What annoys you? (1 Viewer)

[Stan]

Snow on the ground and an overnight low of about 3 degrees (F) last night. Wind chill in the double-digits below zero.
This is Mississippi. Makes me want to watch "The Long, Hot Summer" just to remind me of how it usually is.

Oh well. At least I haven't seen a mosquito for a while.

Total reversal of our weather. Normally we'd be getting yours (Eastern Washington, near Idaho). Instead we're in the '40s, almost all the snow is gone, roads are dry. Of course Mother Nature almost always drops a bomb. It could be the middle of March and we'll get six inches of snow, single digit temps, so winter isn't necessarily done yet.

Sadly we are getting the bugs already, no mosquitoes but others, even saw a dead worm on the sidewalk. The way they come out after a big rain. Always wondered where the bugs go, how they survive the winter, as usual they're coming back.

I know they're necessary, bees I have no problem with, but I despise mosquitoes, flies, etc. Thank goodness I;ve got good screens Ants are fine as long as they stay outdoors. Got invaded one year, they got in through a small gap under mty backdoor. Made this huge Conga line to a bowl of cat food. Thankfully never strayed off that line and I blocked their entrance.

Kind of cruel, but found their nest under a crack in my patio. Poured boiling water into it several times, no poison, environmentally friendly. The surviving buddies brought out all the dead guys, which made wonderful meals for the neighborhood sparrows. A few more tries and they were gone.

Sorry for being a bit of a thread hog, bored and still healing from a broken wrist and semi-sprained ankle, oddly enough from a slip on ice Jan. 2nd, when winter wasn't so nice

 

[Tony Bensley]

Total reversal of our weather. Normally we'd be getting yours (Eastern Washington, near Idaho). Instead we're in the '40s, almost all the snow is gone, roads are dry. Of course Mother Nature almost always drops a bomb. It could be the middle of March and we'll get six inches of snow, single digit temps, so winter isn't necessarily done yet.

Sadly we are getting the bugs already, no mosquitoes but others, even saw a dead worm on the sidewalk. The way they come out after a big rain. Always wondered where the bugs go, how they survive the winter, as usual they're coming back.

I know they're necessary, bees I have no problem with, but I despise mosquitoes, flies, etc. Thank goodness I;ve got good screens Ants are fine as long as they stay outdoors. Got invaded one year, they got in through a small gap under mty backdoor. Made this huge Conga line to a bowl of cat food. Thankfully never strayed off that line and I blocked their entrance.

Kind of cruel, but found their nest under a crack in my patio. Poured boiling water into it several times, no poison, environmentally friendly. The surviving buddies brought out all the dead guys, which made wonderful meals for the neighborhood sparrows. A few more tries and they were gone.

Sorry for being a bit of a thread hog, bored and still healing from a broken wrist and semi-sprained ankle, oddly enough from a slip on ice Jan. 2nd, when winter wasn't so nice

Sorry to hear about your ankle and wrist, Stan. I'm pretty tired of the long winters where we are.

This afternoon, I did some repacking of some of our son's stuff. This involved removing stuff from cardboard boxes, and moving them into plastic totes. I've been getting two new plastic totes a month when finances allow, in preparation for our relocation, which we want to able to do by this coming September. Yep, we really are that tight financially, but I'm used to it. For our relocation to the southern part of our province to be successful, it's going to take pretty much every last penny that we can spare, with no quick credit solutions available to us. Our son is working full time, but it isn't the high paying job that he had been waiting for, and at the moment, he's just barely able to cover his own expenses, let alone help finance our move, which will be at least a grand, and that's just for getting us and all of worldly possessions to London. Hopefully, that will improve somewhat on his end as this year progresses, but we're leaving nothing to chance on our end.

The next door neighbor is still a PITA, and to top it off, her son is in the terrible twos, and is starting to create racket of his own. We swear that his mother is encouraging him in his kicking our shared wall just to piss us off! She is just that type of person, unfortunately. There's simply no reasoning with people of her sort, lord knows we've tried. Thank goodness for noise cancelling headphones!

CHEERS!

 

[Stan]

Sorry to hear about your ankle and wrist, Stan. I'm pretty tired of the long winters where we are.

This afternoon, I did some repacking of some of our son's stuff. This involved removing stuff from cardboard boxes, and moving them into plastic totes. I've been getting two new plastic totes a month when finances allow, in preparation for our relocation, which we want to able to do by this coming September. Yep, we really are that tight financially, but I'm used to it. For our relocation to the southern part of our province to be successful, it's going to take pretty much every last penny that we can spare, with no quick credit solutions available to us. Our son is working full time, but it isn't the high paying job that he had been waiting for, and at the moment, he's just barely able to cover his own expenses, let alone help finance our move, which will be at least a grand, and that's just for getting us and all of worldly possessions to London. Hopefully, that will improve somewhat on his end as this year progresses, but we're leaving nothing to chance on our end.

The next door neighbor is still a PITA, and to top it off, her son is in the terrible twos, and is starting to create racket of his own. We swear that his mother is encouraging him in his kicking our shared wall just to piss us off! She is just that type of person, unfortunately. There's simply no reasoning with people of her sort, lord knows we've tried. Thank goodness for noise cancelling headphones!

CHEERS!

Sorry about your neighbor, the main reason I finally bought a house. I'd always rent the upper floor when I lived in apartments, so no clomping heels. But noises from people to the side and oddly smoke from the people below when they used their fireplace, terrible parking and sharing washer/dryers for laundry.

Although this is where Canada came in really helpful. Yes, I was a terrible person. Had some Canadian coins. Parking meters, no go. Stores wouldn't take them yet they'd sneak them into your change. Anyhow, used some in the apartment laundry, they worked just fine and they magically came back. So I used the same set of coins for about four years.

Atoning for another sin, we used those round paperclips where I worked. They were roughly the size of quarters so I tried one in a parking meter. It worked and I parked free for several years until the city caught on and implemented a fix.
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Back on topic. everybody in my area is incredibly polite and respectful. Just one neighbor two houses away with a couple barking dogs, but they're the only rental in the neighborhood, it tends to turn over every year or so. The owner lives in California, inherited the house, tried to sell, but has an incredibly inflated sense of value. This is not San Francisco.

He finally gave up, came to his senses and rented it after a long vacancy. Not the greatest ones now, but they do keep up the yard, no old furniture or appliances on the front porch, so a little barking I can deal with. I think owners tend to be much better neighbors, they care about things, but these people aren't bad.

Understand the tight finances. I'm going through my house, prepping for a yard sale a neighbor is having when the weather improves. I made some pretty good money at her last one.

I'm getting brutal this time. If I've got stuff I haven't used in 5-10 years, do I really need it? Major annoyance, things like dvd's and Blu-rays that I bought for $25-$30+ are now almost worthless. Went to a pawnshop and they offered 25¢ each. Found an internet site. 23¢ each. May as well use them as coasters on the coffee table or drop them off at the local library.

Moving is a major PITA. Kind of a silly reason, but partially why I still have this house, plus it's paid off in just a bit under six years, so may as well finish it off. I've been a member here for almost 20, so I can go another six.

It will be a huge financial boost to not have a mortgage. Just property taxes and insurance. It's been interesting to watch my statements as principal started terribly small, but little by little principal and interest payments met in the middle. Now almost all of the payment is principal. Kind of sneaky how they front load all the interest so the mortgage company gets their cut early on, then finally I start to benefit. But very young and naive at the time, didn't really know what I was doing. And it was family deal, swindled by my own mother (long story).

Got a loan modification literally days before the 2008 meltdown. Had it been a week later, wouldn't have gone through. Dropped my payments by a third. I'd be paid off now had I not done it, but just couldn't keep up.

That's life.

 

[TJPC]

Although our Canadian coins are the same size as their US counterparts (we have no more pennies of course), their metal content is different. This is what confuses vending machines.

 

[TJPC]

Major annoyance! Suddenly I am no longer receiving any e-mail alerts from HTF for no reason I can detect!

 

[Tony Bensley]

I started feeling a bit head-achy this evening. Took 2 Advil to try and head it off. I hope that it works!

The next door neighbor was banging around a few hours ago. Sounds like a herd of elephants when she does this. My headache is more likely weather change related, though. It's been a bit milder these past few days, but colder temperatures are expected by the middle of next week.

September seems so far away, at the moment. Hopefully, we can keep to this time frame for relocating down south, as having to shift gears in staying put for one more winter has really sucked!

CHEERS!

 

[Malcolm R]

The uselessness of associates in big box stores. They all ask, "Can I help you," or "Did you find everything," but if you ask them for assistance the default response is usually "We don't have that," or "I don't know."

At Home Depot today, my father was looking for three specific things. The associate he asked for help said they didn't have any of them. But I had walked past one of the items on the shelf, so I knew they had that, and I was able to help him find one of the two others. But if he just assumed the associate had a functioning brain cell and took him at his word, he would have walked out of the store without anything he needed.

This also happened to me at Lowe's a while back. I asked an associate where an item was located. I knew they had it, as I had checked stock on the web before going to the store. She said, "I don't think we carry those." I eventually found it by myself.

There's really no point in these people trying to provide any kind of customer assistance when they don't know what is carried in their own store, or are unwilling to even attempt to assist in looking around for it.

 

[Tony Bensley]

The uselessness of associates in big box stores. They all ask, "Can I help you," or "Did you find everything," but if you ask them for assistance the default response is usually "We don't have that," or "I don't know."

At Home Depot today, my father was looking for three specific things. The associate he asked for help said they didn't have any of them. But I had walked past one of the items on the shelf, so I knew they had that, and I was able to help him find one of the two others. But if he just assumed the associate had a functioning brain cell and took him at his word, he would have walked out of the store without anything he needed.

This also happened to me at Lowe's a while back. I asked an associate where an item was located. I knew they had it, as I had checked stock on the web before going to the store. She said, "I don't think we carry those." I eventually found it by myself.

There's really no point in these people trying to provide any kind of customer assistance when they don't know what is carried in their own store, or are unwilling to even attempt to assist in looking around for it.

In 2005, my late sister-in-law wanted to treat me to one of the Laurel & Hardy Hallmark DVD sets that were then fairly new. The name of the chain eludes me at the moment, but when she called ahead to check whether it was in stock, she was told it definitely wasn't. Of course, when she decided to look for it at that store anyway, the DVD in question was on a display in PLAIN VIEW!

I remember that Barbie actually did the eye-roll when she found that Laurel And Hardy Hallmark DVD, as well!

CHEERS!

 

[TJPC]

Home Depot, Best Buy, Lowe’s, — three stores that I have never left without storming out in a huff.

 

[Stan]

Home Depot, Best Buy, Lowe’s, — three stores that I have never left without storming out in a huff.

All worthless. You're on your own, customer service is non-existent, haven't been to one in years. Got a mom&pop hardware store about 1/2 mile away, been a loyal customer for almost 20 years. If they don't have it, they'll find it for you at a really good price.

 

[bmasters9]

Home Depot, Best Buy, Lowe’s, — three stores that I have never left without storming out in a huff.

Especially Best Buy lately-- the first time I went to the one in Greenville on Woodruff Rd., they had DVD releases of almost any series you could imagine; I was practically in hog heaven!

Compare that to today, when they're more about the equipment (televisions, video game systems, appliances), and fewer and fewer DVDs (and what few there are are of new and current series).

 

[TJPC]

The first thing they do at Best Buy is go to the computer to see if the disc you want is in stock. If the computer says “yes” they still have no idea where it is in the store.

Last time I was there a clerk (I absolutely refuse to use their pretentious word “associate”), told me that they have absolutely nothing to do with physical media, and everything is stocked by an outside company.

 

[Stan]

The first thing they do at Best Buy is go to the computer to see if the disc you want is in stock. If the computer says “yes” they still have no idea where it is in the store.

Last time I was there a clerk (I absolutely refuse to use their pretentious word “associate”), told me that they have absolutely nothing to do with physical media, and everything is stocked by an outside company.

Same thing with "associate". Worked for a private company for 17 years. About my tenth year the owners sold out and it went public, walked away with millions. I foolishly stayed, did make some good money, but eventually the "board of directors", the CEO, his father, uncle and wife walked off with almost everything, company eventually failed after having been in business since the late '50s.

I'd mention some very famous names, but probably get in trouble.

Back to the point... We were magically transformed into "associates" after going public. Wow, I was so impressed. Some lame Business 101 decision when daddy provides all the cash to the trust fund baby.

Snarky attitude off

 

[Stan]

Lazy people who leave the shopping trolley in a parking space rather than returning it to the corral. I see it at every store I go to but Walmart seems to be the worst.

Just reading some old posts.

How about finding them blocks away from the store at bus-stops, etc. So incredibly rude and just lazy. We all know the type of people I'm talking about that do this. Walmart customers are by far the worst. Being poor doesn't entitle you to be lazy slobs, especially when you're yapping on a $600 phone.

 

[Tony Bensley]

Just reading some old posts.

How about finding them blocks away from the store at bus-stops, etc. So incredibly rude and just lazy. We all know the type of people I'm talking about that do this. Walmart customers are by far the worst. Being poor doesn't entitle you to be lazy slobs, especially when you're yapping on a $600 phone.

This reminds me of an incident we almost had a number of years ago. Please let me explain.

Neither the Mrs or I have ever had a full fledged driver's license, although before our son was born, she did have what was once called in our country, a "365" beginner's permit, but circumstances (Basically, late term pregnancy with our son, and a skittish driving Instructor in rural cottage country!) prevented her from getting the full license. Eventually, the beginner's permit expired, and not long afterward, our Canadian government, in their infinite wisdom, suddenly hiked many government fees, including driver's permits and licenses several times what they had been, which made any reapplication cost prohibitive for us in our circumstances.

Anyway, getting to the point, one day after we had done some grocery shopping down the road from where we live, we found an abandoned shopping cart for a pharmacy, which is located at least a mile from the grocery store that we were at. Since the said shopping cart was already a long way from where it should have been anyway, the Mrs and I saw no harm in loading our groceries into it, and walking it home to save us a bit of taxi fare.

This is when our stupid Charlie Brown luck kicked in. We had just reached the end of the parking lot over by the Tim Horton's drive thru, where some off duty cop (At least, that was what we assumed at the time!) in an SUV hollered out to us that we had better park the shopping cart and unload our groceries, which we did! So much for saving cab fare, but we weren't about to take any chances on getting arrested over an abandoned shopping cart! YEESH!!!!

CHEERS!

 

[Tony Bensley]

Another annoyance that's actually related to the main grocery store that we use. They have two locations in our town, one on each end. While their carts for both locations are equipped with a coin slot, the one closest to us requires a $1 coin, rather than a single quarter, which the carts for the other location are set up with. It's just more of a pain to have to make sure we have at least one "Loonie", whereas quarters are easier to keep on hand. On top of that, the L shaped checkout aisles at our location are a huge pain, especially as this supermarket chain requires you to bag your own groceries. It's always a race to try and get everything bagged and boxed before the next customer's item start going through. Oh, and each checkout counter has a fork shaped treadmill setup, and it seems like we always get stuck with the more awkward side, which just adds to the fun!

CHEERS!

 

[Stan]

Another annoyance that's actually related to the main grocery store that we use. They have two locations in our town, one on each end. While their carts for both locations are equipped with a coin slot, the one closest to us requires a $1 coin, rather than a single quarter, which the carts for the other location are set up with. It's just more of a pain to have to make sure we have at least one "Loonie", whereas quarters are easier to keep on hand. On top of that, the L shaped checkout aisles at our location are a huge pain, especially as this supermarket chain requires you to bag your own groceries. It's always a race to try and get everything bagged and boxed before the next customer's item start going through. Oh, and each checkout counter has a fork shaped treadmill setup, and it seems like we always get stuck with the more awkward side, which just adds to the fun!

CHEERS!

Paying a "Loonie" seems excessive, hopefully they refund you if you return the cart,

I've heard of stores installing some kind of lock-out mechanism in their parking lots. Once you reach it, the wheels lock up, can't go any further. Might seem kind of mean, but I understand why.

One final bitch about life. This post took me almost ten minutes to type. Partial use of my left hand, thinking I'm typing correctly yet ending up with loads of errors when I see the screen, so tons of correction time..

Don't break your wrist, It's truly surprising how much you need both hands. Orthopedic surgeon visit on the 24th, so hopefully things improve.

 

[Stan]

Once again the media and government at its best..... Awfully hard to mistake dead for injured.
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Ice skater dies after falling at Spokane's new outdoor rink
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UPDATE: Woman injured on ice ribbon is in critical condition, not dead, city now says

 

[BobO'Link]

Don't break your wrist, It's truly surprising how much you need both hands. Orthopedic surgeon visit on the 24th, so hopefully things improve.

This.

My wife suffered a compression fracture to her right wrist last October. The Orthopedic surgeon (once the best in town) said no surgery as it wouldn't help any but he'd re-evaluate in a week. The next week when she asked about surgery, he, in an annoyed voice, said "If I was going to do surgery I'd have done it when you first came in!" After 6 weeks, when things weren't going so well in recovery/therapy, she went to a different one in another city. He told her had she come to him in the first week or two he could have done surgery and she'd be almost back to normal but arthritis had already set in and surgery wouldn't help much, if at all, at that point. The first one is in his 70s, the 2nd in his 30s. A vast difference in experience, but more importantly, new techniques which the older one just hadn't bothered to keep up with.

The annoyance? Doctors who don't bother to keep up with modern techniques and continue to rely on their reputations working far past when they should have retired.

 

[Tony Bensley]

Paying a "Loonie" seems excessive, hopefully they refund you if you return the cart,

I've heard of stores installing some kind of lock-out mechanism in their parking lots. Once you reach it, the wheels lock up, can't go any further. Might seem kind of mean, but I understand why.

One final bitch about life. This post took me almost ten minutes to type. Partial use of my left hand, thinking I'm typing correctly yet ending up with loads of errors when I see the screen, so tons of correction time..

Don't break your wrist, It's truly surprising how much you need both hands. Orthopedic surgeon visit on the 24th, so hopefully things improve.

Just something that I should clarify regarding the grocery carts. A coin insert/unchain from other carts mechanism is used. When returning the cart, the mechanism works in reverse to get the coin back. Its needing to have an actual loonie in the first place that I find an annoyance. Just last week, I realized that I had everything but loonies on me, including what we call toonies, or $2 coins. I asked a lady who was leaving if I could trade four quarters, and she just let me have the cart. It was nice of her, but I felt a bit embarrassed.

As for the locking carts, don't even get me started on the Wal-Mart specials - UGH!

Regarding broken wrists, one of my sisters had a similar problem with the first doctor getting it wrong. After 2 plus years, and exercises, she has about 90% mobility. She said the key is to try and do a bit more with your wrist and hand each day. The worst thing is to do nothing, as atrophy can set in if muscles are unused for too long. I hope this helps!

CHEERS!