#jonno rants

[a-suspicious-lack-of-bagel]

RELATIONSHIP PSA:

In any relationship, what you WANT to happen will not always happen. This is normal and to be expected! There is more than one person involved: logically, there will be more than one preference; and communication and compromise are both part of a healthy relationship.

HOWEVER. If there is anything that you ACTIVELY DO NOT WANT to happen; that should NEVER HAPPEN.

If you want [A] and your partner wants [B], sometimes you will do A, sometimes you will do B, and sometimes you might even do C if it's agreeable to both of you. But if your partner wants [B] and you want [Not B]; ESPECIALLY if you'd be a participant in B, B SHOULD NOT HAPPEN.

If you don't want to do something, it should NOT matter whether or not your partner wants to do that thing. It ain't happening. "No" needs to mean no: at which point you a) don't do the thing; b) don't try to persuade them to do the thing; c) make note of any reasons why that they might choose to mention; and otherwise d) move on.

As a bare minimum, you should be and feel listened to. Being/feeling respected is a staggeringly low bar for "okay"; and CHERISHED is what "good" looks like.

Consent MATTERS, peeps.

[a-suspicious-lack-of-bagel]

While I'm ranting about stuff that peeves me at work, can we take a moment to say "fuck you" to whoever puts marketing information into title fields?

The box says "Title (series #)". There's even an instruction to "Enter title exactly as it is on the book then (series #) if appropriate". These are some examples of plausible titles:

Booky McBookface - title only and no series

Booky McBookface: A Book on the Shelf - title and subtitle

Booky McBookface and the Library Gang (Booky #3) - title and series #

Booky McBookface: Out Of Print (Booky #4) - title, subtitle, and series #

Here are some examples that I would NOT like to see:

Booky McBookface: CBCA Shortlisted Book 2024 - that's an award. it belongs in the awards field and maybe the description.

Booky McBookface: Now a major motion picture - that's marketing info and might be the first line of the description.

Booky McBookface: Australia's next bestseller - i'll believe that when I see the sales data, and then I'll put it in the description or (if appropriate) the awards).

Booky McBookface: the latest release by Biblio Writerson - i can figure that out from the author field and the release date.

Whoever the fuck's marketing team is messing with everyone's bibliographic data, it's time to stop. Don't do this. Be better.

[a-suspicious-lack-of-bagel]

Fun times at the bookshop: Doing shelving, I realised we have 4 different ISBNs of this book:

Australian paperback (6th and 13th editions)

UK paperback

US hardcover

US paperback

And confusingly (for shelving); 13AUPB and 1UKPB list the authors in the opposite order! (As does the sequel).

New shelving policy: Alphabetical by surname of first author, as listed on the earliest edition in stock. All editions of the same title grouped together, but not all titles in the same series; editions sorted by date of first publication in that country then edition number.

[a-suspicious-lack-of-bagel]

minor rant and excretory tmi under the cut. don't Think it needs tws but if so lmk

not sure if I have a virus, or if it's food poisoning, or i've accidentally eaten gluten, or if I'm reacting to my new medication. but i've had diarrhoea for most of the week and I do Not like it!

I'm fed up with feeling sick! my ass hurts from shitting at mach 3! I'd like to not feel slightly anxious every time I cough!

while I'm complaining: 2ply public toilet paper is SHIT but even shittier is when the dispenser manages to rip it and separate the layers. congrats to my local mall, you've outdone yourself

i have soup that I should eat - it's yummy and fairly good for me. that said I kinda feel like eating something with any nutritional value is pointless - if it's all going to go straight through I may as well have ice cream for lunch. that said ice cream probably won't improve anything much, and the soup needs eating.

aaaaaargh.

[a-suspicious-lack-of-bagel]

mini rant on shoe/boot shopping below

why the Heck are my feet so hard (and expensive) to find shoes for. my toes are wide and flat, my arches are fairly high, and my heels are narrow af.

my boots are amusingly the exact same brand and style as the boots I had as a small child. i refused to wear pretty much anything else and loved them to bits. my current ones are my most comfortable footwear and i'm going through the soles. unfortunately for me, they're also the most expensive in that shape before you get to Dedicated Mountaineering Boots.

i've tried the other ones! heck, I even like the look of quite a few of them! but half of them slip all over my heels, or don't tighten over my toes; or they tighten over my toes but squish my arches to death; or they finally fit my heels but they're too narrow for my wideass toes.

on the sneaker front women's ones tend to fit my ankles better, but i'm often in the longest few sizes (and/or wide to boot) so not always in stock. and in men's OR women's, given I don't want white or black; finding a colour that a) I like and b) doesn't clash with my wardrobe is almost impossible.

aaaaaargh. why do my sneakers AND boots have to die at the same time.

[a-suspicious-lack-of-bagel]

eczema and stubble both FUCKING SUCK cos i'll be sitting there minding my business and then i have to have TEXTURE ISSUES with my own fucking NECK

[a-suspicious-lack-of-bagel]

today's chaos at work: one of our compactuses apparently! has a whole bunch of gaps in the top of it! which means that in some areas, it is Significantly less water-resistant than the ikea bookshelves i have at home.

Unfortunately, we got it precisely to be water and dust resistant! And one of the places it happens to have a hole is both right under a leak in the ceiling and right above our collection of Farsi picture books.

And we only discovered this because someone tried to buy one of the damaged books! So now I have to grovel (only slightly cos the customer is a friend of the store) and find them a (ideally similar) replacement book. And also we just lost $500 worth of books. And I found this mess out approximately 3 minutes before I was planning to leave work this afternoon.

All in all it's been a fun experience (sarcasm).

[a-suspicious-lack-of-bagel]

man, they should make heat management on the requirements list for rental properties

it's been about 29C and 70% humidity all day at home. i have a lovely heat rash across my chest. i've got about half the symptoms of heat stress and I've been drinking plenty of water. when the overnight minimum inside is 27 (heck, even 25) i can't sleep properly. don't get me wrong, i love our flat; it's conveniently located, sensibly proportioned, and pretty functional (except the internet but that's the NBNs fault). but in hot, humid weather where it doesn't cool off overnight, it's not particularly habitable.