help

Stolen retirement?

Posted on by backuphill

Retired

People who aren’t relatives, but look like their retired. Photo by Pixabay on Pexels.com

This morning’s irritation doesn’t really have anything to do with me, so much as it has to relatives. Well, this isn’t really an irritation for just this morning. This is an ongoing irritation that flairs of on a regular basis, especially when I feel like someone is being taken advantage of.

I have some family members who are generous people. They like to help others.

I have some family members who make poor choices and like to ask for help when things get tough.

As you can see, this combination of two types of family members makes for some behavior enabling and as a result, I don’t think anyone in the situation wins.

The biggest problem here, as I see it, is that the family members who think they are being generous and helpful are the grandparents of said family members who can’t seem to get their adult life and behavior figured out. Sure, the grandparents are free to spend their money as they see fit. They are adults and they are still of sound mind and body (at least as far as any of us are).

However, the issue I have is the frequency with which the grandchildren take advantage of their grandparents’ generosity. Less than six months ago, one of the grandchildren got a huge chunk of money (to the tune of about $3500) so they could move their family into a different rental house, one that was really beyond their means. Now that same grandchild is in need of a more fuel efficient vehicle (rental house is too far from job) and they don’t have the money for that either…and so an offer from the grandparents is on the table again…

I just can’t help but wonder if the grandparents are being robbed of their “golden years”? They live within their means and they obviously know how to manage their money, but we are often told they live meagerly and they can’t afford this or that, or they can’t get a better car for themselves, or they don’t go to doctor because they don’t think they can afford it. It’s stuff like that. Is that really how they should be living in retirement?

As the parent (step-parent/SNL, at that), when is it appropriate to say “Enough is enough” or to “Stop” or to “Step back”? Or, do I just stay out of it and let it go…none of my business kind of thing?

 

Red alert!

Posted on by backuphill

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Photo by Public Domain Pictures on Pexels.com

Quick, batten down the hatches! Secure the doors! Turn off the lights and be silent!

No coffee in Cubicalville today and the two cups during the commute are not going to suffice. Plain and simple.

If you have the capability, send coffee QUICK!

**If you tuned in yesterday, you know why this is an emergency and you now know it was not remedied over night. The hero of this story will likely die.**

There will be no joy today. There will be no productive things accomplished. There will be no exceptional customer service today.

There will be grumpiness. There will be pining for coffee. There will be sleepiness. There will be desperation.

OK, I better get off of here and go try to see if I can suck the value out of someone’s used up coffee pod from the garbage. Maybe I can just stuff some of those used coffee grinds in between the gum and cheek…

There will be no spitting today.

The phone call we all dread

Posted on by backuphill

man person face portrait

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Yep, it happened. I got the call we all dread over the last weekend. The one that you just wish you didn’t answer the phone. The one that makes you regret getting up in the morning.

“Hi, it’s your sis. Are you available next weekend? We are gonna move and need some help.”

And there it is…yes, you are free and no you don’t want to help. You don’t want to help because moving sucks, always. It is no fun moving yourself, let alone someone else. So, no, I am not free and no I don’t want to help.

“Yeah, I am free. What time do you need me to be there?”

Damn it! That isn’t what I was going to say. Stupid family relations. So you go help.

While you’re there and after having moved stuff all day, your mom says, “While I have you all together, can you do me a favor? After we’re done here, can you all come over to the house and move the piano out of the house? Someone is coming to pick it up.”

Are you serious, mom? We just spend all day moving someone else’s crap and now we gotta go move a piano? I swore off moving pianos the last time I moved a piano. I am NOT doing it this time.

I hate being a good family member. 2500 pounds of piano later…I need pain killer.

Conflicting co-worker help

Posted on by backuphill

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Helpful co-workers?

Maybe not so much.

Having been the “new guy” for the last two years so I am still getting co-workers (who have been here a lot longer than me) giving me “advice” about how to do this and that. The problem is that the “advice” isn’t necessarily the same “advice” that was given by other co-workers. Now, I have had “advice” from multiple people about the same thing from different points of view and for varying ways to do the same thing. Only, the advice is THEIR way to do it and not actually what the SOP (Standard Operating  Procedure) says about how to do it.

So, I am just gonna do it my way because they all got it wrong and the SOP is mind-numbingly stupid because no one has rewritten it in years.

#SMH