3161

I’ve never really understood Scandinavians.

3162

That’s not surprising.

Or, in Scandinavian: Oots-a noot shoorpreeseng, bork bork bork!

3163

I’m sorry to hear about your grandmother Buceph and also, your friend’s situation with MS. What is nice is being able to spend time with them that you will remember for the rest of your life.

I remember being with my grandmother the day she died in the hospital, not the exact timing (probably about 15 years+ ago) and holding her hand. At her services, I remember standing up and telling everybody what a great hand holder she had been over my life. It didn’t matter to me that her hands had become arthritic, knobby, veiny, unattractive to most, over time, it mattered that she loved me and always demonstrated that to me, and I am sure you have many such memories you will carry on.

3164

You should probably not eat a whole thing of purple Nerds right before you meet with the Dean of the college.

They were delicious though.

3165

3166

Was a little curious about actors that have played Power Rangers after seeing a demotivational poster joke about Jason Frank.

The original yellow ranger actress died in a car accident.

Found out the actor that played the original red ranger is now a gay porn actor.

I stopped looking up the actors after that.

3167

Pretzel rolls are gross.

3168

Thanks for a nation of finks.

3169

Proven false! :(

3170

People who justify stores being open at midnight on Thanksgiving so they can start Black Friday at 12:01AM suck. You have nobody but yourselves to blame for the complete commercialization of yet another holiday.

3171

Nah, they’re only part of the problem. Much of the blame lies with the workers who agreed (and still agree) to work these hours in the first place. Now some employers expect it, and treat it as part of the job, disregarding traditional holidays/hoiday weekends and treating them like any other work day.

3172

Out of curiousity, were you aware of the derivation of that (I imagine you are, it would be hard to come up with it out of the blue, though, possibly, it sounds like there might be a band by that name now)?

I ran across it yesterday but didn’t want to post the whole thing since it’s from a dark poem by William S. Burroughs about Thanksgiving and, while I agree with a lot it says, didn’t want to cast a pall on anybody’s Thanksgiving.

Deemed NSFW (better safe than sorry) but if anybody’s interested here 'tis.

http://academic.brooklyn.cuny.edu/modlang/carasi/thanksgivingprayer.htm

3173

Workers don’t have the option of saying no in most places. Most major retailers are not unionized, meaning saying “no” means job abandonment.

The Walmart I work at part-time was absolutely packed last night at midnight. Very few of the employees wanted any part of that.

3174

A successful relationship depends on a 50/50 win/loss ratio at chess.

3175

Poker Night at the Inventory runs like ass on my MacBook.

3176

Stop bringing so many sad dog stories on QT3 :(.

3177

My dog is happy! She’s asleep, actually, but I assume that’s happy for a dog.

3178

3 years ago, the retailer my wife works for decided to open for 4 hours on Thanksgiving day, 5pm to 9pm. In 4 hours they made more sales than they had the previous year on Black Friday. As such, they are now always open on Thanksgiving day. Why did they work? Because they get fired for no-showing a shift, so the company just schedules everyone to work and fires anyone who doesn’t show. Since no one wants to be unemployed going in to the holidays, pretty much everyone shows up. Each year there is always one person who doesn’t… they get fired. It keeps the rest of the employees in line.

3179

I get it. Your shtick is that you just post the stupidest shit ever. I understand. But this is even beyond your caliber, Kerzain. Do you not know how normal jobs work?

If you ‘choose’ not to work, you get fired so that someone who wants to work can work. Almost everyone is ‘at-will’ employed these days, mostly so that corporations can fire you whenever you start dipping below the acceptable work level.

I’m betting almost every person who’s going to have an awful Black Friday while at work is in Retail, and almost every person working retail is ‘at-will’. Therefore, if you don’t work your scheduled hours, they will let you go. And as others have said, no one who needs a job to survive wants to not have that job right before the holidays.

Not all of us have unlimited job prospects like you do Kerzain. You’re a fucking tool for saying it’s the workers fault, and you’re an asshole for believing it.

3180

To play middle-of-the-road advocate here: yeah, most of the people who have it horrible work in retail. However, when you work in retail, you should know the perils that come with it. Yeah, for some people there aren’t a lot of options other than retail: the economy is rough, jobs are scarce, and some people thought a Liberal Arts degree would actually be useful.

I don’t think anyone’s saying that holiday times for retail employees don’t suck - but I don’t think anyone can get away with saying it wasn’t unexpected. Black Friday isn’t like a surprise tsunami, it’s right there on the schedule and you know exactly when it is.

Now, for people who WEREN’T told “You’ll be expected to work weekends/holidays” and get that sprung on them - oh yeah, those folks have my sympathies because I know what that’s like, having your job dictate when you can have a life outside of it. Yet if you know going in that you’re going to be expected to put in extra hours, or come in on weekends, or work closing shift on Christmas Eve - you know it’s going to suck, so at least you can brace yourself a bit.

To turn it around -for the people that do work those holidays, from retail to public service to the plumber who shows up at 7pm when your toilet’s clogged on Thanksgiving - a big thanks to those who put in the time and work so that those of us who aren’t in their shoes can appreciate the time we have.