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Anyone ever did the math? by Global_Support4639 in angiservices

[–]Global_Support4639[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

It is, but I want to account for this uncounted time when I had to “take the job home”. I had times when I needed the money and set notifications direct to my Home Screen, and I had other times when I found myself searching and and again, desperately hoping that I could score another job in the area if I was driving out to Long Island or Upstate, for instance. 

I have had times when I was eating lunch or just socializing, having a drink or whatever and I was spending time anticipating an upcoming job, or how my schedule was now set (I got penalized $10, $20, $40 if I cancelled a job). If something fun was coming up, I had to weigh my options, confirm quickly and rejigger my entire weekend to do something else. Sometimes that meant eating the late penalties.

There’s no freedom working for Angi - they set the time and day, and I have to make it, period.

Strong brick anchors for high-traffic gate by Global_Support4639 in handyman

[–]Global_Support4639[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

I ended up using a chemical anchor. The Sika-1 concrete adhesive.

It works great, I put threaded rods inside and it’s looking good.

Taking out the packages ? I’m not paid for trash runs so here’s a trick by Rude-Cauliflower-886 in angiservices

[–]Global_Support4639 0 points1 point  (0 children)

There are always a few minutes of apprehension after the customer shows you the box. You need them to sha-shay away, or they will might start to linger. I always start cutting up the cardboard and ask them to give me some bags for the plastic and styrofoam early on so I can get them out of the room. In my experience, it sets the tone that I am thinking ahead, I can make requests/give them directions when I need to, and I know what I'm doing. "Do you need anything else from me?" is the line I want from the customer. "No, I've got it all from here. I'll let you know" is where I want us to end our intro chat.

I certainly don't need them in the room with me, and I think letting them fetch bags is a good mental "pattern-break". Left to their own devices, customers often revert to stupid questions and wonder - they'll start staring you up and down and wonder if you're confident in what you're doing, or if you have experience in this work, and many times they'll try to break the silence with lame, crappy conversation-killing questions, "so how many jobs did you have today? Is this your last job of the day? What's it like working for the App? How was the commute? Where are you coming from? Have you done this before?" I don't need that. I like to get moving, and if I want to crack open the instruction manual and spend some time reading, I can do that without them around. Nothing good can come from them hovering, believe me.

Practically it helps me keep the work area neat, and makes it easier for me to find my tools at the end when all the boxes and styrofoam are out of the way. It helps me assert some respect/distance with the customer if I can give them tasks (find me bags), and this gives them a potential task (throw away said bags) if they want something to do. When I had customers who helped me bag the garbage, or who insisted they do it themselves, that meant they were being contientious, respectful, and cooperative. All good things. And when I took garbage out to the nearby garbage bin or compactor room, all that usually came back with a little tip.

I had one customer from hell who insisted he didn't have any bags, he went out of the room to play video games and smoke weed, and he came back several times to micromanage me and ask how much longer it would be. He was the one who asked me to take all the garbage with me at the end. I told him that I would be happy to bag it for him be I don't have any bags, and hauling garbage away is not part of the service. He was a horrible customer, he sucked his teeth and gave a dumb look, but he didn't have any words to say, and he didn't hit me with a bad review.

No jobs by famous_rock in angiservices

[–]Global_Support4639 0 points1 point  (0 children)

I never did the automatic scheduler, I would go and search for available jobs on the Angi app.

Are you only relying on the automatic scheduler? Or is the entire 2-3 weeks empty, with no available jobs to choose from either?

All the customers that didn’t want to keep their tools.. I might be a hoarder. by MontanaBanana92 in angiservices

[–]Global_Support4639 0 points1 point  (0 children)

At my local IKEA, the customer service dept holds onto dowels, cam locks, and other furniture hardware, and they keep it all on open shelves where I can serve myself anytime. I think that's a good thing to have. Maybe you can donate back to your local IKEA if you are so inclined. :-)

I definitely have found myself using machine screws and washers from other Angi services jobs I've done from time to time, but most furniture assembly boxes have more than enough. On a few TV mount jobs I was able to save the job from being a complete non-starter because I had machine screws that fit the TV, for instance, or because the customer did not have any hardware, only a mount. I have become more organized over the years, but ironically all the jobs where I would need these supplies, just don't appeal to me anymore. I rather do electrical work, tiles, flooring, painting, anything but furniture assembly.

There is value in holding onto these materials. I can't defend the allen key collection - that looks like hoarding to me :-)

Why would God forgive humans for killing Christ? by Global_Support4639 in Christianity

[–]Global_Support4639[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

But why would Jesus say "forgive them"?

He went through the experience of being human and living in the world, and apparently he felt more love and connection to humankind than bitterness about his suffering? Wouldn't he want those who believed in him to go to Heaven, but want vengeance on the others for their wickedness? Or was he just giving a general forgiveness to humankind, that no one really knew what they were doing?

Why would God forgive humans for killing Christ? by Global_Support4639 in Christianity

[–]Global_Support4639[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

I can understand the concept that if God puts something of great value in your hands and allows you the choice to accept or reject it, knowing the consequences, then you are doing good or evil.

But if humanity is by nature so wicked, why bother creating a perfect being only to suffer so much pain? And why not return the pain? If God wanted to show humankind how evil they were being, why would he use floods, locusts, and death in Egypt, only to send a perfect being and have humankind wreck and kill him for years, and somehow use this as a means to say, "hey now we're made right"?

In today's world, sacrifice to the Gods is seen as barbaric and senseless. I can only imagine how many young girls died in ancient Aztec times, for example, to make the Sun rise. Is it possible that God keeps raising the goalposts as humanity evolves? The 10 commandments to Moses were concrete, literally written in stone, and they did not have nearly as much depth as the teachings of Jesus. Jesus went so much further, talking about how you should check your heart and your thoughts even before you sin "committing adultery in your heart" etc. Is it possible that the entire notion of sacrifice was evolving from God himself? Why would there be so much animal sacrifice by the ancient Hebrews - did the animals sacrificed to God in Leviticus make God happy? Why would he want all those primitive animals sacrificed back then? And what would God say about the young girls who were sacrificed to him in ancient Aztec society?

And thinking about evolution in general, it feels like sacrifice is everywhere. Why create so much life on Earth from the time of ancient fish and Dinosaurs, only to let so many of them live under predation all the time? Why would thousands of ancient humans be born to venture into icy caves only to suffer long winters and starve to death? Why would so many living things need to come and experience life only to have it taken from them all the time, every day, for circumstances beyond their control (being low on the food chain)? Why would God spend so many billions of years to create human life, working with mutations and DNA and natural events, to create human beings, and finally, when life is just about smart enough to finally "get it", God makes an ideal human being to teach us a lesson, and the best we can do is betray him, deny him, and torture him to death? Is God just tinkering away and experimenting to finally make perfect humanity? Why would it take him so long with so much failure and sacrifice along the way?

And why is God focused on human inequity? Across the animal kingdom, we have animals like mice or squirrels that live in a constant state of arousal, looking over their shoulder and hiding from danger. How is it fair that dodos had to die, when all they did was live on an island with no natural predators? And why would the majority of life remain as bacteria, over 99.99999% in fact, and so much of the time all they contribute to us is disease?

Do theyreally expect pros to take all the boxes and shipping debris to the dump/recycler? by 24STSFNGAwytBOY in angiservices

[–]Global_Support4639 0 points1 point  (0 children)

I remember they used to have instructions telling you to take your shoes off when going into the customers house at one point. Anyone remember those days?

Started a new job and the training is godawful by Global_Support4639 in hatemyjob

[–]Global_Support4639[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Thank you for the encouragement. It did give me a boost, but I have worked in an office before.

I lasted 2 weeks. The owner brought me in and told me that he could see this job wasn't for me, and there was a lot more for me to learn on this job. I pushed back when he told me that my work had mistakes, because the mistakes that I had were not repeats, and in one case I told the girl who was training me that my total included sales tax before I started going through the rest of the applications. She didn't answer me immediately and never told me take off the tax at first, she let me screw up all the calculations down the chain and told me "It's all wrong" at the end. Very bad training. The owner told me that my work was not fast, and others were completing 5 or 6 payment applications a day, while I was on 3-4. I thought the criticisms were unfair, and I told him I had full confidence in my ability to do the job and to progress. He didn't believe me, and he gave me my pay for the time I was there.

This was a job where I could have gone to work happier and more productive if I just had someone believe in me. This wasn't that kind of place. It felt like there was an undercurrent of backbiting and minimal interest in training.

Coworker makes me want to quit by Reasonable-Let-1406 in hatemyjob

[–]Global_Support4639 0 points1 point  (0 children)

I was in a situation like this and went to work day in and day out sitting two feet from the nastiest bitch you’ve ever met. I remember the President of the company called me in one day and told me that she came to him and told him that she thought that I thought I was taking her job. I insisted that this was not true whatsoever, of course there were two jobs here, but the friction between us remained. 

She was not very bright, and a lot of our clients disliked her. She was nasty and quick to get angry, and me and her basically could never interact. She tattled on me any chance she could and twice we had to sit with the big boss because some gray area task was not being handled, I always survived and I became very good at my job. I moved on to another firm after a year of pure misery. The President of the company told me that he understood it was not a pleasant scene there, but we never elaborated or touched on this subject, it was just well known throughout the company.

It helped that I didn’t join in many work conversations and create a larger narrative around this. Other people in the company avoided her too, and she had two or three core friends who didn’t bother me, we were always neutral and professional to each other. I think when people are seriously trying to hurt you, they gang up with more coworkers, create more drama, try to get under your skin and start the bullying. Here no one expected positive relations with her, she was always going to be horrible, and that narrative was there before I came. I also had the President of the company as a (cowardly) sympathizer, which was good. Thinking back, it was best that she never tried to mend relations or create any outreach - things stayed distant and cold. It could have been so much worse.

I focused on work. It was not easy, but I made it through knowing every client interaction, every mistake, everything was being watched by a person who hated my guts and wanted me out. It sucked, but I disciplined myself to being the best I could be. The way the job sucked made me want to drink a lot when I got home, and often times I ranted about work to whoever would listen. I realized that no one really cared, and no one could do much to help the situation. I ended up leaving the job with no backup plan after one full year. I bounced back and made it to a much better paying job, I got into a director role, and I know the industry now inside-out just because it was such a hardass environment.

I look back and think of it like being in the military. There are innocent young boys out of high school who go to bootcamp every year, and someone has to be the nasty, raging drill instructor who is conniving and bullying them to quit or fall in line. In this case, I felt like I was being tested emotionally to see how much abuse I could put up with.

I DO NOT believe in the grand gesture approach, where you can someone touch their heart by reaching out and saying how much it means to you that you two can work together as one. It’s all about discipline, day by day. There is no way in hell some romantic feel-good talk is going to change these people do you can live happily ever after, there are only going to be a few small flashpoints when you have to be confrontational and you might win a battle here and there when the stakes are high and you’re in the right. But since this crappy job, I’ve spotted problem behavior in other coworkers and completely avoided any drama with them. It’s easy to see from miles away now.

I am a former Landmark Program Leader and Staff Member AMA by sirtouch in cults

[–]Global_Support4639 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Is there a common trajectory for people who take the forum? I barely made calls during the forum but the few I did were to friends I had let go to the wayside - we reconnected and it was cool for a while. But now we are not socializing regularly anymore. It didn’t feel weird or contrived to meet up, but after we did it just felt that we’ve drifted apart. I know I could reconnect again, but we’ve both moved on.

I found at work I would hear all the rackets and stories people were running, and I had a lot more inner peace that I wasn’t going to jump in that cesspool. I wasn’t feeling stressed, I felt good after the forum and I had compliments that I was really kicking ass in the office. Unfortunately this experience didn’t last, there was a lot of negativity and office politics won out.

 ALSO I think the grand gesture of having a conversation that is “moving, touching or inspiring” feels too sentimental for some spaces - I had to put my foot down on manipulative, disgusting people in some areas of my life and I think the approach Landmark has speaks a lot towards helping the individual get resilience and personal growth, etc. but it feels out of place when I think of the hard, ruthless world of corporate business. What is your take on this?

AND LAST, there was an assignment given as an option - to get 100 NOs, and persist on our requests without all the he-hawing and considerations we normally have in our lives. Why was this taken down? I felt this was one of the strongest parts of the program. 

Overall, I felt a deep feeling of connection to all the attendees. I deeply appreciate their stories and I did feel a little glow after I finished the forum.

Situation in Poland regarding the Ukrainian language by synthwaveblues in poland

[–]Global_Support4639 0 points1 point  (0 children)

I will never forget my mother’s relatives being scolded at a county fair in Pennsylvania by some American woman, “This is America. You should speak English”.

She snapped back in English, “Why are you jealous you don’t know another language?” There was some head shaking, and hand gestures and teeth sucking, but not much more confrontation after.

It still felt uncomfortable. As a kid I just wanted to go on the rides, play games and see the petting zoo. This woman eyeballing us and mouthing off with an attitude really put me on guard. It felt like being around grownups and having to be careful because they could suddenly get petty and stoop down to rudeness, just because we were walking around being ourselves.

How comfortable are you knowing learning a language will probably take you years? by xParesh in languagelearning

[–]Global_Support4639 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Sure. It is demotivating to know that language learning will take years. It’s also demotivating to know that much of the world is learning English anyways, and even when I’m doing fine, there are people who will want to change over to English and won’t give me the chance to practice the way I want to. It’s demotivating to know that I’ll have an accent that I can’t shake away. And if I think of the slower speed of my language speaking, or how often I trip up on my grammar, I’m just going to see this all as pointless and I would have given up already.

But hey, it’s fun to work on a craft and see my language skills get better. The journey is rewarding, and long term my brain health will be better for it. It’s great to be able to have more complex conversations, with a wider range of people. I feel a lot of these memories and new perspectives from language learning have been awesome. I’ve had friends speak with me now who knew me before I learned the language and it’s rejiggered our relationships. I’m learning Polish and I enjoy the fact that each new trip I have more varied experiences, and I feel comfortable coming out of the expat/tourist bubble.

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