The spite, hate, rage, apathy and mild irritation thread...

[PanicProne]

I've been watching that on the news, Houston is flooded. To all our people in TX, I hope you and your loved ones are, and will stay, safe.

This. Stay safe (and keep those boards dry)!

[popvulture]

Things are fine here in Austin, just getting fucking soaked. I know some people in town probably got flooded. Houston's been majorly damaged, from what I understand... my heart goes out to y'all, hope you're doing alright

[codetocontra]

Hard time complaining about my headphones getting destroyed by my 9 year old in light of the hurricane. Maybe this counts anyway.

[comesect2.0]

[comesect2.0]

any fellow tejas natives know about any legit place to drop off cloths...got tons of kid cloths and whatnot. just would want to know its for sure going to Houston.

[Chankgeez]

Help the fine peoples of Tejas: http://uproxx.com/news/hurricane-harvey ... elp-texas/



https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cS0lieYsIek

Hopin' Billy Gibbons' guitars are safe. Keep dry, Elwood.

[chuckjaywalk]

I just dropped my wife off at the airport. She is getting help for an issue she has struggled with longer than I have known her. I am proud of her, but I am anxious and afraid and utterly alone. She will be gone for weeks, if not a month. When the sun rises tomorrow, it will be the longest we have been apart since we met. Literally, since our first date, we haven't been apart for 24 hours. She needs this. We need this. It will make her life longer and better. I just don't know what to do.

[aens_wife]

I just dropped my wife off at the airport. She is getting help for an issue she has struggled with longer than I have known her. I am proud of her, but I am anxious and afraid and utterly alone. She will be gone for weeks, if not a month. When the sun rises tomorrow, it will be the longest we have been apart since we met. Literally, since our first date, we haven't been apart for 24 hours. She needs this. We need this. It will make her life longer and better. I just don't know what to do.

I am glad to hear that she is moving towards some healing. I know it will be tough, but spending the next few weeks focussed on doing the same for yourself might be in order. Meditate, cry, read, talk to someone (lots of folks here are great for that, including me, if you need someone), make lists, tear them up, play music. Whatever you need to do to move forward, too. This kind of emotional work is so fucking hard, partly because our culture tells us that we aren't required to grow/change.

Best of luck and I am here if you need anything.

[chuckjaywalk]

I just dropped my wife off at the airport. She is getting help for an issue she has struggled with longer than I have known her. I am proud of her, but I am anxious and afraid and utterly alone. She will be gone for weeks, if not a month. When the sun rises tomorrow, it will be the longest we have been apart since we met. Literally, since our first date, we haven't been apart for 24 hours. She needs this. We need this. It will make her life longer and better. I just don't know what to do.

I am glad to hear that she is moving towards some healing. I know it will be tough, but spending the next few weeks focussed on doing the same for yourself might be in order. Meditate, cry, read, talk to someone (lots of folks here are great for that, including me, if you need someone), make lists, tear them up, play music. Whatever you need to do to move forward, too. This kind of emotional work is so fucking hard, partly because our culture tells us that we aren't required to grow/change.

Best of luck and I am here if you need anything.

I wish I could articulate more than 'Thank you.' I can't, though. I'm dreading going home. I don't want to go back to the house and not see her there. Tonight, I will pet the dogs and eat ramen and watch wrestling. Tomorrow, I have to begin finding some kind of peace of mind. I miss making music. I hope, once she is home and working again, I can get an amp and start over. Until then, I'll write her letters. I've never had a challenge like what she is facing, so I need to find a way to relate and be supportive and kind.

[aens_wife]

I wish I could articulate more than 'Thank you.' I can't, though. I'm dreading going home. I don't want to go back to the house and not see her there. Tonight, I will pet the dogs and eat ramen and watch wrestling. Tomorrow, I have to begin finding some kind of peace of mind. I miss making music. I hope, once she is home and working again, I can get an amp and start over. Until then, I'll write her letters. I've never had a challenge like what she is facing, so I need to find a way to relate and be supportive and kind.

That seems like a great start. Maybe write yourself a few letters too. Processing your own feelings in the wake of someone else's major issues can be really hard, but they aren't going through this stuff alone. Everything that happens to her now impacts you too. Try not to be too afraid of your own emotional fall-out. You'll be better able to help her if you have at least started to deal with your own feelings.

And thank fuck you have dogs around. Seriously the best therapy sometimes.

[PanicProne]

Chuck. Without knowing anything about the situation really, it seems like you and your wife are taking hard but very important steps in life. As far as if you need someone to talk to or just someone who listens/someone to write to and just get confirmation on that somebody is hearing you, drop me a message if/whenever you feel like it. I'm here for as much or as little as you want. And yes, dogs are awesome.

[BitchPudding]

Can confirm. Dogs are great. I constantly feel like im fighting myself, drowning from the inside untill i ether scream, sob uncontrollably or both.

Dogs are great when it gets bad. They don't judge.

[Invisible Man]

I don't even know that I believe in 'real evil,' but there are some people that have me leaning that way. Just spend a working lunch with two people who I abhor. I feel legitimately shaken, like these people have no principles, scruples, beliefs, or morality. It's tantamount to psychopathy, and I'm physically shaking with rage after listening to them talk. In their minds, everyone is an incompetent dipshit--their children, spouses, friends, all of our colleagues, students...everyone. Maybe I'm as naive as they believe me to be, and I live in a fairytale world where I love my family, find purpose in work, and value the agreed-upon goodness of scholarship, patience, thoughtfulness, service, and all the other things higher ed is designed to advance and hold in high regard. But I know that's not true, because this isn't my first rodeo. I'm now facing the very real choice between my integrity or my family's well-being. Honestly, it isn't an issue. I'm worthless as a person if I kowtow to bullshit, but I'm not crazy about being a martyr.

Anyway they noticed that I was disengaged from the conversation and started pecking at me. Made fun of my humorlessness, appearance, credentials, &c. It doesn't matter--their attacks don't really bother me that much, because I know who I am--but their lack of attenuation to any kind of credo or philosophy beyond 'me me me right here and now' is really terrifying.

I only went because one of them is retiring this week, and the other one is my boss. Usually turn these down. These are really 'high-ranking' people--one of them is the president; the other is an outgoing dean. Not sure how much more I can toe the 'fuck you' line before I lose my shit or my job. I told the president he shows signs of sociopathy recently...I called him an 'evil administrator' before that...told him he's 99% full of shit. On and on, trying to fight the good fight or whatever. He's told me to 'get on board or quit.' I told him 'there's nothing to get on board with. We have no purpose, we just make decisions based on our budget.' Doing everything possible to leave, but academic hiring cycles are glacial. Like, shit happens once a year. Contacted a recruiter I've used to make hires and told her I'm looking; willing to go outside higher ed if necessary.

I've posted about this a lot. I don't expect to get anything I can use back, or even want sympathy (this job is baller--on paper). I just need to expel their greedy, selfish, miserable, amoral, pathological, grotesque depraved behavior from my mind so I can remember who I am, because I'm not feeling it today.

[drolo]

Ow man ... hope you will be able to get out of there soon and keep a good situation for your family ...
There is an abnormally high percentage of psycho/sociopaths in the high ranks.
I guess you have to be willing to crush people without too much remorse to get there (or be really good, but that is alas rare)

[/useless but nevertheless sympathizing comment over]

[Invisible Man]

OK since typing that last post I've been on a walk with one of the people in question (his request). Topics of 'conversation'

--Asking his dad for money from his recently-deceased mother's life insurance payout so he can buy a fifth income property.
--Said property was foreclosed-on after the woman had her boyfriend evicted as a matter of the restraining order she took out against him
--She couldn't afford the place after her abusive boyfriend left, and has been paying for services by giving people appliances, which irks the person I spoke with to no end (he would have to replace them)
--We walked through the hall of a particularly nervous department chair as a 'joke,' because--get this--with all of the layoffs and program cancellations, wouldn't it be funny if their bosses silently walked through their lab spaces pretending to assess everything? Ha! Ha!
--Listeria causing congenital birth problems. It was suggested that I take hot dogs home to my super-pregnant wife
--Him taking a loan from me to buy said income property (little does he know, I have $11 to my name).

Ha! Ha!