okay, been off work past 3 weeks.  Have a problem still not totally defined.  Have a problem that is physically limiting me.  Fist 12 days I had a Drs. note to be off so as not to aggravate this.  Still after a CT scan (which I ran into my bosses boss, who is my 'big boss' - he was there to get something done not just checking up on me), 4 different pain and antibiotic shots, 6 different lab draws, and a few finger pokes they still don't exactly know what it is...but they can physically feel it.  So still off.  both drs go on vacation (I think, I know one is for sure).   Anyhows, I come back to find out I was not scheduled to work that particular day.  No prob start to go home..then a coworker calls in sick.  I offer to work the shift and get an okay.  6 hours in sides hurting like I got stuck with a hot poker (no, its not appendix...pains on the left).  Big boss says 'go home.  don't come back until both drs say you are okay.'.  he states he'll tell my boss and it's cool.  okay go home take pain pill watch pretty colors and grin stupidly.  3 days later scheduled to work..get phone call from immediate boss 'why are you not at work?'.  I return the call when I become coherent again.  I tell him because big boss...his boss, sent me home.
I hear 'he never told me'.  well shiitake mushrooms I'm getting wrote up as a no-show.  I've work there 16 years never had a no-show. So I call the big boss in his office.  I tell him what happened.  He says he'll fix it.  He says later to bring in drs notes that say I was seen by them.  okay go to dr that is not my normal dr., she does not show up...stuck in surgery.  okay reschedule.  still get note from the office stating was there but not seen and visit rescheduled....after labor day.  take note to work.  Big boss not there, my boss is there and takes note.  gives me nasty look.  no responces at the moment but thinking my boss will 'lose the note'.  Got a surprise ... I made copies (make copies of all papers from work.
wondering if the note I handed will make it to the big boss.

thanks for letting me gripe

I feel you there. Years ago after I had an accident that layed me in the hospital, one of the managers threw a fit because I could not go to work the day after the accident.

I was in the hospital in and out of consciousness every couple of hours asking over and over why I was in the hospital.

I lost a job once because I am Diabetic. My manager thought ALL diabetics suffered from fainting spells and every single other bad diabetic story he had ever heard. Told me to keep my job I would have to get a FULL work up by a doctor showing I was ok to work. I asked if the company would pay for that cause I did not have that kind of money (I really don't think he understood what he was demanding).
Prior to that incident I had a great rep at my job, I was the one they called on to go work at other stores if the need arose, and such things (Loved getting those as it got me extra pay). Then this one manager cans me cause of his delusions about people with health problems. That was a long time ago, but it still sticks in my craw the way he reacted to my health condition and him trying to force me to get several hundred dollars in doctor test and bills just so I could keep my minimum wage job. (I know roughly how much All the test would run that he wanted me to get cause I have had them before - went full diabetic just before Thanksgiving after my 18th birthday, my birthday is in October, just to put it in perspective).
Not the worst manager I ever had, but definitely one of the dumbest.

New hard drive time, wooot. I had an error this morning, and crashes through the day. In my attempts to fix them, somehow recovery wiped the drive and now nothing will recognize it.

There goes my spare cash. At least I get a discount I recon.

No guarantee?

In reply to OceanLake (msg # 634):

I have had this hard drive for over two years. It has been a good run. Dang fool, had to have been lv 5 by now. Pity not only did it fail saving throw, but its cleric fumbled the spell to save it.

Okay still off from work.  But have now had surgery now.  have a huge bruise and swollen area on my left side the size of a large saucer plate and a 5 inch and 3 inch gashes (one was for a drain), its swollen in parts and oddly concaved too.  good news no hernia or lipoma but it was swollen..so much it was pushing my floating ribs out of place.  so she removed normal happy fat cells.  hopefully that is all it will be.  I go back on the 27th.  I'll have been out of work 6 weeks.  work wants me back.  They keep calling and asking when.  You'd think after I have reminded them that they want my drs release for me to come bac, if not back I can't help it.  Buttheads you'd think they'd understand their request when they made it.  lol

In reply to pitademon (msg # 636):

You must be really good at your job for them to want you back so much. So that is a good thing yes ?

In reply to pitademon (msg # 636):

I was the other way around when out for my accident, I had to argue with the doctors and sign paperwork to get my surgery done so I could start mending. they wanted to wait for the concussion to heal, but I could not afford to put off the surgery for 3 more months.

I hope they think I am good.  lol.  Been there 16 years and when this new group took over 2 years ago there are only 4 of us 'grandfathered in' left.  The good thing is they did get rid of a lot of the old people who were not doing their job.  Including one gal we called our 'holy roller'.  She did not want to work with you if you not only believe in GOD, but HER GOD.  If you did not go to her church you were going to hell.  I often told her My God could beat up her God and that her God told me to tell her he'd choose who went where and that she had just better do her job or go home.  She wanted to only do one particular shift and not help others who might have needed it.  When the new group came in they said people were going to have to learn other shifts.  She threatened to quit.  EVERYONE said BYE! and waved at her.

I won't say names, but I just dealt with the most toxic DM I've ever seen, so far. Not only is he supportive of a party member that ditched the party in a time of need, only to slander us to other players, and then finally tried to puppeteer us OOCly when he wanted to blame us. I call him out, DM hounds me, and I try to tell him to let the issue die. Nope, I get harassed consistently by the DM, and then cherry picks or manipulates "quotations" in an attempt to make me look bad when i tried to be reasonable. He kicked me and didn't even let me get my sheet. He then has the audacity to have a "final word" rMail and after I explained his fault to him again, threw an actual "final word" rMail which, to summarize, was only further proof that he was being dumb and unreasonable, and blocked. Coward can't even take what he dishes out. What sucks is that we can't even retaliate against this.

At least I got him nice and salty, all the while being right and reasonable. Suck on that, DM
This message was last edited by the user at 02:44, Wed 21 Sept 2016.

been there.
worst is when they do this 'I am GM so I will be respected...period.  I do not need to respect you..a player'.  Bullbiscuits! Respect goes both ways.  When a GM puts his NPC's ahead of the overall game and the players, uses his player character(s), to control the game and make the critical moves without the players and their characters the game is not fun.  That is just a poor story teller wanting to showoff.  As a GM should let the players make the mistakes or make the grand moves as needed that is showing respect.
Some time ago I was in a game with a GM(who shall be nameless) who had a player character and it was this one that made all the grand gesture points in the game, If a plan was needed it was his we had to follow even if all the other players put in their two cents and dismissed.  We had a disruptive player (one that really got off wanting to poke the bear), instead of dealing with that player, the targets were basically told 'stay away from him as player and charrie'.  Ask a question or offer input never helped.  He constantly kept ejecting good players who did not go with his flow, including players that were there before he was a GM.  why would he be shown respect after this?
All I can say is you know who he is (or she) and just let others know how toxic he/she can be should it arise, and if you are GM and they apply to your game just tell them no.  And you are better off letting them wander off, eventually good players will stop playing with horrible GMs.

so far, the two GMs i have been playing with have been great! the second GM turned out to be a core player of the first GM's group, that i started playing with, so we're all sort of like a big family. xD

It is funny how that happens sometimes. I remember back when I used to be big in this site, I had to laugh when I realised that my gms were in each others games with me. we kept applying to the same type of game.

I get it. I really do. Looking for logic with some people is a waste of time and energy and my ability to make keyboards beg for mercy. But why in the Hades' name is it that way? Sometimes I just want to scream because even when you've countered every point, even when you've made all the right moves and they've had to concede everything else, people won't admit when they're wrong. Dead wrong. They just stop altogether, as though they weren't just screaming about how wrong you supposedly were, or they insist that somehow, someway, despite it all, they're still right.

And I get it. People don't like to be wrong. People sometimes won't bring up points they're hiding because of X, Y, or Z. But when all you say is "Well, I still think it's this" then that's just...

I've been in the middle of a very long spiral towards... something, I guess, for a long time. I don't know what, exactly - depression, or insanity, or just pure apathy - but I know that I'm getting there day by day because people don't seem to use or understand basic logical flow. If your concerns are A, B, and C and I address A, B, and C, it is not your duty to come up with D just so you can still say no. If I prove to you, not just to me but to you, that what you've said is wrong, it isn't your moral obligation to downplay that in order to keep your opinion alive. If I, or anyone for that matter, tries to explain to you that you don't know what other people think and feel just because you think you do, and you can't get it through your skull that you're not psychic, or some sort of emotional savant, or whatever else then you're the problem.

I don't know where I'm going with this one. I'm tired and overworked. I'm at a job I honestly don't know if I like or hate, but I know that most other jobs won't pay nearly as well, and I can't afford to be paid less. I really can't. Tuition, sick animals, sick cars, sick family members, rent, insurance, and lord only knows when my laptop is going to go out, and then I'll really be in a hole. Every time I build up a little bit of savings, BAM, something nabs it away. And I'd get a new job tomorrow if I didn't think it would all happen again. And you know what's stupid about that? I tell everyone that if you don't love your job, you shouldn't do it. Yeah, I'm a hypocrite, but I'm also someone who doesn't back down from obligations.

Actually, I have a bleeding heart. I probably have two. Four twelve hour shifts into an 8 day work week and I stayed on for an extra two hours tonight because I wanted to help out my coworkers. I didn't do it for the money, heck no, because I'll barely see a few dollars out of that time I spent, but I did it because I couldn't just abandon them with a store full of people. I helped out because I could, and I always do that. And it's driving me further along this spiral to somewhere (or nowhere, I guess) because, at the end of the day, I just keep doing it. I don't ever stop. I can't. I've tried and tried and I really don't know how to be selfish without it eating me up inside. If I were religious I could blame it on The Guilt^TM, but I'm not and so it's just regular, everyday martyrdom.

Because I would. I would throw myself in front of a bus if it would help someone, and I would do it again a second later, broken in every way, if it meant someone else would smile. And that's what I don't get about people. Who in the world is your inability to follow basic logic helping? Is it just your own ego that can't stomach it? Are you somehow saving children by insisting that your interpretation of a vague ruling is right? Is acknowledging someone else's point of view - and not just any point of view, mind you, but one backed up by logic and facts, sometimes even more than your own - really going to hurt anyone? Just acknowledging it. Not saying it's right but just saying "I can see where you're coming from," is that really so much to ask?

And, no, I'm not just ranting for myself (as you might have guessed). I'm ranting because I see people dismiss arguments and rational discussion, or insist on something being a different way, and it does hurt people when they refuse to yield. It hurts group cohesion and it hurts people whose only crime is presenting a logical path to follow that doesn't jive with the one some pig-headed Rules Lawyer thinks is the Only Way (patent pending). Maybe it doesn't hurt all of them, and maybe I just have softer skin than most, but it kills me to see someone ignored and dismissed because someone can't get their head out of their own air of superiority. It kills me to see rational discussion lose out to trolls, to unsubstantiated claims, to petty biases, but it especially kills me when it means that someone is going to see it and think 'Well, it looks like neither side won so maybe giraffes don't exist.'

Giraffes exist, no matter how much I might joke otherwise because of a video I once saw.

... I just don't know what to do sometimes. I don't know if I belong where I am or if I'm trying to hard, or just not enough. Maybe everything I do just isn't enough and if I did more I'd find out that's what I was supposed to do. Doing less feels like quitting, like giving up, like being selfish. And I think - I think, because I don't know - that that's just the guilt talking. But I do feel better when I help people, when I succeed in doing more, and so maybe it's not. Maybe I'm spiraling because I'm supposed to catch a draft somewhere and soar back up. Or maybe I'm just delaying the inevitable, trying to soften the landing. The blow. The end.

I'm not suicidal. I don't really believe in taking my own life for a lot of reasons, nor hurting myself. I do though, in some ways. I hurt myself mentally by agonizing over everything. Over what I should've said, could've said, might've done differently. I hurt myself emotionally by keeping this all bottled up until it bursts. I don't mean to. I just don't know where it's all supposed to go because the last time I talked to anyone about it all it was clear to me, truly clear, that it didn't mean as much to them. I was just another person to them, not me but... anyone. Anonymity sucks when you're spilling your guts. Not the anonymity that comes from being behind a screenname, the kind you can choose for yourself, but the kind that people assign to you. Being no one to someone you're trying to talk to is far worse than saying nothing at all.

I guess it all kind of cycles around, eh? I guess I hate seeing all of this because it reminds me of myself and how powerless I feel to be heard. I want others to be heard and to hear so that maybe there's some hope for me. Maybe I am selfish after all, but who isn't? Who has ever done good deeds repeatedly when they did not experience some sort of good themselves? Maybe an inkling of a feeling of an edge of happiness or peace, but something. Who does good to feel bad, truly bad, with no reward at all?

It's 11:34 and I should've been in bed an hour ago. I need to wake up tomorrow. Go to work. Help more people so I can keep helping people. But as I sit here I keep wondering, keep asking myself in my head, 'is it worth it?' Is it? When there are people who will deny the facts, who will insist on giving you nothing, not even a penny for your thoughts, people who will take that penny and use it to gouge out the carefully laid lines of your arguments and yourself, when those people are the ones with the loudest of voices... how long can you keep shouting against the wind, wondering if anyone hears you? I tell myself it is. I tell myself that if someone doesn't fight then soon no one will, and then, without a revolution, all of it will be lost.

Rage. Do not go gently into that good night. Fight for what's right. But don't let it consume you. Don't let it become zealotry and hate. Listen. Hear. Understand. Try to be the good, the change, you want to see in the world. And Heaven help us, if it's right that it should do so. Or Paradise. Or Asgard. Or Jamaica. Or Narnia. Or anywhere in the universe, in anyverse, in everyverse, help.

Help. For I fear I am lost, and yet I keep going. I keep trudging through the muck in hopes of a brighter tomorrow, and yet it seems I plunge only into darkness. I fear evil. I fear good people doing nothing, losing their hope and faith. If I were religious, maybe that would mean something more. Maybe it would inspire or... maybe it would deject. I don't know. I'm so tired and I just feel like I don't understand. For all I know. For all I get. I don't understand.

I know the advice. I give it out like candy, like free samples, like pamphlets and flyers on a street corner. I've talked to a therapist, I've talked to friends, I've talked to myself and although I probably should, I guess I just don't talk enough to anyone who might give me medication (which I probably wouldn't take long enough to notice if the effects were working). I know. That's stupid. But it gets harder and harder to talk the more anonymous you feel. The more you feel they aren't listening, or that they are and you just can't muster up all this - this wall of text and words. - the harder it gets to try and save yourself. I would hold anyone to a wall and talk to them for hours if it meant someone else would get help. But me? Well...

I guess this is all to say that I wish people were a bit more logical, and that I'm hoping there's someone out there who feels the same. I know there are. I just... I had to say something. I had to, and so I have. It's disjointed and broken and it's made me feel like I'm more lost than ever, but I've said it in an anonymity I've chosen, not one given to me. Maybe that'll make a difference. I hope so. I need sleep.

Thank you for reading, if you have. Thank you, and goodnight.

o.O

In reply to RedTeamPyro (msg # 640):

Like the saying goes; there's your side, their side, then the truth.

You metagamed. Whether intentionally or accidental is irrelevant. The issue was brought up and then the DM voiced their opinion. The logical and mature response would have been to acknowledge the incident, apologize for your part in it, rectify the situation and then move on. But no, you couldn't do that. You had to make it personal. Granted, the other player in the situation really handled themselves poorly OOCly, but guess what? You don't have to deal with that. You could have done the mature thing and ignored it, but no, you let him win and gave in to his childishness.

As far as all your other slanderous accusations, I'm not even going to dignify them with a response or rebuttal. You know what you did wrong but yet you're here crying wolf trying to get pity.

In reply to GammaBear (msg # 646):

+1

I would have posted the same, but well... sometimes I feel its better to let sleeping dogs lie, as I would hope people can learn from their mistakes. Maybe I reflect more then others though.

In reply to Merevel (msg # 647):

Seeing stuff like that irks me to the bone. Wanna complain? Fine. I couldn't care less. Wanna completely spin the whole situation to make you the victim. Uh, no. I can't handle that.

We were supposed to have a guest over this afternoon.  There were a round dozen little bits of cleaning that needed to get done, and I didn't want to be the one to do them all.  So I sent my hubby an e-mail from work so he could at least get a jump start on things.  My husband has a bad habit that he doesn't really clean anything until there's a sharp and compelling reason, like something is inconveniencing him, or there's someone coming around he wants to impress.

Husband of mine, do consider that I give up a portion of my time I might otherwise spend on leisure to clean up the house on the days that I work.  I go to bed late and barely get four hours of sleep a night trying to catch up with housework and unwind from work.  I clean right around you and it doesn't seem to register.  I leave things undone, and they stay undone because that just don't seem to register with you.  It doesn't seem to occur to you to put away the dishes I clean (which you won't clean them because the water apparently hurts your hands, never mind the dishwashing gloves I got you three years ago), wipe down any surface in the kitchen or bathroom without prompting, and if you ever dusted voluntarily, I might expire from shock.

I already know about your back problems and all, but there are lots of smaller things you can do, things that suck up my time and leave me perpetually sleep-deprived.  I work longer hours than you, I work nights, and I'm making 3/4s of our household income.  You can tear yourself away from your damn MMORPG for an hour a day to help with the ding-dang household chores.

I'm at the point where I'm going to have to make an adult chore list, so he can see how massively unbalanced our workload is.  Somehow, my husband thinks we can just do a cleaning blitz for an hour or so before guests arrive.  He seems to forget we live in a vastly larger house than we did two months ago, and it takes far longer to clean when you've let it go for weeks on end.  Yes, you have to dust weekly.  You have to scrub the toilet and wipe down the bathroom floor and baseboards.  You have to shake out the bathroom rugs, vacuum the rugs in the main rooms, and sweep all the hard surfaces.  And mop.  Weekly.  A little every day, just to keep things up so that your one-hour cleaning blitz is more about putting away the day's mail and dirty dishes and doing a quick wipe-down of a few surfaces, not breaking out HAZMAT suits for a four-hour stint from hell.

And honestly, if I just left it until it reached critical mass?  I'd still end up cleaning it all anyway.  I've tried that.  I always break before he does, because the idea of having this lovely new house we bought just go to hell makes me want to cry.
This message was last edited by the user at 17:07, Wed 21 Sept 2016.

In reply to Isida KepTukari (msg # 649):

Your Hubbies mind set seems to be bachelor slob (being one myself I see it). I Mean to get up and clean, do laundry etc. But for some reason it's just not important till it gets close to critical mass (like your down to 1 more shirt, towel, etc till you do laundry, not that it's hard, just does not seem important.
Hm, reading this I realize I just described signs of Depression. May have to get that looked in to someday. (Been suffering from depression most of my life - the meds don't work on me, or leave me nutzo, manic, or suicidal. OR they have a bad side effect on my other medical conditions (diabetes heart, AVM being the primaries.)
Oh if they could just come out with a medication that won't Kill you from the side effects.

Anyway you may want to look in to that possibility in his case.

In reply to Isida KepTukari (msg # 649):

Perhaps your finances wont' allow this, but if they will, after you make your lists if nothing changes, tell him you're going to hire someone to help with the cleaning because you just can't continue to do it all.  ShadoPrism's take may be right, but besides the bachelor mind set thing, I wonder if his mother 'did it all'.  People who have never been responsible for doing the housework really have no idea how much work it is, after all, it just gets done, doesn't it?  Magically?  If someone grows up this way, it can be very difficult to retrain them as an adult.  Even if they begin to see logically what is true, every instinct says otherwise.  After all, who really wants to do all that stuff?  (OK a few people do, but he obviously isn't one of them.)

In reply to Brianna (msg # 651):

Since he moved overseas to be with me, 8 years ago, I've considered depression.  I still may push him to look into that, no matter how much he neglects to see doctors of any sort.

But yeah, he lived with family until he came to live with me.  He's from England, and the cost of living being so high, it was immensely more economical to pay rent to live with his father, stepmother, and grandmother.  He only ever really had to bother with his room, but the rest of the flat was cleaned by his grandmother (she insisted).

As far as he's concerned, the cleaning does get done magically.  But then he scolds me for not getting enough sleep.  At some point here, we will be having a Conversation.  I'm hoping the addition of props and lists will make him realize I'm Extremely Serious, and if he can't get it through his head that I need help every day, as opposed to his self-imposed weekly chore of laundry, then we will be having additional Conversations in the presence of a counselor of some sort.

To top off the day:

Me: "Let's go to the local art museum tomorrow, the one I've been trying to get us to for four months!"

Husband:  "Ok."

----

Later:

One of the previous owners of our new house apparently had a teenager/preteen living in what is now our guest bedroom.  I can tell from the 2 dozen repaired holes in the walls, discoloration from way too many pictures and posters, and the massive amount of sticker residue on the door.  My in-laws are arriving in a month.  As I had the supplies and a night off (I work nights, so I stay up the nights I do have off), I decided tonight was the night to paint the guest bedroom (mostly because I was feeling motivated, and sometimes you just have to strike while that iron's hot).  Masking, painting the edges and corners, using the roller, the whole nine yards, I was going to get. it. done.

2/3rds into the process, husband comes in bleary-eyed (he was sleeping in the next room).

Husband, announcing: "We're not going to the thing tomorrow.  All I can hear is that rumbling from that roller."

Me, thinking:  Well, golly gosh, I'm sorry the tedious labor I alone am undertaking on behalf of your parents and to improve the look of our new home is causing you to lose a little sleep.  We had workmen in the house during the day when I was supposed to be sleeping for several weeks during our more involved renovations, and I just turned on the white noise generator and tried to get my shut-eye regardless.  And since the last painting project I implored you to share with me you pooped out on 1/4th of the way through, I knew that you would never do this on your own, so I had to do it.  And my night off is now.  I am not going to stay awake all day as well as all night to do this.  You refuse to use earplugs or the white noise generator so... too bad.

Me, saying out loud, somewhat exasperated:  "Ok."

Because he was way too sleepy for me to talk to and get intelligent answers. If I'm going to talk to him, it's going to be when he can remember what I said.

I guess I'll be going to that museum on my own or with a friend.

Isida... Take a friend but tell him you are going on a date.  lol.