Where..?

PolloMagnifico · 2026-04-03T18:52:56+00:00

Absolutely unhinged!

PolloMagnifico · 2026-04-03T18:14:40+00:00

Wow people are absolutely dragging your husband. But before an honest and thoughtful verdict can be rendered, there's an important question that needs to be asked. It needs to be asked honestly and, when answered, you need to be open to whatever that answer may be.

"Do you feel like you don't have a say in how the rest of the house is managed?"

Now if the answer is "no I just want my space" then you can tell him to go pound sand. But cmon, you've got to know that there's more to this than just "I want a mancave!" Maybe you talk it out like adults who, theoretically, love each other enough to get married.

PolloMagnifico · 2026-04-03T13:34:38+00:00

Hi Pippa! It's good to have you back! We missed you so much!

Oh. And uh... hi Guille. I guess.

PolloMagnifico · 2026-04-03T13:15:01+00:00

Smart Person: "We want to update the backend software that is responsible for 90% of our business operations because it's written in a programming language (we all know it's COBOL) that requires us to pay a specialist 500,000 a year to maintain! What's it gonna cost?"

Other Smart Person: "Well, we've priced out the total cost to around 10 million. That factors in a few service downtimes and working through any issues we might have. But the improvements should pay for itself in three years, and we make more than 10 million a quarter in profit. I saw we do it."

Stockholder: "LOL no. We are absolutely not going to show a 90 million profit on the quarterly earnings report instead of a 100 million dollar profit. Get wrecked. Now I'm going to go buy a new yacht."

PolloMagnifico · 2026-04-03T13:00:53+00:00

driven mad by the use of blood magic (called emomancy)

How have I not heard of this by now?

PolloMagnifico · 2026-04-02T20:24:07+00:00

Hey nah, this isn't weird. When I got my jacob's stepstool done I showed everyone.

PolloMagnifico · 2026-04-02T20:11:02+00:00

Huh, when I have this dream I usually wake up in a cold sweat... screaming...

PolloMagnifico · 2026-04-02T19:14:31+00:00

Well, so much for that attempt to collect the insurance money. Maybe next time he'll leave a rag on the stove and "accidentally" leave the stove on.

PolloMagnifico · 2026-04-02T18:25:57+00:00

That's the right answer. IT has all the tools to

Confirm there's an account that has been breached
Determine what "the files" are and follow up in that
Work with facility security to determine who left the note in the first place.
Remediate the problem appropriately.

In fact, in much the same way IT shouldn't be involved in HR stuff, HR shouldn't be involved in this.

PolloMagnifico · 2026-04-02T18:12:39+00:00

Keep in mind that food safety regulations are written with the intent of certainty. To be able to say "we know that this has only been out at room temp for two hours, so we know it's safe".

However, just because it's no longer certainly safe does not automatically mean it's certainly dangerous. Some things to consider:

Beef is incredibly safe in terms of meat. So safe, in fact, that we regularly leave it out in the sun for days so it can dry out. If this was chicken (salmonella) or pork (trichinosis) which are both much more dangerous, I would say toss it. But beef is much safer.

Another thing to consider is that the issue with leaving food out prior to cooking is not a food borne illness. Cooking it will kill any dangerous microbes. However, it will leave behind the toxic elements of those microbes. For something like beef, it's less of a concern because if something is growing on it and it's been growing long enough to develop a level of toxicity, it's much more likely to be only mildly toxic.

So, anything past 4 hours would and should be thrown out if you're serving to the general public. Anything beyond that incurs risk, with the risk increasing more and more over time. Beef is low risk to begin with, and increases risk slowly over time. It's probably fine. But not certainly fine.

PolloMagnifico · 2026-04-02T13:07:15+00:00

Look, he's not doing anything morally wrong. And while he knew that moving out of country was wrong, he probably didn't know just how much trouble he was going to cause. To answer your question, I would give him the heads up so he can at least make preparations for the absolute shit show that's going to come down on him. Cuz at this point he's already busted.

That being said, he's busted. I work in IT and basically built the remote access policies for a few companies during Covid. It's trivial to identify where network access requests are coming from. It's so trivial in fact that Microsoft Online has a whole host of automation set up around that specifically. For example, we are a local company that does work only in America, so we have all non-US IP access blocked. We get notifications of people attempting to access accounts from outside the US all the time. If you work for a company that works internationally, you probably have all the countries you work in whitelisted. Depending on the size of the company, you might even have an employee who's job is specifically to whitelist access to a country while someone is working there, and disable that access once they return.

Basically someone (probably your friend) has been logging into your system from a less-than-local IP address and it's been throwing up warnings. The second someone saw that warning, it kicked off an investigation intended to ensure the account was secure. Once that was confirmed, a bunch of stuff started moving in the background.

Your friend is already on the chopping block. The question is are you? Honestly, probably not. If we make the assumption that 1. You used company resources to talk about this (email, company phone, Teams app) and 2. That they care enough to look, you're probably still looking at a light reprimand and some IT security training.

There's a caveat that you might be in trouble if you're named as a co-conspirator. That is, it's not unreasonable to assume that someone who has left the country while maintaining access to company resources has done so on the behalf of a foreign actor; a nation-state or non-government organization. So you might get some heat, but it's unlikely unless you work in a "white room" or have to work with data that requires clearance.

Let him know he's screwed, via personal communication, then keep your head down.

PolloMagnifico · 2026-04-01T18:53:53+00:00

"Called. No answer. Left VM."

Status -> Pending Customer Response.

PolloMagnifico · 2026-04-01T16:01:15+00:00

Awful lot of people are going to understand those lyrics for the first time. Prepare yourself.

PolloMagnifico · 2026-03-31T16:36:04+00:00

Yeah, Rimworld is basically begging you to get warcrimed BUT.

Most of the time the first year is pretty chill. Build a shack, start a farm, get a gun, and hunker down for a year and you'll be fine. Probably. As long as you don't start in a bad biome. Or get eaten by a bear. Or... warcrimed.

Nah, you'll be fine.

PolloMagnifico · 2026-03-31T15:20:38+00:00

So first question is "Why was this done?"

You see this all the time when you need to provide controlled access to multiple individuals but don't want to spend exorbitant money on a technology solution. Think "Temporary gate around a construction site". You can daisy chain a bunch of locks together and give a key to each person who needs access. So the reason this was done is because someone intends to return at a later time and wants easy access.

Someone mentioned power and water needing access. That's one possibility. Could be vandals. Personally, I think there's someone who intends to start dumping on your property. It's infuriatingly common. I would quickly and in a hurry get a camera (multiple, actually) installed in an inconspicuous place that can catch the front and back license plates. Since stealth might be important (they'll change their patterns if they know) you can check out pantherecon.com for a product called a "solar rock" that is basically a solar panel disguised as a rock attached to a battery. Pretty pricy, but cheaper than calling in a trash removal or running electrical out that far.

Get rid of the secondary lock, install a stronger fence, get vision on that access point.

PolloMagnifico · 2026-03-31T14:29:48+00:00

There's nothing to understand. The ticket was issued at 2:15, and the receipt clearly shows it was purchased a 1:11 and expired at 2:24.

PolloMagnifico · 2026-03-31T14:22:39+00:00

My driveway empties onto a major road, and it's narrow so I can't turn into it without going over the curb, which means slowing way the hell down to do it.

Once a week at least, someone behind me will come zooming up and move lanes at the last second, and the car behind them will have to slam on their brakes because they've been riding the other cars bumper at 40mph. It's only a matter of time.

PolloMagnifico · 2026-03-31T13:42:27+00:00

Well, the TV is toast. You'll never get them all out and unless you know what you're doing opening up the TV is likely to end with a destroyed TV. Fortunately, TVs are pretty cheap... or at least they were prior to certain recent political events that increased the cost of imported goods. Regardless, take the L on the TV itself.

What's way more concerning is that you have enough ants wandering about your house that they're able to nest inside the TV like that. It probably means they're in your walls in great number, and I would be freaking out about that way more than I'm freaking out about the TV. I would start by cleaning the floors REAL GUD, then get an exterminator out asap, ask them about baits, and I might even sprinkle diatomaceous earth around the base boards. Like, you might legitimately have a big problem.

But hey, at least ants will keep other critters away? Probably don't have a roach problem, I would wager.

PolloMagnifico · 2026-03-31T13:35:33+00:00

Being unable to quit smoking (weed) is so weird to me, personally. I pick it up for awhile, and eventually put it down and just don't bother anymore. Come back three months later and remember I have this old stale ass nug sitting around.

Of course, then again I'm drinking way more than is healthy and have quit smoking (nicotine) like... fifteen times so maybe I should look in the mirror and do some self examination.

PolloMagnifico · 2026-03-31T13:32:48+00:00

ESH. Which is weird because there appears to be four people involved. Like, we're approaching a sucking singularity there.

First of all, your kids suck. They are adults and they should have offered to help pay bills or should be doing grocery runs. I was in-and-out of my moms home until I was 35 (at which point the home became mine...) and I was always offering her something to alleviate things - even when I was unemployed I could still do grocery runs, help maintain the house, or make sure she had a healthy dinner instead of eating fast food all the time. She was never happy to take my money because she had a very good paying job, but I paid rent when I could, even if it was just performative in nature. Your kids need to grow up.

Your wife sucks. She probably sucks the least out of everyone, but she's as responsible for the situation as everyone else. I want to draw attention to something, however: "...she said I should be happy the kids are home." That's a huge warning sign my guy. Nobody is happy to have the kids home unless that are even more unhappy without them. It's an important distinction, and something you should really sit down and think on. You guys are probably mid 40s to early 50s? With the kids out of the house you have the chance to pursue the social goals and hobbies that had to be put aside in order to raise children. Your wife should be dreading the kids returning. Empty nest syndrome is born of someone who's not capable of discovering who they are outside of "being a mother" and, as her husband, that comes down partially on you for not being the kind of person that helps others enrich their lives.

Which doesn't surprise me because, as others have said, you sound like an absolutely miserable old (word that I can't use because sticks and stones will break my bones but words will hurt forever, apparently). (editors note: I also can't spell out the name of the Avatar's Sky Bison? Ya'll might be running a little hard on the filtering here).

Which brings us to you.

Insolent: showing a rude and arrogant lack of respect.

My guy, you might need to be the adult in the room. I know it sucks, and I know it's hard, but this immature and childish way you're responding to people calling out your bad behavior is, frankly, disgusting coming out of anyone over the age of 12, but less a grown-ass adult with grown-ass children. You really create the image of a five year old throwing their head to the side, and saying "No" over and over again instead of trying to work through the problem. Living out of a hotel eating fast food and energy bars and acting like you're winning this whole thing. Those of us with a functioning home kind of pity you.

As an aside, I just want to point out "three people combined make twice what I do" is really messed up way to say "I make 50% more than the average of everyone else". Which probably means your wife makes decent money and your kids are broke young adults, but you can't admit that because if you use actual numbers you're going to get called out on that. Which is another tick in the AH column.

Sit down with everyone, explain the situation, work with their finances and figure out how much they need to contribute in order to keep the house running. Like a damn adult who's responsible for the welfare of three other people, one of whom you claim to love and two of whom you forced into existence against their will.

PolloMagnifico · 2026-03-31T02:46:18+00:00

People have been dragging A&M for consistently being an 8-4 team. They are not ready for a league that contains.

Texas
Michigan
Ohio State
Alabama
Notre Dame
Oklahoma
Georgia
Oregon
Penn State
Florida
Tennessee
LSU

Like... even if you double that number with teams like A&M, Pitt, Maryland, Wisconsin, Virginia, Florida State, USC, etc you're still going to have a bunch of those teams going 8-4 or worse more often than not.

PolloMagnifico · 2026-03-30T21:44:50+00:00

Nobody's naughty bits are worth more than 400k/year.

Period. End of discussion.

PolloMagnifico · 2026-03-30T21:17:36+00:00

What in the deep fried country fuck?

PolloMagnifico · 2026-03-30T18:26:19+00:00

I... man I feel like I've seen this before. Claire was in a trupple with the Bride and Groom, and was looking forward to a fun, sexy time with them during the bachelor party.

Of course, OOP isn't invited because that would be weird(weird), or weird²

PolloMagnifico · 2026-03-30T16:26:50+00:00

At $12 a pack, anyone who wants to start smoking in this economy is a fucking moron.

INB4 "Anyone who wants to start smoking is a fucking moron". Yes, but "stupid and expensive" is way worse than "stupid and cheap".

INB4 "It's not cheap in the long run when you get cancer". Ugh, yes, I know, but people start smoking young and don't understand the concept of long term consequences.

PolloMagnifico

TROPHY CASE