Jump to content

Menu

G5052

Members
  • Posts

    10,667
  • Joined

  • Last visited

Everything posted by G5052

  1. Arg. That happens more and more. A scammer called a relative of mine and wanted money to get my son out of jail. The relative did it and didn't tell me. The whole time my son is commuting to college and going to work like normal. Then they called the relative AGAIN, and that time they figured it out. I was getting online scammers on LinkedIn (lol). They want to link. Then they give some variation on knowing that I am a beautiful person from my picture and my profession. Then they want to get to know me better online because we have "so" much in common. Then I drop them like a hot potato... And yes, I did an image search, and they are all scams. Now I only accept people that I truly know. Using LinkedIn as dating site? Who would have expected that. Then a friend of mine who was also trying to build up her links got the EXACT SAME PITCH. Gosh, we laughed!
  2. We're house hunting and have considered that option. I would start with a contractor. Some contractors have standardized plans that they may be able to use or modify with an architect. You can save money that way. Another option is to do a modularized addition where the contractor assembles panels. The biggest of course is to get a licensed, reliable contractor who has done a lot of additions.
  3. I have a friend who has nine children. They are mostly grown now, but they had a room in their house that was a laundry room/closet/single toilet/single shower. They had two washers and two dryers. The idea is that they would do the laundry and hang it up in each person's cubby. If you came in muddy from their farm, you could strip into the washing machine and shower in that room and put on clean clothes. Each child had a limited wardrobe, FWIW. I thought that was brilliant. But yes, resale. They bought it from another large family. I think I remember her saying that it came that way and had been on the market for awhile.
  4. Yup. I would tell the professor but recognize that the grading may or may not offer separate grading. Some professors do a simple group grade no matter how much one or the other does. My oldest has had a bunch of group project classes, and they have run the whole range. On his major capstone class, he did 90% of the work. On another project they did the entire thing on a Google doc and never met. The professor said it was the best project he had ever seen for that class. I was taking a class some time ago with professors. It was for state certification in online teaching. My father was in hospice, so I was on eggshells. They have horrible internet coverage where I'm from, and I could imagine all kinds of problems ahead. My father died the week that the final project was due. I was the team leader. And my mother who had significant dementia was quite a handful. And the aunt that I was staying with found out when I arrived that their high speed internet was completely down because of a contract problem with their provider over dish location and more. When I emailed the professors teaching the class, they said to either withdraw or tough it out. So I made sure everyone knew what to do and said I'd edit it on the weekend when I could go to the local library. Periodically I checked in and reminded everyone. Three guesses. Yup. Friday evening hit, and I was the only one who done their section. I had to do some things with my mom Saturday morning related to buying certain additional flowers for the grave, so I did that with her and got her lunch. I went to the library and slaved away until closing. Still nothing but my work. I went to church Sunday with friends there, and then got mom lunch again and went to the library. I finished the report and emailed the other professors and said that it was going in at 8pm. I pointed out areas that could be improved if someone had time. I went and took dinner to mom and went back to the library half an hour before closing. Just before the library closed, I submitted it. Nothing else had been done. And when I checked my email the next day, of course there was a firestorm from my fellow group members. Sigh. We all got the same grade.
  5. Yes, it does. I'm sorry that you're going through that.
  6. Yes, I've gone through several reworks of my circle of friends in the last few years. Part was COVID, and part was other issues. I decided to stop making the effort with certain people. Just not worth my efforts if I'm always having to check in and such. Right now one of my good friends has cancer for the third time, and it's weighing on me. At times we've gotten busy, but we always come back. I'm really trying to keep in touch with her right now and another friend who is homeschooling her grandchildren. They both are amazing 24/7 type friends despite the ups-and-downs of life. But there's a balance. Both have sought me out on a consistent basis as much or more than I have.
  7. I saw my asthma doc this morning in her office. She called to see if I could come in before flu season for an in-person visit because I have severe asthma. Then she said we'd do a telemedicine visit in late January or February. All of her sources say that it's going the wrong direction. She asked about my schedule and made several comments about continuing to mask. My church is heading towards not requiring masks and only social distancing in a small, old building (my state no longer requires that for churches), and she got very emphatic that I shouldn't go if that happens. I figured.
  8. I agree that this isn't your game at all. She has serious mental health issues. But I get what she's going through because there are few things in life worse that a rough divorce. There is a reason they call divorce "death without a funeral." Truly the worst experience of my life. I felt my sanity slipping more than a few times during it. I get the desperation and fear. If she had mental health issues going into this, I can guarantee that they are made worse by the divorce process. But I have a different suggestion if you are ever in this position again. I joined a private online divorce support group run by a therapist and a life coach. There I could rant and rave without burning out my friends. My friends only knew the high-level stuff. Maybe some people have friends or relatives that can handle all the swirling mess, but I chose not to share that with them. One of the best choices ever. I didn't drive my friends crazy and came out with my sanity.
  9. I enjoyed reading this. Truly very interesting how other places handle things. I voted Friday partly because I wanted to step away from the drama. Now I don't have to watch election news until the evening of Election Day. 😄
  10. Honestly, it doesn't bother me. I figure that politics and personal values of another individual aren't my concern. I make a practice of buying from small local businesses as much as possible out of principle, but again, my choice. If it bothers you, don't do it.
  11. In my area, the price is driven by the availability of being able to get a well drilled and how the soil percolates for a septic field. Some years ago a friend and her husband bought land and THANKFULLY they put in a clause that they could back out if they couldn't get a good well. They drilled that property in six places, and never got much water. They got their money back. I inherited land in another state. It's completely unbuildable and the whole area has actually been fenced off and condemned. The attorney advised me to get liability insurance on it and then stop paying the taxes so it would revert to the state after five years. It can't be sold. There was another piece of land that the same relative owned that seemed to be in the same category, but someone bought it. Apparently it's a big area for pot-growing, and they just bring in the water by truck. Go figure.
  12. A close friend and her granddaughter got it, and then the granddaughter's parents went to a family reunion without the kids a month later and got it. Two beloved older aunts who attended got it. I read the local news site of my home town, and about 6-8 of my parent's friends and collogues have died of it. There are still people at much church who believe it's a myth. One family stopped attending because the leadership require masks although compliance is frankly marginal. We sit at the back and go outside to talk to folks.
  13. Not much. I had two things on my wish list that came up that I bought. The total was $15 after my $10 credit, but why not?
  14. Yes, supposedly the larger chain department stores are taking them in the back and treating them using various procedures. Steam is one approach.
  15. I'm at the upper-side of that range and had the worst time trying to get full-time work. Two years and over 500 applications later, I decided just to do mostly contract work from home and pay for my own health insurance. I'm making close to what I would have in full-time work if you take out commuting expenses, clothes, etc. Go figure. I'm hoping to semi-retire in about three years and then phase down gradually. Contract work makes that easy to do. What I found to get interviews is that I had to take out as many dates as possible. As much as you can, you don't want betray your age. So I had no dates on my degrees and chopped off a lot of my experience. In my field, I always did a cover letter included work products in the uploads even if they weren't called for unless only a limited number of documents were allowed. I applied for jobs through Ziprecruiter and LinkedIn, but only allowed recruiter contacts through LinkedIn. For some reason I found good jobs on Ziprecruiter when I did the searching, but they weren't good matches if they did it. If you do temp work, read the fine print. I interviewed with several agencies, but like Tap related, I found out that if you worked for them, the company you were working for couldn't hire you without paying a fee. I also found out that temp-perm jobs were rare because of that. The community college offers a paralegal degree, and I've heard that some people find that getting placement requires volunteering at the local organizations that offer free or reduced-rate legal help so that you can get to know attorneys. There's also a local paralegal association associated with the bar association that offers placement help. You may or may not have that type of thing in your area. Good luck!
  16. My school allows professors to give live professor-monitored tests in Zoom if they have regular Zoom meetings. So they test during the regular Zoom class time but have to have a video camera placed. They told the professors to record it. It's only slightly less creepy in my book. When I watch the recordings for my classes, it is just of the one student at their computer. So at least that's more than one student at once; only slightly less creepy. There are only a handful of hybrid classes on campus other than labs and classes requiring hands on with special equipment or facilities. I've heard they really fill up quickly. Yesterday I heard that they are weighing just keeping us largely online through all of 2021. They already announced that we will be that way in January 2021.
  17. Yes, I went to an online seminar about it in August and asked what we should do if we saw something of concern. The manager giving the seminar said it wasn't his job to figure that out, just to train us. We were told to contact our deans. My field has a college-wide dean, and she freely admitted in our discipline meeting in August that she didn't know either. Nothing since. One student contacted me via message and said that she had been crying because her orientation video had been rejected. I helped her figure out who to contact, and she got it fixed. My kids are home from a different college and have had some monitored tests and say it's fine, but both are in the later part of their studies where long take-home exams are more common.
  18. I work for a college that is doing monitored exams that supposedly use artificial intelligence. So with fear and trembling, I looked at my first report. I'm supposed to watch the recorded video that the system flagged if it was scored above a certain number (being vague here). This is HORRIBLE. It flags normal human behavior, especially when they are taking a hard midterm. From what I saw, none of the flagged students cheated. Anyway, I can't provide details, but there it is. The joys of monitored testing.
  19. We had accounts at a bank and a credit union. The credit union membership came through my ex's employment. Recently I dropped the credit union. There was a time that it was better, but no longer. Their rates were consistently the same or only very slightly better at our bank, and they started charging $5/month for an account if you didn't have a direct deposit. The closest branch is not convenient for me. If they had remained like they were 5-10 years ago, I might have just kept them. But even the level of service wasn't stellar anymore. Now my bank is in the process of a merger with another local bank, so we'll see how that goes. They will double their branches and ATMs.
  20. I have a relative who was a hoarder. We had a set amount of money to renovate the house to get it sold, and I live across the country and didn't want to relocate. So we hired someone to clean it out. The person overseeing it sent me pictures, and it was bad. But we got it cleaned and renovated and ended up with twenty-seven offers. Needless to say, the location was prime. Quite an experience.
  21. LOL, mine as a single parent is $2300. More if it's a formula and not stair-stepped like the linked sheet, but REALLY? Not even worth trying.
  22. Yes, I did it every year for one or both kids when they were at the community college because they only did annual scholarships. It seemed like such a racket as life ups-and-downs occur, but thankfully they both qualified for academic scholarships. They required the FAFSA whether it was academic or need-based, so we did it. Then when they transferred to the four-year, we tried for the academic transfer scholarships, but neither one got one. Later we tried for need-based because my income was poor, but I did have some savings, so no. So this fall my income is better, and I didn't bother. One is paying his own way anyway and is graduating, and one is paying part of her way. It works.
  23. Yes, I've been a community college professor for over twenty years now, and the irony is that a percentage of students disappearing/failing is built into the system. If all of our students were diligent, we could never handle them. It's how the community colleges survive, plain and simple. The bar for admission is low, and many don't make it. I'm fortunate in that the courses I teach are both taken by second-semester freshmen or sophomores, so I have a higher finish rate than many.
  24. Yup. The college I work for is keeping the status quo. Most classes will remain online with some hybrid classes. Many labs and clinicals will be in person. We haven't heard yet on my kids' school, but my oldest is graduating anyway. The younger one is fine with online and actually works online for the college in the Writing Center.
  25. G5052

    Would you

    Under those conditions, no. Given that he's still paying for an apartment elsewhere, I'd figure that the food was just a part of life with you. If he lets the apartment go and makes it more long-term, I'd rethink.
×
×
  • Create New...