Rant VIII: The Reckoning

It is terribly sad when a family member says something so horrific to you that you feel you need to end that relationship.

Are sure certain there is no way to maintain even a small relationship with them despite their words?
Why should he? The brother-in-law has proven himself to be a first-rate shithead with no understanding of and no regard for Nick's feelings, or from what we've seen, anyone else's.

Why should Nick punish himself by maintaining that relationship?
 
That probably would work on Cubs. Boy Scouts would just gang up, take you out with sharpened sticks held together with overly complicated lashings, and then go full Lord of the Flies.
Hey - those lashings are not overly complicated, they're just as complicated as the need to be. In fact, they could probably be a little more complicated, just for good measure. Now, if you'll excuse me, I'll go back to designing the perfect wilderness shelter using only branches, long poles, 1/2" line, and thatch.
 
Hey - those lashings are not overly complicated, they're just as complicated as the need to be. In fact, they could probably be a little more complicated, just for good measure. Now, if you'll excuse me, I'll go back to designing the perfect wilderness shelter using only branches, long poles, 1/2" line, and thatch.
Don't forget the mud.

--Patrick
 
Hey - those lashings are not overly complicated, they're just as complicated as the need to be. In fact, they could probably be a little more complicated, just for good measure. Now, if you'll excuse me, I'll go back to designing the perfect wilderness shelter using only branches, long poles, 1/2" line, and thatch.
Glamper.
 
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It was actually my favorite camping trip of each year during my time in the Boy Scouts, the Ewok campout. We'd go out on a Friday afternoon and spend all afternoon/evening building platforms up in the trees to sleep on. Every year our patrol would try to make something that looked like the house from Swiss Family Robinson, but we usually just wound up with a double-decker platform with a couple of really horrible ladders and a piss poor roof of semi-horribly arranged pine boughs.
 
http://wsav.com/2016/12/04/savannah-officer-who-came-to-runners-aid-dies/

God. Dammit. 2016.

This man was my supervisor at the time. When he broke the news about his cancer in roll call, it was an extremely sober time, and he cussed us out for being so down.

He was a genuinely good man; a bit of a rogue, but with a heart of gold. Great sense of humor, led by example.

I'm on the honor guard, and I get the impression that, barring any specific family requests, I'm going to be a pallbearer.

I couldn't be more honored.
 
AND THE HITS KEEP COMING!

Long story short, my mother was sued by the..... progeny of my grandfather's pill-popping wife, after they both died. The same scum that emptied out his house of DOZENS of heirlooms, and a literal library of books. They claimed that she owed them money as repayment for a "loan" that my grandfather gave her.

This has gone through, and her appeal (to reason) has been denied. I am fucking LIVID.

And then I find out that my cousin has breast cancer.
 
Ahh, this sounds familiar. When my grandmother's sister died, some of their cousins, who were similar to the spawn you mention above, came sniffing around, insisting that my great-aunt had promised them an inheritance in her will. Except that she never left a will, and died with nothing but debt that my grandparents paid off themselves. When the cousins starting threatening a law suit, I told my grandmother she should send them the bills and let them know they can pay their share all they want. I don't know if she just said it, or she actually sent the bills, but they stopped bothering her after that. (Didn't hurt that she also kept a pretty good lawyer. My grandmother would address threats like that as "...Bring it.")
 

GasBandit

Staff member
I have a similar story, too.

I dunno if I told you guys about this or not, but it turns out I've got some second cousins x times removed that I had never known about. Seems my great grandfather had another kid besides my grandmother (who died years ago), but for at least 30 years, since my great grandfather's death, this previously unknown branch of my family, who live in Oklahoma, had been claiming they were great grandpappy GB's sole heirs.

This is pertinent because it turns out he owned the rights to a whole bunch of oil producing land being actively pumped by an oil company, which has been paying these Sackville-GasBandits the share of the profits that would have been due a sole heir. Nevermind the fact that my grandmother was apparently entitled to half of it, which, since she has died, then transferred down to her children, one of whom has died (my mother), so basically my Grandfather's been spending time building and carrying out a lawsuit against them, and apparently I'm owed 1/12th of a share of 30+ years' back profits on oil payments. That litigation is ongoing.

But at least the oil company now is disbursing payment differently, so, going forward, it'll be nice to have an extra ~5k a year.

It doesn't feel like this goes in the rant thread, but this is where the topic of litigation with distant relatives came up...
 
Kati has a grandfather with a not insubstantial trust (mostly built by grandma, who is now dead).
When Kati's mother predeceased Kati's grandpa (who must be 90-ish by now), he moved in with Kati's uncle.
Kati's uncle has check-writing privileges against the trust "...to provide for [grandpa]'s care."
Every year, that trust gets suspiciously smaller.

--Patrick
 
I am all too familiar with families disintegrating over the death of one person. It doesn't help that I have lawyers in the family.
 
I hate to say it, but that does sound like the effects of small strokes. Though when my grandmother was on heavy medication, she would have similar episodes.
 

GasBandit

Staff member
I had a great aunt who manifested similar symptoms, right down to the confusing phone calls to relatives - she called various distant relations telling them my uncle had dropped out of college because of drugs, when in fact he had graduated 10 years prior. When my Dad and I went to go check on her, she could barely talk. We took her to the hospital and the doctors discovered she had had a stroke. The good news is, they were able to help her recover most of her faculties. She died 5 or 7 years after that, but it was unrelated to her stroke.
 

GasBandit

Staff member
One incident on Saturday, after telling her I need to wash my hands after cleaning the litter boxes before fixing her a sandwich, she insisted I wash the bananas. She got upset when I told her I had never in my entire life had heard of such a thing, and refused to eat the sandwich if I didn't wash them. I wound up fixing her a bowl of cereal with cranberries instead.
Well, I hope you remembered to wash the cereal.
 
My Dad should be headed to surgery today or tomorrow. He broke his back a couple of months ago, and never noticed. He just thought he was "down in the back." He also did not notice the pneumonia at the same time either.

Sometimes being a tough old bird has its drawbacks.
 
So my leg isn't healing properly. They need to go back in and fiddle with some shit. So I get to go under the knife. Again. On February 14th. Happy Valentine's Day.
 
I would have told you to have them check for that (if you hadn't mentioned they were), it's something that my wife has seen multiple times in her job. Don't know why it does those symptoms, but it's one of the things that she makes them check all the time when one of her wards is having dementia type symptoms.
 

Dave

Staff member
We have an old spare fridge in the garage. Tonight I went out to get my dinner (baked tilapia...mmmmmm) and the freezer side is not freezing. The fridge side does okay, but so much for having a garage freezer.
 
We just had this happen with my father-in-law. I meant to mention it as an alternative. They kept him under observation for a couple days and rehydrated him. He hated being in the hospital, but he came out of it none the worse for wear.
I don't understand the reasoning, either. How does a microbial party in your bladder confuse your brain? They're so far away from each other (ideally)!
We have an old spare fridge in the garage. Tonight I went out to get my dinner (baked tilapia...mmmmmm) and the freezer side is not freezing. The fridge side does okay, but so much for having a garage freezer.
Someone didn't accidentally bump the temp setting, did they?

--Patrick
 

Dave

Staff member
Nope. It's set as cold as it can go. We've had the thing for at least 20 years and when we got it it was already used, so it's not a big surprise. Still, I LIKE having an extra freezer in the garage for overflow. Our indoor freezer is kinda small so it's hard to buy long-term.
 
Nope. It's set as cold as it can go. We've had the thing for at least 20 years and when we got it it was already used, so it's not a big surprise. Still, I LIKE having an extra freezer in the garage for overflow. Our indoor freezer is kinda small so it's hard to buy long-term.
Did you try blowing out the condenser coil on the bottom of the fridge? It could be covered with dust.
 
There are a lot of things that could cause this. When our freezers stop it's most often because the interior coils weren't defrosting correctly. You may find that unplugging it, and leaving it open to completely defrost will restore functionality. Most freezers automatically defrost the interior coils periodically, but that system can sometimes fail, particularly if the door seal is leaky and letting air moisture into the freezer.

Dirty external coils might do it - clean coils with a brush.

Broken thermostat might do it - is the compressor running when the freezer is obviously above temperature?

Very leaky door seal might do it (check around with a piece of cardstock slipped between the freezer and door seal to find "easy" spots where the seal isn't making strong contact).

There are a few safety features some have, such as if the compressor heats up too much you might have to push a button somewhere to reset the breaker on or near the compressor.

These guides are pretty useful:

https://www.repairclinic.com/RepairHelp/Freezer-Repair-Help

But the first thing I'd try is defrosting the thing. It can take several days, though. Pointing a fan into the open door can speed things up, but you don't want to stick a heater in there...
 
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