The Not Happy Thread

Oh, yeah, I can believe that. Several years ago I was railroaded out of a job and ultimately out of a career when certain people, for their own aggrandisement, made vague accusations against me. I mean stuff like, "She's unapproachable." "She's too formal." "She's defensive." I kept asking the powers-that-be (whom my accusers had in their pockets-- good old boy and girl network), "But what exactly did I do? What specific actions of mine are they objecting to? Tell me, so I can do better." To which the powers-that-be responded that if I didn't know what I did wrong, that proved I lacked Self-Awareness. And in their eyes, lacking Self-Awareness was the biggest crime at all.

For what it's worth, the therapist they made me go see concluded that I have too much self-awareness, to the point of paralysis sometimes. But I was already out of my position and she had no influence.

I don't think challenging the AA mandate on church-state issues is much to the point. If it weren't AA, it would be something else. And they'd still be sanctioning you for a crime you did not commit and for a decision that is your Constitutional right.

@No-Name Slob, if you don't mind, I'll keep you in prayer for wisdom to get through this and for justice to prevail so you can put this behind you.

 

The above paragraph says it all. It's not so much AA itself as it is the bastardization of my rights, being wrongfully charged with a crime, and my utter lack of control in that situation. I spoke with my lawyer (the big one, not all the associates I've been dealing with up until now) and she is very excited because she thinks my case is perfect for trial. But I don't want to go to trial. I just want it to be over. Going to trial will be humiliating and painful and exhausting and even more expensive, and even then, the results are uncertain. Sigh. Thank you, @Catrin Lewis, it would mean a lot to me to have your prayers.

 

Will do.

And take this or not, from my experience: Don't tell any of these people anything that isn't the strict truth---and be reticent about that. Including in the AA meeting (I'm praying it'll work out that you don't have to go). We writers are good at making up stories and scenarios, and it can be sooo easy for us to make up lies against ourselves in situations like this. Maybe we're trying to make sense of the whole incoherent mess. So we say, "Well, maybe I did do thus and so," when we have no memory of doing anything of the kind. Or maybe They've given us to understand that if we agree to some part of the charges, it will go easier on us and They'll let us get on with our lives.

It doesn't work. They're like sharks, and if they smell blood, in they go for the kill. I wish I'd refused to theorize anything against myself and instead fought like mad using the legal means at my disposal. I may still have gone down, but I wouldn't feel like a spineless wimp.

That's my experience, anyway. Your mileage may vary.

 

That sounds so rough. I don't know what was going on with those people, that they treated you this way, but obviously it hurt. I hope writing about it helped. It generally does for me.

 

That's very good advice, @Catrin Lewis. Just today, I was telling a friend, "I don't know this all seems so freaking crazy that I feel like some part of me was responsible, because maybe I was out too late, or I was ... XYZ." She told me that she'd recently read an article where a test group of accused people who had not committed any wrongdoing were interrogated. Somehow, the interrogators twisted the situation entirely, causing 70% of them to admit on some level that they had done something they had not done. Crazy. If this goes to trial, I don't want to take the stand for that reason, and that's why I refused to be interrogated in jail. I know myself, I know my extremely high anxiety levels, and I know my tendency to want every action to be justified. I'll second guess myself and say something I don't mean, or I'll say something that seems to mean something other than what it does. I want to avoid that entirely.

 

That's specifically because of the type of interrogation system that is taught to law enforcement. It's called the Reid Method, and recently as you have said, it has been proven that there is a large amount of people that will admit to guilt that are actually innocent. Sadly the government would rather use this technique because they would like to have more people to admit their guilt, than to have people that are guilty to not admit they are guilty... which is totally against the idea of innocent until proven guilty.

If I were you, I'd contact your local branch of the ACLU. Here is the one that is in Texas. https://www.aclu.org/affiliate/texas

 

In real life, that Reid Method business makes me really, really mad. In writing life, I think I'll look into it. In WIP No. 2 my protag, a law-abiding citizen, is arrested for a crime she didn't commit. I want her held in jail without bond for several days, and having her trapped by this Reid Method may do the trick.

 

Let me know if you need inspiration ...

 

My buddy (cat) has been gone for a few weeks now but I can still see his image in his sister who I still have.

 

Working on cutting my parents, a sister, and a brother out of my life. I do not want deal with their abusive cycle anymore and its hard (since I have tried to be a respectful daughter and younger sister) argh!!!!

 

We have a roach infestation and it's bad. They're in almost every room of the house (including mine) and my dad refuses to do anything about them except buy bug spray which doesn't work except make his asthma worse. I want him to call an exterminator so he can bug bomb the house, but he doesn't even want to do that because of the price and because we have a cat that my sister really likes and he doesn't want to throw her out and hurt my sister's feelings. It's slowly pissing me off.

 

Hug.

 

So last night my wife and I are driving around searching for a place to eat. A car speeds past us and other drivers going at least 70 in a 30. they were also swerving a lot. we see them pull into a Mcdonalds and I thought about calling it in to the police but was hungry and didn't bother. Later on that night we saw the car again although this time it was being towed away with glass over the streets and an innocent person gong to the hospital (non-life threatening) We then this morning found out that he was charged with four counts including DUI and three drug charges. He could have killed someone and I could have prevented it if I wasn't so frigging lazy as to pull over and call it in to the police. I feel horrible about it and it would have only taken me all of five minutes....

 

My dad treated us to breakfast at IHOP. He was rude to the Latino people (there were a lot of families present) in the lobby there by saying he hopes Trump gets elected for the purpose of turning them away. When he found out our waitress was a tomboy he got angry and defensive. When she left, he remarked that he didn’t want to have a “nasty dyke” as our server (luckily she didn’t hear him and we later had a guy server) and hoped my younger sister never became a lesbian because that's apparently "trending with my generation,” and if my older sister were to become a lesbian too he would have put up with it, but he wouldn’t like it. I was rolling my eyes.

He then frustrated me almost the whole time we worked on a home project (as usual) I’ll take responsibility when I say I broke the railing by trying to rush up the stairs with too much stuff (It was already messed up, I made it worse) when we about to start. We had a few more floor planks to put down near the basement since he did the rest in the kitchen. He wouldn’t listen to anything I said when it came to cutting the planks right, gave his own plans, and that pissed me off considerably because my way would fixed it far better. The basement door had to trimmed down because it would scrape against the floor if we didn't do it. Once we cut it down putting it back in its hinges was a pain because he wouldn’t tell me what he wanted me to do and he took his frustrations out on me when we messed. Then we had to put molding in. he didn't want to put any on the walls because he would rather have it painted instead. I was relived. All so we can have an inspector look at the house and see house much its worth in a few weeks or a month. Personally, I would rather move in a small apartment by myself then put up with his crap any longer.

Rant over.

 

What does the cat have to do with the roaches? Kitteh will have to stay somewhere else till the dust settles, but otherwise . . . And it may not come to fogging the house. Exterminators these days have lots of options. Traps, bait, etc.

I don't understand why your dad won't do anything about the roaches. They carry diseases, including respiratory ones. I don't know how old you and your sister are, but if you're minors and he refuses to take reasonable action against the bugs, the county can cite him for neglect. Which I'm sure none of you want.

Meanwhile, roach motel traps and boric acid along their favorite routes will help a lot, without being too expensive and without gassing everyone out with the spray. They'd be safe for the cat, too.

 

You can also try this stuff, which is totally non-toxic to humans or animals.

http://eartheasy.com/insect-dust-diatomaceous-earth-4-4-lb

 

Yeah. Thanks for posting this. A lesson to us all.

 

http://www.inforum.com/news/4066996-man-arrested-dui-after-south-fargo-crash

Police are now on my speed dial... sadly round here, there is always a next time

 

I hope the person with the neck injury makes a full recovery, and that kid gets the help he needs to turn his life around. 22 is awfully young to screw things up for good.

 

Well back from the doctor and it's good news and bad news. Good news is that my problems aren't auto-immune. Bad news is my red blood cell count is low so I'm losing blood somewhere. Also the doctor believes my rashes are the result of Hyperuricemia which is high uric acid levels. She said it isn't high enough to be gout, though that runs in the family, but that it could become gout and that working on my feet all day long on concrete floors is making it worse. So because of all my past and current stomach problems the doctor is having my go back to a specialist, and she put me on a medicine for the uric acid.

 

Jesus, I've no words... Not just because he acted like a stubborn ox (no offense) with the railing and floor planks, but the way he treated the Latinos who just wanted to eat some delicious pancakes and the waitress.

 

That day in IHOP was on his good day.

 

I've been meaning to have a mega bitch to the Internet nether.

90% of my brain work is done from home. I work remote and only go into the office for meetings and to socialise, to remind people I still work for the organisation. With this massive push for Windows 10 to our personal desktops by Microsoft and their annoying prompts, I would cancel it. What I didn't know was that they recently change the x cancel button to not mean opt-out but to mean opt-in. The sneaky bastards!

So I am literally counting the hours I have left before I can get a key deliverable done along with final tweaks before I officially say, the new system is live everyone!!!

I take a little nap having slept for 3 hours over 48 hours trying to get everything ready. And in the early hours of the morning...my machine mysteriously beeps...Exhausted, I ignore it. Then it beeps a few more times I think. I finally open my eyes and see my laptop is upgrading itself!

I know there are work apps on it that will probably not work for the new OS...I'm almost certain I will not be able to VPN into my work to finish up the outstanding tasks so when people get into work on Monday, it's all ready to go... It means I have failed and I was so close to finishing....

I freak out and shake hubby up. Yeah, I need to stress with company. In desperation I shut the stupid thing down and restart...

Thank god it went into recovery mode and I did get my job completed but it was right down to the wire. I'm an 80/20 rule person.

But really....

I HATE YOU MICROSOFT!

If I didn't hate the Mac OS so much, I would get rid of you! I bought a Mac-air but had to bootcamp for Windows...

 

I tried to repost an item on craigslist, but couldn't because my phone was messed up. I figured I could use my sister's computer and phone. I asked her if I could use it for a second and she said okay. When she just laid there continuing to browse the internet like I hadn't said anything, I got a bit irked. I asked her again if I could just use the laptop for a quick second and with an attitude she said: "just a second." I didn't want to snap so I just stood there while she continued to browse the internet like I hadn't even said anything. She said it might be another 20 minutes before I could use her computer because I came in unannounced, but I looked over and she was looking at nothing important. Eventually I had to get to craigslist on my phone and only needed her phone number, which she gave me. It worked and she continued to browse the internet. If I were more vocal and weren't afraid to stand up for myself my family and I would be just a jumbled mess. I'm such a pushover.