What Annoyed You Today? (21 Viewers)

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Yesterday I awoke to find the Internet down. Lately I have been paying my cable and internet bill on-line and it was time to do so again, but that's hard to do with the Internet not working. But I was going to meet a friend for lunch not far from the Spectrum office and I decided I would just drop by there and pay by check as well as ask them when the Internet was going to be back up and running.

At the Spectrum office I was informed that they had a kiosk where I could pay my bill by credit card - but it was broken at that time. So I had no choice but to type my name into their system and wait to be called; the office pretty much lacked suitable comfortable seating as well. After a bit I noted that there were still 4 people ahead of me and so I'd go next door to the bookstore and check out their magazine rack. When I got back to the Spectrum office I was no longer in the que and thus was going to have to reenter it. After a few moments reflection, I left. When I got home some hours later the Internet was still out of service, although by resetting the power on the router again it came back on line.

Back in those thrilling days of yesteryear the cable TV company office had a drop box where you could deposit your payment, but it seems our sophistication has grown beyond those primitive methods.

I am going to take advantage of the cold weather and see about mounting a TV antenna in the attic.
 
For the almost 33 years I have lived here, the top shelf in my kitchen pantry has held more mysteries than does the surface of the Moon. For one thing, I can go out in the back yard and look at the surface of the Moon. And I have books about the surface of the Moon. For some inexplicable reason no one has produced a book about the top shelf of my kitchen pantry, which is harder to get to than the surface of the Moon and probably more dangerous.

I have only been able to wedge a couple or three boxes of cereal up there, the space being occupied by a large box of glasses. I had no other place to put the glasses, which are actually made of glass, so I figured they caused the least amount of trouble up there on the Moon. But this morning I wondered again about why that box would not shove all the way to the back and thus make room for another box of cereal, which I needed to buy, anyway. Fortunately a recent technological breakthrough on the order of the Saturn V had been introduced. A friend of mine was cleaning out his airplane hangar and gave me a folding aluminum step stool that was orders of magnitude easier to deploy than the full sized step ladders I have owned. So I bravely made the treacherous trip to the back porch, despite the bitter 43F cold, and got the new instrument of exploration.

I got the cereal out of the way and steeled myself to take the highy hazardous box of explosively fragile glasses down, hopefully without busting more than two or three of them.

The box was empty.

I at first thought that they had developed weightless glasses without anyone telling me. But the damn box was empty. I had to open it to make sure because I did not believe it. All this time and the box was friggin' empty.

Behind the empty box, which should count itself lucky that it did not attain escape velocity, was a large, obviously full and clearly ancient container of vegetable shortening. I have never bought any of that stuff in my life. It had leaked and was glued to the shelf. I pried it off, took it outside and threw it in the trashcan. Probably should call the HAZMAT people.

There was a metal commemorative can 1900-2000 with a big picture of JFK on it for some reason. I suspect it was from the Boy Scouts. It was full of candy, tootsie rolls, lollipops and stuff, all of which had melted into a nearly solid mass. I dumped as much as possible atop the vegetable shortening, which probably will piss off the HAZMAT team.

Alas, the JFK tin may be unsalvageable.

There was a large box of Microwave Popcorn.

I h a t e microwave popcorn. The smell of it is terrible. Mom used to buy it every time she visited and I would take it to work and give it away. This is the largest box of microwave popcorn I have ever accidentally owned.

There were three empty egg cartons, the old fashioned cardboard kind. There was a reason for saving those but I do not recall what it was. Maybe it was sorting parts from plastic model kits, although I can think of a whole bunch of other containers that would be better. But are these things collectors items now?

There was a small folded Pizza Hut box. Whythell would anyone save that?

There was a smal box of powered stuff that was supposed to lower your cholesterol. You are supposed to mix it with water or juice and chug it down as quickly as possible, before it changes to jello. I could never handle it. That was the ONLY legit item up there.

That space is OVER two feet high. It is an immense amount of storage space that could have held plastic model kits, guns and ammo, books, back issues of SF or aviation or Playboy magazines, for over 32 years now! I'm pissed!

So now I have room for the cereal. Who wants the stupid microwave popcorn?
 
For the almost 33 years I have lived here, the top shelf in my kitchen pantry has held more mysteries than does the surface of the Moon. For one thing, I can go out in the back yard and look at the surface of the Moon. And I have books about the surface of the Moon. For some inexplicable reason no one has produced a book about the top shelf of my kitchen pantry, which is harder to get to than the surface of the Moon and probably more dangerous.

I have only been able to wedge a couple or three boxes of cereal up there, the space being occupied by a large box of glasses. I had no other place to put the glasses, which are actually made of glass, so I figured they caused the least amount of trouble up there on the Moon. But this morning I wondered again about why that box would not shove all the way to the back and thus make room for another box of cereal, which I needed to buy, anyway. Fortunately a recent technological breakthrough on the order of the Saturn V had been introduced. A friend of mine was cleaning out his airplane hangar and gave me a folding aluminum step stool that was orders of magnitude easier to deploy than the full sized step ladders I have owned. So I bravely made the treacherous trip to the back porch, despite the bitter 43F cold, and got the new instrument of exploration.

I got the cereal out of the way and steeled myself to take the highy hazardous box of explosively fragile glasses down, hopefully without busting more than two or three of them.

The box was empty.

I at first thought that they had developed weightless glasses without anyone telling me. But the damn box was empty. I had to open it to make sure because I did not believe it. All this time and the box was friggin' empty.

Behind the empty box, which should count itself lucky that it did not attain escape velocity, was a large, obviously full and clearly ancient container of vegetable shortening. I have never bought any of that stuff in my life. It had leaked and was glued to the shelf. I pried it off, took it outside and threw it in the trashcan. Probably should call the HAZMAT people.

There was a metal commemorative can 1900-2000 with a big picture of JFK on it for some reason. I suspect it was from the Boy Scouts. It was full of candy, tootsie rolls, lollipops and stuff, all of which had melted into a nearly solid mass. I dumped as much as possible atop the vegetable shortening, which probably will piss off the HAZMAT team.

Alas, the JFK tin may be unsalvageable.

There was a large box of Microwave Popcorn.

I h a t e microwave popcorn. The smell of it is terrible. Mom used to buy it every time she visited and I would take it to work and give it away. This is the largest box of microwave popcorn I have ever accidentally owned.

There were three empty egg cartons, the old fashioned cardboard kind. There was a reason for saving those but I do not recall what it was. Maybe it was sorting parts from plastic model kits, although I can think of a whole bunch of other containers that would be better. But are these things collectors items now?

There was a small folded Pizza Hut box. Whythell would anyone save that?

There was a smal box of powered stuff that was supposed to lower your cholesterol. You are supposed to mix it with water or juice and chug it down as quickly as possible, before it changes to jello. I could never handle it. That was the ONLY legit item up there.

That space is OVER two feet high. It is an immense amount of storage space that could have held plastic model kits, guns and ammo, books, back issues of SF or aviation or Playboy magazines, for over 32 years now! I'm pissed!

So now I have room for the cereal. Who wants the stupid microwave popcorn?
I applaud your intrepid foray into the great unknown. And congratulate you on your conquest.
I will pass on the offer of expired microwave popcorn, though.
 
Survived New Year's Eve again, but the amount of damage is abysmal.
For you who don't know: this relatively sane country goes beserk at New Year's Eve with fireworks. The damage can be huge. This time amongst others: a 150 year old church in Amsterdam. But every city have there losses. Here in Dordrecht an old, irreplaceable medieval house. It survived the "hoekse en kabeljouwse twisten" up until the heavy fighting in ww2 back in the day, but did not survive new year 2026.
Many hurt, lots of them teenagers or little kids, burned, eye injuries, deaf, usually injured for life. If you get injured, chances are that the police, hospital personal and/or firemen are being bombarded by heavy explosives by bystanders while trying to help you.
At the moment, the count is two death, which is a surprise to be that low.
Not counting the families that lost their house through fire.

So I guess it's not a happy new year for everybody here.

Anyway, on a more positive note, I survived this little yearly "tradition" of little civil war again to be able to wish you all a happy 2026.
 
Survived New Year's Eve again, but the amount of damage is abysmal.
For you who don't know: this relatively sane country goes beserk at New Year's Eve with fireworks. The damage can be huge. This time amongst others: a 150 year old church in Amsterdam. But every city have there losses. Here in Dordrecht an old, irreplaceable medieval house. It survived the "hoekse en kabeljouwse twisten" back in the day, but did not survive new year 2026.
Many hurt, lots of them teenagers or little kids, burned, eye injuries, deaf, usually injured for life. If you get injured, chances are that the police, hospital personal and/or firemen are being bombarded by heavy explosives by bystanders while trying to help you.
At the moment, the count is two death, which is a surprise to be that low.
Not counting the families that lost their house through fire.

So I guess it's not a happy new year for everybody here.

Anyway, on a more positive note, I survived this little yearly "tradition" of little civil war again to be able to wish you all a happy 2026.
we had fireworks going off from 18.00 !

no damage though
 
Survived New Year's Eve again, but the amount of damage is abysmal.
For you who don't know: this relatively sane country goes beserk at New Year's Eve with fireworks. The damage can be huge. This time amongst others: a 150 year old church in Amsterdam. But every city have there losses. Here in Dordrecht an old, irreplaceable medieval house. It survived the "hoekse en kabeljouwse twisten" up until the heavy fighting in ww2 back in the day, but did not survive new year 2026.
Many hurt, lots of them teenagers or little kids, burned, eye injuries, deaf, usually injured for life. If you get injured, chances are that the police, hospital personal and/or firemen are being bombarded by heavy explosives by bystanders while trying to help you.
At the moment, the count is two death, which is a surprise to be that low.
Not counting the families that lost their house through fire.

So I guess it's not a happy new year for everybody here.

Anyway, on a more positive note, I survived this little yearly "tradition" of little civil war again to be able to wish you all a happy 2026.
For people wondering, this is what New Year's Eve looks like. Police cars being targeted with heavy fireworks in The Hague Politiebusje met zwaar vuurwerk bekogeld in Den Haag
 
My left index finger is killing me and this cold weather is making it worse. No, it's not arthritis, even though I'm plenty old enough to have that. I had surgery on my left index finger on Dec 18 to fix a "trigger finger". Technically, it's called 'stenosing tenosynovitis of the flexor tendon.' This is the 5th time I've had this surgery done on different fingers since the early-2000's. It's from my 40 years at the keyboard writing computer code in a corporate environment. I retired in 2014. Not only that, but there's a new trigger finger building up that will require surgery, too. (My "ring" finger on my right hand.) I'm going to have that one fixed this spring or summer (#6). I guess I'm in the running for the world record for the number of these surgeries. Christmas was not very merry for me and my wife because I was constantly complaining about my hand hurting from the surgery and not being able to grasp things with my hand. This last surgery was particularly brutal because the tendon had begun to "fray" from waiting too long to have it fixed, according the the after-surgery report, and the surgeon had to "whittle" on the tendon to fix it. Tendons don't have as good a blood supply as other tissues and that means healing takes a lot longer. (My wife recently called me a 'curmudgeon' about my whining. It's the first time she's used the C-word on me.) So while recovering from this one I have a new one to look forward to, in the future.


Since I can't whine around her anymore, I'm whining here. Thanks for listening.
 
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Thank you for making me feel so much better. The only keyboard injury I have is painless. The left small finger bends 30 degrees out at the first knuckle. According to my doc it is not uncommon and caused by side loading the joint when reaching for the tab/capslock/etc keys and sliding the finger instead of pressing the finger. Apparently the tendon is broken. Looks horrible but painless so who cares.
 
My left index finger is killing me and this cold weather is making it worse. No, it's not arthritis, even though I'm plenty old enough to have that. I had surgery on my left index finger on Dec 18 to fix a "trigger finger". Technically, it's called 'stenosing tenosynovitis of the flexor tendon.' This is the 5th time I've had this surgery done on different fingers since the early-2000's. It's from my 40 years at the keyboard writing computer code in a corporate environment. I retired in 2014. Not only that, but there's a new trigger finger building up that will require surgery, too. (My "ring" finger on my right hand.) I'm going to have that one fixed this spring or summer (#6). I guess I'm in the running for the world record for the number of these surgeries. Christmas was not very merry for me and my wife because I was constantly complaining about my hand hurting from the surgery and not being able to grasp things with my hand. This last surgery was particularly brutal because the tendon had begun to "fray" from waiting too long to have it fixed, according the the after-surgery report, and the surgeon had to "whittle" on the tendon to fix it. Tendons don't have as good a blood supply as other tissues and that means healing takes a lot longer. (My wife recently called me a 'curmudgeon' about my whining. It's the first time she's used the C-word on me.) So while recovering from this one I have a new one to look forward to, in the future.


Since I can't whine around her anymore, I'm whining here. Thanks for listening.
Yikes. I have also been programming for many years. My complains are mostly located in the shoulders. I don't hope I'll get any trigger fingers. Good luck with recovering and the next surgery.
 
Yikes. I have also been programming for many years. My complains are mostly located in the shoulders. I don't hope I'll get any trigger fingers. Good luck with recovering and the next surgery.
Odds are you don't have to worry. After my third surgery for this I started researching it and talking to my orthopedic specialists. It turns out that the cause of this is really unknown. They know it's due to repetitive use of the fingers, but it only happens sporadically in a minority of people. According to the orthos, other guys just like me could have an identical career writing code and never have this. There is apparently some kind of "predisposition" to get this, and the types and degree of trigger fingers that the doctors treat is a small minority of those patients' occupation group. It can run in families, as my surgeon has treated all 10 fingers of some people that have a familial history of it and never used their hands reptitively. I was told that having it in the thumb is most troublesome. They see it in guitar players sometimes (left hand only in right-hand players) and in carpenters that swing a hammer, usually in their right hands. (Hopefully the modern nail-gun will reduce the numbers of these!) Piano players sometimes get it, too. And of course the occasional nerd spending his day at the keyboard gets it. But, the orthos are adamant that, while not considered a rare condition, the people who get it are a sporadic and small minority, and the cause is really unknown.
 

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