On my own. Going down the only road I've ever known.
I had a pair of handymen in last night and the night before installing some fixtures, and one of them kept volunteering Trumpy observations (crime, Biden, etc.). I used the strategy my old teacher called her husband "mooing at me" - just saying "Hm" when something was called for.
2: Lies of the devil.
("there's still time to change the road you're on")
I started feeling not well last Friday, and on Saturday evening I was feeling kind of feverish, so we found a thermometer, and it appeared to indicate I had a bit of a fever. So I thought I better take a Covid test, but it turned out all the Covid tests in the house were expired (even with the extensions). So, on Sunday, I went to my Giant Eagle and blew $8.29 on a Covid test, and I took it and it came back negative. On Monday I went to see a nurse-practitioner and got tested for Covid, strep, and the flu, and got negative results for all three. She told me to rest, drink lots of fluids, and let her know if I wasn't feeling better in a few days. It's a few days later now. I think I feel a little better.
Anyway, writing this reminded me to order my free Covid tests. Maybe you should too! https://www.covid.gov/tests
I just took a covid test this morning. It was negative. I didn't think it likely to get covid again so soon, but figured it couldn't hurt given that two of us in the house had nose-drips.
I had parent-teacher conferences this morning, and it seems that Rascal's teacher is kinda an idiot. So he's very quick at mental math computations and is generally good at math, and has knocked her socks off. (In this area. In social-emotional learning, she firmly has her socks back on.)
We were discussing finding some challenging math for him. She mentions that he could learn another language, specifically Chinese. I say, yes, that would be amazing if Jammies and I were fluent in another language and could introduce it to him, but sadly, we're us. (This is in the context of a dual language program, where she is speaking to them in Spanish 50% of the time.)
She brings up Chinese several times over the course of the conversation, and him decoding the little marks, and it dawns on me that she thinks that learning Chinese is essentially a mathematical skill, where you bring your power of abstraction to make sense of symbols and decode what to do. Like, because he's quick at math, Chinese is the next obvious level.
The two handymen had an odd working relationship, one seeming to be more knowledgeable but doing almost none of the talking, the talkative one I had arranged things with still involved as a lot of it required two pairs of hands, but they seemed to be getting frustrated with each other. (Another possible contributor, they were out doing work past 8pm.)
The most expressive thing said by the less talkative one was "I feel like Clem from Pawn Stars."
You can now order another four free tests from Uncle Joe!
On search for who that meant, I now remember it was Chumlee, not Clem.
His Wikipedia entry suggests that means the guy felt the butt of jokes / underappreciated.
Thought-terminating cliche in common use at the local beleaguered transit agency: "It is what it is". Don't try to figure out why, change it for the better, etc. Maddening, every time I run into it.
Some of the cliches quoted in the OP look like attempts to get out of conversations, not to stop thinking about something. The concept overall seems useful.
Maybe you really have had the conversation before and maybe you really don't agree and maybe trying to resolve it isn't something your interlocutor is interested in doing right now or ever. Have you thought of that? Or did you just mutter "again with the thought-terminating cliches" and stop thinking?
Thanks. Is there a dessert or pastry involved?
15: I think about observer bias a lot, and I'm pretty sure at a glance that's what you're doing.
We need an alternate list of thought-provoking clichés, obviously.
I've been doing my tedious genetic genealogy stuff as a mental numbing agent and did find this interesting piece of speculation about Roma migration to the U.S. South.
Happy chuseok, jms! My daughter celebrated by finding yet another exploit in her screen time limits to watch 90 minutes of K-pop videos on her phone between midnight and 1:30 a.m. NO PASTRIES.
This is why Judaism has lasted. They have pastries. Not always very flavorful ones, but you respect the effort.
thought-provoking clichés
Cakes, and the having and eating of such.
I am sure pastries for Chuseok exist, but I am also sure that you don't get to eat them without atoning* for your screen time sins.
* the relative timing of holidays this week is imperfect
The scary thing hing is that the jarred fish made of mashed up bits of fish isn't what you eat for atonement.
It takes a lot of atoning to even deserve the mashed-up fish.
Happy chuseok! I accidentally bought a moon cake yesterday when I meant to buy a different mung bean confection. But that was at a Chinese market, so for a different style of autumn festival.
Maybe the mashed up fish tastes really good?
We have a Chinese bakery that I can't go to because it's called The Pink Box and a Korean bakery I can't go to because it's called a "cakery".
It may not really be a Korean bakery so much as a bakery owned by people of Korean ancestry.
28: Nah. It's okay with a lot of horseradish.
Although I was at a Rosh Hashanah dinner this year where they had the homemade version and it was definitely much better than jarred.
That's not surprising, but good to know.
14 beat me to "it is what it is". I'd add it to the list if only because of an annoying former roommate who used it a lot.
Cassandane, Atossa, and I have all tested positive for covid in the past two months, in each case for the first time. After all that time I had thought we were immune. I'm still not sure the kid had it, no symptoms and a negative test only two days after the positive test, but Cassandane and I had symptoms.
The start of the school year and various extracurriculars has kept us very busy for the past month or so, but we're getting by. No major crises, just a lot of little ones.
And even better than Jared (any prominent one).
Anyway, it's my birthday. Pretty low-key this year.
I knew that classroom management and lesson planning would be the hardest part of being a teacher, and I was totally right. I just cannot control these 10-12 year olds (grades 5, 6, 7). It is very depressing.
Iberian Fury got COVID at a grant-collaboration-retreat a week and a half ago, testing positive a week ago, while my mother was visiting us. I.F. isolated/masked pretty seriously after that, but my mother still tested positive on Tuesday morning, just after she got home, and I tested positive today -- just when I.F. started testing negative. The Infanta is still negative, so now I've taken I.F.'s isolation room in the office. Hard to believe we can actually keep the Infanta from catching it, but every day of kindergarten is precious, especially when I need to get this week's lessons planned early and well enough that I don't feel too guilty inflicting them on substitute teachers.
Positive birthday wishes for Teo.
Sorry to hear that x.trapnel, that sounds like the beginning of what may be a long year.
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Erik Loomis has a (predictably cranky) obituary for Dianne Feinstein: https://www.lawyersgunsmoneyblog.com/2023/09/feinstein-2
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29: There was a place in Oakland whose menu listed a "cakeage fee" if you brought dessert. The menu also forbade the use of phone cameras in the restaurant which forbiddal I obviously photographed.
Yeah. There's no other choice for that.
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In re the intermittent Thundersticks discussion, this was interesting.
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40: San Francisco is not run by a Board of Governors. Although Loomis gets the name right elsewhere.
I think today is my name day, if I understand Swedish culture. So, my Ursack is a gift. But it looks kind of small for four days of food, even if I leave out the jarred fish course.
I'm trying to figure out the specific knot needed.
They expect you to catch and gefilt your own fish out on the trail.
I guess I'm supposed to be eating freeze dried foods.
Out of a desire to be a better person, I will not write up a bad obituary about Feinstein. But I will enjoy others' cranky obituaries.
I'm just feeling guilty that I still haven't scheduled a colonoscopy.
Happy birthday, teo!
Congratulations on your poop in a box results, JRoth!
"Let's agree to disagree."
Here we go again. We've discussed this phrase before and I don't suppose we'll come to a common understanding, so let's ... I mean, fuck you!
I'm still not sure the kid had it, no symptoms and a negative test only two days after the positive test
Maybe I'm wrong, but I feel like mild, asymptomatic cases sometimes only briefly test as positive. Like, it's asymptomatic because your immune system has it pretty much handled without going full cough/runny nose/fever, but there's still enough viral load to show up on the test during a few peak days.
The significance of which is that you're probably not much of a spreader during that period, as long as other people aren't going way up into your sinuses.
My thought on thought-terminating cliches is that the termination part is not so much about ending (potentially) fruitful discussions as about allowing the speaker to cease thinking. It's "my brain is tired, so I'm going to say this thing that allows it to switch off."
It's kind of like "I gotta run" as a way to end a conversation: it doesn't inherently mean that the conversation is unpleasant or tedious, just that you're done with it. To be clear, I'm not saying that makes it good, just that I don't think it's only or primary use is passive-aggressive argumentation.
Poop-in-a-box
I hope this isn't still about pastries.
not so much about ending (potentially) fruitful discussions as about allowing the speaker to cease thinking
Surely it can be either depending on the situation? If you're in a meeting and someone higher up uses one of these, it'll be taken as an indication that they don't want to go down this road.
Specifically, Waters is so safe the same guy faced her in four consecutive general elections (2016-2022) even as he was convicted of misdemeanor stalking in 2016, jailed for felony stalking in 2019, went Qbert in 2020, and was indicted on 43 federal counts of campaign finance fraud two days ago.
58: Absolutely it can be both, it just felt like all of the upthread discussion was treating it as outward-facing and even quasi-hostile.
IMO a useful framework is that it's a way of turning a potentially thoughtful discussion into small talk. Small talk has social functions, but getting to the bottom of the weather isn't one of them. But sometimes one falls accidentally into a deeper conversation, and a T-DC is just the trick to return things to light and inconsequential.
Imagine, frex, that you're a normal American, and a Senator has just died. You comment on it to your mail carrier as they hand you your junk mail, only to discover that this person has a lot of opinions about the Senator. T-DC to the rescue!
Looking at the link in the OP (last refuge), I see that it originated as a highly and specifically political/ideological concept, so maybe I'm watering it down with ordinary clichés. But I think there's a distinction here that isn't limited to totalistic thinking.
I hate "it is what it is" but I also say it a lot. I think I use it for "yeah, we've sufficiently discussed this problem, and it's real, but there's nothing useful to be done so on to the next thing." Conversation-ending, but intentionally and explicitly so.
But every time I catch myself saying it I want to punch myself in the face.
"It is what it is" is the preferred cliche of athletes these days, right? Especially after a tough defeat?
Continuing my Led Zeppelin theme, maybe it could be replaced with, "What is and what should never be".
I don't know that the problem is cliches as such-- repeating common phrases to explain a common situation makes sense pretty often. Serenity prayer is a cliche, but is also wisdom, so is "measure twice, cut once" and at least some of the phrases in the OP.
Context is everything for speech-- the problem is that people who are misguided or blind won't shut up or relinquish authority; this more than the style in which they express themselves.
At the end of the day, it is what it is.
Better is the end of a thing than the beginning thereof.
What's good for the goose is good to treat dander.
I didn't understand the assignment.
Oh to the other part of the post-- my dad came to visit for a month. He's a well-meaning but kind of odd guy, as a guest is basically a friendly rhino.
Don't know if it's them or me or both, but as my parents get older, I see less of the peripheral parts of their personalities and more of the load-bearing structure. Which bears often alarming similarities to my own personality. He definitely improved after 60, coincident with some life changes, so in that sense (imporoved), there's still hope for me. But one of the distressing byproducts of the years going by is recognizing that there's less future; at least for me, future potential was absolutelya big part of my self-image.
Yes, I have pressing work to be done today, why?
This seems like a helpful concept and a bunch of terrible examples. These look like a better fit.
7: Come on, do you not have a Russian School of Mathematics you can send your kid to? Why aren't you forking out money for outside language instruction? What kind of parent are you anyway?!
Happy belated birthday, two.
Our puppy is a smart, athletic handful. )that's how I spent my Friday.
I hate "it is what it is" but I also say it a lot.
I hate the fact that it is what it is.
People talk about thought-termination as though that's a bad thing.
Is there a heuristic to distinguish which public programs are worth means-testing and which aren't?
"Stop thinking so much" is not like the others, and I can't recall hearing it. "You're overthinking this" is similar but somehow, because it's a statement of opinion rather than a direction, not as intrusive.
80: my heuristic is "none of them are." That may not be useful to you.
Also happy birthday +1, Teo!
I haaaate "Well, we're all doing our best." No, we're not! This is not the best of all possible worlds, and all is not for the best! WE COULD ALL BE DOING BETTER.
that was me. I don't know why my computer forgot me. It is clearly not doing its best.
Maybe we are all doing our best but some of us are doing their best to fuck things up.
Been struggling to stay hydrated.
Vent vent vent.
I'm about as pissed off as it can get. Massive over-work, managers who should be helping me delegating up (to me) rather than down (to the other staff), relentless pressure from clients of all stripes. I worked until 3am several days last week, and was up at 6:30am to start again. I've worked four out of the last five weekends. Also doing the vast majority of all of the domestic, emotional, and administrative labour at home, too, and it's too much.
I have a day off tomorrow, and it turns out, I'm booking a fucking van, and driving a load of furniture and other crap to the recycling centre, and because our local council is total shit, I'm driving it to a recycling centre fucking miles away, so literally all of my day off, that I was going to spend catching up on sleep and then getting a few hours out on the bike to get some exercise and de-stress, is now going to be spend ferrying crap around and getting no fucking rest at all.
Man that sucks. I hope you can find some leverage to change things, however helps.
Yes, me too. The best leverage is another job offer, but that's just more work at the start.
So my department at big fancy hospital is imploding. My team is being moved to the big corporate overlord, but our Senior Director got laid off. She's known for a couple of months, but only told most of us a day before her last day. Another director just got the notice last week, and he had to send his own email where he talked about his love for the organization and what a special place it was. He mentioned how much he respected everyone and shared his contact info, urging people to reach out with any concerns and to connect on LinkedIn.
My former manager is a director at corporate now, and the medical director who was my Senior Director's boss could not be bothered to sign off on a temporary organizational structure for 3 months that was developed a while ago, so I don't actually have a manager in the system to approve expenses or sign off on thing like earned time or FMLA.
Like the remaining director said she felt ok giving a recommendation but technically the chief medical officer of the hospital and physician's organization would need to sign off on vacation or fmla because he could not be bothered to agree to a temporary org chart. Our transfer is scheduled for Jan 1. And the remaining director is pretty busy trying to help her people land jobs.
That sucks ttaM, here's hoping things get better soon
Ttam, that sounds really awful. I am so sorry.
ttaM, that really is awful. I'm sorry.
I just found out that the safe parking project I proposed and advocated for has now been operational for two weeks. Now, people who are sleeping in their cars have a place to park in a local church parking lot, where they won't be trespassing and where they can be checked in on by social services. As far as I know, this is the first safe parking program in the east.
ttaM, are you getting a bunch of equity at this place? Why are you staying?
Thanks for the sympathy, everyone.
Re:95
No. But that's a good question. I have a meeting next week with our CEO/MD to discuss my situation.
I am hiring more staff but not really the staff I need.
I had a visit with a childhood friend yesterday. We were talking about ADHD and neurodivergence, and I admitted that I think my mom is on the spectrum. She basically said, "No duh. I've known this for decades. I didn't have the vocabulary for it back then, but yeah."
It's such a rare thing to have someone else see in the inner workings of your family unit, and even rarer that they will remember and articulate the quirks back to you decades later - I am so appreciative that she shared all this. And she remembered quite a bit. (I've heard her discuss other friends' families, so I think she was generally intrigued by the machinations of other people's families.)
She described how thrown she was the first few times she saw my mom flip out over little routines not being adhered to, until she saw that me and my dad just took it in stride and kept joking around, and mildly problem-solving for my mom but not internalizing her panic. Which is all true. So she followed suit.
When I've tried to describe it to therapists, they think that my mom is being manipulative or a martyr, and it's neither of those. She really is trying her hardest, but has always been very easily rattled by small deviations in routine. But never mean or manipulative.
My parents really did a wonderful job raising us, making sure we were loved and provided for, etc. So I'm not trying to shit on them as parents. Just being introspective, and processing this reflection of someone else's experience.
Also my mom has legit medical issues at this point, but her inflexibility and attachment to routines is really causing her to age really poorly. Like, aging is probably always rough, but those who weather it best have the opposite skill set of her.
80: my heuristic is "none of them are." That may not be useful to you.
Well, here's an example: subsidizing utilities. You don't want to subsidize utilities for everyone because you want to incentivize conservation of electricity and water.
I was arguing for means-testing in this specific case - city is raising rates, local person arguing with me that they should not raise rates because people are poor, and so I found myself arguing for means-tested assistance. Then I wondered if there was a larger principle at play, like, "You should means-test in situations where it's beneficial to society to drive down participation by middle and upper classes" except pithier and more exact.
Also I have some misgivings, because when I pulled up the application for utility assistance, it was so cumbersome and exhausting-looking that I felt my alternate-timeline-Heebie unable to actually complete the damn thing in case of need.
But in this situation a means tested subsidised electricity price seems like a bad solution too, compared with the alternative which is just "give poor people money".
But the city is too broke to do that on a meaningful scale. But they can get grants for specific things like utility relief.
It's really kind of wild and grim how much we've carved the social safety net into so many distinct crumbs that are each so cumbersome to deliver and to acquire.
In general, it feels like I'm struggling a lot to grasp how to one puts the right solutions into practice in an extremely fucked up on-the-ground reality.
It reminds me of a thing I like about math: you are literally capable of understanding every detail from the ground up and deriving the correct solution for yourself. There is no need to compromise, or shoehorn a partial solution into place, or make trade-offs or whatever.
Remember when they wanted to get a bunch of scientists to sign a petition against teaching evolution and there were just too many scientists willing to sign it for it to be practical. You should do what why did and only let people named "Steve" get a transfer payment in lieu of subsidy.
If that's sexist, do "Steve" or "Stephanie".
Wait. There were tons of scientists against teaching evolution? Because they were all extremely Christian or is there some other explanation?
I just have a grim feeling about life right now. Like I'm taking in a lot more utility/resources/etc than I'm putting out, but I don't have the bandwidth to contribute more.
I don't understand 106, but sympathy.
99 last and 101 last are where my heuristic came from. Of course you're trying to make a real difference and I'm not, so you need to engage with reality.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Project_Steve
46: just make sure the string are crossed through the holes
That part I followed. The other instructions seem harder.
Plus, the video I watched to make it simpler had a different knot to tie it to a tree.
I think I did the double overhand on the bag knot and a square knot on the tree.
I can make a square knot, by pretending one end of the cord is a rabbit. I'm having trouble with the double overhand. It doesn't feel right.
Slipknot, slipknot. Much quicker for everyone.
Square knot if you insist, but make it a non-pretend rabbit.
The double overhand looks like the one on the box, but it doesn't feel like a knot. Maybe that doesn't matter because bears don't have thumbs.
But the city is too broke to do that on a meaningful scale. But they can get grants for specific things like utility relief.
I would say just disburse those to poor people as cash - that sounds simpler than saying "if you earn less than X then your electricity costs 20% less per kilowatt hour".
Basically the only sort of means-testing should be where you look at someone's pre-tax income and situation (are they disabled, do they have dependent kids, that sort of thing) and, depending on how much it is, decide that you're either going to take some of it away ("taxation") or give them some more money to top it up a bit.
62: But every time I catch myself saying it I want to punch myself in the face.
The first rule of Thought-Terminating Cliche Club is that you do not talk about Thought-Terminating Cliche Club.
The examples given are all rather odd in their interpretation (I've never heard anyone say "lies of the devil"), but I think it's interesting that all the examples of real TTCs in the wild, as it were, are from religion or extremist politics.
I would say just disburse those to poor people as cash - that sounds simpler than saying "if you earn less than X then your electricity costs 20% less per kilowatt hour".
It's not quite this. I believe it's "if you earn less than X, we'll cover your utility costs for you all together."
The wheel turns and it's my time in life to deal with difficult parents. Need advice on how to handle the situation.
Parents are approaching 80 but generally healthy. My dad is OCD/spectrum/something or other. He's a hoarder and my parents live in the same house they had built in 1980, with minimal repairs. The roof always had problems and there are literally holes at this point where they have to stay home when it rains to empty buckets under all the leaks. The recent NY rains were quite bad. The heating doesn't really work, they use kerosene space heaters in a subset of rooms to get through the winter, or go stay in a hotel when it's really cold.
My dad has been talking about fixing it for years but wants it done in a very precise way (or is using that as an excuse to not do it.). They have plenty of money to afford the repairs but my dad has always been irrationally cheap on some things while happy to spend on others- mostly things he hordes like various kinds of craft artwork.
My uncle (mom's brother; dad is an only child) sent an email that the house is now a safety and health risk and my brother and I need to do something about it before the winter. He said they've tried but my dad won't talk about it and my mom is afraid if her four siblings push him through more formal/legal means he'll cut off my mom from them by not visiting them any more. So my uncle says my brother and I need to deal with it now, first by telling them they can't live there this winter without emergency repairs. I don't think it's feasible to make it habitable by then, so realistically they need to rent a place somewhere else. If they won't listen he thinks we should go through town inspector who would declare the house uninhabitable, or through other legal methods. My dad is still an active lawyer though so anything against his will is going to be quite complicated. According to my uncle, my mom has told her siblings she's very upset about it but doesn't know what to do, although since our immediate family never talks about anything openly with each other she's never said anything to me or my brother.
So what's the best way to approach my father? If we start soft he'll just wave it off like he's always done and they'll be in the unsafe house again. If we go with a harder approach he'll fight back. I don't know how to convince him to actually accept the seriousness of the situation or accept that he needs help from his family.
I think the real answer is you can't until the situation is horrifying. Your uncle is being a jerk, telling you that the situation is so bad you have to wreck your relationship with your parents over it, but it's not bad enough for him to wreck his relationship with his brother-in-law over it. If he brings it up to you again as something you're responsible for getting done because he's unhappy about the situation, I would respond with enough hostility -- cold or hot depending on your style -- to rock him back hard enough to make him back off.
But you do have to try, if there's a real problem and it sounds like there is. Start with talking to your mother privately, maybe? This seems like a safety issue to you -- is there anything you can do to help her persuade your father to cope with it? If that doesn't get you anywhere, yeah, there's nothing to do but make a call on when it's bad enough to call the town inspector.
And this sucks. I'm dealing with a milder version of it with my own father, and anyone who says "you're responsible for making a legally competent adult do something they choose not to do" can bite me. It's not possible.
Oh jesus. That sounds like an awful knot.
Here's my first thought: any way to get him on an anti-depressant or anti-anxiety medication, where he might have a touch more bandwidth to listen to others?
Brought to you by the committee of trying very hard to get my mother on anti-depressants or anti-anxiety meds.
Next thought is to have a second location gamed out and ready for your mom, so that she can re-locate somewhere else when it becomes uninhabitable this winter, with as few obstacles as possible.
I mean, there are really two separate issues:
- your dad's stubbornness and mental health issues
- your parents' marriage and what sounds like his control over your mom.
If your mom doesn't want to stay there this winter, having a back-up location for her sounds like the safest option. And it's possible it may end up making the idea less scary for your dad as well, which would then allow for roof repairs to get planned.
So what's the best way to approach my father? If we start soft he'll just wave it off like he's always done and they'll be in the unsafe house again. If we go with a harder approach he'll fight back.
Finally, I think on this actual question, all you can do is channel that black guy who talks to KKK members one at a a time. If he smells any agenda on you, the conversation will shut down. So all you can do is approach it like a curious anthropologist, and ask him questions from a place of neutral curiosity.
Which sounds utterly ridiculous on a topic like this, but I'm imagining things like, "So what's your own stance on the roof? What kind of thing is worth repairing and what kinds of things aren't worth repairing, and what's the bright line between them?" Not rapid-fire, obviously, but exploring what kinds of scenarios (tree falls through roof? Room collapses?) he'd take action on, and what kinds he wouldn't.
I haven't been to the house in years. My brother is local but hasn't been there in about a year. They don't let anyone else visit the house. It was already bad the last time I was there, as in some places where you could see the sky through the roof. I imagine it's pretty awful now.
Excerpts from my uncle's email (he'll never find this site right?) I think are generally accurate, probably based on what my mom has told him since I don't think he's been there in person for years either:
The house is in violation of code minimums for occupancy and must be fixed--whether (dad) likes it or not, without regard to his mental state, which may need some fixing also but can no longer block the repairs to the home.
Your mother is a physical wreck and an emotional disaster. They have cancelled many trips, they are obsessed with the weather, they can't even get to the mailbox when the catch buckets need constant emptying, and the home is unfit for people of 79 years old....
...your parents are victims of their own neglect and you now are part of that neglect if you do not act soon and forcefully. You have passed the point of saying, "We tried and they will not change", blah blah blah. It's over--this is neglect of health and safety. You must not be responsible for allowing this Jewish Grey Gardens to go on any longer. These people need help and supervision of some kind....
We have all tried in some ways but we do not have proximity and parental ties to confront them--they visit for a few hours and then vanish. From what we see, if they do not have viable quarters, there will be a hospital stay, a fight with the building inspector (maybe a good idea), a serious injury, a mental breakdown, a marital breakup, or even a death soon. If they will not listen to you, maybe it's time to contact the town, a social worker, a rabbi, or some civil authority, maybe even a lawyer.
This is beyond putting up with eccentric relatives, this is two people who have no way to keep themselves from physical and mental torture--despite having funds to fix or move living quarters. We have each tried to say things for a long time, but (mom) is afraid of anyone confronting (dad) and we are lead to believe that if we pry too deeply it will make her life worse or cut us off from them further.
You need to go there, declare things unacceptable, and say and do whatever it takes, and no matter what they say in return. They can ban you from the property, or remove you from the will--but they can't both live that way any longer if you have the options you have. I can't imagine a town/inspector/social service that would let them live there that way. In the bizarre situation where they both fight you and they escape outside intervention, then at least you did all you could.
If we can help, we certainly will, but it's your move....now!
And subsequent reply to my initial acknowledgement:
Your folks live in damp, leaking, mold infested house with cracked windows, no AC, and virtually no heat. The walks are steep and dangerous. They live in fear of any rain. They can have NO visitors. He is on meds for arthritis that make him sleep often, she drove here two weeks ago and she is not a very capable driver. I would say emergency enclosure work to temporarily stop water leaks and some better heat systems are the absolute minimums they need before cold weather.
Convincing my dad to change his medical care is even less likely than convincing him to fix the house. One just doesn't talk about emotions and mental health in my family.
(I'm also waiting on Moby to make a horde/hoard joke about my typo)
132.last is what my wife has proposed- saying we'd like to have a contractor look at it to discuss options and scope, which we assume would end with a shocked contractor who says he has to discuss it with the town inspector (we would tell them to approach it with that end goal.)
Sociopathically, I say go hard, aiming to get them out of the house, not for the winter but permanently, into a smaller place or retirement home/whatever. If you have this kind of trouble fixing a roof when both of them are healthy and lucid you will have vastly greater problems getting them out of the house when they aren't. The town inspector route gives you rare leverage and you should use it.
Maybe you could play it so the rancor ends up directed at the town, not you; maybe you can use the 'temporary' winter relocation as some kind of bridge period to separate your dad from his hoards; maybe you can 'discover' after evacuating them and putting all their stuff in storage, that repairs just aren't economic and they need to sell the place; maybe the inspector will actually straight up condemn the place and take the decision out of your hands.
131- there's even an obvious location to plan for this since her siblings live near each other 6 hours away but they make the drive fairly often to visit. We'd be happy to rent a place for them there. But not sure how we'd handle all the belongings and artwork they've accumulated at the house.
Realistically the end game for the house is probably not to fix it but sell it. There's a rich guy next door who wants to buy the property at a ridiculous markup to expand his private space but of course my dad was stubborn about rejecting that too. I definitely won't mention that in case it sounds like "take the money for the inheritance" which honestly neither of us cares about at all. We've speculated they might even try to donate the whole place to a craft art museum or something.
I'm working so I haven't read the new comments.
135 without seeing 133-4. Both of which I think support my reasoning.
This sounds completely nuts! "Jewish Gray Gardens" painted a vivid picture.
Anyway, my parents - who have entirely different but not entirely different neuroses - are now in possession of a condo in a retirement village that my mom refuses to ever move to, and so I call it their pied-a-terre.
So I am in favor of just having two locations, and a gradual oozing over from one to the next, like a multi-year natural disaster where they can retrieve possessions from the old estate as needed. "Culling by revealed preference", let's call it.
Talk to your mom, see if there's any options that she'll accept that don't require convincing your dad of anything (e.g. you rent a separate place for her, she visits one of her kids for the winter, etc.) and sound out whether Heebie's idea of a second place has any hope of success. Ignore dad, if he wants to die in this house you can't stop him, but you can at least try to get your mother out.
Realistically the end game for the house is probably not to fix it but sell it. There's a rich guy next door who wants to buy the property at a ridiculous markup to expand his private space but of course my dad was stubborn about rejecting that too. I definitely won't mention that in case it sounds like "take the money for the inheritance" which honestly neither of us cares about at all.
This sounds like maybe it could possibly have a little potential. Is there anything absurd in a living situation that your dad would like that could be funded with the ridiculous markup? A house with a big separate outbuilding to display his collections? If you're talking him into spending the money, then you don't look self-interested.
It does sound like a horrible situation needing some care, but I have to say it's shitty to accuse you of neglect if you fail to follow his instructions, or if your parents are autonomous enough to refuse help.
140 sounds right to me. And sympathies, sounds like a very tough situation.
Thanks for the suggestions. 140 is where I'm not sure what would happen but may be where it has to go. I don't know what mom is willing to do or what dad will go along with if she can be convinced to insist on some change. As noted above we don't talk about relationships but it's easy to see there is a very unhealthy dynamic.
141 is interesting except probably wouldn't work due to the specifics of what they've accumulated. Some of it would apply, pottery type things, but the big "prize" is a few dozen outdoor metal sculptures spread around the property weighing hundreds or thousands of pounds each.
I have some sympathy for your uncle, in that it's clear he's worried and doesn't think that he has any sway and he's trying to find a lever. But you're not neglecting them and you can't make an adult who is legally competent do anything.
Is there anything that works with your dad? E.g., you visit and feign shock at the state of the roof? You "just learned" that the roof is leaking so you found three contractors and got bids to save him time so he can craft? Would your brother be the better messenger? (My dad is hopeless about most things, but when he's not, it's me that has to do the bullying.)
Sorry, SP. This sounds awful.
I'd start with visiting the place so you can speak in person and from experience. Is there any way you can persuade them to actually invite you? If not, what would happen if you just dropped by? You said you aren't local but your brother is, so presumably if your parents refused to let you inside you could sleep on his couch, right? Plan this with him first, of course...
I gather that they're in upstate New York or New England, right? Because choosing to live in a house without a functional roof in that climate seems inconsistent with being of sound mind and body.
128 and 129: you both have my sympathy. I have such regret about taking on certain responsibilities when i had limited capacity to solve the problem. You guys are in better spots than I was, but it's cost me a lot. And there are a ton of people who will tell you it's your problem to fix - including medical professionals.
145: Would you like me to put him in touch with my sister's boyfriend? He's a sculptor who sounds as if he'd be right up your dad's alley -- monumental animals made from scrap metal. But that's unhelpful.
Ugh, SP, that sounds miserable. My dad's house is close to that kind of condition - there have been times I could look up and see the sky through the kitchen ceiling - but he's only doing it to himself, not to anyone else, so we all kind of let him live in his chosen squalor. He used to like to DIY things, but kind of enjoyed doing things half-assed and badly, some kind of ingrained contempt for the elitism of skill, and now he can't even really do much of that, thanks to Parkinson's. I do wonder about paying for and sending in a hazmat-suited strike team of professional cleaners.
149- I wonder if my dad is already a customer.
147 is the current plan- tell them we're going to show up because the weather's been bad lately or similar excuse, they wouldn't invite us. It's a three hour drive so I could even do it in a day. I guess the next step really does depend on how bad it actually is- I don't know what to expect. My SIL is also a lawyer so the four of us will all go, we're discussing later this week.
sympathies SP, that sounds awful. Good luck.
I'm repeating things here, but I think the soft spot is your mom. At their age, plausibly gender roles in the marriage are going to make it difficult for her to be defiant, but she's a competent person who's in communication with family, and she sounds like she's unhappy with the situation.
How about this, for spinning out Heebie's idea of two places some more. Talk to your mom, and confirm that she's on your side and would rather not live in the hellhole. Then see if you can find a nearby apartment or condo or some reasonable living space for just her. And sell it to your parents as "Dad, you can make your own decisions about the house, but Mom's old and needs a place to stay that's protected from the elements. It's close enough that she can be with you whenever she wants to be, but she'll have a safe place to go in the weather." If you can make that happen, hopefully your Dad will be seduced by dry bedding and indoor heating, and will abandon the hellhole without needing to admit that's what he's doing.
(Do I think this will work? Nope. But it's the best idea I have.)
If I can get her to be honest with me about her opinion that's a good approach. I'd be in favor of further away, near the siblings- I feel like if they're close it's too easy for them to just go back if my dad insists. My brother or SIL might be in a better position for that opening with my mom because I think mom has told SIL more about the relationship and situation than she's told me (he's the elder.)
I was thinking I could make my uncle take some heat for it by saying to my parents that he and siblings raised concerns, and now that we've looked at the situation we agree. At least then we're united but he's also responsible for the escalation of it goes badly.
I'm so sorry, SP, what a tough situation.
It sounds like their property is relatively large. Is there room for an RV, trailer, yurt, or similar? Perhaps your dad would be less resistant to an option like that where he doesn't feel like he's being kicked off his property.
You might also want to consult the relevant local Area Agency on Aging: https://eldercare.acl.gov/Public/About/Aging_Network/AAA.aspx
Sympathies, SP. I haven't read all the suggestions but I wonder if they are still going to a hotel or wherever when things are bad, could that be an opportunity for an inspection that then bars them from returning? Possession being 9/10 of dealing with difficult situations. You would have to be sure there's no sign that will happen or it could cause some literal digging in.
This set of links in particular might be useful:
https://eldercare.acl.gov/Public/Resources/Topic/Caregiver.aspx#q15
Sympathies SP, what a terrible situation.
Oh, hey, RV/trailer is a good idea.
Conveniently my brother has one that he bought for a family cross country trip years ago and then never drove again. It's been sitting in a friend's driveway, no reason it couldn't sit in parents' driveway. But how do utility hookups work when you're not at an RV campground?
I don't know, but I think you call a plumber/electrician to build hookups to the house utilities.
I fully support you on dragging your uncle into this, btw. I want to kick him in the shins on your behalf.
Second 162. In MA we have sonething called Agibg Service Access Points as well as Town office Elder affairs. There's usually a social worker you can talk to.
Maybe explain to uncle that he needs a role model. He's less of a man than Slippin Jimmy, could watch better call Saul for tips. Is there anything he's sensitive about, a decision he regrets, insecurity about being short?
160: You just have it built on your property. The highest cost I've seen googling around is $12,000 for a professional job, maybe much less. There might be city permitting issues, though - some cities flat out don't want them.
Sympathies, SP. We had a similar situation with my father-in-law that we more or less solved by having him move in with us. I think getting a contractor in to give an independent perspective on how bad it is is a great move, whether or not it ends up with the town inspector getting involved.
We were lucky in that we just live a block away and had plenty of space. It sounds like you do have some potential options for alternative living spaces if it comes to that, which I think it very likely will.
Tell the parents that they are moving out for a renovation.
But I never had any luck getting my father to move, so I'm not speaking from any success.
While I'm being cross about your uncle, I might point out to him that he has exactly the same options for triggering outside intervention that you do, and maybe he should sit with his own responsibility for the situation. I mean, it's unproductive to fight with him, I guess, but what a twerp.
I suppose we can hope that SP's parents are fine, albeit cantankerous and set in their ways, and their uncle is the one with mental problems and is currently suffering from a sort of Munchausen-by-proxy aimed at SP's dad's house.
When you get older, it's important to have a health care Munchausen.