I have a full time job but some coworkers suggested I could apply to a department with a manager who seems to be a complete sociopath and seems to always need personnel.

In said department, there was a nurse that worked part time to finance her bachelor to be a physician assistant with the promise to be hired afterwards. She was sometimes very talkative and a gossip but otherwise a good nurse. Barely a week before the contract was to be signed, after she got her degree, she was told they found a better candidate with more experience so they wouldn’t hire her.

Obviously, she used all her sick days and then quit. Why would anyone work for a manager like this?

Chilling and very sad that people are sometimes like this. She was used.

Would you work for a manager like this? Because some coworkers would like me to apply to work for this guy,because they're always shorthanded. I’m not asking because I need this job, but because it’s always good to know what other options you have before looking elsewhere.

Believe people when they show you who they are would apply here.

and how would an elder start looking for friends or recreational activities for seniors? I don't even know what's available.

my father has always been republican, never a maga type, just old school republican.

The last message he sent me was more a rant against everything that's wrong with the world together with some immigrant blaming and talking about an invasion. He also wrote how he misses when I was 5. He is usually more articulate, this message was all over the place.

My mother is Mexican and I'm half Mexican. Make it make sense.

On my answer, I asked him if my mother should be deported, if he is feeling lonely or angry and if he meets people in real life other than my mother or he spends his time watching slop and listening to right wing media.

I also told him talking about immigrants the way he did to me is the perfect way to end up alone or in a right wing bubble because nobody sane wants to talk to somebody with so much disregard for people wanting a better life.

He also wrote something about how AI makes people stupider, which I agree with and asked him if he is sure this isn't something exactly happening to him right now with the message he sent me, just hoping he snaps out of it.

I suggested, if he feels alone he may contact social services, but I have no idea if they actually help seniors find new people.

I also wanted to suggest he goes to a nursing home but it doesn't seem to be the ideal place for a competent senior to meet new people, does it?

If you ever did this, what worked for you?

I said long term care because I’m not sure how many there are: I’ve heard about assisted living, memory unit and nursing home but I don’t know how they’re connected and who pays for what.

My father has never cooked a meal in his entire life and he’s now pushing 80. First his mother cooked for him, the whole 3 meals a day, then his wife took over. My mother is a person who apparently likes to prepare food in the kitchen on her own while everyone else waits. The idea of independently preparing something quick because you are hungry, you have places to go and don’t want to wait 90 minutes for a full meal is met with hostility and the same kind of language my father used with me when I was a teenager and exactly this happened. It’s no use offering to help my mother because “I don’t do it right”.

If my mother dies before my father, he is going down really fast: no cooking skills whatsoever, knows absolutely nothing about grocery shopping or how much time you need to simply prepare before actually cooking, has never used a washing machine in his entire life. He can still tell you lots about geology, his major and job till he retired, but for some things he is absolutely useless.

I’ve already told him he should prepare, that he should learn at least to cook to be independent as long as possible unless he wants to eat microwaved pizza every day (because he doesn't know how to use an oven), because eating healthy actually gives you more energy and thinking what to cook keeps you active, but apparently my mother won’t let him cook either.

If my father has to go to LTC, do they offer cooking learning courses? IMO it beats always eating what they put in front of you, it’s an excuse to socialize and learning is always good. Or am I being unfair to my father, expecting him to change now that he’s almost 80 and has been catered to constantly? I know my mother won’t change.

my parents live alone 800 miles away from me and are capable of living independently.

There might be a day they're not safe at home anymore and need to be taken care of.

I'm not a caregiver and while my father is flexible and can adapt, my mother is very strict with what she considers right and it's usually her way or the highway, reason why I would never live with her, let her live with me or take care of her alone. It would never work. My parents have a decent pension, no debt, and mostly love each other.

If it ever comes to me taking care of the administrative side of things 800 miles away, what does it look like? If you are in a situation like I described, how often do you visit?

Do you take care of them physically as well? I mean giving them showers, cleaning them, cleaning the house, feeding them, organizing their medicines, dressing them, answering 30 times per day the same question or old story because they forgot, because realistically I can do this up to 2 weeks per year, never on a permanent basis. I'm not a patient man.

I also want to live my life but where I grew up, small town in GA, the expectation seems to be I move in with my parents to physically take care of them, otherwise I'm not a good son.

ETA: thank you all for contributing

I’m preparing for a worst case scenario (parents refuse to downsize, refuse to move to LTC, keep kicking the can down the road because everything is fine...). If they disregard my advice to downsize now that they’re cognizant all I can do is let them fail and use an emergency like a fall or an accident to talk to the ER doctor, convince him they're not safe at home and move them to LTC or AL, somewhere they’re supervised at.

At least 2 fully furnished houses would have to go, these are large, old, but renovated houses: one is 2,700 square feet and the other 1,600, both measurements without counting the front garden and backyard. Completely furnished with stuff from several generations, most of it regular stuff not worth much.

I have zero experience dealing with estate sales and to me it looks daunting: How do I make sure potential buyers don’t low-ball me? Should I ask several local realtors first? How do I choose one to trust? Do I need a realtor? I live on another state and would want to expedite this but I just don’t know if waiting for a better offer would make sense.

How much time did you need to close the sale?

nothing dangerous, just regular aging stuff I'm not gonna get into.

My parents own 3 fully furnished houses in 2 different cities in the south. The oldest, biggest one should be sold because it is simply too big and too much work for them and I live and work 800 miles away.

There are other issues I want to discuss with them, mainly involving healthcare access, credit, several insurances, what to do when my father cannot drive anymore, hygiene, if they want to age in place AND only in place, but where exactly, DNR and intubation status, will and burial...

They are cognizant but I feel they really don't want to talk about it and like many elder parents they wished these questions simply disappeared.

I've seen so much shit with eldercare and even having a plan doesn't mean shit won't happen, it means you'll know how to react and who to call.

I was thinking about inviting my parents to a meal at a quiet restaurant, pay the waiter handsomely and have an extensive conversation there. I don't want to have such a conversation at home because I don't want them to resent the room where I question their ability to live as independently as before.

I don't know if this makes me an asshole.

There is also a chance they storm out or start yelling at me and give me the silent treatment afterwards.

Other stuff means everything you find in a home: tv sets, music players, several sets of cutlery, china and coffee sets, mattresses, lamps, ceiling hanging lamps, books, clothes, magazines, portable radiators, curtains, linens, pans, microwaves, pots... The whole house has to go before selling it.

Some pans are good, I and my sister could use some of them but most of the stuff, bought during a lifetime, will either be sold or given away. Most of the stuff is not from well known brands or something that would catch a collector’s eye, just practical, sometimes reliable stuff, but we also have computer monitors 40 years old, briefcases, suitcases (and also printed bank extracts 15 years old and food expired 12 years ago).

I read realistically we could get 20% of the original value for most stuff, but nobody knows anymore how much each thing cost. Neither I know if this is somebody trying to low-ball me.

My father wants to list each item individually and post an online ad to sell the items over the course of several months. He has the time, is capable and I have nothing against it. Better now that he can decide what to keep and what to toss. How much can he get if the buyer pays transportation or comes to get it? Because the large items cannot be moved without a van and we don’t have one.

I however find it easier to bulk sell: forget the yard sale, contact directly a company that bulk buys second hand stuff (we know none), accept their price, they take it all and we move on. We would be selling books and clothes by weight (several hundreds of pounds) but we are not sure how to deal with larger items, like most furniture and cookware. Also by weight?

If you ever bulk sold stuff like this, what service did you hire? how much did you get? I don't want to have unrealistic expectations.

Or, what would be a better way to do this?

My father is sorting items in his huge houses, 2 of them, to sell, give away or dump as a hopefully previous step to downsizing, which took me to think about how much stuff of my childhood sits there wasting space, stuff I could try to sell or give away, because after my parents die I don’t plan to move back there: I’ve made my life elsewhere and down there there are no decent jobs.

The items: A huge collection of 300 or so music CDs and 50 vinyl records I bought between ages 15 and 25 of my favorite bands back then. I don’t believe I’d get even 2 bucks a piece, not even for the vinyls (no special editions), my library with 250 or so books I bought and received as presents during my childhood, including a complete encyclopedia, clothes that are already too small for my physique.

I moved out 10 years ago and I’ve rarely visited. Those items are more something I remember than something I need: I digitized the music library years ago, the books I like I can get online or I already have them, I could save some clothes that fit and toss the rest, I could also use my old bed and study table, because those things are actually useful. I don’t even have a CD or a vinyl player (my father does).

I know that stuff is only stuff and when I die, it will all remain here on earth and most probably be sold or destroyed, but I I just can't bring myself to throw them away, even though I know it’s the logical choice as a previous step to sell that old house.

Moving the stuff in with me makes me a hoarder, so no. Plus I don’t have that much space. And what would I move the stuff in with me for? It would sit there in boxes wasting space.

What worked for you?

ETA: Thank you all for providing your opinion about this question. I'm contacting my mother and asking her about what she would want, I'll follow her lead and support what she decides. As said I don't believe she wants those toxic family members or her families around on a moment so special like saying your last goodbye to a husband. And neither do I.

I'd prefer a public funeral excluding them or conducting a small Christian ritual for family only where we can mourn him like we want but if she wants them around, so be it.

Funerals are for the living.

Thank you all.

My Christian, old republican southerner father wants me to attend his Christian funeral with all of his surviving relatives present. I don’t believe in any god, he knows that. He needs a religion to give a meaning to his life? Knock yourself out.

Religion is not the main problem here. The main problem is how close minded and fake people are in a southern small town in GA and above all, relatives. 2 aunts love to pretend everything is fine, they excel doing that on funerals and weddings, then stab you in the back as soon as you’re not within ear distance, either need drama to feel important or have way too much free time.

I wouldn’t mind a small Christian ritual with my mother, my brother, a priest and nobody else, but these women and their husbands? They drag everyone down with their stupid grudges about yard sales and business deals made in the early 2020s and seem to be envious of those who left that place and found something better. Last time I saw them, 7 years ago, they complained I don’t call them. What for?

I’m better off without them and don’t have the bandwidth to deal with them.

Family seems to be an identity issue for my father, the idea that his whole family won’t bury him together scares him. I told them I will honor him my way, with luck on the hospital bed where he dies or at home, that mother and brother are welcome to honor him with me, that I won’t attend a funeral with people I don’t like but he is not listening: he is now retorting to manipulate me (it would be so good, wouldn’t it be nice…?)

My father is not cognitively impaired. The easy way out would be to tell him ‘sure, I’ll come to your funeral with all those assholes you care so much about’ and after he dies, ignore it. I suspect my mother would agree, because she wasn’t born in GA and these aunts always felt superior to her, something my father always downplays because ‘we’re family’.

I like treating my father like an adult and want genuine conversations with him. To me, placating him on a thing like this means accepting my father has become a 5 year old who needs to be lied to so he doesn’t start feeling sad or feels I’m attacking him. It doesn’t feel right.

But it feels worse to pretend I respect those lying assholes or to listen to their boring life I don’t care about.

So what do I do?

somebody suggested I'm in the middle of an existential crisis. Just read my last post.

Fine, seems to be true.

Do people snap out of this?

more than a question, this is just something that popped in my mind after taking a week off work already, a week without work means free time to hate the job you have, but in my case more than that I've been thinking about my childhood, my parents, my extended family, our holidays together, how insignificant we humans are, how fragile and short life is, how fast time goes by and how much I don't want to work.

I guess this is cliche, but when I had to work I didn't question my job this much, didn't think about my childhood or my dreams, I simply wanted to get the job done, go home, eat and disconnect till the next day. I was like a machine, or a moron.

I'll be a moron again when I have to work again. I don't want to work.

It's like I'm a different person when I'm not working.

Is this dangerous? People too busy with work don't think like this.

I want to write poetry, lay on the sun in summer, listen to the cicadas, eat oranges and apples, listen to relaxing music. I want to play the guitar.

my father is religious, I'm not and I don't care what happens to my body after I die. Burn me, use me to feed stray cats.

To me, wasting money to buy a plot of land so I may be buried with them when I die is a stupid idea.

It is, however, his money. Who am I to disagree with him?