Minor rant thread. Post your rants o' the day here!

Beer Baron said:

US Geography is great for freight rail. There is a LOT of empty space crossing long distances. Lots of things that are perfectly fine moving at moderate but efficient speeds.

Cleveland - Columbus - Cincinatti would be a good place for commuter rail because it's not that far, it's flat, and there aren't a lot of heavily populated areas where you have to worry about right-of-way.

If they could run a mix of trains with some local stops and some expresses with only a few stops along the line(maybe airports and transit hubs), it'd be great for reducing short haul flights, and cutting down traffic on I-71 and I-75.  Doesn't even need to be European-style high speed rail.  If they could just make something as fast as the northeast corridor, I suspect it'd work. 

In reply to Brett_Murphy (Agent of Chaos) :

I make a habit of checking my pockets for tissues when I run laundry, but inevitably end up missing one every other load. I think it's the inverse of socks- instead of disappearing tissues randomly materialize in the wash.

In reply to Kreb (Forum Supporter) :

Because some important people still think social engineering is a valid thing, and they don't care how much pain and suffering they have to inflict on the moro... I mean, citizens to get them to think correctly.

In reply to Beer Baron :

Yes, STILL.  If the preferred concept doesn't make sense, you manipulate reality until it does.
 

eastsideTim said:

Beer Baron said:

US Geography is great for freight rail. There is a LOT of empty space crossing long distances. Lots of things that are perfectly fine moving at moderate but efficient speeds.

Cleveland - Columbus - Cincinatti would be a good place for commuter rail because it's not that far, it's flat, and there aren't a lot of heavily populated areas where you have to worry about right-of-way.

If they could run a mix of trains with some local stops and some expresses with only a few stops along the line(maybe airports and transit hubs), it'd be great for reducing short haul flights, and cutting down traffic on I-71 and I-75.  Doesn't even need to be European-style high speed rail.  If they could just make something as fast as the northeast corridor, I suspect it'd work. 

But the honest problem is all passenger rail is freight rail.  Unless you can find a way to make dedicated track, all of US rail will (and should) favor freight.  It's, by far, the most efficient way to move goods from the ocean ports inland.  So to make any real progress in passenger rail, you need to make new rail just for it.

I would have loved to been able to take a commuter from here in Ann Arbor to Dearborn- there are even stops at each.  And it's even more passenger than normal.  But its not enough to be able to support real commuter rail from here-ish to Detroit.  And by real, I mean a large volume of trains every day during rush hour displacing a handful of freight.  Even better if there were some express-ish busses that took people to the train station instead of to the bus depot to transfer busses.

Instead, we have a bus that connects us to the airport multiple times a day and one that takes people to Detroit.  

Again, knowing the massive amounts of goods that uses freight instead of roads, I'm 1000% in favor of freight use over passenger for the rail network.  The trade off for passenger flight and car transport is more than worth it for the rail freight.

Brett_Murphy (Agent of Chaos) said:

Guess who somehow wound up with one or more napkins in the washing machine?

I swear I checked all of the pockets and such as I was loading the machine, too.

These are unused napkins and/or kleenex, right?  

In reply to alfadriver :

Never.

My rant: I gave PW a decent set of kitchen knives for Christmas, and now my fingers are a mess

Toyman! said:

In reply to RevRico :

Try taking 400 mg of magnesium. It does a couple of things like reducing anxiety and regulating certain hormones that regulate sleep. 

I'm going to look into this. Sounds like it's perfect for me. 

Toyman! said:

In reply to RevRico :

Try taking 400 mg of magnesium. It does a couple of things like reducing anxiety and regulating certain hormones that regulate sleep. 

Just our E36 M3ty ass memory foam mattress and the back pain I've had since Thanksgiving that my muscle relaxer script isn't touching. Only 2 more weeks till scans then ??? weeks until I can get into PT that I most likely can't afford, if they ever answer their berkeleying phones that I've been calling 3x a day for two weeks now. Because I'm NOT driving an hour plus each way to the next closest office, because I can't sit down for that long at a time. 

No. I didn't run my shopping cart into your car. You ran your car into my shopping cart.

I was walking in a strait line parallel to your car. You turned right while I was alongside you. You ran the quarter panel of your car into the corner of my shopping cart.

I didn't scratch your paint. You did that.

Would you like to call the police and see whether they take the side of the vehicle or the pedestrian?

Trying to wade through the mountain of paperwork required for purchasing a house and I see I need a letter from my employer stating why there is a large disparity between YTD straight pay and annual pay.

It's literally spelled out in plain English on my DEC 2023 paystub under the helpfully labeled "YTD pay" column. Like literally breaks down my YTD vacation, sick, shift differential and overtime.

But hey, thanks for making me do extra work because you are unable to berkeleying read. 

A big ice storm hit the PNW last weekend. We lost power for a couple of hours on Saturday afternoon, then it came back up and I thought that was that. Power died again Saturday night and had been out since, along with internet. We're fortunate to have a borrowed 1200W generator and a fireplace. The utility  company is not providing estimates for repair times and is warning it may be a week until we are back up. No GRM fun for me for a while unless I sneak a peek from work like I'm doing now.

Could be worse, but still not ideal.

Lowball offers on Facebook marketplace. This is a reoccurring problem for me. And this time I haven't even listed the car yet. 
 

Randomly someone that bought parts from my New Beetle messaged me. "Sup man got any thing for sale" I said I might be selling one of my Touaregs. Great it's "Exactly what I'm looking for" A couple details, a picture and shot out a price. $2800. "1800$ tonight or tomorrow cash no bull"

No thanks. 

I was wrong.

I thought once a kid had credit, which could be accomplished on their fifteenth birthday by making them an authorized user on my credit card, I could then create accounts with the three credit bureaus and freeze their credit.

What happened is that I made the kid an authorized user, tried to make accounts only to be told that they couldn't have accounts on the websites because they were minors. Instead I have to fill out a paper form, with my SS number, their SS card copy, a birth certificate copy showing that I'm the parent, and send it all in the mail to all three bureaus.

So I decided to *treat* the daily to sitting inside in the warmth at work to melt excess off of the underside.

Opened the window while it was inside so the interior could also thaw out.

Now all the windows don't work. Either a wire broken in the door jamb or the 30amp circuit breaker fuse ford uses in those esploders.

(All windows completely unresponsive from main switch and each door)

Not like the average temperature has been -30*C with the wind and I have a 30 minute drive one way on the highway everyday...

Both of my kids went back to college today. I'm sure my son was looking forward to it. He has a girlfriend there. My daughter on the other hand is in a long distance relationship and had a hard time making friends at school. She was crying before she left and said she didn't want to go. My wife and I both had a really hard time sending her off.  :^(

I'm trying to teach her to reach out and make new friends. I'm open to suggestions.

I am 3 rooms away and the exhaust fan is running. If I can even hear you talking at all, I am never going to understand more than about 1 in 5 words.

We've been over this.

I keep seeing commercials by Home Title Lock warning about "home theft" which is somebody fraudulently transferring the title to your home into their name.

Apparently, they then barrow against your equity...Um, wouldn't there be an unmistakable trail (paper/electronic) of who got the money proving that it wasn't you?

How would this not be a complete nothing burger "so sorry you made the mistake of lending money to somebody against my equity"...I never asked for the money, I never received the money, this is not my problem in any way, why are you bothering me with your mistake???

They got me, dammit. I just realized I've been rage scrolling Facebook, looking at the short, quippy and wrong troll comments.

In reply to RX Reven' :

"We've been trying to reach you about your expiring warranty" 

So I have been selling a product hand over fist and I am trying to get legit.

It's been over 10 days since I sent my initial request for an LLC from my state. JUST to see if my name is available. That is the first step. No answer so far.

If the name is available then I can proceed to the next step of many steps to get my LLC going.

We have all the documentation from the start, this year, of becoming a company. The bureaucracy red tape is bullE36 M3. 

I live in a small business friendly state too.

What the flying berkeley takes so long.

In reply to preach :

Different state I know, but when I did mine back in 2019, I went through my lawyer in mid October, and got my paperwork around Xmas. 

I hear I'm looking at 6 months from application to kitchen inspection if I follow through with the baking thing. That's after starting another LLC, and dealing with all the other paperwork. 

In reply to RX Reven' :

That was happening around here a number of years ago to people whose homes were paid off. When the bank tried to take the home from the legit owner for nonpayment the court sided with the bank. Only after a huge outcry did the government step in and fix it. 

T minus 7 days until the big cross country move. I feel like I have 2 weeks worth of stuff to get done in that time frame.

Big items on the list:

Sell the Chevy Tahoe (anybody want a 2010 Tahoe PPV? )

Replace two sections of fence

Paint the shed (realtor suggested, it's a damn galvanized steel shed in Florida, of course it's going to have some berkeleying rust)

Replace some of the screen on the lanai

My stress level has almost reached critical levels. So much to do, so many what ifs. All I know is that I have a job in NM, everything else is an uncertainty at this point and I hate that. 

I sold my last house 24 years ago and I still have strange dreams about not being prepared to move out of the old house and a ton of stuff piled everywhere.  Odd.

My hands are dried and cracking. They hurt. 

And im out of cornhuskers.