maskenfreiheit posted:

[WA] Can I throw my ex's poo poo in the dumpster? (self.legaladvice)

quote:

I am a 42 yr old woman, married to my 41 yr old husband, "Red", married for 20 years. We have three lovely children and our marriage is rock-solid. I am writing today about a situation at my husband's job that has affected him greatly, and I'm struggling to be supportive with the facts I have.

Red is a tech executive at a powerful financial company and manages the company's top teams of developers and business analysts. He is extremely well-respected in his role and industry for being a kind and efficient manager and possessing a wealth of business and tech knowledge, and has a loyal band of employees whom have followed him from company to company. He was headhunted by many powerful and prestigious institutions because of this, and he's been with his current employer since August of 2012.

Tom is one of these loyal followers, and joined the company in March of 2013 as a BA. Tom is, from what his coworkers have said, a "brilliant rear end in a top hat". He's a crotchety old New Yorker who has worked in this industry since everything was still on paper, and helped Red take their then-employer electronic back in the 80s. Tom and Red have worked together for 20 years, and everywhere Tom has worked, his immediate coworkers have simultaneously respected and hated him. No one denies his detailed knowledge of the business, but he sounds extremely difficult to work with, to put it lightly.

I have met Tom many times, went to his mother's funeral, hosted him for Christmas, etc. He is very friendly and polite to me... but the stories Red and others have told about him make this very incongruous. For a very long time, I have been reserving judgment for people who actually work with him.

Red, as the newest executive, was saddled with the supposed-to-be boring job of campus recruiting, where he found his program manager, Kit. She was a computer science major who graduated with honors and boatloads of research certifications, and he hired her to start after she graduated in May of 2013. Instead of being placed in the entry-level training programs, Red had her shadow him for 8 months so she could learn as much as possible about their tech stack. I met her at the Christmas party, and could tell right away she was one of those rock star employees. Brilliant, articulate, sweet, confident - she was the real deal.

After kicking rear end her first year at the company, Red was given control of several other huge tech departments in a company re-org around Christmas of 2014. He was going to need multiple project managers instead of just Kit to keep things running smoothly, so he created three senior PM positions in his new group, and promoted her to the PM head of client-facing tech. The lead BA that she'd be facing off to? Tom.

For the first year, there were growing pains with Kit struggling to deal with Tom's difficult personality. Red would tell me all the time about Kit putting Tom in his place, or her complaining to him about Tom, or other people commenting to him about how well Kit was handling Tom. This was far, FAR from the first time Red had dealt with Tom problems: several people have requested internal transfers, some made themselves redundant then quit, some have refused positions in Red's organizations because of Tom. Red was encouraged by how much longer Kit was lasting. I didn't want to assume things but twice I said something along the lines of "You should watch Tom, if he scares Kit away that would be a real shame for the company". I'm sure you know where this is going.

Last year, Red finally was able to give Tom the headcount he'd been screaming about, and after more of the same Tom antics (interviewing 30+ people and several refusals of offers before someone accepted) they finally hired another junior BA, Mel, in January. From what I can gather, Mel became the main channel for Tom's toxic behavior and Kit went crazy watching from afar. Mel came to Kit several times about her issues with Tom, and Kit lit up Red every time. Since March of this year, Red mentioned to me weekly that Kit was in his office about Tom again, and he was starting to worry... he had been in the early stages of grooming Kit for his job, and he was nervous about losing his protege.

In mid-July, he did - Kit came into his office and declared she could no longer work with Tom and demanded Red deal with it. Red left work in a quiet rage that day, apparently Kit had admonished him pretty harshly, but after dinner and the kids washed up, we opened a bottle of wine and he told me everything: the things in Kit and Mel's complaints, the true frequency, the damning statements about how Tom treats the two of them from others, all the other times at other companies Tom has caused problems for Red... he felt betrayed by Tom, that Red has given him many jobs and he repays Red by abusing his employees, and he felt betrayed by Kit, for "not speaking up sooner". I pointed out that he needed to reconcile those two statements... how can Kit have all these complaints yet he thinks she "hasn't spoken up"? He admitted he needed to think on it some, and I told him not to take too long, because Kit was stellar and could have another offer in before the weekend.

He offered her a transfer to another one of his departments, in less of a management role but with similar responsibilities, and Kit took it. He came home the next day saying he felt encouraged by her response and knew she'd be have to transition easily. I told him I was surprised... Tom is a problem but Kit was the one who got moved? It didn't seem right. He said she seems satisfied that Tom was no longer her problem, and he just wants both Kit and Tom happy, so this solution got him what he wanted. I shrugged. We'll see.

He just came home from work a wreck today - Kit put in her two weeks, and the offer she's taking is unreal. Huge pay and responsibility bump, better city, another prestigious company. He choked up and told me he couldn't dream of beating it. I asked him if she's leaving because of the offer, he shook his head and it was a long time before he spoke, and he told me she had practically quoted me in her exit interview, citing that Red enabling Tom is why she's leaving. She told him he was the only reason she was staying and once she lost faith in him as a manager, she had no tether there. He was trying not to cry and he let me read the very touching thank you letter she wrote him about how grateful he was for believing in her and empowering her, and that's why she was able to achieve so much, because of his guidance. He told me that he wanted to get that letter 20 years from now when she was retiring as a top executive. I didn't know what to say, and just held him for a little. We made lunch and he went for a run and is in the shower as I type this.

I just want to scream I TOLD YOU SO. Not because I'm right but because the writing has been on the wall about Tom for DECADES. How can he be this blind??? He LOST his protege because of this jerk! I don't even work, much more with him, and I know what an rear end in a top hat he is! Red enabling this man has brought him endless consequences - now he gets one that hits home and it's STILL not the breaking point? The more and more he refuses to deal with Tom, the more he's going to lose. How can he not see that?!

I don't know how to comfort him. I think he deserves this pain of Kit leaving, but only if he learns something from it. How do I support him without screaming "TOM IS A PROBLEM YOU IDIOT!!!!"

TLDR: My husband's refusal to see a problem employee for what he is keeps costing him. What do I do to help him realize this so he'll stop hurting everyone?

Pick posted:

men don't care if other men rape and abuse because any man means more to them than any woman because women don't have souls, see genesis

Haifisch posted:

My[42F] husband [41M] just lost his favorite employee [26F] to a chronic problem employee [50sM] and I want to smack him for being willfully blind instead of being supportive.

Haifisch posted:

My[42F] husband [41M] just lost his favorite employee [26F] to a chronic problem employee [50sM] and I want to smack him for being willfully blind instead of being supportive.

OP posted:

No, thank goodness no sexual or aggressive harassment. More like... condescension and immaturity so thick and so constant that it's abusive. Forcing people to check and double-check and triple-check things, tantrums when he doesn't hear what he wants to hear, going around people and policy to get what he wants, sacrificing other employees' reputation to meet his goals, not understanding technology at all which led to managerial frustrations, that sort of thing.

The incident that prompted Kit's ultimatum was an awful concoction of all of these things. There was a specific sort of testing that Tom wanted done for the company's clients that involved several different departments around the company, some in Red's world and others not, and some contacts outside the company (regulators, exchanges, etc) and Tom had repeatedly forced Kit to organize and conduct this testing. It had failed every time, because Kit was expected to do 10-2 different jobs as a completely green PM and would be either micromanaged or completely ignored by Tom. After another failed round of testing this past Christmas, Kit swore she would never ever touch that kind of testing again.

May, Tom wants to do the testing again and makes Mel organize it. Mel goes to Kit, who goes to Tom, who has a tantrum. Red breaks up the tantrum with the compromise that Kit and Mel will organize and run the testing one last time and, after it's complete, it will never be done again unless Red approves.

Kit and Mel go around to other departments and external contacts to beg favors for this testing... only for it to all completely fail again, the same way as previous attempts, only this time several of those external contacts and other department heads told Kit that they no longer trusted her and would not be making any more time for this testing going forward unless Red (whom is way too high up at this company to be getting directly involved in testing) forced them. Kit blew her lid that she basically dragged her reputation through the mud to make Tom happy yet again, and that was when she told my husband she was done with Tom.

Admiral Ray posted:

and ditch this loser. Let him marry Tom if he's that loving dedicated to that wad of poo poo. Good on your shithead of a husband to introduce women to the industry by bending over backwards to get hosed by idiots shitbirds like Tom. Everyone knows your husband is a weak manager and a gently caress up enabler.

Pvt.Scott posted:

How did Chad gently caress up? This is exactly how you get your friends better jobs, especially in a tight industry. This is how social networking works in your favor, especially if you have an incident on your work history that looks bad to potential employers. She probably didn't use a single reference that could have vouched for her if the issue came up during hiring. Chad did OP's gf, a solid and she decided she'd rather continue falling on her sword some more, destroy a friendship and sour her chances in an industry likely to gossip about bizarre poo poo like this.

I'd be as confused as OP, frankly.

Pick posted:

This is actually a kind of interesting question because I've ended up with stuff people meant to "come back for" that they left at my house or whatever and I never get rid of it and some of it I think is from high school even. dang. I keep tidy but it feels so wrong.

WampaLord posted:

Hey now, don't you dare badmouth Lilith, the first wife of Adam and lover of Satan.

She's a nice lady.

Haifisch posted:

Now would be a really good time for OP to get a job, so she's ready if/when this implodes on her husband's rear end.

A Wizard of Goatse posted:

No, this is not how references work in any business gf shouldn't be doing her utmost to get the hell out of anyway. Providing positive references for friends and leveraging your business buddies to get them fasttracked is a-ok but getting word that one your acquaintances is looking for a job and going out of your way to make sure the hiring manager gets an earful of scuttlebutt that, notably, Chad doesn't actually know anything about is lunatic behavior that could be reasonably expected to put Chad's and the hiring manager's careers in jeopardy should word get out that's how they do things, assuming they're not already the owner's fuckup cousin nepotism hires. You are three eight-year-olds stuffed in a business suit trying to lecture the grownups on how the world really works

A Wizard of Goatse posted:

Chad's a creep with no boundaries

Avenging_Mikon posted:

Except that the hiring person called Chad.

WampaLord posted:

Still having fun trolling r/poly for stories:

We broke up- over a drunk 18 year old


"Honey, your judgement of me trying to bang this drunk rear end crazy 18 year old is really stressing me out. Welcome to Dumpsville: Population You."

mllaneza posted:

Chad is in no way a creep. It's phrased poorly, but the hiring manager reached out to Chad. Chad gave her a glowing, factual review. He couldn't not mention the accident, he might not be the only person from that company his friend the hiring manager got in touch with, and not mentioning it would ruin his own credibility. One of the most important things you can know about a prospective employee is how they handle difficult, stressful working conditions. GF kept up beautifully, other than an accident that literally no one blames her for including the loving insurance company. The accident anecdote Chad told makes her look good.

The GF has sadbrains about the accident and needs help. BF gave her some by making her apply to other jobs, just getting the phone interview was a big self esteem boost. Chad helped too, his recommendation may have been decisive in the job offer. But she needs real therapy with an aim to get over the accident and own her own competence.

Absurd Alhazred posted:

I think ing from this incestuous and high-stress industry is probably the right call anyway.

Intruder posted:

Intruder posted:

Ok fine that's the world, where the less powerful eat poo poo so the more powerful can wipe their hands of their own mistakes

quote:

My fiancee and I were both invited to my older brother's wedding. Up until now she has been very well liked by all of my family, even seen as part of the family already. But tonight at the wedding there was an open bar and she became completely out of control.

Basically: my fiancee got trashed and caused chaos at the event venue. There was an outdoor tent with tables, the bar, and appetizers set up outside the church. After the ceremony everyone was hanging out there before the dinner. The tent was supported by a few wooden poles underneath near the center as well as poles around the edge. There was also a stage with a live band performing. For most of what follows I didn't see it myself because I was towards the edge of the tent talking with a friend. One of my cousins eventually came and got me, so those parts are from what he told me which my parents confirmed later on:

As she got drunk she started dancing to the music, at first this was fine but she got wilder the more she drank. She was spinning herself around the poles in the center, whooping and laughing, and also apparently trying to pole-dance like what strippers do. At one point she grabbed my brother by his tie and pulled him away from where he was dancing with his wife, trying to swing him around a pole with her. My cousin said his wife looked pissed. By this point everyone nearby had noticed her behavior and was watching and snickering, and she kept spilling her drinks everywhere. This is the point where my cousin came and told me all of what she'd been doing, so I made my way with him through the crowd to near where she was. When I spotted her she was staggering over towards my SIL's elderly grandfather, and made him hold her drink for her while also trying to pull him over to dance with her. When he didn't go she just yelled "WHOOOOO!" and ran back to the pole, practically throwing herself onto it. At the same time I'd almost reached her and was going to make her sit down for a bit. But as she jumped onto the pole trying to climb up it, it fell over on top of her from the weight, and the entire tent collapsed in a domino effect where the rest of the poles under the center also fell.

I'm so grateful no one was hurt, but that ruined the celebration, and everyone had to go inside early until it was time for dinner while the maintenance people cleaned up all the damaged stuff.

I'm unspeakably embarrassed and upset, and my brother and SIL are understandably angry their day was overshadowed by this drama. I of course apologized to them profusely. The rest of my family have been very cold to her/us. Most of the other guests were there when it happened so now she's a laughingstock to some and an object of scorn to others. A lot of these are friends and extended family that are a big part of my life, or will be (SIL's family). This is their impression of my fiancee now. Part of me wants to postpone our own wedding (late September) because I'm just mortified.

This isn't the first time she's had issues with alcohol. She hardly ever drinks much except once in awhile at a party, and twice before she's lost control of her drinking. It's never been this bad but she's done things like taking her shirt off and pestering random people to hook up with each other. She never remembers any of this once she's sober the next day. It puts me in a difficult position because if I go partying with her I fear being embarrassed by her behavior, but if I don't go, I fear she could be out doing who knows what and I'd never find out if it was bad. I also don't want to be one of those guys who forbids her from having fun, nor do I want to have to keep track of how many drinks she's had.

I feel like I can't marry her until I know for certain there won't be a repeat of this or anything like it at our wedding. I don't trust her around alcohol at big events like this. To her credit she immediately knew how badly she'd hosed up and personally (drunkenly) apologized to my brother and SIL, and my parents and SIL's parents. She kept crying and apologizing to the people at our table at dinner too. I knew she meant well but it was still awkward.

Does it seem reasonable to postpone the wedding? I took her home after dinner since she was a mess and she's passed out now. Tomorrow if this goes the same way as the past times she got wasted this bad, she's not going to remember anything that happened. So how do I talk to her about this and get her to see how serious it is? I don't want to make her feel worse but I don't feel like I can just pretend it's all okay. Looking for some guidance on what exactly to say to her. (And also how she/I can repair this mess with my family after losing their respect?)

TL;DR my fiancee's drunken antics ruined my brother's wedding. I love her but I'm humiliated she acted like this, and am thinking about postponing our own wedding until I trust she has better self control. I also would love any suggestions on how we could make this up to my family.

quote:

Length of relationship: friendly for a summer, "sexual" for a day

Over the summer I started my first job, it went fine. Nothing weird happened and the coworker in question was friendly and seemed totally normal. Then she added me on social media and began contacting me just with small talk when I really didn't know her at all.

Long story short the conversation turned sexual on her end, and I'll be honest, I wet noodled on it and didn't out right say no at this stage. Then I found out she was married.

The conversation kept going and I tried to just turn it into a friendly conversation, then she just opened up emotionally and started saying how she's in a loveless marriage, how she thinks I'm perfect, how she wants me, then she said "I love you".

I'm still a young man and truth be told relationships aren't my forte, she continued messaging me after I went to sleep extensively. I'm geniuinely scared for her and my own safety. She came across as a little unhinged during the conversation and I just don't know what to do.

I want to make sure that this doesn't ever happen again with her while simultaneously trying to keep her from becoming even more depressed than she is. I feel like a wiser older person with more experience in this area would be better than just me to find a solution.

tl;dr Trying to keep my former coworker who is emotionally attached to me from hitting on me and don't want to hurt her feelings and make sure that she gets the message absolutely.

quote:

I need a way to settle this with my mom. I am a movie buff and I have always just for some reason liked the Alien franchise. I bought myself this replica bust of the head for $2000 dollars to put ontop of my DVD case. The same day the kids arrived home and burst into tears when they saw it. Izzy thinks it's going to eat her and ben scared of it for the look. I tried to tell them it's fake but they cried harder when I tried to show them. Mom's told me to move the thing out of the living room but I have no space in my room. The thing is enormous and I spent a lot of money on it. Help me baragain with her?

tl;dr: Help me reason with mom. I have no room in my room and she doesn't want to hear it.

But Rocks Hurt Head posted:

I [17M] bought this replica alien head for $2000 and put it in the living room. My half siblings [3M&F] burst into tears when they saw it and mom [34F] told me to move it. I have no space in my room and I want to bargain with her.


A $2000 replica alien head

He's 17

But Rocks Hurt Head posted:

I [17M] bought this replica alien head for $2000 and put it in the living room. My half siblings [3M&F] burst into tears when they saw it and mom [34F] told me to move it. I have no space in my room and I want to bargain with her.


A $2000 replica alien head

He's 17

quote:

Okay friends... I have quite the predicament.

A little back story... my husband went to a bbq at his uncles on the 4th of July, he didn’t invite me because he doesn’t want me to meet that side of the family. He says they’re all trash. Any way after this bbq he was talking all about his second cousin who he hasn’t seen in like 20 years and how good of a kid she was (she’s 21) and how great she is. I thought it was great that he’d gotten to connect with a family member!!

Fast forward a few weeks, he sends me a screenshot and at the top of it it says “Kate is typing...” in the Snapchat notification. I ask who Kate is and he says it’s the cousin he reconnected with. I was like hummm okay, that’s cool. They start talking non. loving. Stop. I ended up getting mad about it and he got defensive. We fought, made up, and I hadn’t heard a word about her. She lives in Kentucky, we live not in Kentucky.

WELL this weekend he had to go to South Carolina to help a friend move some thing out of his house. He made the trip alone, and I barely heard from him all day. I got a text 9 hours later saying he had bad service but was at a hotel in Kentucky. He said he was in One town, but when I got on snap chat it showed him in a town an hour away from where he said he was. I asked him what he was doing and he said that they’re right beside eachother (he obviously forgets google exists at this point) the town Snapchat is showing him in is the town where Kate lives.

I ask him what he’s been doing and he said just watching tv. But suddenly his phone service turns back on and he’s able to text just fine. I get this bad feeling in my gut and look up our call logs for the cell phones. He placed a call to Kate at 6:30, 2.5 hours before he finally text me back.

If it was innocent he would say hey I’m stopping to see family right?? But no he’s lying where he is, won’t talk on the phone, and is only sending back blacked out Snapchat’s. I guess the advice I need is how to approach this. How do I say I’m 99% sure you went down there to gently caress your cousin!? And on top of all that, when we split up... what on EARTH do I tell people because I’m embarrassed as hell!!

TL;DR Husband drove 7 hours away to (probably) have sex with his second cousin. Ignoring calls, claiming spotty service, lying about where he is. How do I confront him in this gross situation and what do I tell people when we inevitably split?!

cock hero flux posted:

considering that this is his mom going "move the alien head" and not "holy poo poo did you just spend 2000 real life american dollars on a giant fake alien head?" I'm assuming that either his parents are unfathomably wealthy, in which case just buy a new house specifically to keep your weird head in, or that it was actually his own money, in which case gently caress, if you're 17 and have 2k to blow on bullshit you might as well just move out when you turn 18 in a couple months and throw a tarp on it until then

maskenfreiheit posted:

I found some good content:

My [29f] Husband [35m] is out of town... and probably cheating on me with his cousin!?! (self.relationship_advice)