#Know your numbers

[sweaterkittensahoy]

When we bought our car, I told Sean to let me handle it. I walked in and said "We have X for a down payment and cannot pay more than Y in monthly payments." My Y number had some leeway, but I didn't mention that.

First thing the sales guy did after I laid down the rules was turn to Sean and go, "What's your number?" And Sean said. "Oh, no, you negotiate with Gayle."

So, strike one for the sales guy. Could not divide and conquer us by implying THE MAN would not surprised at what I laid down.

Sales guy then had to confer with his manager and left us at his desk for several minutes. I have a vague recollection (this was 16 years ago) of Sean and I amusing ourselves doing bits about the other people there to look at cars. I am sure we did not give off the stressed or nervous energy they were hoping for.

Guy comes back. His first offer is fifty dollars a month more than I told him we could pay. I looked at him and said "I gave you our upper limit."

"Well, but what's another 50 bucks a month?"

"Something I can't afford."

He didn't know what to do with my open and unashamed admittal that I had a budget because my money was finite.

He went back to talk to the manager again.

It took two more rounds of "I told you what I can afford" before he finally came back 20 bucks under what I'd stated as my max.

The trick to resisting high-stress sales tactics is doing the math at home, knowing exactly what you can afford, and then walking into the room and stating that number minus 15%. Then refusing to budge from that number. Never, ever, meet then where they want. Always meet them where you want. Because at the end of the day, you can walk away and go somewhere else and say "I told the people at Z what my terms were, and they refused to work with me. Here are my terms. Meet them, and you make a sale today."

Ive said this before but swear the biggest skill to learn as an adult is how to resist high-pressure sales tactics. You do NOT have to answer questions with anything other than "Sorry I'm not interested." No matter how nice they are or no matter how many follow up questions they ask or even how agitated they get when you stand your ground. Just keep saying I'm not interested. Don't answer their questions. Don't give them an opening to try to push back on your reasons. Be a fucking brick wall of I'm not interested.

[badolmen]

People against piracy fail to realize that no, I can’t just ‘buy it.’ They stopped making DVDs and Blu-Rays. They’re barely offering digital copies for download. I am not spending money I could use for food or bills to pay for a subscription service just so I can always have access to a beloved piece of media. Especially not when the service will remove media on a whim without concern for how the loss of access to that piece will make its artistic conservation nigh impossible.

For example, I recently learned that Disney+ had an original film called Crater. It’s scifi, family friendly, and seems cool - I would love to buy it as a holiday gift for my little brother! But: it’s exclusive to D+ and THEY REMOVED IT LITERALLY MONTHS AFTER ITS RELEASE.

The ONLY way I can directly access this film is through piracy. The ONLY available ‘copies’ of this film are hosted on piracy websites. Disney will NEVER release it in theaters, or as something to buy, and it may NEVER return to the streaming service. It will be LOST because we aren’t allowed to purchase it for personal viewing. If I can’t pay to own it, I won’t pay for the privilege of losing it when corporate decides to put it in a vault.

So yes, I’m going to pirate and support piracy.

Edit: if you are able, use $5 you would otherwise use for a streaming subscription to donate to a GazaFunds campaign.

[wanologic]

sorry danny, sam will never think you’re cool

[medugo]

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[lcgoccupationalhealth]

Why is employee well-being important for an organisation?

Fostering employee well-being is crucial because it helps prevent stress, creates positive working environments, and allows both individuals and the organisation to thrive. Investing in well-being leads to increased resilience, improved performance, reduced absence, enhanced work-life balance, a healthier and more inclusive culture, and better employee morale and engagement.

[alexherringva]

The Essential Pillars of Business Success: Record-Keeping and Monthly Bookkeeping

As a Virtual Assistant I talk a lot about increasing revenue streams, but you need to remember that without getting to grips with your numbers, it’s very hard to grow your business. In the world of business, transparency and order are not just virtues; they are the lifeblood that ensures the health and growth of any enterprise. While many entrepreneurs view record-keeping and bookkeeping as…

[gattaxa]

YELENA BELOVA in THUNDERBOLTS* (2025) dir. Jake Schreier

When all you have left to hold on to is a green tactical vest, a tub of hair gel, and a stolen guinea pig.

Bonus:

[littlefankingdom]

Bruce Wayne is canonically a very handsome man (he is called a "pretty boy" and he is in his 40s, for fuck's sake), and he is pretty famous as a rich philanthropist who doesn't want to leave his awful cursed crime infested city. So, there must be a ton of people thirsting over him on the internet. Fancams, edits, fanfics and imagines ("kidnapped with Bruce Wayne 😍 by a Gotham rogue"), the whole charade!

And anytime one of the batkids stumbles on a thirst post, they have the most dramatic disgusted reaction, loudly gagging, before sending the link to the batkids chat, because if they must suffer, then they should all suffer. Clicking on a link in this groupchat is like playing russian roulette, and getting rickrolled is a good ending.

[kensatou]

you think YOU had a bad day at work?

bonus: sid shrieking "no!!!! NO!!!!!" loud enough to be heard in the stands and on camera

[corpsentry]

a glass sun 1/2

[bluegiragi]

new handler.

early access + nsfw on patreon

[biggest-gaudiest-patronuses]

HAPPY SPOOKY SEASON! Have some merch

recently received new stock photos for the Terrible Pink T-Shirts i sell on etsy, and i find them so funny for some reason...

look at the smiling attractive people wearing their (also smiling!) attractive fashion wear!

[cookinguptales]

Now that the post is over 10k and my notes are straight-up unusable...

One thing I wish I'd spelled out more explicitly in the original post because I see this point getting lost on a lot of rebloggers who don't understand why the healthcare thing was such a big deal is like

The subtext I thought would be understood bc I lived back then but apparently has been lost today is that making sure queer employees and their partners had healthcare in the early 90s meant Disney was paying for a lot of AIDS treatment.

This is one reason fundie Christians were so upset and queer employees were so grateful. It's one reason why it was such a controversial decision. It was a major talking point amongst my family, who believed back then that AIDS was a punishment from God.

(Some still do, I think. We don't talk.)

I keep seeing people saying that Disney only chose that option "because of their bottom line" and it's like??? Were you listening??? Disney has been paying for that decision for literally decades, but they've stood by it.

Like... the 90s weren't like now! It wasn't profitable to cater to the queer population of the country back then. They weren't raking in money with this.

It's in no way a perfect company but I fully believe in criticizing people for the specific things they do wrong and praising them for the specific things they do right. Disney has fucked copyright, monopoly, and labor laws and I'm not about to defend that. But they are well known in FL for being friendly to both queer people and disabled people, and that is unambiguously a good thing.

(Like side note, I could talk about Disney and accessibility for days. I have traveled extensively while disabled and no one does it like Disney.)

I've had people reblogging the post like "I straight-up don't believe Disney is an industry leader in equal protections for queer employees" and it's like ??? do you think I just pulled this out of my ass? If you want more information, go look it up! You'll see that this is well-established history. It's not my fault y'all don't read! :|

[poorly-drawn-mdzs]

Thank you all for an incredible 500 days of love and support. I offer you: answers to questions that no one has asked.

(As always, more can be found in the tags <3)

[lazycranberrydoodles]

everybody go home. this is my magnum opus

[soldrawss]

@goodlucktai mentioned awhile ago about Gio, even as the oldest, becomes the shortest of the turtles even as the boys grow older, but his little brothers will still crouch down to meet him at eye level anyway, because they still respect him and look up to him!!! He's still their big brother!!!