You know what really grinds my gears?

[Master Live 013]

Re: You know what really grinds my gears?

And before anyone gets on my case, you can "whitelist" any site you choose to, meaning that that site's ads will not be blocked.

[LambertandHam]

Re: You know what really grinds my gears?

I got to say, I don't really remember the internet before Ad-Block. I do remember the impetus for starting to use it, a long time a go in a galaxy far away Gamespot decided to clutter their site with ads. I remember thinking "this is new, this is different. I have never seen anything like this before. This is borderline-unusable, I'm going to have a really hard time visiting this site going forward".

As a solution people in the forums kept mentioning Ad-Block again and again, I had heard about it, but didn't know if it was a scam or what, but thought I had nothing to lose so I decided to give it a shot.

That must have been like 10 years ago.

Memories of browsing IGN back in the day with full page and pop up ads with sound.

[Majingir]

Re: You know what really grinds my gears?

Memories of browsing IGN back in the day with full page and pop up ads with sound.

Am I the only one who browses without sound?

Unless I forget the volume on, I think the volume is always off when browsing or doing anything on my phone or computer. It's only ever on if I'm watching or listening to something.

[KG]

Re: You know what really grinds my gears?

Getting calls in Microsoft Teams from people that I don't have an active IM going with.

One of those things that people have had to adapt to working from home.
For some reason, very few people in my organization will send a quick "hey have a second for a quick call?". Instead I just random incoming calls.

Which is quite annoying since I could be in the bathroom or working on something. If we were in the physical office, people would usually send an IM before coming to talk to me in my office. Not sure why people don't do that before calling now that we are all at home

Sent from my S10 using Operation Sports mobile app

People do that at my wife's job all the time. I don't even work with her and it annoys me lol

[Blzer]

Re: You know what really grinds my gears?

Am I the only one who browses without sound?

Unless I forget the volume on, I think the volume is always off when browsing or doing anything on my phone or computer. It's only ever on if I'm watching or listening to something.

I insist on keeping it on for myself for e-mail notifications, both personal and work.

Sure, I could enable desktop notifications... but half the time I'm on my computer, I'm also either on another computer, watching TV, eating, or doing something else. Having the sound is helpful in that case.

[BurghFan]

Re: You know what really grinds my gears?

Am I the only one who browses without sound?

Unless I forget the volume on, I think the volume is always off when browsing or doing anything on my phone or computer. It's only ever on if I'm watching or listening to something.

Nope, I pretty much keep mine off too unless I'm watching a video or playing a game mainly (or entirely) because of ads with audio and other auto-play videos.

[LambertandHam]

Re: You know what really grinds my gears?

Am I the only one who browses without sound?

Unless I forget the volume on, I think the volume is always off when browsing or doing anything on my phone or computer. It's only ever on if I'm watching or listening to something.

I have my speakers on most of the time. I hate sitting in silence, especially since I usually have Youtube or Twitch up while browsing.

[Majingir]

Re: You know what really grinds my gears?

Getting woken up before 7am by people fixing my neighbours roof (fyi, I believe city bylaws say 7am-7pm is when people are legally allowed making noises like this)

Yesterday I had to move my car from the driveway because it was in their way.

Guessing I have to do so today too. I just wanna see how early they think is ok to come to my door to ask me. Clearly making noise before 7am wasn't an issue for them.

If they needed me to move it again today, especially at an early time, they should've mentioned it when they were talking to me yesterday.....

[Jolly Roger]

Re: You know what really grinds my gears?

Here's a real gear grinder: My company wants us all back in the office 5 days a week by July, even though most of us want to keep working from home. We work and communicate perfectly fine on the computer and it's actually more efficient and productive. My round trip daily commute to the office was about 85 minutes, so really not looking forward to that again. I am glad to have the job and have had the opportunity to WFH, but it just defies all logic to make people come back when they're at least as productive, if not more so, at home. And trust me, I'm not in an "innovative" or "collaborative" field where we need to be in a room together "spitballing" with a whiteboard.

Companies that aren't so flexible with their personnel might start having turnover issues. We shall see.

I tell you what though, damned if I don't keep up the little habit I've developed at home of cracking open a beer during the day here and there.

[BurghFan]

Re: You know what really grinds my gears?

I think part of the reason companies are forcing their workers back into the office even when working from home has been just as productive (if not moreso) than working in the office is because a lot of them lease their office space from whoever owns the builiding(s) it is in and they don't want to be paying for empty offices. My mom had been working from home full-time but the law firm she works for made them start coming in 2 or 3 days alternating weeks back in February then a couple weeks ago started making them come in 4 days a week every week. My job is full-time remote though.

[Majingir]

Re: You know what really grinds my gears?

Here's a real gear grinder: My company wants us all back in the office 5 days a week by July, even though most of us want to keep working from home. We work and communicate perfectly fine on the computer and it's actually more efficient and productive. My round trip daily commute to the office was about 85 minutes, so really not looking forward to that again. I am glad to have the job and have had the opportunity to WFH, but it just defies all logic to make people come back when they're at least as productive, if not more so, at home. And trust me, I'm not in an "innovative" or "collaborative" field where we need to be in a room together "spitballing" with a whiteboard.

Companies that aren't so flexible with their personnel might start having turnover issues. We shall see.

I tell you what though, damned if I don't keep up the little habit I've developed at home of cracking open a beer during the day here and there.

That's one thing I "fear" about things going back to normal. It'll be just that. We'll go back to living life like it's 2019. Pandemic or not, we're almost halfway through 2021, companies need to get with the times.

So many things about the past year have shown how behind the times some companies are (online ordering/pickup was such a foreign thing to many businesses before 2020), and how many things we can actually do thanks to technology. Work from home has shown just how unnecessary offices can be. The fact that people can be more productive from home says a lot.

I don't have a WFH type of job, but if I did, I wouldn't mind some compromise. Work from home, work from the office, work from home and the office, just get the job done.

If I had a WFH kind of job, I wouldn't mind alternating. Monday and Friday at home, Tuesday,Wednesday,Thursday at the office.

Or some days you can do half a day at home, half a day at the office.

So many possibilities and flexible options. Companies who adapt to the future with things like that will be the companies who have a successful 20s and beyond.


And even from the money/time point of view. For myself, I calculated myself spending approximately $50 a week on commute. If it was a WFH job, I'd be saving $50 and 7 hours of commute time a week (maybe double that time when you factor in the time you spend in the morning getting ready to leave home for the day). That's an hour extra sleep a night basically, and some weekly grocery money. Being more refreshed, having some extra money, who wouldn't want that

[Majingir]

Re: You know what really grinds my gears?

I think part of the reason companies are forcing their workers back into the office even when working from home has been just as productive (if not moreso) than working in the office is because a lot of them lease their office space from whoever owns the builiding(s) it is in and they don't want to be paying for empty offices. My mom had been working from home full-time but the law firm she works for made them start coming in 2 or 3 days alternating weeks back in February then a couple weeks ago started making them come in 4 days a week every week. My job is full-time remote though.

Maybe downsizing (office space) could be a trend too?

And if you're a more productive company with workers working from home most if not all the time, even if office space might feel "wasted", you're still making more money than if those same people were in the office 8 hours a day.

A compromise could definitely be something companies look at.

WFH is a great concept, but what if they made it where a minimum of X number of days a week you had to work from the office. So the office still gets used, but you allow your workers to work from home for the other days if they choose.

Basically every job ever has those "downtimes" despite what managers/supervisors might be telling their employers. There are days or times in the day where there legitimately isn't anything to do. Why force people to hang around the office, mentally and physically draining themselves which leads to worse productivity during the week? Sitting at home at a desk or on a couch doing the same work while not worrying about needing to look busy at all times and not taking a breather whenever you feel like it can do wonders for productivity.


There are parts of jobs which would be better in person (as much as I would prefer WFH, I'd much rather have a group meeting in person vs just stating at a screen). Imo, a good company can plan for that. If theres meetings to be held, or in person business which needs to be dealt with, schedule it for a specific day(s) of the week and make that the in office day.

[dubcity]

Re: You know what really grinds my gears?

From an overall mental health standpoint, I don't like the idea of pushing too far towards remote everything. And this is coming from someone who enjoys alone time.

[kehlis]

Re: You know what really grinds my gears?

From an overall mental health standpoint, I don't like the idea of pushing too far towards remote everything. And this is coming from someone who enjoys alone time.

Yep, agree completely.

I do agree with the hybrid idea and truly believe we'll see more of it at some point in the near future now that we've seen that it can work.


That said, as much as I hate the hour and a half round trip commute (even though I can see downtown from my house and on a weekend it's about a 10 minute trip both ways) I miss having the OPTION to go in.

We were told shortly after that we would be permanently virtual.

So if I have a team meeting or one on one's I don't even have the option to ask my team to go into the office that day.


The absolute hardest thing I've ever had to do over this was having to let someone go virtually. It's obviously not something that easy to do ever, but when I did, I would much rather look the person in the eye rather than have to do it via a virtual conversation.

[l3ulvl]

Re: You know what really grinds my gears?

Walmart getting rid of pickup towers.


apparently the public prefers curbside pickup.


I absolutely loved, and I'm not sure loved is a strong enough word, walking into the store, scanning my device at the tower, and having my purchased item pop out.


So quick and easy, no need to interact with anyone.