Re: Urban Living 101: How Not To Make Friends With The Neighbors

1

I would've been impressed. Also, I saw a new (to Broadway) and not good show tonight, Spring Awakening. Just in case you were considering seeing it.


Posted by: washerdreyer | Link to this comment | 11-21-06 11:15 PM
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On the contrary, it sounds like she was very impressed indeed.


Posted by: teofilo | Link to this comment | 11-21-06 11:16 PM
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3

Yes, yes. I'm sure it was fantastic. What night were you going to see it, Becks?


Posted by: TJ | Link to this comment | 11-21-06 11:16 PM
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4

Did you even try the "give cake to woman" command?


Posted by: Jackmormon | Link to this comment | 11-21-06 11:22 PM
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5

So, you want to knock off a liquor store next time you're in town? Maybe hot-wire some cars? Cause I know a guy who knows a guy...


Posted by: Matt F | Link to this comment | 11-21-06 11:24 PM
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Less Veronica Mars for you, Becks. If only the criminals of the world were so ingenious and diligent...


Posted by: ogged | Link to this comment | 11-21-06 11:26 PM
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4 - Do you really think that woman would take cake from me after that? She'd probably think I ground up roofies inside or something so I could rob her apartment.


Posted by: Becks | Link to this comment | 11-21-06 11:26 PM
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If only the criminals of the world were so ingenious and diligent

And non-violent.


Posted by: Matt F | Link to this comment | 11-21-06 11:27 PM
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(And the hell I'm giving away yummy saffron coffee cake. She can think I'm crazy!)


Posted by: Becks | Link to this comment | 11-21-06 11:27 PM
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10

Don't worry, she will.


Posted by: teofilo | Link to this comment | 11-21-06 11:34 PM
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11

At least I assume that by the way she ran out of the mailroom, having decided she really didn't need to check her box after all.

At which point you executed the simpler, shorter version of your plan?


Posted by: Josh | Link to this comment | 11-21-06 11:35 PM
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12

It seems to me that a certain insight into the criminal mind is a prerequisite to city living. Becks' sharing such insight should have been met with an appreciative laugh The walking away represents a denial, a rejection of the possible. Clearly the neighbor in question would like to think he is living in such a place that theft is inconcievable., and becks' advice threatens this view: hence the retreat.


Posted by: foolishmortal | Link to this comment | 11-22-06 12:53 AM
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Becks' sharing such insight should have been met with an appreciative laugh

I misread 12 at first to be talking about Becks' sharing her experience in this post, and telling Unfogged commenters how they should respond -- I was like fuck you, Foolishmortal -- I'll decide for myself when I want to laugh appreciatively or to castigate Becks! Then went back and realized Fm is talking about what the neighbor should do.


Posted by: Clownæsthesiologist | Link to this comment | 11-22-06 5:17 AM
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Not sure whether that's better or worse than the time I was babysitting aged 14 or 15 and told the parents at the end of the evening that I could kind of understand how some people felt the urge to shut their babies up in some violent way. Not that I had felt like that at all, but 3 hours of picking the baby up and it being quiet, putting it down and it starting to scream again, gave me some sympathy. I can't remember whether I babysat for them again.


Posted by: asilon | Link to this comment | 11-22-06 6:19 AM
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At my last job, my workaholic tendencies had resulted in me voluntarily taking responsibility for basically every task involving actual cash coming through the office -- taking the payments from the patients, processing insurance payments, preparing the bank deposit. I told them a couple different ways that I could rip them off undetected, and they ended up still letting me keep all those duties, at least for a few months.


Posted by: Adam Kotsko | Link to this comment | 11-22-06 6:21 AM
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Ha, my dad was a programmer for a large IT firm, and for many years he produced cheque-processing software for one of the major high street banks here. He used to tell us that he had a secret plan set up and on one particular day everything would go haywire and he'd get loads of money shunted into his account and he'd be heading off to Rio. So far he's still around ...


Posted by: asilon | Link to this comment | 11-22-06 6:40 AM
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told the parents at the end of the evening that I could kind of understand how some people felt the urge to shut their babies up in some violent way.

Decades ago I told the grandparents that I knew how the guy in the news report felt who had just bounced his new baby off the walls a few dozen times, and that the only difference between me and him was just a little bit of self-control. Both sets asserted I didn't feel that way, it was not possible. I never bothered to mention it again.

It's a variation of the "He was always such a nice, quiet boy" syndrome; people will not see what they are afraid of seeing.


Posted by: Biohazard | Link to this comment | 11-22-06 7:23 AM
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Clearly your neighbor ran off so she could implement the plan herself, before you got a chance.


Posted by: rob helpy-chalk | Link to this comment | 11-22-06 7:46 AM
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19

Or was fleeing because you were on to her.


Posted by: tom | Link to this comment | 11-22-06 9:03 AM
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20

Do people really think that real criminals would say, "Hey, I know how to rob this place!" Or that real terrorists would make a spectacle of themselves by praying in public before a flight?
As for you people with baby problems, you need one of these.


Posted by: SP | Link to this comment | 11-22-06 9:08 AM
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21

20: Real criminals are stupid.

I write bank software (including check processing software) and I have had occasional conversations with fellow programmers on various ways to make off with the money. It's actually extremely easy to divert money around when you write the software. The primary difficulty is traceability. Anywhere you can send the money, it's going to be hard to make it so it can't be tracked. Anywhere you could convert it to cash, there's surveillance. You can easily get the money, but then you have to outrun the feds.

Those conversations are fun to have loudly in restaurants. But unless you actually want to do that, (and I really don't,) then it's kind of boring to think about.


Posted by: pdf23ds | Link to this comment | 11-22-06 1:05 PM
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22

Couldn't you do something like deposit every leftover fraction of a penny to an account....?


Posted by: Adam Kotsko | Link to this comment | 11-22-06 1:17 PM
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Anywhere you can send the money, it's going to be hard to make it so it can't be tracked.

Unless you write the software for that place, too! I'm sure there's a way to tie "Reflections on Trusting Trust" into this somehow.


Posted by: ben w-lfs-n | Link to this comment | 11-22-06 1:21 PM
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24

"pdf23ds" s/b "Peter Gibbons"


Posted by: m. leblanc | Link to this comment | 11-22-06 1:41 PM
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s/b "Michael Bolton"


Posted by: m. leblanc | Link to this comment | 11-22-06 1:41 PM
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s/b "The Plague"


Posted by: washerdreyer | Link to this comment | 11-22-06 2:02 PM
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I don't know whether to be amazed or horrified by the non-nested parens/commas in 21 -- written like The One True Programmer, or The Anti-Programmer? I think the latter, but either way: a bravura performance.


Posted by: arthegall | Link to this comment | 11-22-06 4:27 PM
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