u/Ok_Counter1939

When you leave a church, particularly if you left voluntarily but you saw signs that it was time to move on, and then the church shrinks significantly after you leave, have you done anything other than pray for it and maybe refer people to it?

I’m not a pastor, but I was a volunteer leader of a branch of a multinational Christian nonprofit. The more I got to know the nonprofit‘s leadership, the less I wanted to be involved. Then the nonprofit kept saying different things about people in my position needing to leave at the end of the current term, but that it didn’t want me to leave; whatever. I quit.

I see on the organization’s event invitations online that the number of people attending its events is much smaller than it was when I was in charge. Attendance is so small: maybe 20 people now, compared to 50 to 200 when I was in charge.

Yes, at first I felt vindicated, but we all work for Jesus and seeing a Christian organization shrink dramatically isn’t good, regardless of our feelings about the organization.

As a pastor, have you seen this happen? If so, did you do anything about it?

Thanks.

I’m an angel investor. Startups message me on LinkedIn, saying that they’re raising and offering “a quick intro call”.

No. Send an executive summary.

I could do perhaps 16 intro calls in a day. I could review many times that number of one-pagers.

If you’re looking to raise funds, send a one-pager, then do a call if the investor wants one. Not the call first.

(Yes, I know that lots of founders will disagree with this.)

If you’re dining or getting drinks at the Harvard Club of New York City, and you’re with a member, can you give your credit card to pay?

I see online reviews saying that you can.

But when I asked at the HCNY, I was told no by some employees and yes by others.

Does anyone know if the answer is yes or no?

If you’re a 23-year old Harvard College graduate and you are a Club member and want to take your parents to brunch in the Main Dining Room, or if you want to take a business contact who is a member for drinks, surely there’s a way to pay by credit card, right?

Thanks!

In your company, does senior management (e.g., the Board of Directors and C-suite) actually hate employees who report to senior management (either direct reports or more junior employees)? For example, during senior management meetings, does senior management mock and say nasty things (for example, calling them names and describing them as "useless") about employees who report to senior management?

Am I correct to view Norm Law as the most elite of the AI-native firms, with Crosby and General Legal the next most elite, and most others (unless they’ve raised investor funds) not much more than solo practitioners or small firms that just market themselves as “AI-native”?

Today’s church service was wonderful: a very engaging, helpful sermon; lots of Scripture; and excellent music.

What’s the best way to say thanks and make sure that the pastors and music director know that we appreciate them?

-An email to everyone involved

-Separate emails to everyone involved

-A handwritten thank you note to everyone involved

-Separate handwritten thank you notes

-A gift basket or the like sent to the church (with food for the staff)

-Something else?

If you look at Yelp reviews and YouTube videos of malls, even dead malls, there are people who do detailed photos and videos of elevators, showing the model number, even.

I guess being interested in a dead mall is a bit unusual, but being very interested in elevators in malls is even more of a niche hobby.

What is the appeal to people of documenting elevators in malls: do they work in the industry or something?

In 2022, the ECVC team from McCarter & English left and went to Nelson Mullins in NYC. Then most of the team seems to have moved onto other firms.

Am I assuming that Nelson Mullins offered to pay the partners more, but somehow things didn’t work out at Nelson Mullins? Does anyone know what went wrong at both firms?

I’d like to spend a weekend afternoon on the LIRR, Metro-North or NJ Transit: perhaps 4 hours from start (Grand Central or Penn Station) to stop (back at Grand Central or Penn Station, but I don’t have to return to the station I left from).

What’s the best trip to take, in terms of seeing lots of train variety and ideally a nice station as the destination?

Seeing the Acela at 160 mph through NJ would be a plus, but it’s not a requirement.

Thanks!

If I hear tax lawyers ramble on with encyclopedia-type ramblings, when all the client needs is a “do this to avoid that” instruction, I’m going to scream.

Who rambles on the most in client meetings? I think it’s the tax department.

If your family first arrived in Greenville 100+ years ago, do you know what brought them here? Was it a land grant from the state (or colonial governors)? A job? Something else?

My own ancestors arrived when Greenville was perhaps a few shacks along a dirt road, in the 1700s, so I’m curious as to what the attraction was.

Does that always mean that the store eventually will close?

Let’s say that you have two malls:

The first is 500,000 sf and is fully occupied.

The second has the exact same stores and trade area demographics as the first, but the second is 1,000,000 sf and a 50% vacancy rate.

How much lower would traffic at the second mall be than at the first?

Is there objective data about how much vacancies alone reduce traffic? The sight of closed stores is a turnoff for people, but does the sight of closed stores reduce traffic, if so, and by how much?

When I was in college, I was so stressed out by grades that I didn’t want any interruptions from studying, except maybe Saturday evenings. I figure that students ought to be spending time meeting each other and studying.

I now have a nephew starting college about half an hour from my house, and 1500 miles from his home. He’s been to the small town where his college is probably twice a year over the last ten years, and his now-gone grandmother grew up in that town and his now-gone great grandparents lived there until recently, so there is a distant family connection to that town, but he knows maybe two people who will be in his class.

We aren’t close, mostly because he lives so far away, and I am terrified of saying or doing the wrong thing (I am prone to, and I’m a childless widower so I don’t have anyone to catch me before I screw up), so I don’t reach out a lot.

If you’re in his shoes, how often would you want to see your aunt or uncle who lives 30 minutes away from your dorm?

Would taking him and his friends to lunch or dinner once a month be ok? Would sending him a gift basket once a month be ok? Anything else I should or should not do?

Thanks.

NetDocuments is absolutely excruciating: to even change a comma on a document requires downloading the document, opening a website, uploading the document to the website and typing in all sorts of information about the document.

It alone makes me want to quit.

Heavyweight passenger cars in the U.S., built before the 1940s, were often painted dark or olive green. So were passenger cars in the UK and in various European countries, even until more recently.

Why, and why not white or gray? Did dark green hide dirt or something?

The only affordable thing in Greenville is the taxes, and even those are higher than elsewhere on some things (groceries, some car things).

If you want to be "respectable" in Greenville, you need a well-maintained house and yard and a decent car.

Houses need upkeep. Things break all the time: pipes, appliances, electrical things. Tens of thousands of dollars from time to time, plus $15k ever 15 years to buy a new HVAC unit. Roof? Tens of thousands.

Yards need upkeep. Weeds don't stop and maintaining a yard to keep up with the neighbors takes time and/or money. Hundreds per month.

Cars need upkeep and to be replaced. A new tire this week was over $400.

Real estate prices in some parts of Greenville are literally what they are around some big cities such as SF and Boston and DC.

And the schools are not great (that's the fault of parents and children in them) so if you want an A-grade education it's necessary to go private and quality private schools are an arm and a leg.

So in Greenville you pay a ton for real estate, house/yard/car upkeep and K-12 education. The only cheap thing is taxes and they aren't necessarily lower on all things than elsewhere. Yet wages/salaries are significantly lower than in bigger cities and some parts of the country.

If you're a professional looking to get ahead, a country club membership is part of the game and that's a $40k initiation fee at some places.

I really question how people here make it.

I'm on my university's alumni board for my city, and we have lots of events for alumni. The events are free and are usually for business networking.

Most anyone who comes to us with an event idea and is willing to organize it and either get a sponsor or pay for the costs of it themselves is generally welcome to, within a few limits. In that case, all the alumni association does is send out an email to alumni and set up a ticket registration page. Most events are organized by alumni, and generally they get some business or personal benefit out of it. People who organize events almost never create any issues; we tell them that we'll send out an email and it's up to them to handle the event, and we tell them the alumni association requirements and it's fine.

We had a recent event where the organizer became irate because nobody from the alumni association board attended the event or introduced her at the event, and because the organizer had to operate the Google Meet by themselves. I'm now concerned that more could go wrong at future events.

Question: Would it be reasonable and a good idea to have event organizers and speakers (none of whom are paid for the event) sign a waiver before the event?

For example, the waiver could require them to take all responsibility for the content of the event. It would also say that all the alumni association does is publicize the event and handle online registrations, and that the alumni association doesn't cover any costs. It could also say that the alumni association may in its discretion have a board member attend and give a greeting, and it could also specify, in writing, what the criteria for alumni events are.

I think this would be a good idea, but I haven't heard of anyone doing that.

Thanks.

I own a house but travel most of the time for work. It’s in a desirable neighborhood. I inherited the house recently. I am keeping it. I am not selling it.

One realtor who have never met or communicated with contacted my neighbors, telling them that “in the real estate world, there’s a lot of talk that” I’m selling my house.

That‘s not at all true.

Is that typical realtor behavior: contacting someone’s neighbors to try to get information about the status of a house? Particularly saying things that aren’t true to get information about the status of a house?

If I ever sell, I’m certainly not using that realtor.