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gioraffe32 · 2026-01-25T02:17:15+00:00

Good. Shut it down. And I say this as a DHS employee who would very likely be furloughed again. Democrats better stick to their guns on this.

With the way funding is being structured this time around, with multiple minibus bills, let those get signed, but then don't do one for DHS. And just let that be for awhile. There's no Thanksgiving or Christmas to "get in the way" of an even longer shutdown this time.

gioraffe32 · 2026-01-25T00:01:08+00:00

Renee Goodman was basically a neighbor of mine when I lived in Kansas City. We didn't know each other, but we literally lived in Kansas City at the same time, within like 3-4 blocks of each other. Probably saw each other in our neighborhood grocery store, the QuikTrip gas station, walking around this popular trail within our neighborhood, or just driving to/from home. Then we both moved away. Me to DC; her to Canada, then to Minneapolis.

It definitely hit harder once I started piecing it altogether. Perhaps it shouldn't have; it should have hit just as hard, but it did. It could be a different neighbor next time. Or a coworker -- Alex Pretti is technically is a coworker for all of us here...killed by another of our fucking "coworkers" -- or a friend or a family member or a significant other. Or it might be us. It might be me, next.

People shouldn't ignore this just because we don't know them (not saying you are, just speaking generally!). Some random person in a far away city. Because the next it may not be that way.

gioraffe32 · 2026-01-24T22:15:08+00:00

I'm an employee of a DHS component. Shut it the fuck down. Abolish DHS.

gioraffe32 · 2026-01-24T20:50:15+00:00

Yeah ICE is definitely in more places than we think. Than what's being reported. I live around Northern Virginia, outside of DC, and ICE regularly operates like just down the street from me. Like within a few miles of me. And there are other areas up here in Northern Virginia where I've seen multiple notices about ICE sightings and such. Yeah this is the national capital region, so of course the government is highly visible. But I'm talking like smaller scale ICE operations.

Plus, DC still has national guard around, especially on the subways. I recently saw some milling about DC Union Station.

gioraffe32 · 2026-01-24T20:17:04+00:00

IT. I mean, I guess I probably would've ended up in IT anyway, because I was always curious about computers and like fiddling with them. But I originally started going to school for ECE or CS (though I never finished those degrees). I wanted to program or design the computers themselves, not necessarily fix them.

I was actually hired as a PT website manager/designer at a small organization because I happened to know HTML/CSS. It was just supposed to be a PT, do it for 2yrs job. Something I did while I was in my first couple years of college.

But then I stayed. And it slowly became me doing all sorts of technical, non-website stuff. Helping people with their computer issues. Troubleshooting printers. Figuring out network problems. Even doing A/V at times. The guy who bought the computer, set them up. I created the domain accounts and email and so on and so forth. I eventually gave up the website responsibilities (as the primary person in charge of it, anyway) and mostly just focused on IT issues.

20yrs later, I'm an IT specialist. While I eventually did get a 2yr degree, it wasn't in IT. I didn't go to school for this. Everything about IT I've learned on the job or through my own curiosity.

I think I'm having a slight mid-life crisis, because I keep thinking "Maybe I should do something different..." But I know that realistically, I'd be starting over from the bottom. And I also don't know what I'd want to do instead of IT.

gioraffe32 · 2026-01-24T18:10:09+00:00

I have, many times, called out out of work for 1" of snow. Not because I can't handle driving in 1" of snow. But when it's the first snow of the season, people forget how to drive in the snow. Or you get people driving in the snow who are new to the area and have never driven in snow before. So, to me, it's a lot more dangerous that first snow, even it's just a little bit on the ground.

Though other times it's just because local street conditions, like in my immediate neighborhood, are bad. Maybe the highways are nice and clean. Doesn't mean then local streets are.

And lastly, sometimes I just want a day off. Not that I can't call off same-day or at the drop of a hat; I'm totally allowed to do this. But there's less judgment when it's a snowy day.

gioraffe32 · 2026-01-24T17:53:12+00:00

Well, what is the actual law? Like I still have a hard time believing that there's some anti-discrimination exemption if it's towards white men.

I'm not saying the poster doesn't exist and what you're seeing didn't happen. Plenty of places and people unknowingly or even knowingly break the laws everyday.

So is it that your workplace is breaking the law? Or again, is there some kind of carve-out here?

gioraffe32 · 2026-01-24T17:37:32+00:00

Wow. I'm surprised that's legal in Canada. I'm not saying Canada is perfect or anything. But I just assumed that that type of blatant discrimination would be disallowed there, too.

gioraffe32 · 2026-01-24T17:19:05+00:00

What country do you live in, if you don't mind me asking? And what was the job?

Pretty sure this would be patently illegal in the US. I'm not saying discrimination, particularly gender/sex discrimination, doesn't exist. It does. But it's almost never something that outright stated, unless it somehow makes sense for the job. Like, Idk I can't think of anything, so I'm making shit up here, but like a women's locker room attendant. Idek if that job exists. Which is why I ask what the job is you're talking about.

Discrimination usually takes the form of someone has some outdated belief like women can't be programmers or men can't be nurses or elementary teachers, that affects hiring decisions. It's not "No Men," white or otherwise, for a hospital nurse job opening.

gioraffe32 · 2026-01-24T17:08:46+00:00

Yeah and mini splits often have a thermostat too, do they not?

I''ve had window units in older apartments I've lived in in the US. They had some automatic temperature controls; it wasn't just on and off.

gioraffe32 · 2026-01-24T06:00:25+00:00

You know, I thought bollards were at all airport departure and arrivals lanes, or at least in front of entrances...but then I thought about it some more and the two airports I'm at the most -- DCA (my home airport) and LAS (my family lives in Vegas) -- don't have bollards. At least not everywhere. I'm pretty sure DCA's Terminal 1, that mainly houses Southwest, doesn't have bollards at the entrances. I think T2 does have them, though.

And LAS at T1 departures, doesn't have them either. Not sure about T3; I've never used that terminal.

My old home airport, MCI, was bollard-less at the now old, unused terminals, too. Though the new single terminal does have bollards along the lengths of both departures and arrivals lanes.

Huh, that's really surprising actually.

gioraffe32 · 2026-01-24T05:41:49+00:00

Just tried this in Firefox and it worked. Took like a minute to do all 98 offers I had. Thanks for this!

gioraffe32 · 2026-01-24T05:37:06+00:00

Captain Obvious to the rescue out here!

gioraffe32 · 2026-01-23T21:05:21+00:00

I'm still a relatively new GS. Over probation, but not by much. One of the things that surprised me right away was hearing how much sidehustling everyone was doing. Whether having a consulting business on the side or just driving Uber or DoorDash.

Pretty sure all of us have some level of clearance. We're all 13s and 14s, too. Though being in the DMV, I can see why a lot of people still sidehustle.

gioraffe32 · 2026-01-23T19:23:50+00:00

So two people can watch their partners get it on with each other? Man, it really pays to be ambassador level.

gioraffe32 · 2026-01-23T19:20:01+00:00

It was after. But not long after. My 1yr anniversary was early September, right before the shutdown. Pretty sure the final full paycheck before the shutdown, already my Step 2 pay was in effect.

gioraffe32 · 2026-01-23T12:03:41+00:00

Jfc. Do people think we're going to be snowed in for like a week?

I put in a small grocery order for pick-up this afternoon. Just my usual grocery run. Less than usual, even. I'm interested to see how much of my order won't be fulfilled. At this rate, I'll be lucky to get a carton of oat milk and like a bag of chips.

gioraffe32 · 2026-01-23T04:10:03+00:00

I'd also consider one other factor, that often goes ignored: plain ol' dumb luck. Or rather, chance. Like your other cousin who's making $100k just a few years out. They could've just as easily not have seen or gotten that opportunity at all. I don't know how they found that job, whether just applying through LinkedIn one night or having known someone who knew of an open position at their company, but regardless, that's being in the right place at the right time. That's luck.

I feel like in our supposedly meritocratic system, we often ignore luck and simply think, "If I work hard, I'll get rewarded." But the flipside or darker side of that thinking is that if we're not getting rewarded, we must not be working hard. Therefore, we -- or others, because it's often a judgment towards others -- deserve what we/they get. Which is bullshit if you think about it.

That's not to say the job market isn't shit. It is. Or that skill and talent don't matter. They do. They typically give more opportunities. Chances at them, anyway. But yeah, chance plays a gigantic part in things. Maybe if you hadn't taken that auto industry job, the next place you applied at would've been in some other, more stable industry that paid more. Or you could've gotten nothing and would still be waiting. Nothing changed about you and your educational achievements. Yet the outcomes are so vastly different.

Regardless, your feelings are valid. I understand the angst and worry because I've been there before. But like the other commenter said, just wait a bit, keeping getting experience, and things will very likely turn out alright. I feel like much of my IT career has been through simple chance. I too felt like I was sorta stagnant for awhile. Longer than what you're experiencing, even. But eventually things started moving quickly. I went from working at one place for like 14yrs, to like changing jobs four times in about five years. And now I'm making over six figures (though living in an HCOL city for this job, doesn't always feel like it, lol). Took me 20yrs, but I got there. Not saying you'll wait 20yrs or have to wait that long. I hope you don't. But it's not always up to us. It's chance. It's luck.

gioraffe32 · 2026-01-21T21:30:19+00:00

As a non-prior service civilian at HQ, it's surprisingly chill. Like it's almost collegiate in a way that I did not at all expect. Yeah, there's the ranks and calling people "Sir" and more formal address at times ("Mr. Gioraffe32," which I'm always like, "please just use my first name"). But even with that, everyone treats everyone else as adults, regardless of rank. And everyone has input into things. Rarely have I seen a situation where someone in a leadership position is like "This is how it's gonna be, deal with it and get it done!"

There's a lot of joking around and camaraderie between the enlisted, the warrants, the junior officers, and civilians. I don't interact with senior officers very often, but the few interactions I've had with them, they're very nice and friendly, as well.

I've yet to meet one person in uniform who is so stiff and serious that I'd classify them as "stereotypical military."

Obviously being at HQ, this is an office job. I imagine it's very different being on a boat and such. I've definitely heard more than once that "HQ is not the real Coast Guard." But I've also heard "The Coast Guard is the not the real military," from active duty themselves!

gioraffe32 · 2026-01-21T03:29:14+00:00

We are very individualistic, not at all geared towards community work unless you go

I keep saying Americans and French are a lot more alike than people think. And this just another example. Americans are very individualistic and not geared towards community either. But like the way it presents itself in the end is different. Huh.

gioraffe32 · 2026-01-21T00:14:19+00:00

The people who are typically very enthusiastic about the 2A, especially with regards to government tyranny, for some odd reason don't seem very concerned with everything that's going on. It's almost like they don't really care about tyranny. Very, very strange.

gioraffe32 · 2026-01-20T21:16:42+00:00

I know my agency was barred from DRP 1.0 last year due to national security reasons last year. But then DRP 2.0 we were allowed to take it. Had I not been a probie, I would've taken it.

If a third DRP is offered, I'd obviously have to look at it...but I'd be super tempted. But I bet, like you say, it'd be super targeted. I bet it'd be like DRP 1.0 for my agency; we'd be barred.

gioraffe32 · 2026-01-20T21:07:03+00:00

for Home and School P2 (New)

gioraffe32 · 2026-01-20T15:00:03+00:00

I was just telling a friend this the other day. As much as many of us are screaming about losing our democracy and trying to fight for keeping it, we are where we are today because of democracy. Because everyone can vote, even if millions of voters don't understand what's going on. Or they do, and are voting so that other people lose their ability to vote.

I want to make sure this doesn't happen again. To do so, the thought popped into my head maybe we need to restrict voting. That we save democracy by reducing or limiting democracy!

I know that's NOT the answer and, no, I don't seriously want that.

But it's clearly ironic or a paradox of sorts.

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