Tag: Work

A Slightly Kinder Version of Hell

I opened my email today and then quickly closed it again.  There were 238 new messages.  238!!  I’m in no shape to deal with that!  I’m barely able to brush my teeth.

It all started last week.  Wait, more accurately, it started 3 years ago but last week was an event of sorts.  It’s genealogy – convoluted, confusing genealogy.  My Great Grandmother started this whole thing when she watched Roots: The Miniseries, way back in the 1970’s.  She started digging and researching and put together an impressive lump of material without the aid of the internet.

My parents took up the cause and collected an even more impressive chunk of information, including photos.  They wandered all over the USA, wrote letters and badgered relatives until they now have branches on the family tree that go back to the 1600’s.  The pile is spectacularly imposing.

All of this information and keepsakes and heirlooms and photos……all of it…..will go to my older sister.  But where does that leave my kids?  What if they want to know the stories about their great, great, great, great, great Grandfather/Grandmother?  It would break my heart to lose all the information that’s been lovingly compiled over 50 years.

I decided that wasn’t going to happen.  About three years ago I started writing a short book about my parents and their parents.  I’ve spent the last 6 months scanning over 800 photos.  Some photos deserved better than my old Brother scanner that tops out at 1200dpi, so I bought another scanner that does 6400dpi.  I taught myself Photoshop and spent hundreds of hours touching up photos.

This brings me why I’m in no shape to deal with 238 245 (more have come in since I started this post) damned emails.

I drove 4 hours to my parents and spent Friday afternoon, all day Saturday and part of Sunday working on notes for their book and going though keepsakes in the family trunk and then drove the 4 hours back home.  I want this project finished so I can move on with my own projects, namely a book on how The Viking and I stormed Europe, offended Catholics, pissed off the Autobahn, shocked small villages and educated Florencians on how to curse.

But for now my brain is full.

It’s so full there isn’t room for anything else.  And I’m tired to the bone.  It’s probably because my brain is so busy trying to compartmentalize all that information that it has nothing left to actually operate my body.  That happens to computers all the time!  It’s so busy updating the Anti-Virus that it can’t play a single game of Solitaire.  That’s totally legit.

Except, apparently, it’s not legit when it’s anything other than a computers.  Because I came home and my car vomited all the binders, photos, keepsakes, tintypes and diaries all over the kitchen.  On Monday I looked at the mess and…..NOPE!  It just wasn’t in me to deal with it.  Yesterday was the same way.  Until The Viking decided that all this shit was messing up the clean kitchen he had personally arranged for me.

 

 

 

So, with aching back and foggy mind, I have picked up the harness of Mundania.  I’ve got no great ideas for a blog post – or supper for that matter.  I’ll come up with something I guess.  It’s supposed to thundershower this afternoon, fucking up any thoughts on barbequing.  I might be able to but as soon as I rely on it the heavens will open up and drown me, the barbeque and whatever the hell the main dish is.  Maybe something in the slow cooker?  It doesn’t give off much heat so shouldn’t turn the house into a slightly kinder version of Hell.

In the meantime, I will tackle the monster that is my Inbox.

Why Aren’t You Electrocuted?!

Over the weekend, The Viking and I – mostly The Viking – had to replace our Garage Door Opener because it inconveniently and selfishly died.

We took down the dead and useless Door Opener and then began assembling the new unit.  It was all very straight forward, no big surprises, until The Viking went rogue.  He threw the instruction manual into the corner and began fiddling with electrical wires.

Me:  Why aren’t you electrocuted?!

The Viking:  What?  There’s no power to these lines.

Me:  The wires are coming right out of the ceiling, the breaker hasn’t been flipped, so why aren’t you electrocuted?!

The Viking:  These wires get their power from the garage door opener brains, not from the building’s power supply.

Me:  Stop talking in Sorcery!  The brains are plugged in!  I can see the power cord plugged into the power plug!

The Viking:  Relax!  Take it easy.  I know what I’m doing.

Me:  …….

Me:  …….

Me:  …….

Me:  I will never understand electricity.  It’s terrifying.

He carried on with his Warlockery and I watched him.

Me:  I can’t believe I’ve lived for this long without understanding electricity.  I stuck a knife in an electrical socket once because my mother told me to never do that.  Ever.

The Viking:  And so you did.

Me:  Of course I did.  You can’t just tell me not to do something without telling me why.

The Viking:  Well, you obviously didn’t die.

Me:  Exactly.  It hurt, but I didn’t die, and my curiosity was gone.  My parents could have spared me that.

Me:  I also stuck my head in a plastic Drycleaning bag because there was a warning on it that said to never do that.  Again, they never said why.

The Viking:  Seriously?

Me:  Yes.  And I didn’t suffocate.  Now that I think about it though, I think the warning did mention ‘Suffocation’ but I was like 6 years old and didn’t have a clue what that meant.

The Viking:  …..

Me:  My best friend found a box of wooden matches once.  They looked harmless but apparently they were ‘extremely dangerous’ and children should never play with them.

The Viking:  Let me guess….

Me:  See?!  You know already what needed to be done!  We tried to light the wooden fence on fire but it wouldn’t burn.  We tried to set the grass on fire too, but that wouldn’t work either.  The only thing that actually did work was burning our fingers.  And then I got a spanking, like having burned fingers weren’t punishment enough, because Darcy apparently didn’t know how to lie.  I couldn’t be friends with him after that.

The Viking:  Hahaha!

Me:  And pull cords on blinds.

The Viking:  You didn’t!

Me:  Actually, yes.  I did.

The Viking stopped what he was fiddling with and looked at me with an odd expression on his face.  “You sound like your daughter.”

Me:  That’s impossible because I made certain that I explained things to her.  Don’t put a knife in an electrical outlet because electricity, through sorcery, will enter the knife, travel through your arm and straight upward because of gravity or something and blow your head completely off your body.  And guess what?  She never stuck a knife in an electrical outlet.

The Viking:  That’s not how electricity works.

Me:  Does it really matter?  The point is that she never electrocuted herself because she listened to me.  Unlike you who will die at some point this afternoon because you keep touching electrical wires.

The Viking:  I’m not going to die today.

Me:  I feel like a kid when my Dad took me to work with him and I had to sit around doing absolutely nothing for hours because there might be bears around.

The Viking:  …..

Me:  There were only so many times I could be interested in what was in the glove compartment.  And without the truck running fiddling with the radio buttons was less than satisfying.

The Viking:  …..

Me:  I did find a magazine full of naked women behind the seat.  Dad took it away from me and then made another worker take me home.  He said he had an emergency to deal with but I didn’t buy it.

The Viking:  …..

Me:  He did explain the perils of playing with the gear shifter when the truck was running but he never left it running.  He must not have trusted my judgement.

The Viking:  …..

Me:  There were old pallets at Dad’s job and he wanted to take them apart and use them for something else.  He gave me a hammer and told me to get all the nails out but I accidentally stepped on a nail as I was pulling a nail from another piece of wood.  I didn’t even get a tetanus shot.  Oh!  And one time I had a really, really sore throat so he painted my tonsils with MercuroChrome.  It’s toxic to the environment but not tonsils I guess.  I’m lucky to even be alive!

The Viking:  …..

Me:  Hey!  Did I ever tell you that I know how to pick a lock on an interior door?  So if you were to lock the bathroom door and then accidentally faint I would be able to pick the lock and save you.

The Viking:  I never lock the bathroom door.

Me:  I’ve just noticed that when I get bored my mind has a tendency to wander a bit.

The Viking:  You think?

Me:  I’m seriously bored.  I didn’t think it would take this amount of time to replace a door opener.  I would have brought booze and a book if I had known.  Maybe a pillow for a nap.  And a fuzzy blanket.  Or binoculars.  That might have amused me for a little while.

You’re not even listening to me anymore.

Who Flung Poo?!

 

Oh!  Hello!  Is it the weekend already?  Let me put some coffee on.  I honestly don’t know where the time goes.  Do you remember how slowly time passed when you were a kid?  It took 29 years for Christmas to arrive.  Now, it comes every 3 months.  The only place time ceases to move is in the Doctor’s Office, in a Traffic Jam or at the Passport Office.

Anyway, I’ve got bigger fish to fry today.  It’s called Litter and it’s the bane of my existence.  Who invented this crap?  Oh sure, it clumps around cat pee and poo so it’s easy to scoop, but it spreads through the house like a disease.  We’ve put men in space but can’t invent a decent litter?  My vacuum never sees the inside of the closet anymore.

I made matters infinitely worse when I went to buy more litter and there on the shelf was something called Litter Lite and it practically floated into my cart.  I’m accustomed to wrestling a 50 pound bag in which cursing, sweating and grunting are inevitably involved.  And usually a small crowd gathers at each end of the aisle to watch the show.  Litter Lite was a dream to get in the cart by comparison.  I waved at the bystanders and said “No show today, folks!”

However, here are the problems with Litter Lite:  it’s easier to dig in and it clings to the fur on the bottom of their feet in spite of having 3 large Litter Pads that are supposed to stop Litter spread.  I have carpeted the entire laundry room with those pads (which cost a fortune!) and there is still litter all over the house!

Then The Viking made the mistake of putting too much litter in the box so the litter was almost level with the flap door.  And it turns out that both cats are like ground hogs digging new burrows when it comes to burying their poo.  Litter shoots through that flappy door at the velocity of sandblasters.  We had discussions with both Teddy and Izzie, clustered around the litter box for demonstrations of proper digging techniques that limit the amount of collateral litter spillage, but it’s like they couldn’t care less about technique.

And then catastrophe happened.

I went into the laundry room to load the washing machine and there, laying on a Litter Pad was a turd.  It’s was sprinkled lightly with litter but it was definitely a turd.

“FOR FUCK’S SAKE!!”  I shoved the clothes into the machine.  “WHO FLUNG POO?!!”  The sound of 8 little feet and two big feet galloped down the hallway.  Teddy, Izzie and The Viking clustered around the doorway, all of them with the same wide-eyed, innocent expressions.

“Did you say something, Babe?”

“YES I DID!”  I hollered.  “Just look at that!  Right there!  It’s a TURD!”

The Viking immediately tried to deflect.  “I didn’t do it!”  But both cats were looking at him and nodding like they saw him do it.  “You can’t believe them!  They’re traitors!  Besides, I can’t even fit in the Litter Box.”

“Touché, salesman!”  I huffed and turned my attention to the short people.

Realizing the tide had turned, both cats looked at me.  “Well?!  Who flung the poo?!”

Izzie’s eyes were locked to mine, but Teddy’s eyes kept flicking to the left.  Toward Izzie.

“Did you fling poo, Izzie?”  I demanded.  “I’ve heard you in there doing the Macarena.”

She sat a little higher and indignation flooded her face.  I already knew it wasn’t her but I had to be certain before I looked at the real culprit.

“Teddy?”  He wouldn’t look at me.  “Did you fling the poo?”  He walked away without giving a full confession.

So we made changes.  I went to wrestle a 50 pound bag of heavy litter and amuse shoppers, while The Viking scooped the excrement then re-purposed the remaining litter.

But guess what.  There’s still litter all over the house!!

So, how was your week?  Aside from my Litter Dilemma mine was great.

PS:  Enjoy this clip about Flinging Poo

 

Special thanks to Part Time Monster and Nerd in the Brain for hosting Weekend Coffee Share.

No Good Lousy Day!

I slept badly last night, dreaming the whole night about asshole guys running into my car, stealing my groceries and throwing random things at me.  It looks like I’ve been hit between the eyes with a hatchet! And my head is throbbing! And my neck is stiff and sore! Gawd!!  Why am I even out of bed?

And what in the hell is up with the fucking cat?! Teddy has taken over my office chair! He was eating his breakfast and then before I could hit the power button on the coffee maker he was in my chair!

When I got up to get a cup of coffee…..

When I went to open the family room curtains….

When I went to take a pee……

When I went to get another cup of coffee…..

He says he’s just keeping it warm for me but if that were the case he would be easier to dislodge; he wouldn’t be digging his claws into the fabric which necessitates a damned wrestling match every single time! As soon as I get his front claws unlatched, his back claws catch the edge of the seat. And he’s had the worst farts ever lately so every time I squeeze him in the middle he emits a noxious cloud of poo gas. It’s so bad I have to check to make sure it isn’t actual poo, and then more poo gas seeps around my face while I’m checking.

And he leaves gobs of his hair on the seat! And he and Izzie were playing with the stupid hair remover brush thingy and broke it! And now I’m going to have a hairy ass everywhere I go today!

Izzie isn’t any help either! While Teddy is rubbing his hairy body all over my chair, she’s taken residence on my keyboard. Or on my mouse. Or standing in front of the monitor.

I’ve loved you both up already! Can’t you see I’m in a bad mood? Stop looking at me like that! Why aren’t you harassing The Viking?! He’s not in a bad mood!  As a matter of fact, he seems to think my bad mood is fucking hilarious!

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And now I’m out of coffee and it’s only 11:40 in the morning. Fuck!  I suppose I may as well run some damned errands with my hairy ass. I’ll go get more of the good cat food so Teddy doesn’t smell so bad. And I’ll get groceries – and I swear to Gawd if even one guy tries to steal them in the parking lot I’m going to lose my shit!

And then I think I’ll get myself a Caramel Apple Cider at Starbucks. With whipped cream. And a piece of Banana Bread.

Because I deserve it.

Updates, Profanity & Apricot Brandy

I received an email the other day regarding my Simply Accounting software. Usually when I get these I delete them without a second look, but this time, for some reason, I scanned the message quickly until my eyes found the words ‘database corruption’ and then I fainted. When I woke up I read it more carefully. Here are the highlights of the email:

Good Afternoon Lori,

 I am your Account Manager at Sage 50 Canada.

 I am emailing you as a courtesy as our records indicate your version of Sage 50 is obsolete and no longer supported.

Some updates on your Windows operating system may be incompatible with your actual version of Sage 50/Simply Accounting which may generate, in some situations, a database corruption.

C…

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 Long story short, I gave him my Mastercard and he sent me an email with instructions. Evidently, my software was so obsolete I had to download a 2015.3 file before I could download the 2017 Edition. I asked him if a monkey could follow the instructions he was sending me and he assured me that even a monkey could perform the required skills.

Once my software was updated and working properly, I sent C. an email.

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Hey C,

It worked! I only had one small hitch.

The 2015.3 Download asked me a question about activation keys and in a blind panic I started stabbing the Serial Number and Activation Key into the spaces and it got all irritated and said it didn’t know me well enough for that kind of intimacy and I said that it shouldn’t be asking me any questions then, and it said I was annoying, so I yelled “You started it!” and then it said that it didn’t like my tone, and I said I didn’t like it’s tone when it said it didn’t like my tone, and then it said “You’re Activation Number is WRONG!” so I said ‘FINE! I’M LEAVING!’ and decided to ignore it completely and move on to the 2017 Download and the 2015.3 yelled ‘GOOD RIDDANCE!’

You may get a complaint. In my defense, I am 3 years into Menopause, the batteries in my mouse just died and I wasn’t expecting any questions from that Download. There is a slight possibility I may have over-reacted. I always expect the worst of updates and upgrades; baggage from a failed upgrade to the original Star Craft, I suppose. It’s a fault I should work on but probably won’t.

The 2017 Download took several long moments to berate me for my obsolete Sage 50 Edition. Apparently it barely recognized the files involved. I tried to explain that I liked my Edition – there were no surprises, I knew exactly how to do everything, we were friends! 2017 wasn’t impressed and I suspect it actually rolled its eyes at me.

When it finally finished desecrating my files and opened the new dashboard….well……there was a little bit of profanity. From me, not 2017. It looks terrible! It’s all modern and font-y and dull! It’s like the décor in the Space Shuttle! I like a little color, a few wrinkles, some fraying around the edges…..some personality! My old man is gone and some sort of Accountant-y guy showed up. It’s horrible!  Hideous!

But then I opened up a new invoice and…….there he was!!! He’s not gone! Someone put a really ugly suit on him but his underwear is exactly the same! Happy, happy, happy!

Overall, this process was less painful than I thought it would be. Good work! The only way it could have been better is if you sent someone directly to my house to help me with deep breathing techniques while the upgrade had its way with my files. I realize this might be unnecessary for most people so maybe you could just offer it to women well into Menopause. And a bottle of Apricot Brandy would go a long way in getting me to keep my software up-to-date.

Wait. Are you in charge of all obsolete Sage customers? Am I your worst? Maybe I was your only project! Did Sage create an entire department to talk me into upgrading?! If that’s the case, sending me Apricot Brandy might put you out of a job. So, how about you give me Apricot Brandy and I promise not to upgrade for another 5 years.

 Sincerely,

C. didn’t strike me as a guy with a good sense of humour though. He might not appreciate my thoughts at all but that wasn’t the point of writing the email. The point was – he pried my Mastercard number out of my extremely reluctant hands while holding my files hostage and that sort of thing requires a lengthy response. Especially when it costs me the kind of money Sage wants for their Accounting program.

3 hours later…..

Huh! Apparently, I was completely wrong about C:

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Hahaha, that made for some very good post-lunch reading material! 

Apricot Brandy is a good start, I’d prefer a nice 18-year single malt, but hey a drink is a drink. Hope everything is working out well for you, let me know if you need anything else, and I’ll definitely get it sorted.

Thanks Lori!

Waaaaait a minute……

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I think you are confused, C. I wasn’t going to send you Apricot Brandy. You were supposed to send me Apricot Brandy. It’s nice to know that you like 18 Year Single Malt though, in case I need to bribe you or something. I would definitely send you 18 Year Single Malt for a software related favour in a distant future.

 Wait. Are your emails monitored? Maybe I shouldn’t be throwing around words like ‘bribe’ and ‘favour’. If you get in trouble, let me know, I’m sure I can fix it.

 PS: Everything is working perfectly.

I was trying to save the guy’s job and he suddenly thinks I should send him whatever the hell 18 Year Single Malt is? And who considers any old drink as good as another old drink? I’m talking Apricot Brandy here – there is no equivalent. If someone handed me a glass of Sambuca and told me it’s as good as Apricot Brandy….well, there would be profanity and then a lesson on the finer points of drinking spirits.

Excellent happy to hear that.

Yes, I’m sure bribe and favor would be frowned upon haha.

No worries Lori

Take care

 I bet he never sends me Apricot Brandy.

A Family History, A Tax Return And A Book

I’m over-extended. I bit off more than I could chew. I’ve procrastinated myself into a maelstrom of missed deadlines. The pressure is on. I don’t have any time. Every distraction puts me further behind.

It’s my own fault, of course – which makes it worse. I can’t even point a finger at someone and holler “IT’S ALL YOUR FAULT!” I can’t even lose my temper because The Viking might list all the time I have wasted in the past 6 months when I could have been working on the projects that I’m now stressing over. I hate it when I think I know what he’s going to say.

Priority One right now is Year End for our business. It’s kind of time sensitive – I can’t put it off for another week because I have invoices for 2017 that have to wait until I’m done 2016. It’s not like it’s difficult, it’s just been neglected into a sweaty, angry mess that I have to untangle and decode before I can end it.

In my defense, I found something I wanted to do more than the things I am supposed to be doing. I can’t be alone in that. Who wouldn’t want to write a blog post instead of entering depreciation of company-owned machines? I took a whole diploma program for business accounting so I could do our books only to discover that I hate accounting. This sort of thing happens to me more than you might imagine. Be that as it may, it’s a chore that has to be done and I’m the only one capable of doing it.

I’ve promised to stay on top of it in the future so I don’t have to spend weeks at the end of the year. Sigh.

Priority Two is the huge project that I took on without knowing exactly how much work it would actually be. I wanted to give my children a story and pictures about where and who they come from. Every kid should know that.

So, I’ve been scanning old pictures; I’ve spent hundreds and hundreds of hours doing it. The book portion of the project is about half finished but I’m not really happy with it so will start from scratch again. It’s all worth it for my kids and grandkids though. Right? And as soon as I’ve finished Year End, this becomes my Number One Priority.

Priority Three is a labour of love. The Viking and I subjected ourselves on Europe for 7 weeks in 2014, from Denmark to Italy to Croatia and back to Denmark. I kept a journal of our adventures and I will expand it and, hopefully, have it published. Trust me that no one has ever taken a European Vacation like The Viking and I did. Seriously.

And now that I’ve written all my priorities down, I can see a hint of New Year’s Resolutions which I had decided not to do because I never take them seriously enough. These might resemble Resolutions but they definitely are not Resolutions. These are……um……hmmm…..well I don’t know what to call these other than Priorities so that’s what they are.

I have a plan. It’s a good plan, a meaty plan that, once accomplished, should make me feel like a Goddess. A Goddess with a Family History and a Tax Return and a Book! If only the Gawds will play along…..

And then I can celebrate!

A Primal Scream and Maple Brown Sugar Drop Cookies – Part 2

So, a few days ago, the Internet Gawds decided to fuck with me by rendering my website unresponsive. Google went all Schultz….

 

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and Word Press kept saying “What? I don’t understand!”

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Then one of the Lesser Internet Gawds said it was all Jetpack’s fault. So I fired off a frantic, Primal Scream on their Support Form who then said I would have to wait for 24 to 48 hours before someone could look at my problem.  Wait?!

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Apparently my Primal Scream was a little less rational than I had hoped.  And then it turned out not to matter because the Internet Gawd that was fucking with me got bored and returned my website to me.  Yeah!  Right?  Wrong!  I had to ‘fess up to Paul at Jetpack Support that I may have over-reacted so I wrote an eloquent apology to him.

AND HE REPLIED!!

Here is the apology with Paul’s response in italics:

Lori,

SIGH! So the next day I thought I would take a chance and the stupid site loaded without any problems at all! This is like taking my car to the mechanic because it makes a horrible squealing sound and then it won’t make the sound for the mechanic but as soon as I leave the shop it starts squealing again. Gawd! Of course, I have The Viking now so this is no longer an issue but still……. The truth is that I panicked, because I have no idea how all this stuff works together. The Internet Gawd pointed the finger at Jetpack and like a panicky beast with the Dumb I fired off a primal scream on your Support Form.

I believe you! I know how this feels, so no worries. It happens to all of us every once in a while.

However, we’ve both learned something in the past couple of days. I’ve learned that there is actually someone on the other end of the Jetpack Support Form. Too many online Support Forms are there only to give the illusion that someone gives a shit if you have a problem. Jetpack has Happiness Engineers though! That must be the best fucking job on the planet! Wait. You do get paid, don’t you? Because I’m a Happiness Engineer too except they call me a Wife or a Mother and I get nothing for wages. Or vacation. Or sick days. You probably aren’t paid enough either though, are you? Because Engineering happiness is hard work.

You’re too funny! Yes, we do care and we are taken care of. We hope you’re appreciated, too.

You’ve learned that Menopausal Women who don’t understand how this shit works can panic in glitchy situations. We’ve survived child birth and shopping trips with 3 children under the age of 4 and our husband getting a vasectomy and horrible in-laws and a whole slew of other crap but when our blog goes down for a day we lose our shit. You might want to put a button on the Support Form for ‘Menopausal Women Who Don’t Understand How This Shit Works’. And the automated reply saying you’ve received our Primal Scream could say things like “It’s okay, have some booze.” OR “We understand this is the last fucking thing you need today so we will hurry to help you.” OR “You’re not stupid. Just confused. Here’s a hug.”

We will look into implementing some of your suggestions, but we can’t make any promises 😉

Anyway, please accept my apologies for bothering you. I can send you Brownies as a consolation/apology gift if you’d like. I make amazing Brownies. Oh! Or Maple Brown Sugar Drop Cookies! They are delicious! Please ask for these so I have an excuse to make a double batch and eat half of them myself.

Sorry again. Thanks for your help. Have a great day.

This was the greatest response I’ve ever received, and I’ve been doing this for a while! You made my day, and we’re glad that your site is back on track.

If you ever need us again, we’ll be here 🙂

Best,

Paul C. | Happiness Engineer | WordPress.com

I CAN’T BELIEVE HE REPLIED!

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I was expecting no acknowledgement at all.  Or at best, maybe a turd emoji or a ‘Whatever!’  The Viking didn’t think I’d actually sent the apology so he was as surprised as I was.  At the end of the whole mess, I guess Paul C. won’t send me a turd emoji if I need help in the future.  Which is a relief because I hate getting turd emojis.

AND….just as I was about to publish this post I received an email from Jetpack wanting me to rate my experience.  I said it was GREAT!  They said:

Thanks for your feedback!

We love to hear what we can do to improve our support.  Would you mind taking a moment to tell us what could have gone better?

So I said:

“Nothing……short of Paul C. coming directly to my house and personally hugging me.  He deserves a raise.  And cookies.”

I guess there’s a moral to this story somewhere.  I’m not sure what but I imagine you guys will come up with a few.

 

 

 

A Primal Scream and Maple Brown Sugar Drop Cookies – Part 1

My website stopped working 3 days ago. I tried everything to get into my Admin site and it all failed. The only clue I had was this warning, “There was an error retrieving your site settings. Make sure your Jetpack is up to date”.  How can I update Jetpack if I can’t get into my site?

So I sent Jetpack Support the following message on their Support Form.

I get HTTP 500 Internal Server Error when I attempt to access my admin site.

When I go through Word Press and try to access I get this error:

There was an error retrieving your site settings. Make sure your

Jetpack is up to date.

 I can’t update my Jetpack because I can’t get into either the wp-admin site or the .com site.”

The Form said it could be anywhere from 24 to 48 hours before I heard back from Jetpack.  Moan.

The following day, just for shits and giggles, I tried logging into my site AND IT WORKED! I hadn’t done anything, it just healed itself! Wonderful, but how is this possible? It is working perfectly.

This morning I received this from Jetpack:

We’re sorry you’re experiencing an issue.

 We only see one site associated with your ******** WordPress.com account, your self-hosted, WordPress.org Jetpack site, www.mrs-completely.com.

 What is the address of the WordPress.com site you’re referring to?

 Also, if you are not able to access the Dashboard of your self-hosted, WordPress.org site, please reach out to your site host for assistance, as they should be able to help you regain access to the site.

Once we get some feedback, we can take the next troubleshooting step in resolving your issue.

 Best,

Paul C. | Happiness Engineer | WordPress.com

Brilliant. So I confused them AND I don’t need them anymore. I hate it when this happens and I have to write a reply that admits my incompetence. I wish I didn’t have to but I’m an adult so apparently I can’t just hope it all goes away without any input from me. So:

Hi Paul,

SIGH! So the next day I thought I would take a chance and the stupid site loaded without any problems at all! This is like taking my car to the mechanic because it makes a horrible squealing sound and then it won’t make the sound for the mechanic but as soon as I leave the shop it starts squealing again. Gawd! Of course, I have The Viking now so this is no longer an issue but still……. The truth is that I panicked, because I have no idea how all this stuff works together. The Internet Gawd pointed the finger at Jetpack and like a panicky beast with the Dumb I fired off a primal scream on your Support Form. I’m 50. And menopausal. And I may or may not have been in the middle of a hot flash when I hit ‘Submit’. That’s my excuse. It’s up to you whether you believe it or not.

However, we’ve both learned something in the past couple of days. I’ve learned that there is actually someone on the other end of the Jetpack Support Form. Too many online Support Forms are there only to give the illusion that someone gives a shit if you have a problem. Jetpack has Happiness Engineers though! That must be the best fucking job on the planet! Wait. You do get paid, don’t you? Because I’m a Happiness Engineer too except they call me a Wife or a Mother and I get nothing for wages. Or vacation. Or sick days. You probably aren’t paid enough either, are you?

You’ve learned that Menopausal Women who don’t understand how this shit works can panic in glitchy situations. We’ve survived child birth and shopping trips with 3 children under the age of 4 and our husband getting a vasectomy and horrible in-laws and a whole slew of other crap but when our blog goes down for a day we lose our shit. You might want to put a button on the Support Form for ‘Menopausal Women Who Don’t Understand How This Shit Works’. And the automated reply saying you’ve received our Primal Scream could say things like “It’s okay, have some booze.” OR “We understand this is the last fucking thing you need today so we will hurry to help you.” OR “You’re not stupid. Just confused. Here’s a hug.”

 Anyway, please accept my apologies for bothering you. I can send you Brownies as a consolation/apology gift if you’d like. I make amazing Brownies. Oh! Or Maple Brown Sugar Drop Cookies! They are delicious! Please ask for these so I have an excuse to make a double batch and eat half of them myself.

I can only hope that he accepts my apologies and that the next time I hurl the Primal Scream on the Jetpack Support Form he won’t reply with a Turd emoji.

turd-emoji

Slogging or My Muse must be on Vacation

When I woke up this morning my plan was to write a post. Sometimes this only takes a couple of hours because I’m in the groove and other times it takes the entire day because I have to slog through ideas that went nowhere, ideas that went somewhere I didn’t want to go, ideas that turned me into an angry Harpy or, most likely, no ideas at all. But today I was optimistic that it would be the former; I slept good and I was in a relatively good mood given that I wasn’t on vacation and I wasn’t a Millionaire. And I even managed to play with the Feline Fiend before I had coffee. I hoped the play time would buy me some uninterrupted writing time but Izzie is never that gracious. Still, the Writing Gods were obviously in my corner.

Or not.

In hindsight, I think I mistook the Writing Gods for the Just Kidding Gods who were, most probably, laughing. It was barely past 9:00am when I opened my email and realized that my plans for the day were……well……fucked. Hunkered down in my In Box was the offending email. “Your parts have arrived and are ready for pick up.”

Shit.

I am the parts picker upper around here. The low wo/man on the Totem Pole. The Gopher (basically a rodent when you don’t sugar coat it). There is no one else that I can foist it on. The buck stops here.

The Viking has fairly firm rules regarding the position at the bottom of the Totem Pole:

He/She who makes the least amount of money shall be The Rodent and shall perform all Rodent-y duties including picking up parts, making meals and doing laundry. Also, The Rodent shall help look for lost tools, the misplaced telephone, missing keys and small parts that have been put down somewhere and now can’t be found.

Addendum: The Rodent shall also smile, nod and make appropriate sounds of support during random outbreaks of cursing, finger pointing, and blaming.

For the most part I totally agree with the rules, except when it’s inconvenient and then I start looking for loop holes. Unfortunately there’s very little wiggle room in the ‘earnings’ section of the rules. So, I am the Gopher / Gnaveren / La Rongeur / Das Nagetier! Whatever you want to call it……I am the rodent.

And don’t get me wrong either.  I don’t usually mind picking up parts because it keeps The Viking busy so he doesn’t bother me with little things like accomplishing something. Ordinarily, I like driving; I turn the music up too loud, sing terribly but loudly, conduct the orchestra and enjoy the sunshine. But I had plans!

Sure, I needed to go to the grocery store and pick up Lottery tickets but that would only take an hour out of my day. I would have plenty of time to write, right? Adding a jaunt to the other side of the city and back would take a significant chunk of my time though – especially when the City insists on throwing Construction zones in my way.

I can’t say for certain but I suspect that construction sites are where guys and, to a lesser degree, girls go to just hang out – like a daycare center for grown-ups. They laugh and play and generally do nothing until someone (The Viking?) tells them I need to go somewhere and suddenly they spring into action and stop traffic in all directions.

They also put people on the road with huge signs that say “SLOW”.  I don’t know why.  Don’t those people have enough challenges without being forced to stand on the side of the road with a sign? Are the Construction Gods hoping that I will feel so bad for the slow people that I won’t notice the Construction Zone? If that is their reasoning I would really like to see people standing there with signs that say “STILL DRUNK” or “SLEPT WITH THE BOSS’S WIFE” or “NOT WEARING UNDERWEAR”. Now that would brighten up my day and make me far happier slogging through construction zones!

Once I’m finally through the construction zone, I think people abandon their earth movers, backhoes and hard hats and informal games of baseball or soccer resume. It’s only a theory but it certainly would explain the ridiculous amount of time it takes to put an overpass together.

Anyway……….

I didn’t get my post done yesterday. Who knows what brilliance might have happened? Instead, I can only complain about lost opportunities and foiled plans. When I finally finished with my errands for the day and found myself sitting in front of the computer I was completely stumped. Zero inspiration. I trolled through Facebook. Nothing. The clock kept ticking and the cat kept laying on my boobs (It’s hard to think – not to mention type – when your boobs become lodgings for a pet). I played Solitaire for half an hour and felt guilty. I scrolled through my Reader. And then…….

The Bloggess has something new. Inspiration! She hadn’t accomplished anything either except forgetting something that she didn’t know she knew. It makes more sense when she says it. However, I managed to slog through useless ideas, and several construction zones and found enough to say/complain about for a post.

I’m pretty sure that I’m not going to win a Pulitzer with it.  Not a single word of this post has fallen onto the page the way some posts do. This one was a slogfest. Edit after edit after edit. It seems less than what I would expect for two days work but here it is.

PS: The cat accidentally stepped on the adding machine paper advance and scared the living shit out of herself. Best thing that happened all day.  Or yesterday, for that matter.

Slog

Telepathy, Shit and Leonardo Da Vinci

When I first met The Viking just over 9 years ago I didn’t have high hopes that we’d end up in a long-term relationship. At first blush we didn’t have much in common. He’s a guy’s guy while I am a girly girl who has man hands and, among other things, big feet. However, according to him he started falling in love with me when he saw my car had a manual transmission. That’s as good a foundation for a long-lasting relationship as any other. Right?

When I moved in with him I brought all my shit from my condo. And my shit wasn’t shit because I had collected it over the 4 years since I had left my husband. It was shit that made me happy, shit that made me smile every time I saw it.  It was shit that reminded me to take care of my soul and to find joy every where I happen to be. The Viking’s household shit though was mostly shit. Wal-Mart shit. Shit that a guy’s guy would buy to serve a function regardless of sex appeal. But his shit was his shit and my shit was my shit and we squared off in front of our respective piles of shit to decide what shit to keep and what shit to trash.

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