I say YES. YOU say NO....Numero Tre! Enjoy!
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unfortunately the national hurricane center is keeping their eyes on another storm in the Atlantic. Heading west, northwest. In other words, here. With a 70% chance for more development. 💩🤬🤬
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Man, I can relate to the divided family scenario. My sister & BIL sound exactly like yours, Divine. We have so many wonderful family memories, and yet there is a fundamental disconnect when you are not only on separate pages, but apparently reading two different books! When she has made pronouncements that I find completely ludicrous, I have literally opened my mouth, slammed it shut, and walked away. There is nothing I could say that would not lead to trouble. We only see each other once or twice a year, so it just isn't worth it. Sad.
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Ruth & Devine - I have only one brother left. We have exactly that kind of relationship. I have to monitor every thought & word. Nothing must escape about politics or religion or family or even food. Trouble for sure. Last time I visited him, he said anyone who eats butter or mayo is crazy. I don't eat dry bread/toast/sandwiches - so I took my rental care & went to the grocery store for a 1/4 lb of butter. His response - what is that horrible stuff doing in my fridge. Luckily (or conversely sadly) we only see each other once a year - or less.
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Everywhere is the center of the world. Everything is sacred. -Black Elk (Oglala Sioux)
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May it be the un-doing of this man.
People do notice tings like this while you people are busy trying to degrade Democrats, ban books and destroy women's rights. Like to think we could wave goodbye to you which if absolutely what you deserve.
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It would be nice if we could just avoid mentioning certain subjects. My side of the family is fairly liberal, as is my DH's generation on his side. But his parents' generation are quite conservative, and his dad is obnoxious about it. My oldest child is nonbinary. On a recent family phone call (we live in different states), he opened a conversation by asking them, "So, are they teaching all that woke crap at your school?" DH quickly steered the convo to another subject, but my FiL wasn't done. He wrote an email to DH saying how he noticed that he changed the subject and how he "is concerned about the direction the country is going, and we need to teach our kids about this stuff. Otherwise teachers will be the only ones telling kids about these things, and we might not like what they're learning." DH took a few days to compose his reply, and calmly and politely told FiL that we make sure we are aware of what is being taught to our kids and we discuss the subject matter with them. Also, that it was very insensitive of him to open a conversation with a flagrantly antagonistic question against inclusivity, knowing that their grandchild was nonbinary.
At the next family call, FiL was much more reserved, and barely said anything. Honestly, it was nice to hear MiL talk for a change, instead of him trying to dominate the conversation.
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When people say things that I KNOW are meant as bait; I remember that I don't have to attend every argument I'm invited to.
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I'm sorry to hear some of you have the same kinds of troubles with your family as I do, but it helps to know I'm not alone.
Minustwo, gosh, don't you wonder why your brother would have a problem with butter and mayo? I also find myself monitoring every thought and word around my sister. She trolls for something to pounce on.
Miriandra, just wow on the FiL, to begin a conversation with such an inflammatory comment. Some of my relatives behave in similar manners. Not sure why some people are like that. I certainly would never be that way with anyone. It's very big of your dh to calmly compose a polite reply to his father's badgering. Good for him for asserting himself while still keeping the peace.
Ruth, I have gotten pretty good at not taking the bait. The problem with being around my sister is she still gets enjoyment saying offensive things, knowing I heard her, even if she gets no response. In fact, I feel it's often intentionally targeted towards me. That's why I have learned to stay away.
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Well, my sister gave me a My-Pillow-Guy blanket for Christmas!
DH wanted to throw it in the garbage & confront her (just exactly what she was looking forward to, I'm sure). Instead I sent a generic 'thank you for thinking of us' note, and immediately donated the blanket to a group that collects supplies for refuges and other displaced people. ARGH!!0 -
Awful. Should have sent her a pic of where it was donated. Bit early for Christmas isn’t it?
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Ready for some good news?
WE HAVE A UNION!!! 7 votes YES, 1 vote void (envelope wasn't prepared correctly) = 100% pro-union!
Our Elements Massage in Denver is the first unionized franchise-owned massage studio in the nation. Hopefully we'll be the first of many.
Even more fun, the NLRB is proposing new rules that will expand the definition of "joint employment". Currently, multiple entities (e.g. a franchise owner and a corporate entity) have to show active control over employees to qualify. The new rules will include training, payroll, and benefits. So if a corporate entity provides training for individual stores to use to train their employees, or mandates payroll/benefits policies, the corporate entity is a joint employer and shares the burden of any compensation due employees and any fines from unfair practices. This will absolutely impact WellBiz, Elements' corporate parent organization, and their responsibilities to the therapists.
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Miriandra: Great news about the Union. Hooray!!! Congrats after all your hard work.
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Hooray Miriandra. What fantastic news. I hope the 'good' keeps coming now for you and the people you work with.
Spookie, glad to hear that Biden wants to run again. I had been wondering. I would like to see him rest, and not so much from the presidential yrs. he is putting in, but the many yrs. he was and has been in the government. I'm also hoping that his health ( I do think being Pres. ages most men ) holds up -- so if he ran '24 and won it would be 6 more grueling yrs. I think he has done a pretty outstanding job so far although he hasn't gotten near the credit he should have. I kno he could do well, but I think I won't be able to get a good sense of if it is a good thing or not till much closer in.
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Sure wish it was that easy.
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my be old news, but sure hope it is true.
Can't believe anything much will come of it.
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Congratulations, miriandra! That is awesome news!
Spookie, the My-Pillow was from last Christmas. I am going to suggest we quit with the gifts altogether.
I can't get my hopes up about Trump getting what he actually deserves. Too disappointing when nothing happens.....sigh!
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Illinois, it may be that easy....
What Happens When a Group of Fox News Viewers Watch CNN for a Month?
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CONGRATULATIONS, Miriandra!!!!!!! 🎉♥️
How very impressive, and what a great distinction: “first unionized franchise-owned massage studio in the nation.” I’m so happy that all your hard work paid off! How are you feeling about it? It is so interesting to see how the process has unfolded from the time you started having problems with your employer—can you remind us of when that all began? Again, congratulations and well done!
Ruth, omgosh, the my pillow guy blanket story! Of all things. Isn’t that kind of like a passive-aggressive move by your sister? You are ultra classy for handling the matter so perfectly. You gotta wonder why someone would bring politics into the family gift exchange. Your sister will never know the lengths you go to in order to keep the family peace.
I agree with you about not getting hopes up about Trump getting what he deserves. He’s another Teflon Don. All the crap simply slides off him.
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Congratulations miriandra! What a wonderful win for workers. I’m sure your hard work is appreciated.
Ruth - the Mypillow blanket seems like a wonderful gag re-gift. Had a former co-worker who did that with Sarah Palin’s book Going Rouge among her liberal friend group. No one read the book, just re-gifted it.
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My sister is the Queen of Passive/Aggressive Land!
I see even the Supreme Court can't bring itself to let My-Pillow off the hook, as they are letting the defamation lawsuit that Dominion is bringing against him proceed.
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This popped up on my Facebook memories that was before January 6
An anguished question from a Trump supporter: "Why do liberals think Trump supporters are stupid?"
The serious answer: Here's what we really think about Trump supporters - the rich, the poor, the malignant and the innocently well-meaning, the ones who think and the ones who don't...
That when you saw a man who had owned a fraudulent University, intent on scamming poor people, you thought "Fine."
That when you saw a man who had made it his business practice to stiff his creditors, you said, "Okay."
That when you heard him proudly brag about his own history of sexual abuse, you said, "No problem."
That when he made up stories about seeing muslim-Americans in the thousands cheering the destruction of the World Trade Center, you said, "Not an issue."
That when you saw him brag that he could shoot a man on Fifth Avenue and you wouldn't care, you chirped, "He sure knows me."
That when you heard him illustrate his own character by telling that cute story about the elderly guest bleeding on the floor at his country club, the story about how he turned his back and how it was all an imposition on him, you said, "That's cool!"
That when you saw him mock the disabled, you thought it was the funniest thing you ever saw.
That when you heard him brag that he doesn't read books, you said, "Well, who has time?"
That when the Central Park Five were compensated as innocent men convicted of a crime they didn't commit, and he angrily said that they should still be in prison, you said, "That makes sense."
That when you heard him tell his supporters to beat up protesters and that he would hire attorneys, you thought, "Yes!"
That when you heard him tell one rally to confiscate a man's coat before throwing him out into the freezing cold, you said, "What a great guy!"
That you have watched the parade of neo-Nazis and white supremacists with whom he curries favor, while refusing to condemn outright Nazis, and you have said, "Thumbs up!"
That you hear him unable to talk to foreign dignitaries without insulting their countries and demanding that they praise his electoral win, you said, "That's the way I want my President to be."
That you have watched him remove expertise from all layers of government in favor of people who make money off of eliminating protections in the industries they're supposed to be regulating and you have said, "What a genius!"
That you have heard him continue to profit from his businesses, in part by leveraging his position as President, to the point of overcharging the Secret Service for space in the properties he owns, and you have said, "That's smart!"
That you have heard him say that it was difficult to help Puerto Rico because it was the middle of water and you have said, "That makes sense."
That you have seen him start fights with every country from Canada to New Zealand while praising Russia and quote, "falling in love" with the dictator of North Korea, and you have said, "That's statesmanship!"
That Trump separated children from their families and put them in cages, managed to lose track of 1500 kids. has opened a tent city incarceration camp in the desert in Texas - he explains that they're just "animals" - and you say, "well, ok then."
That you have witnessed all the thousand and one other manifestations of corruption and low moral character and outright animalistic rudeness and contempt for you, the working American voter, and you still show up grinning and wearing your MAGA hats and threatening to beat up anybody who says otherwise.
What you don't get, Trump supporters in 2018, is that succumbing to frustration and thinking of you as stupid may be wrong and unhelpful, but it's also...hear me...charitable.
Because if you're NOT stupid, we must turn to other explanations, and most of them are *less* flattering.
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Original post by Adam-Troy Castro.
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Ruth - donating the MyBlanket is the best way of turning your sister's spite into loving charity. And that's beautiful.
(Note, I'm having trouble getting the story to post, so I'm piece-by-piecing it.)
Divine - Back when studios were beginning to reopen after the COVID lockdowns, we had a really good team. It wasn't perfect, but we had good access to our manager, and we could usually work towards a solution that kept everyone happy. Then we were purchased by a new franchiser, a guy named Dan. He came in with lots of big promises and exciting words, and we were eager to follow where he wanted to lead us.
Then he fired our manager and kept firing them (or he badgered them until they quit). We had 5 different managers total in a period of 2 1/2 years. He also kept giving us excuse after excuse on why the big improvements he promised weren't coming through. Why we weren't getting the education-based promotions we were promised after we had earned them, why we weren't getting the new equipment we were promised, etc. Slowly, the perks that encouraged us to go the extra mile on our own dwindled to where we didn't want to go any more extra miles.
Then we realized that we were not getting paid for all the hours we were working - hours that should have been paid according to state Dept of Labor laws. We were only paid for the time spent actively providing massage therapy to clients. We could clock in to be paid for meetings or training, but that's it. We weren't paid for coming in ahead of schedule to set up the room, we weren't paid to clean the room after sessions, we weren't paid for writing up patient notes. If we were contractors, these duties would have been included in our task-defined contracts. But we were hourly employees, so every minute spent "performing labor for the benefit of our employer" should be paid.
I did some research and found that Colorado's DoL could help us pursue unpaid wages up to 2 years back and for a claim of up to $7500. I shared this information with my coworkers, helped them figure out how much they could receive in compensation, and helped them file their reports with the DoL. I hadn't yet completely given up on our franchiser, so I talked with him about the upcoming DoL investigations. Colorado recognizes joint employment. That is when two entities have control over an employee, and both entities might be held responsible for compensation should a wage dispute occur. The way I saw it, WellBiz, our corporate entity, had exerted control over us by limiting raises and promotions, and by initially establishing the unpaid wage policies that we were reporting. Because of this, I thought Dan could protect himself from the financial burden of paying our back-pay by claiming joint employment, and splitting the fines and compensation awarded with WellBiz. But Dan didn't want to hear it. "Do what you think you have to do, but the less I know the better." His Regional Director went even further telling me to stop helping any other employees from pursuing unpaid wages. "This can't bleed out any further. We're here to work and make money."
Finally, there was a nasty situation at a company picnic when one of my coworkers, a comfortably out gay man, was playfully called a pillowbiter by said Regional Director. When the issue was brought to HR, they tried to downplay it and sweep it under the rug. We resisted and insisted on an investigation, as EEOC regulations require. Right after that, Manager #4 was removed and replaced by a passive-aggressive tyrant. That was when we decided that we could no longer rely on Dan to treat us fairly, and we reached out to a union organization.
A week or so later at our first meeting with the UFCW reps, half of us signed union cards. Two days later, I was fired for "at will" reasons. The next day, my coworker was also fired for "at will" reasons. He fired his two most popular, most in demand, most booked out, most expensive (because of our additional training, our sessions were considered premium, were priced higher, and generated additional income for the studio therapists at a time when the studio was desperately trying to hire additional therapists. It wasn't an at will decision.
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(Part 2 - Our glorious new platform keeps throwing Firewall errors when I try to post.)
... It was because we had discussed wages with our coworkers, filed reports with a government agency, and organized a union.
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(Part 3)
All of these are protected activities, and employees cannot be fired for them even in at will states.
By the end of the day, the union had begun their wrongful termination filings with the NLRB, and we strategized on our next moves. When Dan held a captive audience meeting to have a guy who he flew in from out of state talk for an hour about how unions are bad, that pushed several of our undecided coworkers over into Union Yes. Finally we got our election scheduled, and the team voted overwhelmingly FOR the union. We did it!!
We're still waiting on the NLRN decision for the wrongful terminations, and I need to call the DoL to check on how our unpaid wages case is going. But things are looking so much better for our future.
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Ugh! That was ridiculous! I reported the issue to BCO.
I had been composing in the text box, but the lag was getting out of control. Type words, wait 2 seconds, see word is misspelled, hit delete key several times, wait, see that I hit delete too many times, retype, wait..... So I opened a text app to finish my story, then copy and paste into the text box. Then I got the error screen. I thought maybe it was because of some hidden html in the app. It's RTF, so it shouldn't but sometimes there is embedded garbage that can screw things up. So I started pasting and saving bit by bit to try to isolate whatever was causing hiccups. My chopped up results are above. I don't know why it resisted so many times on the phrase "organizing a union".
Hmmmmm........
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Interesting how this all played out, Miriandra. Glad that the union votes and voters saw the light that management and HR are not always worker centric. HR will always protect the institution/business etc. and not the employee rights in my experience. PA is an "at will" state and they do not provide a reason for firing and it seems don't have to either. Hoping you get reinstated and get your back pay. Keep us informed on how this plays out.
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