Get Your Grump on Thursdays - Was (What's chapping my @ss today?)

[bironi]

Not Thursday and not a serious grump.
Just wanted to share a humorous irritation.
My wife bought an Monopoly game based on the city of Aspen a year or two ago.
Since then we have been bombarded with very glitzy big catalog mailings from multiple companies.
Nothing we need, want, nor can afford.
Recently I began the process of unsubscribing from each catalog.
I have not kept count, but it must be at least 10 thus far.
Of course, most of the companies sell themselves as environmentally friendly.
Bull.

[ides1056]

I browsed the state health exchange, and come home to a dozen messages every night.
Went with what we already had.

40K for a family of four.

Looking forward to turning 65.

[j44ke]

I am going early. The owner of a three story 1870's house across the street somehow managed to "avoid" historic designation and tore down the building to put in a small 10 story hotel. Five weeks ago, they began excavation and within a couple days, they discovered half their lot is a giant chunk of bedrock. The lot is tiny, and there are two large apartment blocks on either side of them. So no explosives allowed! But that means jackhammers. Hours and hours and hours of jackhammers. For the last three weeks, every M-F from 7AM to 5PM with one hour off for lunch it is jackhammers. No break. Four guys, two jackhammers, when one guy can no longer feel his arms, another one takes it up and carries on. It is going on as I write this. I would say looking down into the site from our front windows that they've easily got another week. Incredible.

This is becoming a problem in the city. Way too much construction. If you come and visit, bring your work boots, a respirator and surgical gloves.

I've been upstate for two weeks basically. 8AM and guess what - jackhammers.

I know I am complaining on Monday, but last Thursday I was parked in an opposite side of the street parking zone every Thursdays unless it is Friday in months starting with the letter V between 7:00 AM and 6:59 AM when stopping is prohibited while parking during street cleaning yesterday.

[David Tollefson]

Why does the DMV experience stink in every state? It honestly is like something out of a cheesy comedy film if it weren't so endlessly frustrating.

A popular kids movie captured the experience nicely...

[Corso]

Why does the DMV experience stink in every state? It honestly is like something out of a cheesy comedy film if it weren't so endlessly frustrating. Two visits, two long waits, both times sent home empty because what I had doesn't match their needs. It's not hard to see why people don't like government when interacting with such unmotivated, uncaring state employees.

My latest DMV trip: Registered car online- waited but registration and plate sticker did not come in mail. Can't have car inspected (yearly money grab) without sticker. Contact registry "it's in the mail". After 6 weeks, go to DMV where everything is conformed, but due to "lost in mail" I have to apply for a duplicate and pay more $$$. If I came in within 30 days I wouldn't have to re-pay, but when registering they say will come within 2-4 weeks...huh?

Registry lady tells me she always tells people to come into the DMV in person to get registration right after they do it online. Um, doesn't that defeat the purpose?

Next: I can't register a small old snowmobile trailer I've had forever. Always been able to simply do it online. Screen says (can not process go to registry). So I do. When I originally registered it years ago, DMV told me to call it "homemade" as I had no clue who manufactured it. Now they tell people to call it "utility" trailer. So that one word change they made forced me to the DMV. It's $20 a year, they give me paperwork and tell me "it's only good to December31. They changed policy (no warning) that registration for trailers is Jan to Dec, NOT a year from when you actually register it.

Staff at DMV were very nice and helpful, hard to blame them for the State's ever changing b**sht.

[72gmc]

Registry lady tells me she always tells people to come into the DMV in person to get registration right after they do it online. Um, doesn't that defeat the purpose?

"We don't actually have a system that allows you to do that online, but it makes [agency] look good when they say you can"

[bcm119]

Why does the DMV experience stink in every state? It honestly is like something out of a cheesy comedy film if it weren't so endlessly frustrating. Two visits, two long waits, both times sent home empty because what I had doesn't match their needs. It's not hard to see why people don't like government when interacting with such unmotivated, uncaring state employees.

I'm not here to defend the DMV, but consider that the DMV may not be representative of government any more than Comcast may be representative of the private sector. Should I judge all private companies based on my last experience with Verizon customer service? Talk about uncaring employees...
Yes, I work for a gov agency. Not the DMV, thank god.

[bigbill]

In the winter of 1987, my car was parked in the bank parking lot next to Friendly's in Saratoga Springs, NY. A man backed out of his spot and hit my parked car. He called the police, I was in the YMCA across the street and found out quickly what had happened. The police wrote up an accident report, never asked for my insurance info, the other guy admitted fault, his insurance paid for everything including a rental car, done. In 2015 as I approached my 50th birthday, I went to TxDot to renew my driver's license. I had been in the Navy 1985 to 2012 and kept my TX license, renewing it by mail every 5 years. The clerk at TxDot told me that I had a hold on my license for being an uninsured motorist involved in an accident in New York. It took six weeks to clear it all up and have my license renewed.

[Saab2000]

I'm not here to defend the DMV, but consider that the DMV may not be representative of government any more than Comcast may be representative of the private sector. Should I judge all private companies based on my last experience with Verizon customer service? Talk about uncaring employees...
Yes, I work for a gov agency. Not the DMV, thank god.

I’ll do my pushups. I said it wrong when I threw gov’t workers under the bus. That was inappropriate and I’ll eat it. It was a frustrating situation and I hope it will be resolved soon.

[davids]

In the winter of 1987, my car was parked in the bank parking lot next to Friendly's in Saratoga Springs, NY. A man backed out of his spot and hit my parked car. He called the police, I was in the YMCA across the street and found out quickly what had happened. The police wrote up an accident report, never asked for my insurance info, the other guy admitted fault, his insurance paid for everything including a rental car, done. In 2015 as I approached my 50th birthday, I went to TxDot to renew my driver's license. I had been in the Navy 1985 to 2012 and kept my TX license, renewing it by mail every 5 years. The clerk at TxDot told me that I had a hold on my license for being an uninsured motorist involved in an accident in New York. It took six weeks to clear it all up and have my license renewed.

What scares you more?

A world where your personal information between two independent organizations is shared imperfectly?
Or.
A world where your personal information between two independent organizations is shared perfectly?

[bigbill]

What scares you more?

A world where your personal information between two independent organizations is shared imperfectly?
Or.
A world where your personal information between two independent organizations is shared perfectly?

The former. I renewed my license by mail six times after I left New York. It wasn't until all the data bases were linked did this come up. The actual police report had been archived and then lost so all the state had was a report that I didn't have insurance. I did have it, it wasn't requested, but 28 years later all that was required was a request for dismissal of charges which I could have got in 1988 if I had known. The State of NY was still all paper on this as of 2015. I couldn't fax or scan and attach, I mailed correspondence to them. The only upside is while on hold for almost 3 hours at work, I got all my CBT's done for the year.

[Drew]

What scares you more?

A world where your personal information between two independent organizations is shared imperfectly?
Or.
A world where your personal information between two independent organizations is shared perfectly?

What scares me the most is when INCORRECT information is shared. Which seems to be the case here.

[Tom]

Current crop of Halloween decorations. Size isn't everything. Going to the big box and laying down plastic for more plastic, nope.

The best one I've seen this year is somebody took a witch on a broom and suspended it from a high high branch of the pine tree in their front yard using a rope that you really can't see so it looks like she's flying 15 feet off the ground. Clever. Admittedly they bought her but the application is artful. And its the only thing they did.

The rest of them? I want to sneak around with a box of kitchen matches tonight.

[Octave]

A grump with a silver lining

Today, on my usual morning ride through the Parc National des Calanques, I stopped and cleaned up 50 gel packets and >100 zip ties in less than 1km which were left by the Marseille-Cassis running race. Every year the national park is absolutely covered with these. Last year I organized a group after the race-organization elected to do nothing and we went up there and filled up 8 trash bags of plastic bottles, more than 1000 gel packets and hundreds of energy bar wrappers in only a few hours. This year the mess was worse than ever, even though the organizers wrote a whole page on their website about being eco-responsible. Bullshit, as usual.

The silver lining: I posted about this on instagram (@likeflowersatlast) and have received a really massive response. Unlike last year, where I posted almost exactly the same thing, this year I've been reposted by a dozen accounts, then picked up by the national parc system who has filed a formal complaint against the race organizers, and the photos have been picked up by the newspaper as well. I am just happy to feel like I'm no longer shouting into an abyss, but actually being heard. Hopefully this affects real change because year upon year of this kind of rubbish in a national park should not be tolerated.

[bcroslin]

5:30 am came WAY too early today and so I missed the dawn patrol gravel ride. The silver lining: I slept till 9:30.

[defspace]

Grump 1: It's open enrollment time. HR sent out the benefits info package. There are errors in there (factual errors regarding the IRS). I brought them to attention. They made no mention of these errors in the company meeting. What were we saying last week about sharing incorrect information...

Grump 2: People seem to think that funding benefit accounts is a donation back to the company.
"I can't afford to put any money in an HSA this year. We're having a baby."

People go on strike for this stuff. But hey, at least you have a new iPhone.

Grump 3: I guess I can complain about a healthcare system that is so complex people who know they are going to have a child don't understand that they probably want a well-funded HSA.

[ides1056]

This boggles the mind:

E.P.A. Set to Roll Back Rules on Toxic Metals from Coal Plants - The New York Times

But the Times gave me a gold star when I opined:

Another day, another counterproductive, boneheaded move by this administration that seems bent on destroying the planet at every turn.

What is the point, Donald? What is the point?

[guido]

The biggest private coal miner in the US just declared bankruptcy. The administration had to do something...

[ides1056]

the orange baby just has to take a shit on the world every chance he gets

[slwrnu]

slightly bitter/sweet comment having read the couple of litter posts, but I came home on the bus today and there were many schoolchildren. they were mainly civil, and most said thank you to the driver when they got off. but some of them left rubbish on the bus - plastic bottles, crisp packets and so on. I am near the end of the line and there was just me and a young chap (about 16) left. I said to the young chap, let's pick up the rubbish so the driver does not have to do it. He was on his phone of course, but he said, yes, that is a good idea. It took just seconds and the driver thanked us. Bitter/sweet.