Actions or Goals: More Housemate Complaints

Stealing from AI summary slop for a moment...

Action-oriented refers to being willing or likely to take practical action to deal with a problem or situation. It involves focusing on taking action rather than just planning or deliberating.

Being goal-oriented means focusing on reaching or completing specific tasks to achieve a planned outcome. People who are goal-oriented are driven and motivated by purpose, often referred to as being task-driven or results-driven.

I put these definitions here to acknowledge and immediately discard them. I am here to complain about my housemates. For the purpose of this post we're talking about actions being "doing a thing" and goals being "accomplishing a task." You'll get it in a second.

So, yes, housemates. I'm so fucking tired of the two of these ~40 year old men not understanding that there is a goal at the end of every action. For a simple example, take turning on the light. The goal is to, say, illuminate a room. The action one might take is flipping a light switch. For the both of them that's where it ends. Some synapse says "I've flipped the switch" and they're done. They've checked out. They have completed the action they wanted to do - it doesn't matter if the goal was accomplished. "What if the light bulb has burned out?" or "what if the breaker has popped?" might come to your mind, but it does not enter theirs; they have flipped the switch and therefore are done. They'll sit in the dark - metaphorically appropriate to this post - happy in the knowledge that they've performed an action.

"Certainly you're not getting angry about light switches!" you might think, and you're correct. I don't know how best to lay out my annoyances, so here's three.

• "Feed the cat" = put cat food on a plate. Don't check if the cat actually eats it. Don't smash the pâté like the cat likes. Merely placing the food on the plate is the action necessary. This certainly does not also include picking up the dish afterward so ants don't crawl into the house.
• "Wash the dishes" = rub a sponge on the dishes. Don't check if the dishes are actually clean. God forbid we have clean dishes. No, just move a sponge around a bit. This certainly doesn't include making sure the drying rack is clean - no, put the "clean" dishes on a moldy drying surface. If they cleaned the drying rack it might cut two minutes out of the time they could be watching wrestling reruns.
• "Clean the living room" = push the vacuum around. Don't move any furniture. Don't tidy anything. CERTAINLY don't dust anything. Just push the vacuum for five minutes. Oh, and don't worry about emptying the vacuum container - why would you care about maintaining your tools? Weird that the last two vacuums have burnt out (not that they noticed, of course, they have both pushed vacuums around that weren't actually running).

I really don't know what to do here. I've laid out three scenarios, but it's everything. I've mentioned things where they underdo it, but it's also shit like overdoing it on soap and laundry. WON'T uses a bar of soap every week. He sits in a chair 16 hours a day and screams at the TV - he's not a coal miner or anything that might get him actually dirty. But the action of taking a shower includes using a significant portion of a bar of soap. CAN'T uses a month's worth of detergent in every load of laundry. I bought a five-year supply thinking I'd save money buying in bulk. Five months later and we've run out. He's also not a coal miner - the laundry he's doing is moderately sweaty clothes. But he knows the action of doing laundry includes adding powder, so he just dumps it in. Honestly, I'm not sure how he hasn't developed rashes from all that detergent on his skin.

This is all without mentioning that these two ~40 year old men still work on the "I didn't use the last of it" principle as if they were children. Toilet paper, towels, tissues, coffee, creamer, milk, and more. That's a separate complaint - a wonderful life hack where they don't have to contribute to the house if they didn't physically use the last bit of a thing. It just "magically" appears because - this is crazy - I want to wipe my ass when I'm done taking a shit.

Again, I'm not really sure how to end this post. I suppose I'll indulge in their logic - I've engaged the action of typing up a post, but it's unlikely I've accomplished the goal of putting something interesting up on the blog. Sorry?

Chasing Waterfalls

 The inclined plane is a simple machine that has been in use since prehistoric times. Used as a machine it allows for motion from one plane to be transferred to another plane with mechanical advantage - that is, for example, to push a vehicle up a ramp (pushing horizontally makes the object move vertically), to split wood (chopping “down” makes the wood split “sideways”), or convert rotational motion to longitudinal motion (a screw twisting into wood or a propeller propelling a ship through water) with less effort than simply lifting, tearing, or pushing. This is all to say that the inclined plane is ubiquitous - I suspect there’s one within eyesight of wherever you’re reading this.

When we think of machines, we often think of humans doing work. Work, however, can be done by gravity. Think of a marble at the top of a ramp. Gravity pulls the marble “down” and the inclined plane transfers that motion “sideways” - instead of ending up directly beneath where it started, the marble will end up somewhere else horizontally (assuming the ramp is not also a helix).

This is all to say this is a simple concept. A ubiquitous concept. A prehistoric concept. Yet, it’s a concept that seems to escape people all around the world. Especially people who have to deal with water.

I am going to blow your mind: water generally flows downhill. Crazy, right? Obviously I’m being sarcastic, as you certainly already know this. You know who doesn’t know this? Bathroom contractors, the streets department, and my housemates.

Are you Smarter than my Housemates?

Happy (almost) New Year! In the spirit of "out with the old and in with the new" here's a rant.

A palate-cleanser. Feel free to look at this when you're done.

I am not the best housemate. I have clutter. I sometimes leave dishes in the sink overnight. I'm sure there are a dozen other things that would drive another housemate insane - including my complaining about the shit that they do. But here's the thing: I am capable of change.

Let me introduce you to my housemates: CAN'T and WON'T. They're both stuck in some pre-pubescent developmental stage where one can not learn new things and one chooses not to learn new things. I'm not sure which is worse. I'm very tired of looking after them. So tired, in fact, I've stopped doing things in my house. We need a new faucet, but I know if I install one it'll be broken in a week. I've had broken lights in the kitchen, two bedrooms, and the basement for years because one of them doesn't know the difference between a pull-chain and a lawnmower pull-start. There's a gas clothes dryer in the basement waiting to be hooked up, but I know - I know- the second I hook it up one of the two is going to burn my house down.

What can I do? Well, rant about it for a bit. With apologies for pictures of my dirty house - I simply cannot clean up after three grown men (including myself).

The Drying Pad

Am I am idiot? 

Is there a truth that has not been revealed to me? 

Why do the people who prepare food in my house use the drying pad to prepare their food? 

I didn't think this would be controversial or contentious, but here we are: the absorbent mat we use to put freshly cleaned dishes on to dry is the number one spot for coffee grounds, raw meat, and veggies ready to eat. It can't be moved to make more counter space. It can't be cleaned after it gets dirty. No, it must have a little taste of all the food we are soon to eat. 

I suppose I'm the dumb one, as everyone seems to use it the same way. 

Maybe one day I'll be enlightened. Maybe one day a bolt of lightning will strike me and I'll see the truth. That'll probably the same day I lose the ability to see crumbs and grease and ants.

Today I Learned

alt: On the Necessity of Posting

I am, for lack of something better to do tonight, going to post an unnecessary rant about others' need to post their unnecessary thoughts online. Perhaps it's my age. Perhaps it's a weariness that's been beaten into me through years of most people not giving a shit about what I think most of the time. Perhaps it's another reason altogether, but I continue to be astounded by the absolute drivel people feel obliged to type and post.

My Radiolab Rant

I give up.

My podcatcher shows that I've listened to 279 episodes of Radiolab. It will stay at that number. This has been a long time in the making (obviously), but at some point the delightful edutainment podcast left and was replaced by a well polished approximation of what idiots think intelligence sounds like - the Big Bang Theory of podcasts. Where once I listened to episodes eager to learn something new, now they sit, continually being pushed to the bottom of my queue. I should have stopped a while ago - it is partially anger at myself for not having done so which is fueling this particular rant.

My first annoyance - the thing I always had to grin and bear to get to the content - is the way the hosts waste my time by speaking for the guests, often intersperced with the stupidest babble imaginable. A fictitious example:

Host 1: And so we went to Philadelphia to interview Simon
Simon: Hi, I'm Simon
Host 1: He's an expert in flags.
Simon: I live in Philadelphia and I'm a vexillologist.
Host 2: What did he say? Veximotoxilist? Vexipagoloist? Fleximotologist?
Host 1: Vexillologist - he studies flags.
Host 2: Ohhh, a vexillologist!
Simon: I like studying flags.
Host 1: And we brought him in to talk about flags.
Host 2: Flags? Like the flappy things? The things you put on flagpoles?
Host 1: Yes, the things you put on flagpoles.
Host 2: Red, white, and blue? The Star Spangled Banner?
Host 1: The very same!

The Middle Class Doesn't Exist

Here I am, getting back to the roots of this blog (and, of course, not writing fiction). I was listening to one of the NPR political podcasts the other day which touched on the recent college admission scandal in the US where people - often celebrities - paid tens of thousands to millions of dollars to get their kids into elite universities. What really tripped me up was, in the span of a minute, the hosts talked about how these people were not the 1% (who "buy buildings" to get their kids accepted), but more like the 2% - which then they referred to as the "upper middle class".

What?

I have a problem with the way Americans use the term "the middle class" - that is to say recklessly and indiscriminately. I almost guarantee if you went up to someone on the street and asked "would you consider yourself to be a part of the middle class?" they would answer in the affirmative. If you followed that up with a request for a definition, you'd probably get some wishy-washy statement about being able to afford some luxury every once in a while. It's a national myth that everyone's "middle class" and, I feel, that's harmful.