Useless Conversation

[Merusk]

So... any opinions on Chicago?

Just got a solid lead via my network but I'm not sure about relocating to the city of my birth, Capone and Corruption.  aka, I know of nothing good to ever have come from Chicago.

[Ingmar]

I just now read that it has lost 200,000 people in the last 10 years, so that bodes pretty well for the housing market there at least?

[Chimpy]

So... any opinions on Chicago?

Just got a solid lead via my network but I'm not sure about relocating to the city of my birth, Capone and Corruption.  aka, I know of nothing good to ever have come from Chicago.

Where is the job at? In the city or out in one of the burbs?

Most of the North and West suburban school districts are pretty good (I know you have kids, so that is always a consideration). Arne Duncan and King Daley did a lot of work on the Chicago Public Schools, so the ones in nicer neighborhoods are pretty good as well.

I am not really a big city person, but I liked living up there overall. I would probably not have moved away when I did if I had full time employment.

For someone who has been stuck in the Cincinnati metro area and is always lamenting the Glenn-Beckyness of the place, I think you will find even the more conservative western burbs around Wheaton to be a breath of fresh air.

[Sand]

I'll also take the time to pimp myself out if y'all need help on your taxes. Just send me a PM to discuss.

Whats your hourly rate? And how long have you been in the business? And do you also handle corporate filings?

So... any opinions on Chicago?

Just got a solid lead via my network but I'm not sure about relocating to the city of my birth, Capone and Corruption.  aka, I know of nothing good to ever have come from Chicago.

Significant other spent years there. I've been back a few times.
I am always amazed at a few things.
1. How clean it is. At least in the areas we have visited it is one of the cleanest big cities I have ever been in. Seriously.
2. How bitterly fucking cold it gets in the winter. Im pretty sure they send the Antarctic research teams to Chicago to train for upcoming missions at the Antarctic base.
3. How low the housing prices are compared to similar big cities. There are some awesome deals in Chicago whether you are looking for a condo downtown or a house in the pseudo-suburbs.
Areas we were looking in: Lincoln Park (closer to downtown more urban lifestyle but cool hip neighborhood), Glenview (more traditional suburb style)

Biggest advice we were given was stay north or north-northwest of downtown. How ever my own internet sleuthing makes me think that advice is suspect because there seem to be some amazing neighborhoods around Hickory Hills which abuts the Cook County Forest Preserve.

[Paelos]

I'll also take the time to pimp myself out if y'all need help on your taxes. Just send me a PM to discuss.

Whats your hourly rate? And how long have you been in the business? And do you also handle corporate filings?

Firm's local, 30 years old, and we do corps, personal, and trusts. I've been there 2 years, and 6 years in the profession.

As for the billing rate, that's a PM question. Arthur_Parker keeps files on all of us. 

[Merusk]

I just now read that it has lost 200,000 people in the last 10 years, so that bodes pretty well for the housing market there at least?

Well, losing 200k households is a bad thing for my line of work, but the territory the office is being opened for stretches from Phoenix to Columbus, Oh.   It'd be with a new architecture office for the largest homebuilder in the US (Pulte group).  Which, of course, brings up a whole host of other issues, questions and problems.  I figure it's worth at least getting some opinions on the city and talking to the hiring manager.   We'll see how effectively he can lie to me about their strategy for not losing money and closing the shop within a year.

Downside is that it's right back into doing what I'm trying to break out from.  I'd rather find a luxury or high-end builder to work for, or a commercial firm at the very least.  Still, if the pay's good enough it gets me out of this hellhole and to a market that actually has successful Arch. firms in the area without the steady flow of cheap intern labor from the local college that UC provides.

The cold and size of the city are a little concern.  Still, I visited 7 years ago and liked the place, I agree with Sand that it was pretty clean.  It reminded me of Cleveland in that regard.*  It'd be nice to live in someplace a little larger and more culturally diverse for a while, too.  The kids are starting to pick-up some bad habits and thought processes here (My daughter has begun calling environmentalists "hippies" despite many lectures and explanations about why it's not good to think that way.) As for the Cold, well it's something you get used to.  I grew up in Cleveland after all, and as someone from an actual snowy place it'd be nice to live someplace that can handle it again for at least a few years.

Hm.. guess I've made up my mind to discuss it at least.  The wife seems Ok with it. (Though she'd prefer Az, but I'm not moving anyplace with water problems.)

* No, really, Cleveland is cleaner than Cincinnati or Pittsburgh. Old jokes about river fires aside, those are explainable because of the way the Cuyahoga bends a 180 and traps a lot of debris.  The river itself is cleaner than the Ohio, Monongahela or Allegheny.

[ghost]

For those of you who need your taxes done we file everything online these days paperless, so there's no excuse for you having to deal with an efile rejection.

Isn't paperless the default now?  My CPA said we had to fill out some form to do it the old way.  

So... any opinions on Chicago?

Just got a solid lead via my network but I'm not sure about relocating to the city of my birth, Capone and Corruption.  aka, I know of nothing good to ever have come from Chicago.

I like Chicago.  I would have to think that a good job is a good job. 

[RhyssaFireheart]

Despite my desire to leave Illinois and Northern Illinois in general (I'm soo over winter and snow and freaking cold weather), I really like living in Chicagoland.  My experience is from living in the NW Suburbs (Schaumburg initially, now out in LITH/Crystal Lake) so I can't advise on living in the city or the inner ring of suburbs.  I did commute downtown for several years and didn't mind at all, personally.  Depending on where the company office is actually located, you could have the benefits of living in the suburbs with commuting downtown, just need to be closer to one of  the Metra lines is all.

[Sky]

there's no excuse for you having to deal with an efile rejection.

Yeah, no shit. But through the amazing powers of bitching about stuff on f13, after two weeks of silence H&R finally told me I had pre-dated my bank authorization. It's how I always did it on the paper returns, figuring it meant the state was allowed to access those funds as of that date. Whatever, fixed it and re-filed (even though they said I couldn't...). We'll see if it works this time. Last time I had to deal with the NYS tax bureau, all correspondence had to be done with snail mail. For reals. No phone, no email.

Fucking deer. 

Hey, this reminds me. I wrote a new country song the other night. It's called FUCKING BEARS. It goes:

G - FUCKING BEARS!
C - FUCKING BEARS!
G - FUCKING BEARS!
D - RUUUUN!
C - RUUUUN!
G - FUCKING BEARS!

It's a sing-along!

[Arthur_Parker]

Arthur_Parker keeps files on all of us. 

  Mrs just got a new phone, it has the option for google updating her location via gps or something (I'm not into phones).  I'm constantly amazed at the personal information people give away without the slightest thought.

[Paelos]

For those of you who need your taxes done we file everything online these days paperless, so there's no excuse for you having to deal with an efile rejection.

Isn't paperless the default now?  My CPA said we had to fill out some form to do it the old way.  

Efile is the movement yes, but that wasn't what I meant by paperless. Essentially, my office has adopted portals which act as our staging point for client document delivery. You upload whatever scans you need, fill out the questionaire, and everything gets handled by us without you ever having to show up in the office if you don't want to. Hell I can do most people's returns via email exchange and then upload completed returns back to their personal portal after they have been efiled for their records.

Paper is dead!

[ghost]

My folks don't have something elaborate like you, but I do most of my interactions over the internet through email.  I would love it if there were truly paperless though. 

[Merusk]

Arthur_Parker keeps files on all of us. 

  Mrs just got a new phone, it has the option for google updating her location via gps or something (I'm not into phones).  I'm constantly amazed at the personal information people give away without the slightest thought.

IIRC, If you have a smartphone it does that anyway, whether you activate the app or not.  It's one reason I decided I'm never owning a smartphone.   

[ghost]

Smartphones are the number of the beast.

[Sand]

Still, if the pay's good enough it gets me out of this hellhole and to a market that actually has successful Arch. firms in the area without the steady flow of cheap intern labor from the local college that UC provides.

If you dont mind my asking, where do you live presently?

[Merusk]

Cincinnati

[Yegolev]

I'm fascinated with how Filipinos shorten their names in basically the opposite direction that I would.  Elvin becomes Vin, Nathaniel becomes Niel, Rosario is Sar, and William is Yam.

[SnakeCharmer]

I could totally go for some lumpia and pancit about right now...

[ghost]

I'm fascinated with how Filipinos shorten their names in basically the opposite direction that I would.  Elvin becomes Vin, Nathaniel becomes Niel, Rosario is Sar, and William is Yam.

I wonder if this has anything to do with the Chinese form of the first name being the "family" name.  I know this is the case for Chinese, thus Yao Ming would be Mr. Yao.  Some of the filipino languages are descended from asian languages, I thought.   I don't know if this naming convention follows for other Asian languages though. 

[Sand]

Is it due to the fact that most English names with two or more syllables place the emphasis on the lat syllable, example Ri-chard.
So they assume the last syllable is the most important and keep it?

Do we have any Filipino posters on the board?

[Samwise]

Is it due to the fact that most English names with two or more syllables place the emphasis on the lat syllable, example Ri-chard.

You say riCHARD instead of RICHard?  I don't think I've ever heard anyone, even a non-native speaker, pronounce that name that way.

[ghost]

Is it due to the fact that most English names with two or more syllables place the emphasis on the lat syllable, example Ri-chard.

You say riCHARD instead of RICHard?  I don't think I've ever heard anyone, even a non-native speaker, pronounce that name that way.

There are many names in Spanish that have that type of accent, and the Philippines were a Spanish interest at one point.  That is probably the reason. 

[Chimpy]

You would need someone who speaks Tagalog to tell you why they do it that way (as that is probably where they take their language conventions from, not Spanish).

[Ingmar]

Is it due to the fact that most English names with two or more syllables place the emphasis on the lat syllable, example Ri-chard.

You say riCHARD instead of RICHard?  I don't think I've ever heard anyone, even a non-native speaker, pronounce that name that way.

Or WillIAM instead of WILLiam, or daVID instead of DAvid or lauRA instead of LAUra or hey maybe Sand is talking out of his ass.

[Lantyssa]

You might get daVID from someone who speaks Hebrew.

[ghost]

You would need someone who speaks Tagalog to tell you why they do it that way (as that is probably where they take their language conventions from, not Spanish).

Actually, Spanish has a very strong influence in the Phillipines and was the official language for many years until it was rescinded in 1973.  I know nothing of Tagalog.  It is possible that it has some similar conventions and there are quite a few Spanish words that the Filipinos have adopted, although the meanings may differ some from what we might expect. 

[Strazos]

My last name, which is Spanish by way of the Philippines, has the emphasis on the second-to-last syllable. /shrug

[ghost]

My last name, which is Spanish by way of the Philippines, has the emphasis on the second-to-last syllable. /shrug

Don't two syllable names in Spanish often have the accent on the second syllable?

[Strazos]

No idea; mine is 4.

[Furiously]

So Teal'c was Spanish?

[Sand]

Is it due to the fact that most English names with two or more syllables place the emphasis on the lat syllable, example Ri-chard.

You say riCHARD instead of RICHard?  I don't think I've ever heard anyone, even a non-native speaker, pronounce that name that way.

Or WillIAM instead of WILLiam, or daVID instead of DAvid or lauRA instead of LAUra or hey maybe Sand is talking out of his ass.

Or hey maybe Sand was just asking a question. The mind boggles.
 

I'll be honest. When I say "David" to myself I cant tell if there is more emphasis on either syllable.

[Paelos]

I put the emphasis on both D's




 

[Nerf]

I'm starting to think I might be an asshole.

Went to staples tonight to buy a printer, a Lexmark Pro901 ($5/500 pages black ink? yes please).  Sale price of $199.99, and they give a $50 credit if you trade-in an old printer.

Get to register, request a pricematch, asst. manager asks what store and I say "Well, Amazon has it for One Fift..." cuts me with off with "We don't pricematch Amazon."

Nerf: "Ok, no problem, Wal-mart has it for cheaper too, give me a second and I'll pull the price up."
AM:   "We don't pricematch Wal-mart."
Nerf: "Uhh, what?"
AM:   "We don't pricematch Wal-mart."
Nerf: "Yes, you do, I'd be more than happy to show you your own pricematch policy, and I need to speak to your manager"
   Guy storms off and disappears in the back for 5 minutes, walks up to me and spits out, "Do you have it?"
Nerf: "The wal-mart price or the policy, and where is your manager?"
AM:   "I know our policy, we don't pricematch wal-mart, and the general manager isn't here."
Nerf: "That's fine, I need you to call him."
AM:   "We don't pricematch wal-mart, here's the GM's card (with the store phone # on it), now leave or I'll phone the police."
Nerf: "Excuse me?  You need to get your manager on the phone, NOW."
AM:   "We don't pricematch wal-mart, you leave or I call police."

He then just walked off into the back for another 10 minutes or so, I turned to one of the guys at the front who was just standing there looking shocked and said, "hey dude, I know you've got the GM's phone number in the back, I need you to get him on the phone for me, this is unacceptable."
Register dude walks into the office, comes right back and says that asst. manager is on phone with GM.  AM comes out a few minutes later and puts his cellphone in his pocket.  I tell him again that I need to speak to his store manager, and he again says the GM cannot ever be reached if he's not on site, and he'd have me arrested if I didn't leave.
I whipped out my cellphone, recorded a minute or so of video of the guy being the worst goddamn manager in history, and went on my way.

Tomorrow should be fun, fortunately this particular staples is right on my way home from school, and when I'm done even Fry's won't fucking hire Alieu Touray.
If I'm going to get treated like an asshole anyways, I'm at least going to fucking enjoy it.

On the plus side, I discovered a breaker in my panel that had caught on fire a little bit the other day.  Called Old Republic Home Warranty yesterday, they had an electrician out within ~5 hours, and today he replaced the entire main panel.  Total cost to us? $60.

[Samwise]

 

[Sand]

Nerf I am convinced a camera crew could follow you around and just film random shit that happens in your life and make money hats from it.
You are a singularity for drama and lulz.