minor inconveniences that are not struggles

[Rufus]

Last time I had food poisoning I couldn't imagine going anywhere. You're playing a risky game.

[Atramental]

Just worked 10 hours straight without eating. Yaaaaay...

Thank goodness coffee dulls the hunger pains.

[chronovore]

Just worked 10 hours straight without eating. Yaaaaay...

Thank goodness coffee dulls the hunger pains.

Between your diet, sleep, and work habits, no joke: you gotta learn to be nicer to yourself.

[Valkyrie]

Please take better care of yourself, Atra. People actually die from that shit.

[Madrun Badrun]

Work is Atra's life.  If he dies working that's just ascension to a higher plane.  Probably where there is a 6 day work week.

[toku]

tis a shame he is no longer a wizard, to sacrifice so much for the human experience  :'(

[Phoenix Dark]

too bad you threw that chubby girl in the bushes, I bet she would have cooked a meal for u and gave you some head tonight but nah you had to fuck it up 

[Madrun Badrun]

lol like that's better than posting on the bore.

[Atramental]

I would've kept her around longer if she didn't feel the need to text me while I was deep in the weeds on some website that needed to be finished before someone in management threw a shit fit.

And she admitted she wasn't much of a cook.

edit: Also, being highly introverted, I only have so much energy to dedicate to people. Being in a relationship and working with people all day drained me so fucking fast. It was frightening.

[toku]

living with autism is hard, but we manage

[Huff]

Excuses are like tampons atra

[chronovore]

I would've kept her around longer if she didn't feel the need to text me while I was deep in the weeds on some website that needed to be finished before someone in management threw a shit fit.

And she admitted she wasn't much of a cook.

edit: Also, being highly introverted, I only have so much energy to dedicate to people. Being in a relationship and working with people all day drained me so fucking fast. It was frightening.

Real talk, being messaged endlessly is bad, but how many of those messages landed when any normal human would have been off work, but you were still hammering away at 10PM?

[CatsCatsCats]

plus, text messages don't require immediate response. If you're too busy, you just don't answer until you're able

[bluemax]

living with autism is hard, but we manage

I have been at my job for 3 weeks and have already sort of picked up the responsibility of translating the junior engineer with tourettes for the non engineering people.

[Atramental]

I would've kept her around longer if she didn't feel the need to text me while I was deep in the weeds on some website that needed to be finished before someone in management threw a shit fit.

And she admitted she wasn't much of a cook.

edit: Also, being highly introverted, I only have so much energy to dedicate to people. Being in a relationship and working with people all day drained me so fucking fast. It was frightening.

Real talk, being messaged endlessly is bad, but how many of those messages landed when any normal human would have been off work, but you were still hammering away at 10PM?

I go to bed early too. Usually around 8:30pm. She stays up to 3:00am because she works 3rd shift at a retail job. 

So when I got home around 6pm the last thing I wanted to do was text someone who I had a mild thing for but quickly turned into annoyance because I didn't realize how needy she was and how socially distant I can become when I'm juggling both work and a relationship. (Things were good when I was on Christmas break, tho.)

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[Atramental]

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[bork]

I go to bed early too. Usually around 8:30pm.

[Atramental]

If I have to work 10 hours I rather work from 6am to 5pm than 9am to 8pm.

My quality of work is much higher if I get a good chunk of it done before lunchtime.

Also, beating morning traffic is great because SC traffic is generally a fucking mess most days.

[Huff]

So the thing about happy hour is when everyone bails you just crush drinks and now I'm hammered

[Mupepe]

A coworker of mine who has been begging for the opportunity was put on a sink or swim project. I've been trying to give them guidance on how to go about completing their deliverable. The first few weeks were gentle rejections of my advice and this last week was outright hostility even though they were coming to me for advice. Their manager has also been trying to provide guidance but it has also gone ignored. Against our advice they asked for an extended timeline and a lower target. It was begrudgingly accepted by upper management and yesterday they told me they has only completed %15 of what was required and it was due today.

They told me their plan for presentation and to basically say "it's too hard." I tried to explain that they needed to communicate better and be precise in how they defended themselves. I'm friends with her manager and they talked to me about it as well. I work closely with the Director who owns the project and told the manager the same thing that they needed to phrase it and present it in a certain way - basically provide solutions to the problems, not just whining. I heard the manager talking to her and then some yelling from my coworker saying that's just not how she works and a bunch of other crap.

So we go into the presentation and from the moment she starts speaking it just blows up. She basically blamed everyone, provided no path forward, wouldn't make eye contact, cried and could give no specific answers.

It's so frustrating to watch someone completely destroy their career in such a trivial way. She was just so stubborn and would not accept any help. I felt like I needed a shower afterwards.

[Atramental]

*TFW when I've passed every sink or swim project that I was given* 

[chronovore]

If I have to work 10 hours I rather work from 6am to 5pm than 9am to 8pm.

My quality of work is much higher if I get a good chunk of it done before lunchtime.

Also, beating morning traffic is great because SC traffic is generally a fucking mess most days.

I hear you on the early hours. Being in the office with no-one to distract me, I had a run at one company where I had completed everything on my to-do list by 10AM every day, for several months.

Yeah, I had to get up at 5:30AM to be at the office that early, and despite the flex-time that was inherent in our contract, the senior management passive-aggressively had an Associate Producer arrive at the office earlier and earlier each morning, hoping to catch me not there when I said I was. This AP gradually grew more haggard and exhausted because his commute was 2 hours, so he was getting up at 3:30 or 4AM to "catch me."

Oddly, no-one in management ever realized they could simply look at the dev room's keycard lock history to verify that I was there at 6AM every day.

[chronovore]

Working on a perfect weather day, windows and screen doors carrying a beautiful breeze through my home office while I work…

…and the construction crew next door is breaking out with their paint thinner for the end-of-day cleanup, all of which is coming in on the breeze.

[bluemax]

Went in to work early and left two hours early so I could be home by 4 for a 4-6 window of having my junk car towed.

It is 6:15 and no word from the towing company. When I call the number I have it says they closed at 4:30pm. FML.

[chronovore]

Wrote this whole thing once, accidentally closed the browser window, lost everything. 

Client finally responded with some assets. Still not /all/ the assets, just some. Jesus, this is getting old.

Trimming some subscriptions I've not been using: Marvel Unlimited, I am not reading enough to rationalize this monthly expense. The website mis-renders on Mac's Safari so I couldn't even log in; used Chrome, killed it. 

Am at Amazon now, going to kill my USA Prime membership because it doesn't help me in Japan. Looks like Amazon has removed region restrictions for things they made (e.g. Man in the High Castle), but not other people's stuff (The Wire, Sicario, etc.). Oddly, their standard music streaming now works in Japan, and now I'm not sure if I want to kill it any longer. :-/ It always comes in handy when I need a rush-order during USA visits.

Speaking of those, trying to book plane tickets for next month, everything is more than $100 more expensive than yesterday. And Expedia's site is being a little PITA. 

Who do you guys go through for plane tickets?

[Valkyrie]

I'm in the same boat as you for the plane tickets. Gonna move/leave Japan around August I hope, and the plane tickets are disgustingly expensive. The only website that had reasonable (but still expensive) tickets were bravofly.com. My regular booking site wanted fucking 50万円.

[chronovore]

I'm in the same boat as you for the plane tickets. Gonna move/leave Japan around August I hope, and the plane tickets are disgustingly expensive. The only website that had reasonable (but still expensive) tickets were bravofly.com. My regular booking site wanted fucking 50万円.

Holy shit.

That's expensive.

 Is that a one-way ticket, or are you going to look into a round trip and just abandon the second flight? Sometimes one-way flights are more expensive than round-trip.

[Valkyrie]

It's me + the kid. She'll be 2 years so she's required to have her own seat which costs almost the same as an adult.

I've yet to find any cheaper one-way tickets (plus I think it'll look bad to leave Japan as a foreigner with a Japanese child on a one-way ticket, lol. I will leave with the right custody papers but I still would wanna avoid that kinda trouble). Luckily there are many routes to get to my hometown, but most websites are fully booked or just too pricey. I think the cheapest I found so far is 20万円, which isn't too far from what we've had to pay in the past. More planes = more expensive. It takes 2 transits to get home. :<

Which websites have you checked on?

[brawndolicious]

Last week I noticed there were a lot of very cheap flights from late Summer to Fall (IE: $650 round trip from San Francisco to Rome) but then apparently that was also noticed on a bunch of deals forums and so now those flights did jump about $100. I haven't had a vacation in.....five years I think so I held a fare at $750 for mid-August. I'm gonna watch it for a week before pulling the trigger.

[Valkyrie]

Just make sure you're always browsing for flights in Incognito Mode. Lots if scummy websites will jack up their prices on returning visitors. Now that Google owns all your data, simply clearing your cookies won't work.

[chronovore]

It's me + the kid. She'll be 2 years so she's required to have her own seat which costs almost the same as an adult.

I've yet to find any cheaper one-way tickets (plus I think it'll look bad to leave Japan as a foreigner with a Japanese child on a one-way ticket, lol. I will leave with the right custody papers but I still would wanna avoid that kinda trouble). Luckily there are many routes to get to my hometown, but most websites are fully booked or just too pricey. I think the cheapest I found so far is 20万円, which isn't too far from what we've had to pay in the past. More planes = more expensive. It takes 2 transits to get home. :<

Which websites have you checked on?

Just Expedia. Your site returned better results, though I'm not sure about China Eastern Airlines' uneven reputation.

Just make sure you're always browsing for flights in Incognito Mode. Lots if scummy websites will jack up their prices on returning visitors. Now that Google owns all your data, simply clearing your cookies won't work.

Shit, I bet that's what happened. I should have known about this trick; thanks for the heads-up.

[CatsCatsCats]

Omg how is it only Wednesday

[Atramental]

Work be like:

[seagrams hotsauce]

Got a letter in the mail a few days back saying my insurance is being terminated this week. Why? I evidently didn't provide proof of residence, because they never fucking asked for it. The best part? The deadline for receiving said proof of residence was in fucking November. Fuck MassHealth.

[seagrams hotsauce]

So I'm not actually getting kicked off, but my status is now "inactive" and thus I'm not covered for anything, but I can't get any reason why or anyone to change my status, so I can't apply for a new plan, or seek any medical attention. Fuck

[brawndolicious]

So I'm not actually getting kicked off, but my status is now "inactive" and thus I'm not covered for anything, but I can't get any reason why or anyone to change my status, so I can't apply for a new plan, or seek any medical attention. Fuck

That really sucks. I'm sure it'll eventually get resolved in a few weeks as you gradually get more frustrated but the phone ping pong gets tiring.

[Atramental]

I'm at this weird crossroads in my life where I'm trying to decide if I should keep on going down the graphic design path or start going down the illustration & concept art path. 

[chronovore]

I'm at this weird crossroads in my life where I'm trying to decide if I should keep on going down the graphic design path or start going down the illustration & concept art path. 

Are you trained as a concept artist or illustrator?

Those are substantially more competitive fields than graphic design, which has a far greater number of available positions. Art Center and Cal Arts, as well as any number of schools and online centers are churning out concept artists every year.

On the other hand, you need to feel actualized in your work, especially if you have a tendency to overwork.

What's your plan?

[Atramental]

Are you trained as a concept artist or illustrator?

Not formally. But I know if I dedicated more time and effort to my drawing ability that I could produce much better work than I do now.

Those are substantially more competitive fields than graphic design, which has a far greater number of available positions. Art Center and Cal Arts, as well as any number of schools and online centers are churning out concept artists every year.

On the other hand, you need to feel actualized in your work, especially if you have a tendency to overwork.

What's your plan?

Competition doesn't skeeve me out too much. If anything it makes me better and helps me hone in on what makes me unique.

I'm thinking about going the online course route instead of enrolling at an uber expensive brick & mortar school.

Noah Bradley's (Illustrator & Concept Artist) Medium article definitely inspired this:
https://medium.com/i-m-h-o/dont-go-to-art-school-138c5efd45e9

On the subject of actualization: Yeah... I don't see myself designing website after boring website into my 30s. It fucking drains me so much. And there's really only one thing that I love to design and that's logos but logo projects are so few & far between.

I'm still working on my "escape plan" but one big part of it is moving in with my brother and potentially working part-time as a designer at the agency I'm at now or at another agency so I can still easily pay rent & bills. Then during the rest of my time I would dedicate it to taking online courses, drawing whenever I could, and possibly doing freelance illustration gigs to help build up my own network of clients.

And hell, if this illustration shit doesn't work out I can always go back to designing websites.

[Madrun Badrun]

Are you trained as a concept artist or illustrator?

Not formally. But I know if I dedicated more time and effort to my drawing ability that I could produce much better work than I do now.

Know the feeling.  My art is never done. 

[Atramental]

Are you trained as a concept artist or illustrator?

Not formally. But I know if I dedicated more time and effort to my drawing ability that I could produce much better work than I do now.

Know the feeling.  My art is never done.

spoiler (click to show/hide)

[close]

[I'm a Puppy!]

Me to my boss:

"K I need to fire these two guys."

Boss: "OK fire guy #1 today."
"K"
Boss: "Oh and fire these 4 other guys from offshore."
"Uh, K, but what about guy #2? He's just eating up my budget and not adding value."
Boss: "Give him 4 more weeks."
"But, I could use that budget for other"
Boss: "Yeah, 4 more weeks will be great."

[chronovore]

Me to my boss:

"K I need to fire these two guys."

Boss: "OK fire guy #1 today."
"K"
Boss: "Oh and fire these 4 other guys from offshore."
"Uh, K, but what about guy #2? He's just eating up my budget and not adding value."
Boss: "Give him 4 more weeks."
"But, I could use that budget for other"
Boss: "Yeah, 4 more weeks will be great."

Just shoot guy #2. Or hire one of the offshore guys to do it.

[Tasty]

<dialog>



This is why everyone hates you, Mozilla. You don't support what web devs want so they target Chrome, and users follow. Fuck you.

[Cerveza mas fina]

When you visit your family once a year due to distance etc and you want your kid to behave and be at her best but nope

When you visit your family once a year and your dad has to give you parenting "tips"*

*from 80's communist Poland

[Cerveza mas fina]

When you visit your fatherland once a year and get reminded of how backwards the mentality is of many here and you know you could never fit in again

[Cerveza mas fina]

When you forget yout daughters favourite stuffed animal in a hotel 400km away

[chronovore]

HOLY SHIT, TWITTER IS FUCKING GARBAGE. 

I've got a regular account, and another for my business. The mobile app allows switching accounts on-the-fly, but not the web browser interface.

Resetting passwords is a pain in the ass.

In this case, doubly-so, because it's registered with a mail account I have also forgotten its password, and for which my forwarding service turned out to have long-ago lost the pwd.

So I find a webmail access for that email, so I can reset the Twitter account's password, so I can log in to it and also grant tweedeck access, which also floods my inbox with a bunch of garbage from the email's months of neglect.

Here I am, I've been doing nothing but account maintenance and password shenanigans and email cleanup for 2.5 hours.

Jesus.

[Rufus]

Get yourself a password manager. I recommend Keepass. It's a standalone program, so you don't have to trust an online service with your passwords. You can achieve the same thing with a simple txt file, BUT txt files don't have a neat auto-type function or a built-in password generator. That may not alleviate the account switching hassles much, but it will ensure you don't forget any passwords in the future.

Well, provided you don't ever forget/misplace the password to the encrypted database. God help you if you do. 

[Huff]

No, but I stopped hanging out with high schoolers after I graduated

[demi]

google hangouts fucking sucks

[Valkyrie]

Huh, how isn't Google Hangout nuked yet?

[demi]

they got rid of old google chat and now its all this hangout shit

[chronovore]

google hangouts fucking sucks

Huh, how isn't Google Hangout nuked yet?

WTF is wrong with Hangouts?

For my part, it took Google Voice and Google's chat stuff, integrated it. I can make free calls to USA phones from my international cellphone, for which Google Voice required a separate app (because: International), and text/voice/everything is integrated into Inbox.

[Atramental]

It me.



I better get one FAT fucking promotion after July is over with.

The new site I'm working on for my company should skyrocket our conversions/sales because our current one is a fucking dumpster fire by comparison.

[Madrun Badrun]

good luck

[Madrun Badrun]

Also please note that I meant that sarcastically, slave 

[Valkyrie]

google hangouts fucking sucks

Huh, how isn't Google Hangout nuked yet?

WTF is wrong with Hangouts?

For my part, it took Google Voice and Google's chat stuff, integrated it. I can make free calls to USA phones from my international cellphone, for which Google Voice required a separate app (because: International), and text/voice/everything is integrated into Inbox.

Oh nothing, I'm just surprised to learn that people still use it. Thought it had died off as fast as Google Plus did.

[toku]

i believe in you atra

[CatsCatsCats]

I guess Photobucket is shit now or has been whatever something something but I can't be assed to rehost an avatar rn