Shmoolikipod
Stranger to the Light
Thanks for this stupid fucking ceasefire. Now I have to endure this cold without heat 
Rant Thread
- Thread starter Ariana
- Start date
Not necessarily the gift you hoped for, no
Meliegree
Evening The Odds.
the only thing worse than this is when someone in the office announces that they came in sick as if it was some kind of badge of honor.Don’t you just love it when you go to your relatives’ and one (or more) of them announces: “I’m sick by the way.” And two days later you’re feeling sick as well.
Edington
Last Son of The Miracle
More of a ramble than a rant, didn't know where else to put it.
I can't believe it's New Year's Eve already, said everyone, every year. Even though I continue to not care about New Year, I thought I'd take a look back on 2024, and I realised this year's been... alright, actually.
2023 felt like a big turning point for Edington. I ticked off two of my three long term goals by starting a new job and joining a new band, and the positives those brought me have carried over into 2024 and continued to grow. I have become more comfortable and confident in my job which has brought me new confidence in my personal life, and, after a slightly rocky start, the band has settled nicely. It's helped massively improve my guitar playing, given me a reason to get out of the house every other weekend, I have gotten closer with my bandmates. I have also had some great times this year with my friends and family, I've grown closer with some new friends and I feel very fortunate to now have them in my life. I've also somehow grown even closer with my old friends, particularly as one of them got married this year, going to Berlin for his Stag weekend and the wedding itself are two memories that will always be with me.
Wasn't all good though. While work has been very beneficial to me, I did face two big issues there this year. One time I thought I was going to be fired (which was entirely me catastrophising, as my manager assured me, but it still wasn't fun to be in that mindset), another time I was on the verge of packing up my shit and walking away. Again, catastrophising, and a completely unnecessary response, but still not fun to be in that frame of mind and both problems did make me question whether I had made the right decision in joining this company. But, both have long since been resolved and left behind, I can only hope I won't face similar issues this year.
Another thing that's hung over me this year was a relationship that didn't go the way I was hoping it would in the autumn/winter of last year (starting a relationship was actually the third of my long-term goals. Two out of three ain't bad, I suppose). I've gone over it here before, basically we liked each other but she wasn't ready to take things further with me, having very recently broken up with someone before she started seeing me. We managed to stay friends for a while, but things still felt so good between us that I was having a hard time letting things go, until late-March when I finally realised I was doing myself no favours by seeing her and decided I needed to put some distance between us. That distance turned into only seeing her once in the space of seven months, which wasn't quite what I intended. There have been a few times where I've gotten upset thinking about it, remembering old times between us, thinking it was over and I'd never see her again, but I finally accepted that it was done and started to move on. Then, she reappeared, we met again a couple of times over Christmas. Things are fine, we didn't talk about us and seeing her didn't reignite anything, it's just nice we're still on good terms. I'm determined not to spend another year dwelling on her though, it's been long enough and I've let it overshadow some good things this year.
TL;DR, Ed's year was alright.
Happy New Year, MaidenFans, to you, your families, and friends. Hope you enjoy whatever it is you're doing tonight. Or, if you've already crossed into 2025, hope it's treating you nicely so far.
I can't believe it's New Year's Eve already, said everyone, every year. Even though I continue to not care about New Year, I thought I'd take a look back on 2024, and I realised this year's been... alright, actually.
2023 felt like a big turning point for Edington. I ticked off two of my three long term goals by starting a new job and joining a new band, and the positives those brought me have carried over into 2024 and continued to grow. I have become more comfortable and confident in my job which has brought me new confidence in my personal life, and, after a slightly rocky start, the band has settled nicely. It's helped massively improve my guitar playing, given me a reason to get out of the house every other weekend, I have gotten closer with my bandmates. I have also had some great times this year with my friends and family, I've grown closer with some new friends and I feel very fortunate to now have them in my life. I've also somehow grown even closer with my old friends, particularly as one of them got married this year, going to Berlin for his Stag weekend and the wedding itself are two memories that will always be with me.
Wasn't all good though. While work has been very beneficial to me, I did face two big issues there this year. One time I thought I was going to be fired (which was entirely me catastrophising, as my manager assured me, but it still wasn't fun to be in that mindset), another time I was on the verge of packing up my shit and walking away. Again, catastrophising, and a completely unnecessary response, but still not fun to be in that frame of mind and both problems did make me question whether I had made the right decision in joining this company. But, both have long since been resolved and left behind, I can only hope I won't face similar issues this year.
Another thing that's hung over me this year was a relationship that didn't go the way I was hoping it would in the autumn/winter of last year (starting a relationship was actually the third of my long-term goals. Two out of three ain't bad, I suppose). I've gone over it here before, basically we liked each other but she wasn't ready to take things further with me, having very recently broken up with someone before she started seeing me. We managed to stay friends for a while, but things still felt so good between us that I was having a hard time letting things go, until late-March when I finally realised I was doing myself no favours by seeing her and decided I needed to put some distance between us. That distance turned into only seeing her once in the space of seven months, which wasn't quite what I intended. There have been a few times where I've gotten upset thinking about it, remembering old times between us, thinking it was over and I'd never see her again, but I finally accepted that it was done and started to move on. Then, she reappeared, we met again a couple of times over Christmas. Things are fine, we didn't talk about us and seeing her didn't reignite anything, it's just nice we're still on good terms. I'm determined not to spend another year dwelling on her though, it's been long enough and I've let it overshadow some good things this year.
TL;DR, Ed's year was alright.
Happy New Year, MaidenFans, to you, your families, and friends. Hope you enjoy whatever it is you're doing tonight. Or, if you've already crossed into 2025, hope it's treating you nicely so far.
DJ James
A coma stole my name.
I was looking for the general musings thread, but I believe this rant thread will do.
I believe I could've been anyone in the world if I wasn't me. No, actually, maybe what I am feeling right now isn't that serious. Corporate burnout. I've seen it argued that corporate burnout might be responsible for all our modern problems in our modern world. And maybe I can twist the truth to see that too.
Back around April of 2023, I got very serious about a couple things in my life. I felt a certain dullness in the way I was living, and the future was hazy. I've been living by myself, more or less, since 2017, when I was 19. In April of 2023, I took inventory of my life and what I wanted out of life. I wanted a lot, I wanted the world even, but to summarize the world: I wanted to look better, I wanted a more definitive career path, and I wanted to go back to school. From that point on to about May of 2024, I put my nose to grindstone. I dropped from 240 pounds (roughly 108kg for my metric readers) down to 178 pounds (81kg). I found a college offering an Automated/Automotive Manufacturing Technology course (very closely related to what I do for work), and I started to take my job more seriously than ever.
Early returns were great, I set up a one year review with my plant manager and the shop owner's son and laid out my professional goals. They liked what they saw; and when I asked for a raise in pay, they met my price immediately, which I was surprised by, as I over shot what I wanted. Walking out of that meeting, I knew at the two year review I wanted to blow them away. I mean just knock their socks off. I began brainstorming over what that was going to be, and I settled on a presentation. A presentation more or less about efficiency in my department, what I've been doing to increase that, lean manufacturing, scalable percentages, the whole nine.
I began school in May of 2023. I completed 3 classed for 10 credit hours during the summer, 4 classes for 12 credit hours during the fall, and in January of 2024, I started the spring semester at college. This semester was intensive: a robotic welding class along with another rather competitive welding class. This other competitive welding class required a lot of lab time along with outside time for me to excel. I wanted to finish top of the class. I really had to lock in and focus to accomplish that. On Mondays and Wednesdays, I would wake up around 7 PM, go to the gym and then run afterwards. At 10:30 PM, I would start getting ready for work. I would then work from Midnight to 8 (sometimes 10 AM or later depending on the state of affairs) and then leave to go study until noon. I would then go to class and weld from noon to 2:30 PM. I would usually get home, shower, and be in bed by 4:30 PM, only to have to be back up in a couple hours for my shift again. I maintained this schedule while only missing one class from January to May. At the end of the semester, I won, I was the top student in the class out of 26 students. Some of them even aspired to be full time welders, God bless them.
Very shortly after the spring semester ended, I finished up work on my presentation. My two year review was upon me. One year I had waited for this. That night driving into work on my two year anniversary, I had a selection of songs I played in preparation. Carefully curated, as I had thought about this for one whole year. The highlight was this:
My favorite movie of all time, I've seen it about 40 times. When I got to work, I smashed through what I needed to do for the next 8 hours. No headphones, no music, no podcasts, just reciting the presentation to myself. At 8 that morning I was summoned. I had anticipated that it was going to be the same setup as last time, just me and the plant manager and the owners son, but I was greeted by a larger party in the conference room. The plant manager, the machining supervisor, my boss on night shift, the owner's son, and the old bastard himself: the owner. Now the old bastard I have a strange respect for. Prior to this meeting, we exchanged 3, maybe 4, sentences. Yes, only 3 to 4 sentences over two years. As soon as I closed the conference room door, I heard him say, "Alright, can someone tell me what the fuck it is I'm doing in here right now?". They all looked at me, no one really liked challenging him or speaking too loudly around him, I gave him an answer though. An answer in the form of an all time performance. This presentation I had spent a long time on, and throughout presenting it along with the handouts I had made, I feel like I fuckin' killed it. And I did. For the next three hours we discussed in depth my future with the company and they threw a couple things at me and I threw a couple things at them. They were impressed, but I wanted a lot out of my future with the company.
That all sounds kinda vague, but my exact terms for the future I wanted weren't necessarily met, but we were damn close. Without full on doxxing myself or getting too specific, I happen to be filling multiple roles at my job while also having a deep understanding of multiple manufacturing systems we employ. I was also the lead something or another on my shift. This is where the corporate cat and mouse game began. Setting up a follow up was proving to be difficult. Both the plant manager and the owners son were acting somewhat shifty and avoided using any definitive or concrete language around me. This cat and mouse game lasted until the beginning of July. I was in something of a career limbo. I had asked for something and got half an answer, and the other half was being heavily guarded. I made a decision to send out my resume to a number of companies to see what I would pull "on the market". I was shocked to find out a couple things. One, I was in high demand, and two, I was being offered a lot more than what my current company was offering.
These shops, especially some of these smaller ones, talk. Word got out, somehow and someway, that I was on the market. Within the day, the owner met with me to tell me that he had given me the raise I asked for. I thanked him, but the pay wasn't the only thing I was concerned about. Throughout the next week, I had completed 5 interviews and received offers from everywhere I interviewed with. From here, I was able to craft counter offers that I liked. I ended up taking what was one of the more competitive offers that included tuition assistance and further opportunities for professional development. I put my two weeks in, and from here, my old job met with me a number of times to try to get me to stay. I kept it professional and nice, but the offer I got was just too good to pass up.
That all leads me to today, typing this. I started work at this new job at the end of July, and I love it. I am learning so much, and the overtime has been fantastic. I'm not "coerced" into working the overtime, but anytime I want a 70 hour week, I can get it easily. At the end of July, I felt like I got everything I wanted. I kinda started to let my professional and personal health goals slip after that. I am back up to 215 pounds, and I kinda slacked off this past semester (still finished with all A's due to a masterful 4th quarter comeback). This semester I am taking a break. I am looking forward to getting back into shape, and I have Hells Heroes to look forward to in March. Maybe this is a parable about wanting to much? I sometimes wonder, if I ever got the world, I would probably sit there and say "that's it?".
I believe I could've been anyone in the world if I wasn't me. No, actually, maybe what I am feeling right now isn't that serious. Corporate burnout. I've seen it argued that corporate burnout might be responsible for all our modern problems in our modern world. And maybe I can twist the truth to see that too.
Back around April of 2023, I got very serious about a couple things in my life. I felt a certain dullness in the way I was living, and the future was hazy. I've been living by myself, more or less, since 2017, when I was 19. In April of 2023, I took inventory of my life and what I wanted out of life. I wanted a lot, I wanted the world even, but to summarize the world: I wanted to look better, I wanted a more definitive career path, and I wanted to go back to school. From that point on to about May of 2024, I put my nose to grindstone. I dropped from 240 pounds (roughly 108kg for my metric readers) down to 178 pounds (81kg). I found a college offering an Automated/Automotive Manufacturing Technology course (very closely related to what I do for work), and I started to take my job more seriously than ever.
Early returns were great, I set up a one year review with my plant manager and the shop owner's son and laid out my professional goals. They liked what they saw; and when I asked for a raise in pay, they met my price immediately, which I was surprised by, as I over shot what I wanted. Walking out of that meeting, I knew at the two year review I wanted to blow them away. I mean just knock their socks off. I began brainstorming over what that was going to be, and I settled on a presentation. A presentation more or less about efficiency in my department, what I've been doing to increase that, lean manufacturing, scalable percentages, the whole nine.
I began school in May of 2023. I completed 3 classed for 10 credit hours during the summer, 4 classes for 12 credit hours during the fall, and in January of 2024, I started the spring semester at college. This semester was intensive: a robotic welding class along with another rather competitive welding class. This other competitive welding class required a lot of lab time along with outside time for me to excel. I wanted to finish top of the class. I really had to lock in and focus to accomplish that. On Mondays and Wednesdays, I would wake up around 7 PM, go to the gym and then run afterwards. At 10:30 PM, I would start getting ready for work. I would then work from Midnight to 8 (sometimes 10 AM or later depending on the state of affairs) and then leave to go study until noon. I would then go to class and weld from noon to 2:30 PM. I would usually get home, shower, and be in bed by 4:30 PM, only to have to be back up in a couple hours for my shift again. I maintained this schedule while only missing one class from January to May. At the end of the semester, I won, I was the top student in the class out of 26 students. Some of them even aspired to be full time welders, God bless them.
Very shortly after the spring semester ended, I finished up work on my presentation. My two year review was upon me. One year I had waited for this. That night driving into work on my two year anniversary, I had a selection of songs I played in preparation. Carefully curated, as I had thought about this for one whole year. The highlight was this:
My favorite movie of all time, I've seen it about 40 times. When I got to work, I smashed through what I needed to do for the next 8 hours. No headphones, no music, no podcasts, just reciting the presentation to myself. At 8 that morning I was summoned. I had anticipated that it was going to be the same setup as last time, just me and the plant manager and the owners son, but I was greeted by a larger party in the conference room. The plant manager, the machining supervisor, my boss on night shift, the owner's son, and the old bastard himself: the owner. Now the old bastard I have a strange respect for. Prior to this meeting, we exchanged 3, maybe 4, sentences. Yes, only 3 to 4 sentences over two years. As soon as I closed the conference room door, I heard him say, "Alright, can someone tell me what the fuck it is I'm doing in here right now?". They all looked at me, no one really liked challenging him or speaking too loudly around him, I gave him an answer though. An answer in the form of an all time performance. This presentation I had spent a long time on, and throughout presenting it along with the handouts I had made, I feel like I fuckin' killed it. And I did. For the next three hours we discussed in depth my future with the company and they threw a couple things at me and I threw a couple things at them. They were impressed, but I wanted a lot out of my future with the company.
That all sounds kinda vague, but my exact terms for the future I wanted weren't necessarily met, but we were damn close. Without full on doxxing myself or getting too specific, I happen to be filling multiple roles at my job while also having a deep understanding of multiple manufacturing systems we employ. I was also the lead something or another on my shift. This is where the corporate cat and mouse game began. Setting up a follow up was proving to be difficult. Both the plant manager and the owners son were acting somewhat shifty and avoided using any definitive or concrete language around me. This cat and mouse game lasted until the beginning of July. I was in something of a career limbo. I had asked for something and got half an answer, and the other half was being heavily guarded. I made a decision to send out my resume to a number of companies to see what I would pull "on the market". I was shocked to find out a couple things. One, I was in high demand, and two, I was being offered a lot more than what my current company was offering.
These shops, especially some of these smaller ones, talk. Word got out, somehow and someway, that I was on the market. Within the day, the owner met with me to tell me that he had given me the raise I asked for. I thanked him, but the pay wasn't the only thing I was concerned about. Throughout the next week, I had completed 5 interviews and received offers from everywhere I interviewed with. From here, I was able to craft counter offers that I liked. I ended up taking what was one of the more competitive offers that included tuition assistance and further opportunities for professional development. I put my two weeks in, and from here, my old job met with me a number of times to try to get me to stay. I kept it professional and nice, but the offer I got was just too good to pass up.
That all leads me to today, typing this. I started work at this new job at the end of July, and I love it. I am learning so much, and the overtime has been fantastic. I'm not "coerced" into working the overtime, but anytime I want a 70 hour week, I can get it easily. At the end of July, I felt like I got everything I wanted. I kinda started to let my professional and personal health goals slip after that. I am back up to 215 pounds, and I kinda slacked off this past semester (still finished with all A's due to a masterful 4th quarter comeback). This semester I am taking a break. I am looking forward to getting back into shape, and I have Hells Heroes to look forward to in March. Maybe this is a parable about wanting to much? I sometimes wonder, if I ever got the world, I would probably sit there and say "that's it?".
I'm so fucking tired of Elon Musk. So dreadfully, absolutely sick of seeing his ugly face. So annoyed by the constant headlines about him. So irritated by politicians worshipping him and then backpedalling when he says something they can't defend. If I stop reading the news one of these days it will be because I just don't want to read about him anymore.
Meliegree
Evening The Odds.
I'm completely fed up with the misconception that knowing how to use a program makes you an 'expert' in a given field. As if knowing Excel makes someone an accountant and knowing Word makes someone a writer. Silly, right? However, in marketing, if you know (averagely) the Google Ads panel, you're suddenly an 'expert' in marketing, and if you can draw a square in Figma, you're an expert in User Experience.
I've stopped counting how many times in the last 5 years I've talked to agencies and the dialogue looked something like this:
Agency: And our UX expert designed a mockup of the website using his extensive experience.
Me: But how did he design the mockup? I don't know anything about any research on our clients, can you show me the results?
Agency: No, we didn't do any research - our UX expert created it.
Me: So the user experience expert didn't talk to users, but created something that only he potentially likes?
Agency: ... Yes.. [email to the director of my unit that I'm a difficult partner in discussion].
And the problem is not limited to one country or agency - I currently work with agencies from 16+ countries on 4 continents and in most cases it looks like this.
I've stopped counting how many times in the last 5 years I've talked to agencies and the dialogue looked something like this:
Agency: And our UX expert designed a mockup of the website using his extensive experience.
Me: But how did he design the mockup? I don't know anything about any research on our clients, can you show me the results?
Agency: No, we didn't do any research - our UX expert created it.
Me: So the user experience expert didn't talk to users, but created something that only he potentially likes?
Agency: ... Yes.. [email to the director of my unit that I'm a difficult partner in discussion].
And the problem is not limited to one country or agency - I currently work with agencies from 16+ countries on 4 continents and in most cases it looks like this.
Daggmask2009
Invader
Since I was 13 (I am 15 now) I’ve had a huge problem that really deteriorates my mental wellness; the Swedish insect fauna. Look, I really love the insects that do reside here, however I have some large gripes regarding it —or lack there of. The winter in northern Sweden is long, cold and insect lacking. For half of the year I can’t interact with the arthropods; I can’t photograph them, I can’t dissect them, I can’t pin them and I can’t study their behaviors. I know my problems seem futile compared to adult problems, but it really does affect me mentally.
I have, however, found a semi-solution: microbiology. I am currently saving my monthly allowance for a microscope; this opens previously unforeseen opportunities! The amount of ciliates, tardigrades, bacteria and other microbes I can study is mind blowing! So in the summer I can focus on entomology and in the winter I can focus on microbiology. Hopefully I can soon afford a microscope, I have 4100 kr (around 410 American dollars I believe) and it costs around 4600 kr, so only 500 kr (50 dollars) left!
I have, however, found a semi-solution: microbiology. I am currently saving my monthly allowance for a microscope; this opens previously unforeseen opportunities! The amount of ciliates, tardigrades, bacteria and other microbes I can study is mind blowing! So in the summer I can focus on entomology and in the winter I can focus on microbiology. Hopefully I can soon afford a microscope, I have 4100 kr (around 410 American dollars I believe) and it costs around 4600 kr, so only 500 kr (50 dollars) left!
Onhell
Infinite Dreamer
I get ya. I used to have a similar problem with... waiting. Then I realized, the waiting, the anticipation, is half the fun. Instead of feeling bad, because I can't do "x" or "y," I started looking forward to what I could/will do once that activity is available again. Give it a shot.
It is good that you found a new hobby to keep you busy though, best of luck with the microbiology.