Random Fail: First World Problems

[Blubbartron]

Yeah, I'm forced to agree with hey on this one. The state of the lawn is in no way indicative of a lack of maintenance on the house. Half the shit that was listed as "basic maintenance" isn't even necessary if you don't buy a shitty house. There are gutters that will never clog or get debris in them, spray foam insulation that is impervious to mold growth, vapor barriers and siding to prevent outer walls from getting fucked up. I mean, shit, go watch some Holmes on Homes.

[Jaybar]

Yeah, I'm forced to agree with hey on this one. The state of the lawn is in no way indicative of a lack of maintenance on the house. Half the shit that was listed as "basic maintenance" isn't even necessary if you don't buy a shitty house. There are gutters that will never clog or get debris in them, spray foam insulation that is impervious to mold growth, vapor barriers and siding to prevent outer walls from getting fucked up. I mean, shit, go watch some Holmes on Homes.

Mold/mildew can and will grow on the outside of the home, especially on wood. There are paint and stain products that reduce and prevent the growth of mold/mildew, though. You can talk about how awesome non-clog gutters are but not every home is equipped and not every homeowner will equip them, just like not every homeowner will buy roof heating coils to prevent ice buildup in the winter. Vapor barriers are designed to prevent condensation buildup along the interior partition of the outer walls (generally placed behind the gypsum/plaster unless you live in tropical climates). You might be thinking of water barriers like Tyvek but those are used to protect the substrate material and not the cladding (which in general is to protect plywood substrate on homes). The only thing protecting the outer barrier directly is paint/stain or inherent properties of the cladding (see: masonry).

As Aksannyi mentioned an unkempt lawn is the least of your worries but it is the easiest thing to take care of. Refusing to take care of you lawn but going through the throes of painting, getting on ladders to clean, or applying mold killing products is a bit skewed.

[Blubbartron]

Mold/mildew can and will grow on the outside of the home, especially on wood. There are paint and stain products that reduce and prevent the growth of mold/mildew, though. You can talk about how awesome non-clog gutters are but not every home is equipped and not every homeowner will equip them, just like not every homeowner will buy roof heating coils to prevent ice buildup in the winter. Vapor barriers are designed to prevent condensation buildup along the interior partition of the outer walls (generally placed behind the gypsum/plaster unless you live in tropical climates). You might be thinking of water barriers like Tyvek but those are used to protect the substrate material and not the cladding (which in general is to protect plywood substrate on homes). The only thing protecting the outer barrier directly is paint/stain or inherent properties of the cladding (see: masonry).

As Aksannyi mentioned an unkempt lawn is the least of your worries but it is the easiest thing to take care of. Refusing to take care of you lawn but going through the throes of painting, getting on ladders to clean, or applying mold killing products is a bit skewed.

My mistake, I was confused. But regardless, I still don't think it's skewed. One of these maintenance activities actually does preserve the function of your home. The other one just makes your home "look nice". If you don't give a shit about looks, and only care about function, the choice is clear. Personally, I'd rather have a cement slab for a yard than grass. Lawns are one of the most wasteful, useless concepts that humanity has come up with (and we've come up with some seriously stupid concepts).

[Jaybar]

My mistake, I was confused. But regardless, I still don't think it's skewed. One of these maintenance activities actually does preserve the function of your home. The other one just makes your home "look nice". If you don't give a shit about looks, and only care about function, the choice is clear. Personally, I'd rather have a cement slab for a yard than grass. Lawns are one of the most wasteful, useless concepts that humanity has come up with (and we've come up with some seriously stupid concepts).

I hate to keep railing on the subject, but lawns are very important. I understand you dislike the American Dream Lawn (the perfect 2in cut, square lawn with picket fence) and I too have a particular disinterest in those lawns. I mentioned previously the importance of keeping soil healthy for storm water runoff, and it doubly goes for a pavement lot. One of the most unsustainable parts of large parking lots (and in your case a cement lot) is the unfiltered and undeterred surge of storm water that would end up in the city's waste water system*. When you hear of basements flooding it is because there is too much runoff during a storm. In some cases it is not preventable (very steep slopes, highly compacted soil, frozen ground, over-saturated soil), but as a community it is best to have healthy soil to absorb much of the water and slow the rate at which it enters the waste water system.

Mowing your lawn to a manageable level from a non-aesthetic standpoint keeps the accumulation of soil-loving insects from infesting the area and ruining the grass. It makes it easier for birds and other animals to pick them away too.

You might be interested in these studies which touch on what I said in greater depth - http://www.sustland.umn.edu/maint/benefits.htm

*What many areas will do is set up swales to collect and drain waste water runoff from pavement but are often simply funneled into cement runoffs that lead to the waste water system effectively doing nothing.

Spoiler: show

http://www.ence.umd.edu/~apdavis/MDE...20arrows-r.jpg

[Niiro]

Neighbor lady of mine wound being taken to the hospital late spring/early summer. As is, she's pretty terrible about maintaining the hedges along the front/back of her yard and the few that linger in the border to ours. Now, the guy that lived there before he passed away spent a lot of time on the yard, and when you're retired and at the age he was, it's not exactly surprising. He kept the bushes around 3 feet high and the stuff at the border was never a hassle. New lady? 7 foot+ monsters reaching their leafy tentacles every which way. We can no longer see where we park one of our cars on the front street because of this. But as one might suspect, since she's been in the hospital like 6 months now, her shit got hella worse. I managed to strike up a conversation with one of my neighbors who does lawn work and he agreed to run his tractor over her yard every 2-3 weeks, so unmanageable grass was at least contained. However, sometime in September I just got pissed at one of those border bushes hanging so far into our yard that I had to literally push it up just to mow my grass. Given her history of neglect and not knowing when she'd even be back to bitch at her, I stepped in my garage, grabbed a pair of hedge clippers, and cut the whole damn thing down.

Anything growing on a neighbor's property that hangs over onto yours is yours to cut back, doesn't matter where it's rooted.

If it's over your property it's yours to trim back however far you want to the property line.

[arus2001]

Anything growing on a neighbor's property that hangs over onto yours is yours to cut back, doesn't matter where it's rooted.

If it's over your property it's yours to trim back however far you want to the property line.

I figured as such, but after like 10 years of messing with it every summer.... yeah. People may sympathize with me. Law might not so much.

[Niiro]

You actually think this woman who doesn't tend to her own yard is gonna care if you trim the crap growing on your side of the property line enough to involve the authorities in any way?

If anything, it's not like she has any right to come over into your yard and trim the bush over your property anyway.

[Kerberoz]

Get a hand drill and some Round-up. Tiny hole where the roots meet the rest of the plant -> pour in -> conceal hole -> bush dies while everything around it lives.

[Myrrh_Quetz]

Not random fail for me but for everyone else in my shitty city(It's been snowing like a super bitch here and cold as fuck). I'm leaving to the Bahamas for a week. Boo ya, flights in 2 hours. I'm giddy as shit. Thread incoming on Dec3rd at 10:55pm on why I'm going to Bahamas.

[bluefan]

Yeah, Winnipeg's been pretty nasty last few days. Cold I don't mind too much, you can just layer up. But all that damn snow to shovel....ughhhhhhhhhh.

[Deadgye]

I hate to keep railing on the subject, but lawns are very important.

A few unkempt lawns are not going to create a flood, you're being incredibly silly. Me not taking proper care of my lawn in a timely manner is not going to harm you in any way. If it bothers you , then you have the option to fix it yourself. Next you're going to tell me that not raking up the leaves in my backyard is sacrilege and harmful.

Expecting someone else to do mow your lawn because you are too lazy is the most ridiculous shit I've ever heard of.

The post right under your previous one pretty much implied it lol. Noone should have to mow someone else yard because their neighbor is a lazy asshole.

The way you've twisted or misunderstood my words is pretty ridiculous to me. I would never expect someone to mow someone else's lawn, but the option does exist.

[Rooney]

A few unkempt lawns are not going to create a flood, you're being incredibly silly. Me not taking proper care of my lawn in a timely manner is not going to harm you in any way.

As someone who's been trained in stormwater runoff and drainage, yeah it's kind of a big deal. A one inch rain over a square mile produces right around 86,000 cubic yards of water. That's 17.3 million gallons, or 72,000 tons of water if you prefer.

The difference between dumping that in the city's drainage system right now (pavement), pretty much right now (poor soil), and over the course of the next hour or so (well maintained soil/vegetation) is massive. I went to college in a city that had a combined stormwater and wastewater drainage system. A heavy rain meant there were things running in the water on the street and into the river that you'd rather not think about.

No, one unkempt lawn won't create a flood, nor will a handful of them. But if more people start doing it, you won't like the results.

[Buffy]

My random fail:

Because of school, we get access to Microsoft product free of charge. I normally skip them because I use open office and it works for me and I like that it is an open source project. However, this one assignment for school has a power point requirement and I hate the open office version of powerpoint, so I decided to bite the bullet and download office from the school website. I had to un-install the 2010 version of Visio and the 2013 version of project to do it, which I did.

After I installed office, I reinstalled project and visio (which didn't come with office), only to discover there was a free upgrade to 2013 visio, so I uninstalled the 2010 version and installed the 2013 version.

Then I updated.

127 updates.

Took me 4 hours to do all of that. Hadn't even started on the power point yet.

Probably could have just done it on the software I dislike during that amount of time.

[Brill Weave]

Make fun of the wife because she got the kid's cold. One night later wake up with 102.8 fever which I'm still dealing with right now. That my friends, is karma at work.

[Ratatapa]

Random fail for the guy but win for me

Announce to sell assassins creed iv and guy says he's giving me 40 since he need to buy the upassport for 10$

Says ok then we meet up give him the game he gives me the money

I saw 2 20$ bill so intake the money and go back home

Arrive at home and check my wallet wtf I got 3x 20$ bill

Yay just sold ac4 for 60$ instead of 40

[Moss]

my brain cells...

[Ratatapa]

my brain cells...

pleasure :D

[izembo]

especially since they discontinued the uplay passport and discounted it to $0.

[Souj]

Uuuugh my pc just died. Out of nowhere, one of the fans just started making a really loud noise, then it turned itself off then on then off over and over forcing me to unplug it. Then I waited a few min and restarted it only for it to do it again. Now it just won't turn on. It's quite a few years old and I definitely need a new pc, but I really don't have much money to spend on one, especially one that would run what I want it too.
So now I've just hooked my monitor, mouse, and keyboard up to my little acer inspireone netbook.

[Kerberoz]

Probably just the PSU.