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I have a couple of short stories about this and I wonder how many other people it happens to. Is it that some people are so stubborn they can't be told anything? Is it some sort of bias only against their kids? Read on and decide:
Friend of mine used to be a painter, does real estate now. He's in his late 40's. About 10 years ago, before he went solo as a painter, he was working with his dad's painting company. (which basically consisted of him and his dad, and a couple of part-time guys)
They were doing a church, which of course had high ceilings and they couldn't use regular ladders because of the stained glass windows. The dad's idea was to get scaffolding and paint it that way. But to do that, they would have to unbolt all the pews from the floor, move them, set up the scaffolding, etc. Mark did some research and found that they could rent one of those mobile scissor lifts which fit perfectly next to the pews, reduced the number of man hours by 60% and made life easier. They'd save money and get the job done faster.
Mark's dad wouldn't have it. Refused to budge, despite the numbers being there in black and white. So they used his dad's method which took a multitude of hours longer and they made less money on the job. Mark quit the company not long after that and went solo.
Then again, when his dad was in the hospital last year from a heart attack, he didn't want to lay in bed, take the drugs prescribed to him, or do anything the doctors said... resulting in an infection in his chest that almost killed him.
Sometimes you have to bite the bullet and knock it off with your stubbornness, I think.
Story 2:
While playing D & D one night one of the women in my group got a call from a friend of hers whose mother had gotten a fake Microsoft technician telephone call and wanted to give the guy her credit card number and access to her computer. Of course, the mother refused to listen to her daughter because how could she know anything? So she called the woman in my group, Julia, who is a computer geek and actually does some soldering and web site work for my company, in hopes that she could talk some sense into her mother.
And I'm in the background yelling "TELL HER I OWN A COMPUTER STORE! I GUARANTEE ITS FAKE!"
Finally, having three people telling her it was a bogus call, she hung up on the fake Microsoft tech. But goddam, woman... try listening to people.
Actually, one more related... had a customer a few years ago who had to get power of attorney over his uncle, because the guy had spent TENS OF THOUSANDS OF DOLLARS sending it to a guy in Nigeria with the absolute belief he was going to get a million dollars in return. Unfortunately it was looking like the guy was going to lose his house and it was probably too late to do anything about it, as he had spent all his tax/mortgage money on Honorable Barrister Whackadoo Jones. I never heard what happened after that.
So you'll buy in to the bullshit story of some random guy from Nigeria you never met, but you won't listen to your own family. Oy vey.
Friend of mine used to be a painter, does real estate now. He's in his late 40's. About 10 years ago, before he went solo as a painter, he was working with his dad's painting company. (which basically consisted of him and his dad, and a couple of part-time guys)
They were doing a church, which of course had high ceilings and they couldn't use regular ladders because of the stained glass windows. The dad's idea was to get scaffolding and paint it that way. But to do that, they would have to unbolt all the pews from the floor, move them, set up the scaffolding, etc. Mark did some research and found that they could rent one of those mobile scissor lifts which fit perfectly next to the pews, reduced the number of man hours by 60% and made life easier. They'd save money and get the job done faster.
Mark's dad wouldn't have it. Refused to budge, despite the numbers being there in black and white. So they used his dad's method which took a multitude of hours longer and they made less money on the job. Mark quit the company not long after that and went solo.
Then again, when his dad was in the hospital last year from a heart attack, he didn't want to lay in bed, take the drugs prescribed to him, or do anything the doctors said... resulting in an infection in his chest that almost killed him.
Sometimes you have to bite the bullet and knock it off with your stubbornness, I think.
Story 2:
While playing D & D one night one of the women in my group got a call from a friend of hers whose mother had gotten a fake Microsoft technician telephone call and wanted to give the guy her credit card number and access to her computer. Of course, the mother refused to listen to her daughter because how could she know anything? So she called the woman in my group, Julia, who is a computer geek and actually does some soldering and web site work for my company, in hopes that she could talk some sense into her mother.
And I'm in the background yelling "TELL HER I OWN A COMPUTER STORE! I GUARANTEE ITS FAKE!"
Finally, having three people telling her it was a bogus call, she hung up on the fake Microsoft tech. But goddam, woman... try listening to people.
Actually, one more related... had a customer a few years ago who had to get power of attorney over his uncle, because the guy had spent TENS OF THOUSANDS OF DOLLARS sending it to a guy in Nigeria with the absolute belief he was going to get a million dollars in return. Unfortunately it was looking like the guy was going to lose his house and it was probably too late to do anything about it, as he had spent all his tax/mortgage money on Honorable Barrister Whackadoo Jones. I never heard what happened after that.
So you'll buy in to the bullshit story of some random guy from Nigeria you never met, but you won't listen to your own family. Oy vey.
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