics.

I work in a very small group.  Back in Nov. it was just me and one other guy (who got along famously), and we hired this chick who initially seemed to fit right in, personality-wise.  She had great previous experience in an area we'd been lacking, so we were excited to have her.  But right away, red flags... just little ones here and there for a few weeks, and mostly we brushed it off, thinking that she was just going through a rough time in her life.  The more things started happening, the more we started wondering how much of it was true, because honestly it all just seemed way too unbelievable that one person could have so much going on.  This week it's a random car accident on her way back from lunch, the next week it's the flu, then she breaks up with her boyfriend and needs a mental health day... you get the idea.  In the first 10 weeks she was with us, she literally only worked one full 5-day week.  Then personality conflicts started arising when we were under intense pressure for a major deadline and it became very apparent that she was still going to work her 37.5 hours/week and go home, no matter how much work there was to do.  We tried to wipe the slate clean and start over after the deadline had passed, but things kept getting worse, with her being mercurial and defensive about seemingly minor things.  The other guy here and I both tried very hard to modify how we were interacting with her in case we were unwittingly contributing somehow (body language, choice of wording, etc), but it never seemed to help.  To make things worse, my bosses seem to love this girl and be completely oblivious to the fact that she was a problem employee who had trouble getting along with others and rarely completed tasks assigned because of her lack of commitment to the job.  We found out along the way that she'd been blind copying my boss on a bunch of emails (she's one of those people who will send an email about something stupid rather than just talk to the other 2 people in the group face-to-face), plus meeting quite a bit with her on the side.  Two weeks ago she basically picked a fight with the other guy here when he asked her something innocuous, then didn't show up to work the next day.

The following Monday, my boss pulled the other guy and I into her office and told us that the girl had quit effectively immediately "because of how we treated her."  She actually believes all the this chick had been apparently saying behind our backs, all "woe is me, I'm just trying to do a good job and people are being mean to me" without ever asking for our side or considering that maybe someone who is clinically depressed (and taking medication for it) isn't seeing things rationally.  Or maybe that she was a con artist who's been using us all along to get a better job, because she was hired at a salary that was only justified by a certification that she only acquired in late May (after failing the first time in Feb.) that she was paid to study for, 1 hr/day, the entire first 6 months she worked with us.  But my boss is so snowed that she was defending the who quit with zero notice and was instead telling the other guy and I about how things need to change when we hire the next person.  I'm so done.

(Sorry, that was still a long version!)

[Taro T]

2 hours ago, biodork said:

This one is two weeks delayed because I've been so crazy busy that I've forgotten to post it.  I'll try to give the Cliff's Notes version since it would take way too long to go into all the specifics.

I work in a very small group.  Back in Nov. it was just me and one other guy (who got along famously), and we hired this chick who initially seemed to fit right in, personality-wise.  She had great previous experience in an area we'd been lacking, so we were excited to have her.  But right away, red flags... just little ones here and there for a few weeks, and mostly we brushed it off, thinking that she was just going through a rough time in her life.  The more things started happening, the more we started wondering how much of it was true, because honestly it all just seemed way too unbelievable that one person could have so much going on.  This week it's a random car accident on her way back from lunch, the next week it's the flu, then she breaks up with her boyfriend and needs a mental health day... you get the idea.  In the first 10 weeks she was with us, she literally only worked one full 5-day week.  Then personality conflicts started arising when we were under intense pressure for a major deadline and it became very apparent that she was still going to work her 37.5 hours/week and go home, no matter how much work there was to do.  We tried to wipe the slate clean and start over after the deadline had passed, but things kept getting worse, with her being mercurial and defensive about seemingly minor things.  The other guy here and I both tried very hard to modify how we were interacting with her in case we were unwittingly contributing somehow (body language, choice of wording, etc), but it never seemed to help.  To make things worse, my bosses seem to love this girl and be completely oblivious to the fact that she was a problem employee who had trouble getting along with others and rarely completed tasks assigned because of her lack of commitment to the job.  We found out along the way that she'd been blind copying my boss on a bunch of emails (she's one of those people who will send an email about something stupid rather than just talk to the other 2 people in the group face-to-face), plus meeting quite a bit with her on the side.  Two weeks ago she basically picked a fight with the other guy here when he asked her something innocuous, then didn't show up to work the next day.

The following Monday, my boss pulled the other guy and I into her office and told us that the girl had quit effectively immediately "because of how we treated her."  She actually believes all the this chick had been apparently saying behind our backs, all "woe is me, I'm just trying to do a good job and people are being mean to me" without ever asking for our side or considering that maybe someone who is clinically depressed (and taking medication for it) isn't seeing things rationally.  Or maybe that she was a con artist who's been using us all along to get a better job, because she was hired at a salary that was only justified by a certification that she only acquired in late May (after failing the first time in Feb.) that she was paid to study for, 1 hr/day, the entire first 6 months she worked with us.  But my boss is so snowed that she was defending the who quit with zero notice and was instead telling the other guy and I about how things need to change when we hire the next person.  I'm so done.

(Sorry, that was still a long version!)

You live in a marijuana legal state, right?

Happy Labor Day. ;)

[spndnchz]

  ??

[nfreeman]

Thanks JSB.  Very meaningful to hear from someone who has gone through the same thing.  

[nfreeman]

OPENED.

[spndnchz]

sorry. late night

[jsb]

I'm still on Call for work for approximately 20 more hours.

I STILL HATE BEING ON CALL

Example of being on call, I get a call at 4am stating "my freezer isn't working right"....... Want to reply but don't "I don't work on freezers and even if I did WTF do you want me to do about it at 4am"??

Edited September 6, 2018 by jsb

[darksabre]

I don't even know where to start with today. 

[Samson's Flow]

Had to take off work to take care of my dad in his battle with pain medication. I have spent the last few days feeling helpless watching him struggle in agony.

After over a dozen years taking hydrocodone, then methadone, then suboxon, he and his doctors have made a commitment to wean off of opiates and find alternative treatment. It's a quality of life issue he must address and fix forever or else become another statistic. My take is it's no way to live.

Since last Saturday he's gone 5 days with no opiates. He says this has been the most difficult stretch of his entire life (and he broke his neck as a child, was in the Navy, etc.). Last update is he's currently in the last stages of opioid withdrawals.

I'm amazed after seeing all this that opioid painkillers are prescribed freely, but safer alternatives (like medicinal marijuana) have a negative stigma and are not explored.

[WildCard]

Summer is over. Already have nightmares about the winter

And Erik Karlsson...still not traded

[Eleven]

5 minutes ago, Samson's Flow said:

Had to take off work to take care of my dad in his battle with pain medication. I have spent the last few days feeling helpless watching him struggle in agony.

After over a dozen years taking hydrocodone, then methadone, then suboxon, he and his doctors have made a commitment to wean off of opiates and find alternative treatment. It's a quality of life issue he must address and fix forever or else become another statistic. My take is it's no way to live.

Since last Saturday he's gone 5 days with no opiates. He says this has been the most difficult stretch of his entire life (and he broke his neck as a child, was in the Navy, etc.). Last update is he's currently in the last stages of opioid withdrawals.

I'm amazed after seeing all this that opioid painkillers are prescribed freely, but safer alternatives (like medicinal marijuana) have a negative stigma and are not explored.

Follow the money.

I'm really happy that your dad is moving forward.  And it's wonderful of you to take time off to help him.

[Samson's Flow]

21 minutes ago, Eleven said:

Follow the money.

I'm really happy that your dad is moving forward.  And it's wonderful of you to take time off to help him.

Follow the money is right. The prescription drug industry is rolling in it at the expense of people's lives.

Thanks for the kind words Eleven. You lawyer types are alright... ?

[Weave]

Sent our 10 yr old chocolate lab into the vet last Friday to have a fatty tumor removed.  Found out the old boy has cancer.  Looks like it is on his liver, spleen, and has a cancerous tumor on one of the pads on his rear paw.  He's home getting spoiled while we figure out when is the right time to put him down.  He doesn't seem to be in any discomfort.  But he's obviously not going to be with us much longer. 

He's been a fantastic companion.  He's the best damned dog I've ever encountered.  And is my wife's buddy.  He's her support when I'm traveling for work.  This is going to be hard.

[nfreeman]

Sorry Weave.  That stinks.

[WildCard]

2 minutes ago, Weave said:

Sent our 10 yr old chocolate lab into the vet last Friday to have a fatty tumor removed.  Found out the old boy has cancer.  Looks like it is on his liver, spleen, and has a cancerous tumor on one of the pads on his rear paw.  He's home getting spoiled while we figure out when is the right time to put him down.  He doesn't seem to be in any discomfort.  But he's obviously not going to be with us much longer. 

He's been a fantastic companion.  He's the best damned dog I've ever encountered.  And is my wife's buddy.  He's her support when I'm traveling for work.  This is going to be hard.

That sucks man, hope you give him a great last couple of days/weeks and enjoy them

[LTS]

1 hour ago, spndnchz said:

sorry. late night

So it was Thursday when you got home?  No excuses.

4 minutes ago, Weave said:

Sent our 10 yr old chocolate lab into the vet last Friday to have a fatty tumor removed.  Found out the old boy has cancer.  Looks like it is on his liver, spleen, and has a cancerous tumor on one of the pads on his rear paw.  He's home getting spoiled while we figure out when is the right time to put him down.  He doesn't seem to be in any discomfort.  But he's obviously not going to be with us much longer. 

He's been a fantastic companion.  He's the best damned dog I've ever encountered.  And is my wife's buddy.  He's her support when I'm traveling for work.  This is going to be hard.

I often prefer the company of dogs to people.  It's terrible news and you have my sympathy on the tough road ahead. Man's best friend for a reason.

[Samson's Flow]

43 minutes ago, Weave said:

Sent our 10 yr old chocolate lab into the vet last Friday to have a fatty tumor removed.  Found out the old boy has cancer.  Looks like it is on his liver, spleen, and has a cancerous tumor on one of the pads on his rear paw.  He's home getting spoiled while we figure out when is the right time to put him down.  He doesn't seem to be in any discomfort.  But he's obviously not going to be with us much longer. 

He's been a fantastic companion.  He's the best damned dog I've ever encountered.  And is my wife's buddy.  He's her support when I'm traveling for work.  This is going to be hard.

That sucks man. Dogs are awesome.

The greeting I got from my little girl coming home for the first time after spending a few days with my dad warmed my heart. There's nothing better than a dog greeting their owner coming home from work/travel.