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healing
Posted by
shadow460 
, Wed Sep 16, 2009 11:59 AM
I wonder if my foot would heal faster with the Loritab. It is still available if I want it. I've kept it wrapped through the day, and had the wrap off two nights ago. Last night I wrapped it a little closer to my toes than normal, and it woke me up several times. I worked the wrap off little by little, and left it off for about half an hour to let things air out.
My wife is quite patient when things like this happen. As a result, when I find myself out of work, I try to do more house work than usual, and I try to make sure that the bathroom (and hot water!) is available to her in the morning before work and late at night when it's shower time.
So she says "we need to do laundry". I realize that the military seabags we use for that can hold 40 pounds of laundry each. I had one of them almost full. She also has been asking me since a couple of weeks ago to run another errand. lol, I wound up kicking the full seabag down the stairs with my good leg and dragging it roughly 100 feet to the laundry room. I stayed there a little too long, though, standing on my right leg while chatting with a neighbor. I had to sit down for a few minutes.
I swiped my wife's truck since it has an auto tranny and no clutch for that left foot to fight with. If trucks have feelings, mine is probably wondering why I don't love it anymore. I refuse to even touch the little Mazda, as there's not enough energy in either leg to kick it. And it has a clutch, too. On a side note, my Dad mentioned that he has a backhoe available to him and he's been crushing cars with it. I told him I wanted a door mat made, with four 16 inch Chevrolet rims, one at each corner, and the word "MAZDA" printed right across the middle where I wipe my feet.
OK, enough hatred for the one little Mazda truck. Want a truck? All you need is a letter and three numbers. F, one five zero. You could use a two in place of the one if you need a little bit bigger truck. That's "Lobo" to the Mexican folk, BTW. I'm sure you could use a similar combination like D one zero zero, or K two five zero zero, but I am a Ford man.
I am able to take semi normal steps today, albeit slowly. I wondered about that, being up off and on all night. As long as I don't try to flex my left foot, I am fine. I think it is allowing itself to flex some, though, or I may be getting used to having it wrapped up. It was quite stiff right behind my toes when I rolled out, but some of the stiffness is gone. I've been able to wear my shoe normally over the Ace wrap when I have to go somewhere.
I wonder something else. Would a metguard have prevented this injury? I've worn metguards before. They take a long time to break in, and they cause the shoe to be enormous. Shoes with metguards look, to me, about two sizes larger than they actually are. I already wear steel toes almost everywhere, so getting used to a metguard in an every day shoe would be a smooth transition. In fact, at one point my daily shoes did have metguards in them.
The incident would have probably pulled on the metguard, possibly breaking it, but it might have prevented my foot from flexing. Of course, the chance I would have fallen right then might be higher, too. I'd have probably shattered the toolbox when it hit the ground, so even if I didn't sprain a foot, I might have been injured by the plastic from the box or the tools inside.
I guess that question is academic, then. I don't know why I didn't think to just release the box. It's not like it would have smashed my toes or anything had it landed on me.
Anyway, there is a 7 Eleven about a block away. I limped there yesterday and got some soda pop. I will try to go there, against my better judgment, and get more soda after a while.
I faxed two resumes and made two calls today, all to places from the local job listings who need maintenance staff. Two are needing maintenance for larger office buildings. I have specific companies in mind that I'd like to work for, but I have not contacted them yet. I know one of them is hiring, but I do not know for what positions. If PARC Management is, in fact, hiring maintenance staff, I would like to apply for it. I should ask them.
My favorite two facility maintenance positions were in large, single structures. One was a nursing home, listed earlier in my blog, and one was a US Navy repair facility (SIMA Norfolk) where we did tons of remodeling around the turn of the century.
My wife is quite patient when things like this happen. As a result, when I find myself out of work, I try to do more house work than usual, and I try to make sure that the bathroom (and hot water!) is available to her in the morning before work and late at night when it's shower time.
So she says "we need to do laundry". I realize that the military seabags we use for that can hold 40 pounds of laundry each. I had one of them almost full. She also has been asking me since a couple of weeks ago to run another errand. lol, I wound up kicking the full seabag down the stairs with my good leg and dragging it roughly 100 feet to the laundry room. I stayed there a little too long, though, standing on my right leg while chatting with a neighbor. I had to sit down for a few minutes.
I swiped my wife's truck since it has an auto tranny and no clutch for that left foot to fight with. If trucks have feelings, mine is probably wondering why I don't love it anymore. I refuse to even touch the little Mazda, as there's not enough energy in either leg to kick it. And it has a clutch, too. On a side note, my Dad mentioned that he has a backhoe available to him and he's been crushing cars with it. I told him I wanted a door mat made, with four 16 inch Chevrolet rims, one at each corner, and the word "MAZDA" printed right across the middle where I wipe my feet.
OK, enough hatred for the one little Mazda truck. Want a truck? All you need is a letter and three numbers. F, one five zero. You could use a two in place of the one if you need a little bit bigger truck. That's "Lobo" to the Mexican folk, BTW. I'm sure you could use a similar combination like D one zero zero, or K two five zero zero, but I am a Ford man.
I am able to take semi normal steps today, albeit slowly. I wondered about that, being up off and on all night. As long as I don't try to flex my left foot, I am fine. I think it is allowing itself to flex some, though, or I may be getting used to having it wrapped up. It was quite stiff right behind my toes when I rolled out, but some of the stiffness is gone. I've been able to wear my shoe normally over the Ace wrap when I have to go somewhere.
I wonder something else. Would a metguard have prevented this injury? I've worn metguards before. They take a long time to break in, and they cause the shoe to be enormous. Shoes with metguards look, to me, about two sizes larger than they actually are. I already wear steel toes almost everywhere, so getting used to a metguard in an every day shoe would be a smooth transition. In fact, at one point my daily shoes did have metguards in them.
The incident would have probably pulled on the metguard, possibly breaking it, but it might have prevented my foot from flexing. Of course, the chance I would have fallen right then might be higher, too. I'd have probably shattered the toolbox when it hit the ground, so even if I didn't sprain a foot, I might have been injured by the plastic from the box or the tools inside.
I guess that question is academic, then. I don't know why I didn't think to just release the box. It's not like it would have smashed my toes or anything had it landed on me.
Anyway, there is a 7 Eleven about a block away. I limped there yesterday and got some soda pop. I will try to go there, against my better judgment, and get more soda after a while.
I faxed two resumes and made two calls today, all to places from the local job listings who need maintenance staff. Two are needing maintenance for larger office buildings. I have specific companies in mind that I'd like to work for, but I have not contacted them yet. I know one of them is hiring, but I do not know for what positions. If PARC Management is, in fact, hiring maintenance staff, I would like to apply for it. I should ask them.
My favorite two facility maintenance positions were in large, single structures. One was a nursing home, listed earlier in my blog, and one was a US Navy repair facility (SIMA Norfolk) where we did tons of remodeling around the turn of the century.
Another day, another job
Posted by
shadow460 , Mon Sep 14, 2009 9:56 PM
Well, there went another job today. I am beginning to think of them in terms of assignments that only last a few weeks until it is time to find another.
I was working overtime this weekend, and I chose to work both Saturday and Sunday evenings instead of through the day. that might have been a mistake since I really could have used sunlight coming through the patio door for what I was doing. Instead, I used a DeWalt work light.
I have been doing facility and residential maintenance off and on since I graduated high school. For the last two years I have done residential maintenance in apartments and nursing homes. The tenants you find in a typical apartment are not monsters or anything, and you make a few friends. Nursing home residents are simply awesome to work with. Each one from either job is a story all in themselves. Whereas most of the stories of low income dwellers make me irate (lay up in the bed, spread legs for anything that moves, have 3 to 5 kids, then soak the daddies for child support, the state for housing assistance, the utility companies for payment assistance, and the USDA for food stamps, then waste what coin you have on nice cars and electronics), some of them really are trying to make life better for themselves. Senior citizens are great, though, even if some of them can't acknowledge you or have something wrong that makes them temperamental, hostile, or the like. I remember incidents of some of them crying aloud like an infant, undressing themselves in front of everyone, and the like, but I can't feel anything but sympathy and yes, even some respect, for them.
I've digressed. What my last assignment boiled down to was that we were failing to meet guidelines set forth by the city and state housing assistance agencies in the time we were given by the property manager. When I say "we", I mean three, no four, different crews. Three were assigned to prepare apartments for new move ins. Such apartments have to pass a housing inspection if the prospective tenant receives any kind of assistance with their rent. The guidelines for those units are much stricter than for those whose tenants pay rent on their own. IMO, therein lies a grave injustice. Each person should receive the same quality apartment regardless of who is paying.
Three of the four crews quit. They did not receive payment for their services for several weeks and they walked away. I feel like the reasons given by the property manager were weak excuses at best. The fourth crew, of which I was a part, had two of its own members quit as well. In the beginning, we had roughly a dozen folks to do a job, in the end, we were pared down to just two. The other person that was left besides me was not paid for about a two week period. Once again, I feel like the reasons given were inadequate.
It seems lately that every day when I went into the office, the property manager raised her voice about something. Last week she raised her voice at me for getting 34 hours of overtime on the weekend, but if you read my thread about birthdays that I started on September 4th, you will know that I was most definitely not working that weekend. I explained this. The next day, she yelled at me again for wasting her 34 hours of overtime.
Another day she yelled at me because I was draining the swimming pool. Hello, it is too cold to swim. It developed an algae growth, and if that reaches a certain stage, the only way to clear it involves partially draining the pool. We were taught this in a course given by our city's department of health. It was also written into our instruction book that we were given to take with us for a reference.
I was tired of her attitude problem at this point. Up until a few days ago, I barely even knew the office staff. I would only go in there to get work orders for the day if I didn't already have my work list made out the previous day. I would go in there occasionally when I needed to purchase something so that I could get approval. Now I never got prior approval before purchasing tools, but I spent my own money on those. She asked that we meet in the office each morning, though, so I would go in there right when I got to work. The very next morning, and each one thereafter, this manager yelled at the only two people she had left in the maintenance department. I tried to reason with her, but I am sure I, too, raised my voice when I tried that. I am not one to sit be yelled at--I will almost always yell right back in the person's face.
Two weeks ago, we were assigned to prepare a particular apartment for move in. My co worked scheduled contractors to replace the tile and carpet on the floor on a Monday. It would be inspected Tuesday. We started Friday at 11AM. That is when I found out the unit had a massive water leak. We knew instantly we would be working all weekend. We got our saws out and got busy cutting modly sheet rock out. I removed the dishwasher and the water tank and cleaned up all the mess we had made. We built a new shelf for the aircon to sit on since the old shelf was rotten. The next day we came in and we painted half of the apartment. We hung new sheet rock and textured it. The day after, we did more painting, installed trim, installed the water tank, mounted the new shelf, and hung sheet rock in the hot water closet. A contractor asked us to leave part of the sheet rock down so he could re install the aircon easier. We expected that we would be able to work after or around the flooring contractor to install a door and fix a few other problems the apartment had. I was asked to purchase the door and request a reimbursement. I refused, based on the fact that many of our contractors were still awaiting their payment. I was then told that the property manager would provide money to purchase the door that day so we could hang it Monday. That didn't happen, either.
Monday I found out that the flooring contractor had been canceled. We were told that the deadline was changed on that apartment since we had many others to prepare. I assisted in preparing several of those and preparing some occupied units for inspections, and many of them passed. The few that didn't were due to things not being done that the property had planned to hire contractors for, such as flooring.
A contractor was hired to clean the apartment up. When I realized he had the only key to the place, I took it from him and copied it, then brought him the copy. He never returned it. I had not turned that original key in when I changed the locks, so as far as anyone else knew, it never existed, but the copy I made did.
Anyway, fast forward to Friday at 4:45 PM. The property manager asks me to go and purchase the door, but she handed me some petty cash to do so. I was told the new inspection date was today, Monday, so we had to finish up in there. I was aware that someone had been "borrowed" from another property to work in the particular unit. He had told me the day before that he wanted to paint. He did next to nothing in reality. I had already cut all the trim he needed, and there was very little sheet rock to hang up. He hung five piece of sheet rock and attached one piece of trim. The rest of the trim had been thrown away. He did not address any of the other items that needed done, such as replacing screens, hanging blinds, changing light bulbs, and whatnot. Even the trim and sheet rock he installed looked terrible.
I realized when I entered on Saturday I had my work cut out for me once again. I worked as much as I could finishing the installation, placing "mud" and tape onto the new walls and texturing them. I did some plumbing and electrical work. I tested and repaired appliances, save for the dishwasher which I could not save since the pump seal was leaking. I installed a towel bar, did some caulking, installed a smoke alarm, hung the new door, and installed the return air vent. I spent six hours each day, from 3 to 9 in the afternoon/evening, working to pass that housing inspection. I realized late yesterday that while I probably would not finish everything then, if I asked for help in the morning that two of us could finish up and the apartment would pass. I was growing impatient and I decided it was time to call it quits for the evening. I packed up my tools and began to load them into my truck.
My tool box's weight changes day to day depending on what I have in it. Yesterday it was full, so I estimate it weighed close to 100 pounds. It is bulky, so it requires two hands to lift even if it is nearly empty. I had loaded all the smaller items into my truck, and as usual I loaded my tool box last.
The ground has washed away somewhat near this apartment. To get to the parking lot, one must either walk through the washed out area, or take the longer route following the sidewalk and down a couple of steps. Sometime before the ground washed away, a cable of some sort was buried, but the erosion has exposed a 15 foot section of it.
With my 100 pound tool box in both arms, I failed to see that cable in the dark. I unknowingly planted my right foot on it and my left foot caught underneath it. The box began to pull me forward and down. I jerked frantically with my left foot, trying to free it, since my right was already behind me and I could not transfer that much weight (300 pounds total) back to it. I was falling. My left foot came free after a couple of seconds, but it still felt as if the cable was wrapped around it. I stumbled forward, the weight of the box pulling me further forward and down with each step. A few steps later, I crashed into a parked car and my box landed hard on the hood. I fell across the hood and my tool box. I lifted the box and realized quickly my left foot would not hold any weight. I did manage to hobble to my truck with the box, but the truck was only a few feet away. I locked everything I could into my truck and drove to the shop. I was able to unload one thing, my step ladder, so I placed it near the door, locked up, and called my co worker to let him know he would have work to do in the morning and that I might not be able to help.
I drove home, but I did have problems working the clutch in my truck. I wanted to go into work today, but I did not know if I would be able to drive. I decided that if I was still hurting and I could drive, I'd ask for the day off in person, but that if I could not drive, I would call in.
As it turns out, several spikes of pain shot through my foot and into my leg this morning. I could work the clutch to an extent, but for the most part I had to operate all three pedals with one foot. I called my co worker and told him I was not going to make it and that I intended to call the office next. They beat me to it--I got a call waiting while I was on the phone. They asked where the keys were and I explained that while their cleaners had lost the set they were supposed to have, a spare existed and I happened to have it. I told them I was having problems driving, but I would bring the keys in. I thought about swiping my wife's truck, which has an auto tranny, but I knew she needed it to get to work and we didn't have time to carpool before that inspection occurred.
I brought the keys to work and explained why I was limping so badly. I said I'd like to go home and put some ice on my foot. I turned to my co worker and told him there were a few things left and I'd left a list but forgotten something on it. That's when the property manager interrupted and her attitude problem showed back up. An argument ensued, and we both yelled at each other. I told her I was "tired of this" (meaning the situation, not the job), and she demanded my office and shop keys. We each said to one another that were were "finished with each other". I asked for my shop key back so I could get my tools and at first she refused. I asked again for either a key or someone to accompany me, and before I could threaten to cut a wall out of the shop or back through the door, she handed me a key.
It took a while for me to load everything up. There is a full set of DeWalt power tools including some saws and a vacuum cleaner, all of which was purchased separately, a step ladder, many hand tools, a small fridge that I generally hook up wherever I work, and three fans. Normally I could have it loaded in about ten minutes, but it took half an hour today. My co worker loaded the fridge. The whole bunch of tools would cost around $1500 to replace at retail if it were stolen or lost.
After that, I drove home to think for a few minutes. I called a personal injury lawyer to ask questions. My call was returned about half an hour later. I decided it was best to go get checked by a doctor. I went to the workman's comp clinic the parent company used, but they would not see me even when I offered to pay for it myself. I went to a minor emergency clinic where it cost me $160 to get examined and x rayed. My foot is sprained, but fortunately it is not broken. I was prescribed Loritab, which I am afraid to take, and 600 mg Motrin. I have over the counter motrin at home, which can be taken in 400 mg doses so I decided to go with that instead of paying for the stronger pills.
Ordinarily I would have stayed home today with ice on my foot, then gone back to work the next day or the following day. I made the decision to be seen to get a snapshot of the damage done before it healed up, mainly in case it was needed for the workman's comp claim.
Since nothing is broken, I expect I will be able to walk normally within a few days. Even if it was broken, I could have my wife drive me to work in the morning where I could sit at a desk and take or make calls, or lease apartments.
The last people I called were the unemployment folks. I explained all of this to them. They will determine if I am eligible for benefits. I see no harm in calling them and telling the truth, as making that determination is their job. They did ask if I was able to work, and I told them I felt like yes I can do a desk job even if they call me tomorrow with one. I explained that the doctor did not ask me to return.
The last thing I did before finally relaxing at home was to get the Ace wrap the doctor "prescribed" and get something to eat. That, 400 mils of Motrin, and some ice have helped greatly with pain.
I feel like I was not told what was expected of me this weekend. I expected to walk in on Saturday, hang a door, paint that door, install a vent, and leave, and that was it. I feel like I was terminated partly because of the argument, partly because the property manager did not think the apartment would pass inspection, and partly because I was injured. I feel like it is wrong to terminate anyone between the time of an on the job injury and the time they get treated. At the least, I feel like even if the person was wrong, they should be treated, then terminated and possibly billed for the treatment.
The lawyer explained that I should be able to receive payment for several things, including the days I am out of work because of this (this possibly includes the time I'm out of work over losing the job, too), and I should be able to recover the $160 I spent at Fast ER care today. I did not ask how his fees would be paid.
If I can sue for damages, should I? On the one hand, all I really want is my money back for the doctor and the lawyer, and payment of several days' wages that I would normally have been able to earn if I was still working. On the other hand, if I were able to sue for damages, and I did so, perhaps such a lawsuit would cause the parent company to think about their workman's comp practices and terminate those who do not follow them. It might not help me much, but it could help someone else avoid this kind of thing in the future. Even if I didn't win anything at all, it still might prevent this happening again.
As for this board, the questions are largely rhetorical. I have asked the to my wife for real, and I may ask some other family members and some friends what they would do.
On the bright side, the $160 I spent today is less than what I would have spent on one month medical insurance the last time I was offered it. In addition to that, chances are that even if I landed a new job tomorrow, the start date would be a few days later which would give my foot time to heal. My wife, of course, still has her job, and we have savings to help out.
I was working overtime this weekend, and I chose to work both Saturday and Sunday evenings instead of through the day. that might have been a mistake since I really could have used sunlight coming through the patio door for what I was doing. Instead, I used a DeWalt work light.
I have been doing facility and residential maintenance off and on since I graduated high school. For the last two years I have done residential maintenance in apartments and nursing homes. The tenants you find in a typical apartment are not monsters or anything, and you make a few friends. Nursing home residents are simply awesome to work with. Each one from either job is a story all in themselves. Whereas most of the stories of low income dwellers make me irate (lay up in the bed, spread legs for anything that moves, have 3 to 5 kids, then soak the daddies for child support, the state for housing assistance, the utility companies for payment assistance, and the USDA for food stamps, then waste what coin you have on nice cars and electronics), some of them really are trying to make life better for themselves. Senior citizens are great, though, even if some of them can't acknowledge you or have something wrong that makes them temperamental, hostile, or the like. I remember incidents of some of them crying aloud like an infant, undressing themselves in front of everyone, and the like, but I can't feel anything but sympathy and yes, even some respect, for them.
I've digressed. What my last assignment boiled down to was that we were failing to meet guidelines set forth by the city and state housing assistance agencies in the time we were given by the property manager. When I say "we", I mean three, no four, different crews. Three were assigned to prepare apartments for new move ins. Such apartments have to pass a housing inspection if the prospective tenant receives any kind of assistance with their rent. The guidelines for those units are much stricter than for those whose tenants pay rent on their own. IMO, therein lies a grave injustice. Each person should receive the same quality apartment regardless of who is paying.
Three of the four crews quit. They did not receive payment for their services for several weeks and they walked away. I feel like the reasons given by the property manager were weak excuses at best. The fourth crew, of which I was a part, had two of its own members quit as well. In the beginning, we had roughly a dozen folks to do a job, in the end, we were pared down to just two. The other person that was left besides me was not paid for about a two week period. Once again, I feel like the reasons given were inadequate.
It seems lately that every day when I went into the office, the property manager raised her voice about something. Last week she raised her voice at me for getting 34 hours of overtime on the weekend, but if you read my thread about birthdays that I started on September 4th, you will know that I was most definitely not working that weekend. I explained this. The next day, she yelled at me again for wasting her 34 hours of overtime.
Another day she yelled at me because I was draining the swimming pool. Hello, it is too cold to swim. It developed an algae growth, and if that reaches a certain stage, the only way to clear it involves partially draining the pool. We were taught this in a course given by our city's department of health. It was also written into our instruction book that we were given to take with us for a reference.
I was tired of her attitude problem at this point. Up until a few days ago, I barely even knew the office staff. I would only go in there to get work orders for the day if I didn't already have my work list made out the previous day. I would go in there occasionally when I needed to purchase something so that I could get approval. Now I never got prior approval before purchasing tools, but I spent my own money on those. She asked that we meet in the office each morning, though, so I would go in there right when I got to work. The very next morning, and each one thereafter, this manager yelled at the only two people she had left in the maintenance department. I tried to reason with her, but I am sure I, too, raised my voice when I tried that. I am not one to sit be yelled at--I will almost always yell right back in the person's face.
Two weeks ago, we were assigned to prepare a particular apartment for move in. My co worked scheduled contractors to replace the tile and carpet on the floor on a Monday. It would be inspected Tuesday. We started Friday at 11AM. That is when I found out the unit had a massive water leak. We knew instantly we would be working all weekend. We got our saws out and got busy cutting modly sheet rock out. I removed the dishwasher and the water tank and cleaned up all the mess we had made. We built a new shelf for the aircon to sit on since the old shelf was rotten. The next day we came in and we painted half of the apartment. We hung new sheet rock and textured it. The day after, we did more painting, installed trim, installed the water tank, mounted the new shelf, and hung sheet rock in the hot water closet. A contractor asked us to leave part of the sheet rock down so he could re install the aircon easier. We expected that we would be able to work after or around the flooring contractor to install a door and fix a few other problems the apartment had. I was asked to purchase the door and request a reimbursement. I refused, based on the fact that many of our contractors were still awaiting their payment. I was then told that the property manager would provide money to purchase the door that day so we could hang it Monday. That didn't happen, either.
Monday I found out that the flooring contractor had been canceled. We were told that the deadline was changed on that apartment since we had many others to prepare. I assisted in preparing several of those and preparing some occupied units for inspections, and many of them passed. The few that didn't were due to things not being done that the property had planned to hire contractors for, such as flooring.
A contractor was hired to clean the apartment up. When I realized he had the only key to the place, I took it from him and copied it, then brought him the copy. He never returned it. I had not turned that original key in when I changed the locks, so as far as anyone else knew, it never existed, but the copy I made did.
Anyway, fast forward to Friday at 4:45 PM. The property manager asks me to go and purchase the door, but she handed me some petty cash to do so. I was told the new inspection date was today, Monday, so we had to finish up in there. I was aware that someone had been "borrowed" from another property to work in the particular unit. He had told me the day before that he wanted to paint. He did next to nothing in reality. I had already cut all the trim he needed, and there was very little sheet rock to hang up. He hung five piece of sheet rock and attached one piece of trim. The rest of the trim had been thrown away. He did not address any of the other items that needed done, such as replacing screens, hanging blinds, changing light bulbs, and whatnot. Even the trim and sheet rock he installed looked terrible.
I realized when I entered on Saturday I had my work cut out for me once again. I worked as much as I could finishing the installation, placing "mud" and tape onto the new walls and texturing them. I did some plumbing and electrical work. I tested and repaired appliances, save for the dishwasher which I could not save since the pump seal was leaking. I installed a towel bar, did some caulking, installed a smoke alarm, hung the new door, and installed the return air vent. I spent six hours each day, from 3 to 9 in the afternoon/evening, working to pass that housing inspection. I realized late yesterday that while I probably would not finish everything then, if I asked for help in the morning that two of us could finish up and the apartment would pass. I was growing impatient and I decided it was time to call it quits for the evening. I packed up my tools and began to load them into my truck.
My tool box's weight changes day to day depending on what I have in it. Yesterday it was full, so I estimate it weighed close to 100 pounds. It is bulky, so it requires two hands to lift even if it is nearly empty. I had loaded all the smaller items into my truck, and as usual I loaded my tool box last.
The ground has washed away somewhat near this apartment. To get to the parking lot, one must either walk through the washed out area, or take the longer route following the sidewalk and down a couple of steps. Sometime before the ground washed away, a cable of some sort was buried, but the erosion has exposed a 15 foot section of it.
With my 100 pound tool box in both arms, I failed to see that cable in the dark. I unknowingly planted my right foot on it and my left foot caught underneath it. The box began to pull me forward and down. I jerked frantically with my left foot, trying to free it, since my right was already behind me and I could not transfer that much weight (300 pounds total) back to it. I was falling. My left foot came free after a couple of seconds, but it still felt as if the cable was wrapped around it. I stumbled forward, the weight of the box pulling me further forward and down with each step. A few steps later, I crashed into a parked car and my box landed hard on the hood. I fell across the hood and my tool box. I lifted the box and realized quickly my left foot would not hold any weight. I did manage to hobble to my truck with the box, but the truck was only a few feet away. I locked everything I could into my truck and drove to the shop. I was able to unload one thing, my step ladder, so I placed it near the door, locked up, and called my co worker to let him know he would have work to do in the morning and that I might not be able to help.
I drove home, but I did have problems working the clutch in my truck. I wanted to go into work today, but I did not know if I would be able to drive. I decided that if I was still hurting and I could drive, I'd ask for the day off in person, but that if I could not drive, I would call in.
As it turns out, several spikes of pain shot through my foot and into my leg this morning. I could work the clutch to an extent, but for the most part I had to operate all three pedals with one foot. I called my co worker and told him I was not going to make it and that I intended to call the office next. They beat me to it--I got a call waiting while I was on the phone. They asked where the keys were and I explained that while their cleaners had lost the set they were supposed to have, a spare existed and I happened to have it. I told them I was having problems driving, but I would bring the keys in. I thought about swiping my wife's truck, which has an auto tranny, but I knew she needed it to get to work and we didn't have time to carpool before that inspection occurred.
I brought the keys to work and explained why I was limping so badly. I said I'd like to go home and put some ice on my foot. I turned to my co worker and told him there were a few things left and I'd left a list but forgotten something on it. That's when the property manager interrupted and her attitude problem showed back up. An argument ensued, and we both yelled at each other. I told her I was "tired of this" (meaning the situation, not the job), and she demanded my office and shop keys. We each said to one another that were were "finished with each other". I asked for my shop key back so I could get my tools and at first she refused. I asked again for either a key or someone to accompany me, and before I could threaten to cut a wall out of the shop or back through the door, she handed me a key.
It took a while for me to load everything up. There is a full set of DeWalt power tools including some saws and a vacuum cleaner, all of which was purchased separately, a step ladder, many hand tools, a small fridge that I generally hook up wherever I work, and three fans. Normally I could have it loaded in about ten minutes, but it took half an hour today. My co worker loaded the fridge. The whole bunch of tools would cost around $1500 to replace at retail if it were stolen or lost.
After that, I drove home to think for a few minutes. I called a personal injury lawyer to ask questions. My call was returned about half an hour later. I decided it was best to go get checked by a doctor. I went to the workman's comp clinic the parent company used, but they would not see me even when I offered to pay for it myself. I went to a minor emergency clinic where it cost me $160 to get examined and x rayed. My foot is sprained, but fortunately it is not broken. I was prescribed Loritab, which I am afraid to take, and 600 mg Motrin. I have over the counter motrin at home, which can be taken in 400 mg doses so I decided to go with that instead of paying for the stronger pills.
Ordinarily I would have stayed home today with ice on my foot, then gone back to work the next day or the following day. I made the decision to be seen to get a snapshot of the damage done before it healed up, mainly in case it was needed for the workman's comp claim.
Since nothing is broken, I expect I will be able to walk normally within a few days. Even if it was broken, I could have my wife drive me to work in the morning where I could sit at a desk and take or make calls, or lease apartments.
The last people I called were the unemployment folks. I explained all of this to them. They will determine if I am eligible for benefits. I see no harm in calling them and telling the truth, as making that determination is their job. They did ask if I was able to work, and I told them I felt like yes I can do a desk job even if they call me tomorrow with one. I explained that the doctor did not ask me to return.
The last thing I did before finally relaxing at home was to get the Ace wrap the doctor "prescribed" and get something to eat. That, 400 mils of Motrin, and some ice have helped greatly with pain.
I feel like I was not told what was expected of me this weekend. I expected to walk in on Saturday, hang a door, paint that door, install a vent, and leave, and that was it. I feel like I was terminated partly because of the argument, partly because the property manager did not think the apartment would pass inspection, and partly because I was injured. I feel like it is wrong to terminate anyone between the time of an on the job injury and the time they get treated. At the least, I feel like even if the person was wrong, they should be treated, then terminated and possibly billed for the treatment.
The lawyer explained that I should be able to receive payment for several things, including the days I am out of work because of this (this possibly includes the time I'm out of work over losing the job, too), and I should be able to recover the $160 I spent at Fast ER care today. I did not ask how his fees would be paid.
If I can sue for damages, should I? On the one hand, all I really want is my money back for the doctor and the lawyer, and payment of several days' wages that I would normally have been able to earn if I was still working. On the other hand, if I were able to sue for damages, and I did so, perhaps such a lawsuit would cause the parent company to think about their workman's comp practices and terminate those who do not follow them. It might not help me much, but it could help someone else avoid this kind of thing in the future. Even if I didn't win anything at all, it still might prevent this happening again.
As for this board, the questions are largely rhetorical. I have asked the to my wife for real, and I may ask some other family members and some friends what they would do.
On the bright side, the $160 I spent today is less than what I would have spent on one month medical insurance the last time I was offered it. In addition to that, chances are that even if I landed a new job tomorrow, the start date would be a few days later which would give my foot time to heal. My wife, of course, still has her job, and we have savings to help out.
**** the DHS
Posted by
shadow460 , Thu Jul 23, 2009 7:18 PM
I'm divorced. When it happened, the state stepped in and determined child support and they ignored what both my first wife and I wanted. OK, when I have a job, I pay it. If I was still married to her and lost my job, no one would care that my kid might be going without a little, so why should it matter that I lost my job after we were divorced?
It takes about a month for the DHS to start the allotment for child support from my paychecks. If I send it manually during that time, they never start it. That allotment includes a court order on whichever employer to pay child support. I tried simply giving the case info to one employer and they took the money out of my check but didn't make all the payments to the state. So that's out--with the order in place if that happens again, the employer is in trouble. I also tried contacting the DHS myself with my new employment info, and their response was to freeze my bank account and threaten to suspend my driver's and professional licenses. The never suspended any licenses, and they didn't take any money from my bank, either! They did that strictly to halt the use of my debit card and to stop me from withdrawing any money that I'd had direct deposited into my account.
No, instead of letting me help them out by telling them who to call for support payments, they'd rather cut my cash flow off without even a moment's notice.
I'm not a fool, though. The horror stories are all over the news, so they didn't stop anything financial on my end.
Fast forward. I get hurt on the job. It's minor, but I still go to the doctor for a simple diagnosis and some pain killers. This happened over a month ago, and I requested nothing more than to see a doctor and get painkillers. Today I get this letter in the mail saying "Since you owe back child support, we have a lien on the settlement you got from worker's compensation."
WTF?!? Excuse me, but it's not my fault the economy went south and I lost my job!! It's not my fault that you people didn't tell me until two months after the judgement was entered that I even owed child support! For crying out loud, when that judgement was made, I was still married to the kid's mom! How the heck am I gonna pay child support to my own wife?
Now here's the best part, what if I had been hurt bad and unable to work? How the heck would I live then? What, would they get 100% of the annuity payments? Man send that stuff to my 401(k) plan. I might not get it now, but the DHS sure as heck can't touch that.
This kind of thing really ruins the good memories I had of that marriage, and it does little good for the relationship with my daughter. It doesn't affect me at all financially, since I had no plans to sue or seek anything more than (everybody say it now) a trip to a doctor and some pain meds.
What is the DHS smoking? Excuse the **ll out of me for having a child...like most married folks do. Excuse the blank out of me for being a "deadbeat" dad...<total sacrasm> sure I have three Jaguars, a Porsche, and a Ferrari in the driveway of my giant mansion with the pool and the nice home theater, maid service, ten acre lawn, and the works. </sarc> Crap I'm just trying to stay above water here.
<end rant>
I ain't trying to avoid support here, I'm just trying to keep the ____ DHS off my back.
Why can't I just be a normal father? I'm OK now, just a couple games of something and I'll be fine...just had to rant...
OK, this is too personal for a public board, enjoy my blog.
It takes about a month for the DHS to start the allotment for child support from my paychecks. If I send it manually during that time, they never start it. That allotment includes a court order on whichever employer to pay child support. I tried simply giving the case info to one employer and they took the money out of my check but didn't make all the payments to the state. So that's out--with the order in place if that happens again, the employer is in trouble. I also tried contacting the DHS myself with my new employment info, and their response was to freeze my bank account and threaten to suspend my driver's and professional licenses. The never suspended any licenses, and they didn't take any money from my bank, either! They did that strictly to halt the use of my debit card and to stop me from withdrawing any money that I'd had direct deposited into my account.
No, instead of letting me help them out by telling them who to call for support payments, they'd rather cut my cash flow off without even a moment's notice.
I'm not a fool, though. The horror stories are all over the news, so they didn't stop anything financial on my end.
Fast forward. I get hurt on the job. It's minor, but I still go to the doctor for a simple diagnosis and some pain killers. This happened over a month ago, and I requested nothing more than to see a doctor and get painkillers. Today I get this letter in the mail saying "Since you owe back child support, we have a lien on the settlement you got from worker's compensation."
WTF?!? Excuse me, but it's not my fault the economy went south and I lost my job!! It's not my fault that you people didn't tell me until two months after the judgement was entered that I even owed child support! For crying out loud, when that judgement was made, I was still married to the kid's mom! How the heck am I gonna pay child support to my own wife?
Now here's the best part, what if I had been hurt bad and unable to work? How the heck would I live then? What, would they get 100% of the annuity payments? Man send that stuff to my 401(k) plan. I might not get it now, but the DHS sure as heck can't touch that.
This kind of thing really ruins the good memories I had of that marriage, and it does little good for the relationship with my daughter. It doesn't affect me at all financially, since I had no plans to sue or seek anything more than (everybody say it now) a trip to a doctor and some pain meds.
What is the DHS smoking? Excuse the **ll out of me for having a child...like most married folks do. Excuse the blank out of me for being a "deadbeat" dad...<total sacrasm> sure I have three Jaguars, a Porsche, and a Ferrari in the driveway of my giant mansion with the pool and the nice home theater, maid service, ten acre lawn, and the works. </sarc> Crap I'm just trying to stay above water here.
<end rant>
I ain't trying to avoid support here, I'm just trying to keep the ____ DHS off my back.
Why can't I just be a normal father? I'm OK now, just a couple games of something and I'll be fine...just had to rant...
OK, this is too personal for a public board, enjoy my blog.
Theme park accidents
Posted by
shadow460 , Wed Jun 17, 2009 9:16 PM
I've seen people walking down one coaster, and I've been stuck on another. Just today I saw a fellow lose his inner tube on an intense water slide.
When I was still pretty young we took a trip to California to visit my great aunt. While she was managing her restaurant therein Van Nuys, we were touring and going places like Universal Studios and Disneyland. The second day were were in Disneyland, something happened to the Matterhorn Bobsleds and folks had to walk down the mountain.
A few summers later, I was at Big Splash water park in Tulsa, OK, and I got stuck on one of the slides. It took me so long to work my way along that the person behind me crashed into me from behind.
Years later someone misjudged their tolerance and caused the Busch Gardens Europe crew to have to "perform minor housekeeping duties" about Apollo's Chariot. It was more than minor. My train sat in the block brakes for a good ten minutes in the cool Virginia evening while they cleaned up.
Just today as I climbed the seven story tower known as "the Bermuda Triangle", I saw a kid on the sidewall of one of the tube slides, and his tube was on the other side. He flipped over lengthwise before hitting the splash pool below. He got up and made his way to the exit no worse for the wear.
The tower itself has five slides, so you get to choose the quick way down. It's clearly visible from the freeway, which adds to the fear factor when you get to the top and see 18 wheelers going by at 60 MPH. Three of the five slides exit into a splash pool. The total drop on the purple, yellow, and blue slides is 70 feet, and riders get to speeds of 35 MPH. Purple and Blue are mostly enclosed, Yellow is not.
Then there's a green speed slide. It's smooth and fast, and reminds me of Apollo's Chariot since you can literally feel the speed on both rides, yet there are zero bumps of any kind.
And then there's my personal favorite ride in the park...the Acapulco Cliff Dive, which is a white speed slide that goes west from the tower. Riders go about 1/4 of the way down and then level off before the main drop. The slide has water dumping into it in the level section, which gives the rider a pretty good boost...enough that most people over 150 pounds catch several inches of air, then smack down onto the fiberglass at nearly full speed. I always catch air, and that's the main draw! I actually got some battle damage from it today, too. I walked away from my first ride with blisters in two places and almost a third. I didn't care--I went back for more! And I got to freak people out like I used to do with new Alpengeist riders...
"Is it scary?"
"Yep. You look out over this green slide and all you can see is air. You can't see the slide at all. It's 64 feet to the ground, and rumor has it that you exceed 60 MPH on the way down."
"How about the white one?"
Now the fun begins...after I have convinced them that only suicidal people would ride down the tower in any other way.
"I come off of that slide every time I ride it."
Serious, three guys were hanging on to the fence watching folks drop down the Cliff Dive. When one person went right before me, they were all like, "Whoa! That dude came off! Did you see that!?" I told 'em I was gonna come off, too...just you hide and watch!
A couple of days ago I saw a kid lose his life jacket when he hit the water coming off of another slide in the same park. He'd been told he shouldn't slide with it, but he ignored the guards and went anyway. They got him out of the splash pool and he went on his way. The slide is called Cannonball Falls, and he went on the more intense green slide. There's an eight foot drop into the splash pool, and when combined with the speed built up from the slide itself you hit the water with a lot of force. It knocked his life jacket off of him.
Fortunately I have never seen anyone hurt on any kind of ride, and don't really think about it much before I ride. Matter of fact, I'm going on the Bermuda Triangle again the next chance I get, even though I usually hit the wall several times no matter which of the five slides I ride down.
All that said, though, I love extreme roller coasters, but I'm too chicken to get on an extreme water slide...you know, the ones where you gotta pick your shorts out when you get up, right? There just ain't nothin' between my pasty self and the ground if anything goes wrong.
I was watching some POV films from several rides. I gotta go get on Griffon some day--that looks like fun! They said it has a 205 foot height to it. I also watched POVs of some old favorites like Hypersonic XLC and Volcano. I love the way when volcano launches, you can't see what happened to the hapless riders but you can hear them scream. I watched some videos of the Steel Lasso, and I can't wait to get on it when I get the chance. Ditto for a wooden coaster called the Wildcat. Normally you wouldn't see me get worked up to go to Frontier City, but it's beginning to pick up a little bit.
So I have officially ridden everything in White Water Bay. Not this year, mind you, as there are some SBNO rides in the park and I haven't worked up whatever it is to ride the Big Kahuna. I rode that once and I didn't really like it. But I have been on everything there.
What really cracked me up was when a guard told me that I could go down the Cliff Dive head first. I knew she was joking, but then told her that such a ride existed where the Big Kahuna sits today. None of the guard believe me when I tell them of the All American Plunge, and of the times we watched folks skip across the splash pool and crash into the pile of inner tubes. This guard didn't believe me, and she also didn't believe that the park used to have a mini golf course.
I think the Cliff Dive was built to replace the All American Plunge, and I gotta say the Cliff Dive is a worthy ride, but it'll never replace the feeling of "oh $**t" that the Plunge could give when its gate opened and you were dispatched head first on those special kick boards.
Seems that the greatest rides of all sometimes don't make it. Rest in pieces, Hypersonic XLC and All American Plunge. What's real sad, though, is that they were never within 1500 miles of each other...and they shoulda been in the same park!
When I was still pretty young we took a trip to California to visit my great aunt. While she was managing her restaurant therein Van Nuys, we were touring and going places like Universal Studios and Disneyland. The second day were were in Disneyland, something happened to the Matterhorn Bobsleds and folks had to walk down the mountain.
A few summers later, I was at Big Splash water park in Tulsa, OK, and I got stuck on one of the slides. It took me so long to work my way along that the person behind me crashed into me from behind.
Years later someone misjudged their tolerance and caused the Busch Gardens Europe crew to have to "perform minor housekeeping duties" about Apollo's Chariot. It was more than minor. My train sat in the block brakes for a good ten minutes in the cool Virginia evening while they cleaned up.
Just today as I climbed the seven story tower known as "the Bermuda Triangle", I saw a kid on the sidewall of one of the tube slides, and his tube was on the other side. He flipped over lengthwise before hitting the splash pool below. He got up and made his way to the exit no worse for the wear.
The tower itself has five slides, so you get to choose the quick way down. It's clearly visible from the freeway, which adds to the fear factor when you get to the top and see 18 wheelers going by at 60 MPH. Three of the five slides exit into a splash pool. The total drop on the purple, yellow, and blue slides is 70 feet, and riders get to speeds of 35 MPH. Purple and Blue are mostly enclosed, Yellow is not.
Then there's a green speed slide. It's smooth and fast, and reminds me of Apollo's Chariot since you can literally feel the speed on both rides, yet there are zero bumps of any kind.
And then there's my personal favorite ride in the park...the Acapulco Cliff Dive, which is a white speed slide that goes west from the tower. Riders go about 1/4 of the way down and then level off before the main drop. The slide has water dumping into it in the level section, which gives the rider a pretty good boost...enough that most people over 150 pounds catch several inches of air, then smack down onto the fiberglass at nearly full speed. I always catch air, and that's the main draw! I actually got some battle damage from it today, too. I walked away from my first ride with blisters in two places and almost a third. I didn't care--I went back for more! And I got to freak people out like I used to do with new Alpengeist riders...
"Is it scary?"
"Yep. You look out over this green slide and all you can see is air. You can't see the slide at all. It's 64 feet to the ground, and rumor has it that you exceed 60 MPH on the way down."
"How about the white one?"
Now the fun begins...after I have convinced them that only suicidal people would ride down the tower in any other way."I come off of that slide every time I ride it."
Serious, three guys were hanging on to the fence watching folks drop down the Cliff Dive. When one person went right before me, they were all like, "Whoa! That dude came off! Did you see that!?" I told 'em I was gonna come off, too...just you hide and watch!
A couple of days ago I saw a kid lose his life jacket when he hit the water coming off of another slide in the same park. He'd been told he shouldn't slide with it, but he ignored the guards and went anyway. They got him out of the splash pool and he went on his way. The slide is called Cannonball Falls, and he went on the more intense green slide. There's an eight foot drop into the splash pool, and when combined with the speed built up from the slide itself you hit the water with a lot of force. It knocked his life jacket off of him.
Fortunately I have never seen anyone hurt on any kind of ride, and don't really think about it much before I ride. Matter of fact, I'm going on the Bermuda Triangle again the next chance I get, even though I usually hit the wall several times no matter which of the five slides I ride down.
All that said, though, I love extreme roller coasters, but I'm too chicken to get on an extreme water slide...you know, the ones where you gotta pick your shorts out when you get up, right? There just ain't nothin' between my pasty self and the ground if anything goes wrong.
I was watching some POV films from several rides. I gotta go get on Griffon some day--that looks like fun! They said it has a 205 foot height to it. I also watched POVs of some old favorites like Hypersonic XLC and Volcano. I love the way when volcano launches, you can't see what happened to the hapless riders but you can hear them scream. I watched some videos of the Steel Lasso, and I can't wait to get on it when I get the chance. Ditto for a wooden coaster called the Wildcat. Normally you wouldn't see me get worked up to go to Frontier City, but it's beginning to pick up a little bit.
So I have officially ridden everything in White Water Bay. Not this year, mind you, as there are some SBNO rides in the park and I haven't worked up whatever it is to ride the Big Kahuna. I rode that once and I didn't really like it. But I have been on everything there.
What really cracked me up was when a guard told me that I could go down the Cliff Dive head first. I knew she was joking, but then told her that such a ride existed where the Big Kahuna sits today. None of the guard believe me when I tell them of the All American Plunge, and of the times we watched folks skip across the splash pool and crash into the pile of inner tubes. This guard didn't believe me, and she also didn't believe that the park used to have a mini golf course.
I think the Cliff Dive was built to replace the All American Plunge, and I gotta say the Cliff Dive is a worthy ride, but it'll never replace the feeling of "oh $**t" that the Plunge could give when its gate opened and you were dispatched head first on those special kick boards.
Seems that the greatest rides of all sometimes don't make it. Rest in pieces, Hypersonic XLC and All American Plunge. What's real sad, though, is that they were never within 1500 miles of each other...and they shoulda been in the same park!
more job searching
Posted by
shadow460 , Wed Feb 25, 2009 6:06 PM
I had a manager call me back today from a place in Norman not far from the Grace home I worked at last year. The first one, that is, not the hostile alien environment I was transferred to later. A test was given when I applied and evidently I blew away the HVAC portion. Sweet. Dunno if it'll go anywhere, but hopefully so and hopefully they'll help me get the PEA certification I need.
In other news, I gotta pull the blower resistor out of my Mazda and bench that to see if I can get all four fan speeds working, and I gotta bench an SCPH-1001 PlayStation to get the drive going. Then if there is time I need to bench my wife's VCR and see how badly the VHS deck is worn out, and if it can be fixed. Common honey, like that you'd get from a bee (unless you got venom instead...owwwitch!) works wonders in lieu of belt dressing for that kind of thing. I'll pass on the bees, though--you can keep them!
In other news, I gotta pull the blower resistor out of my Mazda and bench that to see if I can get all four fan speeds working, and I gotta bench an SCPH-1001 PlayStation to get the drive going. Then if there is time I need to bench my wife's VCR and see how badly the VHS deck is worn out, and if it can be fixed. Common honey, like that you'd get from a bee (unless you got venom instead...owwwitch!) works wonders in lieu of belt dressing for that kind of thing. I'll pass on the bees, though--you can keep them!
Job search and other stuff
Posted by
shadow460 , Tue Feb 24, 2009 2:42 AM
Its boring staying at home all the time. I stay up too late, sleep too late, then when I get up I fax a couple resumes off (the free limit at Faxzero is two a day) and either go put in applications or do something else job search related.
Today I made a list of ALL of my work history. From the after school tutoring in 1990 all the way up to my last job.
Last week I had a job fair and an interview. The job fair was simple, and I spoke to a manager about the position they had, however it had already been filled. The interview was something else--they offered me $12 an hour to supervise the maintenance crew in a high rise apartment. I'm scared of heights, and I was too chicken s**t to go on the roof of a 15 floor high rise even for a tour of the place. I will pass on becoming a bloody spot in the middle of May Avenue in any other fashion than jaywalking. Serious, like the only things you can see from up there are the two more high rise buildings, the New York Life tower, and tornadoes. I never went back, and they relisted the position on the internet.
I've spent many an hour on the roof of a place called SIMA Norfolk. It is, in case the name doesn't give it away, in Norfolk. However, that roof was about 40 feet up and had internal access from about three places inside the structure. It was pretty big, too, I'd guess there's probably half an acre up there to walk around on. I had zero trouble getting up and down and working on stuff up there. But 15 floors is about, oh, 200 feet by the time you add the elevator shack and the basement which I think is partly above ground. And the footprint is nowhere near half an acre. That plus acrophobia equals one scared senseless huan being. Maybe for $15 an hour I'd do it, but they never offered that.
Anyway, so I am back into the job searching mode. I never left it. I need to call Grace in Del City tomorrow and try to work from that end to see if my former employer is really going to create the position I'm supposed to get or if I should just forget it.
I benched a set of headphones this week. That is, I put them on the workbench for repairs. They were Optimus Pro 25's, now they have only the Pro 25 wire/inline volume, a Pro 35 diaphragm on the right and a Koss Porta Pro diaphragm on the left. One diaphragm is coated with metal and the other is plastic. Shockingly, they sound great. I used a Pro 35 headband, which clamps the phones solid to the wearer's head. It's not a comfortable band. It trades comfort for sound quality.
Also I'm trying to roll the score and difficulty in Subterranea. Every time I get it out, I get a little further then I hit a brick wall with it. I got shot four times in less than ten seconds at one point. I didn't have a chance to move or shoot back--four times over an enemy appeared from the right and blasted me. I slammed the stick down (something rare for me) and hit reset. After the next game, I took a five minute break. I played for about fifteen minutes after that then stopped. I've acted out smashing the cartridge with my bard hands, throwing the cartridge, burning the cartridge, wiping my butt with the instructions, burning the instructions, and ripping the instructions to ribbons. It felt good. I didn't actually do any of that, but acting it out felt great!
Today I made a list of ALL of my work history. From the after school tutoring in 1990 all the way up to my last job.
Last week I had a job fair and an interview. The job fair was simple, and I spoke to a manager about the position they had, however it had already been filled. The interview was something else--they offered me $12 an hour to supervise the maintenance crew in a high rise apartment. I'm scared of heights, and I was too chicken s**t to go on the roof of a 15 floor high rise even for a tour of the place. I will pass on becoming a bloody spot in the middle of May Avenue in any other fashion than jaywalking. Serious, like the only things you can see from up there are the two more high rise buildings, the New York Life tower, and tornadoes. I never went back, and they relisted the position on the internet.
I've spent many an hour on the roof of a place called SIMA Norfolk. It is, in case the name doesn't give it away, in Norfolk. However, that roof was about 40 feet up and had internal access from about three places inside the structure. It was pretty big, too, I'd guess there's probably half an acre up there to walk around on. I had zero trouble getting up and down and working on stuff up there. But 15 floors is about, oh, 200 feet by the time you add the elevator shack and the basement which I think is partly above ground. And the footprint is nowhere near half an acre. That plus acrophobia equals one scared senseless huan being. Maybe for $15 an hour I'd do it, but they never offered that.
Anyway, so I am back into the job searching mode. I never left it. I need to call Grace in Del City tomorrow and try to work from that end to see if my former employer is really going to create the position I'm supposed to get or if I should just forget it.
I benched a set of headphones this week. That is, I put them on the workbench for repairs. They were Optimus Pro 25's, now they have only the Pro 25 wire/inline volume, a Pro 35 diaphragm on the right and a Koss Porta Pro diaphragm on the left. One diaphragm is coated with metal and the other is plastic. Shockingly, they sound great. I used a Pro 35 headband, which clamps the phones solid to the wearer's head. It's not a comfortable band. It trades comfort for sound quality.
Also I'm trying to roll the score and difficulty in Subterranea. Every time I get it out, I get a little further then I hit a brick wall with it. I got shot four times in less than ten seconds at one point. I didn't have a chance to move or shoot back--four times over an enemy appeared from the right and blasted me. I slammed the stick down (something rare for me) and hit reset. After the next game, I took a five minute break. I played for about fifteen minutes after that then stopped. I've acted out smashing the cartridge with my bard hands, throwing the cartridge, burning the cartridge, wiping my butt with the instructions, burning the instructions, and ripping the instructions to ribbons. It felt good. I didn't actually do any of that, but acting it out felt great!
Shattered games...
Posted by
shadow460 , Sun Feb 15, 2009 11:39 PM
OK, so now here's how I can turn a sad story into something good.
First, I managed to acquire some very nice 2600 games late last year. Among them is a near mint condition Fishing Derby and a near mint CIB Fire Fighter.
So I'm looking for Missile Command in my stack of carts yesterday. I don't remember if there was a text release of this or not, and my Atari picture labels are stacked under three layers of games. Time to go digging... first thing I did was spill about half a dozen carts. I picked them up immediately. See, Intellivison carts don't stack straight. I don't have an Inty, so why on Earth I have 20 or 30 games for it is beyond me. I don't even know if any of them work!
I thought I'd just stack a handful of 2600 carts atop those, but no, the 2600 carts took a spill, and the dang Inty carts stayed put!
Long story short, the 2005 and 2007 AA Holiday carts were fine, (dunno if Stella's Stocking boots, but it should), Parker's Frogger was fine (if it had been Starpath's, I would have saw red), but Fishing Derby had some kind of rattle in it. I looked down in there and two large chunks of plastic were missing by the edge connector. The board was loose, too, and this cart was almost mint! #!?@
Looks like I had work to do, and I'd been meaning to strip the Activision glue from that cart for a while.
A bit of history on it, though:
I got this cart in a Craigslist lot. It's the only respectable copy of Fishing Derby I'd found in the wild in the last four years. I had to wait a week to pick the lot up because its owner was on vacation. It was worth it, though, for the number of games that were in excellent shape. I gave my "old" copy of Fishing Derby to my brother along with 50 other games, a ton of controllers, and my light sixer.
Anyway, I heated the label but it just refused to peel off. I finally dug up a corner of it to get it started, then heated it and it came right off. The label was fine, but the damage to the shell is extensive. The supports that hold the ROM board in place were shattered, the flat piece that is behind the edge connector was broken, and the bottom half was cracked lengthwise all the way to the Activision logo. I used cyanoacrylate super glue to put everything back together meticulously. The left screw post was also shattered, and I put that back together with the glue. I stripped the Activision glue from the shell and replaced it with Elmer's school glue stick.
In the end, I got the whole thing back together and the only way to tell it's been damaged is to look down beside the edge connector. The glue spots on the bottom of the case are barely visible, as is the damage to the label were I had to start it peeling off on one corner.
So next was the Fire Fighter cart, whose minty label was peeling off. Turns out that all I had to do was heat it up and the original glue stuck it down again.
Looks like I've got what it takes to fix dead games. I've worked my magic on a 7800 Ms PAc Man cart that was shattered during shipping, and I've also repaired PSP games with destroyed shells. The new shells even still have the UMD sticker in the middle! (this reminds me that I need to transfer the sticker from my sratched beyond repair ATV OffRoad FUry game to my GTA:LCS game...) I've also brought dead CD games back to life. I can't do a thing about CD rot...yet, but give me time and I'll have that one licked, too.
My previous hardware projects were fixing the Power and Reset switches in my 7800. I have to do the Puase and Select switches now. The fix I used does not require replacement parts--I work directly with the switches that are there. Also, I did some work on my Heavy Sixer. Other than that, I also worked on a truck.
First, I managed to acquire some very nice 2600 games late last year. Among them is a near mint condition Fishing Derby and a near mint CIB Fire Fighter.
So I'm looking for Missile Command in my stack of carts yesterday. I don't remember if there was a text release of this or not, and my Atari picture labels are stacked under three layers of games. Time to go digging... first thing I did was spill about half a dozen carts. I picked them up immediately. See, Intellivison carts don't stack straight. I don't have an Inty, so why on Earth I have 20 or 30 games for it is beyond me. I don't even know if any of them work!
I thought I'd just stack a handful of 2600 carts atop those, but no, the 2600 carts took a spill, and the dang Inty carts stayed put!
Long story short, the 2005 and 2007 AA Holiday carts were fine, (dunno if Stella's Stocking boots, but it should), Parker's Frogger was fine (if it had been Starpath's, I would have saw red), but Fishing Derby had some kind of rattle in it. I looked down in there and two large chunks of plastic were missing by the edge connector. The board was loose, too, and this cart was almost mint! #!?@Looks like I had work to do, and I'd been meaning to strip the Activision glue from that cart for a while.
A bit of history on it, though:
I got this cart in a Craigslist lot. It's the only respectable copy of Fishing Derby I'd found in the wild in the last four years. I had to wait a week to pick the lot up because its owner was on vacation. It was worth it, though, for the number of games that were in excellent shape. I gave my "old" copy of Fishing Derby to my brother along with 50 other games, a ton of controllers, and my light sixer.
Anyway, I heated the label but it just refused to peel off. I finally dug up a corner of it to get it started, then heated it and it came right off. The label was fine, but the damage to the shell is extensive. The supports that hold the ROM board in place were shattered, the flat piece that is behind the edge connector was broken, and the bottom half was cracked lengthwise all the way to the Activision logo. I used cyanoacrylate super glue to put everything back together meticulously. The left screw post was also shattered, and I put that back together with the glue. I stripped the Activision glue from the shell and replaced it with Elmer's school glue stick.
In the end, I got the whole thing back together and the only way to tell it's been damaged is to look down beside the edge connector. The glue spots on the bottom of the case are barely visible, as is the damage to the label were I had to start it peeling off on one corner.
So next was the Fire Fighter cart, whose minty label was peeling off. Turns out that all I had to do was heat it up and the original glue stuck it down again.
Looks like I've got what it takes to fix dead games. I've worked my magic on a 7800 Ms PAc Man cart that was shattered during shipping, and I've also repaired PSP games with destroyed shells. The new shells even still have the UMD sticker in the middle! (this reminds me that I need to transfer the sticker from my sratched beyond repair ATV OffRoad FUry game to my GTA:LCS game...) I've also brought dead CD games back to life. I can't do a thing about CD rot...yet, but give me time and I'll have that one licked, too.
My previous hardware projects were fixing the Power and Reset switches in my 7800. I have to do the Puase and Select switches now. The fix I used does not require replacement parts--I work directly with the switches that are there. Also, I did some work on my Heavy Sixer. Other than that, I also worked on a truck.
job transfer
Posted by
shadow460 , Fri Oct 10, 2008 11:55 PM
I guess I probably blog more when I'm stressed. I was told today that my job in Norman would be ending soon, and the person who will fill it is going to be working a week from Monday. The company has made arrangements for me to transfer to a different facility. I've been to the different facility and met some of the people there. Still, though, the people I'm working with now are the ones I've gotten to know and got used to seeing every day. It's not just the employees, either. The residents make the place unique, and I will probably miss them more than I miss the employees.
Some of the residents have moved away. They have gone home after staying with Grace and getting healthy enough to live on their own. Others, well ... didn't make it. They have passed on. I was not close to very many of them, but I was close to a couple who went home. I did have some interaction with some of the ones who are no longer with us while they were still at Grace.
Now it seems like all of that is being yanked away. Ya know, I was told that this job could really get to you, could really push your emotions, and I knew that leadership of any form could be tougher than a normal position. I have a good reputation within the company I work for, and the administrators I have met and the people who are above me want me to stay with Grace. I'm fine with that. But how do you deal with losing 160 friends at once!?
The person I filled in for was on deployment. I'm glad he's safe. If anything had happened to him, I'd have probably quit the position. I've met him and worked with him before, and he's a great guy.
Then there's the fact that everything's gonna be different, too. I won't know just instinctively where, say, the fire panel or the hot water tank is, won't have the things at hand that I'm used to (it'll all be different)... it's like playing your favorite game on a different console, ya know?
I dunno what bugs me worse...having to learn a new facility or knowing I probably won't see the friends I've made in Norman again. I might see 'em at their funerals, but that ain't what matters. I ain't trying to remember them by seeing them at a funeral! Right now they've all got life left in them and I don't ever want to forget them--I don't want that to be stained by death!
Ya know, money ain't what it's about, either. You can't buy or sell friends. My friends are worth more than the $1.25 extra I'll be making.
I wouldn't be surprised if I do have a good future with Grace. With that is going to come the times I have to explain to a family that their loved one is gone. It's going to come with times when I have to transfer to yet another place, and another, and another... and go through the associated emotions all over again. I'll never be able to get used to it, but the one thing I know is that when it gets the best of me, I can come home and cry all I want to about it and nobody will think less of me. Men aren't immune to tears, either. I wonder what our male CNAs go through when they lose a favorite resident or two ... or three. I know it's gotta catch 'em all off guard sometimes...someone doesn't make it through the night and they gotta try desperately to revive the person they've bonded with.
Ya know, I kinda started bonding with one of the more well known residents, then one day the crash wagon was gone and they told me later what happened... I wonder how many employees went home and cried that night.
I guess as long as I can have my time to release emotions I will be fine in the medical field. Maybe this helps explain why my ex wife, a CNA herself, seemed to have something bothering her sometimes. I wonder if my current wife is surprised when I come home stressed about a certain resident. It's not like they didn't warn me it would happen--we were told up front that it can be very hard on the emotions.
Some of the residents have moved away. They have gone home after staying with Grace and getting healthy enough to live on their own. Others, well ... didn't make it. They have passed on. I was not close to very many of them, but I was close to a couple who went home. I did have some interaction with some of the ones who are no longer with us while they were still at Grace.
Now it seems like all of that is being yanked away. Ya know, I was told that this job could really get to you, could really push your emotions, and I knew that leadership of any form could be tougher than a normal position. I have a good reputation within the company I work for, and the administrators I have met and the people who are above me want me to stay with Grace. I'm fine with that. But how do you deal with losing 160 friends at once!?
The person I filled in for was on deployment. I'm glad he's safe. If anything had happened to him, I'd have probably quit the position. I've met him and worked with him before, and he's a great guy.
Then there's the fact that everything's gonna be different, too. I won't know just instinctively where, say, the fire panel or the hot water tank is, won't have the things at hand that I'm used to (it'll all be different)... it's like playing your favorite game on a different console, ya know?
I dunno what bugs me worse...having to learn a new facility or knowing I probably won't see the friends I've made in Norman again. I might see 'em at their funerals, but that ain't what matters. I ain't trying to remember them by seeing them at a funeral! Right now they've all got life left in them and I don't ever want to forget them--I don't want that to be stained by death!
Ya know, money ain't what it's about, either. You can't buy or sell friends. My friends are worth more than the $1.25 extra I'll be making.
I wouldn't be surprised if I do have a good future with Grace. With that is going to come the times I have to explain to a family that their loved one is gone. It's going to come with times when I have to transfer to yet another place, and another, and another... and go through the associated emotions all over again. I'll never be able to get used to it, but the one thing I know is that when it gets the best of me, I can come home and cry all I want to about it and nobody will think less of me. Men aren't immune to tears, either. I wonder what our male CNAs go through when they lose a favorite resident or two ... or three. I know it's gotta catch 'em all off guard sometimes...someone doesn't make it through the night and they gotta try desperately to revive the person they've bonded with.
Ya know, I kinda started bonding with one of the more well known residents, then one day the crash wagon was gone and they told me later what happened... I wonder how many employees went home and cried that night.
I guess as long as I can have my time to release emotions I will be fine in the medical field. Maybe this helps explain why my ex wife, a CNA herself, seemed to have something bothering her sometimes. I wonder if my current wife is surprised when I come home stressed about a certain resident. It's not like they didn't warn me it would happen--we were told up front that it can be very hard on the emotions.
incompetent mainteneace people...
Posted by
shadow460 , Sun Oct 5, 2008 7:48 PM
Love my apartment managers, love em!
A week ago Friday I woke up to find my bathroom sink full of water. Joy, I get to plunge it when I get home. I went to work, hoping for the best. When I came home, the water had drained and it seemed that I'd be able to plunge it at my leisure. I went to pick up my wife from her job, and when we came home, the sink was so full that it covered the overflow ports and water was sitting an inch from the top. This is a Bad Thing, since mine and my next door neighbor's bathroom sinks drain into a common line. I called the emergency maintenance person and waited for close to an hour. Nothing. I unscrewed the pipes and put a plug into the line to keep the water from rising in my own sink. Next I went to Wal*Mart to buy a snake which would clean the drains out.
The pipes are mostly metal, and plastic pipes have been used to replace the metal pipes where they have rusted through. When oxygen hits a metal pipe, it starts the rusting process. When water hits the weakened pipe, it accelerates the rusting process. Now what this means is that with the water sitting in my sink drain on that metal pipe, it rusted right through the side of the pipe. That's why the water level was going down...the water was leaking out of the drain and down the wall. Further, the standpipe that goes to the roof also connects to the junction between mine and my neighbor's drains, and it has no cover on it. Simply not using the faucets doesn't stop the leaking--rain can get into the standpipe and fill up our sinks.
The emergency maintenance guy finally arrives while I'm at Wal*Mart. He brings a couple pairs of pliers and that's it. I told his answering service he would need a snake, but he didn't bring one. He takes the pipes apart and finds my plug, then tells me and my wife that this is what plugged up the drain. No duh, dude, it kept the water out of my sink, too. NBow you need a snake to unclog the drain. He also pointed out the cracked pipes under my sink. We placed a bucket under them and he told me that he had a replacement pipe at another property (a lie--he only works at one property) and he'd be back to fix it the next day. He comes back the next day and says he doesn't have the part here, but he'll get it Monday and come fix my drain (another lie).
I checked the sink every day last week, and the pipes were still leaking. I wondered if they'd had trouble getting in since I had replaced my deadbolt, but no, I left that unlocked and locked the knob on my door, which I left them a key to last year. I called the office on Wednesday, and the manager told me that they had discussed my drain that very morning (probably a lie) but they didn't have keys to my apartment. I told her that their key would unlock the knob, and they could open the door that way. Still nothing. I woke up yesterday to a flood in my bathroom, and called the maintenance person again. He said that I needed to tell the next door neighbor not to use his sink and I needed to stop using mine. Well, that's obvious, but it's just habit that I wash up in the bathroom sink after I sit on the best seat in the house. Still, I used the tub to wash up as much as possible all of last week. Aside from that, it's not my job to go and tell my neighbors what to do. I vacuumed up the water and dumped the bucket.
The conversation went like this:
"Did you call me?"
"Yes, my bathroom is flooded"
"You need to stop using your sink, I'll fix it Monday"
"It's just habit, and the neighbor is using his"
"Go tell him to stop"
"OK, when can you have the sink fixed?"
"I get the material Monday"
"You told me that last week and when I worked here it didn't take eight day to get materials"
"We don't have key to your apartment"
"Yes, you do. The pest control guys have been in here recently. I could smell the pesticide. Your key open the bottom knob, which is the only thing that's locked. I left you that key on my last day that I worked the complex"
"I look in office and don't find any key"
"OK, I'll make you one"
"I don't have material but I get it Monday"
"OK, we'll try to hold out til then"
Today I wake up to a flooded bathroom and soaked carpet in my hallway. I can hear the water going full blast next door, and it's going everywhere. I'd had enough. I called the emergency line and hollered into the phone for a few seconds, then erased that message and recorded a civil one for the maintenance man to hear. I did not wait for him to call me back. My wife went next door, but the guy there wasn't home. I went to the Home Depot and bought drain parts and a new deadbolt which has a quick re keying device that I can match to the office keys.
In the drain, there's the typical stuff, you know, grate, vertical pipe, trap, rubber boot, waste pipe going into wall, etc. There's also stuff you usually don't see, but is always there, the standpipe, a junction, and a main drain line. Of course, the standpipe comes out on the roof. It's there so you can snake the main line and unclog it if need be.
I took everything apart first, then cut the copper waste line that goes into the wall. I had to cut out about 12 in square of sheetrock to get to the waste line. I pushed the boot back over the remaining cracked area, closed up the drain, and turned on the water. Water sprays out from the bottom of the sink and from the wall. Looks like I missed with the boot, and the SOB maintenance man had pulled my drain loose from the sink! So I cracked open the drain and water came out of it forever. I pushed the boot further back and tightened up the drain grate. I closed it all up again and turned on the water. This time it held fast, but the water level began rising. Even after I handed him a brand new snake that SOB didn't snake the line, but he told me he did! Why is my snake still shiny silver if he used it!? When I got done it was covered in the blackest, nastiest stuff I've ever seen.
Now here's the kicker: I used the exact same parts when I put the drain together that I had taken off of it. Yet he's telling me he needs "the materials" to fix it. I interpret this as either laziness or incompetence, probably a little bit of both. I snaked the drain, it took like three tries. The thing was so clogged that it nearly jammed my snake line in the drain pipe.
Saturday evening was really when I'd had enough. That's when I sent messages to the Oklahoma Housing Authority, the Housing Finance Authority, the Oklahoma County Attorney General, the BBB, and the landlord's main office. Hey, calling the BBB and the attorney General helped with my wireless carrier, so why the heck not call 'em?
In the end, I did get the drain line fixed. I also installed the new deadbolt on my door. I'm going to call the office tomorrow and ask if they'd like to inspect my work (I do this kind of work for a living, so I know it is good). If so, I'll call out from my job tomorrow and wait for them. If not, I'm going to key the deadbolt to my own key and lock it to keep them from coming in and messing up my drain line.
Wonder why I have a high security lockset? We're surrounded by drug dealers, prostitutes, gangs, and violence. During three months last summer I saw two doors kicked in. One had been kicked so hard that the hinges broke out of the frame. When I got fired from my job here, they tried to evict me without cause. I changed my lockset to something I knew would resist the lock breaking methods their maintenance people had bee taught. I got a lockset that I can re key in about a minute, and I kept the only keys to it. Later I re keyed the knob to work with the key I left in the office on my last day, but the deadbolt could not be re keyed. I got one tonight that I can re key at will.
One other thing, though: when the manager and the maintenance man are both Mexican in an area that has a high rate of illegal aliens, how do I know that they aren't illegal aliens themselves and that they didn't lie to get a job with the complex? If they'd break the law twice already, what's to keep them from stealing things from me when they come in? Better to keep them locked out and risk an eviction, IMO.
so I've spent half the day fixing something that my landlord was supposed to fix. As soon as we have a place picked out to move to, we are going to break our lease here. And no, we are NOT going to pay any kind of early termination fees of any kind. I'm taking my lockset with me, and whether or not I put the old one back on depends on how tired or lazy I am that day. I may also undo the repairs I did to the drain and make them fix it right. I'd have left it alone, but I don't wanna live in a flooded apartment.
A week ago Friday I woke up to find my bathroom sink full of water. Joy, I get to plunge it when I get home. I went to work, hoping for the best. When I came home, the water had drained and it seemed that I'd be able to plunge it at my leisure. I went to pick up my wife from her job, and when we came home, the sink was so full that it covered the overflow ports and water was sitting an inch from the top. This is a Bad Thing, since mine and my next door neighbor's bathroom sinks drain into a common line. I called the emergency maintenance person and waited for close to an hour. Nothing. I unscrewed the pipes and put a plug into the line to keep the water from rising in my own sink. Next I went to Wal*Mart to buy a snake which would clean the drains out.
The pipes are mostly metal, and plastic pipes have been used to replace the metal pipes where they have rusted through. When oxygen hits a metal pipe, it starts the rusting process. When water hits the weakened pipe, it accelerates the rusting process. Now what this means is that with the water sitting in my sink drain on that metal pipe, it rusted right through the side of the pipe. That's why the water level was going down...the water was leaking out of the drain and down the wall. Further, the standpipe that goes to the roof also connects to the junction between mine and my neighbor's drains, and it has no cover on it. Simply not using the faucets doesn't stop the leaking--rain can get into the standpipe and fill up our sinks.
The emergency maintenance guy finally arrives while I'm at Wal*Mart. He brings a couple pairs of pliers and that's it. I told his answering service he would need a snake, but he didn't bring one. He takes the pipes apart and finds my plug, then tells me and my wife that this is what plugged up the drain. No duh, dude, it kept the water out of my sink, too. NBow you need a snake to unclog the drain. He also pointed out the cracked pipes under my sink. We placed a bucket under them and he told me that he had a replacement pipe at another property (a lie--he only works at one property) and he'd be back to fix it the next day. He comes back the next day and says he doesn't have the part here, but he'll get it Monday and come fix my drain (another lie).
I checked the sink every day last week, and the pipes were still leaking. I wondered if they'd had trouble getting in since I had replaced my deadbolt, but no, I left that unlocked and locked the knob on my door, which I left them a key to last year. I called the office on Wednesday, and the manager told me that they had discussed my drain that very morning (probably a lie) but they didn't have keys to my apartment. I told her that their key would unlock the knob, and they could open the door that way. Still nothing. I woke up yesterday to a flood in my bathroom, and called the maintenance person again. He said that I needed to tell the next door neighbor not to use his sink and I needed to stop using mine. Well, that's obvious, but it's just habit that I wash up in the bathroom sink after I sit on the best seat in the house. Still, I used the tub to wash up as much as possible all of last week. Aside from that, it's not my job to go and tell my neighbors what to do. I vacuumed up the water and dumped the bucket.
The conversation went like this:
"Did you call me?"
"Yes, my bathroom is flooded"
"You need to stop using your sink, I'll fix it Monday"
"It's just habit, and the neighbor is using his"
"Go tell him to stop"
"OK, when can you have the sink fixed?"
"I get the material Monday"
"You told me that last week and when I worked here it didn't take eight day to get materials"
"We don't have key to your apartment"
"Yes, you do. The pest control guys have been in here recently. I could smell the pesticide. Your key open the bottom knob, which is the only thing that's locked. I left you that key on my last day that I worked the complex"
"I look in office and don't find any key"
"OK, I'll make you one"
"I don't have material but I get it Monday"
"OK, we'll try to hold out til then"
Today I wake up to a flooded bathroom and soaked carpet in my hallway. I can hear the water going full blast next door, and it's going everywhere. I'd had enough. I called the emergency line and hollered into the phone for a few seconds, then erased that message and recorded a civil one for the maintenance man to hear. I did not wait for him to call me back. My wife went next door, but the guy there wasn't home. I went to the Home Depot and bought drain parts and a new deadbolt which has a quick re keying device that I can match to the office keys.
In the drain, there's the typical stuff, you know, grate, vertical pipe, trap, rubber boot, waste pipe going into wall, etc. There's also stuff you usually don't see, but is always there, the standpipe, a junction, and a main drain line. Of course, the standpipe comes out on the roof. It's there so you can snake the main line and unclog it if need be.
I took everything apart first, then cut the copper waste line that goes into the wall. I had to cut out about 12 in square of sheetrock to get to the waste line. I pushed the boot back over the remaining cracked area, closed up the drain, and turned on the water. Water sprays out from the bottom of the sink and from the wall. Looks like I missed with the boot, and the SOB maintenance man had pulled my drain loose from the sink! So I cracked open the drain and water came out of it forever. I pushed the boot further back and tightened up the drain grate. I closed it all up again and turned on the water. This time it held fast, but the water level began rising. Even after I handed him a brand new snake that SOB didn't snake the line, but he told me he did! Why is my snake still shiny silver if he used it!? When I got done it was covered in the blackest, nastiest stuff I've ever seen.
Now here's the kicker: I used the exact same parts when I put the drain together that I had taken off of it. Yet he's telling me he needs "the materials" to fix it. I interpret this as either laziness or incompetence, probably a little bit of both. I snaked the drain, it took like three tries. The thing was so clogged that it nearly jammed my snake line in the drain pipe.
Saturday evening was really when I'd had enough. That's when I sent messages to the Oklahoma Housing Authority, the Housing Finance Authority, the Oklahoma County Attorney General, the BBB, and the landlord's main office. Hey, calling the BBB and the attorney General helped with my wireless carrier, so why the heck not call 'em?
In the end, I did get the drain line fixed. I also installed the new deadbolt on my door. I'm going to call the office tomorrow and ask if they'd like to inspect my work (I do this kind of work for a living, so I know it is good). If so, I'll call out from my job tomorrow and wait for them. If not, I'm going to key the deadbolt to my own key and lock it to keep them from coming in and messing up my drain line.
Wonder why I have a high security lockset? We're surrounded by drug dealers, prostitutes, gangs, and violence. During three months last summer I saw two doors kicked in. One had been kicked so hard that the hinges broke out of the frame. When I got fired from my job here, they tried to evict me without cause. I changed my lockset to something I knew would resist the lock breaking methods their maintenance people had bee taught. I got a lockset that I can re key in about a minute, and I kept the only keys to it. Later I re keyed the knob to work with the key I left in the office on my last day, but the deadbolt could not be re keyed. I got one tonight that I can re key at will.
One other thing, though: when the manager and the maintenance man are both Mexican in an area that has a high rate of illegal aliens, how do I know that they aren't illegal aliens themselves and that they didn't lie to get a job with the complex? If they'd break the law twice already, what's to keep them from stealing things from me when they come in? Better to keep them locked out and risk an eviction, IMO.
so I've spent half the day fixing something that my landlord was supposed to fix. As soon as we have a place picked out to move to, we are going to break our lease here. And no, we are NOT going to pay any kind of early termination fees of any kind. I'm taking my lockset with me, and whether or not I put the old one back on depends on how tired or lazy I am that day. I may also undo the repairs I did to the drain and make them fix it right. I'd have left it alone, but I don't wanna live in a flooded apartment.
111
Posted by
shadow460 , Sun Jul 13, 2008 3:25 AM
What a world. Sometimes I wonder how a person can look so well on the outside and feel so awful inside. Maybe it's just another depressive state.
I've moved around most of my life, and settling down is hard to get used to. Every few years I've been torn up from my roots, and I've had to forge new relationships. It hurts to let the old ones go. I try to stay in touch by phone, but eventually that falls through. It's bad enough having to move on to a new life and leave friends behind. People come and people go, but what happens when a best friend turns against you? How much damage can that cause? How much can one person destroy the relationship between mutual friends for a third party?
I've changed a lot in the last ten years. I'm doing some of the things now that I did eight or nine years ago. I go to the flea market. I enjoy the same games, but they are classic now. I sit in front of a DVD, and soon I will be hitting the theme parks again. I go out the same days that I used to.
Now I'm hunting up the same friends. I just wonder how it is a couple of folks can click as friends. I wonder what it means sometimes, and why best friends can become so important to a person.
I have "lifeline friends" that mean a lot to me. I can trust them with nearly anything, and they won't bite me in the butt with it. In my lifetime, many of those friendships have faded, and one was purposely destroyed.
Maybe it's memories. I've been triggering memories of my past a lot recently as my game collection swells to include what it used to, and my hobbies move toward the same ones I used to have. I spent a lot of time in Hampton Roads, and part of me wants to move back. On second thought, though, maybe if I move cross country, I should go to San Diego instead. It's my favorite city, and I could skirt around the very painful stuff that I may find in HR.
Sometimes I wonder if I don't dig myself deeper, though. I wonder if I should just drop everything and everyone from the past and move along. Taking that to the very extreme would mean dropping everyone from the day of my birth up to the day that decision is made. It would mean breaking contact with everyone I know now, and include closing my account here, too. I don't think I'm capable of such a decision, but perhaps a date at some point in the past could be chosen as the cutoff, say, a date that was a few years ago.
I want stability, and I want to be able to forge friendships that aren't going to fall apart within five years. It's not just one thing I am worried about, it's a number of things:
I hope my old friends will recognize me now. As Linkin Park says "Things aren't the way they were before. You wouldn't even recognize me anymore. Not that cha knew me back then but it all comes back to me in the end." I got a letter from my lawyer today, and I need to re-examine a few things. Even if they aren't going to change, I want to make sure they are set up correctly. I know the first time I step foot in Frontier City, it's going to bring back memories of Busch Gardens Williamsburg, and I will probably come home in tears, hurting from the loss again. Don't get me wrong, I'll enjoy the day, but I wonder if maybe that's why I haven't put forth more effort to get the season tickets. I'm not going to let such a thing bar me from the park totally (I've been to two of the sister parks, Elitch's and White Water Bay both since my ex wife left).
May 2002:
I set foot into the gate, wondering what Elitch's held in store for me. I had seen the ads and I was curious. I rode all the coasters save for the inverted one that they hadn't finished yet. I sat down alone and ate dinner, then rode the giant drop ride again. It was fun, but the whole day I felt this emptiness. I realized that in a crowd I was totally alone.
It's just not the same anymore, though. Even with my second wife and her curiosity toward things, it's just not the same. It is difficult adjusting to her sometimes. It's not as frustrating as you might think, it just takes patience and effort. What I can't understand is why I am still unable to completely unlearn the habits I developed in three years of marriage, especially since it's been twice that long since that marriage fell apart. For the last four years I have known my current wife, and I wonder how it is that even over that time, I still could not unlearn some things. Maybe what I'm trying to change goes deeper than just a few years of my life--maybe it has been with me all along.
I feel like I'm trying to fit a square peg into a round hole. I can't trim down the peg to fit, so I have to reshape the hole instead. My life is the hole, and the peg is...
I'll be fine after a while. Such is my life, going up and down like the rides in a theme park. I have slowly put it back together after a series of events wrecked it in 2002, and again in 2004. It is very important to remember that this is not the result of any one person's actions. The only common denominator throughout that time frame is me. That's right, just me alone.
I'm probably trippin' over nuthin'. But if there's anything going on with my ex that doesn't affect me or my daughter, I really don't want to know about it. It hurts too much, even now.
I've moved around most of my life, and settling down is hard to get used to. Every few years I've been torn up from my roots, and I've had to forge new relationships. It hurts to let the old ones go. I try to stay in touch by phone, but eventually that falls through. It's bad enough having to move on to a new life and leave friends behind. People come and people go, but what happens when a best friend turns against you? How much damage can that cause? How much can one person destroy the relationship between mutual friends for a third party?
I've changed a lot in the last ten years. I'm doing some of the things now that I did eight or nine years ago. I go to the flea market. I enjoy the same games, but they are classic now. I sit in front of a DVD, and soon I will be hitting the theme parks again. I go out the same days that I used to.
Now I'm hunting up the same friends. I just wonder how it is a couple of folks can click as friends. I wonder what it means sometimes, and why best friends can become so important to a person.
I have "lifeline friends" that mean a lot to me. I can trust them with nearly anything, and they won't bite me in the butt with it. In my lifetime, many of those friendships have faded, and one was purposely destroyed.
Maybe it's memories. I've been triggering memories of my past a lot recently as my game collection swells to include what it used to, and my hobbies move toward the same ones I used to have. I spent a lot of time in Hampton Roads, and part of me wants to move back. On second thought, though, maybe if I move cross country, I should go to San Diego instead. It's my favorite city, and I could skirt around the very painful stuff that I may find in HR.
Sometimes I wonder if I don't dig myself deeper, though. I wonder if I should just drop everything and everyone from the past and move along. Taking that to the very extreme would mean dropping everyone from the day of my birth up to the day that decision is made. It would mean breaking contact with everyone I know now, and include closing my account here, too. I don't think I'm capable of such a decision, but perhaps a date at some point in the past could be chosen as the cutoff, say, a date that was a few years ago.
I want stability, and I want to be able to forge friendships that aren't going to fall apart within five years. It's not just one thing I am worried about, it's a number of things:
I hope my old friends will recognize me now. As Linkin Park says "Things aren't the way they were before. You wouldn't even recognize me anymore. Not that cha knew me back then but it all comes back to me in the end." I got a letter from my lawyer today, and I need to re-examine a few things. Even if they aren't going to change, I want to make sure they are set up correctly. I know the first time I step foot in Frontier City, it's going to bring back memories of Busch Gardens Williamsburg, and I will probably come home in tears, hurting from the loss again. Don't get me wrong, I'll enjoy the day, but I wonder if maybe that's why I haven't put forth more effort to get the season tickets. I'm not going to let such a thing bar me from the park totally (I've been to two of the sister parks, Elitch's and White Water Bay both since my ex wife left).
May 2002:
I set foot into the gate, wondering what Elitch's held in store for me. I had seen the ads and I was curious. I rode all the coasters save for the inverted one that they hadn't finished yet. I sat down alone and ate dinner, then rode the giant drop ride again. It was fun, but the whole day I felt this emptiness. I realized that in a crowd I was totally alone.
It's just not the same anymore, though. Even with my second wife and her curiosity toward things, it's just not the same. It is difficult adjusting to her sometimes. It's not as frustrating as you might think, it just takes patience and effort. What I can't understand is why I am still unable to completely unlearn the habits I developed in three years of marriage, especially since it's been twice that long since that marriage fell apart. For the last four years I have known my current wife, and I wonder how it is that even over that time, I still could not unlearn some things. Maybe what I'm trying to change goes deeper than just a few years of my life--maybe it has been with me all along.
I feel like I'm trying to fit a square peg into a round hole. I can't trim down the peg to fit, so I have to reshape the hole instead. My life is the hole, and the peg is...
I'll be fine after a while. Such is my life, going up and down like the rides in a theme park. I have slowly put it back together after a series of events wrecked it in 2002, and again in 2004. It is very important to remember that this is not the result of any one person's actions. The only common denominator throughout that time frame is me. That's right, just me alone.
I'm probably trippin' over nuthin'. But if there's anything going on with my ex that doesn't affect me or my daughter, I really don't want to know about it. It hurts too much, even now.
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