The Kvetch Thread

Except the way the most such software works (at least the programs I've used) the alphabetical order is automatic. sounds like ti was done by hand and randomly..after it all was writtien..always a bad idea.

You're in the right place, Andy. Poor guy. Computerless. Been there. A nightmare.

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I spent all day yesterday thinking it was Friday--until I turned on the TV. All the Thursday programs were on. Still, it was Friday for a long time.

Now I gotta have another Friday. One a week is plenty.

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I was offered another editing job. Time was I could do five at a time. This new one would make three. I don't think I can do it. Too feeble-minded. I HATE turning down work. You know, they pay me for that stuff. HATE it. I didn't come out with a direct no. I fumfered. Is that how you spell fumfer? See, feeble-minded.

Maybe I should switch professions. I know for sure that most employers would love to have an aging, sickly, pain in the ass like me on the payroll.

dishwasher repair man is here. I had to agree to a $200 service fee upfront whether he fixes it or not. He said it's 10 years old and should be replaced. I said for $200 he can fix it.

Can you delay and put it in a queue?

JPB, You're damned right. For $200 he should not only fix it, but he should give it a nice cleaning too. BTW, I'm my dishwasher.

Not sure I understand the question about the queue. Do you mean work? Deadlines would make that impossible--if that's what you're referring to.

yeah, that's what I meant. Sorry you're having to turn down work.


My kvetch of the day is with trying to fill out health insurance applications for Mr B and the girls. He's had BCBS forever as part of his work-provided benefits. We're trying to apply for a private BCBS policy for them for when his COBRA runs out in Oct.

The application is horrendous. I called and asked if they couldn't simply look at their records for the medical histories. They've got a much better history of our medical past than I do, particularly when it comes to dates/dr info/details. "Oh, no -- just fill out what you can for the past five years for each of them."

This is nuts! WHY CAN'T YOU JUST LOOK IT UP!?!?!?!?!?

I emailed this kvetch today from my phone... I needed to get it out! Name deleted....

(Annoying co-worker) is such a freak. Break time. Donuts r late. "Are we getting donuts? Where r the donuts?" over and over. And coffee. Then the donuts and coffee arrive. "Oh, i shouldn't have a donut" muttering and pacing. "I had almonds". She has a donut.
It's my break, i wish she would keep her donut anxiety to herself. It's disruptive to my break. As i eat my yummy yogurt, granola, strawberries and banana that i brought in from home.

JPB, Sure they can look it up, but you work for free!

caribou, This is a kvetch once removed, right? Not yours? Annoying is annoying whethre it's yours or not. Glad I don't have to work with the donut nut. There are advantages to working at home.

Oh no, that was my rant. I was at work, it happened, I needed to get it out, so I typed an email on my phone to my friend, and sent it. I just copied and pasted it here to share.

I work with freaks. It's going to be a long month or so. I'm grateful for my headphones.

I'm editing a book that is an editor's nightmare. It's vague. I have no doubt that the author knows this stuff, but communicating it is another matter. In addition to the vagueness and strange use of language, the author comes up with some doozy statements that make my eyeballs spin. Plus there are other problems. Single instead ot double quotation marks--ordinarily nbd, except there are hundreds of things that have quotations marks even if they're not quotes. Another sign of sloppy thinking: I'm in Chapter 2, and I've seen hundreds (not exaggerating) of etc's. Not only do I have to change most of them to "and so on," "and so forth," etc., but they are another sign of vagueness.

Some figures were deleted after the fact, so I have to renumber everything. And some of the tables aren't numbered and should be. So I have to renumber them as well.

When I'm working, I usually moan, snarl, and mutter dirty words. You can be sure that there are lots of oys. Last night I muttered, "Oy gevalt." Tonight was the biggie. I said to myself, "Oy Abruch."

Is this any way to make a living? Hey, I'm not even making a living.

Fie, feh, and phooey.

As a former newspaper editor who did a fair share of copy editing 'on the rim' as we used to say in the biz, my heart aches for you, 'Boita.

Thanks, Andy. I appreciate the sympathy.

I came back with a PS kvetch. Since my computer was reconfigured, I can't use the publisher's editing template, so I'm doing all the coding manually. Thud.

Abruch?

is that dirty?


Sorry to hear it, Boida.

Not a dirty word. I don't know many dirty words in Yiddish. I looked everywhere for a translation of oy abruch. Nada. I found other people asking about it.

The best that I can come up with is what I thought it meant. I could be right. I could be wrong. I think it means Oh God!

From my childhood perspective there were different levels of oy. Plain oy. Oy vey. Oy gevalt. And oy Abruch.

So I tried again to find oy abruch on google. Where was I directed? To the hebonics thread on a2k started by someone named Roberta. Not helpful, but definitely a small world moment.

I wish Phoenix was around. She'd probably know.

Roberta, that other Roberta is so everywhere! She should be careful of the fame and the subsequent backlash!

I hear that Phoenix KNOWS everything! She just holds back her knowledge from humanity because she can... oh and something to do with the Prime Directive.

Fame!

I think you might be right. I base this on the meaning of the opening words of the well-known prayer "Baruch adanoi. . ."

New editing project. I'm working on the annual update of a book about taxes. One of life's little ironies.

Frankly I'm sick of life's little ironies. But I need the work.

Here are a few more. All this work all of a sudden will probably put me over some limit. I'll have to give back some of my social security, and I'll probably lose my Medicaid.

Hey LLIs, stuff it!

it means 'Oy, a Blessing'!