FuglyDuck

“Professional time” sounds like a euphemism for wanking off on the clock.

I’ll second the book… read it in highschool,

It’s a bit sick-puppet-ish, but it’s still a good read.

Yeah that’s pretty complicated, I was just laughing at my own us-centrism for a moment. I’m still kinda pissed at our transit here, though.

Like, here, Minneapolis alone has several different agencies running in it (several precints of normal cops, transit cops, park cops. River cops.) not to mention “hosting” several agencies for suburbs. Any cops in the state can do things in the city.

Edit: also, holding the light rail train over a 2 dollar fare for an hour is exactly something the transit cops would do.

there’s been a few. my (very much evil) step-grandmother was visiting my home with the rest of the family for a weekend barbeque. there were two things that happened that day. First, fairly early on, a new neighbor had brought back this ceramic baking dish I had brought them cookies and lemon bars over in. It was nice of them (they come back about half the time. they’re nice-ish, but not expensive baking dishes. our entire neighborhood bombards the new families with things. We even have it scheduled out for a couple months so they don’t get tossed.)

in any case, the mother was bringing it back and happened to be muslim. My Step-grandmother yelled- intentionally loud enough to be heard by my new neighbor, “YOU’RE NOT GOING TO INVITE THAT DIRTY TOWEL HEAD IN, ARE YOU?” the neighbor bolted before I could apologize, (i’ve subsequently repaired that damage.) Then my grandfather bitched me out when I told her that it was my house, and I would invite any one in I wanted to invite, and if she has a problem, she can leave.

then, I came back inside to her call my partner a Slut. Because she was a single mother. my partner heard. And my daughter. I WENT BALLISTIC. we were pretty close to going no-contact already. but that alone was enough.

of course, the rest of the family thought I was the bad guy for a couple years- and I more or less put them all on no-contact because they kept trying to sneak them over for holidays. after being told explicitly not to do that and if they had an issue, they can host it and we won’t come if they’re there. so they had a big “intervention” over it and things got heated. “You shouldn’t talk to people like that. What you said hurt” was the general gist of it. and that I should forgive the evil step grandma.

Ultimately, they decided to maybe leave it alone, because, why the hell are you talking to me. the conditions we set for them coming back have yet to be met. (Basically an apology. to me. and to my partner.) and I may have shamed my dad and brother because Evil Step Grandma shifted her vitriol to them. she was a truly vile person.

you noticed that too, huh?

it was kind of unspoken before this incident, but It got official with a little placard and everything at work after. So, I worked out of a satellite office, I was the senior manager with an office in that office; my boss was out for client meetings with people for whom it was easier to get to that office (the reason we kept it,) and had wrapped it up when I was coming in for the day. Our employees work 24/7 so, one of us was always on call, with a third and fourth people that could pick up slack if either one of us was unavailible for whatever reason.

Now. I’m walking in, some asshole that had been assigned to our office to provide coverage for an area that wasn’t anywhere in the state. (basically remote, but whatever.). This guy was a piece of work. rubbed everyone the wrong way. didn’t get along with anyone in the space, didn’t follow any of the even remotely basic play-nice-in-the-office rules.

Like, for example, putting on a fresh pot of coffee if you take the last.

So, here I am, walking in at the start of my shift, and my normal walk-in routine is to come in, set my stuff down and put on a fresh pot of coffee, for myself and a few others that were also coming in around then. In any case Asshole, here, sees me put on the fresh pot, and I went about tidying the donut station and such like waiting for the fresh coffee; He sees the coffee gets done, and comes out with a carafe air pot type thingy, pours the entire pot into that and turns and walks back to his desk.

now, anybody who actually knows me in the office, knows I’m a freaking addict. so here Asshole is, walking back to his desk, and he must have felt the daggers I was shooting into his back. Because he turned and said, “you know, people would like you a lot more if you just smiled more.”

My boss, who was done with whatever had come out to hear that comment. and to see my face. And she thought I was about to kick his ass. (and I might have been thinking about it.)

So now, it’s an official, with a placard and everything rule. “If the coffee is low, make a fresh cup.”

Another one that I’m quite proud of, is a “Must Report” rule. if your a member of management, and you see somebody doing good work… you must report that. the report goes into their file, with a quick blurb explaining what they were doing that was even modestly above and beyond. “picked up trash they didn’t have to”, “was extra patient with idiots”, ect. most things get a comment from their relevant manager as well. (nothing special or cheesy. just a, ‘hey thanks for taking care of that.’)

you’d be surprised the difference that makes.

No. I told her the truth: she doesn’t get to demand that. It’s contract security, and while there are elements of customer service…it is absolutely not customer service. For one thing we’re allowed- and expected to tell people to fuck off.

If I had to call my boss- who literally had no fucking clue what the policies at that account were- every time someone felt entitled…

We wouldn’t be in business very long as a company.

“We’re about to leave their jurisdiction…”- you

“That’s not how…”

“…. International….”

“Oh… that is how that works…”

I was working as a security guard.

She called the cops on me because i refused to call my manager for her. The thing was it was getting late and my manager goes into the office early.

She wanted to complain about how I tie my shoes.

She came in when I was re-tying my boots, saw that it was weird. Got offended enough to demand I tie them “the right way”.

I politely explained that the usual bow falls apart too quickly, especially with the boot laces, and the doubled up bow is impossible to undo. This was a much better knot… and “now are you visiting someone here?” (Aka “can I just trespass you already.”)

She got even more offended, insisting I do it right. I refused again. She insisted I get the manager… whose at home, probably sleeping or fucking… Nope. Not giving you his cell either, so you can harass him.

So she called the cops for “impersonating a security guard and I just feel very unsafe!”

So. Cops come out. Replayed the security tapes - with audio- “yeah.”

so… i second TTRPG events. or similar. Also, group dancing classes at a studio. usually it’s not horribly old people (kinda hard to dance with a walker…sorry.) but there might be a broad spectrum of ages, so definitely ask before you just buy a session.

Swingers sex cult will get everybody interested. make sure they leave the kids at home, though.

It’s possible that they took care of the difference on their own. The manager only cares the till comes out as it should.

Define “good reason”?

I’ve asked for managers to compliment staff, I’ve asked to speak to managers when I knew there was some reason the individual wouldn’t be able to help, I’ve also escalated on tech support calls when we started going round in circles. (For an example… when my mobo wasn’t posting, and they kept telling me to reseat everything. First thing I tried. I told them that. Turns out it was a batch of recalled boards.)

I’ve also asked to speak to the manager at a wing joint, I was there for a company happy hour (uhhhg. Wouldn’t have gone if I didn’t have to pick up the tab. You know the rule to not outndrink the boss? Sucks for them when the boss doesn’t drink.)

There was a pretty big disruption where a patron at the bar was sexually harsssing passing waitresses- and probably assaulted them. So I asked ours to send the manager out immediately. We knew he knew. He watched it going down from the kitchen.

He basically told us to mind our own business and that if “his girls” had a problem with it they’d speak up.

So I called the DoLabor on him and reported the place as a hostile workplace environment.

Maybe excessive, maybe he was right and I should mind my own business. But as a boss sitting there with supervisors, I felt it was necessary to lead by example. Also. Don’t let patrons molest your waitstaff.

They could have just improved the security in their door.

Probably for less than the cost of a single attack.

They were almost certainly targeting your stores because it was easy. Probably because they were extremely vulnerable locks. (You’d be surprised how easy it is.)

they knew about climate change in the 50’s- actually, greenhouse gases were first proposed in the 1820s.

Lol!

I mean, read the foundation series. Asimov’s take kn where we’d be would have probably slagged most the planet… they just didn’t how dangerous that stuff is.

Which is hilarious because when he was talking about things glowing with radiation… it was literal. Humans can see x-rays as a soft blue glow. If the source is strong enough. (And that’s very much not safe to be around,)

It’ll be interesting to see what we misunderstand in our modern sci-fi

Linux liveUSBs, and the kind of documents I’m uncomfortable storing in the cloud.

(Including a particular usb I load up taxes and financial documents, encryption keys and such for the “I died and you get to sort it all out.” Package.)

Department 13

In cyrrillic.

There was an “FBI Van” in the apartment van and I thought going with the KGB assassination team would be amusing.

Unfortunately, nobody got it.

Something like this but smiling. Sorry I suck at drawing so AI art it is. (a bean with a pompodour.)

well the flying cars is easy: there’s two reasons. First, It’s very energy inefficient. for transporting people, you’ll never get the same effective range for the same energy capacity whether it’s running off fuel or batteries- because ground vehicles have to push it along where aircraft have to both push it along and push it up.

Secondly, it’s about size and form factor. what is a flying car? a hybrid vehicle designed to be able to switch between being a ground vehicle and an aircraft. Engineering is all about balance, and designing to fit a certain task. when you go with two tasks, suddenly you’re making compromises to achieve both of them. And generally those compromises means it sucks at both of them.

Just one example of the compromises: do you want a comfortable on the ground ride? the unsprung mass of a typical 4 person sedan is around two to three hundred pounds, and that’s basically just the wheels . a far 103 compliant ultralight is capped at 250 pounds.

You’d also have to pile on a motor (Or motors, or some sort of transmission system) just to drive it. You’d also have to have some sort of steering system. All of that is going to turn into dead weight when you start flying… which means you’re going to need bigger motors, bigger and faster rotors (or bigger wings) which all equate to even more weight- and even more fuel- which makes the thing even bigger. and bigger. Until now you have to take off and land at an airport or something, and won’t be allowed to fly into a city because… well you’re liable to fall out of the sky.

More annoyingly, you’re now also maintaining basically to drive trains- and those drive trains are more complicated than they would have been on their own, which makes maintenance annoying, and expensive.

And that’s just one compromise. It’s a lot easier to just buy a car, and buy an aircraft. and you’ll be more comfortable in both.

as for robot pets… speak for yourself. Sure, they’re not sentient… but I got mine…