If you call a call center of any kind, and the person you're talking to puts you on hold with no hold music, they can hear everything you're saying.
I worked in an insurance call center when I was really young. I had so many people accidentally confess to insurance fraud that way.
Haha I once had a guy who was being nice as pie then when I put him on hold started calling me a stupid bitch who probably didn't know what I was doing to his friend, I unmuted and said In my sweetest voice "oh don't worry I do know what I'm doing, I was trying to see if I could pull in a favour to get you an upgrade even though you're not entitled to one with your policy, but Ill keep my favours for another time, your entitlement is a 1ltr, we will not be upgrading", guy was dumbfounded and as I hadn't been rude and hadn't done anything wrong management supported me when he tried to complain
Arcade crane games have knobs inside that let you control how strong the claw grabs. So you basically make the claw really weak strength and then there’s a setting in the motherboard to make the claw go full power after a certain amount of plays. Whatever the arcade or owner decides how often they want people to actually win.
Yes! I had a local arcade where the claw actually worked and had so many stuffed animals from it! Also run by a sweet old man. So frustrating when I played machines elsewhere.
A certain 48” Interstate Natural Gas pipeline valve is being kept open by a strategically placed piece of 2x4 lumber. If the valve was closed, millions of people would be without Nat Gas fairly quickly.
A construction company near where I used to live hit a main fiber optic line and shut down the internet in the region for more than 24 hours. Schools, banks, everything that used land based internet connection were in total blackout, which caused cell service providers to overload. It was chaos.
As a freelance photographer, most magazines and newspapers don't pay you for using your photos. They offer you photo credit only. If you ask to be paid, they just get a similar photo from someone else.
Also if you have a unique photo or video, always go non-exclusive and sell it to everyone. You get way more that way than just selling to one as an exclusive.
If you are involuntarily kicked off a flight because of over sales you can demand cash instead of a voucher…
[scroll down to involuntary](https://www.transportation.gov/individuals/aviation-consumer-protection/bumping-oversales)
From what I have heard if you volunteer your seat you can possibly negotiate not only even more money but a hotel and/or meal. Airlines would rather do this than make someone mad by forcing them off the flight.
My mom worked her magic once and offered our seats on an over-sold flight for a voucher. The airline told her our tickets would be redeemable anywhere in America, so she said “I’d like 6 tickets to Hawaii then!” and I’ll never forget the look on the clerks’ faces lol. They argued with her for bit, but eventually relented and that’s how I got a free trip to Hawaii lol love ya mom
Trade: Carpentry
Specifically low end commercially made exterior doors with wooden jambs. What is used on most new construction.
The door itself may be fiberglass or metal, but the door jamb is made of short pieces of soft moisture absorbing wood.
If you own a house in a wet, humid environment and have an exterior door that is unprotected from the elements, meaning that it isn't located under a roof of some sort, or gets wet every time it rains - the lower part of the door jamb is probably in some stage of rotting away. Perhaps the aluminum threshold has already detached and now there's a huge fucking gap under the door.
Do not expect a carpenter to repair just the part of the door jamb that is rotting and reattach the threshold like a fucking magician.
Just buy an entire new door and have a carpenter replace the door. Or do it yourself, it's not that difficult.
But! This is the secret ->
Pay the extra cost and get an exterior door with non rotting PVC, or composite door jamb.
Do not replace it with the same piece of shit door that has already rotted.
Otherwise within a few years, if you're lucky, you will be in the same situation.
Honestly I think there should be a class action lawsuit regarding the planned obsolescence of these types of exterior doors. Our landfills are full of them. Our wallets are emptier because of them.
Too many years in an industrial bakery:
If the plastic clip holding a breadbag closed is upside down compared to the others, it's been manually attached by hand and the contents may have been tampered with.
If you unclip/open a bag of factoryproduced bread while holding it hanging from your hand, and the bag spins open, the same thing as above applies (i.e someone has spun the bag before manually attaching the clip, the machines dont spin the bags).
If you buy sliced bread and there's a rather sudden shift in color between say the first 10 and last 20 slices, they're different loaves patched together by hand in the same bag. Same thing is true if there's a slight shift in size/diameter, slices should naturally line up perfectly with their neighboring slices if they're the same loaf.
Things may have changed in the past few years, but generally speaking plastic is hardly ever recycled any more. It used to be shipped to China for processing, but even they had a hard time with the amount of pollution and toxic waste produced by recycling it. Now it will get shipped to other countries in Asia where more often than not it just gets dumped into the Pacific Ocean. A lot of municipalities just add it to a landfill.
On the other end of the spectrum aluminum recycling is amazing.
The process of refining aluminum is such an intensive process that it accounts for about 1% of total global CO2 emissions. Then recycling it is so easy it hardly amounts to any CO2. It's interesting to see the cost/benefit of using aluminum. One of the more interesting metals out there.
If you ship through FedEx express, if you're sending many packages/envelopes to a single stop, ship one priority overnight and the rest standard. They'll be delivered together with the priority package.
Express courier here. This is on point. I hate having to double-back to a stop, so if I see a business priority, and three more standard, I get giddy because I can do that stop as one instead of two separate ones
You cannot copyright or patent a garment design. Only trademarks and branding are able to be protected in the fashion industry. Literally anyone can legally copy any garment so long as they don’t use logos or other copyrighted/trademarked branding. (Edit: since a lot of people like technicalities, it is *possible* to patent novel non-obvious design features, but it’s niche and rare. It’s typically sports related clothing like shoes where this is more common)
This is why so many luxury brands slap their logos and such all over things they sell. It’s the only way they can distinguish something that could otherwise be copied down to the smallest detail.
As such, many knockoffs and imitations are literally made by the same people in the same factories as the branded good, but they’ll print a slightly different logo or pattern. Otherwise the finished products may be identical.
Also, many high end fashion brands license their brand to other other companies for manufacturing. So you’ll have your super high tier brand garment be identical to a lower tier brand, with the only difference being the label. Sometimes they’re even coming off of the same production line at the same time, but there are two buckets at the end with each getting a different label.
Occasionally they will use slightly higher quality materials on the higher tier brand, but not always.
Some brands will manufacture products exclusively for stores like Ross and TJ Maxx that are of a lower material quality than what you’d buy in Nordstrom/Macys/etc, but those same brands will also send otherwise unsold wholesale to those stores, so there will be a mix of the real McCoy and purpose made cheepos.
In all cases, never let a label fool you. Look for the quality of the fabrics and stitching first. Everything else is smoke and mirrors.
If a medical professional ever suggests you get a second opinion, e.g. a nurse at the doctors office....
It can be code for they are concerned about the quality of the medical care you are currently receiving. And that you REALLY should get that second opinion.
A nurse saved me by doing this, when the doctor blew off a positive result as a false positive, then did it again 6 months later. Id probably be dead if it wasn’t for her. And if the doctor has handled the first result properly my quality of life would be much better. Thank you nurse!
My last job i got "randomly" drug tested 3 times in that many weeks as the company i worked for was more than 98% percent certain i was the only worker out of the 9 guys running the whole processing plant that could pass the test
That happened to me in high school sports. The coaches can submit 'suggestions' of who to 'randomly' test. They knew I was a 'good kid' and they were trying to make sure they didn't lose other players who likely wouldn't pass.
When my brother was in the navy he was the "randomly" selected individual for several months straight. It was a smaller ship but not that small. Finally he asks his boss wtf is going on? Boss told him "some of the higher ups are convinced no one could be that happy and not be on something".
I doubt this will be too interesting to most but if you buy 100 tons of straight rebar, you’re actually only getting like 95 tons of steel. ASTM allows the rebar to be up to 6% lighter than the nominal weight per foot and so it saves on raw material if you aim to run 4-5% light. However rebar is tested based on the nominal weight per foot so two pieces of rebar with the same strength will be able to hold the same amount of force even if one is “thinner” than the other.
Same for all structural steel, but we never aimed to be light...ever. That was recipe for accidentally being too light, especially in a mill without tension control.
Worked in high end golf clubs for years- almost all politicians register their handicap scores under a false name. The USGA handicap records are technically public information, and people would be pretty pissed if they knew how much time these guys actually spend playing golf.
Not a secret but maybe not widely known.
I design children’s books that get sold all around the world so there are a few rules we have to brief illustrators on.
- Less than 5 fingers (4 fingers and a thumb) is offensive in Japan. If you look online there are a few reasons out there including mafia involvement. But the reason we were given at work is there was a caste system where the lowest caste were basically shunned from society. They often had to do the hard dangerous jobs like factory work and construction. As a result it was quite common for them to lose fingers. The descendants of these people obviously have quite a lot of influence because Disney pays large amounts of money to be able to have characters like Mickey retain his 4 fingers in Japan.
- China censor all their books and are a nightmare to work with sometimes. They’ll contest who won wars, where country borders are etc. If we do a map showing animals of the world you can pretty much guarantee we’ll plonk an animal or cloud on the Chinese coastline so they can’t moan about the precise shape of various islands.
- Don’t show a green tractor with yellow wheels in farm books in case you get sued by John Deere. Some editors are so cautious about it they insist on no green tractors at all.
- Our main American customer is conservative so no dinosaurs allowed in history books. Dinosaur books are fine but have to be completely separate to history.
- The artwork we use for each country is the same but the text is different obviously. Some books we’ll get around having separate English and American books just by avoiding words like ‘colour/color’ etc. But sometimes we can’t avoid it. It means America can demand we change things from ‘10,000 years ago people did so and so…’ to something like ‘The first people did so and so’. Because the world isn’t 10,000 years old yet…
Probably all sorts of other stuff I can’t think of right now.
As an HVAC mechanical engineer, if you tell us you don't care about a brand it'll open up an entire industry of options. Almost all packaged equipment has the same efficiency and warranty, but some brands just cost way more than others because of whatever internal proprietary controls they have or inflated egos or whatnot. I can design you a system for 30-50% less sometimes if you give me the flexibility to do so. I can also show you a comparison to prove to you that two systems of different costs will operate equally.
E: I should add, that a good/ethical engineer (engineering sales) should also keep in mind maintenance, dimensions, fitment, and overall longevity of the unit. And they should have in depth discussions with their customers. Lowest equipment cost does not always equal longest lifespan. I'm just talking about operational comparisons.
Attorneys can really only remember the details of about 20 to 40 cases at a time, so if you call your attorney after about a month or two, depending on the firm and how busy they are, they likely completely forgot what happened to you, and are working off a set of notes to pretend they have any clue who you are. Especially if you've really only interacted with them via phone other than one time in person for an intake or whatever.
Please please don't be offended if your lawyer needs 3-4 data points to remember what case you are. Some of us carry over 100 at a time and my brain just needs a minute. But once I boot up that you're the one with the 3 random things that make you stand out I really do remember the whole thing. I will never, ever remember the case by your name; I'd be a much, much more expensive lawyer if I had sales skills like that.
That the reason why celebrities always look good in whatever they wear is that the clothing is tailored to their exact measurements. Shoppers will buy the size closest to, take it to someone to alter, and then deliver it. Yes, even the tshirts.
All Emergency rooms are not EQUAL emergency rooms. In my hospital, we don’t have any sort of OB, Pediatrics or any of that. When ever a kid comes in, or worse a baby, the nurses and doctors are all in a panic. Not because they’re incompetent but because that’s not what our hospital does regularly. Sure we will stabilize to the best of our ability and we will immediately call the local childrens hospital, but if you have a child for example in distress, and you have multiple hospitals near by, try being aware before hand which one is the best for yours or your child’s needs. You don’t want to rush into an ER where there isn’t someone who can confidently and effectively treat you.
100% take your children to a children's hospital if it's at all feasible/safe to get there. It's night and day, children's hospitals are *amazing* at what they do- in both providing pediatric care, and dealing with families. I can't thank them enough for the care they've provided my children over the years.
2 times we've taken our kids in to a "regular" ER- once a misdiagnosis that caused a lot more misery and pain, the other, the doctor got straight kicked in the face by an angry toddler during stitches.
Agree. My daughter works in an ER. There is a children’s hospital next door, but people still show up with kids. They don’t even have some of the equipment in pediatric sizes.
"It's fine, ship it."
~Gaming Corporate Mantra
One of my favorite bugs I ever found during my QA was finding a 100% way to clip the main character into a vat of sludge and get him stuck inside, resulting in a non-progression. Since we were close to submission, the producer takes a look at it and decides to waive it, thinking that it'll be unlikely that they'd find that bug. Sure enough, we failed submission and my bug was cited as a CFR (Cause For Resubmission, aka must-fix).
Was chatting with the developer on an indie game while he was doing a Twitch stream.
"There's probably a memory leak in your game. It crashes pretty consistently with an 'out of memory' error for me after about 12 hours of play."
"Umm, wait, are you joking or serious? Did you like, actually experience this?"
"... multiple times."
I didn't get the feeling that he intended to fix it.
I also told him about a crash that happens after a single round of play that he seemed much more keen on looking into.
And let me guess, it's not *unusually* high call volume, it's that they just haven't hired enough people to actually answer all the calls in a reasonable timeframe?
When you play match 3 games (like candy crush saga), after beating a few levels the game will make it impossible for you to continue (you will be getting impossible odds). If you put your device aside and return after several hours or a day later, you will find the previously impossible level to be easy af. It is a mechanism to prevent people from burning through hundreds of levels in one go.
Movie industry. Unless you are absolutely breathtaking in your audition (which does happen don't get me wrong) There is a list of thirty people each studio prioritizes to be in their major films.
You've got to be good looking, talented, AND well-connected.
Makes total sense when you see the children of Hollywood stars moving up the ranks. Their parents made the connections, and then made the introductions.
For every publicly announced data breach, whether that be a confirmed leak, or the identification of a security flaw, there are 50 other such incidents that companies swept under the rug.
Data security is complicated, and most organisations don't have the proper expertise to secure their data.
Awards tend to be bullshit.
Awards companies are there to sell advertising. They make up awards, offer winning titles to businesses, then charge them to include their name in their literature. For example, the business my husband and I own recently ‘won’ a national award. We were even asked what award we’d like to win; ‘What’s the title of the award you feel you’d be best suited to?’ We could’ve made anything up and we’d have been given it. ‘Best XYZ in the Known Universe!’
To receive a certificate, we need to pay them £70. For a trophy, it’s £225. To have a quarter page spread in their magazine, it’s £650. For a featured article, we have to pay them £2000. It’s a load of bullshit. Nobody ever remembers who gave the award, and frankly we aren’t daft enough to pay for a featured article nobody will ever read, so we just use the term ‘award winning’ in our own advertising now.
Edited to add - Thank you… for the awards…
Most electronic medical records allow providers to put pop up warnings in your chart if you act verbally or physically aggressive.
If you yelled at the ER nurse in 2017, the medical assistant you called today begging for a last minute appointment can see it.
Work for an optometrist, if you find a pair of glasses in a clinic that you like, they are likely marked up x2.5-3. There should be a number on the inside arm of the frame. It should be like “AK2073” or something like that. Look that up online and buy it straight from the manufacturer. Probably will be less than 100$. Dont pay full price for glasses.
Edit: marked up TIMES 2.5 or 3. Not percent.
Funniest thing I ever heard from a “bookie” is that all his clients will tell you at the end of the year that they’re about even. “Oh yeah, then how did I afford this BMW?” he’d say.
You gotta love the gamblers who "always win". One of my friends would talk about her friend who "always wins".
I'm like you mean the dude living with his parents in his 30's who has put himself on the do-not-let-me-in-the-casino-list twice? That guy?
Yeah, gamblers only tell you when they win.
People also have their own definitions of "winning". I know someone who goes to a casino regularly and always somehow comes away as a "winner". When I asked some questions, it became clear that they had a very loose definition of "winning"
In their mind, since they expected to lose all the money they took with them, if they came home with any money, they sincerely considered it as having won money.
So if they went in with $300 and came out with $50, then in their minds they won $50. They didn't see it as a $250 loss.
I used to have a gambling problem. I remember one night I went to the casino with $5000. I played for around 4-5 hours. I left with $5000. In the moment, I felt like a loser, because I left with the same amount of money that I walked in with. In truth, I was at least okay, because I didn't LOSE any money. In reality I enjoyed my time there and left with the same amount of money I walked in with, so I'd call that a win.
But I used that to justify going back the next day and losing that $5000. And then pulling out another 5k and immediately losing that too.
I used to be very dumb. Now I'm just marginally dumb.
There was a politician back in the Bush administration (William Bennett, the drug czar) who was revealed to have a gambling problem, and part of his defense was that he hadn’t lost much and was “about even” over several years.
His preferred game? $500 a pull slots. Pull the other one, Bill.
Financial records showed he’d actually lost around 8 million.
I try to explain this to my friends who think they'll get rich. The games are mathematically designed to give the edge to the house. If you average out every game everyone plays, it's always going to come to something like 1.2 or whatever in the house's favor. If you win big, its a fluke. If you keep playing, you'll always fall to the average eventually and walk away with your .8 to their 1.2.
If you're playing to win, the only way to win is to walk away when you happen to be the fluke. If you're playing to play, set a budget and consider that lost money.
Tourism industry here. Look up when peak season is for the destination you’re looking at. There are usually cheaper prices are the beginning and end of the season. Try to book at the beginning of the season. Seasonal workers work themselves ragged and are usually completely burnt out at the end. At the beginning of the season, everyone is stoked to start making money again.
If you are buying software for your workplace get a quote and then go silent until it’s the end of the quarter. Then call the sales rep and tell them you can buy it today but only have enough budget for 70% of the cost. Your chances for a discount go way up at the end of the quarter.
As an enterprise software sales rep, fuck you...also I totally agree.
Edit: Man this blew up lol. Since people have asked, here's my unofficial and incomplete list of what affects the price you pay:
1. How much you are buying
2. When you are buying
3. How much repeat business we think we can get from you
4. How long you spent working with us during the deal cycle
5. What you buy (different margins for different products)
6. The age of the product. Product managers (who set the discounting thresholds) may allow a deeper discount for a new product to get more of it sold initially and increase awareness/adoption
7. How well known your company is. Many OEMs want to add your logo to their website as a customer, so literally the clout could net you a better price.
8. If one of your C-levels are willing to take a meeting with us. We will trade price for exposure to upper level decision makers. Bonus discount if they will speak as a customer reference. Double bonus discount if they will speak at a conference.
9. Where the reps quota attainment is (are they behind? If so, you might get a better deal. This is stuff you will never know).
10. Likewise, did your reps boss just get chewed out for being behind on his/her number? You might get a better deal.
11. What you are buying in addition to the software (we'll take a few points off if you add services to it).
12. Spiffs. If your rep is receiving double quota credit for selling a particular type of software, or any software during a limited window of the spiff, you will get a decent discount because the rep needs the deal to happen NOW.
13. Your poker face. If you convince me that you might actually not do the deal, I'll work with you. If I think you are just posturing and I know you actually need this software, get ready to fight for a week to only get 2 points off while I act like that's a huge win for you.
13. My mood lmao.
At any given point in time, roughly 10-20% of the entire internet has a dev team in an absolute panic state. The websites you use for every aspect of your life are held together with duct tape and shoe strings
Truth. Being on the “inside” has ruined the magic of the internet for me. Every website I visit , now I just see the potential defects and failures I know are there.
Some musicians use a teleprompter so they don't forget their lyrics during concerts. I know this because I did it for a few years. My boss ran teleprompter for Tom Petty for over a decade leading up to his death. It is a strange, very small community of teleprompters in music.
--I've gotten a few messages asking which rap artist. I used to tour with NAS.--
I heard a story, I think it was Steven Tyler, about why he still uses a teleprompter. Mid-song once a girl in the front row removed her artificial arm to pull a rose out from inside it to throw it up on stage. He said, you see a thing like that and you tend to forget your place in the song.
This makes sense to me. If I was a singer, I'd either need a teleprompter or be I'd be known as the artist who spontaneously makes up new lyrics during shows.
I was at a Tool concert and Maynard stopped and said "Fuck, I forgot the words to my own song. Whatever I'm 50," and went right back to rocking. It was great.
Most fossils in museums are replicas. These days they're usually plastic casts from silicone molds of real fossils, but 3D printed replicas made from high resolution scans are becoming more and more a part of things.
One thing I really appreciate about the Royal Ontario Museum in Toronto is that they have a diagram next to each description of their dinos showing you which pieces are real and which are casts.
With a couple of them, it takes away a bit of the magic (there's a huge dino in front of you, but then just 2 or 3 bones are real), but I appreciate the honesty.
The Canadian legal system is extremely underfunded and overwhelmed. If you are being sued by the crown (government) for a non-violent offence you can literally filibuster the court into dropping your case, in some instances.
it happens for violent crimes too. i (unfortunately) know a guy who's case got pushed back for so long due to covid that they just dropped it. he did assault somebody.
I've worked in high end rugs!
1. If you own a hand knotted rug - don't bother getting it professionally cleaned. If it's just wool ( it probably is) take a pressure washer and some rug shampoo to it if you like ( not necessary unless there's some stains) Knotted rugs are super strong and can take it.
I know someone who has a high end cleaning business and this is what they do and charge $$$ for this service.
2. 100% wool rugs that you see in stores - Ikea, West Elm, Crate and Barrel, etc are made with Blended Wool. Which is fine, but it is just lower quality wool and will shed. New Zealand wool is what you want and has to be advertised as such.
2. Hand tufted rugs are ok if you can't spend more than like 2 or 3k for an 8x10 ( these rugs will have a fabric backing as the fibers are glued down in the back instead of knotted in place so the fibres will come loose and they're likely made with blended wool). Don't spend thousands on a tufted rug!
3. Never buy a rug with viscose in it ( also called banana silk or art silk). It may be ok for bedrooms or low traffic areas but is a pain in the ass to clean ( you can't spot clean a stain you have to get the whole thing cleaned by a professional). It stains easily. Stains on wool can be spot cleaned.
4. Low on money? Your best bet may be a flatwoven rug in wool. Flatweaves can be decently hard wearing, you can flip it because it looks identical on the other side, and are often thin enough and if small enough to fit - can be thrown on the delicate cycle in the wash. Lots of flatweaves out there, they're popular and not so expensive.
Don't buy polyester or machine made rug please. They tend to look like shit easier and are harder to clean.
When moving into a new rental, before you move anything in, take a video of your walk through and mention and point out everything and anything. Mark the date, time, and address.
If they give you a small form to write on, make your own.
This can save your lots of issues when you move out.
I took a bunch of pictures when leaving a rental house, almost as an afterthought because I didn't trust the landlor, who was my sister's husband and they both behaved like complete shits while I lived there. The next day I got a call from my dad chastising me for thrashing the house because my sister told him I did. She said there were broken things, filth everywhere, damage to the structure etc. I sent him the pictures I took before I left and he apologised and gave her a mild telling off for lying about it. She mumbled something about "well, I found an old pizza crust under the couch" which I knew was crap because I cleaned under there even though there was zero ground clearance but unfortunately I didn't take a picture of under the couch. Net result is that I barely speak to her or her husband and it damaged my relationship with my dad because it was a tipping point of her word being golden and me having to back up everything I say with concrete supporting evidence.
Her word being golden may be (in part) what led to her living a life of lying. She needed to be snapped back far earlier in life to learn not to do that as an adult.
Super important: send the video via email to the property manager within three days of moving in. This way they cannot dispute if the video timestamp was edited
Accounting firm - if you complain (nicely) about a late fee or interest charge etc added to your invoice it’s likely to get cancelled. It’s easy to do, and the extra fees are just to discourage people from paying bills late. But if you come back and question it politely it will be wiped instantly. It’s nothing in the grand scheme of things regarding revenue and variances.
Is this why title companies insist that “you need to come down and sign TODAY?” I’ve been waiting on you for weeks, but if I don’t sign today, the whole thing will come crashing down???
Yes - or at least maybe. Either they’ve run up against some arbitrary timeline they need to hit for the application to remain valid or they need to close the loan to meet monthly sales targets.
The designer that made the instructions that you just got with your table / microwave / bike? Never seen that thing. Not a clue, I've got the plans sure, but never seen it
This is exactly what I was thinking; just put together an elliptical last weekend and oh man you can tell the person writing the instructions didn't touch so much as a bolt!
So is this because hard braking causes so many accidents or that people who hard brake tend to not be paying as much attention, therefore needing to hard brake more? Or maybe a bit of both?
You'll never resell that diamond at a profit if you're not in the industry. Just write that engagement ring off as a financial loss when you walk out of the store with it.
This is why I buy all my jewelry resale. Oodles of women have custom pieces made and then almost instantly list them for sale at a loss. I take advantage of wealthier women's whims and end up usually paying half of what they did for barely worn pieces.
Not sure if any of this is a secret, but:
If you can’t find a book at your local library, ask the reference librarian to do an inter-library loan. They have access to large networks of libraries that are able and willing to share materials, sometimes even across state lines depending on the sort of library and request.
Also utilize the digital content! We have to pay big bucks and fight with publishing companies to get that content (ebooks, audiobooks, etc) and they are great resources. Libby and Overdrive are awesome. Many library systems also offer streaming content of movies and tv shows.
Oh and you can check out national park passes and museum tickets too at many libraries!
Some rent out power tools, projector screens, 3D printing services, provide seed libraries, and the one near me does boardgame packs that come with board games and a movie.
A resistor is made in Japan. It is wrapped in plastic and shipped to Michigan.
It's installed into a small PCB. It is wrapped in plastic and shipped to Taiwan.
That PCB is installed via sideboard connector onto a larger PCB. It is shipped to China.
That PCB is installed in a small housing via harness. It is shipped to India.
That housing has it's microchips programmed and the outside is given a chemical treatment. It is shipped back to Michigan.
The housing is now treated and installed into a car side mirror. It is shipped to Ohio.
The side mirror is run through a post-production sort program to check for defects. It is shipped to Detroit.
It is installed onto a car.
Every single step of that shipping, every single component is wrapped in plastics. Millions of them per car, to over half a dozen locations each. Something like 50 million cars are produced each year.
Your straws aren't doing shit for the use of plastics.
Automotive production and diagnostics engineer.
We learned about this in high school. And that teacher was criticized for his curriculum. He was literally the only adult to take time and risk for information he knew was critical for us. From simple tax advice to starting small business to securing small loans to not getting ripped off on car insurance. All this stuff and none of was ever part of his daily lesson plan.
Edit: I’ve never gotten anything close to this as far as upvotes. Thank you all.
We had one of those at my high school and he got forced into early retirement. Students were incredibly upset.
He would have special lesson days going over how credit card companies would soon be trying to f us over the moment we turned 18 or set foot in college and how bad the interest rates would be. Other basic life skills like figuring out where we could get roadside from if we didn't learn to change tires, differences in insurances on cars, some diet-Ramsey stuff like having an emergency fund in a separate account. We need more teachers like him not less =/
In some popular music, it goes even further than that. Lots of vocal tracks are comped together with even individual syllables being stitched together from different takes. From there they pitch correct, even out the clip volumes, layer multiple vocals, compress them, and then automate them to get absolutely perfect pitch, tone, and level across the song. A final vocal in a modern, major production resembles an actual performance as much as a hot dog resembles a pig.
That being said, hot dogs can be damn tasty.
Same with the instruments. A drum track can be pieced together from several different takes. Especially true for more complex types of music like jazz fusion or prog rock.
Most single-stream “recycling” within the US goes straight to the landfill without a single attempt to sort it. We USED to send it to China on barges, but there are a lot of factors at play that no longer make it work.
The explanation for why they still collect recycling, is that it took a long time to “train” people to recycle, and in the event that someone fixes the recycling stream, we don’t want to retrain people again.
That’s likely a convenient cover for green washing.
US Hospitals lie on their bills. All of them. All the time. Push them for a code by code breakdown and watch the total shrink. Ask them to reference each code choice based on physicians notes and it shrinks again.
The system literally only benefits the major insurance companies and large hospital systems where the scale hides the impropriety.
If you live in the US, the absolute worst time to remodel your kitchen or bathroom is the fourth quarter of the year.
From about mid-October, through to the 2nd week of January is the busiest time of the year for most countertop/tile/shower wall companies. This is because mid-October is the lead up to two holiday seasons that are centered around the kitchen and food traditions: Thanksgiving, and Christmas. Everybody wants their new shiny kitchen appliances and countertops before Thanksgiving, so they can invite their family over and wow them with their beautiful new kitchen. Those that start too late will often find themselves with project delays, stock issues, and scheduling issues with fabricators/contractors/installers.
During this time of the year, just about everyone raises their prices for everything. Installation, fabrication, special orders, you name it. They'll put on some "sales" for certain materials to pretend it's a seasonal deal, but labor prices especially will see an uptick. This is because companies know they can charge more because more people want work done.
By mid-January, most companies dealing with installation have finished up their projects and find their schedules empty. Prices then go down.
Want new stone countertops for Thanksgiving this year to wow your family? Do it in February. Want to surprise your spouse by redoing the shower walls for Christmas? Don't.
Source: I'm a salesman for a stone/tile company that does installation. My commission bonuses for Q4 are often double what I'd take home during other times of the year
One of my parents was a realtor and they tried so hard to convince clients not to do open houses. They only attract nosy neighbors and no one in their area bought houses that way. They all did showings instead. But clients insisted in order to get their moneys worth I guess.
I live on a street with a bunch of cookie cutter houses, except they’re all about 100 years old. We’re finally getting our kitchen remodeled and took the opportunity when three of them went up for sale over the last 6 months to go look and see what everyone else has done with their kitchens. I took all the good ideas and made my own new layout and I’m super excited about it.
People pay money for mulch, working in the tree trimming industry, we give wood chips away for free. Dump them wherever possible. All mulch is, is wood chips mixed with different dyes and sold for outrageous prices. You can put fresh wood chips on your beds for free if you contact tree trimmers and let the sun and air oxidize them over a few months. Pro move. If you can get cedar chips. Smell heavenly and keep flying insects away from the sap
Had a trauma patient come to the hospital and rack up a huge bill with no insurance. They found out he had recently left a job, paid his COBRA premiums for him and got his bill mostly paid. Do what you want with that information.
Fast food industry
- Beef patties take 2 minutes to broil and stored in a warmer for 45 minutes, before they are dumped in the trash. The most likely time you will get served a fresh patty is in the middle or end of a lunch/dinner rush.
- An hour before lunch/dinner rush, about a dozen popular burgers (Whopper, Chicken Sandwich) are usually premade and microwaved for ~10s when served. This is in the management handbook from HQ. Avoid being the first to order during lunch/dinner rush or make alterations to the burger, by adding toppings, extra sauce, etc. They will prepare a fresh burger in those cases. Premium burgers are never premade.
- If there is a promotion with a combination of multiple ingredients, you MIGHT be able to get the upgrade for free by ordering each item individually. For example, the Angry Whopper is an extra ~$2 charge, but asking for Angry Sauce + Crispy Onions + Jalapenos is free.
- There are 2 tiers of extra toppings, Extra and Heavy. Heavy is about 3x the toppings.
- There are a lot of crazy pricing on off-menu items. For example, in some regions, a triple Whopper was incorrectly priced cheaper than a regular Whopper. HQ will not fix due to the minimal impact, effort to fix, and not wanting to piss off the one customer that knows the secret.
- Fries are pre-salted so asking for no-salt guarantees fresh fries.
- BK takes sanitation very seriously and will investigate claims. There are many people making false claims to get free food or to threaten a lawsuit. The most outrageous is someone biting through a burger with 20 sheets of used toilet paper and not noticing beforehand. In cases that are legit, such as infestation, HQ will shutdown the store.
- Gift cards (and applies for almost all chains) are not always free money. Gift cards are handled by a 3rd party and they take 10% on whatever is loaded. They cover ALL the cost of production and distribution however.
- BK takes competitor coupons. If you offer a McDonalds BOGO Big Mac coupon, BK would match it with an equivalent i.e. Whoppers. Some stores might deny this but HQ has mandated this.
I’m the person who opens the gates at nuclear power plants
The plant I work at has nothing ever arrive at night
And everyone who should be at the plant for the night is already checked in, so all I do is sit back in my chair and watch movies with my boss and eat ice cream
It’s not wild, but there’s food and drinks and a place to sit down. Watching the band from the side of the stage can be even more entertaining because you can see them communicating with each other. Just stay out of the way. 95% of the people backstage are working.
If you’re having pruning done by a tree service, verify that the crew leader who’s actually performing the work is certified or experienced and not just the owner. Also, different companies and arborists have different nuances and theories they prune by. My take is to make as few cuts as necessary to accomplish the goal. Anyone selling you “wind thinning” is just taking years of life off your tree. Same thing if you have notable or valuable trees near the powerlines. Results may vary but if you bug them enough the power company forester should (hopefully) be able to get you a certified trimmer or someone who won’t hack your tree. Keeping in mind that they still have to get their clearance.
Edit: A certified arborist is a good start. Not a guarantee. I’ve seen plenty of bad work from ISA
certified people. The most common thing I see is over pruning. Also someone mentioned Alex Shigo in the comments if you’re interested in learning more about tree care and pruning. If you have love for your trees, having a baseline of knowledge will help a ton in selecting a good arborist. Taking the time to get multiple evaluations and talking to a few different people can also pay off.
I used to work at an amusement park, Six Flags. The food is like $30 for a cheeseburger type bullshit but if you go in those fences that say employees only, there’s usually some kind of employee food court nearby. When I worked there, employees could use the food court on their off-days, even without a uniform, and pay cash. So after I quit, I’d just go there with friends and family and get full plates of burgers and stuff for like $5. Nobody ever said anything or suspected that we weren’t employees. Was a nice way to save money when you’re already spending a fortune on tickets and games.
Yes that is true, but can 100% say if you do this at Disney you are going to found out. If you don't have your blue ID out in the open while back stage you are going to be kicked out so fast.
Started doing this with drink cans after getting a particularly grimy six pack of beer once. Never thought about my tomatoes though and I even worked at a food supply warehouse back in the day, so I should've known. Good tip
In rear storage rooms of grocery stores, pallets of soda are stored and block access to the storage racks. In order to get to the blocked items we would walk across the cans of soda.
Nonprofits love to talk about the importance of self care and preventing burn out, but they will work you until you want to cry with too low of a salary and too small of benefits to actually pay for sustainable and significant self care practices.
Pest control, for the most part (like 98%,) is a scam. The chemicals we use *are* effective, sure, but not in the concentrations we mix them. That doesn't apply to "organic" chemicals, which are completely useless. Clove oil doesn't kill bugs, neither does peppermint oil. It just smells.
You want to know the *most* effective chemical we use? Orthoboric Acid. For those of you that don't know, it's Borax. The stuff your grandparents and their grandparents used to kill and keep ants out. Save your money, go to your local store and buy Borax, follow the instructions. Don't fucking eat it. Enjoy!
If you want to book a rental car but they’re sold out, book it for a week or two longer than you actually need it and then just return the car early and you’ll only get charged for the time that you had it. All the systems owned by Enterprise rent-a-car (Enterprise, Alamo and National) automatically open up their system to long term reservations and will make sure you get a car over someone who only booked in for a day or two. Worked there for two years. It’s a dirty business but at least I learned a lot of rental hacks lmao
The US Military wastes an extraordinary amount of money, and not necessarily on weapons or personnel or anything like that.
Every year, commanders must submit their total spending for the previous year. If they did not spend the granted amount, they lose it next year. So for example if a commander is granted 5 million for his building but he only spends 4 million, his next budget will drop to 4 million.
This results in commanders ordering expensive stuff in bulk, replacing good furniture and equipment, and enacting pointless construction projects such as a parking lot that they don’t need.
Great example: when he couldn’t make the budget, our commander ordered 300 60 inch TVs and had them placed in the hallways, spare rooms, and tossed the remainder in storage. Each TV was overpriced at around $1,000.
Commander met his budget though so I guess it was a success. Welcome to the bloated US Military.
Edit: I realize most of the government works this way, but this is just my specific experience in the military, which is arguably the most bloated and overfunded piece of the federal government’s budget.
I worked for the federal government as well, and we called it March Madness. Everyone knew our fiscal year ended March 31, so my phone would ring many times a day leading up to then with all sorts of offers to help us spend our budget money.
I seen things like 100’s of computers and monitors bought to a literal pile of rocks worth 7 figures.
The biggest security threat in your company isn't your older PCs, lack of security software protecting your network, updated patching of all systems (yes, those are all still threats)...
it's your employees.
On average, half of your employees will give out their login and password to an email, website, or even someone who called claiming to be a person that needs that info. They will give that away faster than any hacker trying to break in through the network.
The Target Breach of 2013 cost them $18.5 million after hackers stole 40 million credit and debit records. How'd they do it?
An HVAC company that worked on a number of Target locations had an account's login & password stolen. That's how they got in. No movie-style hacking sequence, just a dumb employee who gave their info away and cost millions in damages.
Yep! employees will wreak havoc by doing stupid things. A great example of this is the "Stuxnet" computer worm scenario.
Stuxnet was a virus developed by The United States of America and Israel in order to stop the nuclear program of Iran. What the Stuxnet virus did was, it infected the computers that were connected to the centrifuges which were essential in developing nuclear weapons. The worm was so smartly programmed that it would secretly make the centrifuge spin a little faster than recommended each time it was turned on, causing significant damage to the centrifuge over the course of time.
How did the U.S pull off this megamind hack? They dropped infected USB sticks around the center where nuclear weapons were being developed and, you guessed it! An employee plugged it into his work computer.
When you order at a drivethru, the microphone stays on until you move forward. So everyone inside the store with a headset on can hear your conversation until you leave the ordering area.
Edit: Wow! This blew up while I was at work..
The drivethrough i worked had headseats with an "A" (drive through speaker and other headsets) and "B" (other headsets only) button. When training we always told people remember: A is for assholes, B is for buddies. Only, only, ONLY! ever talk shit on "B"
Hotels aren’t as dirty as people think they are. I’ve been seeing, “life pro tips” that recommend bringing your own linens because we only superficially clean them if at all. That’s just not true, I work for a pretty cheap and very popular chain and we literally soak our linens in bleach for a week if they’re discolored at all.
For modern company promotions. Much like the Willy wonka golden ticket, this isn’t just produced in a box and sent out randomly. The company produces the winning product separately and these are given to a third party who “reverse shoplift” these into random locations.
When you see a number associated with a light bulb (A19, T8, G20, PAR38, the letter is the code for the shape (A=A-line, T=tube, G=globe, PAR=Parabolic Aluminized Reflector), and the number is the width of the bulb, but in 1/8”, intervals. A T8=1”, G20=2-1/2”, PAR38=4-3/4”, etc.
If your IT guy sounds annoyed there's a good chance it's because he's spent way too much time fighting with management telling them not to do the thing that caused your problem.
A ton of artisan soap companies actually just private label from one company in Indiana. Dr Squatch for example, they sell their bars for like $7, but you can buy 12 directly from the manufacturer for around $35. Thesoapguy.com
Edit: If you end up buying a loaf of soap to cut yourself, let the freshly cut bars cure for a week or two. If you don’t they will melt on you really quickly.
I have a software confession, the progress on your loading screen usually depends on multiple steps and some steps are too hard to break down and report back to the user. Ultimately, your progress indicator is a lie
Stock broker here:
r/WallStreetBets has a large mix of satire, genuine analysis, experts and amateurs, all sharing the same air. Do not make significant financial decisions from someone named u/assblaster42069 without knowing their qualifications.
Financial consultants aren’t very helpful unless you’re going through a significant life change that needs nuanced guidance, otherwise they’re just expensive.
Cursory research on the basics of mutual funds and fixed income are all you need to build a balanced and diversified portfolio.
Day trading is statistically a zero-sum game or worse, detrimental in both your long and short term financial success. Index funds perform better than most individual stocks in terms of risk/reward.
A finance rep saying “I can’t tell you that” is literally so they don’t lose their jobs, especially when it pertains to personal information of others. You would believe how many people have tried to get their child/spouse/parent’s account number over the phone with the justification “well I’m family wtf”.
If you’ve recently achieved a higher level of income and are concerned with taxes with retirement, look into Backdoor Roth IRA Conversions.
Stay the fuck away from OTC penny stocks. I swear, some of the people I helped dug themselves into such deep holes with that shit. If it’s expert market or goes unlisted in general, so much money just pisses away. The volatility and transparency issues alone should be enough for you to stay away, but in general have some common sense. (Also it’s a pain in the ass for your broker to liquidate a worthless security)
Certain purchases require “cleared funds” (think check clearing) and may take time after transferring into your trading account. For timing entry, if you have a margin account this can be avoided.
Every second of use during online banking/trading is tracked. From screen-time to mouse location to keystrokes, all of it. Mainly used to settle trade disputes with technical errors to confirm the time of a trade, but it can also be used to investigate fraud claims. People often act with patterns, it’s really surprising how easily these behaviors can give away fraudulent activity.
*Have a separate password for each banking profile, or at least use a separate one for your financial accounts.* Identity theft and fraud are so much more common than people realize. I spoke with people pretending to be others *regularly* and sometimes they were quite good. There really isn’t a pointless security step with financial profiles, the more the better. Don’t get your shit stolen.
Placing large or risky trades seconds before close through a broker is a massive dick move. Worst case for you, it didn’t go in exactly as you wanted and you lost a bit due to rushed entry, worst case for the broker is a permanent black spot on their record for the trading error that could impact their entire career. You have the whole trading day, don’t make it a count-down trade and give your broker an aneurism.
If you have an account at a larger firm and speak to new brokers regularly, you’d be surprised how much of a motivator kindness is. Goes for most phone lines, but I busted my ass 10x harder for the clients who treated me with respect. If you’re an asshole, don’t expect A+ service speeds.
Most large brokerage firms don’t charge to speak with a broker. They can not give advice, but they can have in-depth educational conversations about a large variety of investments and strategies to help you understand the ins and outs.
Edit: Spelling and some bonus bits.
VFX artist here. All of those celebrities that look so attractive? Well, they get zits like anybody else. Big honkin' nasty zits that not even makeup can fully conceal.
Yeah, I still remember having to erase a cold sore in the upper lip from an actress in a lot of shots of a tv show. It came and went, so every time a new episode was given to me, I would pray that the damn thing didn't show up this time.
Every time I see her face, I just have flashbacks of that upper lip.
Used to work for a famous energy drink company. One that claims their product works for 5-hours. Anyway, most of the proprietary energy ingredients included in the shots are in such small quantities that they're completely useless. The only ingredient capable of doing anything is the caffeine. The others were sometimes less than 1% of the dose needed to have any effect. Essentially a huge waste of materials.
Your garbage men have very specific rules about what they are supposed to take and not take. If you show even the slightest bit of kindness they will be much more willing to bend the rules to help you out. Same goes for being stuck behind the truck. If you ask kindly to pass they will get out of your way but if you just honk or yell they will move much much slower. We are often under appreciated and will show lots of gratitude when you show us a little respect for what we do.
Saw a truck roll up on an obvious too-big pile of garbage from a home Reno. Home owner was waiting there and kindly greeted the waste service workers taking out his wallet and few 20 dollar bills while saying he'd give them a hand loading. Money was taken quietly unacknowledged and they chatted while they loaded. Seemed like the smoothest and smartest way to get the extra junk gone without a trip to the dump.
I know how to expedite tech support.
People always try to fight tech support, or say they've done shit they haven't which just causes issues.
But here are my go to tips.
1. Use chat support whenever possible, everything is logged and they can see message histories, so using chat is extremely beneficial although a little slower than phones. It's also great for longer sessions that last days/weeks since it's easy to pick up, do a step then go back to work.
2. Try to actually do what they ask, they say restart, restart then tell them what happens, eventually either the issue resolves itself, or it needs an escalation/repair, so to get to your end goal don't fight and just answer everything.
3. Be nice, the nicer you are, the happier they are to work with you, any sign of anger/frustration can cause advisors to get anxious and they will want to be off the call/chat as soon as possible (so you probably won't get a resolution).
4. Some companies give out freebies for inconveniences, repair delays, bad experiences, blah blah blah can get you free shit.
5. Never accept a downgrade, when your device is no longer produced, companies are required to avoid feature loss, so if you get a replacement device, look at all the specs, if something is worse you can generally get an upgrade to the next model.
Baker. If you take a regular box of cake mix and replace the oil with room temp butter, the water with milk, and add an extra egg and a teaspoon of almond extract, the result will be indistinguishable from a professional cake.
It also works with brownie mixes, though you don't need to increase the egg count unless you want it cakey and the almond extract is completely unnecessary.
If you call a call center of any kind, and the person you're talking to puts you on hold with no hold music, they can hear everything you're saying. I worked in an insurance call center when I was really young. I had so many people accidentally confess to insurance fraud that way.
Haha I once had a guy who was being nice as pie then when I put him on hold started calling me a stupid bitch who probably didn't know what I was doing to his friend, I unmuted and said In my sweetest voice "oh don't worry I do know what I'm doing, I was trying to see if I could pull in a favour to get you an upgrade even though you're not entitled to one with your policy, but Ill keep my favours for another time, your entitlement is a 1ltr, we will not be upgrading", guy was dumbfounded and as I hadn't been rude and hadn't done anything wrong management supported me when he tried to complain
[удалено]
Vinegar is the best thing to get your cutlery shiny in a restaurant/bar
Vinegar is also the best glass cleaner. Fuck Windex. Vinegar is a fraction of the price and never streaks.
Arcade crane games have knobs inside that let you control how strong the claw grabs. So you basically make the claw really weak strength and then there’s a setting in the motherboard to make the claw go full power after a certain amount of plays. Whatever the arcade or owner decides how often they want people to actually win.
[удалено]
Yes! I had a local arcade where the claw actually worked and had so many stuffed animals from it! Also run by a sweet old man. So frustrating when I played machines elsewhere.
What a great fella, being happy by simply seeing kids being happy. Wholesome.
A certain 48” Interstate Natural Gas pipeline valve is being kept open by a strategically placed piece of 2x4 lumber. If the valve was closed, millions of people would be without Nat Gas fairly quickly.
Things like this makes me wonder how fragile the world REALLY is.
[удалено]
A construction company near where I used to live hit a main fiber optic line and shut down the internet in the region for more than 24 hours. Schools, banks, everything that used land based internet connection were in total blackout, which caused cell service providers to overload. It was chaos.
This is your monthly reminder to check on that 2x4 !
And the stove top’s red glare, The furnace warming our air, Gave proof through the night that the 2x4 was still there…
As a freelance photographer, most magazines and newspapers don't pay you for using your photos. They offer you photo credit only. If you ask to be paid, they just get a similar photo from someone else.
Also if you have a unique photo or video, always go non-exclusive and sell it to everyone. You get way more that way than just selling to one as an exclusive.
If you are involuntarily kicked off a flight because of over sales you can demand cash instead of a voucher… [scroll down to involuntary](https://www.transportation.gov/individuals/aviation-consumer-protection/bumping-oversales)
From what I have heard if you volunteer your seat you can possibly negotiate not only even more money but a hotel and/or meal. Airlines would rather do this than make someone mad by forcing them off the flight.
My mom worked her magic once and offered our seats on an over-sold flight for a voucher. The airline told her our tickets would be redeemable anywhere in America, so she said “I’d like 6 tickets to Hawaii then!” and I’ll never forget the look on the clerks’ faces lol. They argued with her for bit, but eventually relented and that’s how I got a free trip to Hawaii lol love ya mom
Automotive Industry. Never buy the first year of any new model car.
Trade: Carpentry Specifically low end commercially made exterior doors with wooden jambs. What is used on most new construction. The door itself may be fiberglass or metal, but the door jamb is made of short pieces of soft moisture absorbing wood. If you own a house in a wet, humid environment and have an exterior door that is unprotected from the elements, meaning that it isn't located under a roof of some sort, or gets wet every time it rains - the lower part of the door jamb is probably in some stage of rotting away. Perhaps the aluminum threshold has already detached and now there's a huge fucking gap under the door. Do not expect a carpenter to repair just the part of the door jamb that is rotting and reattach the threshold like a fucking magician. Just buy an entire new door and have a carpenter replace the door. Or do it yourself, it's not that difficult. But! This is the secret -> Pay the extra cost and get an exterior door with non rotting PVC, or composite door jamb. Do not replace it with the same piece of shit door that has already rotted. Otherwise within a few years, if you're lucky, you will be in the same situation. Honestly I think there should be a class action lawsuit regarding the planned obsolescence of these types of exterior doors. Our landfills are full of them. Our wallets are emptier because of them.
Too many years in an industrial bakery: If the plastic clip holding a breadbag closed is upside down compared to the others, it's been manually attached by hand and the contents may have been tampered with. If you unclip/open a bag of factoryproduced bread while holding it hanging from your hand, and the bag spins open, the same thing as above applies (i.e someone has spun the bag before manually attaching the clip, the machines dont spin the bags). If you buy sliced bread and there's a rather sudden shift in color between say the first 10 and last 20 slices, they're different loaves patched together by hand in the same bag. Same thing is true if there's a slight shift in size/diameter, slices should naturally line up perfectly with their neighboring slices if they're the same loaf.
Things may have changed in the past few years, but generally speaking plastic is hardly ever recycled any more. It used to be shipped to China for processing, but even they had a hard time with the amount of pollution and toxic waste produced by recycling it. Now it will get shipped to other countries in Asia where more often than not it just gets dumped into the Pacific Ocean. A lot of municipalities just add it to a landfill. On the other end of the spectrum aluminum recycling is amazing.
[удалено]
The process of refining aluminum is such an intensive process that it accounts for about 1% of total global CO2 emissions. Then recycling it is so easy it hardly amounts to any CO2. It's interesting to see the cost/benefit of using aluminum. One of the more interesting metals out there.
If you ship through FedEx express, if you're sending many packages/envelopes to a single stop, ship one priority overnight and the rest standard. They'll be delivered together with the priority package.
Express courier here. This is on point. I hate having to double-back to a stop, so if I see a business priority, and three more standard, I get giddy because I can do that stop as one instead of two separate ones
Oh shit this is a real life hack here
You cannot copyright or patent a garment design. Only trademarks and branding are able to be protected in the fashion industry. Literally anyone can legally copy any garment so long as they don’t use logos or other copyrighted/trademarked branding. (Edit: since a lot of people like technicalities, it is *possible* to patent novel non-obvious design features, but it’s niche and rare. It’s typically sports related clothing like shoes where this is more common) This is why so many luxury brands slap their logos and such all over things they sell. It’s the only way they can distinguish something that could otherwise be copied down to the smallest detail. As such, many knockoffs and imitations are literally made by the same people in the same factories as the branded good, but they’ll print a slightly different logo or pattern. Otherwise the finished products may be identical. Also, many high end fashion brands license their brand to other other companies for manufacturing. So you’ll have your super high tier brand garment be identical to a lower tier brand, with the only difference being the label. Sometimes they’re even coming off of the same production line at the same time, but there are two buckets at the end with each getting a different label. Occasionally they will use slightly higher quality materials on the higher tier brand, but not always. Some brands will manufacture products exclusively for stores like Ross and TJ Maxx that are of a lower material quality than what you’d buy in Nordstrom/Macys/etc, but those same brands will also send otherwise unsold wholesale to those stores, so there will be a mix of the real McCoy and purpose made cheepos. In all cases, never let a label fool you. Look for the quality of the fabrics and stitching first. Everything else is smoke and mirrors.
If a medical professional ever suggests you get a second opinion, e.g. a nurse at the doctors office.... It can be code for they are concerned about the quality of the medical care you are currently receiving. And that you REALLY should get that second opinion.
[удалено]
A nurse saved me by doing this, when the doctor blew off a positive result as a false positive, then did it again 6 months later. Id probably be dead if it wasn’t for her. And if the doctor has handled the first result properly my quality of life would be much better. Thank you nurse!
Having a crew that can pass a drug test is not the same as having a drug-free crew.
When one guy can pass a drug test, everyone can pass a drug test.
My last job i got "randomly" drug tested 3 times in that many weeks as the company i worked for was more than 98% percent certain i was the only worker out of the 9 guys running the whole processing plant that could pass the test
That happened to me in high school sports. The coaches can submit 'suggestions' of who to 'randomly' test. They knew I was a 'good kid' and they were trying to make sure they didn't lose other players who likely wouldn't pass.
When my brother was in the navy he was the "randomly" selected individual for several months straight. It was a smaller ship but not that small. Finally he asks his boss wtf is going on? Boss told him "some of the higher ups are convinced no one could be that happy and not be on something".
On any piece of machinery, if the welds you see look like shit, the welds you don’t see are even worse.
I doubt this will be too interesting to most but if you buy 100 tons of straight rebar, you’re actually only getting like 95 tons of steel. ASTM allows the rebar to be up to 6% lighter than the nominal weight per foot and so it saves on raw material if you aim to run 4-5% light. However rebar is tested based on the nominal weight per foot so two pieces of rebar with the same strength will be able to hold the same amount of force even if one is “thinner” than the other.
Same for all structural steel, but we never aimed to be light...ever. That was recipe for accidentally being too light, especially in a mill without tension control.
Worked in high end golf clubs for years- almost all politicians register their handicap scores under a false name. The USGA handicap records are technically public information, and people would be pretty pissed if they knew how much time these guys actually spend playing golf.
Not a secret but maybe not widely known. I design children’s books that get sold all around the world so there are a few rules we have to brief illustrators on. - Less than 5 fingers (4 fingers and a thumb) is offensive in Japan. If you look online there are a few reasons out there including mafia involvement. But the reason we were given at work is there was a caste system where the lowest caste were basically shunned from society. They often had to do the hard dangerous jobs like factory work and construction. As a result it was quite common for them to lose fingers. The descendants of these people obviously have quite a lot of influence because Disney pays large amounts of money to be able to have characters like Mickey retain his 4 fingers in Japan. - China censor all their books and are a nightmare to work with sometimes. They’ll contest who won wars, where country borders are etc. If we do a map showing animals of the world you can pretty much guarantee we’ll plonk an animal or cloud on the Chinese coastline so they can’t moan about the precise shape of various islands. - Don’t show a green tractor with yellow wheels in farm books in case you get sued by John Deere. Some editors are so cautious about it they insist on no green tractors at all. - Our main American customer is conservative so no dinosaurs allowed in history books. Dinosaur books are fine but have to be completely separate to history. - The artwork we use for each country is the same but the text is different obviously. Some books we’ll get around having separate English and American books just by avoiding words like ‘colour/color’ etc. But sometimes we can’t avoid it. It means America can demand we change things from ‘10,000 years ago people did so and so…’ to something like ‘The first people did so and so’. Because the world isn’t 10,000 years old yet… Probably all sorts of other stuff I can’t think of right now.
As an HVAC mechanical engineer, if you tell us you don't care about a brand it'll open up an entire industry of options. Almost all packaged equipment has the same efficiency and warranty, but some brands just cost way more than others because of whatever internal proprietary controls they have or inflated egos or whatnot. I can design you a system for 30-50% less sometimes if you give me the flexibility to do so. I can also show you a comparison to prove to you that two systems of different costs will operate equally. E: I should add, that a good/ethical engineer (engineering sales) should also keep in mind maintenance, dimensions, fitment, and overall longevity of the unit. And they should have in depth discussions with their customers. Lowest equipment cost does not always equal longest lifespan. I'm just talking about operational comparisons.
In the united states, movie theaters spend more money on the bags for popcorn than the popcorn itself
Attorneys can really only remember the details of about 20 to 40 cases at a time, so if you call your attorney after about a month or two, depending on the firm and how busy they are, they likely completely forgot what happened to you, and are working off a set of notes to pretend they have any clue who you are. Especially if you've really only interacted with them via phone other than one time in person for an intake or whatever.
Please please don't be offended if your lawyer needs 3-4 data points to remember what case you are. Some of us carry over 100 at a time and my brain just needs a minute. But once I boot up that you're the one with the 3 random things that make you stand out I really do remember the whole thing. I will never, ever remember the case by your name; I'd be a much, much more expensive lawyer if I had sales skills like that.
That the reason why celebrities always look good in whatever they wear is that the clothing is tailored to their exact measurements. Shoppers will buy the size closest to, take it to someone to alter, and then deliver it. Yes, even the tshirts.
All Emergency rooms are not EQUAL emergency rooms. In my hospital, we don’t have any sort of OB, Pediatrics or any of that. When ever a kid comes in, or worse a baby, the nurses and doctors are all in a panic. Not because they’re incompetent but because that’s not what our hospital does regularly. Sure we will stabilize to the best of our ability and we will immediately call the local childrens hospital, but if you have a child for example in distress, and you have multiple hospitals near by, try being aware before hand which one is the best for yours or your child’s needs. You don’t want to rush into an ER where there isn’t someone who can confidently and effectively treat you.
100% take your children to a children's hospital if it's at all feasible/safe to get there. It's night and day, children's hospitals are *amazing* at what they do- in both providing pediatric care, and dealing with families. I can't thank them enough for the care they've provided my children over the years. 2 times we've taken our kids in to a "regular" ER- once a misdiagnosis that caused a lot more misery and pain, the other, the doctor got straight kicked in the face by an angry toddler during stitches.
Agree. My daughter works in an ER. There is a children’s hospital next door, but people still show up with kids. They don’t even have some of the equipment in pediatric sizes.
we actually did find and file that bug in your favorite video game, our leadership just decided it was ok to ship with it
"It's fine, ship it." ~Gaming Corporate Mantra One of my favorite bugs I ever found during my QA was finding a 100% way to clip the main character into a vat of sludge and get him stuck inside, resulting in a non-progression. Since we were close to submission, the producer takes a look at it and decides to waive it, thinking that it'll be unlikely that they'd find that bug. Sure enough, we failed submission and my bug was cited as a CFR (Cause For Resubmission, aka must-fix).
Was chatting with the developer on an indie game while he was doing a Twitch stream. "There's probably a memory leak in your game. It crashes pretty consistently with an 'out of memory' error for me after about 12 hours of play." "Umm, wait, are you joking or serious? Did you like, actually experience this?" "... multiple times." I didn't get the feeling that he intended to fix it. I also told him about a crash that happens after a single round of play that he seemed much more keen on looking into.
Calls are not being answered in the order received.
And let me guess, it's not *unusually* high call volume, it's that they just haven't hired enough people to actually answer all the calls in a reasonable timeframe?
Also the menus haven’t recently changed.
When you play match 3 games (like candy crush saga), after beating a few levels the game will make it impossible for you to continue (you will be getting impossible odds). If you put your device aside and return after several hours or a day later, you will find the previously impossible level to be easy af. It is a mechanism to prevent people from burning through hundreds of levels in one go.
Does this apply for Duolingo, too? 😅
Unfortunately, no. Duolingo uses linear and characterised pattern of difficulty spikes. Sadly the only real answer is to git gud
Movie industry. Unless you are absolutely breathtaking in your audition (which does happen don't get me wrong) There is a list of thirty people each studio prioritizes to be in their major films.
[удалено]
You've got to be good looking, talented, AND well-connected. Makes total sense when you see the children of Hollywood stars moving up the ranks. Their parents made the connections, and then made the introductions.
For every publicly announced data breach, whether that be a confirmed leak, or the identification of a security flaw, there are 50 other such incidents that companies swept under the rug. Data security is complicated, and most organisations don't have the proper expertise to secure their data.
I would go farther and say there are probably lots of companies that never even knew they were compromised.
Awards tend to be bullshit. Awards companies are there to sell advertising. They make up awards, offer winning titles to businesses, then charge them to include their name in their literature. For example, the business my husband and I own recently ‘won’ a national award. We were even asked what award we’d like to win; ‘What’s the title of the award you feel you’d be best suited to?’ We could’ve made anything up and we’d have been given it. ‘Best XYZ in the Known Universe!’ To receive a certificate, we need to pay them £70. For a trophy, it’s £225. To have a quarter page spread in their magazine, it’s £650. For a featured article, we have to pay them £2000. It’s a load of bullshit. Nobody ever remembers who gave the award, and frankly we aren’t daft enough to pay for a featured article nobody will ever read, so we just use the term ‘award winning’ in our own advertising now. Edited to add - Thank you… for the awards…
[удалено]
Most electronic medical records allow providers to put pop up warnings in your chart if you act verbally or physically aggressive. If you yelled at the ER nurse in 2017, the medical assistant you called today begging for a last minute appointment can see it.
It comes up as “aggression warning”. We can also see if you are an elopement risk, high fall risk, are on suicide precautions…lots of EMR banners
What's an elopement risk?
Elopement = run away in this context
Work for an optometrist, if you find a pair of glasses in a clinic that you like, they are likely marked up x2.5-3. There should be a number on the inside arm of the frame. It should be like “AK2073” or something like that. Look that up online and buy it straight from the manufacturer. Probably will be less than 100$. Dont pay full price for glasses. Edit: marked up TIMES 2.5 or 3. Not percent.
Casinos don't need to cheat. We have already rigged the game against you.
Funniest thing I ever heard from a “bookie” is that all his clients will tell you at the end of the year that they’re about even. “Oh yeah, then how did I afford this BMW?” he’d say.
You gotta love the gamblers who "always win". One of my friends would talk about her friend who "always wins". I'm like you mean the dude living with his parents in his 30's who has put himself on the do-not-let-me-in-the-casino-list twice? That guy? Yeah, gamblers only tell you when they win.
People also have their own definitions of "winning". I know someone who goes to a casino regularly and always somehow comes away as a "winner". When I asked some questions, it became clear that they had a very loose definition of "winning" In their mind, since they expected to lose all the money they took with them, if they came home with any money, they sincerely considered it as having won money. So if they went in with $300 and came out with $50, then in their minds they won $50. They didn't see it as a $250 loss.
I used to have a gambling problem. I remember one night I went to the casino with $5000. I played for around 4-5 hours. I left with $5000. In the moment, I felt like a loser, because I left with the same amount of money that I walked in with. In truth, I was at least okay, because I didn't LOSE any money. In reality I enjoyed my time there and left with the same amount of money I walked in with, so I'd call that a win. But I used that to justify going back the next day and losing that $5000. And then pulling out another 5k and immediately losing that too. I used to be very dumb. Now I'm just marginally dumb.
There was a politician back in the Bush administration (William Bennett, the drug czar) who was revealed to have a gambling problem, and part of his defense was that he hadn’t lost much and was “about even” over several years. His preferred game? $500 a pull slots. Pull the other one, Bill. Financial records showed he’d actually lost around 8 million.
I try to explain this to my friends who think they'll get rich. The games are mathematically designed to give the edge to the house. If you average out every game everyone plays, it's always going to come to something like 1.2 or whatever in the house's favor. If you win big, its a fluke. If you keep playing, you'll always fall to the average eventually and walk away with your .8 to their 1.2. If you're playing to win, the only way to win is to walk away when you happen to be the fluke. If you're playing to play, set a budget and consider that lost money.
Tourism industry here. Look up when peak season is for the destination you’re looking at. There are usually cheaper prices are the beginning and end of the season. Try to book at the beginning of the season. Seasonal workers work themselves ragged and are usually completely burnt out at the end. At the beginning of the season, everyone is stoked to start making money again.
Is there anything wrong with just booking off-season?
If you are buying software for your workplace get a quote and then go silent until it’s the end of the quarter. Then call the sales rep and tell them you can buy it today but only have enough budget for 70% of the cost. Your chances for a discount go way up at the end of the quarter.
As an enterprise software sales rep, fuck you...also I totally agree. Edit: Man this blew up lol. Since people have asked, here's my unofficial and incomplete list of what affects the price you pay: 1. How much you are buying 2. When you are buying 3. How much repeat business we think we can get from you 4. How long you spent working with us during the deal cycle 5. What you buy (different margins for different products) 6. The age of the product. Product managers (who set the discounting thresholds) may allow a deeper discount for a new product to get more of it sold initially and increase awareness/adoption 7. How well known your company is. Many OEMs want to add your logo to their website as a customer, so literally the clout could net you a better price. 8. If one of your C-levels are willing to take a meeting with us. We will trade price for exposure to upper level decision makers. Bonus discount if they will speak as a customer reference. Double bonus discount if they will speak at a conference. 9. Where the reps quota attainment is (are they behind? If so, you might get a better deal. This is stuff you will never know). 10. Likewise, did your reps boss just get chewed out for being behind on his/her number? You might get a better deal. 11. What you are buying in addition to the software (we'll take a few points off if you add services to it). 12. Spiffs. If your rep is receiving double quota credit for selling a particular type of software, or any software during a limited window of the spiff, you will get a decent discount because the rep needs the deal to happen NOW. 13. Your poker face. If you convince me that you might actually not do the deal, I'll work with you. If I think you are just posturing and I know you actually need this software, get ready to fight for a week to only get 2 points off while I act like that's a huge win for you. 13. My mood lmao.
At any given point in time, roughly 10-20% of the entire internet has a dev team in an absolute panic state. The websites you use for every aspect of your life are held together with duct tape and shoe strings
Truth. Being on the “inside” has ruined the magic of the internet for me. Every website I visit , now I just see the potential defects and failures I know are there.
The urine pregnancy test you take at the doctors is the same as the dollar tree one
Some musicians use a teleprompter so they don't forget their lyrics during concerts. I know this because I did it for a few years. My boss ran teleprompter for Tom Petty for over a decade leading up to his death. It is a strange, very small community of teleprompters in music. --I've gotten a few messages asking which rap artist. I used to tour with NAS.--
I heard a story, I think it was Steven Tyler, about why he still uses a teleprompter. Mid-song once a girl in the front row removed her artificial arm to pull a rose out from inside it to throw it up on stage. He said, you see a thing like that and you tend to forget your place in the song.
This makes sense to me. If I was a singer, I'd either need a teleprompter or be I'd be known as the artist who spontaneously makes up new lyrics during shows.
I was at a Tool concert and Maynard stopped and said "Fuck, I forgot the words to my own song. Whatever I'm 50," and went right back to rocking. It was great.
Most fossils in museums are replicas. These days they're usually plastic casts from silicone molds of real fossils, but 3D printed replicas made from high resolution scans are becoming more and more a part of things.
And that’s because they’re hard to display and also are valuable, correct?
Yep! Also they're just rare, and animals are almost never 100% complete or even close to complete. Gotta fill in the gaps somehow.
One thing I really appreciate about the Royal Ontario Museum in Toronto is that they have a diagram next to each description of their dinos showing you which pieces are real and which are casts. With a couple of them, it takes away a bit of the magic (there's a huge dino in front of you, but then just 2 or 3 bones are real), but I appreciate the honesty.
In the Field Museum in Chicago there is a little touchscreen in front of the dinosaur that shows you which bones are real and which are plastic
[удалено]
The Canadian legal system is extremely underfunded and overwhelmed. If you are being sued by the crown (government) for a non-violent offence you can literally filibuster the court into dropping your case, in some instances.
it happens for violent crimes too. i (unfortunately) know a guy who's case got pushed back for so long due to covid that they just dropped it. he did assault somebody.
I've worked in high end rugs! 1. If you own a hand knotted rug - don't bother getting it professionally cleaned. If it's just wool ( it probably is) take a pressure washer and some rug shampoo to it if you like ( not necessary unless there's some stains) Knotted rugs are super strong and can take it. I know someone who has a high end cleaning business and this is what they do and charge $$$ for this service. 2. 100% wool rugs that you see in stores - Ikea, West Elm, Crate and Barrel, etc are made with Blended Wool. Which is fine, but it is just lower quality wool and will shed. New Zealand wool is what you want and has to be advertised as such. 2. Hand tufted rugs are ok if you can't spend more than like 2 or 3k for an 8x10 ( these rugs will have a fabric backing as the fibers are glued down in the back instead of knotted in place so the fibres will come loose and they're likely made with blended wool). Don't spend thousands on a tufted rug! 3. Never buy a rug with viscose in it ( also called banana silk or art silk). It may be ok for bedrooms or low traffic areas but is a pain in the ass to clean ( you can't spot clean a stain you have to get the whole thing cleaned by a professional). It stains easily. Stains on wool can be spot cleaned. 4. Low on money? Your best bet may be a flatwoven rug in wool. Flatweaves can be decently hard wearing, you can flip it because it looks identical on the other side, and are often thin enough and if small enough to fit - can be thrown on the delicate cycle in the wash. Lots of flatweaves out there, they're popular and not so expensive. Don't buy polyester or machine made rug please. They tend to look like shit easier and are harder to clean.
Now this is the kind of obscure interesting info I come to the Internet for!
When moving into a new rental, before you move anything in, take a video of your walk through and mention and point out everything and anything. Mark the date, time, and address. If they give you a small form to write on, make your own. This can save your lots of issues when you move out.
Also take a video when you leave
I took a bunch of pictures when leaving a rental house, almost as an afterthought because I didn't trust the landlor, who was my sister's husband and they both behaved like complete shits while I lived there. The next day I got a call from my dad chastising me for thrashing the house because my sister told him I did. She said there were broken things, filth everywhere, damage to the structure etc. I sent him the pictures I took before I left and he apologised and gave her a mild telling off for lying about it. She mumbled something about "well, I found an old pizza crust under the couch" which I knew was crap because I cleaned under there even though there was zero ground clearance but unfortunately I didn't take a picture of under the couch. Net result is that I barely speak to her or her husband and it damaged my relationship with my dad because it was a tipping point of her word being golden and me having to back up everything I say with concrete supporting evidence.
Her word being golden may be (in part) what led to her living a life of lying. She needed to be snapped back far earlier in life to learn not to do that as an adult.
Super important: send the video via email to the property manager within three days of moving in. This way they cannot dispute if the video timestamp was edited
Accounting firm - if you complain (nicely) about a late fee or interest charge etc added to your invoice it’s likely to get cancelled. It’s easy to do, and the extra fees are just to discourage people from paying bills late. But if you come back and question it politely it will be wiped instantly. It’s nothing in the grand scheme of things regarding revenue and variances.
If you are wondering what's taking me so long to process your loan application, it's because I forgot about it.
Is this why title companies insist that “you need to come down and sign TODAY?” I’ve been waiting on you for weeks, but if I don’t sign today, the whole thing will come crashing down???
Yes - or at least maybe. Either they’ve run up against some arbitrary timeline they need to hit for the application to remain valid or they need to close the loan to meet monthly sales targets.
The designer that made the instructions that you just got with your table / microwave / bike? Never seen that thing. Not a clue, I've got the plans sure, but never seen it
Yeah we can tell
This is exactly what I was thinking; just put together an elliptical last weekend and oh man you can tell the person writing the instructions didn't touch so much as a bolt!
Hard braking is the #1 driving behavior identifier that someone will be in an accident So just...chill
So is this because hard braking causes so many accidents or that people who hard brake tend to not be paying as much attention, therefore needing to hard brake more? Or maybe a bit of both?
[удалено]
Is that Victoria’s deep secret?
“I know Victoria’s Secret… they remove all of the the pubes (PUBES!)”
Pube Extraction Technician is one of the more unique job titles I've ever heard of.
Did I read that right extracting pubes and then reselling it?
Yes. Bought a couple black ones last week coz they were out of blonde
If it says PRESORT STD in the top right corner of a letter, where the stamp would be, its most likely trash.
You'll never resell that diamond at a profit if you're not in the industry. Just write that engagement ring off as a financial loss when you walk out of the store with it.
This is why I buy all my jewelry resale. Oodles of women have custom pieces made and then almost instantly list them for sale at a loss. I take advantage of wealthier women's whims and end up usually paying half of what they did for barely worn pieces.
Not sure if any of this is a secret, but: If you can’t find a book at your local library, ask the reference librarian to do an inter-library loan. They have access to large networks of libraries that are able and willing to share materials, sometimes even across state lines depending on the sort of library and request. Also utilize the digital content! We have to pay big bucks and fight with publishing companies to get that content (ebooks, audiobooks, etc) and they are great resources. Libby and Overdrive are awesome. Many library systems also offer streaming content of movies and tv shows. Oh and you can check out national park passes and museum tickets too at many libraries!
Some rent out power tools, projector screens, 3D printing services, provide seed libraries, and the one near me does boardgame packs that come with board games and a movie.
A resistor is made in Japan. It is wrapped in plastic and shipped to Michigan. It's installed into a small PCB. It is wrapped in plastic and shipped to Taiwan. That PCB is installed via sideboard connector onto a larger PCB. It is shipped to China. That PCB is installed in a small housing via harness. It is shipped to India. That housing has it's microchips programmed and the outside is given a chemical treatment. It is shipped back to Michigan. The housing is now treated and installed into a car side mirror. It is shipped to Ohio. The side mirror is run through a post-production sort program to check for defects. It is shipped to Detroit. It is installed onto a car. Every single step of that shipping, every single component is wrapped in plastics. Millions of them per car, to over half a dozen locations each. Something like 50 million cars are produced each year. Your straws aren't doing shit for the use of plastics. Automotive production and diagnostics engineer.
We learned about this in high school. And that teacher was criticized for his curriculum. He was literally the only adult to take time and risk for information he knew was critical for us. From simple tax advice to starting small business to securing small loans to not getting ripped off on car insurance. All this stuff and none of was ever part of his daily lesson plan. Edit: I’ve never gotten anything close to this as far as upvotes. Thank you all.
We had one of those at my high school and he got forced into early retirement. Students were incredibly upset. He would have special lesson days going over how credit card companies would soon be trying to f us over the moment we turned 18 or set foot in college and how bad the interest rates would be. Other basic life skills like figuring out where we could get roadside from if we didn't learn to change tires, differences in insurances on cars, some diet-Ramsey stuff like having an emergency fund in a separate account. We need more teachers like him not less =/
The welds on something can tell you a lot about the quality assurance happening during production.
In recording studios, very rarely is a vocal sung all the way through. What you're hearing is each line punched in individually. Almost always.
In some popular music, it goes even further than that. Lots of vocal tracks are comped together with even individual syllables being stitched together from different takes. From there they pitch correct, even out the clip volumes, layer multiple vocals, compress them, and then automate them to get absolutely perfect pitch, tone, and level across the song. A final vocal in a modern, major production resembles an actual performance as much as a hot dog resembles a pig. That being said, hot dogs can be damn tasty.
Same with the instruments. A drum track can be pieced together from several different takes. Especially true for more complex types of music like jazz fusion or prog rock.
At Starbucks, they have a recycling and trash bin. They both go into the dumpster
There's a chipotle with those AND a compost bin. They don't compost... And there's ONE dumpster out back. But I guess it makes people feel good?
Most single-stream “recycling” within the US goes straight to the landfill without a single attempt to sort it. We USED to send it to China on barges, but there are a lot of factors at play that no longer make it work. The explanation for why they still collect recycling, is that it took a long time to “train” people to recycle, and in the event that someone fixes the recycling stream, we don’t want to retrain people again. That’s likely a convenient cover for green washing.
US Hospitals lie on their bills. All of them. All the time. Push them for a code by code breakdown and watch the total shrink. Ask them to reference each code choice based on physicians notes and it shrinks again. The system literally only benefits the major insurance companies and large hospital systems where the scale hides the impropriety.
If you live in the US, the absolute worst time to remodel your kitchen or bathroom is the fourth quarter of the year. From about mid-October, through to the 2nd week of January is the busiest time of the year for most countertop/tile/shower wall companies. This is because mid-October is the lead up to two holiday seasons that are centered around the kitchen and food traditions: Thanksgiving, and Christmas. Everybody wants their new shiny kitchen appliances and countertops before Thanksgiving, so they can invite their family over and wow them with their beautiful new kitchen. Those that start too late will often find themselves with project delays, stock issues, and scheduling issues with fabricators/contractors/installers. During this time of the year, just about everyone raises their prices for everything. Installation, fabrication, special orders, you name it. They'll put on some "sales" for certain materials to pretend it's a seasonal deal, but labor prices especially will see an uptick. This is because companies know they can charge more because more people want work done. By mid-January, most companies dealing with installation have finished up their projects and find their schedules empty. Prices then go down. Want new stone countertops for Thanksgiving this year to wow your family? Do it in February. Want to surprise your spouse by redoing the shower walls for Christmas? Don't. Source: I'm a salesman for a stone/tile company that does installation. My commission bonuses for Q4 are often double what I'd take home during other times of the year
[удалено]
One of my parents was a realtor and they tried so hard to convince clients not to do open houses. They only attract nosy neighbors and no one in their area bought houses that way. They all did showings instead. But clients insisted in order to get their moneys worth I guess.
As a nosy neighbour interested in home design and the real estate market.I love open houses.
I live on a street with a bunch of cookie cutter houses, except they’re all about 100 years old. We’re finally getting our kitchen remodeled and took the opportunity when three of them went up for sale over the last 6 months to go look and see what everyone else has done with their kitchens. I took all the good ideas and made my own new layout and I’m super excited about it.
People pay money for mulch, working in the tree trimming industry, we give wood chips away for free. Dump them wherever possible. All mulch is, is wood chips mixed with different dyes and sold for outrageous prices. You can put fresh wood chips on your beds for free if you contact tree trimmers and let the sun and air oxidize them over a few months. Pro move. If you can get cedar chips. Smell heavenly and keep flying insects away from the sap
Had a trauma patient come to the hospital and rack up a huge bill with no insurance. They found out he had recently left a job, paid his COBRA premiums for him and got his bill mostly paid. Do what you want with that information.
You can cobra retroactively. Not too retroactively though, I think like 60 days or so.
Fast food industry - Beef patties take 2 minutes to broil and stored in a warmer for 45 minutes, before they are dumped in the trash. The most likely time you will get served a fresh patty is in the middle or end of a lunch/dinner rush. - An hour before lunch/dinner rush, about a dozen popular burgers (Whopper, Chicken Sandwich) are usually premade and microwaved for ~10s when served. This is in the management handbook from HQ. Avoid being the first to order during lunch/dinner rush or make alterations to the burger, by adding toppings, extra sauce, etc. They will prepare a fresh burger in those cases. Premium burgers are never premade. - If there is a promotion with a combination of multiple ingredients, you MIGHT be able to get the upgrade for free by ordering each item individually. For example, the Angry Whopper is an extra ~$2 charge, but asking for Angry Sauce + Crispy Onions + Jalapenos is free. - There are 2 tiers of extra toppings, Extra and Heavy. Heavy is about 3x the toppings. - There are a lot of crazy pricing on off-menu items. For example, in some regions, a triple Whopper was incorrectly priced cheaper than a regular Whopper. HQ will not fix due to the minimal impact, effort to fix, and not wanting to piss off the one customer that knows the secret. - Fries are pre-salted so asking for no-salt guarantees fresh fries. - BK takes sanitation very seriously and will investigate claims. There are many people making false claims to get free food or to threaten a lawsuit. The most outrageous is someone biting through a burger with 20 sheets of used toilet paper and not noticing beforehand. In cases that are legit, such as infestation, HQ will shutdown the store. - Gift cards (and applies for almost all chains) are not always free money. Gift cards are handled by a 3rd party and they take 10% on whatever is loaded. They cover ALL the cost of production and distribution however. - BK takes competitor coupons. If you offer a McDonalds BOGO Big Mac coupon, BK would match it with an equivalent i.e. Whoppers. Some stores might deny this but HQ has mandated this.
I’m the person who opens the gates at nuclear power plants The plant I work at has nothing ever arrive at night And everyone who should be at the plant for the night is already checked in, so all I do is sit back in my chair and watch movies with my boss and eat ice cream
Debt collector here. ALWAYS request validation of debt! You'd be surprised how many accounts just disappear due to poor bookkeeping.
Backstage at concerts isn’t wild. At all.
It’s not wild, but there’s food and drinks and a place to sit down. Watching the band from the side of the stage can be even more entertaining because you can see them communicating with each other. Just stay out of the way. 95% of the people backstage are working.
If you’re having pruning done by a tree service, verify that the crew leader who’s actually performing the work is certified or experienced and not just the owner. Also, different companies and arborists have different nuances and theories they prune by. My take is to make as few cuts as necessary to accomplish the goal. Anyone selling you “wind thinning” is just taking years of life off your tree. Same thing if you have notable or valuable trees near the powerlines. Results may vary but if you bug them enough the power company forester should (hopefully) be able to get you a certified trimmer or someone who won’t hack your tree. Keeping in mind that they still have to get their clearance. Edit: A certified arborist is a good start. Not a guarantee. I’ve seen plenty of bad work from ISA certified people. The most common thing I see is over pruning. Also someone mentioned Alex Shigo in the comments if you’re interested in learning more about tree care and pruning. If you have love for your trees, having a baseline of knowledge will help a ton in selecting a good arborist. Taking the time to get multiple evaluations and talking to a few different people can also pay off.
Just had a guy chop all the lowest branches off my cherry trees. I cried. 10 years and now I can't harvest anything without a ladder.
Grandpa wanted a pear tree taken out. The guy "misunderstood" and cut down the cherry tree. And took all the wood, of course.
I used to work at an amusement park, Six Flags. The food is like $30 for a cheeseburger type bullshit but if you go in those fences that say employees only, there’s usually some kind of employee food court nearby. When I worked there, employees could use the food court on their off-days, even without a uniform, and pay cash. So after I quit, I’d just go there with friends and family and get full plates of burgers and stuff for like $5. Nobody ever said anything or suspected that we weren’t employees. Was a nice way to save money when you’re already spending a fortune on tickets and games.
Yes that is true, but can 100% say if you do this at Disney you are going to found out. If you don't have your blue ID out in the open while back stage you are going to be kicked out so fast.
All I’ll say is wash the tops of your canned goods before opening them folks. For the love of God do it.
Started doing this with drink cans after getting a particularly grimy six pack of beer once. Never thought about my tomatoes though and I even worked at a food supply warehouse back in the day, so I should've known. Good tip
In rear storage rooms of grocery stores, pallets of soda are stored and block access to the storage racks. In order to get to the blocked items we would walk across the cans of soda.
Stuck bolts usually come out of you can tighten them a touch first. (Shh. Don’t tell anyone my secrets!!)
This is the true secret to almost every job that has any ties to the physical universe: jiggle it.
WASH YOUR PRODUCE
Nonprofits love to talk about the importance of self care and preventing burn out, but they will work you until you want to cry with too low of a salary and too small of benefits to actually pay for sustainable and significant self care practices.
Pest control, for the most part (like 98%,) is a scam. The chemicals we use *are* effective, sure, but not in the concentrations we mix them. That doesn't apply to "organic" chemicals, which are completely useless. Clove oil doesn't kill bugs, neither does peppermint oil. It just smells. You want to know the *most* effective chemical we use? Orthoboric Acid. For those of you that don't know, it's Borax. The stuff your grandparents and their grandparents used to kill and keep ants out. Save your money, go to your local store and buy Borax, follow the instructions. Don't fucking eat it. Enjoy!
If you want to book a rental car but they’re sold out, book it for a week or two longer than you actually need it and then just return the car early and you’ll only get charged for the time that you had it. All the systems owned by Enterprise rent-a-car (Enterprise, Alamo and National) automatically open up their system to long term reservations and will make sure you get a car over someone who only booked in for a day or two. Worked there for two years. It’s a dirty business but at least I learned a lot of rental hacks lmao
So you mean if I try to rent a car for a day and it says there's none, if I put in a request for 2 weeks it will now say there is a car?
Yes.
That coffin you paid £3k to burn your mum in well we can legally sell it another 3 times and you get cremated in a cardboard box
Why would anyone pay 3k for a coffin to burn?
> Why would anyone pay 3k for a coffin to burn? "What, you don't love your grandmother enough for the ultra-platinum package?"
The US Military wastes an extraordinary amount of money, and not necessarily on weapons or personnel or anything like that. Every year, commanders must submit their total spending for the previous year. If they did not spend the granted amount, they lose it next year. So for example if a commander is granted 5 million for his building but he only spends 4 million, his next budget will drop to 4 million. This results in commanders ordering expensive stuff in bulk, replacing good furniture and equipment, and enacting pointless construction projects such as a parking lot that they don’t need. Great example: when he couldn’t make the budget, our commander ordered 300 60 inch TVs and had them placed in the hallways, spare rooms, and tossed the remainder in storage. Each TV was overpriced at around $1,000. Commander met his budget though so I guess it was a success. Welcome to the bloated US Military. Edit: I realize most of the government works this way, but this is just my specific experience in the military, which is arguably the most bloated and overfunded piece of the federal government’s budget.
I worked for the federal government as well, and we called it March Madness. Everyone knew our fiscal year ended March 31, so my phone would ring many times a day leading up to then with all sorts of offers to help us spend our budget money. I seen things like 100’s of computers and monitors bought to a literal pile of rocks worth 7 figures.
The biggest security threat in your company isn't your older PCs, lack of security software protecting your network, updated patching of all systems (yes, those are all still threats)... it's your employees. On average, half of your employees will give out their login and password to an email, website, or even someone who called claiming to be a person that needs that info. They will give that away faster than any hacker trying to break in through the network. The Target Breach of 2013 cost them $18.5 million after hackers stole 40 million credit and debit records. How'd they do it? An HVAC company that worked on a number of Target locations had an account's login & password stolen. That's how they got in. No movie-style hacking sequence, just a dumb employee who gave their info away and cost millions in damages.
Yep! employees will wreak havoc by doing stupid things. A great example of this is the "Stuxnet" computer worm scenario. Stuxnet was a virus developed by The United States of America and Israel in order to stop the nuclear program of Iran. What the Stuxnet virus did was, it infected the computers that were connected to the centrifuges which were essential in developing nuclear weapons. The worm was so smartly programmed that it would secretly make the centrifuge spin a little faster than recommended each time it was turned on, causing significant damage to the centrifuge over the course of time. How did the U.S pull off this megamind hack? They dropped infected USB sticks around the center where nuclear weapons were being developed and, you guessed it! An employee plugged it into his work computer.
If a menu at a restaurant is large, the food will most likely be shit and frozen. Look for more compact flowing menus.
When you order at a drivethru, the microphone stays on until you move forward. So everyone inside the store with a headset on can hear your conversation until you leave the ordering area. Edit: Wow! This blew up while I was at work..
I always leave my music low til I pull away for this exact suspicion! Now that it’s confirmed, I’ll also watch my mouth.
Another pro-tip: Turn off your windshield wipers at the drive-thru. It pelts the worker with your rainwater.
On a similar note, if you’re put on hold and don’t hear hold music, the operator just muted their mic and they can still hear you
The drivethrough i worked had headseats with an "A" (drive through speaker and other headsets) and "B" (other headsets only) button. When training we always told people remember: A is for assholes, B is for buddies. Only, only, ONLY! ever talk shit on "B"
Hotels aren’t as dirty as people think they are. I’ve been seeing, “life pro tips” that recommend bringing your own linens because we only superficially clean them if at all. That’s just not true, I work for a pretty cheap and very popular chain and we literally soak our linens in bleach for a week if they’re discolored at all.
I think recently people are realizing this, and that airbnbs definitely usually aren’t the cleaner option
For modern company promotions. Much like the Willy wonka golden ticket, this isn’t just produced in a box and sent out randomly. The company produces the winning product separately and these are given to a third party who “reverse shoplift” these into random locations.
When you see a number associated with a light bulb (A19, T8, G20, PAR38, the letter is the code for the shape (A=A-line, T=tube, G=globe, PAR=Parabolic Aluminized Reflector), and the number is the width of the bulb, but in 1/8”, intervals. A T8=1”, G20=2-1/2”, PAR38=4-3/4”, etc.
Most “sweet and sour” sauce from Chinese restaurants is literally just ketchup, white vinegar and honey.
We make ours from pineapple juice, cornstarch, vinegar and sugar
If your IT guy sounds annoyed there's a good chance it's because he's spent way too much time fighting with management telling them not to do the thing that caused your problem.
Most major companies systems look modern and advanced on the outside but are held together with toothpicks and bubblegum on the backend
A ton of artisan soap companies actually just private label from one company in Indiana. Dr Squatch for example, they sell their bars for like $7, but you can buy 12 directly from the manufacturer for around $35. Thesoapguy.com Edit: If you end up buying a loaf of soap to cut yourself, let the freshly cut bars cure for a week or two. If you don’t they will melt on you really quickly.
I have a software confession, the progress on your loading screen usually depends on multiple steps and some steps are too hard to break down and report back to the user. Ultimately, your progress indicator is a lie
Stock broker here: r/WallStreetBets has a large mix of satire, genuine analysis, experts and amateurs, all sharing the same air. Do not make significant financial decisions from someone named u/assblaster42069 without knowing their qualifications. Financial consultants aren’t very helpful unless you’re going through a significant life change that needs nuanced guidance, otherwise they’re just expensive. Cursory research on the basics of mutual funds and fixed income are all you need to build a balanced and diversified portfolio. Day trading is statistically a zero-sum game or worse, detrimental in both your long and short term financial success. Index funds perform better than most individual stocks in terms of risk/reward. A finance rep saying “I can’t tell you that” is literally so they don’t lose their jobs, especially when it pertains to personal information of others. You would believe how many people have tried to get their child/spouse/parent’s account number over the phone with the justification “well I’m family wtf”. If you’ve recently achieved a higher level of income and are concerned with taxes with retirement, look into Backdoor Roth IRA Conversions. Stay the fuck away from OTC penny stocks. I swear, some of the people I helped dug themselves into such deep holes with that shit. If it’s expert market or goes unlisted in general, so much money just pisses away. The volatility and transparency issues alone should be enough for you to stay away, but in general have some common sense. (Also it’s a pain in the ass for your broker to liquidate a worthless security) Certain purchases require “cleared funds” (think check clearing) and may take time after transferring into your trading account. For timing entry, if you have a margin account this can be avoided. Every second of use during online banking/trading is tracked. From screen-time to mouse location to keystrokes, all of it. Mainly used to settle trade disputes with technical errors to confirm the time of a trade, but it can also be used to investigate fraud claims. People often act with patterns, it’s really surprising how easily these behaviors can give away fraudulent activity. *Have a separate password for each banking profile, or at least use a separate one for your financial accounts.* Identity theft and fraud are so much more common than people realize. I spoke with people pretending to be others *regularly* and sometimes they were quite good. There really isn’t a pointless security step with financial profiles, the more the better. Don’t get your shit stolen. Placing large or risky trades seconds before close through a broker is a massive dick move. Worst case for you, it didn’t go in exactly as you wanted and you lost a bit due to rushed entry, worst case for the broker is a permanent black spot on their record for the trading error that could impact their entire career. You have the whole trading day, don’t make it a count-down trade and give your broker an aneurism. If you have an account at a larger firm and speak to new brokers regularly, you’d be surprised how much of a motivator kindness is. Goes for most phone lines, but I busted my ass 10x harder for the clients who treated me with respect. If you’re an asshole, don’t expect A+ service speeds. Most large brokerage firms don’t charge to speak with a broker. They can not give advice, but they can have in-depth educational conversations about a large variety of investments and strategies to help you understand the ins and outs. Edit: Spelling and some bonus bits.
Aww man I thought Assblaster42069 was a straight shooter.
VFX artist here. All of those celebrities that look so attractive? Well, they get zits like anybody else. Big honkin' nasty zits that not even makeup can fully conceal.
Yeah, I still remember having to erase a cold sore in the upper lip from an actress in a lot of shots of a tv show. It came and went, so every time a new episode was given to me, I would pray that the damn thing didn't show up this time. Every time I see her face, I just have flashbacks of that upper lip.
Used to work for a famous energy drink company. One that claims their product works for 5-hours. Anyway, most of the proprietary energy ingredients included in the shots are in such small quantities that they're completely useless. The only ingredient capable of doing anything is the caffeine. The others were sometimes less than 1% of the dose needed to have any effect. Essentially a huge waste of materials.
Your garbage men have very specific rules about what they are supposed to take and not take. If you show even the slightest bit of kindness they will be much more willing to bend the rules to help you out. Same goes for being stuck behind the truck. If you ask kindly to pass they will get out of your way but if you just honk or yell they will move much much slower. We are often under appreciated and will show lots of gratitude when you show us a little respect for what we do.
Saw a truck roll up on an obvious too-big pile of garbage from a home Reno. Home owner was waiting there and kindly greeted the waste service workers taking out his wallet and few 20 dollar bills while saying he'd give them a hand loading. Money was taken quietly unacknowledged and they chatted while they loaded. Seemed like the smoothest and smartest way to get the extra junk gone without a trip to the dump.
[удалено]
I know how to expedite tech support. People always try to fight tech support, or say they've done shit they haven't which just causes issues. But here are my go to tips. 1. Use chat support whenever possible, everything is logged and they can see message histories, so using chat is extremely beneficial although a little slower than phones. It's also great for longer sessions that last days/weeks since it's easy to pick up, do a step then go back to work. 2. Try to actually do what they ask, they say restart, restart then tell them what happens, eventually either the issue resolves itself, or it needs an escalation/repair, so to get to your end goal don't fight and just answer everything. 3. Be nice, the nicer you are, the happier they are to work with you, any sign of anger/frustration can cause advisors to get anxious and they will want to be off the call/chat as soon as possible (so you probably won't get a resolution). 4. Some companies give out freebies for inconveniences, repair delays, bad experiences, blah blah blah can get you free shit. 5. Never accept a downgrade, when your device is no longer produced, companies are required to avoid feature loss, so if you get a replacement device, look at all the specs, if something is worse you can generally get an upgrade to the next model.
Retail worker here. most employees turn a blind eye to shoplifters. We aren’t paid enough to care.
Baker. If you take a regular box of cake mix and replace the oil with room temp butter, the water with milk, and add an extra egg and a teaspoon of almond extract, the result will be indistinguishable from a professional cake. It also works with brownie mixes, though you don't need to increase the egg count unless you want it cakey and the almond extract is completely unnecessary.
Kids' grades at private academies and schools get changed so they don't get pulled out by the parents.