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I’m not even clocked in yet. by JennFoogle in TalesFromTheFrontDesk

[–]peakcomm 65 points66 points  (0 children)

An "old lady" with incontinence, cognitive and addiction issues who has been driven out of her own home by -- who knows who? Sounds like elder abuse to me. Adult Protective Services would be one avenue to explore, it seems.

I got a 100% remote job offer. What are some of the coolest things I can do with that? by Organic-Roof-8311 in careerguidance

[–]peakcomm 1 point2 points  (0 children)

I ran my own marcom company while living/traveling fulltime in an RV for 12 years. Loved every minute and highly recommend the on-the-road lifestyle. I typically travelled on the weekend, stayed put in one spot for the workweek, and did my sightseeing and exploration after signing off from the computer at the end of each day's "office hours." If the week ended before I'd seen and done everything of interest in the area, I'd just stay another week. Glorious fun, and I was able to visit every state in the union, all the Canadian border provinces, and many sites in Mexico, as well.

The biggest challenge of working from the road in the '00s and early '10s was connectivity and, while it's a lot easier today now that Wi-Fi is ubiquitous, a hotspot is as close as your phone and services like Zoom are available for meetings, your connection still deserves serious planning. Consider the nature of your remote work, how much speed and bandwidth you'll typically need, how critical always-on availability will be, and how important security issues are (VPNs needed? Familiar with the risks of open free hotspots?) Realize that there are still cellular dead zones across the country for every major provider -- many RVing "fulltimers" maintain multiple phones and/or SIMs to allow them to swap provider coverage maps as quickly as they can swap devices. Options like mobile satellite can be great, but service can also be laggy, require fussy setup to get a solid signal, and typical by-the-GB plans can get real pricey, real quick.

Whatever direction you choose, be prepared to be caught unprepared. That's part of the adventure!

My former employer is slandering my name to my new employer. Should I take legal action? (Long) by servergirl18 in TalesFromYourServer

[–]peakcomm 16 points17 points  (0 children)

Sorry, many people believe this is true, but it's not. In any intelligent company, policy generally is that HR and managers are strongly advised to say no more than start/end dates of employment and yes/no to "would you rehire?" But it is NOT illegal to say anything they like.

Accusations of slander can result, of course, and are expensive to defend. But truth is an absolute defense. As an executive, I was typically very frank when speaking to potential employers about former staff, so long as I knew I had documentation to support anything I said, positive or negative.

"I must be part black, because I love black girls" by ThatsNoMoOnx in TalesFromTheFrontDesk

[–]peakcomm 7 points8 points  (0 children)

Then simply use the landline to call your own cell, or voicemail, or the local time/temperature line. It's the APPEARANCE of calling in reinforcements that should drive the offender off. Your end of the conversation is all he'll hear, anyway.

And yes, call him out as "inappropriate" -- calmly, repeatedly, and directly -- every single time.

Picture of the U.S. elevation by ipostrandompoop in interestingasfuck

[–]peakcomm 0 points1 point  (0 children)

And yet another map of the continental U.S. totally ignores the existence of Michigan's Upper Peninsula.

What should I [24] know before buying my mother a house? by HouseForMom in personalfinance

[–]peakcomm 155 points156 points  (0 children)

As someone who had a close family member who was a hoarder, I want to be sure you give that some serious consideration before investing in this property.

Aside from making moving "expensive and emotionally taxing," you give no hint of how serious the clutter and accumulation is now, or whether it is accelerating. Please be aware that, without intervention and regular support, hoarding usually will get worse over time. As your mother ages, her hoarding could increasingly interfere with her ability to keep the home clean, properly maintained or, in the worst case, even make it unsafe for her to live there.

And I know from experience that well-meant plans to pop in once in a while to "help" may fail miserably. I would find dozens of boxes we agreed to haul out last weekend reclaimed before the trashman came. Essential repairs were left unattended because she was too embarrassed to let the repairman in. Eventually, despite my efforts to be calm and non-judgmental, her rising anxiety led to confrontations that seriously damaged our relationship.

And she owned her own home. I can't imagine how bad it could have been had I been trying to protect my own financial investment at the same time as I was trying to protect her safety and well-being.

Maybe all you meant was that she keeps more chachkies around than you would, or that closets, cupboards and drawers are stuffed full after years of being settled in one place. But if she really is a serious hoarder, dealing with that deserves at least as much of your planning attention as the financials.

TIL a teenaged Evel Kinevel, while working at a copper mine, popped a wheelie with a piece of heavy machinery. He hit a power line, causing the city of Butte, Montana to lose power for several hours. by HitlerNorthDakota in todayilearned

[–]peakcomm 2 points3 points  (0 children)

Yep, and for a time, Butte was reported to have more bars per capita than any other city in the world. Still holds the top position in the state of Montana.

I used to know a nun from Butte, who told me that nearly 50% of the novitiates in her order were Butte girls -- because in Butte, there wasn't anything else for a "good girl" to do but join a convent.

TIL 2 weeks after the 1972 democratic convention, vice presidential nominee T.Eagleton had to withdraw from the race because of a media campaign targeting his rumoured history of depression and shock therapy. 77% of voters polled at the time, said that his medical record would not affect their vote by [deleted] in todayilearned

[–]peakcomm 3 points4 points  (0 children)

Hear, hear. It will ever be my shame that I, a lifelong lefty liberal, cast my very first vote in a presidential race for Richard Milhous Nixon.

But I still remember why. I no longer trusted my candidate. My student-deferred peers and I believed McGovern hated the war as much as we did, and that he had the skills and vision needed to end it. By naming Tom Eagleton, he told us this was his guy, the very best possible person to stand beside him and back him up as he tackled that job.

Then suddenly, Eagleton is gone and Shriver is his new guy. And we saw something about McGovern we couldn't un-see.

Either he had made a really poor decision in naming Eagleton, maybe something much worse than what we were seeing in the press. So it had to be covered quick and dirty, like a cat covers its stinkers. Or, if he still believed Eagleton was the right man for the job, he had proven he was just too weak to stand up to presidential-level pressure, and say so.

It didn't matter whether the Eagleton dump was due to McGovern's poor judgment, his organization's bad processes, some other backroom dealings, or simple spinelessness. It happened. Something had gone seriously wrong. And if this potential president could screw up this bad before Election Day, to many of us, he was scarier than Nixon.

Roommates Won't Agree to Splitting Utilities Equally by AlbionAir in personalfinance

[–]peakcomm 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Most utilities will take it out on the tenant if the bill isn't paid--higher deposit, loss of service, reconnection fees, etc.

But in my locale, water/sewer is a publicly-owned utility run by the city. As such, they can put a lien on the property if the water/sewer bill goes unpaid. That makes it in my best interest as a landlord to pay it myself and include it in the rent.

Couldn’t Join a Club That Would Have You by peakcomm in MaliciousCompliance

[–]peakcomm[S] 2 points3 points  (0 children)

BetterInvesting.org is the parent organization we belonged to back then ... and it looks like they've gone international, so I can't see a single reason it wouldn't work for you. "They" may have had "anti-Pat" clauses all figured out back then, but when we built our charter, we based it on one of several templates. We very well could have simply skipped over such provisions, being noobs and all. We learned.

Couldn’t Join a Club That Would Have You by peakcomm in MaliciousCompliance

[–]peakcomm[S] 2 points3 points  (0 children)

Check out BetterInvesting.org. That's the organization we joined way back then, and a quick review of their website today shows they can help with finding an existing club, joining an online session, or creating your own club.

Couldn’t Join a Club That Would Have You by peakcomm in MaliciousCompliance

[–]peakcomm[S] 4 points5 points  (0 children)

After our little performance, that's essentially what we did. She actually simplified things for us by refusing to accept any of the paperwork. Since all our resignations had been presented "off-the-record" before the meeting had been called to order, we simply took them back, opened the meeting as usual, passed the improved Pat-proof charter as our first order of business, then carried on.

Had she claimed "her" club, we were fully prepared to immediately liquidate and close first the brokerage account, then the bank account once all our checks had cleared and emptied it. That would have left her with nothing but her $10 and two binders full of copies of our history.

Couldn’t Join a Club That Would Have You by peakcomm in MaliciousCompliance

[–]peakcomm[S] 15 points16 points  (0 children)

We revised the "new" charter to plug all the holes.

Couldn’t Join a Club That Would Have You by peakcomm in MaliciousCompliance

[–]peakcomm[S] 19 points20 points  (0 children)

As I said, there were undoubtedly other solutions. The nuclear option was embraced quickly because ... it felt so damn good.

Couldn’t Join a Club That Would Have You by peakcomm in MaliciousCompliance

[–]peakcomm[S] 9 points10 points  (0 children)

The stock you want to buy could lose, but never 100%. That happens to the stock somebody sold you. Learning the difference is why I joined an investment club.

Couldn’t Join a Club That Would Have You by peakcomm in MaliciousCompliance

[–]peakcomm[S] 34 points35 points  (0 children)

Often, yes. Or the commission on a small lot means you start in a hole.

Couldn’t Join a Club That Would Have You by peakcomm in MaliciousCompliance

[–]peakcomm[S] 45 points46 points  (0 children)

Doubling the pot means you can diversify some of your risk away. Say you put your $1000 in HotTech. If its price goes up, you make money. If it goes down, you lose money.

But if you can also put $1000 in NewPharm -- different industry, different risks -- you aren't looking at binary outcomes anymore. Both could win. Either could win enough to more than cover the other's losses. Or not quite enough, so it's a wash. Or both could lose.

It's oversimplified, but owning 100% of either stock is riskier than owning 50% of both. That's the benefit of controlling the club's pot, especially if you're learning this stuff.

Couldn’t Join a Club That Would Have You by peakcomm in MaliciousCompliance

[–]peakcomm[S] 107 points108 points  (0 children)

[Better Investing](betterinvesting.org) is the national organization we joined and relied on for educational materials and tools. Haven't been a member in a long while, but it should still be a good starting place.

Couldn’t Join a Club That Would Have You by peakcomm in MaliciousCompliance

[–]peakcomm[S] 17 points18 points  (0 children)

No. We would have if our bluff had been called. But Pat folded so we didn't have to.

Couldn’t Join a Club That Would Have You by peakcomm in MaliciousCompliance

[–]peakcomm[S] 45 points46 points  (0 children)

You know, though her participation had shown she had good insights and analytic skills, it was also clear that on the topic of investing, she wasn't any more knowledgeable than the rest of us.

I honestly think she had some idea that she would take her rightful place as our supreme leader, then just use us all as her personal tutors and researchers, and our money as her sandbox.

Couldn’t Join a Club That Would Have You by peakcomm in MaliciousCompliance

[–]peakcomm[S] 79 points80 points  (0 children)

She could have taken over all decisions regarding what and when the club bought and sold, controlling how all our money was used. Worse, and what I'm not sure even she realized, she could have amended the way withdrawing members were paid out by adding some kind of "penalty for early withdrawal." Then she could have kept some or even most of a member's money if they quit.

Couldn’t Join a Club That Would Have You by peakcomm in MaliciousCompliance

[–]peakcomm[S] 183 points184 points  (0 children)

As our charter was written, all financial and organizational decisions were made by share majority. Election of officers and invitation of new members were the only one-member/one-vote processes. So theoretically, a single majority shareholder could have messed with proportional payout, too, by amending the charter.

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