FML general thread [7]

[pwhodges]

The real FML is that since I got the rare DVD(s) at a rare price, the film concerned has unexpectedly appeared on BD, so now I have no prospect of recovering any useful value by selling one.

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NEW POST:

Now a real FML. Last week I bought a (new, boxed) potters wheel for my wife (a Japanese one) for just over £700 - a good price, but not outside the range you might see for end of the previous line. I won't have confirmation until tomorrow, but it appears almost certain that it is one of a stolen consignment.

[Bagheera]

Damn, man. Sorry to hear about that; it's always a downer to get mixed up in something like that. Hope it doesn't result in any negative fallout for you.

[pwhodges]

Yup: stolen. I've started the process of trying to get a refund through PayPal, but I don't know how that works out - it takes weeks, anyway.

The company from whom it was stolen* could not be nicer, though. In the interests of customer relations, they are even planning to offer discounts to those who bought them from the thieves, though they won't be able to match the prices we paid. As they are the sole importers of the wheel we wanted, I'd be going back to them to buy in any case, so that's a crumb of comfort - and delivery would be easy, as I already have it in my care! The matter of recovering the payment made to the thieves is separate.

I spoke to no less than four different police forces this morning, trying to find the most appropriate one to report it through.


* "Stolen" as in purchased openly from the importers, but using stolen credit cards which then refused to pay up.

[Shamsiel-kun]

The last four weeks were a slight nightmare due to a rather elusive waste water leak in the flat above me that took ages to properly diagnose and fix (thanks to a previous company fixing the main (vertical) waste water fixtures and misinforming us about the layout of the horizontal tubes).

Now it seems the flat(s) above have another problem, a annoying banging sound whenever they use the water (of course, not helped by people using their washing machine at night in a two-room apartment - those things are programmable for a reason...). Me thinks they did not open up the water mains far enough after it was shut down during the previous problem... *sigh*

[pwhodges]

Banging is more likely to be caused by them opening it fully when previously it was limiting the flow.

[Shamsiel-kun]

Banging is more likely to be caused by them opening it fully when previously it was limiting the flow.

Well, I surely hope not, because the mains tap is of such a design that if it is opened too far it might leak


(basically, it's possible to screw the rotating bit out of the tap - there's no stop)

Other small FML: To fix the leak they made a completely new conduit that partially runs through the false ceiling in my flat. It goes through a crude hole between the two flats, which was sealed on one end only (the other end being rather inaccessible inside the false ceiling). The sound of running water is rather unnerving (it doesn't leak). What is more annoying is that it clearly wasn't sound-proofed, so I can hear my upstairs neighbor much more than before anytime she's in the kitchen. I wonder whether she can hear my (hard rock/metal) music...

Oh well, if it annoys me too much I guess I'll ask my landlord whether I can replace the false ceiling (it's mostly a hollow space) with a tighter, sound-proofed box around the conduits running through it.

[Sgt. Griff]

All my academic documentation for 2014 has been lost

This is awful. On the bright side I still have time to get copies before applications close for uni, but still, alongside being rejected for a job that I really wanted because they only offer two year contracts and I intend to study overseas for a year on exchange it really smarts and I'm a bit bummed that I'll have to waste my holiday getting it sorted.

[Rosenakahara]

You know when I first told my mother I was gay she seemed to take it pretty well, at least I thought she did but for the past year I have noticed a very clear change in how she treats me.
She still babies my brothers including the one who frequently insults her yet when she talks to me the "I love you" always feels dis-genuine and her general tone is very much flatter as a whole.
I have also seen her giving me very cold looks now and again I might just be simply thinking some of this stuff up though but I cant shake the feeling...

Now some of this could be written off but then we get to the part that's causing me massive stress and flaring up my depression, turns out one of my brothers did not get a job only an interview but my mums response was that of love and kindness, 5 minutes later she is attempting to start an argument and threatening to take my PC (which I built and payed for) away because I don't have a job yet despite looking really hard for one and already having voluntary charity work.
Then whenever one of my brothers does something that pisses her off she doesn't know how to get to them to stop it, so what does she do now? take the internet away punishing me for something that they have done and this isn't just a few times, she has done this more and more frequently lately and whenever I try to calmly talk her down she says I never do anything for her anyway.
Except y'know ALL THE CHORES IN THE HOUSE since my brothers are too lazy.

She is treating me like shit and im getting more and more angry and depressed like this I have punched a few walls recently and made a visible dent in one so im getting worried about what will happen if this keeps piling on and getting worse.

[Shamsiel-kun]

^ Uh, record yourself doing the chores and post that on Yout00b? You can even add a message at the end "Dear brothers, clear up your own crap (it's never too late to learn)".

[A.T. Fish]

She still babies my brothers including the one who frequently insults her

Are you the middle child?

[Rosenakahara]

No I'm the first child.

[A.T. Fish]

No I'm the first child.

Hmm, then maybe your mother expects more of you because you're the older one. The gay thing could also be a factor, parents sometimes have a hard time dealing with that, unfortunately, even nowadays. This is obviously just speculation, and I'm not well equipped to give you advice. So, hang in there, I guess.

[CX1329]

I'm trying to text a close friend of mine and it keeps giving me an "unsuccessful" delivery report, which means the messages aren't getting through. This is REALLY irritating, especially considering it was working just fine before. Nothing on my phone has changed from the time it was still working, so the problem has got to be on the carrier side. Jesus, does this make me angry.

[TehDonutKing]

Rose, Dream and i discussed your predicament, and i'm posting a conglomerate of our advice. Main thing is to write your mother a letter, as it's easier to formulate and convey ideas when there's no possibility of interruptions. It'd be best to avoid being passive-aggressive (which is hard to do; i have trouble with that in many situations) and, obviously, avoid outright hostility. Rather, remain objective and diplomatic as possible. Diplomacy is a useful skill, natch.

I've had similar frictions with my mother, although not identical to the ones you've described, and the best thing to do in my experience, is to reason by way of written correspondence, or conversation when an altercation happened an hour or so ago, but you've both calmed down. Typically, if all she's doing is saying unkind words, i just kind of turn my brain off until she's done, whereas, in cases of things that actually affect me, i try to politely reason with her. It doesn't always work, but it's more likely than snapping back.

Honestly, based on our perspective, and going by stuff you've said before, it seems your mother has her own problems, neuroses, etc., so it would be best to try to figure it out, if possible, and then avoid tripping off any "triggers", so to speak. While it's possible that your mom truly does treat you differently on account of your homosexuality, it's also possible, and frankly seems more likely, that your difficulties are more due to personal history than any kind of homophobic prejudice.

Regardless, it's probably best to neglect to mention anything about homophobia in future exchanges; if she is homophobic, there's sadly little that you can do alone; if she isn't, then there's another reason that you may or may not be able to help with. As with everything, ganbatte; good luck and do your best.

[Chainsaw Owl]

Oh joy, I'm the only person in my department who didn't call in "sick" today. That's fine, I guess I'll gladly do the work of four people for nary an extra cent. It's just a shame to see responsibility become indistinguishable from stupidity.

[IronEvangelion]

Witcher 3. 17-fucking-gigabyte patch. Now I won't be playing the game until I upgrade to a bigger hard drive next year, not because of a lack of space for it on the default hard drive but because I only get 25 gigs worth of data per month and I am NOT downloading this abomination twice. That and because even though I specifically unchecked all the automatic download boxes in my PS4's settings, it still tries to download the patch automatically whenever I start the game. That means every time I start TW3 I have to exit the game and pause the damn download to keep it from eating up my data. Gets irritating really fast.

Seriously WTF was wrong with the game when it launched that it would need a 17-gigabyte patch? Assassin's Creed: Unity was a broken mess when it launched and it didn't take nearly that much to fix it.

[Spud]

I understand that I'm a bit of an unknown entity in this forum. I haven't consistently posted in quite a while. I keep telling myself I'll keep at it and stay up with it but I never seem to remember. I honestly annoys me that I can never seem to stay on top of it.

In other more depressing news we lost a Marine. Johnson, our armorer. I'm relatively new to this unit. In fact I've only been here for about two and a half months. However in that time I've gotten to know a few people. One of them was Johnson.
We would sit on the catwalk drinking beer and bull shit about the day or life in general. In fact he was part of a group of people that we would relax with. I would even borrow tools from him to work on my computer a bit. He was a good, sarcastic guy, who wouldn't hesitate to help you if you asked for it.

Last week on November 16 he was killed in a car crash. We aren't entirely certain what happened yet but it is widely believed that he fell asleep at the wheel and veered off the road. This all happened just days before our Marine Corps ball in Vegas. In fact he was heading to pick up his girlfriend to take her down there.

What hit me the hardest was not necessarily the news of his death (this however did shake me up for the day) it was seeing his family at the ball a few days later.That and his closest friend/roommate was behind me when it was announced. He was loosing it and I felt helpless. I couldn't say or do anything that would help this Marine get through the day. For the first time I felt like I truly didn't know what I was doing as an NCO.
When they played taps at the ball it was hard to not show it. (Taps has always effected me in some way since my grandfathers funeral). When taps plays everyone is silent and no one moves. His mother however is sobbing and its unmistakable. In fact she's the only on make a noise.
It was ... hard.

Then there was the memorial the unit put on. That hit me the hardest honestly. It started bringing up old memories I thought I buried. Trying to maintain some sort of composure was probably the most difficult thing I've done in some time. See his family there all grieving and there's honestly nothing I can do about this. I had to circle around base a few times on the way back to get my wits about me.


Edit: So it kinda looks like this post is a bit garbled and unorganized. However I'm going to leave it because this is more or less how my brain is right now.

[Tankred]

Sorry to hear that Spud, it's good to vent about this kind of thing though.

[IronEvangelion]

In other more depressing news we lost a Marine. Johnson, our armorer.

Damn. I'm sorry to hear that.

[child of Lilith]

I'm sorry to hear that, Spud. Hang in there. :(