Lured into hard work

[Malkavian]

It's 4:20 am here, and I'm currently taking a short break from the ardous task my mother has placed before me...

A week ago, she mailed me, and asked for some help with translating "a bit of text". She works for the Danish Handicap Sports Association(or whatever their international name is), and they are getting rady for the Olympic Games next year. So they had received some text, which was to be send on to the various Handicap Sports Clubs/Gyms/Teams/whatever. And she wondered if I'd do it for her.
"Well," I think to myself, "I'm pretty damn good at english, if I may say so myself, a bit of text can't take long." So I reply that I'll gladly help her. She emails me the text, and because my life is rife with interesting and important stuff to do(Modern Warfare, Brütal Legend, long trips to the bathroom... Being unemployed is no easy task), I put it off 'till today.
So, earlier this evening, I opened up the PDF to get the job done.
It was 36 pages of solid text.
My precise thoughts at that moment escape me, but planning my mother's demise was part of it.

I felt totally screwed. Not only was there no reward for this task, but 36 pages are not "a bit of text".

I know, I know, I should have checked the contents of that PDF when I got it, but really... 36 pages? "A bit of text"? I'm gonna have a word with my mother in the morning...

Another story is of this summer. My dad called me up and said he needed some help at his company. 3 or 4 days of work. When the 3 or 4 days were over, there was more. Vague questions with no actual dates or sense of span of time my help would be needed, was suddenly used against me, as I started to complain that I didn't really expect to keep working this long. I worked about 9-10 hours a day for three months, and each day I had to crash on a sofa at either my mom's or my dad's, since I live in another city. It was hell. The work was incredibly monotonous, and I couldn't relax when I got off, since I had no room to retreat to, and was forced to be together with the rest of the family. I was paid, and I can't deny I needed the money, but it wasn't what I initially agreed to.

Both experiences have somewhat destroyed a measure of trust towards my parents. I will in the future be much more cautious and unwilling to help them when they ask for it, and I think that's a shame.

So, fellow Escapists, have you ever felt lured into hard work, by those close to you? Have you ever had your faith and trust betrayed?
Have I been too uncautious when agreeing to help? Am I being selfish here?

 

[Malkavian]

No, I always make sure I'm getting something in return and if someone says "only a few minutes" or something like that I'll only do a few minutes unless I'm offered a greater reward.

Even close family?

 

[Lord Mountbatten Reborn]

Haha, Tom Sawyer'd.

And nope, I always make sure I get paid. I'm not charitable to people.

 

[Kasawd]

I'm usually happy to help my parents.

It is often just simple chores and I love to do physical labour when I'm not at work. It's refreshing to just do something physical after hours of speaking to people on phones.

You, though, got a rough deal.

 

[Monkfish Acc.]

I go into everything expecting it to be stupidly hard work.
Especially if someone else has asked me to do it.

So, no, I cannot say I have ever felt as if I were lured into hard work.

 

[Timotei]

Now what's the moral of this story children?

 

[bcponpcp27]

It's 4:20 am here,

Light up!

In all seriousness, they sound like manipulative jerks. Your fucking PARENTS shouldn't trick you into working extra for nothing.

 

[Berethond]

No, I always make sure I'm getting something in return and if someone says "only a few minutes" or something like that I'll only do a few minutes unless I'm offered a greater reward.

Even close family?

Uhhh.... yeah.
Why should I care about them more than anyone else?
Why would I do anything for my brother? Like he's ever helped me.

 

[QuirkyTambourine]

I was walking by the recording studio office at my school last year, when I hear someone call my name. I look over to see one of the seniors struggling with a box of mics because he was moving a cart of stuff down to the theater for a "little project he was working on". I move the mics down, always gotta help a fellow engineer out, and as soon as I walked into the studio, I realized what I had been roped into.

They were multitracking a jazz band, using 36 mics in all. Now, for a lowly freshmen, all I see in that is a mountain of cable running, and stand setting up, since the seniors get to have the fun part of actually placing and recording the mics.

Of course, the senior strong armed and guilt tripped me into helping out ("Man, I'll beat you up if you don't help out, and you really should since it's your major and you're not doing anything else today")

That happened at 430pm, I didn't get back to my bedroom until about 2am after all was said and done.

 

[thiosk]

Hey! We've been invited to write a review paper on recent advances in supramolecular assembly. YOU are going to author it.

"Oh shit" i said.

 

[Kuchinawa212]

Well now you won't do it next time, won't ya

 

[Malkavian]

No, I always make sure I'm getting something in return and if someone says "only a few minutes" or something like that I'll only do a few minutes unless I'm offered a greater reward.

Even close family?

Uhhh.... yeah.
Why should I care about them more than anyone else?
Why would I do anything for my brother? Like he's ever helped me.

Well, family situations are different. Both my parents, and especially my father, has always been there when when I needed help.

My problem is not so much the lack of reward(aside from the supposed warm fuzzy feeling that I've never really had), nor the ammount of work in itself; it's the fact that I wasn't properly told what I was getting myself into. I mean, if I ask someone a favour of this magnitude, I make sure people know what they are signing up for.

I was walking by the recording studio office at my school last year, when I hear someone call my name. I look over to see one of the seniors struggling with a box of mics because he was moving a cart of stuff down to the theater for a "little project he was working on". I move the mics down, always gotta help a fellow engineer out, and as soon as I walked into the studio, I realized what I had been roped into.

They were multitracking a jazz band, using 36 mics in all. Now, for a lowly freshmen, all I see in that is a mountain of cable running, and stand setting up, since the seniors get to have the fun part of actually placing and recording the mics.

Of course, the senior strong armed and guilt tripped me into helping out ("Man, I'll beat you up if you don't help out, and you really should since it's your major and you're not doing anything else today")

That happened at 430pm, I didn't get back to my bedroom until about 2am after all was said and done.

I had a friend who was in a similar situation. "We need someone to control the mixer system during school meetings" became "we need someone to do all the cabling and setup for all who will be speaking or performing music at school meetings, since they can't be arsed to do it themselves", as soon as he'd said yes.

 

[QuirkyTambourine]

*snip*

That's one of the reasons that I don't deal with live sound at all. It's a lot of ***** work, and it gets really dull after a while. Running live sound is fun once you're at the board, but everyone expects you to be god behind the sound of any event.

 

[Carbonic Penguin]

I signed up for 3 unit maths, thinking 'hmm, this is goona be hard!'. What they didn't say was this year, they're going to spend the first 3 terms doing the ENTIRE 2 unit course, and then the next year just the 3rd unit. We had to do a whole years work in 2 and a half months to sit the half yearly... but now that that's over, I can finally do 1 units amount of work in a 3 units amount of space!