What's making you feel bitter-sweet today?
 

Well yesterday,..

I used the wallet tool Sundae gave me. It was a moment.

Came across this today... 1985, damn. 32 years ago.

Minifob has a crush on a girl at school. A couple months ago he freely admitted he thought she was cute, and was surprised and chagrined when the group of girls she was with started giggling like mad.

Today, he had a friend pass on the message that he liked her, and her response was that she knew. I asked if she said she liked him back, because that's pretty important information, and he said he doesn't want to ask her that part just yet. "Timing's pretty important, you know?"

Yeah, son. It is.

This thing about parenting, where you know you're going to have to watch the inevitable parts of life that suck, like heartbreak (maybe not this one, but eventually)... goddamn.

Clodfobble, my friend, you have a flair for understatement.

sweet pain

I now have a real will. No one in my family gets anything. No one. Nothing. Hopefully, there will be nothing left to leave. I'll be cremated, and my ashes thrown in the trash. I've been thrown away more than once in life, might as well be thrown away in death.

It'll be like I was never here.

That would suck for all of us if you hadn't been here. Well, most of us. OK, some of us. Alright, me. And maybe Infinite what's her name?


@clodfobble. I know what you mean. I worry about when I die and the pain my kids will go through then. I'm hoping I make it to their 40s. Probably will, but I'll be in my 80s. The mm already goes through occasional crying jags when she thinks about the inevitability of death.

We've looked at mortality from a number of atheist angles; Conservation of matter and energy, where were we before we arrived? Did we feel the same way about leaving there to come here? Is the cycle of life and death analogous to the seasons? Where do the plants go and how do they come back? Do we do something similar? Is death sometimes welcome when you are very old and tired? Is it like sleeping? When you sleep, the world you perceive ceases to exist until you wake up. The rest of us are still here, but not to you. (cf the Buddhist trinity for existence: 1. There must be a perceiver. 2. There must be a thing to be perceived. 3. There must be consciousness. Without all three present nothing exists) And last and maybe most importantly, Would you want to live forever getting older and older until you were a tiny little shriveled up raisin of a person?

I'm bittersweet about selling all my photo gear. I've been moving it on eBay and slowly clawing my way out of debt. It feels good and lighter to let go of it and to bring some cash in and pay off bills, but it also freighted with so many associations of my childhood, when I started.

It's acknowledging that some ships have sailed, but at the same time it is allowing new ships to dock and take on passengers.

Fixed that for ya.:cool:

And the SS Gravdigr is taking on no more passengers.

If you die, I'll never forgive you. :p:

So, this evening I threw my dad off a bridge.

S'ok. He actually wanted me to. He always said he wanted his ashes spread on the 405 Freeway, where he literally spent years of his life in traffic for his job as the Western Regional Manager of Pfizer's hospital supply division.

I also left some of his ashes at the corner of the property where my folks used to live, and earlier this afternoon I dug a little hole in the grass at my mom's grave and poured some of dad's ashes in there.

My job is done. :neutral:

Well done.:comfort:

Thanks, xoB. I feel good about it, but, you know . . . bittersweet.

My SIL and I thought long and hard about how to do this without getting arrested or causing a wreck. ;) Instead of driving down the freeway leaving a trail of dust and drama behind us, we decided to slowly sprinkle a cup of dad's ashes off an overpass. We chose Sunset Blvd.

Then, we drove "west on Sunset, to the sea . . . The end of a perfect day."

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pAuPMJlK92s

:o

Well done Glinda

Nice. I like that.

Not for my ashes, but you know what I mean.

:thankyou:

You did right by him. I've always liked the idea of ashes going where the person wanted them to go, instead of sitting in an urn on someone's shelf.

I just hope their souls go where they want them to.;)

Good on ya, Glinda.

Yeah. This. Well done, Glinda. X


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Exactly. I suspect dad was being a bit facetious about the 405, but he said it so many times over the years that there's no way I wouldn't have followed through. And since I also put some of his ashes in other places that meant a lot to him, I know he'd be pleased with his final resting places. My fireplace mantle never meant anything to him, y'know? But he and mom were married 67 years and they lived in the same place for 37 years, so . . .

RIP, dad. You were the best. :heart-on:

And, in case you're watching, ma, you were my best friend, strongest supporter, and most trusted confidant for my entire life. I miss you like crazy. :heart-on:

I'm hoping they're together, satisfied that they lived a good, long life, and that they rest easy knowing how deeply grateful their daughter is for all the wonderful things they did for her over the years.

Thanks, everyone. I won the Parent Lottery, big time.

I'm having beest made into paintballs.

Hell yeah.

Fuckin' A, monster you've got the right idea. :notworthy

Maybe even paint balls that look like googly eyes.

What an awesome idea!

Brilliant!

Shit, I could see fine just a second ago...:sniff:

Happens to me all the time. :hug:

On Friday I heard through the grapevine, though haven't been officially told yet, that those of us joining the specialist team will be starting 14th May.

I'm really excited - but also going to miss my current team and the role. it sounds a very different way of working. Much more opportunity to go deep into stuff and to take a claim from start to finish, but the flip side of that is a much less team oriented approach to case handling. That is going to make for a different energy and feel.

What we do in Rapid (the first line claims handling) is a bit of a highwire act. You take what comes through on the phone, triage it and either keep it in your team or route it through to different specialisms - everybody in all the teams is working all the stuff if they're the ones answering that call - so you're in and out of each other's cases and team mailboxes, and you're constantly being put on different lines or asked to work someone else's mailbox because it's out of service levels

Within teams you might have 8 people answering calls and 2 people working emails and system tasks and callbacks for the whole team.

That means, if I'm not in, someone else is picking up my stuff. My name may be on a claim and I am supposed to keep an eye on it, but if I am not there it will still get worked.

In the specialist team, you do a little bit of the above, but mostly you are working your own caseload and unless a customer calls and urgently needs someone to work their claim then nobody is working that stuff if you don't.

Which is great, but probably makes for a less energetic and close-knit team - right now, we're all in constant communication - checking in with each other about the claims we're all working.

So - that makes this bitter sweet for me. Because I do love what I am currently doing - more than any job I've ever done.

But - I do like the detailed work. I do like being able to solve the whole puzzle. And I do like the intricacies of policy interpretation and claim assessment.

The thing I am weakest on is buildings - which is what I will mainly be focused on in the new team. It's a really good opportunity to stretch myself.