Has anything of interest happened to you recently?

That we know of, anyway; in fact, there are posters by the mail slots that encourage Christmas decorations, within tasteful standards.

But we'll see after Aaron pops by the leasing office tomorrow morning.

Damn that Obama, coming over to Norway and making sure we have free healthcare and queues. *fistshake*

Definitely feels a bit better, yeah. And it means I can finally start at the gym without having to fear collapsing in the middle of a workout due to some undiscovered horrible hidden illness.
('Course, I might still collapse in the middle of a workout, but it'll be a regular seizure and it'll pass relatively quickly.)

<hesitant, uneasy like for progress>

Ahh, yeah, that IS different.

As far as the Fair Housing Act, which is the federal non-discrimination law, goes, there's not a lot of difference. State laws governing LL-T relationships are going to be different than HOA laws, yeah.

Yesterday was a smaller holiday in Germany, usually celebrated by handing sweets to kids and pretending that St. Nicholas brought them. Since the time I moved out of my parents home my mom always sent a package with cookies and other stuff to me on that day. Ten years or so ago I stopped being annoyed by that; this year I finally realized how happy i am that she does that. And that she is still around to do that.

Isn't that the weirdest feeling? "Oh, I'm in great health except that my brain is all busted"? Maybe this'll be one step closer to getting those nifty subdural electrodes implanted, eh?

I think in general, most people explain or just dismiss whatever is wrong with them and look at other people as unfortunate. "Me? I'm fine, 'tis but a scratch! Only a small axe, sticking out of my head. But that poor person chronic flatulence."

Reconsider this course of action. Your husband is not guaranteed employment at the new company; a three month delay in his start date is three months for shit to happen. Everything from them having second thoughts to them having a rough quarter and instituting a hiring freeze (I had a friend get bit by this one; a company had given him a verbal offer and then got hit with a surprise hiring freeze).

I get not wanting to abandon a project. However, it's a job. They'll be fine without him (really, they will). He should be looking out for himself above all else.

That's a fair point, and part of the reason why we insisted on a written offer from the new company before we said anything to his current employer. The last thing we want is for this whole thing to blow up in our faces.

Meanwhile, we did a bunch of fancymaths and tried to put number values to everything we possibly could, as well as making a bunch of generous assumptions about what his current employer would offer to retain him (we haven't been given any specific numbers about what a raise would be like, for example), and then normalized it to cost of living differences in each area. Moving beats out staying by roughly 12%, and that's without considering that he'd likely get a raise and "promotion" (title change) after he finishes training at the new job, which takes 6-9 months. If we factor in his second job, he'd have to work every 3 out of 4 Satudays a month in order to close the gap.

Since I'm the type to favor the bottom line, I'm firmly in the GTFO now camp, but he's much more about the enjoyment and personal fulfillment part, which is a complete unknown to him and it's why he's being so indecisive. He did say though that if his project was done, he'd probably feel okay with leaving. It's not even really a matter of "if I don't do this it will never be finished!" and more "this is something I've been looking forward to working on for a year and I hate that I won't get a chance to do what I wanted with it."

Written offers aren't worth jack when thinking of time scales of 3 months. They can usually be rescinded without any issues. I've had friends get hired by a company then laid off the day they showed up. Shit happens.

Unfortunately you're taking the route with the highest chance of things going pear shaped on you.

That said, if personal fulfillment is the most important thing, it probably would have been wise to defer any of this until after he was done with his project.

Yes, I realize a written offer is not an employment contract. We asked for it under the assumption he'd be starting in January (since that's what he told them was the earliest at his interview) and not in 3 months; this was just an idea we had come up with last night that he had planned to pitch today. I'm just feeling incredibly frustrated that he's being so indecisive about it because I'm a logic-type person and he's a feelings-type person. This was just the only way I could get him to budge on the issue at all, since he's been flip-flopping on it since this whole thing started and insists he doesn't feel strongly one way or another.

Holy shit I think we might be done finally. He pitched the idea to the new company and they said they wouldn't wait that long. Hubby decided he wants to work for them anyway so he'll get over his hang-ups and we'll be moving next month.

FINALLY.

OMG.

On-site apartment management is notoriously under-educated about reality. In the vast majority of cases (especially in CA) they are simply paid staff who shuffle paperwork on behalf on a property management company. I've gone toe-to-toe with a number of them including quoting state law on various things and almost always received replies that are embarassingly naive. I told one person to go ahead and send the notice to the county* and see what happens when we go to court**, another one I simply refused to write whatever check they claimed to require and told them to do something about it, a third I e-mailed a particular person in the heirarchy with scans of the lease, photographs, quotes from other apartment employees, and citations from the relevant statutes and received a significantly larger security deposit/refund check back.

The point is, apartment management staff are almost always drones. The only downside to puffing up your chest in dealing with a douche is that they will then "not like you" while you live there, so things like maintenance and signing for packages and other general forms of help will be set aside like so much junior high school pettiness. So I only recommend extreme measures when you're definitely moving out. So exercise good judgment but don't be cowed by the court jesters of suburban micro-fiefdoms.

*generally counties handle evictions and other routine tenancy disputes in NV and CA
**I'm currently 3 for 3 in civil suits, two against landlords :)

"I've got two guns, Urim and Thummim, one for each of ya!"

Dammit, all this wordplay around Judiaica lately is giving me ideas.

Blah blah blah.

"You don't get to enforce the rules against decorations that don't look Christian while encouraging Christmas decorations that violate the rules."

"Maybe you should talk to the manager."

"What? It's not nailed into the door itself*, it's on the doorframe? No problem, you can hang things there."

*The door is metal. It is not nailed into the door.

Problem solved.

I just drove all over town trying to find anyone who has my favorite cereal bars in stock. The fuckers at Nabisco seem to have decided to fuck with us and stop making the Snackwell's Cinnamon Raisin bars, which I had previous waxed poet upon.

THIS IS BULLSHITTERY OF THE HIGHEST ORDER, NABISCO. THIS AGGRESSION WILL NOT STAND. I just don't know what to do at this point.

We went to Ikea's big Christmas Julbord buffet tonight. I took this picture of the light entertainment they had scheduled.



Not a photoshop.

He just rebooted it, didn't he.

I rebooted it first! Or thought I did, anyway... >.>

"Annoying Instrument Orchestra"? Feh -- I don't see an oboe.

That's a good point. Without a piccolo, either, it's hardly valid.

...or a trombone! All instruments my mom refused to let me play in the house. To be fair, they were pretty damn annoying and I was terrible at them.

Heh. When I started instrumental music, my policy was "nothing bigger than me," and my parents' was "nothing that has a spit valve, or you're playing it out the window." Two of the most important reasons I became a violinist.

SPIT VALVES ARE SO MUCH FUN.

I always wanted to learn the violin. Instead the piano was forced upon me.

Now I can't even play that because stupid smashy hand.

Luckily even with one and a half hands I still type faster than most of humanity.

Is it? Holy shit, I've been wondering. It used to be straight, maybe someone crooked it for us.

Most instruments are made for two hands so you'd be out of luck no matter what. Maybe take up the harmonica?

you could play most brass instruments (depending on the hand) - the french horn if it's the right hand, most others if it's the left. Of course, spit valve.

Utterly frustrated with work.
So during the Halloween season (see: all of October), I worked at Halloween Horror Nights at Universal. What this means is that, from 7PM to 3AM, I was in charge of selling food. Unfortunately, this also means that I was often working at spots that did not have a cash register. With high traffic. In the dark. With no light provided. Naturally, this means that there are going to be variances (when the amount of money you have is not the same as the amount you should have). I still managed to do well, and oftentimes whenever I got a variance that was pretty bad (anything over $5), my leads and managers said that they would take care of it and I wouldn't be penalized.

Turns out they were lying.

I got a letter in the mail telling me that I've accumulated enough points to receive a documented warning and if I want to contest those points, I have to go in. I'm going to, but I'm really irritated. HHN was kind of a mess; people didn't know where they were supposed to go, there were terrible decisions made in regards to how many people should work at each spot (oh hey, so this person has to take orders from in front of them, behind them, and to the sides and still manage to not get anything stolen by punk kids? BETTER LEAVE THEM ALONE THAT'S A GREAT IDEA YEP) and just....ugh.
Genuinely hoping I can get everything worked out because I feel it's not okay to penalize me for things that could have been prevented had the higher-ups actually thought about what they were doing.
Sending someone to a dark, crowded area? Give them a light.
Sending someone to an area where they get business from every direction and can't keep an eye on their merch? Send more than one person.
Someone needs change? Take the money to the bank like you're supposed to instead of being lazy and trying to do the transaction yourself using someone else's money.

my hands are in the air i'm so frustrated.

EDIT: And now I've just learned that friend from earlier whose girlfriend decided to try to get us to stop talking because she couldn't handle him having female friends blocked me on Facebook because she really can't handle him having female friends.
I don't know if I should feel bad because I've lost a friend for a stupid reason or feel amused that he's so controlled by this random chick.

Okay, so I'm trying to move out of my parents' house and into the city where my university is located. The thing you should know about the way that goes in the Netherlands, is that you have these "student houses" where a bunch of students live together (sometimes in filth). Acquiring a "room" in one of these houses is a problem, since there is a real shortage. Thankfully my brother already lives in this city and he's got some contacts for me, so I'm going to go look at this room in a studenthouse where a friend of his lives. I'm really hoping I'll get it and I won't be annoying and scare everybody off. I think I already did something stupid though: usually when you go to look at these rooms, there are a bunch of other students who are also trying to get this room. Which sucks. To get a good look at the different people they often make you write a fluffpiece about yourself, about who you are and your hobbies and such. I wrote something like "My interest are in movies, music and reading art-books". Now, I already knew that the reading art-books thing might be a bit weird to some people, but I wanted to make myself stand out a little since "movies and music" sounds so generic. I sent it to that friend and he sent back something to the extent of "well it might not be boring but it kind of sounds boring". So I said: "I know what will make it less boring, change it into 'I like to read art-books while making a cartwheel on one hand and fighting crime with the other' ".
I kind of hope he didn't do that though I'm honestly not sure if it might give me a better chance.

Went Christmas shopping with the parents.

Fainted(or, well, had a seizure, if my doctor's hunch is correct) mid-sentence entering a shop, scaring my parents half to death.

Good times.

<hugs Thoro>

Oh man. Hope you get this sorted soon. All the best !

Here's hoping you get better Thoro, and something to pass the time until then.

My cell phone was stolen on Friday, so that happened.

So one of my friends is getting pretty big "in the business." Not so much that he has his own show yet or anything, but enough that he's in one of those film festival things with William Sadler and Chris Sarandon and on any given night on TV you're probably seeing him doing background work or being a standin for a lead character on a show.

Anyway, he asked me to write a short that we can both star in that we could film sometime in the spring or the summer. I'm more than happy to, I've got what I think is a pretty cool idea. And he's super laid back so there's no pressure or anything.

Until today. When he's apparently pitching it to one of the aforementioned guys who are actually in actual movies to see if he'd be up to a small part in it. While they have lunch. Cause they're lunch buddies.

PRESSURE D:

Good luck. If you get it, I might have a list of stars that I'd like to meet.

Edit: On your yacht, cruising the Caribbean might be a good location for introductions.

Taking good news for granted leads to bad karma: This morning I got a bag of my clothes and stuff from my parents: Since my dad is doing well there's no need for me to stay with my parents, and since I was bringing him to the hospital for checkup/stitch removal it was an excellent opportunity to bring my stuff back home.

By this afternoon, my dad was admitted to hospital, again, and is now waiting for his third (well, fourth, actually) surgery in as many weeks. On one hand he seems to be doing well. On the other, complications seem to be piling on.

The whole thing sucks.

Damn, Krise. Still really hoping your father pulls through this with minimal issues. :/

That would be the Annoying Instrumentalist Orchestra. Easy mistake to make.