Venting Thread- Vent about anything.

[i.am.me]

I wish I had a job to hate :-/

[VulpesZerda]

The more the merrier. Do you work on weekends only or what?

 

I just started this job, and "chance of overtime" was quickly changed to "six days a week required". Fuckin stupid.

  

Ouch, that sucks. I did that in the summer. But yeah I cut my hours back to just weekends to maintain my sanity. But I do two 10-hour shifts so it's not really helping!

Do you work at Initech? (Office Space reference)

Haha! I can't wait to have a sit-down job, I work in retail. Though it's probably good to have an active job since I don't get much other exercise lol

[spectastic]

I'm part of a unit that makes hydrogen cyanide - hydrogen-fuckin-CYANIDE. The safety/environmental restrictions are ridiculous. Nothing gets done as a result. The amount of paperwork you have to do for everything is so fucked you might as well sign a piece of paper on the stall before you take a shit, just to be safe. There are about 4-5 operators who have 30+ years of experience, and all fixing to retire in the next 5 years. There's a huge dichotomy of really old and experienced operators and really young inexperienced operators, and only a few in the middle. This is a result of the unit sucking so much at retaining its employees, firing employees, and a management system based on fear and intimidation. So in 5 years, there's going to be young inexperienced guys running this very dangerous unit.

 

Same situation with pretty much every other part of the unit (E/I, DCS, managers, operations - on every level). The company has people who retired/fired/quit, and nobody to replace them. So instead of hiring someone new, it distributes the workload to the point where one guys gets the job of 2 or more compared to 10 years ago. I'm actually lucky because the units I mange are small and relatively maintenance free. So as a result, people are quitting because there are more lucrative offers elsewhere with easier tasks. and it's a vicious circle.

 

On top of that, they treat employees like shit, like fucking mules who are supposed to churn out work and progress regardless of the circumstances. There's a huge disconnect between management and everyone they manage. I suppose that's true to a certain extent in every workplace. But this place really sucks at it. I've talked to a couple of my peers, and they show similar signs of impatience with this place.

Edited December 3, 2014 by spectastic

[Lisa44201]

I am so tired of being pregnant! This is my third child, so I had a clue going into it as to how much not-fun it is (especially by the end), but still. I want to sleep on my back. Hell, I want to sleep at all. I want to be able to roll over without having to sit up. I want to tie my own shoes again. I am so OVER IT (three weeks, four days and counting.....).

[GCool]

Do they at least mask the "treating like shit" with good benefits and pay and things like that?

 

That's what they do at my work. My parents are all, "you should be grateful for the money", but I don't give a SHIT about the money! I want a good fit that'll actually get me experience to get where I want to go.

[spectastic]

Do they at least mask the "treating like shit" with good benefits and pay and things like that?

 

That's what they do at my work. My parents are all, "you should be grateful for the money", but I don't give a SHIT about the money! I want a good fit that'll actually get me experience to get where I want to go.

I give a little shit about money, but it's a diminishing return. But our benefits are pretty standard compared to other oil/gas related companies, or even subpar.

 

What really pisses me off is that everyone has been asked to work 72 hour weeks (6 days/week 12 hr shifts) for at least three months, due to this new thing they're bringing out that I'm not supposed to talk about or I'll get sued and have my balls chopped off. I've heard that us salary people aren't going to get any form of compensation for it, aside from the free lunch on the weekends, because that was the case in the past. On the other hand, the hourly people are getting paid enormous amounts due to overtime. I heard this one lead operator is going to pull in $240k for the year, largely from the overtime he's accumulated.

 

On a side note, my coworker's bf pulls in $240k/yr as a entry level engineer working in the shale fields. But the work is not intellectually stimulating at all, and you're stuck working with a lot of idiots.

 

I'd much rather get paid less to do what I like, but not on a PhD salary for 5 years.

[geographyrocks]

Student who missed lab last week and didn't turn in the previous week's lab:

I didn't know we had class last week (even though it's in the syllabus AND I sent a reminder email).  I didn't realize we had to turn in the previous lab (even though it was stated in class and was stated in a second email).  Can I turn in the lab for partial credit or do extra credit work? ---Sent 1 hour before the last lab of the semester.

To sum up my long, eloquent reply: Hell, no. 

As a side note: this person has told me about how they're an A+ student all semester.  Oh, yeah?  Well, A+ students show up to class and don't wait a full friggin' week to email the instructor. 

[Gvh]

Student who missed lab last week and didn't turn in the previous week's lab:

I didn't know we had class last week (even though it's in the syllabus AND I sent a reminder email).  I didn't realize we had to turn in the previous lab (even though it was stated in class and was stated in a second email).  Can I turn in the lab for partial credit or do extra credit work? ---Sent 1 hour before the last lab of the semester.

To sum up my long, eloquent reply: Hell, no. 

As a side note: this person has told me about how they're an A+ student all semester.  Oh, yeah?  Well, A+ students show up to class and don't wait a full friggin' week to email the instructor. 

 

Seriously. TA woes are ridiculous. I'll spare you the details, but sometimes I really wonder how some of my students are able to sit up right and breath at the same time. 

[smg]

Giant pools of shit, broken machines, brain aneurisms. 

[shadowclaw]

*GROAN* I decided to look at the application status for my submitted applications. I looked at the WUSTL app just now, and it says one of my LORs are missing. It would be the one I was waiting for Monday night at 9:00 PM. He sent me an e-mail after completing each letter, but I didn't actually check to make sure they were there. I hope he didn't try to do University of Washington twice or something weird like that. I e-mailed the department to make sure it really isn't there. Luckily, the application says right on it that materials will be accepted for a few days after the due date.

[grad_wannabe]

*GROAN* I decided to look at the application status for my submitted applications.

 

This is going to be me for the next 3 months. Refresh ... refresh ... refresh

[shadowclaw]

I know I'm repeating the frustrations of many others, but why can't my LOR writers just upload all of their letters now instead of waiting until the due date? Only one has done this. He uploads within a day or two of receiving the emails. The other two just wait. I know they have the letters written, and all they have to do is check some boxes, upload the file, and hit submit. It can't take that long. Some of these schools start reviewing applications as they come in.

[dr. t]

Submitted application yesterday. Found minor typo ("that that") in SOP today.

[smg]

Submitted application yesterday. Found minor typo ("that that") in SOP today.

 

I hear ya.  I forgot a "the" in my SOP. 

[dr. t]

I hear ya.  I forgot a "the" in my SOP. 

 

Gaiman’s First Law: “Picking up your first copy of a book you wrote, if there’s one typo, it will be on the page that your new book falls open to the first time you pick it up.” - Neil Gaiman

[wuglife427]

Dear coworker I barely know: How fast I eat is not an appropriate topic of conversation at a holiday luncheon. You don't know what my relationship with food is like, and I'm self-conscious enough without you pointing stuff like this out to the whole lab. Please work on that brain-mouth filter.

[Between Fields]

It's the start of my first finals week as a doctoral student and I suddenly find myself with the attention span of that dog from the movie Up.

[wuglife427]

I haven't been getting much sleep lately due to finals, apps, and insomnia. Last night I was really hoping to get ~7 hours and have a mostly-clear head for finishing my next application. I didn't actually manage to fall asleep until around 4am (having gone to bed at 2:30)...and then my drunk roommate sat on me. I wake up terrified and confused, and I see her scurrying away. My heart was pounding and it took me another hour or so to fall back asleep. I pretty much feel awful this morning. My roommate is one of my best friends and we've never had any kind of problem in ~2 years of living together, but I'm really upset about this. I don't know if I should bring it up, though, because it's not like this is something she does regularly, there's not really anything she can do besides apologize, and I'm honestly not sure she remembers it.

[GCool]

 it's not like this is something she does regularly, there's not really anything she can do besides apologize, and I'm honestly not sure she remembers it.

 

Sounds like you have your answer. I mean, it's still really shitty,  but there's no way your friend could have understood what you were going through unless you had just told her about it before she got drunk. Heh

[Maveth]

As an antisocial, mediocre undergraduate who suffers from severe depression, it's just a little more of a knife wound to have the professor, whom I was forced to take 80% of my major level courses with, pretty much give me the most dismal review ever... to my face. I went from being tired and overstressed to produce his monster final, which he demanded to be turned in a week before finals were even supposed to start, to being a self-destructive wreck as he went on to completely tear my intelligence and writing to pieces in front of an entire class. At least I wasn't alone when he proceeded to inform us we're all apes compared to his precious honor students. Or perhaps he's still irate, because instead of being an active participant in his special picketing group in front of the power company building, I chose to go to work and earn my pittance of a paycheck so I could sleep under my roof for another month. I should be used to his consistent degrading commentary, since thanks to his personality, every other professor in the field that I could have looked to for a recommendation has fled for the hills to other less abusive environments. I would feel more comfortable asking for letters for grad school from ANYONE but him. However, how do you find people to write for you when within a semester or a year they move to other colleges? Or only know you vaguely? I have no hope for getting into any decent school if I have to rely on this man to recommend me... and save for one other professor, any others I took classes with are long gone. I feel like I have a stunning future ahead delivering pizzas and being slowly crushed by loan debt, because my degree is worth nothing without a Doctorate, and the one who best is familiar with my work despises me.

[dr. t]

It shouldn't be a goddamn fight to have gender neutral language in a document.

[shadowclaw]

I don't understand why it's so difficult to fix an online quiz so that it actually gives you a grade. Took a quiz twice, and my grade is still listed as "--/33."

 

I also discovered that there was a bag of potatoes on my backseat under a sweatshirt... from the first week of the semester. I tried to gently pick up the bag, but they were mush and squirted rotten potato juice all over my seat.

[MoJingly]

I also discovered that there was a bag of potatoes on my backseat under a sweatshirt... from the first week of the semester. I tried to gently pick up the bag, but they were mush and squirted rotten potato juice all over my seat.

 

ewwwww.  Yeah, nothing beats a rotten potato.  I've had quite a few go rogue underneath the fridge.  They smell fantastic.

[Quantum Buckyball]

bitches be crazy 

[Scantronphobia]

no sleep, all work, other people somehow find time for social lives (are they just genuises or what?) possibly coming down with a cold.