Sour Grapes Post [NOT 25/1/21]

a bunch of grumpy green grapes

Hi friends!

Is there something you’ve got sour grapes about in your life?

I did my 2020 taxes after work today. Grrrr. Fucking Cheeto Mussolini’s Tax Act. Everyone I know, me included, got fucked on our tax returns in 2019 and didn’t magically have a bigger paycheck.

Well, 2020 continued that trend. I managed to have an even smaller tax return than 2019, which is annoying since I didn’t make enough money to hit a higher tax bracket.

Cambridge dictionary refers to sour grapes as “If you describe someone’s behavior or opinion as sour grapes, you mean that that person is angry because they have not gotten or achieved something that they wanted.” –> accurate to my mood!!!

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42 Comments

  1. Dork that I am, I also admit I was entertained to reuse my awesome image I used for my green grapes are the worst fruit post. 

  2. My kitty is home and fairly pissed off. She’s avoiding me (and yeah that sounds like typical cat behavior, but it’s unusual for her). They weren’t lying about the eye not being very pretty… Also I have two different meds, one which is every 12 hours, and one which is every 8 hours UGH. At least the every 8 hours (pain med) is only for five days. But of course they told me to give the first dose at 6pm, which means the next dose is at 2am… did they think this through? 
     
    Also I’m supposed to give them with food but of course she’s not interested in eating. So I just gave them anyway, and she managed to dodge part of the antibiotic dose, which ended up inside her cone. Sigh. I’ll have to do better on the next one. 

    • Good news, overall I suppose.  The surgery went as well as expected under the circumstances.  Honestly, I’d give her one at 11:00 and then again at 7:00. 

      • Yeah, I already gave a dose to her at 630, so I think I will wake up during the night for at least this first night. Tomorrow I think I’ll stretch between doses to get her on a more reasonable schedule. 

    • Medicating cats is so tough, good luck with that. I’m sure she’s scared and uncomfortable,in a couple of days she’ll be her lovable self again.

      • Oh definitely, and cats are always weird coming off anesthesia anyway. I know to expect it, but I still wish I could comfort her. But the best thing I can do according to her is leave her alone. 
         
        Have we had this conversation here or just on GT? Cats are an excellent teaching tool about consent. 

        • Pets generally I think are a good lesson in consent. After the trauma of our last dog and her surgery we know we couldn’t put her or another dog through it again. 

          • That’s definitely true for the big stuff like that. I generally think cats are a little more obvious about it than dogs, because I’ve had to really teach Lil how to ask her if she wants to be pet and pay attention to what she’s telling him. Not all dogs are the same, but ours was happy to be pet pretty much any time, any way. 

            • Dogs will put up with a lot more unwanted attention than cats.

    • Aww poor baby. She’s probably very disoriented from losing balanced vision in addition to scary vet stuff. Hopefully she’ll settle down soon. Are the meds pills or liquid? 

      • Both liquids thankfully. But she’s never been very food motivated and has always rejected any attempt to mix meds into food, so I’ll still have to squirt them in her mouth. 

        • That’s good. Liquid meds are a little easier. I’ve had several cats who needed daily meds so I’ve tried lots of methods. The easiest I’ve found is this: Swaddle kitty in a towel burrito if alone or if you have two people, the helper can hold the kitty. Use one hand over the kitty’s head to pry open the mouth from above, then insert the syringe in the corner of the mouth and squirt the meds as far away from the tongue as possible to reduce retching. Hopefully this is helpful to you! Sending lots of get well’s to your little pirate kitty!

  3. If that’s the definition of Sour Grapes, then I’ve got enough to start a whinery.
     
    But, for now, we can start with the fact that my life got blown up by an abusive spouse who was able to manipulate the implicit bias of society to accuse me of being the batterer–which enabled her to prevent me from having any relationship at all with my now-27-year-old daughter who refuses to have anything to do with me.
     
    That got dark in a hurry.

    • No following that, it’s a wrap people…I’ll take my rants about treasonous Republicans & family members that think toilet paper rolls can go either way to another platform.  Good day sir!  

    • I spent most of my life thinking my dad was the “bad” one because he is an alcoholic and had lots of anger issues. He wasn’t physically violent, but the man was always screaming and my parents fought almost constantly when I was growing up. There was a lot of verbal abuse that both my mom and I were on the receiving end of. 

      This made me really focus on my mom, and how he was the problem and how he was the worst etc etc. 

      After they got divorced and I was helping her get her shit together, holy fucking hell was she the problem, too. Like I’m not absolving my dad of being a verbally abusive drunk, but once he wasn’t around to be enabled by her and the focus of what she did, she was a pain in the ass and caused a lot of strife a lot between us. I definitely reevaluated how I thought of my parents due to that, and which parent was the “bad” one and which was the “good” one. That all happened in my late 20s.

      I guess what I’m getting it is there’s always a possibility that your ex will show her true colors and your daughter may eventually reevaluate how she thought of things. 

    • Damn. That’s a lot. I’m not in any position to offer advice, so I hope I don’t offend, but I hope you’ve been able to express to your daughter in some way that your door is open if she decides she does want a relationship at some point. Maybe she’ll want to hear the other side of the story someday. 

      • I tried, but she sent the letter back unopened.  All she’s ever known is what her mother told her because we divorced before she was born.  She’s only ever had one point of reference and that’s a hard thing to cast aside.  It’s like if someone told me that the Earth really is flat and was able to present evidence of it.  No way could I just let that go.

  4. I don’t think you want me to open the  Pandora’s Box of Bitterness I’ve spent years trying to repress. 

        • I’ll jump in with non-sour grapes then because I LOVE those popcorn tins and someone sent me one for Xmas that I was finally able to open.

          I had to wait til I got my cracked molar fixed, which I was finally able to do last week. (sour grapes there for sure) 

        • “Sour grapes” originates from one of Aesop’s fables.  A fox, try as he might, cannot reach the bunch of grapes that is dangling over his head.  He walks away, saying “They were probably sour anyway.”
           
          “Sour grapes” is rationalizing that not getting something you wanted was probably for the best.  In your case, it could be “It’s just as well I didn’t get a bigger return; I probably would have just pissed it away on scratch tickets anyway.”

          • Ahh gotcha. 

            Also probably an accurate statement, I do piss money away on scratchers sometimes. 

  5. We’ve been stalling on putting our dog down for over a month now. Her condition has been deteriorating over the past year. She’s barely able to walk on her own without ripping her back paws to shreds (we have a harness for walks and put booties on her back paws which protect her from the worst of it). Her next appointment is this Thursday and I believe it will help convince my husband that the time has come. She is such a loving creature and the disability hasn’t changed her personality. It would not be an exaggeration to say that everyone who meets her falls in love with her. Bonus she is a gorgeous wolfish looking dog (husky shepherd mix).

    • It’s always a tough decision to make. Looking back, we realize we waited probably a month or two too long with our last dog. 
      There are at-home euthanasia services available. That’s what we did and it was much better than taking her to the vet. 

      • We did this when we put our dog down in March & it was cathartic to all get to pet him & love him as he passed.  Didn’t make it easier but was an important family moment.  My daughter won’t let up on getting another dog but as I’m crying just thinking about that, I definitely don’t need a new dog!

    • I feel like the hardest thing with pets is when it’s a muscle or skeletal problem that is just a slow decline. We had a shepherd when I was a kid that was like that. His heart was willing, he was the bestest boy. But the hip deteroriation and the lumbar spondylosis were so bad for him.  

      • Ahh fuck pretend I can spell deterioration correctly all the time

        • Just the be thankful spellcheck didn’t change it to something completely unrelated like St. Ignatius of Loyola, which is what it likes to do to me.

    • @HammerZeitgeist I’m so sorry. It’s never easy, even though you know it’s the last loving thing you can do for them. 

    • I’m so sorry. It’s a horrible decision to have to make. 

  6. I thought the sour grapes came from some story/folklore (an Aesop’s fable?), where a fox was trying to eat some grapes or something, but couldn’t reach them, so got all huffy and said the grapes were probably sour anyways, and then flounced off. 
    So, I kinda felt like sour grapes was trying to pretend you weren’t interested in something that you failed to achieve/obtain.
    Sorta like if you got rejected for a job after an interview, and then you told people the commute would have been terrible and the parking sucked, and you just applied to use it as a practice interview.  or something, I suck at trying to think of examples…

  7. me….i just want to get the fuck out of this house asap….which just isnt happening courtesy of the housing market
    doesnt help the missus has started some kind of charm offense (even trying to win the cats over by only feeding them fancy foods and treats when im at work….lol)
    but yeah.. apparently shes cool mumming it now and letting me be the bastard that insists maybe chores should be done and ferfuckssake at least put fucking tiktok away whilst we are eating…geh…
    anyways ive stopped doing that…i just want out now
    and then i guess i’ll wait and see how long it takes for those two to murder eachother once im not around to get blamed for everything

    • on the upside tho…i kinda figured id have a long slog getting over her once im on my own
      maybe make an embarrassing attempt or two trying to get her back
      thats not going to be an issue now….
      one less thing to worry about i guess

  8. My grapes are all sweet, but your stories are giving my empathy muscles a workout, so thanks everyone for sharing, and I wish you well.

  9. I found out by chance that my favorite ex was engaged, yeah, I felt a pang of regret, followed by, whatever, he was a really shit bf, no chance of that leopard changing his spots, and when I hear about what other people go through in their relationships, happy to be on my own.

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