HeadphoneAddict Posted August 3, 2014 Report Posted August 3, 2014 Drove to Houston for my step-dad's funeral tomorrow. My eldest daughter came with me, and we've both only had about 3.5 hours of sleep since 9AM yesterday morning, because we didn't get to leave until 9PM yesterday after the news came late (driving 6 hours to Amarillo last night, and another 10 hours today). He was in the hospital with a broken hip and shoulder, and doing rehab with some diabetic complications (79 years old); but he seemed fine when my mom had lunch with him, and 2 hours later he was dead before she could make it back to say goodbye. He's been my step-dad for 26 years, and part of my life longer than my father or any previous step-dad, and he'll be missed. His eldest son is being an ass and has already divorced his part of the family from my mom, and wont even meet with us or have dinner with us after the funeral, before he flys back to NY. The younger daughter is a friend to my mom, and she will be spending time together with us after the funeral and celebrating Bob's life with memories. But this guy pisses me off, so pray for me that I don't try to punch his face out tomorrow. My mom is grieving and he's just adding to her loss. I wish I could talk smack with refinement, so I don't look like an asshat myself - I'd love to make him feel guilty and boorish by his behavior. Well, now I wish I had punched the motherfucker in the face. Here's why... My step-dad left almost everything to my mom. Since my step-dad's son is aka "the evil one" who treated my mom like crap for 26 years, she doesn't want him to have real valuables from her husband unless specified in the will - minor sentimental things like a yarmulka from a bar mitzvah, sure, but not something like her husband's gold watch. There's really no other tangible assets other than clothes and meds, with the house in my mom's name after she inherited it from her mom. So we sat down and after a little discussion we decided that my step-dad's vintage gold Omega from the 1950's, which his previous wife gave him as an engagement present decades ago, would go to her step-daughter's oldest son (her step-grandson in his 20's). It made sense that it would stay on his side of the family, since the boy's actual grandmother by blood had given the watch to his grandfather (my step-dad). So my mom, my step-sister, and I presented the watch to this young man after the funeral. Last night "the evil one" shows up at his sister's and nephew's hotel room and demanded the watch, and basically stole the watch from the kid under duress and fear! What kind of bastard steals an inherited watch from his young nephew? My step-father wore that watch during the entire 26 year marriage to my mom, and as his widow she had every right to give it to her grandchild after his grandpa dies. But this fucker storms in and takes it away from him! It's not like the man needs a $500-$1000 watch. He's an anesthesiologist who showed up to the funeral wearing a Rolex Sub (and his wife with her two-tone Datejust). My step-sister says he's got a drawer full of "dead people's watches" that he never wears and just pack rats them, and she'd rather have seen me get the watch than her brother (my brother and I both wanted her son to have it). This was a watch the boy would actually wear as a keepsake in memory of his grandpa. I guess it's a good thing I wasn't there when it happened, because I would have called the police and then waited for him to touch me so I could go all apeshit on his ass for "assaulting" me. He would have been down before I needed to reach for my oxygen tank. PS: It's really not a particularly valuable or desirable watch, especially with a repainted dial, but certainly a sentimental one. We had taken a photo of the watch so I could get more info about it for him later. His watch is on the left and was closer to the camera than mine, so it looks bigger than mine but is actually smaller.
crappyjones123 Posted August 3, 2014 Report Posted August 3, 2014 Both of my photographs submitted to a juried art exhibition were accepted Can't wait till Thursday to find out if they won anything. Hooray! 4
Dreadhead Posted August 4, 2014 Report Posted August 4, 2014 Condolences Larry. Sorry for your loss Ian lovely tribute.
en480c4 Posted August 4, 2014 Report Posted August 4, 2014 Thanks everyone. She was such a good pup, and it's strange how missing them pops up at strange times. So far what's gotten me were checking for her before firing up the vacuum because she hated the sound of it, or rushing to get home to make sure she could hide in the bathroom during a thunderstorm, only to get half way and remember that she didn't have to be scared of them any more. And sorry for your loss, Larry, and even more sorry that a difficult situation had to be made more difficult for no reason.
n_maher Posted August 4, 2014 Report Posted August 4, 2014 You know my thoughts on this, Ian, but you gave her the best life that I can imagine she ever would have gotten. It would have been wonderful if there had been more time, but such is the nature of these things in that I'm not sure we ever get as much as we would have liked to have. 6
swt61 Posted August 4, 2014 Report Posted August 4, 2014 I agree. Just remember how much she enriched your life, then factor that by about 10 to know how much you enriched hers. 1
skullguise Posted August 5, 2014 Report Posted August 5, 2014 After a fairly inefficient day (lots of work, little actual progress), I came home tired and mentally a bit stressed. Checked my email for the multitude of job opportunities I seem to get, and one came in that was so mis-matched to my experience, I had to reply tongue-in-cheek. Here is my reply to the basic required duties of the position.....click to read if you care (I had fun with it, it de-stressed me, and the recruiter loved it) 1
Hopstretch Posted August 5, 2014 Report Posted August 5, 2014 Shot 67 at Spyglass in the PGA aboutGolf sim. Would that I could do it in real life.
Augsburger Posted August 6, 2014 Report Posted August 6, 2014 You had me going there for a while. First, I was trying to figure out how I missed that you were coming out to California. Then I was impressed you got a tee time at Pebble Beach this time of year. Then I was pissed you didn't invite me for a martini to celebrate shooting five under.
VPI Posted August 6, 2014 Report Posted August 6, 2014 Our new CEO played her first round of golf ever at Pebble Beach last week for some corporate thing. She did not do that well.
Augsburger Posted August 7, 2014 Report Posted August 7, 2014 Well the "Pebble Beach" course is really difficult and is not something a first timer should ever be introduced to. Similar to taking a beginning snow plowing skier down the double black face at Whistler. Ouch!
Dusty Chalk Posted August 7, 2014 Report Posted August 7, 2014 Yeah, I didn't learn nothing on the double black diamond other than how to take a fall ... actually, come to think of it, that was really useful on the 'field of moguls'.
Dreadhead Posted August 7, 2014 Report Posted August 7, 2014 Returned to work after little over a week off. 200+ emails and almost none of what I asked/thought to be done when I was out is done. Yay. 2
skullguise Posted August 7, 2014 Report Posted August 7, 2014 Sorry to hear that, Chris....that's my world after almost every vacation......
Aimless1 Posted August 7, 2014 Report Posted August 7, 2014 Ditto. When I go in Monday nothing will have been touched and I'll delete at least a third of the emails unread.
CarlSeibert Posted August 10, 2014 Report Posted August 10, 2014 (edited) Only 200 emails after 5 working days off is something to celebrate. <whining> Me, I'm going through all my online accounts that met (at the time) the "this account can't hurt me so I'll use the same (decent, but nevertheless the same) password" test and changing the password to LastPass-generated randomness. Which means I've got a couple hundred opportunities the experience the quality of coding on the world's websites up close and personal. It's pretty shocking. A lot of them are designed to make the job of changing a password as difficult as possible. Fully half of them fail in some time-sucking way. Like a bunch of them return you to the password change page with a tiny little graphic change as the only indication that you got success instead of a loop. Which is great synergy, considering that a lot of them do fail by looping. And at least a half a dozen so far have celebrated the password change by sending an email with my new password in clear text. Priceless. </end whining> Edited August 10, 2014 by CarlSeibert
Dusty Chalk Posted August 10, 2014 Report Posted August 10, 2014 @ clear text passwords in emails Can I and SMH at the same time? 'cause that makes me want to.
Dreadhead Posted August 11, 2014 Report Posted August 11, 2014 (edited) Today I learned the value of calling around for car repair quotes. It saved me at least $400 over the original quote because they wanted to replace the whole control arm rather than just the bushings.I also got them to match the dealer for the exact same service and saved $120 right there. Edited August 11, 2014 by Dreadhead 3
CD44hi Posted August 11, 2014 Report Posted August 11, 2014 (edited) Not today but yesterday: 12hrs in a car driving down from Boston (including a gazillion of pit stops.) Yikes ..... Edited August 11, 2014 by CD44hi
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