The Salt of Carthage

Here is a tiger just going about life until this human gives it the fright of its life. Still cute af. Dream job to be honest. 17/10 would be such an honor to pet

more animals rated here

WHY THE FUCK ARE YOU TRYING TO SCARE A TIGER BRAH

no no no no no look at those ears, tiger totally knows he’s there

tiger thinks the bipeds are terrible, terrible tigers and don’t know how to tiger worth a damn so when one actually pays tiger cub ambush game tiger is so happy

look at that happy tiger

look at it

YES YOU TERRIBLE TIGER YOU ARE FINALLY LEARNING HOORAY :D

#i love that all cats seem to just categorize humans as awful ugly children who need to be taught to cat

@wolfintheroses

“YES STRANGE BIPEDAL TIGER YOU GOT ME I AM KILLED DEAD GOOD JOB.” 

Seriously that tiger flopped over with more drama than you would find in a middle school play death scene I love it. 

Anyone else reminded of this?

I love when singers think maybe their song requires a little prerequisite information so they just cover it real fast so everyone’s on the same page. I love that TLC opens No Scrubs quickly reviewing exactly what a scrub is and when ABBA was like “just in case you didn’t know, famed 19th century militant ruler Napoleon Bonaparte was defeated in the battle of Waterloo. We though perhaps not everyone would know that. Alright, so moving on to my love life, which is similar to that actually,”

exactly thank u yes I saw that too. this is about in-song debriefing specifically. when the lyrics themselves are a quick explanation of the info you need to set u up for the rest of the song

there was a certain man in Russia long ago

The soft eyes! The forward facing ears! The question mark tail! Not to mention the poise and control! This little dude is having a blast and is SO good at it!!

black spotted tabby

EVERY YEAR

Flowering Sakura.

Tokyo, Japan.

I just want to know how this was recorded.

It's not just to have a "do over" that doesn't involve the original cast, it's to cut them out of the royalties. Literally the entire point is to make sure all the money made by Harry Potter goes to transphobes or people willing to work with transphobes.

If you watch it, you are supporting bigotry, hate, and oppression. That's just objective reality. All for a story that you probably have already seen in movie and book form.

#the last point is especially true since the old cast receives royalties for anything with their likeness on it#meaning the original trio still gets money for every mug with their 14 year old faces on it#if they stop making those and replace them with the new cast which they will the old cast gets cut off completely#which is again exactly what rowling wants because she cannot stand those 'ungrateful brats' as she would likely put it#and as she has last say in anything that gets made in harry potter paraphernalia this might also explain the decrease in faces on products

via @discipleofkleio

I hate Rowling so much.

There's people in the notes saying they're going to watch it anyway, and you know, I understand how you can start feeling so burned out and numb from the world that it may feel too hard to avoid things that will give you a little immediate relief in some way in order to avoid the long-term impact of funding these things.

But. If you can't bring yourself to avoid watching it, you better at least fucking pirate it.

One of the problems that came up this week is actually a problem that came up in December.

On December 15th we got a warning about disk health in a server; there is a drive that is at risk of failure.

A ticket was created for me to create a quote to replace the drive.

There was no part number associated with the ticket, and because of the type of server, there was no easy way to access configuration information online and our hardware documentation is a disaster (I have thought it was a disaster since the acquisition; I set up hardware documentation at the old job specifically to avoid issues like this and now all that documentation is gone because we didn't keep any licenses of the old job's CRM). This was not a situation where I could find a part number.

I contacted Tech Alice and asked her to check the part number on the server. Alice reported back that because the drive was part of a RAID array, she couldn't get the part number. She recommended asking Bob, and put her time entry on the ticket.

I contacted Tech Bob and asked him if he could find the part number for the drive on the server; Bob also reported back that he could not find a way to get the part number from the server, he recommended that Charlie collect the part number when he went onsite. Bob added his time to the ticket (still my ticket) and added the status "onsite needed."

Now it is December 23rd. I have messaged Charlie and asked him to check the part number when he is onsite and have added him to the ticket. I'm out of the office today, Charlie is out of the office next week. Charlie does not remember to look at the part number when he is onsite. It is the end of the year.

Now it is January 15th. We lost the first week of the year to assessments, and the second week of the year to the state and our clients being on fire - people were unable to go onsite because of all of that. Charlie is going onsite. I remind him to get the part number when he is at the client site. When he is at the client site he alerts me that actually he is at their other location, not the location with the server.

Now it is January 27th. Charlie is going back onsite, he is on my ticket, the ticket is set to onsite needed. I remind Charlie that we need the part number. Charlie does not remember.

Now it is February 6th. We have created a whole new ticket for Charlie with the *EXPRESS STATED PURPOSE* of going onsite to collect a part number for the failing drive in the server. Charlie marks the ticket as "waiting materials" and makes a note that he can't replace the drive until we order the part.

Now it is February 7th. We have explained, in writing, in Charlie's ticket that we can't order the part until he goes onsite and collects the part number, because we cannot get it because the server won't report the part number if it's in a raid array for reasons that I'll be honest I do not understand.

Now it is February 14th. Charlie closes his ticket and he and Bob pull me into a meeting. The server at the client site is so old they're not sure it's a good idea to replace the drive. Charlie has recommended that the project team quote a migration to sharepoint, which the client has expressed interest in in the past. Bob makes a note of this in my ticket. But I do not close my ticket. I do not close my ticket because I know there must be some fuckery coming. So I put my ticket to "on hold" and set it to reactivate on March 10th so that I can follow up with the project team and see if the migration project is making any progress or if we still need to replace this drive because the server drive is still failing.

It is March 13th. I have a bad week. A very bad week. My manager looks at my open tickets and asks why on earth I still have a server drive failure ticket open from December. I explain that I only have it open to follow up on the migration because the technician suggested server replacement but if there wasn't progress we should still quote a drive, but I still didn't have the part number.

My manager puts me in a chat with me, Charlie, the Project team lead, my manager, and the service team lead and asks what the fuck is going on. I paste Charlie's last update on my ticket and say that I'll be happy to quote a hard drive but I still don't have the part number.

Charlie says "Oh, I put the part number in the ticket" and pastes a photo of a drive (low light, low contrast, and blurry but with a visible part number) in the chat.

"Great!" I say, and immediately assemble a quote and find stock. Then i look back at my ticket. "But I'm actually not seeing the part number on this [my] ticket. Where was that again?"

Charlie has put the part number on his ticket, which I was never on, which he closed.

"Ah, okay. I see."

And here's where the different standards that all of us are used to using work against us.

My old job built RAID servers all the fucking time. It was totally standard, totally easy, totally sensible, and I always knew to double the number of drives we needed for the storage we got because we'd be mirroring. Because we'd be using RAID 10. Because it's robust and can take a lot of failure. A drive failing in a server configured with RAID 10 is not ideal, but it's also not a drop-everything and panic emergency. I *still* wouldn't want to leave it two months in an ideal world but I can't drive up to San Francisco and get a part number, and sometimes the world literally catches on fire.

However, these new folks use RAID 5.

A drive failing in a server configured with RAID 5 *IS* a drop everything emergency, because if one drive goes down the whole system goes down until you can replace the drive and rebuild the array, and because RAID 5 is slower than 10, this can take a very, very long time depending on how much data there is. And if *two* drives fail the data is *gone*

So.

Whose job is it to get the part number, and whose job is it to know that the server is at imminent risk of failure?

Well, now I have properly reconfigured my internal alarms about any failing server drive, but I don't understand why none of the three technicians who worked on this ticket with me didn't at any point say "hey this is an emergency" (Alice is from my old team and used to RAID 10 also, I'm willing to give her a pass) and I'm *really* confused why Bob and Charlie would recommend *not* replacing a drive in a server that is that close to failure.

(And again, I just didn't know. Believe me, I am never, ever going to shut up about drive warning tickets in the future)

And, the thing that scares the shit out of me and my manager and part of the reason why this has been a bad week and I'm having stressful conversations: What if I had just closed that ticket instead of letting it reactivate to follow up on? What if I had just marked it as done when Charlie gave me the update? It wouldn't have been an old-ass ticket in my queue that my manager flagged, it would have been a note in an after-action report when the client's server crashed.

(The client has the quote now with the statement "this failing drive puts your server at risk of failure and we strongly recommend replacing" but they haven't approved it yet because they're really cheap so I'm going to have to send it again and say "this is a mission critical part that you need to replace; your server is at risk as long as the drive is not replaced.")

So. The boss is asking "why is procurement taking so long" and really, now that I'm thinking about it - because he brought it up - how much of this really IS supposed to be my job?

It is now March 17th; the client has approved the drive and I have ordered the drive with 1 day shipping. I reach out to my manager and say "Does this need to be a ticket or a project? It's going to take the server down" and my manager answers "Mini project." I don't know what the hell that means so I go to the project manager (who is a good project manager, but who is non-technical).

"Manager Danny says that needs to be a mini project. I don't know what that means, but this will take down the server for us to install; we need to get it done as soon as possible."

"Okay," Project Manager Elizabeth says.

It is now March 19th. The drive is on site at the office where techs Bob and Charlie work.

"Is there a ticket or a project created for this drive installation?" I ask. I still have the procurement ticket open. I am waiting for an update. I get no answer.

It is now March 20th. The drive is onsite at the office where the techs work. "Elizabeth, has this been assigned to anyone?" No answer.

It is now March 21st. This specific ticket, this nightmare fucking ticket, has provoked institutional changes in ticket handling. We are now going to be responsible for ticket ownership. Your ticket, your problem. "Great!" I say in the meeting. "How do we escalate if we've got a ticket that's beyond what our skills are?"

"You'll forward it up the chain to team leads Frank, Giselle, and Henry; we'll also have a daily scrum call to figure out how we're going to handle stuff."

"Neat!" I say. I reach out to team lead Frank and let him know that there is a drive in the office that needs to be installed for a user who has a failing drive on their server and that we need to move on this.

There is no response.

It is March 24th. I am in the daily scrum call. "I need someone to go onsite and install this drive," I say. "The client has a failing drive in their server. We need to replace it, we need to schedule a time to replace it. We need to communicate with them because the server will be down while it's rebuilding. We need to do this fast the drive has been failing since December."

"That needs change monitoring, since it's going to take the server down," Project Manager Elizabeth says. "I'll send you the form."

It is March 25th. I have filled in as much of the change form as I can. I am in the daily scrum call. "I need someone to go onsite and install this drive. We need to schedule it. The server has a failing drive. I need help completing the change form because I don't know how to estimate how long it will take to rebuild."

"That's my wheelhouse," team lead Frank says. "Let's go into a separate call after the meeting and I'll work with you."

Frank and I get on a call; the call before me runs late so we have fifteen minutes. I spend three getting him up to speed and he spends the rest trying to read the new change form. I complete some of the sections as he gives me dictation, then he has to run to another meeting. Frank is too busy to install the drive himself, Bob isn't capable of it, so Charlie is the only one in that region who can do so. I don't know that we can trust Charlie.

It is 4:30PM. I message Project Manager Elizabeth. "Where does the form go when I'm done with it?"

"Into the client folder; we'll get that processed into a project this week."

"I need you to get on the phone with me."

"Sure."

"This is an emergency. If I knew how to do it I would drive to northern california and install this drive myself tonight. This is just like the other emergency that happened that took down a major customer. We need to do something about this now."

"OH. Oh. So this needs to be a priority."

"Yes."

"Okay, can we have Frank install it?"

"Charlie is the only one who can install it at this point."

Elizabeth makes a face. "I would really, really prefer it if Frank did the install. I'm not sure we're supposed to let Charlie do the install."

"Me too. But Frank is swamped, and Bob can't do it."

"Okay; I can work with you on it in the morning, but we're not going to be able to get anyone out there tonight anyway."

It is 4:45 PM. I message my manager Danny. "I need help escalating this. I'm having trouble communicating the urgency we need here. We need to get someone scheduled to install this drive. Nobody is scheduled for it. This is still my ticket so it's still my problem."

Danny says "Oh. That's not really procurement's problem anymore. We'll get a ticket or project created and we'll get it handled."

"When?"

"I'll talk to Elizabeth about it in the morning and see where it is in her schedule once you complete the change form."

It is 4:55 PM. I message Team Lead Giselle, who was on my old team. She lives in southern california. "We have a client with a failing drive in a RAID 5 server. The drive has been failing since December. There is a drive onsite to replace the failing drive. Is this something you would be willing to drive to Northern California to fix?"

Giselle says possibly, then starts looking into my ticket. "It's been failing since december?!?!" Yes. "The drive has been onsite for most of a week?!?!" Yes. "What does their storage look like?" 96% utilized. "Oh jesus that's going to take forever to rebuild. What did Frank say?"

That he wanted Charlie to do it. But I don't think we're supposed to let Charlie do it and Bob can't and Frank is swamped.

"What did Danny say?" That I could close my ticket and we'd get another ticket created for install.

"There isn't even a ticket for this?!?!?!?!"

"No. Should I create a ticket and assign it to you? If you want this, I'm going to create a ticket and assign it to you and list all the backstory and it's going to be your ticket, your problem."

"I can't agree to go up to NorCal without prior approval. This probably needs to be a project."

---------

Should I just call the CEO at this point? Should I just say "look this is a fucking emergency, this is ON FUCKING FIRE, this is something that needs to be done RIGHT NOW and I don't know what you mean by "take ownership" if I can't get anyone else on the team to escalate or understand how a failing drive in a RAID array is a RIGHT FUCKING NOW issue when we HAVE the hardware on hand"?

I feel crazy. Nobody is reacting to this correctly. I have no idea what to do.

And, once again, how much of this really is my fucking job?

It's RAID 10 and I am going to document this fucking company at fucking knifepoint.

My coworkers are assholes.

for april fools we’re deleting this entire site sayonara you weeaboo shits

gotta appreciate the classics

💜🚨💜 BWOOP BWOOP ATTENTION @CLEOLINDA THERE IS A BABY PALLAS CAT 💜🚨💜

LOOK AT HIMMMMMM

this is the first time I've seen a Pallas cat display any resting emotion other than Pure Rage™

Have you ever looked closely at a car windshield?

The edge of the glass is painted where it is glued to the car but it has these small dots between the clear and painted glass.

These are there for a reason. When the sun hits the glass the painted areas and the clear areas will absorb heat at different rates. This causes the glass to expand and contract differently putting stress on the glass.

These dots help the glass to warm up more evenly over a larger area so the glass does not suffer stress that could cause it to spontaneously explode.

Fun fact: the Tesla cybertruck doesn’t have these.

Yes, the glass will spontaneously crack or explode in the sun.

I dreamed the Pope announced a new deadly sin called 'sluttony' and everybody was really excited to try it.

wait this just changed something in me

Okay, so. Yesterday, my spouse's cat (my beloved, furry stepdaughter) was suddenly very sick. Spouse had the car on the opposite end of the state for work, so I walked down the road to the local vet. Unfortunately, she needed to be rushed to the emergency vet in the next town over, so I had to order an Uber and cross my fingers.

Enter Donald, a gay Puerto Rican man who rolls up in an electric Kia with a rainbow Zelda shirt. I know he is Puerto Rican because that is the theme of his car's decor. He's probably in his late forties. He's gushing over the cat but his demeanor changes when I tell him how sick she is and how I need to get her to the ER. He solemnly informs me, "I'll take care of it," and RIPS out of the parking lot of my building.

Dude is flooring it. The entire time he is sending his husband text-to-speech messages about, "Going to the vet, do you want me to go in and talk to them?" He informs me that he actually needed to go speak to the vet at this clinic anyway--his dog who he just had to put down yesterday went there for renal failure treatments--and that "fate brought us together." He tells the cat to hang in there, that, "Girl, I will take care of you."

He turns on his emergency blinkers. He's weaving through traffic like he used to professionally race. Any gap he sees, he takes it. It is terrifying but I am in awe.

We get to blocked traffic because it is rush hour. He asks me if I trust him. I tell him, "I guess I have to in this situation," and he nods and swings into the shoulder, guns it, whips around the traffic, and takes off on a side road. The GPS means nothing to him. He knows exactly where he's going and he is beating the traffic jams for the sake of the cat. She can't wait.

When we pull into the vet clinic, he goes in with me. As my cat is taken in, he asks me if I want to see pictures of his late dog. He shows me a picture of a chihuahua in a bow tie and it is the cutest fucking dog I've ever seen. He tells me how his husband is a dog trainer and the dog had been around the world, and that this vet is a good one and my cat will be fine.

I compliment his shirt and he nods like Arnold at the end of Terminator 2. Then he just marches out the door.

Anyway. The cat is staying overnight at the emergency vet but seems to be doing fine aside from not wanting to eat. Apparently, this is a $2.5k case of "your cat has a cold and is constipated, and what you thought was respiratory distress was her gagging on snot while nauseous." We pick her up sometime today.

Wherever you are, thank you, Donald. My spouse left you a tip higher than the cost of the trip because you are awesome and your dedication to our cat was inspiring. 10/10, I would endanger myself on the road with you again.

We got a $500 refund, so only $2k now. But yeah. The, uh, actual vet visits (plural) were just as insane.

And I feel like this whole experience just sums up the personality of Smudge as a cat, because this is the most Smudge thing she has ever done.

yeah, that tracks. I have been there and paid that. I'm sorry for your expenses and I'm glad Smudge is better. Did the vet give you advice about keeping her unconstipated? (Pumpkin, Metamucil, water, etc.)

a clownboy (half clown, half cowboy) says yeehonk

this is it. the worst post i’ve ever seen. my own two eyes are cursed