Octopus Overlords

Popeyes grilled chicken sandwich is by far the best available in the fast food business.

Not about chicken sandwiches, but due to the impacts of COVID my employer is allowing us to roll an extra week of vacation over to next year. Normally we can roll 40 hours over, this year we can roll 80.

I have a hard enough time taking 4 weeks off, now you want me to take 5 next year (6 if I actually use that one week I've been rolling over since 2002)? Maybe I should buy an extra week and just take a couple months off.

coopasonic wrote: Thu Sep 17, 2020 3:09 pm Not about chicken sandwiches, but due to the impacts of COVID my employer is allowing us to roll an extra week of vacation over to next year. Normally we can roll 40 hours over, this year we can roll 80.

I have a hard enough time taking 4 weeks off, now you want me to take 5 next year (6 if I actually use that one week I've been rolling over since 2002)? Maybe I should buy an extra week and just take a couple months off.

It's not healthy. I'm at 227.2 hours and I have to scramble every time I approach the cap.

I've been trying to take 2-3 days a month since June. Since our original vacation plans got whacked. Otherwise it would be Dec. and I'd have taking nada. We don't roll anything over. We don't actually get an official amount of days off. It's "manager discretion". Which sucks now since the other two guys on my team left, making me the "senior" member of the team with 2 brand new recruits. And I still feel like I know almost nothing. Fun, fun, fun.

LawBeefaroni wrote: Thu Sep 17, 2020 3:14 pm

coopasonic wrote: Thu Sep 17, 2020 3:09 pm Not about chicken sandwiches, but due to the impacts of COVID my employer is allowing us to roll an extra week of vacation over to next year. Normally we can roll 40 hours over, this year we can roll 80.

I have a hard enough time taking 4 weeks off, now you want me to take 5 next year (6 if I actually use that one week I've been rolling over since 2002)? Maybe I should buy an extra week and just take a couple months off.

It's not healthy. I'm at 227.2 hours and I have to scramble every time I approach the cap.

My wife has lost time to the cap this year. She is permitted to sell it at 90% and she complains about losing that 10%. It's hard to convince her that 90% is way better than 0%. She has been at the same hospital for 22 years and works part time. She earns almost as much vacation time as she works (not really, but it can feel that way) and has almost no need to take a vacation and with the workload few opportunities these days.

coopasonic wrote: Thu Sep 17, 2020 3:28 pm

LawBeefaroni wrote: Thu Sep 17, 2020 3:14 pm

coopasonic wrote: Thu Sep 17, 2020 3:09 pm Not about chicken sandwiches, but due to the impacts of COVID my employer is allowing us to roll an extra week of vacation over to next year. Normally we can roll 40 hours over, this year we can roll 80.

I have a hard enough time taking 4 weeks off, now you want me to take 5 next year (6 if I actually use that one week I've been rolling over since 2002)? Maybe I should buy an extra week and just take a couple months off.

It's not healthy. I'm at 227.2 hours and I have to scramble every time I approach the cap.

My wife has lost time to the cap this year. She is permitted to sell it at 90% and she complains about losing that 10%. It's hard to convince her that 90% is way better than 0%. She has been at the same hospital for 22 years and works part time. She earns almost as much vacation time as she works (not really, but it can feel that way) and has almost no need to take a vacation and with the workload few opportunities these days.

When I left my previous job at 19 years I had 350 sick days that went poof. They were legacies from before PTO and could only be used for short term disability (100% paid) in the PTO.era. I had 230+ PTO that I cashed but losing those sick days was kind of annoying. I was getting something like 1 PTO day for every 8 days worked.

Starting back at 0 put me in conservation mode. Unnecessary, it turns out.

Lorini wrote:Popeyes grilled chicken sandwich is by far the best available in the fast food business.

If you were in front of me, I’d cut you (not really).

Wendy’s Spicy Chicken Sandwich is life.

RunningMn9 wrote: Thu Sep 17, 2020 5:22 pm

Lorini wrote:Popeyes grilled chicken sandwich is by far the best available in the fast food business.

If you were in front of me, I’d cut you (not really).

Wendy’s Spicy Chicken Sandwich is life.

Though to be fair, I like it in the more recent Bacon Jalapeño version.

i was always envious of people with weeks of PTO. i used to use them as fast as i could get them - traveling to visit my son (or taking vacation time when he visited). traveling to visit my parents. traveling to visit the nephews. never actually get around to vacation traveling... and i would get sick a lot. aaaand i worked a lot of contract jobs and i never had an opportunity to bank those days - contract ends, start anew somewhere else. hell, my current contractor doesn't even pay for holidays.

i don't actually remember now when the last time i fell ill (not including the bike accident last year), but i think i'm at a year and a half now without a cold or whatever, which is kind of a record for me. remote work might've signaled a turnaround, and yet i'm currently at _negative_ eight hours of (combination sick/vacation).

I'm sitting on about 8.5 weeks of PTO and the only reason it's that low is because I went down to 0 two years ago when I had my kidney transplant. Because I've been with the company for so long, I earn 5 weeks of vacation every year. In theory, we aren't supposed to carry over more than 5 weeks but there's no actual written policy explicitly stating that and I know they paid out one guy over 12 weeks. Optimally, if I ever quit we would all agree to pay it out over the actual time, because I don't want to pay the taxes on a big chunk, and I know my company wouldn't want to write a check for that much all at once, but it will be whatever it is. I'm not going to be using 5 weeks of time per year anytime in my foreseeable future, so that number if only going to get bigger.

When I was with my previous company I wracked up something like 480 hours of PTO. They came to me in October and were like you have to use like 336 of those hours by the end of the year as you can only roll over 144 hours.

I pointed out that to do that I would go home at the end of the day and not come back until January. The backed off of that but I took a week off in October, and then took off from Thanksgiving to the New Year. It was glorious.

When I got laid off a couple of years later, I was back up to 232 hours. That softened the blow of getting laid off. I got that paid up front and then had 12 weeks of severance that got me to the next job (my current job).

Good times.

I worked for a company once that paid PTO at the end of each year. Personally I liked the time off from work. But we had this one smug bastard who used to come to work sick because he wanted that money at the end of the year. Gave me his diseases more than once. And the others too.
Then one year come Xmas time they changed their policy and said use or lose it and they weren't paying for the previous year. He lost it.
It made me very happy.

dbt1949 wrote: Thu Sep 17, 2020 8:52 pm I worked for a company once that paid PTO at the end of each year. Personally I liked the time off from work. But we had this one smug bastard who used to come to work sick because he wanted that money at the end of the year. Gave me his diseases more than once. And the others too.
Then one year come Xmas time they changed their policy and said use or lose it and they weren't paying for the previous year. He lost it.
It made me very happy.

If it's something that you are expecting every year, to just drop it at the last minute with no warning is shitty. They really should have either said this is the last year we are doing this or given notice ahead of time. I know plenty of people who go to work sick. A lot of them are not doing it to get the payout at the end of the year but because the job is overworked and callouts put the rest of the team in a bad position.
Heck, in every retail job my wife and I have ever had they actually try to pressure you to not call out sick and to come in anyway. Mostly because retail is generally scheduled to be shorthanded and a callout breaks things if they can't get coverage. They aren't thinking about the fallout if you come in and get everyone sick and there are multiple callouts, they just want their coverage and health be damned. While I do miss a few of my retail jobs I am happy to be away from that environment.
My current job gives us a soft pushback, mostly because we can work remotely (and I'm currently 100% remote now, nothing to do with COVID) so it's more of a hey, you are sick so thanks for not coming in and spreading the plague but we'd like you to still work remotely if you can be productive. This is fine for me as there are plenty of times I am sick and contagious but can still be productive. We also don't get sick days, just a single PTO pool to take from, but they are also EXTREMELY easy going with you taking PTO, like many times you can come in on a Friday and let them know you are taking vacation the next week.

There's no doubt he got screwed. I just didn't like him.

dbt1949 wrote: Fri Sep 18, 2020 8:36 am There's no doubt he got screwed. I just didn't like him.

I was thinking more about the other people who didn't bring the plague into work instead of calling out. They potentially lost extra money that they were expecting.

It was a crappy company.

I get about 7 weeks of time off a year (a few days more because of stat holidays but everyone gets those). I try to take every damn day - even in Covid I spent time on the golf course, with my kids, going for a long walk -- whatever. If I'm getting aced by a virus, I'm not doing it with a big # of time off hours in the bank.

The company will survive, take your time off people. Every American I've worked with wears it like a badge of honour to not take time off (my current boss is a US transplant - and he takes vacation days and keeps working on them). I don't get it, take advantage of the few benefits left working for an employer!

Hey look - non-COVID-19 things do happen. in Indiana too.

Health officials are urging anyone who ate or drank anything from an Indiana grocery store since Sept. 7 to monitor themselves for signs of Salmonella infection.

Local media, FOX59, reported county officials are investigating a cluster of illnesses among patrons of La Aldea Grocery Store at 2801 Klondike Rd #D. Public health staff from the Tippecanoe County Health Department are reportedly working with the state health department on the investigation.

...

The county health department requests that anyone who ate or drank anything from the store in West Lafayette between Sept. 7 and 17 and became ill contact a health care provider as well as the county department. Sick people should call 765-423-9222 Ext. 1, according to the FOX59 report.

"Ate or drank anything at the store" is kinda concerning.

I saw another article where they say Arkansas need to be locked down or locked up. I'm not sure.

Smoove_B wrote: Sat Sep 19, 2020 4:49 pm Hey look - non-COVID-19 things do happen. in Indiana too.

Health officials are urging anyone who ate or drank anything from an Indiana grocery store since Sept. 7 to monitor themselves for signs of Salmonella infection.

Local media, FOX59, reported county officials are investigating a cluster of illnesses among patrons of La Aldea Grocery Store at 2801 Klondike Rd #D. Public health staff from the Tippecanoe County Health Department are reportedly working with the state health department on the investigation.

...

The county health department requests that anyone who ate or drank anything from the store in West Lafayette between Sept. 7 and 17 and became ill contact a health care provider as well as the county department. Sick people should call 765-423-9222 Ext. 1, according to the FOX59 report.

"Ate or drank anything at the store" is kinda concerning.

Concerning because of "anything" or "at?"

The article says, "from the store". But yeah, if they can't even narrow down what it is, ick.

Horror movie - "Its coming from inside the store!!"

With all this social distancing and mask wearing I don't know that I'm going to get a flu shot this year. I'm sure the covid reaction is going to last thru flu season.

Im getting mine at the usual place (pharmacy) at the usual time (mid Oct)

Getting mine at work this week or next. Kids are going to their pediatrician because they hate shots and that's the least "scary". Wife will probably go to Walgreens. Her PCP is dowtown, not worth the trip for a flu shot.

Kids and wife got it over the weekend. I will get mine at work. It is supposed to be available after 10/1.

I didn't think my town would be offering the free flu shots this year, but it turns out they're doing them outside of Town Hall next weekend, instead of in the auditorium, so I reckon I'll go there, as usual.

Got mine for free at the Target pharmacy. They then gave me a $5 coupon for shopping. So, I guess I was actually paid to get a flu shot this year.

Crap. I forgot to ask my doctor for one when I was there Friday.

I asked my doctor when I was in there a couple of weeks ago, and she recommended waiting until the first week of October. Here in a week or two I'll likely just get mine at Wal-Mart like I usually do.

I went to get mine and there was no social distance markers in the line so people were lined up next to each other. Didn't stay and lodged a complaint.

I'll be getting my flu vaccine tomorrow from my PCP. I also followed the advice of a good friend who's a combat medic specialist, and talked them into giving me the first of the pneumonia vaccines (PCV13) last year without having any of the typical underlying conditions and being under the age of 50. So I'll likely be able to receive the second one (PPSV23) this year, too. Because while pneumonia vaccines obviously cannot prevent all cases, it seems only prudent to err on the side of caution in terms of limiting one's risk of further complications courtesy of Chairman's Xi's bat clap.

Cases have been climbing again in most Canadian provinces over the past month. Yet in Ontario at least, only a few restrictions have been re-implemented... they're starting to talk about more. The prime minister is recommending against gathering on Thanksgiving (October 12th). But, as far as I'm aware schools and restaurants/bars are still open. Albeit with distancing measures still in place, and I think all parents/students were given the option of remote learning in Ontario. But it still feels like a mixed messages. It's like we want the economy to be supported, but are expecting stupid, reckless people to do it at the expense of us all.

Wisconsin is back on the 14 day quarantine list, so that kills our plans for a long weekend planned in early October.

College kids are still dropping like flies around here giving Washington county the most Covid cases in the state all the time. (I know that's not quite the right term)

Science Times

Valneva, a France-based biotech company, is currently developing a drug that has the potential to treat Lyme disease. Called VLA15, the drug is in phase two of trials and the company is already planning for phase three.
...
The specialty vaccine company had already developed two commercial vaccines to treat Japanese encephalitis with IXIARO®/JESPECT® and a vaccine called DUKORAL® for cholera and diarrhea caused by Enterotoxigenic Escherichia coli (ETEC).
...
Phase one of the trials was completed in July 2017 and results showed that the drug passed safety requirements and demonstrated strong immunogenicity after mice were tested with four different Borrelia species. It has since been granted the Fast Track designation by the Food and Drug Administration (FDA).

I know this isn't an infectious disease, but it is a health issue. I don't think we have a "Horrors of 2020" thread and it's a little late to start now.

Brain eating amoebas in Texas water supply.

Article wrote:On Friday evening, the Brazosport Water Authority released a “do not use” water advisory for eight Texas cities, under direction from the Texas Commission on Environmental Quality. By Saturday, the warning was lifted in all cities — except for Lake Jackson — and Mayor Bob Sipple of Lake Jackson issued a disaster declaration.

“The impact of this threat is severe,” the mayor said in an emergency request to Gov. Greg Abbott of Texas. “The potential damages include: sickness and death.”

Sleep well. 2020 isn't over yet.

How in the hell do they clean those out of the water supply?

Chlorination and filtration work, though the water treatment facilities might need tweaking. No danger in drinking the water, instead it would be a shower that has water shot up your nose that would be a potential killer.

And kiddie pools.
And washing the dog with the hose.
Hell, and kids drinking from the hose. And water balloons in your face. Etc.

I need to wash the dog today like that here. I hate to do it with him old and the water is cold. But he refuses the tub and I cant drag him into it.