Small Town Incompetence

It's the opioids, OP.

I can't say incompetence, but a few surprises for me were that ATM fees were much higher as was dry cleaning. Clearly, there isn't the volume in a small town so that is made up with higher fees.

The one thing that I have noticed that isn't really incompetence but feels like it is the number of tradesmen who will come out, give you a quote and then disappear. One would think that they would be hungry for work, but that is not the case.

However, you've lived in small towns by CHOICE!?? I'm having difficulty jumping aboard your rant. If you don't like it, I'm sure you can choose to live elsewhere.

OP, most people know this. The rube here is you.

This sounds like a wonderful idea for a sit-com.

MARY!

OP = Moira Rose

R3, you are correct. For every inconvenience of a small town there are the city folk who embarrass themselves. My favorite was a guy who was complaining about the condition of our dirt roads. He showed a video of a cup of soda sloshing around is car. Unfortunately, both the speedometer (50mph+) and the Mercedes logo were visible. The locals trashed him for going 50 on a dirt road with a low profile vehicle.

We also have people who complain that horse riders do not pick up after their horses. Someone pointed out that it wasn't horse poop pictured , it was bear poop.

Mail boxes are a real problem. Town people complain that all of the mailboxes are on the same side of the road because the mail person cannot turn around to do both sides or that the town snowplows don't plow out the mailboxes (honey, you're lucky the snow plow doesn't take out your mail box.) People complain that they have to walk a 1/4 mile to get to their mailbox. As with so many things *you knew that when you bought the house*. It isn't some surprise that was dumped on you. You bought a secluded house with a long driveway. The mail person is not driving up your drive to deliver mail to your door.

The first time you got the main dish with sauce, shame on them. The second time, shame on you for expecting a third and FOURTH try was in order. The manager was being helpful - don't put yourself through such aggravation - eat at family restaurants and take what you get. If you developed a rapport with the staff at a local place, they would probably be willing to adapt to your "big city gourmet" tastes as best as possible.

You do realize that you are not at the top of the pecking order when it comes to access to quality service. Do you know the service the .001% get?

Moral - when in Rome, do as the Romans.

I recently moved to a small town from a major U.S. city...and it's on an island.

In some ways, paradise. In some ways, I have had to make (to put it charitably) a "recalibration" of what I expect. Things happen slowly, and there's nothing you can do about it. So there's not much point in getting upset about it.

I came up with a new word--Octcember--to show how uncertain and unpredictable it is that purchases, approvals, or any desired change will actually takes place. I use it often.

In my mothers small town, which is on a sea island in South Carolina, the dentist is half the cost of a big city, and she’s very good. All medical and veterinary care is a fraction of urban areas. The tradespeople are all on meth and oxy though, and occasionally commit violent crimes. Last month a local murdered their boyfriend in the shower with a hammer. I don’t know who keeps hammers in the shower. Or I used to not know, now I do.

[quote] can't say incompetence, but a few surprises for me were that ATM fees were much higher

Who the fuck still uses an ATM?

R12, Small town businesses will only take cash or check. An actual bank branch is 40min away.

r13 where do you live? Here in CT every business takes cards and many are now taking phone payments. Shit, I go to an outdoor fruit and vegetable place on a local farm and even they take cards.

[quote]The tradespeople are all on meth and oxy though, and occasionally commit violent crimes.

And that never happens with tradespeople in cities, of course.

R14, very rural NH. We don't have many Free-State residents, but the majority of people like being disconnected from Big...anything. We are having a huge fight over Fios. Since Covid-19 made working from home the norm, we have had some city folk move into the area and they are demanding high speed internet. The locals are against it. They have done fine without it and they don't want it.

Actually, R15, where I am in New England, all the tradespeople are from small towns. They come to the big cities because that's where they can make money. And bitch about the parking.

The difference, though, is that people in the city know better than to accept shitty work at high prices from the rubes.

NH takes NIMBY and extrapolates it to an entire state.

I also moved to a small town last year, and some differences are astounding.

We had our first big snowfall of the year last week, and the town does not have the main street cleared well; the sidewalk approaches on thr corners are blocked with piles of snow. Might be a path cleared about a foot wide, but if you're disabled, using a walker or stroller, crossing the street is a hassle. Lots of icy spots in & around crossings. They don't use salt, they use fine gravel. In the spring we had to rake the gravel out of our grass along the curb, & we're on a large corner lot.

Same about services, as a previous poster mentioned. There are two or three options for every service: car repair, veterinarian. We have one pharmacy that has operated since 1838. If I didn't like a place or had poor service in the city I could find another option. Here..... you take what you get, or you look for the service in towns nearby.

The services can be frustrating. Even if someone is recommended, even by more than one person, it may not be thr best work. Example: the most well known masonry company in the area has been around forever, and has strong ties in town. One of the owners is on the town council. People recommend them, but I've also heard a couple people complain about the work done by some of the guys. Lots of ghosting too, from my own experience & heard from others.

You have to watch what you say. If you speak negatively about a service to your neighbor, you might discover you're talking about your neighbor's brother or cousin. A reserved sense of diplomacy works best.

It's a strange way of living. Definitely requires a recalibration!

[quote]The difference, though, is that people in the city know better than to accept shitty work at high prices from the rubes.

And people in the country are just as intolerant of shitty work. You haven't lived until you've heard the entitled white cunts in CT and NY state bitch and moan about not being able to find good tradespeople.

r19 it sounds like you need to widen your search from just your own town and the immediate area. Lots of tradespeople in New England will travel.

Cities with a lot of rich people have industries geared towards catering to rich.

Obviously if you move outside of those type of zones, you aren't going find that services that are built around catering to rich people and exacting standards.

My parents and grandparents lived in NH, and we spent a lot of time there. Yes, there is very little in the way of top quality service as no one since the dawn of time has ever showed them how to do things efficiently, or in a now accepted manner.

For instance you can actually find very good food, but there is not a competent waiter or waitress with a hundred miles. They are excellent at building roads well and quickly, but anything involving one-on-one services tends to be...well, whatever it is.

OP sounds like a real pill to deal with.

PS you DON'T want to know what they were doing with your food in the kitchen lol!

Let's get down to brass tacks, shall we?

How are the rentboys?

[quote]However, you've lived in small towns by CHOICE!?? I'm having difficulty jumping aboard your rant. If you don't like it, I'm sure you can choose to live elsewhere.

What a stupid comment. There could be any number of reasons why the poster has made this decision. Also, he or she may have thought and hoped that bad service in one small city or town wouldn't necessarily be a predictor of bad service in another.

The thing about New Englanders is that they don't give a shit about a person's social position. You're not going to get your ass kissed just because you're wealthy like you would in NYC. You'll be treated just like everybody else, and New Englanders are also rather salty anyway.

My mother still lives in my dying rustbelt town of 5,000 (same pop. as when I was a kid). There is no tailor or alterations; one grocery store (not counting Family Dollar and Dollar General); a couple fast food restaurants; no clothing stores for at least 40 mi.... and on and on.

She's afraid to shop online so she just goes without.

[quote]The thing about New Englanders is that they don't give a shit about a person's social position. You're not going to get your ass kissed just because you're wealthy like you would in NYC. You'll be treated just like everybody else, and New Englanders are also rather salty anyway.

Fine, but what does that have to do with the OP or the rest of this thread? Seems like a totally separate issue to me.

All I know is that I feel the need to shit whenever I drive through a small town!

R26 not so stupid, because you yourself used the phrase “...poster has made this decision...” implying they have a choice. Also, bite me!

It appears that many buy into the bucolic, Norman Rockwellian facade of small town living, but once they arrive they want to change things to suit their lifestyle, rather than adapt to the prevailing lifestyle. It is pure arrogance.

R4 nailed it.

OP is basically wondering why he isn't finding the same level of service in a local diner he finds in his 500 per person Manhattan restaurant.

This is common sense.

My primary residence is in one of the 10 largest cities in America but I spend the spring and summer 3+ hours south out in the middle of nowhere 15 miles from the nearest sizable town that has about 32,000 people (plus 20,000+ college students when classes are in session). But being way out in the country I have to look for people who are close by in some of the tiny communities I'm closer to. I haven't had any problem at all finding good qualified people to do work for me. In fact the quality of their work is as good or better than most service people I encounter in the city. Down here these are salt of the earth people. They take pride in their work because they want you to keep doing business with them. When you demonstrate that you're going to use them again and again they will go out of their way to accommodate you. And when the occasion occurs that I need to call someone in to do work they are usually there the same day. I've even had one guy (a plumber) I called at 4pm who came by at 6pm on his way home from work to take care of my problem. I'd never find anyone back home who would do such a thing.

R29, OP's post reads like it's written by a rich, entitled asshole who thinks his shit doesn't stink. He was treated "special" in the big city but is now treated like everyone else and resents it. He is also ignorant of that fact, which makes it even more "special".

Exactly r34. I suspect he also has an arrogant, high-handed way of dealing with the "rubes" which could be why people don't go out of their way to help him.

[quote] Let's get down to brass tacks, shall we? How are the rentboys?

They are incompetent.

No, they are incontinent.

R34 nail, head etc.

People like that really irk the fuck out of me. I know a few.

[quote]Who the fuck still uses an ATM?

People who live in legal recreational cannabis states, that's who the fuck.

i.e. paying your dealer r39.

OP, Hicksville is *not* a small town. It’s for 42,000 people in it & is surrounded by other well populated suburban metro NY towns.

It is Billy Joel’s home town & was founded by the Hicks family

[quote] House Cleaning: be prepared for slovenly people who bring filth-encrusted mops into your house, reach into your garbage can with their hands and then go back to cleaning, and wipe your microwave out with dusty rags

Hey fuckface, what's wrong with you? You don't have mops/brooms/rags? You make your cleaning person bring their own mops and rags?

That's probably why the cleaning person brought over filthy mops, because you are too damned cheap to own one yourself.

In “Laura Lansing Slept Here” Katharine Hepburn plays an out of touch novelist. Her editor won’t let her use the word “penthouse” in another book title.

“Out of touch? Why, just last night I had dinner with Barbara Walters, Clint Eastwood and Jackie Onassis. Just plain folk!”

So she moves to Hicksville.

OP, there is nothing MARY! about your post. You just sound like a snob who can’t adapt. And I can almost hear your tone of voice with those whom you clearly view as your inferiors.

And OP of course the mops and rags are dirty because they are used to clean. Cleaners do not open up sterilized packages of mops each time they get forty dollars for cleaning your dumpy digs.

First World Problems! Move bitch, you are not the center of the fucking universe. Oh and I'm sure the second time you sent back your food the cook put a little shit in your food. Stupid faggot being stupid.

Clean your own house and cook your own meals, you fat whore!

MARY! MARY! MARY! MARY! MARY! MARY! MARY! MARY! MARY! MARY! MARY!

MARY! MARY! MARY! MARY! MARY! MARY! MARY! MARY! MARY! MARY! MARY!

MARY! MARY! MARY! MARY! MARY! MARY! MARY! MARY! MARY! MARY! MARY!

MARY! MARY! MARY! MARY! MARY! MARY! MARY! MARY! MARY!

MARY! MARY! MARY! MARY! MARY! MARY! MARY! MARY! MARY!

MARY! MARY! MARY! MARY! MARY! MARY! MARY! MARY! MARY!

MARY! MARY! MARY! MARY! MARY! MARY! MARY! MARY! MARY!

Perhaps you live in the wrong small town. Mine is tremendous. And they even know how to plow snow from roads - really well!

Small towns around here in Lousy-ana are always having boil orders for their water systems. Some redneck yahoo overseeing the water system, no thanks. It was in Louisiana that the woman got brain eating amoeba and died by using her neti pot with the village water system. Small towns can be deadly.

[quote]Not so stupid, because you yourself used the phrase “...poster has made this decision...” implying they have a choice. Also, bite me!

People can "decide" to do something because they feel it's the best option available to them, and because their ideal situation is not possible for whatever reasons. I hope you can understand that.

And, as I said, just because services in one small city or town were bad didn't mean the OP should have assumed that they would be bad in every small city in which he went on to live, but in his opinion, that turned out to be the case. Hence his comment.

Our town whore doesn't realize blow is a term.

I have a place in the country, and it's true that you really have to adjust your expectations. I've found that you also have to be clear on what you expect. For example:

"You'll actually stack the wood into a cord when you deliver it instead of just leaving it in a pile, correct?"

"When you fold the linen napkins, could you please do me a tiny favor and fold them all the same way? I won't be picky on what way, just that they're consistent."

"When you say tomorrow afternoon, do you mean between noon and five PM?"

Stuff like that.

"

[quote]"When you fold the linen napkins, could you please do me a tiny favor and fold them all the same way? I won't be picky on what way, just that they're consistent."

I'll take 'Entitled White Cunts' for $400.

Stacking your own wood is great exercise, you should try it.

Some things are much better in small towns, like the inevitable jury duty. When I was called for jury duty in a small town in Colorado, I was there for 3 hours, and there was one case. In Los Angeles, it’s always a shit show that lasts all day. People are in the wrong room, there’s always an old man yelling about his special circumstances and frazzled business people are pleading to go home. The last time I was called, I got a margarita at lunch to cope.

Ever since I saw "Doc Hollywood" I wanted to live in that town!

In small towns there are fewer options. That's just the way they are. If you don't like that, then don't move to one.

OP sounds like a hissing kween.

I've always found that the level of service one gets is in direct correlation to the level of rapport you have with the provider. With good rapport you can establish mutual expectations. Service providers generally like to please, and take pride in their work.

I can imagine this 'big-town' kween hasn't figured that out yet.

OP, how classist can you fucking get? A grease fire is too good for you. Die in a guillotine during the revolution.

[quote]OP sounds like a hissing kween.

I have to admit that was the first thing that went through my mind too. The second thing was that OP looks something like this:

[quote]I've always found that the level of service one gets is in direct correlation to the level of rapport you have with the provider. With good rapport you can establish mutual expectations. Service providers generally like to please, and take pride in their work

EXACTLY. Don't act like an upper-middle class twit talking down to "the little people," which is what so many do, OP is probably in this camp as well. I was raised UMC but goddamn if I don't talk to and treat everybody with the same level of respect and friendliness. It was how I was raised. I've used the same car mechanic for years and we chat for awhile every time I go in to the garage. If I have people like plumbers or contractors coming over to my house I always have water, soda and snacks for them and we chat for awhile in the kitchen. Treat others with kindness and respect and you will be treated the same way in return. Acting like an "overlord" is so tacky and ungracious.

I picture OP like this, with the same smug expression whenever he talks to people who are "beneath" his socioeconomic niche.

R53- You are exactly right. I never thought I'd need to clarify that I wanted my Christmas wreaths the same size for 4 windows, but here in a tiny SC island town, the person that makes and sells the wreaths has no clue about her pricing, how large the frames are, etc. Had to go two counties over just to have a florist makes bows for them. She couldn't provide a quote either....$231.00 later, never making that mistake again. At the seamstress, I wanted to have a repair made on a sweater and was told they only have black and white thread. For salmon, I'd need to go to the next town over.

So go to the next fucking town over! What is your problem, you really expect one town to have everything that caters to your oh-so-specific needs? JFC.

In Manhattan you don't think twice about going from one end of the city to another for some specific service, why should a suburban area be any different?

This reminds me of my dear friend Carolyne Roehm's funny-horror anecdote called the "Passmenterie in Bethlehem Incident." It was so traumatic Carolyne simply banished all window treatments from Weatherstone, a very stylish and successful solution. Toujours comme il faut with Carolyn.

[quote]"When you fold the linen napkins, could you please do me a tiny favor and fold them all the same way? I won't be picky on what way, just that they're consistent."

Only if you'll do us a tiny favor and die in a grease fire. Any kind that burns consistently.

I love the prisspot who still uses linen napkins, and has to have them folded JUST SO.

OP = goyishe kvetch

I use linen napkins because I inherited over a hundred of them, but I fold them every which a way and reuse mine for several meals. I do all my own work, too. What kind of lazybones is hiring staff to fold napkins and clean during Covid? Aren’t you all home all day anyway? I think it’s stupid that people pay for gym memberships yet can’t chop wood or shovel snow or vacuum.

[quote]What kind of lazybones is hiring staff to fold napkins and clean during Covid?

An entitled cunt.

Do you people realize that some of these replies are, more than likely, mostly fictional? It’s a blend of 80s television and classic Hollywood films, dipped in late 90s gay culture and Martha Stewart. The linen napkins don’t exist.

r72 you must be new here. Many DL elders are stuck in the past.

There are some good small towns like Park City, Jackson Hole, Palm Springs.

Park City is kind of ugly, at least Jackson has some stunning scenery. Unfortunately, both are in Republican zones, and both prominently feature outlet mall shopping. Gross.

I wouldn’t consider Palm Springs a “small town” it’s a resort that’s an extension of Los Angeles.

[quote]I'll take 'Entitled White Cunts' for $400.

I assume if you're running or managing a restaurant everyone sits and folds napkins before each shift, so it really does need to be done consistently. I doubt it's asking the maid to fold six napkins.

70-something posts and no TL;DR on the OP.

[quote] Do you people realize that some of these replies are, more than likely, mostly fictional? It’s a blend of 80s television and classic Hollywood films, dipped in late 90s gay culture and Martha Stewart. The linen napkins don’t exist.

Exactly. OP most likely hasn't set foot outside of a gay ghetto in an urban area of a blue state since Reagan was president, or even gone to non-urban areas of that same blue state, and his view of the rest of the country is based on media-generated stereotypes by people who likely haven't been outside their comfort zones in a similar amount of time. Yet he snidely and smugly scoffs at anyone who tries to argue that the success of unfunny TV sitcoms about white people at the expense of actually funny TV sitcoms about nonwhite people is the result of racism.

[quote]Exactly. OP most likely hasn't set foot outside of a gay ghetto in an urban area of a blue state since Reagan was president,

That might POSSIBLY be true, but why do you think it's "most likely," and how could you possibly know? For the sake of argument, what would OP have to gain by posting if everything he wrote was made up?

OP likes that people are excited, and talking about dainty things like linen napkins.

R79: Because threads like these are always posted by people who suffer from an unmistakable combination of classism and class envy. We are in the midst of a fucking pandemic where people’s jobs and homes are on the goddamn line, and OP still feels entitled to punch down.

[quote] I love the prisspot who still uses linen napkins

I'm no prisspot, but I use cloth napkins all the time. But I wash, fold, and iron the things myself. I've found I really enjoy ironing. I lower the ironing board so I can sit and watch TV while I'm ironing. I find it very calming.

R8 None of that negates my critique of small-town service. And there isn't need to go all tribal about this. I didn't say city people were superior in every way.

R24 So I'm a "real pill" because of what? Sorry, no. There is nothing in my post that you would not also be upset about if it happened to you.

R32 Read my post. I was not in a "local diner", I was in a nice restaurant and even in a diner I should not have to ask 4 times to leave a sauce of a dish and then be insulted by the manager.

R34 and R35 are both morons. I am actually poor, and I was never impolite to any of these service people. I've done these jobs myself.

R42 you are an extreme and psycho moron. I didn't ask her to bring anything. She just brought supplies with her.

R62 Another moron. I am poor and I don't "look down" on anyone. Except people with no critical thinking abilities, like you.

Everyone here would also be upset by the things that happened to me. There is nothing extreme or fussy about the things I expected from these service people.

[quote]Everyone here would also be upset by the things that happened to me. There is nothing extreme or fussy about the things I expected from these service people.

Wrong and wrong. You're a cunt.

[quote]Except people with no critical thinking abilities, like you.

Everybody on this thread who slammed you for being an obnoxious entitled spoiled cunt has pretty good critical thinking abilities.

I'm with you to a certain extent, R84. These people are assuming that, because they have not had bad experiences with service people in small towns, there must be something wrong with YOU because you did. I would also be very annoyed by the things you experienced, assuming your stories are accurate. On the other hand, while I'm sorry for your bad experiences, I don't think you should make huge generalizations about the services available in small towns. I think maybe you have just been really unlucky so far.

Everything is a trade off.

I live in a rent controlled apartment in Los Angeles and have kept my job during the pandemic.

As my old bldg. is rent controlled, the walls are paper thin and this former New England boy can testify that it gets pretty cold here in LA.

I have a heater for the bedroom and hope to someday be able to afford one for the living room.

I feel like a millionaire some days because I have a job and pay low rent.

I'd rather make more though and afford the high end services of a big city.

R84 is known as digging yourself into a deeper hole, dear DL.

Ssh, let’s be quiet and watch how this unfolds. Popcorn, anyone?

You can't get there from here.

Do gays flee to small towns because I live in a very rural area and see some gays? We have 20 acre lots and only three houses on our road. Two owners are gay and the couple who run post office r fag hag plus gay guy. Lots of single guys out here who could be gay.