The Rant to Your Heart's Content Thread

[heza]

We've been written up for lease violations twice in 12 hours at our apartment for really stupid, minor things. The notices were very dire sounding, like we're one cross look away from being evicted.

We've lived there two months, now, and only very recently got a clicker for the gate that works (we were having to follow people in) and we still haven't gotten access to the storage we're paying monthly for. And they still haven't addressed the repairs we've reported needing (including one for a black mold problem), some more than 30 days ago.

That's not because there's anything problematic; it's just because the staff is completely inept.

So... yeah, I'm going to write them up for lease violation when I get home. I might fine them, too.

[SomethingOrOther]

I'm an unsalvageably bad prose stylist. (Except when I'm writing fiction. I usually like my narrators' voices.*) My brain just puts together ugly, arrhythmic combinations of words, and I can't help/stop/fix it. It's really fucking frustrating. Seriously, wtf?

I guess it's possible that I have a bad habit of using the worst possible inner monologue "voices"—a habit that doesn't carry over to fiction—but aawegkjwaeltjwakjwlt.

*The difference is I'm pretty good with words that represent concrete stuff, which fiction is full of, but abstractions seem to give me a lot of trouble.

***

Okay. If everything I've written isn't the only example I need:



So, um, why did I write chief? It's kind of a gratuitous and weird (weird in a bad way) substitute for main, first off. And on top of that, their and chief being right next to each other—both five-letter words, both using the same vowel-consonant schema (vowel-consonant schema? the fuck?) of ccvvc (huh?), and both using the exact same vowels—looks ugly.

And in the first sentence, I wrote look into? Why? Why not check out? And what's the point of the have to? Why I've never instead of I haven't?

I mean, yeah, these are the types of mistakes writing will be full of pre-revision, but they're just so gross-looking, and my natural voice is just so alien and bizarre and incompetent.



Maybe I mentally read my own writing in a voice that doesn't mix well with it. Or maybe I'm hyper-sensitive to language in a strange way. Idk.

[buzhidao]

Kick their ass, heza...black mold and nothing? Crap.

Originally Posted by SomethingOrOther

I'm an unsalvageably bad prose stylist. First I've heard of it. (Except when I'm writing fiction. I usually like my narrators' voices.*) My brain just puts together ugly, arrhythmic combinations of words, and I can't help/stop/fix it. Except for "help/stop/fix" that sentence was pretty rhythmic to me... It's really fucking frustrating. Seriously, wtf?

I guess it's possible that I have a bad habit of using the worst possible inner monologue "voices"—a habit that doesn't carry over to fiction—but aawegkjwaeltjwakjwlt. I suppose that one was a little puzzling.

*The difference is I'm pretty good with words that represent concrete stuff, which fiction is full of, but abstractions seem to give me a lot of trouble. Abstractions suck ass. I dislike them. And math. Is math abstract? I can't remember.

***

Okay. If everything I've written isn't the only example I need:



So, um, why did I write chief? It's kind of a gratuitous and weird (weird in a bad way) substitute for main, first off. That one reads fine to me. And on top of that, their and chief being right next to each other—both five-letter words, both using the same vowel-consonant schema (vowel-consonant schema? the fuck?) of ccvvc (huh?), and both using the exact same vowels—looks ugly. I think you may be overthinking it. Didn't notice "their" and "chief"...but I did notice "vowel-consonant schema." :p

And in the first sentence, I wrote look into? Why? Why not check out? And what's the point of the have to? Why I've never instead of I haven't? Didn't notice any of that either. What's wrong with it?

I mean, yeah, these are the types of mistakes writing will be full of pre-revision, but they're just so gross-looking, and my natural voice is just so alien and bizarre and incompetent. Pfffffff



Maybe I mentally read my own writing in a voice that doesn't mix well with it. Or maybe I'm hyper-sensitive to language in a strange way. Idk.

You have a large vocabulary that I occasionally find puzzling because my vocabulary is only "large" in very specific areas. Like, not literary...things (crazily enough). I am envious of how precise it is and simultaneously feel a little overwhelmed (er, stupid). But all that's subjective and whatnot. I know my own vocabulary presents problems...like, I probably shouldn't use [CENSORED]bandit as much as I do...

I see nothing wrong with your rhythms. You write well...and you certainly dissect it well.

(<<is jealous of it kinda)

[SomethingOrOther]

Okay, yeah, you're right. I probably caught all those so-called "errors" because I was super frustrated with something earlier today.

[Kylabelle]

It is really stupid how freakin much I want to throw this computer across the room and smash blam crash through the sliding glass door, smithereens!!!!!!!!!!! Oh I would love to see smithereens explode in showers of fucking shards of irretrievable volcanic destruction, FAIL FAIL FAIL FAIL

I canNOT learn this shit! I hate it! Why the world has to have shit like formatting and stupid machines that think they are so smart and try to fucking do shit for you before you can even finish the last thing you tried to do

ARGH!!!!!!!!!!!!!

to my everlasting shame I even wrote some blog thing or other about how ridiculous it is to bitch at the computer and HERE I AM STILL DOING EXACTLY THAT BECAUSE IT WON'T DO WHAT I WANT IT TO!

bazongers. Simply freaking bazongers.

I give up.

Plant me now, right now. I probably won't even make good compost.



lemee outa here.

[SomethingOrOther]

That rant is mega-elite.

[Kylabelle]

Oh, dear, and here I was hoping it was omni-pedestrian so that everyone could relate.



It sure felt good to get it out though!

[Lidiya]

*Coughs a little bit*

I HATE MY DAMN EYES.
Seriously, why the hell do 5 minutes on the computer make them feel as if they've been dissolved by acid? WHY does my head feel like it's been used as a drum whenever I write as little as 3 words on Microsoft Word??

WHY IS IT SO DAMN PAINFUL to be a writer? My fingers hurt, my eyes hurt, my head hurts, my legs are cramped from not moving, and, oh, I'm vitamin D deficient now!!

Damn problems.

*Emits the loudest possible sigh in the world*

[bearilou]

How does a person get grown and not know how to do things on their own? Simple things like get a prescription filled or fill out simple forms?

And get to the point that they passive-aggressively push things off onto others that they should be doing for themselves because they don't know and don't want to know. They just want someone else to deal with it for them?

And how can they not know how stressful it is that someone now has to take care of their lives as well as dealing with the things going on in their own lives?

And not realize that if I have to, not only call and make their fucking appointments for them because they don't want to (and if I force them to I'm face with the prospect of wasting more time and gas because they won't take care to see that it's done right to start off with), then I have to haul their asses around to those appointments because they don't want to deal with it, that it not only stresses me out but it pretty much destroys my day having to wait around while they get attended to?

And that when I'm also trying to earn money and that just because I'm not going into an office job or off to a site to work that to assume that I'm not busy as well, or that I don't have other household obligations to attend to so I have time to handle their shit for them, shit they SHOULD have learned how to do in the fifty years of their life up until now, that it puts further pressure on me?

and that while I'm really a very easy going person and can handle a lot of stress normally, their inability and unwillingness to learn to do things on their own is just going to set the powder keg off eventually because while I can and do handle the stress with relative calm, even I am hitting the maximum level in which I can take on their responsibility?

and that I can't really drop it back in their lap and say 'you deal with it' because we are talking about their heart and their health that is currently the center of this entire whirlwind of passive aggressive emergency-driven bullshit and with them have NO insurance and that the bulk of the financial responsibility will fall back on my mother if I don't step up and take responsibility at this crucial time...

...I'm about to fucking explode in a fiery spray of anger and resentment?

and to top all this off is that I do understand that they are scared and don't really know what to do and that no matter what my stress levels are, they do understand the gravity of the entire situation even if they don't know what to do.

I just need them to step up to the plate, too, without making this even more stressful than it is now.

[Chase]

Originally Posted by bearilou

They just want someone else to deal with it for them. . .

Your rant is probably my girlfriend's. I'm deaf, and she deals with all my phone calls.

I know I should be self-sufficient, but (we dependent users always have several buts) TTY is long-standing joke.

Oregon has the more modern 7-1-1 Relay for the Deaf, but I had to pay for the required land-line only to have most people hang up because the connection beeps apparently sound too much like automated phone solicitations.

I'm helpless if I encounter phone answering trees wanting me to press 1 for English. I never had one business or government agency return a call in the year I had the pricey 7-1-1 Relay. Many won't go though the voice agent after I read messages scrolling on an impossibly tiny screen.

I have a text phone, but few people my age text. I had to teach my boss and girlfriend, and my only sibling who texts is my deaf sister.

I keep in touch with family and friends via email (what a gift for us deafies); however, few businesses allow two-way email. I was lucky to find one dentist out of a dozen willing to skirt HEPPA regs to allow email, yet my girlfriend can call. Same with the VA clinic. I feel I'm de facto dependent.

Over protest, I pay half her phone bill. I do half the cleaning and laundry and most of the cooking, and she's got breakfast in bed every Sunday for seven years, but I can see it's not enough by a long shot.

[bearilou]

Originally Posted by Chase

Your rant is probably my girlfriend's. I'm deaf, and she deals with all my phone calls.

not by a long shot.

this is someone who chooses not to.

this is someone who gave me his prescription to get filled while he was with me. we were there. together. in the drugstore. he is able to speak, walk, see, hear, move. he choose not to hand the prescription to the lady behind the counter and deal with her. he handed it to me to give to her.

while standing there. talking to me.

Originally Posted by Chase

Over protest, I pay half her phone bill. I do half the cleaning and laundry and most of the cooking, and she's got breakfast in bed every Sunday for seven years, but I can see it's not enough by a long shot.

yeah, well, it's more than I get. I do all the cleaning and the laundry and the dishes. I haven't gotten breakfast in bed yet.

Again, this is not me complaining and getting all that isn't what I want, need or require.

But when I have a full day of running all over the place (we live remotely and to get to the nearest town is 1/2 hour drive minimum (getting to the hospital where he had to go was 45 minutes one way), having to take care of my own obligations which included house sitting a house 25 minutes from our house and dogs there and at home, taking him into town to get his medications...well, sorry, I can't see asking that he handle that is too much to ask.

I'm not married to him. He's not my brother. He's a cousin that has a work relationship with my mother and lives in the house with us. Has his own car. I'm not unsympathetic to getting diagnosed with a heart problem (not a heart attack, thankfully) and being scared in this time of economic stress and not having insurance. Neither do it I think it's too much trouble for him to fill out his own forms (and not try to hand them off to me to fill out), for him to talk to a receptionist to tell her that he needs to see the doctor (and not look at me to tell her while he's upright, mobile and able to talk) or talk to the pharmacist to get his drug prescription filled (and hand the prescript to me to give to her with him standing right there).

He doesn't know how to fill out the forms? Totally fine. I don't mind helping.
He doesn't know how to talk to a doctor? Totally fine. I don't mind being there to help prompt for information.

I don't mind assisting. I do mind when it's dumped off on me to handle completely because he doesn't want to.

[Chase]

Originally Posted by bearilou

I don't mind assisting. I do mind when it's dumped off on me to handle completely because he doesn't want to.

Yeah, cuz sounds like a he's found a free ticket on the gravy train. Family should know better but often are the neediest and least grateful. I hope you find a way to derail him.

Anyway, thanks for a reminder how foisting off responsibilities can wear thin on others.

[Bufty]

Wow! Just, Wow! Bearilou. That type of blinkered, selfish, self-centred behaviour would stretch anyone's patience.

I would like to think that I would - but maybe I wouldn't because it's not my situation and that makes a huge difference - sit down and tell him straight what's buggin' me, and that having a dicky ticker doesn't mean the world comes to an end. Everybody's ticker gives up someday. Yours will give out before his at this rate. He still has the use of eyes, ears, arms and legs and a brain and doesn't have to lie down and give up. Jeepers, it must be obvious to him that you've done more than he could reasonably have expected from anyone.

Again- just, wow!

Hope you find a way of easing yourself out of this unnecessary pressure.

=bearilou;8000013]not by a long shot.

this is someone who chooses not to.

this is someone who gave me his prescription to get filled while he was with me. we were there. together. in the drugstore. he is able to speak, walk, see, hear, move. he choose not to hand the prescription to the lady behind the counter and deal with her. he handed it to me to give to her.

while standing there. talking to me.



yeah, well, it's more than I get. I do all the cleaning and the laundry and the dishes. I haven't gotten breakfast in bed yet.

Again, this is not me complaining and getting all that isn't what I want, need or require.

But when I have a full day of running all over the place (we live remotely and to get to the nearest town is 1/2 hour drive minimum (getting to the hospital where he had to go was 45 minutes one way), having to take care of my own obligations which included house sitting a house 25 minutes from our house and dogs there and at home, taking him into town to get his medications...well, sorry, I can't see asking that he handle that is too much to ask.

I'm not married to him. He's not my brother. He's a cousin that has a work relationship with my mother and lives in the house with us. Has his own car. I'm not unsympathetic to getting diagnosed with a heart problem (not a heart attack, thankfully) and being scared in this time of economic stress and not having insurance. Neither do it I think it's too much trouble for him to fill out his own forms (and not try to hand them off to me to fill out), for him to talk to a receptionist to tell her that he needs to see the doctor (and not look at me to tell her while he's upright, mobile and able to talk) or talk to the pharmacist to get his drug prescription filled (and hand the prescript to me to give to her with him standing right there).

He doesn't know how to fill out the forms? Totally fine. I don't mind helping.
He doesn't know how to talk to a doctor? Totally fine. I don't mind being there to help prompt for information.

I don't mind assisting. I do mind when it's dumped off on me to handle completely because he doesn't want to.

[lmoses2011]

My boyfriend keeps insisting that I'm cheating on him. I know that this is his little psycho way of showing that he's insecure in the relationship and all but for shit's sake stop!!!!!!! I have never cheated on him. And the kicker is he's cheated on me, granted it was a while ago and we worked through it, he cheated and I don't accuse him at every second!!!!! So seriously he needs to stop before I am forced to kill him!!

[Chase]

Originally Posted by lmoses2011

I have never cheated on him. And the kicker is he's cheated on me, granted it was a while ago and we worked through it, he cheated and I don't accuse him at every second!!!!! So seriously he needs to stop before I am forced to kill him!!

He's projecting (no, I don't have a degree in psychology, but I still have my book from college psych 101, 102, and 103). He's putting on you what he did.

Give him the phone number of Cheaters, the TV program, and tell him to have you followed and filmed to his heart's delight.

If it doesn't work, then I think killing suspicious boyfriends is legal in Trinidad.

[bearilou]

In with the good air, out with the bad air
In with the good air, out with the bad air
In with the good air, out with the bad air
In with the good air, out with the bad air
In with the good air, out with the bad air
In with the good air, out with the bad air

A racist, bigoted, misognynistic, all wrapped in the veneer of 'christianity', uncle is coming to visit.

Think kind, loving thoughts.
Think kind, loving thoughts.
Think kind, loving thoughts.
Think kind, loving thoughts.
Think kind, loving thoughts.
Think kind, loving thoughts.

For two days.

When it's a choice between being right and being kind, be kind.
When it's a choice between being right and being kind, be kind.
When it's a choice between being right and being kind, be kind.
When it's a choice between being right and being kind, be kind.
When it's a choice between being right and being kind, be kind.
When it's a choice between being right and being kind, be kind.

[Kylabelle]

Oof.

Well, another good one for such a circumstance is "would I rather be right or have peace?"

Two days. Maybe you can find stuff to occupy him for most of the time so that conversation is minimized! Good luck with it.

He is probably miserable, underneath all that toxic crust.

Be peace.

[jjdebenedictis]

Originally Posted by bearilou

A racist, bigoted, misognynistic, all wrapped in the veneer of 'christianity', uncle is coming to visit.

For two days.

((((*hugs*)))) Yep. That sucks.

Best wishes for toughing it out. It's only two days--you can do eeeet, Bearilou! *shakes pompoms*

[SomethingOrOther]

Is this your uncle?



*buys pompoms and shakes them*

[ElaineA]

ARGH!! I am SO suspicious that a new-ish member of this community is using AW for a psych paper or something. He's been here 1 month and started 16 threads. I've gotten caught up in one of them and his responses seemed so disingenuous. It's really got my antennae twitching.

He's making people I respect on this board dance around like puppets on a string. So today I wrote a long reply to his latest salvo calling him out but I deleted it because I can't PROVE anything. And NOW I feel like the biggest COWARD! I am 99.993% certain this poster is up to something that isn't about writing. I think he's working on his master's thesis on the "Interrelationships of an Anonymous Community" or something insidious like that. But if I'm right and I call him out publicly, I both dance to his tune and give him fodder for his paper and if I'm wrong, I've publicly humiliated him and I would feel ashamed about that. I keep waiting for the community to shut him out but it isn't happening. He's walking just close enough to the line to keep it rolling, even garnering apologies from some who've questioned his motives. And it's none of my business anyway. I can stay away from his threads

BUT AHHH! SO FRUSTRATING!!! I HATE FEELING MANIPULATED! (Even if it's paranoia. Blargh!!)

[Amadan]

Originally Posted by ElaineA

ARGH!! I am SO suspicious that a new-ish member of this community is using AW for a psych paper or something. He's been here 1 month and started 16 threads. I've gotten caught up in one of them and his responses seemed so disingenuous. It's really got my antennae twitching.

He's making people I respect on this board dance around like puppets on a string. So today I wrote a long reply to his latest salvo calling him out but I deleted it because I can't PROVE anything. And NOW I feel like the biggest COWARD! I am 99.993% certain this poster is up to something that isn't about writing. I think he's working on his master's thesis on the "Interrelationships of an Anonymous Community" or something insidious like that. But if I'm right and I call him out publicly, I both dance to his tune and give him fodder for his paper and if I'm wrong, I've publicly humiliated him and I would feel ashamed about that. I keep waiting for the community to shut him out but it isn't happening. He's walking just close enough to the line to keep it rolling, even garnering apologies from some who've questioned his motives. And it's none of my business anyway. I can stay away from his threads

BUT AHHH! SO FRUSTRATING!!! I HATE FEELING MANIPULATED! (Even if it's paranoia. Blargh!!)

You should probably PM your concerns to the mods rather than "calling him out" here.

[evilrooster]

Originally Posted by Amadan

You should probably PM your concerns to the mods rather than "calling him out" here.

This. Report the posts, PM the room mod, or PM me (not because I'm a special PM-everything-to mod, but because I am a mod and I happen to be here).

We'll take a look and use our best judgment. We won't automatically FRY HIM FROM ORBIT without thinking it through. So don't be afraid of false alarms.

[bearilou]

Originally Posted by evilrooster

We won't automatically FRY HIM FROM ORBIT without thinking it through.

well y'all are no fun.

[evilrooster]

Originally Posted by bearilou

well y'all are no fun.

Frying people from orbit is much more fun if it's preceded by careful contemplation. Then one can savor the experience like a fine single malt, layer by layer, from the sweet anticipatory foretaste through the sparky, explosive middle and all the way to the smoky aftertaste.



Now I'm all thirsty. Or bloodthirsty. Or possibly both.

[bearilou]

Originally Posted by evilrooster

Frying people from orbit is much more fun if it's preceded by careful contemplation. Then one can savor the experience like a fine single malt, layer by layer, from the sweet anticipatory foretaste through the sparky, explosive middle and all the way to the smoky aftertaste.



Now I'm all thirsty. Or bloodthirsty. Or possibly both.

U RITE PURDY WURDS.