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Faceplams: Dealing with cell phone service companies. It's the new used car.
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Dealing with cell phone service companies. It's the new used car.
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Originally Posted by chuckrh
There's a previous video in the 'series':
24.24.2.2866
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holy shit. my wife just called and the electrician that was supposed to just fix a switch is replacing the entire circuit breaker and we're out $7700 in one fell swoop. apparently it isn't just 'not up to code' but violating the whole thing flagrantly.
he said "if you tried to sell your house the inspector wouldn't let anyone buy it" which brings up the question of "well then how did the inspector let us buy it in the first place?!"
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Alexis Marshall’s new solo album came today. The box was bent a little and the record is warped. Emailed Hello Merch to ask for a replacement. They responded saying that Sargent House’s policy doesn’t allow for refunds or replacements of items that may have been damaged in shipping but if I’m willing to pay the shipping cost they’ll send a replacement. That’s some bullshit.
EDIT: Luckily it seems that the warp doesn't effect playback at all. I also posted a picture of it on Instagram as I do whenever I spin a record and complained a bit about the label's policy, and Alexis commented almost immediately saying, "Sorry, man." Nice of him to say. I feel a little bad as it's not his fault at all that the label has that policy. Hopefully the saw the part of the post where I said the album is great. Haha.
Last edited by otnavuskire; 07-27-2021 at 08:35 PM.
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I know I have a photo of the rat's nest of wires that was in there but whatever. The problem was that apparently grounds were routed to the same poles so you'd turn a breaker off and it would actually still have power to it because two-three-four grounds were all on the same pole. We were going to have someone look at it anyway because we're at the point where we can afford to do that but that was under the assumption that it was just a "make sure it's good" not "fix this thing that could explode at any second". (also that does explain why electrical work still shocked us even though we would turn the breakers off so we just started turning the whole thing off to replace switches and plugs)
Bite me
Wait, so you had to get a whole new BOARD?
This thing you say about ground doesn't make sense, no offense. Many older homes don't even HAVE a ground wire. Or even a NEUTRAL wire. The house is grounded against lighting by attaching a ground wire to the gas pipe, or water main. And the house "passes" home inspections because that's just way the houses were built. Not to mention that most home inspectors aren't even licensed under any standardized forms of licensing. I know more than some home inspectors. The most liability that home inspectors have in most states is what you paid for that home inspection. The name of the game in buying a house is: Caveat Emptor.
When you buy a house, even the world's best home inspector can't tear open walls. And, even if they look at a panel, they can't always tell what's going on with the wires inside that panel. Double tapped circuits are extremely common in older homes, and your inspection report can say that (ours did) and the best your attorney can ask for is either fixing it or getting a credit before closing. Sellers can tell you go pound sand, or can give you some money. And that money often isn't enough. A home inspection isn't a code inspection. A code inspection is done by the city. Did you get a permit for this work? Do you have to have a city inspector come out?
I had my old double-tapped board upgraded when we moved in. Then, I had to add a bunch of circuits when we did our kitchen. That left us with zero circuits on the board. Then, we started this basement project, with zero circuits on the board. So we had to add an additional panel.
We opted, instead, to upgrade to 200-amp service and swap out to a 200-amp panel. (Plus, this way, if G opts to get a Tesla, we will have enough service coming in.) When they pulled off that panel, it looks like spaghetti. It's scary. The basement was loaded with BX behind the paneling, which is bad, because we can't run new wire through BX; so we had to rip all that out and run conduit so we can run everything through the new conduit. Electric, with the new service, the drop from the pole, the panel, the copper wire (copper is now incredibly expensive), the new outlets, cans, switches, etc. is running us over $11 grand. Maybe more. We ain't done, yet.
Last edited by allegro; 07-28-2021 at 03:19 PM.
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yeah, whole new board. twice as big as the old one too.
She did ask him that since the house was built in 1981 would it have passed code then and he said nope. But you never know, hindsight etc.
As for the wiring, that was second hand from my wife since she was home all day with the electrician so it's a game of telephone for understanding what actually happened vs. what she understood. Though he did ground the house "properly" because he said it wasn't up to code. Again, 2021 code vs. 1981 so I'm sure there have been modifications.
Also we used the VA Home Loan program and so we had two inspectors. The best they did was "this switch does nothing, it's not even for power to a random outlet, oh well" and signed off on the whole thing. Funny story: the VA inspector told us "we won't give you the money because these trees are too close" so we cut them down. The realtor did not like that, but it got us the house. The previous owner was deceased and his sister was selling it from Texas so it's not like they would have figured it out.
We were also thinking of upgrading the board anyway because of a "you turn the vacuum on while the AC is on and the house turns itself off" issue so this is basically that but sooner than we wanted.
Bite me
Electric Code is mostly national, with a minimal few local variances, and they really haven't changed all that much since the 60s.
The stuff that HAS changed isn't related to the board so much as stuff like location of outlets in the home (within 12 linear feet of each other, an outlet near entrances, stairs, doorways, at least one outlet in bathrooms), GCFI requirements, etc.
Again, if every home's electrical system had to "pass code" before sale, a HUGE number of homes wouldn't sell. Homes built in the 1940s and older have electrical systems that are fucking FIRE hazards. Like knob and tube? Cloth-covered wiring? Romex? And those houses still sell, every day. Even with FHA loans. But FHA will make you do something about peeling paint, due to lead paint possibilities and kids eating lead paint.
The trees? Often, trees really ARE too close.
Electricians cost a lot, but the ones whose costs scare me most? PLUMBERS, omg. And they don't send you bill, they want payment right then. One plumbing company charged us for the cost of the plumber driving here (travel time), and the plumber lived on the next block.
Last edited by allegro; 07-28-2021 at 08:54 PM.
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chemo...
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Every single time my son comes back home from his mothers house he clogs the fucking toilet within 24 hours.
Without fail. What the fuck does she feed him over there???
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*email notification*
Oh, it's from the property management company...
"Hey, we've have a complaint of cannabis odour from your apartment. This is cause for termination of lease."
Well... how about a big old fuck you. Not only am I legally exempt, you company has known about this for six years. Maybe check the fucking notes on the file rather than sending stupid stress inducing notices like that on a Friday afternoon you piece of shit.
Oh, you sent it to the whole building because you couldn't actually pin down where the smell comes from? Fuck off.
24.24.2.2866
My Dad is USELESS when it comes to conversation, can't even get a complete thought out of him most of the time. I try to bond with him and all he can offer is a bunch of grunts, no opinions, no interest, NOTHING and then he'll pull out his stupid phone and become completely distracted. The one thing that drives me up the wall that he does and it's so fucking rude and inconsiderate, you can be talking to him and before you've even finished he just gets up and walks away. Like he expects you to follow him around everywhere. Fucking asshole and you can forget sharing any kind of feelings or having a heart to heart with the guy. He has the emotional capacity of a STONE!
UGH! FUCK!
Just tickles my balls!
Has he been like that with everyone? All his life? Or maybe he has some kind of underlying anxiety issues that cause the behaviour? I’ve known a few people and it has been like getting blood out of a stone for them to start talking. Then eventually you see the underlying insecurity or whatever it may be and they open up, or at least start talking more. You have to hit the right note.
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@Erneuert Oh yeah he does it around others and without a doubt he's got anxiety issues. He smokes like a chimney as a result, that's how he copes. Something like a pack a day or more at this point and he'll never quit because he's as stubborn as i am, I'm glad i never picked up that habit but I'm sure I have some others to make up for it. I've got a lot of anxiety myself, social and/or generalized on top of just being naturally introverted. I have sympathy for the guy, i really do.. it's just frustrating and soul-crushing not being able to click with him. I'm sure there's also some undiagnosed ADHD or something as well (same goes for me), not to mention whichever way the military fucked him up psychologically. He worked in transport mainly and never saw any action to my knowledge but still the military takes it's toll.
Just tickles my balls!
@thelastdisciple Oh, for sure it does. I can’t remember how many WWII/Vietnam war stories I’ve watched on YT. There’s one in particular that always stands out to me because of how vivid of a picture he paints (landing on Omaha beach). I mean, imagine living this:
I didn’t ever pick up the smoking habit either, despite being born with extremely high anxiety, but I’m extremely high functioning, apparently. I’m actually surprised I didn’t ever pick up the habit. Alcohol ruled for a while there, but I was able to get it under control. Has he seen a therapist? Going by the stubbornness you mentioned it doesn’t sound like he’d allow for it anyway.
24.24.2.2866
Yeah I don't think he would go for it at all sadly even with some kind of intervention, just suggesting it would get him in a mood. He has had other health ailments looked at like his IBS, some mild dystonia giving him head tremors, bloating and balance issues but when it comes to mental health? forget it.
Speaking of his time in the military he did tell me this one story where he was transporting some high ranking dude with some troops across a bridge on his route and he started to wig out, not sure if it was vertigo or some depth perception thing that brought a nauseating feeling but since then he's had a very hard time with driving over bridges. I guess it just triggers him like PTSD or something? I'm also talking like major suspension ones over bodies of water not simple highway overpasses.
I have a heights thing myself and so bridges also fuck me up big time. It sucks.
Genetics, right?! Blech.
I was nobody. Nothing.
So THIS fucking sucks: I mentioned, recently, that my Godmother, who had just moved in with us, recently lost HER mother.
Well, lately, she's been, I guess, fainting? She's just been falling out. Night before last, she fell in the hallway, coming out of my mom's room. It knocked her out.
Instead of crying out for help, she CRAWLED to the living room, to the couch. She said it took a fucking HOUR. She didn't want to call out for help because she "didn't want to bother anyone."
ANYWAY, so, yeah, I found all this out yesterday morning, and took her blood pressure, and it was like 80/40. Also, she had a knot on her head that took up MOST of the back of her little head (she's like five one.)
So we rushed her to the hospital. She's still in the ER, waiting to be moved to the ICU or a regular room: we aren't sure which.
In keeping with the specifics of this thread, the thing that pisses me off is that she didn't call for help.
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Jeez - I hope she gets better soon :-(
I was nobody. Nothing.
Yeah, me too. Thank you miss Vicky.
And I'm gonna say this here, because it's a safe place to say it- 98% of y'all don't know who I am, and 100% of you don't know who my Godmother is...
So, here it is. She's been taking a lot of Kratom. And I mean a LOT: like fifteen or twenty caps a day.
I felt horrible doing this- I felt like a snitch, but, I found out she hadn't mentioned the kratom to the ER staff. So I kind of told on her, I guess.
I'm not SURE that's what it is, but it COULD be, and they definitely need to know.
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That's disgusting. For some of those kids, those are the best meals they get.
I was nobody. Nothing.
Still fucking fighting with my Godmother's family about getting all her stuff, and I'm talking 2.5 ROOMS worth of stuff, floor to ceiling, out of our house, in the wake of the assault/police/hospital drama and her spiral into dementia.
Our ancestral family home is not a storage facility for the clan of someone who doesn't give a shit about their relative.
This is poised to become a legal battle, I'm afraid.
Bite me
Can you send them an eviction notice or something? I'd speak to a lawyer. Not a paralegal; hire an actual lawyer.
24.24.2.2866
I'm becoming irrationally cranky about everything lately and i mean like I'm spiritually George Costanza.
So what pisses me off today? single function microwaves piss me off, what i mean by that is with this model they've made it so you CAN'T set both a timer and also still use the cooking function. You can only do one or the other, if a timer is set then you have to wait or cancel it in order to cook something and if something is cooking you obviously have to wait until it's done before it's freed up for the other use.
Now i know there are some workarounds for this, i can use something else as a timer like my phone or an egg timer but it's still annoying because i could just do it with the old one i had but not with this new POS!
END OF THE WORLD. Clearly.
Please laugh at me.
I was nobody. Nothing.
We might have to. Here's what's kind of good (but also sad,) too: SHE is semi-lucid. We've actually talked to her. She understands that her mental capacity is diminishing, and that she can't really come back here. And she's ok with that. I mean, we didn't have to TELL her. So we ARE having the shit moved out and put into storage, for now, at our expense.
Between that, and all three of our health concerns (my mom may have caught covid AGAIN-although it's unlikely, the test was inconclusive,) and, yeah. We are running low on anxiety meds around here
tempus est umbra in mente
ok, so this is definitely a little thing (in the larger scale of how awful things tend to seem to be lately), but my girlfriend and I are settling into our new apartment. The apt and neighborhood kick ass. All that is good.
But I thought I'd splurge a bit as part of a "housewarming thing" and buy a really nice adjustable mattress and an electronic adjustable base. The mattress is great.
The base I skimped on a little bit, but not in some stupid way. I paid nearly 800 dollars for this. It's supposed to do some adjustable things to relieve lower back pain, some floating zero gravity mode, buzzy massage, and for a bunch of reasons I'd rather not go too into, that all sounded like it was worth 800 bucks (including the extra cost for a compatible mattress that works with the adjustable base).
The base was over 200 pounds and the size of a queen mattress, and our apartment doesn't have an elevator. The stairwell is also really narrow. Getting this thing up the stairs made me feel like I was going to faint. But I got it up there, and nothing happened to it... I didn't drop it and nothing got smashed or anything.
Plug it in and it doesn't work. Did customer service chat and they ran me through an hour+ of "did you try this?" bullshit. I pulled out an electricity reader and traced the electricity to the central control unit. Explained that everything was working up until that point. They ask me if the remote has batteries in it. YES. Does a light come on when you push the buttons on the re.e.......ee.e.e.e.e.e YES! Are all the cables properly plugged in!?!?!??! YESYESYESYESYES YOU HORRIBLE COMPANY! You sold me some fancy pants luxury shit that I already felt like a douche for buying, but I just wanted a really nice bed.
I did not want to deal with customer support for hours trying to convince them that this isn't my fault. "Did you try holding down the button again?" YES!
So here's the lesson for anyone thinking of doing what I did... just spend the extra 400 bucks and buy it from Sit n Sleep and have them drag the fucking thing up the stairs for you, have them slap the mattress on, and then have them make it work before they take your money, because trying to work this out is dumb. At this point, I'm just going to call my credit card company and insist they reverse the charges, because at this point, dealing with their customer support is veering into "now it's personal" territory. They have wasted so much of my time it's insane.
Last edited by Jinsai; 09-16-2021 at 08:16 PM.
Bite me
@Jinsai - Those fancy bed bases are REALLY popular around here. Most even contain USB ports and stuff. So I wouldn’t feel too bougie about it. I know it’d be a huge pain, but can you return it?
Also: You’re MOVING IN WITH A GIRLFRIEND???
Dude! Your life has changed a LOT! Mazel Tov!
Last edited by allegro; 09-17-2021 at 09:56 AM.
tempus est umbra in mente
Things are turning around in some good ways, and after calling them again the company is going to fix the bed frame so that’s good. I was really hoping it wouldn’t come down to me having to ship back that huge 200 pound thing (let alone get it down the stairs, and then carry up a replacement). So that seems to have worked out as well
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