Minor rant thread. Post your rants o' the day here!

eastsideTim said:

Don49 (Forum Supporter) said:

Eastside,

I just got the same letter from the IRS saying they hadn't received my 2019 return, but had a credit in the amount of tax I paid. I think there is a real problem there.

Hmm, seeing that it's not just me, I have some opinions, but they'd break board rules if I expressed them.

 

Fortunately I keep copies of all of my tax return paperwork, but this is still annoying.

But is it political if you just go after bureaucrats and their inability to think?  That is unquestionably both sides.

Streetwiseguy said:

eastsideTim said:

Don49 (Forum Supporter) said:

Eastside,

I just got the same letter from the IRS saying they hadn't received my 2019 return, but had a credit in the amount of tax I paid. I think there is a real problem there.

Hmm, seeing that it's not just me, I have some opinions, but they'd break board rules if I expressed them.

 

Fortunately I keep copies of all of my tax return paperwork, but this is still annoying.

But is it political if you just go after bureaucrats and their inability to think?  That is unquestionably both sides.

It's political because there is a political reason the IRS has gotten so backed up.  I should stop there.

In reply to eastsideTim :

We have people who mailed in paper tax forms, while most of the humans there were working from home.  The paper got lost...

There's an independent shop nearby that the guy likes to play dress-up and pretend he's a mechanic until he gets in over his head, which isn't very deep, and then he sends it down to our dealership for us to fix it for him. It's always rusty, old, high-mileage, cobbled-together wrecks that are all sorts of berkeleyed up. Right now I've got an '07 GMC Sierra that he sent down that wouldn't start so he threw a fuel pump control module at it and wanted it programmed. I program the module, still won't start, the service writer calls him up and he says "I don't know what's wrong with it, you guys fix it." I determine that it actually needs an engine control module, we order one and I go to program it, and it won't program. Well, because it's a 2007, you can't program an ECM with the old MDI or the new MDI2 diagnostic devices, they attempt to program it too fast and so it rejects the programming sequence. You have to hook the even older Tech2 scan tool to it and connect a computer to the Tech2 with an RS232 cable. Well, our Tech2 has been gathering dust for the better part of a decade and last I knew they didn't work right, the old PCs were chucked in a dumpster around 5 years ago, our new laptops don't have RS232 ports, and GM retired the old TIS2Web programming interface this summer in favor of the new TechLine Connect. Our IT guy managed to resurrect one of the Tech2s, and he scrounged up a laptop with an RS232 cable, but we can't get it all to work. We can talk to the truck with the Tech2, and we can talk to the Tech2 with the laptop, but we can't talk to the truck from the laptop through the Tech2. And the TechLine Connect programming interface doesn't seem to have a way to even select the Tech2 Pass-Thru programming option. So now, I've wasted a full day berkeleying around with some 15 year old rusty piece of E36 M3 that wasn't even my problem to begin with.

In reply to NickD :

Its terrifying to think that a truck that's not that old can be rendered nearly unserviceable AT EVEN A SHOP like yours because of outmoded electronic dongles. Yikes.

Appleseed said:

In reply to NickD :

Its terrifying to think that a truck that's not that old can be rendered nearly unserviceable AT EVEN A SHOP like yours because of outmoded electronic dongles. Yikes.

Knowing GM can't service a 15 year old truck they built does not give me the warm fuzzies about anything built after Y2K.  I'll keep my GMT400 and always have a paperclip handy to read codes thank you very much..   EDIT:  Who knew 2007 was such a pivotal year for GM trucks, first the AFM issues and now this..

There's a late model GM for sale locally that would make a great budget commuter. It's cheap and apparently needs an EPM. Younger, more adventurous me would have been all over that. No way I'm going down that road now.

A buddy gave me a roof box for my audi wagon. Brand new, actual audi brand box. Super cool. I don't have crossbars. I ordered them online on the 12th. Supposedly to arrive Monday the 24th. From like 4 states away. They didn't get SHIPPED until the 25th. Ugh. I want my roof box mounted!

I want to re-read a long post that I thought I made here on GRM, but I can't find it.

The subject was the weird time flow in Rise Of The Skywalker.  It must have been on Facebook, which is unfortunate, because finding old stuff on FB is nearly impossible.

In reply to Duke :

I recall reading that post but I can't remember where.

Did you two just Mandela Effect yourselves?

In reply to Appleseed :

Maybe. 

It was something about how the events of the film take place over roughly 16 hours, so for every minute of screen time, there's only 7 minutes of offscreen action. All the planet-hopping, exploring, fueling, communicating, explaining, everything.

berkeley. My 4yr old daughter tested positive for COVID after having a stomach bug on Monday. Back to herself on Tuesday. Test results came back today.  So, my wife and I probably have/had it. Last week I had symptoms but had two negative (rapid and PCR) tests. Neither of us have symptoms and my daughter is back to herself, full of toddler energy. I'm thankful we're all fortunate enough to be OK, but now we're stuck at home for the next week.

Dear USPS. You are by far the worst agency/business I have to deal with. Three letters showed up today that were postmarked in August of last year. Five berkeleying months? No note. No sorry. Just here you go, we accidentally found these somewhere while masturbating on the job. Seriously? Not only checks with money owed to me but insurance information I had to get reissued because of your incompetence. 

In addition to that, I mailed 5 checks to vendors on the 10th of January that still haven't been delivered. Not just one of them, but all 5. The batch mailed on the 17 made it through. That means one of your useless employees fat-fingered them or tossed them instead of taking the trouble to do his berkeleying job. 

And your response? You'll look into it. Yeah, right. Bunch of lying ass pieces of E36 M3. You might as well go ahead and say berkeley Off. Coming from your mouths it means the same thing.

I would say you are an embarrassment to all other government employees, but we know better than that. They all wish they could suck as much as you do and get away with it.

Useless berkeleywads. Here's hoping you all end up paid what you are worth and living under a bridge somewhere. 

NickD said:

In reply to Appleseed :

Maybe. 

It was something about how the events of the film take place over roughly 16 hours, so for every minute of screen time, there's only 7 minutes of offscreen action. All the planet-hopping, exploring, fueling, communicating, explaining, everything.

Sounds like typical JJ Abrams.  His reboot of Star Trek seems to have put the Neutral Zone only a few minutes away from Earth at warp speed.

In reply to Duke :

Here you go

The post you're looking for is about halfway down. 
I re-read the thread. And not to rehash old arguments, but a REALLY disagree with some of what was posted and question if some folks are just trolls or not nearly as informed as they claim to be. 

In reply to Appleseed and NickD :

It was in one of my Star Wars threads. I remembered and was able to find it. 

06HHR (Forum Supporter) said:

Appleseed said:

In reply to NickD :

Its terrifying to think that a truck that's not that old can be rendered nearly unserviceable AT EVEN A SHOP like yours because of outmoded electronic dongles. Yikes.

Knowing GM can't service a 15 year old truck they built does not give me the warm fuzzies about anything built after Y2K.  I'll keep my GMT400 and always have a paperclip handy to read codes thank you very much..   EDIT:  Who knew 2007 was such a pivotal year for GM trucks, first the AFM issues and now this..

It isn't a GM issue specifically, it is a consumer electronics issue.  

The last time I paid attention was 2018, but everyone in the industry was shouting loud and clear to never use Windows 10 based computers for reflashing.  Reflashing turns your computer into a passthrough device, the remote server does all of the work.  If Windows decides to start updating during a reflash, say hello to a shiny new brick.

Streetwiseguy said:

In reply to eastsideTim :

We have people who mailed in paper tax forms, while most of the humans there were working from home.  The paper got lost...

A friend of my Mother's just got her letter from the IRS about a credit for payment and a missing 2020 tax form.  Apparently they lost a LOT of paper..  

barefootskater5000 said:

In reply to Duke :

Here you go

The post you're looking for is about halfway down. 
I re-read the thread. And not to rehash old arguments, but a REALLY disagree with some of what was posted and question if some folks are just trolls or not nearly as informed as they claim to be. 

Since that thread was posted, I have become something of a huge SW fan (and it is all thanks to Force Awakens and Mandalorian). I have watched all of Clone Wars, Rebels, Bad Batch, Mandalorian, and am 2 episodes behind on Book of Boba Fett. I have also read the young adult novel Ahsoka and a New Dawn. 

I really think people get too wrapped up in it. I really enjoyed the movie then, and I really enjoyed it a few weeks ago when I rewatched all of the movies. Perfect? No. Great entertainment? Yeah, for me, it is. 

Here is my SW rant, stolen from a TikTok: Every Star Wars Movie (Skywalker Saga) is titled wrong.

• Ep 1: Meet Anakin, should be Rise of Skywalker
• Ep 2: Learn Palpatine has ordered an army to destroy the Jedi. Revenge of the Sith
• Ep 3: Order 66 happens, Attack of the Clones
• Ep 4: Obi Wan that its time for Jedi to return... Return of the Jedi
• Ep 5: Yoda teaches Luke to use the Force. Force Awakens
• Ep 6: Yoda and Anakin die, making Luke the Last Jedi (depending on how we classify Ahsoka and what Ezra is doing)
• Ep 7: New empire emerges after destruction of the old Empire... Empire Strikes Back
• Ep 8: Luke sacrifices himself to save the Resistance... A New Hope
• Ep 9: Palpatine comes back from the dead... A Phantom Menace

NickD said:

There's an independent shop nearby that the guy likes to play dress-up and pretend he's a mechanic until he gets in over his head, which isn't very deep, and then he sends it down to our dealership for us to fix it for him. It's always rusty, old, high-mileage, cobbled-together wrecks that are all sorts of berkeleyed up. Right now I've got an '07 GMC Sierra that he sent down that wouldn't start so he threw a fuel pump control module at it and wanted it programmed. I program the module, still won't start, the service writer calls him up and he says "I don't know what's wrong with it, you guys fix it." I determine that it actually needs an engine control module, we order one and I go to program it, and it won't program. Well, because it's a 2007, you can't program an ECM with the old MDI or the new MDI2 diagnostic devices, they attempt to program it too fast and so it rejects the programming sequence. You have to hook the even older Tech2 scan tool to it and connect a computer to the Tech2 with an RS232 cable. Well, our Tech2 has been gathering dust for the better part of a decade and last I knew they didn't work right, the old PCs were chucked in a dumpster around 5 years ago, our new laptops don't have RS232 ports, and GM retired the old TIS2Web programming interface this summer in favor of the new TechLine Connect. Our IT guy managed to resurrect one of the Tech2s, and he scrounged up a laptop with an RS232 cable, but we can't get it all to work. We can talk to the truck with the Tech2, and we can talk to the Tech2 with the laptop, but we can't talk to the truck from the laptop through the Tech2. And the TechLine Connect programming interface doesn't seem to have a way to even select the Tech2 Pass-Thru programming option. So now, I've wasted a full day berkeleying around with some 15 year old rusty piece of E36 M3 that wasn't even my problem to begin with.

And people wonder why I walked away from being a mechanic and want sweet berkeley all to do with late model cars....

I've been saying  to friends that are into cars for a decade now that modern cars won't exist as classic cars in the future because the burden of trying  to keep the electronics afloat will be to great for pretty much anyone once things become obsolete and the support dries up.

Even with the tools at your disposal as a dealership, you're struggling to get a 15 year old car back on the road. How's Bob going to go in 2047 trying  to faithfully restore his 2018 brz or mustang back to original  showroom condition and function.

Don't get me wrong, what were achieving  with the technology is awesome and we're definitely in a purple patch regarding  horsepower and performance. But it comes at a cost unfortunately 

barefootskater5000 said:

In reply to Duke :

Here you go

The post you're looking for is about halfway down.

Excellent, thank you!  I couldn't find the right word combination to make that thread come up.

In reply to Duke :

I just googled "grm Star Wars" It was funny though because when you mentioned Star Wars and ridiculous time line I remembered the post vividly. Can't remember lunch yesterday.

In reply to daeman :

To be fair, they threw away some of the tools they needed.  Who brings 15 year old cars to a dealership?  They probably don't have an old Interrogator rolling ignition scope either.

As a consumer, I could read the old ECM and reflash with a Write All with HPTuners to a different ECM.  This option is not available at the dealer level.

Pete. (l33t FS) said:

In reply to daeman :

To be fair, they threw away some of the tools they needed.  Who brings 15 year old cars to a dealership?  They probably don't have an old Interrogator rolling ignition scope either.

 

As a consumer, I could read the old ECM and reflash with a Write All with HPTuners to a different ECM.  This option is not available at the dealer level.

Yeah, although GM also did away with the old software that you need. TIS2Web is completely gone. I ended up calling GM TechLine for assistance and they remotely logged in to the laptop we had that had the RS232 port and then declined to help me, because, get this, the laptop was too old. They wanted a minimum Gen 6 Pentium processor and this had a Gen 4 Pentium. 

My one coworker then goes "You want it programmed? Give me the ECM and the VIN." I do and he walks away, performed some sort of dark art that I'm not sure I want to know, and we plug it into the truck to do the immobilizer learn. I hit the key and nothing happens, no gauge self-test, no crank, nothing. We kind of exchanged a glance, tried the key a few more times to the same effect, and then all of a sudden it cranked, lit off and started running. The ECM still has a current code for the theft deterrent needing to be learned though. It also had a code for the crankshaft position variation not being learned, so I started warming it up to allow the learn procedure, then the Tech2 screeched at me that I had "possible wrong vehicle selection", then all of a sudden all the gauges went dead. The truck still runs, I can still talk to the ECM, but the coolant temp gauge, fuel gauge, tach and speedometer are all bottomed out aside from the occasional wiggle. This truck is so berkeleyed up.