u/DramaticErraticism

I've recently watched most of the original Law & Order (on in the background as I work from home). Started working my way through SVU. You start to notice certain tropes, certain things that happen on a regular basis.

I'm just some simple white person, but I couldn't help but notice the lack of...well...normal? Asian Americans?

Any crime involving Asian people seems to always be related to Asian people who can barely speak English (or they can't speak at all). The police go there and then the mom or dad go 'Oh herro porrice, oh yes big crime we have, we simple immigrant. Can I take your order prease.' and then it moves on from there.

Some of the times they will have first generation children who do all the translation for them.

It just seems goddam odd to me. I have been to NYC many times and I am aware of areas that are largely Chinese immigrants, but there are a shitload of other Asian people who speak the language and have been in this country their entire lives.

I know its just a TV show, it just throws me for a bit of a loop. Any other odd tropes that people notice on the show?

Im nearing the finish of The Great Hunt and the horn has gone back and forth...at least 4 times now. I appreciate the horn is important and it is an easy way to give characters something new to do when someone steals it.

I am just wondering...how many more times are there going to be plots about the horn being stolen? Is this going to be the next 12 books of horn stealing and horn recovery or is it something that gets fairly resolved at some point in the future?

Not that I am going to stop reading, I am enjoying myself quite a bit. Just wondering what I am getting myself into a bit.

Edit: Well that answers that! Thanks everyone! I was ready to name the series 'The Wheel of the Horn', but it sounds like this book wraps things up nicely and its on to new adventures!

Im sure we're all familiar with SLAs. I work for a fortune 500 and we've always been pretty lax on SLAs. The general policy is to just make sure you're updating tickets and users within a reasonable timeframe.

When a ticket gets closed, users can submit a rating and/or additional feedback, if they want. Then managers can review the feedback for their individual employees and make some judgement/determination on their effectiveness and customer service, the system worked pretty well.

Now my company has gone SLA crazy, the only thing they care about it SLAs and closure times. If you can't close a ticket on time, you need to change the status to 'on hold' etc.

I'm almost always on top of my tickets on my team, I usually take the worst issues because people will just let them sit in the queue and pretend they don't see them, that means some of my tickets take a while to close.

Today my manager was getting all over me about a ticket that broke an SLA. So I just closed the ticket, opened a new one under the same user and placed the status 'On Hold' while I work on it.

All the rest of my tickets are up to date. Another guy on my team takes forever to resolve/close simple issues. He has tickets from 30+ days out and he just changed the status for all of them to 'on hold' and the boss is happy with him as none of his tickets have technically broken SLA.

These systems are so nice in theory, but once you get humans involved, they don't seem to be quite so effective. Now everyone is just using tricks to avoid tickets breaking SLA, they're more focused on that than resolving the issues for users...its all about status management now and not about customer service.

I'm sure others have similar stories. I can see how this seems like such a great idea from the higher ups, we're going to put SLAs in place and give customers much better support! Unfortunately, things don't work like that. Instead of better support, people are just using tricks to manage SLAs while the end user ends up suffering. All while upper management pats themselves on the back with SLA metrics that look better than last year.

Ahhhh Corporate America, its such a joke sometimes.

Hello,

I've always generally liked Law & Order, but never really sought it out in any real way. If it was on in the background, I'd watch it.

Now that I work from home, I like to have shows on in the background that are entertaining but not engrossing, so I can actually still focus on work. I've had L&O playing for weeks now as I make my way through the series.

I just got done with S13 E18, it really is a completely forgettable episode, nothing crazy really happens, performances are average, but something about the story is sticking with me for some reason.

At the end of the episode, the brother is found guilty for murdering everyone on the boat. From the evidence they have, it doesn't seem clear at all that the brother did it, other than him being the only one still alive (which is significant, I suppose).

The episode seems to hint heavily that the brother did not do it, yet McCoy pushes very hard for the conviction. On the stand, the brother tells his story of what happens and seems generally truthful and has no history of violence.

The guy got found guilty and will be in prison for the rest of his life, I'm guessing they don't have another episode down the line that turns around the conviction.

Do people think that the brother really did it? If he didn't do it, was it his friend whose girlfriend was being seduced by his brother, causing the other drunk friend to kill them out of a jealous rage?

It's like they took some very basic pieces of evidence and just slapped it against the only person who is still alive, just as a reason to put someone in jail, without having any idea who really did it...which just seems kinda wrong.

I mean, I guess this is kind of nice...but the only thing I can think about is how goddam old I am now.

Unless they were calling to offer me a reward for my loyalty, I don't know if I want another call after 50 years of banking with them.

Who else has randomly made you feel old lately? This is like a personal attack!

Without getting deep into details, here is the short story; I saved 5%-10% ever since I got my first IT job at 23 years old. Bought my first house at 34, I was on a good path.

I met the wrong woman, pushed me to get rid of my house to move into the city, I supported her starting a business and she pushed and pushed me into getting her the dream house she wanted and using my 401k to do it.

I was deeply in love and couldn't see the forest for the trees. COVID came around, lost the successful business, got divorced, lost everything I ever worked for.

So now here I am. Divorce was a few years ago and I'm starting from near scratch.

I literally think about this stuff everyday. How hard I worked, how hard I planned, all the good decisions I made and now I have nothing, just because I fell in love with the wrong person.

Anyway, enough of that pity party. On the positive side of things, I make 150-170k in the upper midwest, good job, stable, good pay, the one shining light in my life and I have zero health problems, so its not all bad. My 401k currently has 100k.

I have a cheap apartment, rent is only 1200/mo, no frills, just the basics. My car is paid for and is 5-6 years old, will probably keep it another 10 years.

Other than that, I have one loan of 700/mo for the next 5 years.

I know my dream of retiring early is dead, just trying to see what I can do to help myself as much as possible.

1. Work has a 4% match, I am currently contributing the max to my 401k. I have it invested in an aggressive retirement portfolio.

2. HSA through work, contribute the maximum.

3. My work has a pension, I am 100% vested at this point, it pays 1k/mo after 67 years old.

4. My current statement from Social Security puts my monthly payment at 4k a month at standard retirement age.

I am still saving 30k+ a year. I live a pretty cheap life and I'm single, I will probably be able to save a similar amount every year.

What advice do you have for those extra funds? I can only contribute so much to my 401k. I could save it up and buy a house for cash, some years down the road...but it seems crazy to just let that money sit around in a savings account.

I know very little about the stock market, but I am capable of learning.

Any advice folks can give me?

Edit: I think I got some great advice, I should be set. Thanks again for all your help!

1. Open Roth IRA, max it out.

2. Take any remaining funds and open a brokerage acct and focus on ETFs. I already work with Vanguard, so I will just open a brokerage acct with them and focus on VOO.

3. Don't worry about saving every cent, go out and travel and have fun while my body is still young.

Edit 2: Just wanted to say that these responses have made me realize this post may be somewhat insensitive. I know I am in a better spot than the average person. I guess I was saying I am 'way behind' where I was before, where I thought I would be, where I worked to get to. I understand I am still very lucky and still have a good path forward and that many would kill to swap spots with me. I am grateful for what I do have, the job I have and many other things in life and I don't mean to offend.

I actually feel...a lot better. This is something I think about and worry about all the time. The responses in this thread have really calmed me down and given me a sense of peace and acceptance, to some degree. I will be ok, I just need to keep it up and make good decisions, everything will be alright.

Ironically, my ex-wife just messaged me yesterday (we hardly ever talk), she was apologizing again for all she did and her regrets. Can't hold onto this anger forever, even if she has no money and can't pay me anything back, at least she feels bad about it.