[Lounge #372]
This is the lounge. You can discuss anything you want, but you will do it kindly. Hey, is that a teletubby?
Status: Heavily Moderated; Previous thread
Evolution, development, and random biological ejaculations from a godless liberal
Evolution, development, and random biological ejaculations from a godless liberal
This is the lounge. You can discuss anything you want, but you will do it kindly. Hey, is that a teletubby?
Status: Heavily Moderated; Previous thread
Improbable Joe:
October 5th, 2012 at 5:13 pm
Orange baby monkey is orange!
moelarryandjesus:
October 5th, 2012 at 5:20 pm
Did I miss the post where PZ cuts Sally Quinn’s head off and leaves it on a stake as a warning to other idiotic bigots?
blogofmyself:
October 5th, 2012 at 5:37 pm
Today I realized I needed a book for some research I’m doing, so I looked it up in our university’s library catalog. We have the book, but it’s checked out until August 30, 2013. So, who do I have to kill to get that kind of check-out time? Seriously, I want to be a university professor if only for the library privileges. In related news, today was the first time I’ve ever had to request an inter-library loan.
deborahbell:
October 5th, 2012 at 6:48 pm
Old Lounge:
@76 Alethea
I had something similar to what you described with alcohol. I was on an anti-depressant and had insomnia pretty often, so the psychiatrist prescribed me Ambien. Everything was fine, I had no trouble with being groggy or sleepwalking or anything on the Ambien, and then I was prescribed a migraine preventative, and the next time I took Ambien I slept for more than 2 days. I tried to drive somewhere on the 3rd day and ran a red light because I couldn’t figure out what I was supposed to do in time to stop (I immediately went home, rather than continue driving). Turns out that migraine preventative interacts with the anti-depressant I was on to suppress the central nervous system and any sleep aid stronger than Benadryl put me out for days. Fortunately, the insomnia got better with my depression lifting and the migraines getting better, and eventually I was able to get off the anti-depressant. I just always think about how strange it was that something I was already taking suddenly worked much differently.
@83 FossilFishy
I did one of those FB games that tells you you are something random after asking you weird questions. This one was what percent angel or devil you are that day, and it posted to my wall. A while later I noticed I had a message from an older person who was one of my FB friends, telling me she couldn’t delete her status about being a devil and not to post about her being a devil to her status again (she didn’t know what it was and obviously didn’t understand quite how FB works). After that I went through and deleted all the old church people that were in my friends list that I haven’t actually ever talked to since I started using FB and didn’t think I ever needed to talk to, hopefully giving me more freedom to say whatever the hell I want on my page. Good luck with your brother.
@87 Portia
I’m not planning on having children, but if I ever did, I would want to do a baby shower like that. It was actually fun, for pretty much everyone.
@116 thunk, Blob Alert
My state is thought to be completely red safe, so I’m thinking about voting for the Green Party candidate.
@164 Portia
I don’t even understand how you could imagine that any medication (homeopathic or real) could “treat” bedwetting. I mean, if it’s not a medical condition, how can you treat it medically? It might be different if it was a medical condition, but most children it’s really not, right?
Re: sisters My sister is 7 years younger, and we did conflict. Time with my stepfather (her father) was in short supply and high demand, and he would usually take us separately to do things. And she wanted to do everything I was doing, but wasn’t able to, and wanted me to do what she was doing even though it was boring for me. And then I was regularly put in charge of making sure she behaved, when our parents disappeared for hours at a time (I later learned that was for opportunity for my stepfather to harangue my mother about how awful a person she was and often threaten to kill her and us and himself) – and I had no way to make her behave, and would regularly get kicked and hit and bitten by her when I tried to stop her from doing something we both knew she wasn’t supposed to do. We get along today, but aren’t really close; she’s become the good one by becoming really religious and serious and hiding it from the parents when she dates or drinks.
@229 Audley
That’s awesome!!
@245 Audley
I just checked our mail because my first paycheck from new job is due today by mail, and found 7 books in separate packages and a bunch of mail. Roommate usually check mail, but I guess he skipped for a few days and the mailbox was completely stuffed full.
@335 Beatrice
I’m not avoiding carbs, but I read the South Beach Diet book when it was recommended by my migraine doctor. I’m not sure what that had to do with anything; he seemed to think eating that diet would help with headaches, it didn’t, but meds did. In any case, the breakfast I liked from it was little egg quiches – basically egg and vegetables cooked in muffin tins, without the paper cups, just grease the tins. They are good fresh, kind odd leftover, which the book suggested. You can probably do any breakfast type protein and just leave out the toast/muffin/waffles etc.
@339 Joe
Gratz on job for your wife! And I hope the negotiation turns out well for you guys!
New Thread:
@3 blogofmyself
I used to see year long checkouts occasionally at my public library, for books that were missing and they were looking for them. I suppose that’s not the case for your book. I did my first interlibrary loans in the 90s when I was working at a library in my teens and I was using the huge Books in Print books (no internet at libraries then) to look up the works of Isaac Asimov and request them on little paper forms via interlibrary loan. :)
a3kr0n:
October 5th, 2012 at 6:49 pm
I wonder who’s hair Orange baby monkey is grabbing on to?
deborahbell:
October 5th, 2012 at 6:51 pm
I think I’ve said my new job is repairing laptops. I got one yesterday where the problem description was:
blockquoteLaptop won’t always boot, when it does it has multiple problems such as a bad keyboard. Please fix!blockquote</b
I kept shaking my head over that all day; "multiple problems such as" doesn't work. You have to tell me exactly what's wrong with it for me to test, duplicate, and fix the "multiple issues". And seriously? I need your hard drive to boot from to duplicate your issue. (He's getting that one back unrepaired, because we couldn't find anything wrong with the computer.)
Nerd of Redhead, Dances OM Trolls:
October 5th, 2012 at 7:19 pm
When I worked in the Sears small engine repair shop forty plus years ago, we had a saying “customer must be smarter than machine to operate”. Sounds like the case here…
Martin Wagner:
October 5th, 2012 at 7:31 pm
The nice thread, huh? Okay. Please enjoy this picture of a dachshund dressed as a giraffe. Also, Ken Ham is stupid.
Menyambal --- Sambal's Little Helper:
October 5th, 2012 at 7:35 pm
blogofmyself, when I was in college I got into the honors department, then was a graduate student. I had four-months checkouts for one of them. I’d get my textbooks list, bustle over to the library and see if any were available—if so, I was set for the semester and saving a bundle.
But a year checkout? Oy.
—
Dang, it is cold here. I’ve been wearing shorts and Hawaiian shirts since Spring, but today I put on long pants. It took me forever to find something to hold the pants up, too. I put on a very heavy sweater and was fine in the house, then I had to go out and jimmy open a car door in the wind and a light rain—I hate cold rain. In all the confusion, I missed out on breakfast and lunch, so I was really feeling the cold. I am dry now, but still feeling hungry and cold.
Oh, well, I got to be helpful in getting the car door open.
And clever, too. I pried the door out at the top, and had a straightened wire coat hanger that I could bend to touch the unlock button, but it was too flexy to push it. I also had a carbon-fiber rod that was stiff, but wouldn’t hold a bend to reach the button. So, I wrapped the wire around the rod, bent the wire to keep the rod flexed, and Bob was my uncle.
jonbonjovi:
October 5th, 2012 at 7:54 pm
‘v fllwd th FrThghtBlgs (whch s rnclly hvn fr ntllctl cwrds wh mst cnsr th mr sggstn tht thr vws rqr dpr nlyss) nd Th “thsm Pls” mvmnt frm th bgnnng. PZ, Grt, phl nd s frth r sm f th mst dsgstng hmn bngs hv vr hd th msfrtn f lrnng bt. Btwn yr cnstnt vctmhd mntlty, cmplt ntlrnc fr pn dscssn nd vtrlc cmpgns t hrss ths wh dr crtcz y, y r msrbl xcss fr hmn bngs nd dsrv nthng lss thn t b cstgtd t th rfs bns f th skptcl cmmnty. Y -rlgs dgmtsts r, n my ys, vn wrs thn th rlgs dgmtsts s y nsst n smrng thsts wth yr bhrrnt nd chldsh prsnl cndct. Thnks t th lt f y, ppl wh clm tht thsm s rlgn hv vsbl dgmtc cmmnty f thsts t pnt t t shw tht thsts cn b jst s rrtnl s rlgs fntcs nd sps th sm lvl f cndct. hv n dbt tht th bn hmmr s cmng t prvnt m frm pstng gn nd thr ths cmmnt wll b scrbbd r mmbrs f th +/FtB crcl jrk scts wll rl n hw t f ln ths pst ws. Bt n th sncr hps tht ths mssg ss vn n y f n prsn wh ws hvng dbts bt yr blg nd t hlps t chs thm wy frm yr prtclr brnd f ntllctl psn, cn rst ssrd tht ths lttr ws nt n vn. Th + cmmnty s shnnd by grt mny mrtrs ndvdls nd t s vry clr t s why.
[Read the opening post, derpwad. This is the moderated open thread -- of course your rant is going to get axed. You want the [Thunderdome], which is mostly unmoderated. Continue to violate the rules, and yes, you will be banned. Because you’re an idiot. –pzm]
Portia:
October 5th, 2012 at 7:59 pm
Herp derp
Chris Clarke:
October 5th, 2012 at 8:05 pm
I worked in a nursery — plant, not baby — in Maryland in 1986, and my boss hired this local high school kid that summer to help with the watering and mulch carrying and such. When introduced to me, he held his hand up and said “Bon Jovi, dude!”
It took me a couple hours to figure out that he wasn’t being ironic. It was his standard greeting to everyone.
I imagine he’s got his MBA by now.
Aratina Cage:
October 5th, 2012 at 8:14 pm
Madalyn Murray O’Hair thinks you’re full of shit. Atheists get this from spiritual leaders all the time; good of you to join them, jonbonjovi.
Aratina Cage:
October 5th, 2012 at 8:15 pm
What will really piss him off is if you disemvowel his screed. Heeheehee.
Caine, Divisitrix du mal:
October 5th, 2012 at 8:19 pm
jonbonjovi, you’re in desperate need of new material. That’s near-lethal levels of boring you’re putting out.
Lofty:
October 5th, 2012 at 8:25 pm
johnbonjovi needs to scuttle off to where his views are valued…
Caine, Divisitrix du mal:
October 5th, 2012 at 8:27 pm
Oh, I’m sure they would get plenty of attention in Thunderdome.
Setár, genderqueer Elf-Sheriff of Atheism+:
October 5th, 2012 at 8:28 pm
#10: TROLLLL! TROLLLLLLL INNNNNN THE LOOOOOOOOOOOUUUNNNNNNGE!
…thought you’d might like to know…
—
Anyone? ><;
StarStuff, a soulless cunt:
October 5th, 2012 at 8:32 pm
@ Troll at #10
Hey, hey, boring troll, take your shit to the Thunderdome. What’s wrong with you? Do you normally just burst into a place, ignore the rules, and shit on the carpet? Or are we getting special treatment here?
StarStuff, a soulless cunt:
October 5th, 2012 at 8:34 pm
Seriously though, is there, like, an anti-FtB madlibs that I’ve missed? They all use the same buzzwords. Eerie.
ChasCPeterson:
October 5th, 2012 at 8:38 pm
http://scienceblogs.com/pharyngula/2010/01/21/looking-for-grant-money-for-yo/#comment-2219170
Ing:Intellectual Terrorist "Starting Tonight, People will Whine":
October 5th, 2012 at 8:39 pm
Not sure why anyone who really thought that would bother sharing. They should presume such a comment would be deleted and censored
Idiot
StarStuff, a soulless cunt:
October 5th, 2012 at 8:46 pm
In other news… I’m going herping tomorrow (from 6am til 8pm)! I hope it doesn’t rain.
AJ Milne:
October 5th, 2012 at 8:48 pm
(Lols…)
You need to do the dead faint to bring it home.
I was trying to do something with the nym, but it all wound up kinda limp…
Working concept when I gave it up was: “It’s nice to see that old rockers do go onto new careers, new horizons, keep challenging ‘emselves, keep trying to move artistically forward, but I really don’t get Jon’s new ‘Incoherent curmudgeon/stream-o-consciousness/semiliterate beat poet’ stuff. And honestly, it almost makes me miss Slippery When Wet.”
… so, yeah, best sometimes just to move on.
JAL: Snark, Sarcasm & Bitterness:
October 5th, 2012 at 8:51 pm
I was so confused by “herping”. I thought of “herp a derp” or herpes.
Praise to Google so I could find out what it meant and not look stupid.
deborahbell:
October 5th, 2012 at 8:57 pm
@18 Setar
Er, I have no idea. Is it more likely they will publish the letters if they only get one, or if they get more than one at once? I would probably opt to spread it out myself.
Rev. BigDumbChimp:
October 5th, 2012 at 9:01 pm
Worst call in modern baseball history.
StarStuff, a soulless cunt:
October 5th, 2012 at 9:02 pm
@ JAL
lol! Sorry! I forgot to explain it again. I keep doing that. I forget who I’ve explained it to and who I have to explain “herping” to (hint: pretty much everyone).
Here’s an educational moment, brought to you by StarStuff, your resident amateur herpetologist:
Herps are reptiles and amphibians. Herpetology is the study of reptiles and amphibians. And herping is going out and finding reptiles and amphibians through a variety of means. My means tomorrow will mostly involve me being kneed deep in muddy water with a large dipnet.
Now you know! :D
Rev. BigDumbChimp:
October 5th, 2012 at 9:03 pm
Shot to the heart and you’re to blame
You give love
A bad name
mythbri:
October 5th, 2012 at 9:05 pm
Trying to resist the urge to start shit on an acquaintance’s FB page. Some idiot friend of his posted an anti-Islam joke and then called MY friend a racist when she criticized him for it.
“Islam is evil. I didn’t know you supported the right for them to beat their wives.”
Yeah, and the Bible says that it’s cool to rape people as long as you buy them from their fathers or conquer their land.
What’s your point?
/rant
redpanda:
October 5th, 2012 at 9:05 pm
A friend of mine is having a conversation with a creationist on Facebook and this just popped up:
Apparently the guy is a chemical engineer who graduated from Stanford. Where do these people come up with this stuff?
JAL: Snark, Sarcasm & Bitterness:
October 5th, 2012 at 9:07 pm
That does sound very interesting, though hard work as well to do it all day long.
It also threw me off since I know, like, nothing about reptiles. My immediate thought was “wouldn’t it be better for it to rain so the frogs with come out?” Then “oh duhhhh I’m stupid.” Obviously, that’s just ignorance on my part and I realize that. There’s so many different animals so I really shouldn’t be surprised they don’t all like the rain. I’m sure it just makes it harder for you.
Thanks for the lesson! I need work on those base jump to conclusions of mine.
StarStuff, a soulless cunt:
October 5th, 2012 at 9:14 pm
@ JAL
Frogs fucking LOVE the rain. However, I don’t :P
I just don’t want to spend the whole day wet.
Went out on Wednesday with my herpetology class (same group I’m going out with tomorrow). We only stayed out for about an hour though because of the rain. I was disappointed. However, we did find quite a few frogs! And I like frogs, so that’s always nice.
Nutmeg:
October 5th, 2012 at 9:21 pm
StarStuff:
Jealous! I finished my fieldwork in July, and I’m starting to miss it. And it’s also getting cold and rainy and snowy here. I hope you get lots of herps tomorrow! Have fun!
SC (Salty Current), OM:
October 5th, 2012 at 9:22 pm
:)
***
I don’t think it should be allowed to use the name of another living and well known person for your pseudonym.
StarStuff, a soulless cunt:
October 5th, 2012 at 9:24 pm
@ Nutmeg
I’m in north Florida. There are always lots of herps! Maybe not always the ones we want to find, but we’ll find a lot of something (probably frogs).
SC (Salty Current), OM:
October 5th, 2012 at 9:45 pm
I think I’m drinking vodka from Kentucky. Is that possible?
Nerd of Redhead, Dances OM Trolls:
October 5th, 2012 at 10:02 pm
Starch/sugar+yeast+distillation? No requirements for the starch/sugar or region. Yep, very possible.
SC (Salty Current), OM:
October 5th, 2012 at 10:07 pm
Then…there’s more than one.
Azkyroth, Former Growing Toaster Oven:
October 5th, 2012 at 10:41 pm
The Heisenberg Uncertainty Principle says that the product of the uncertainties in a particle’s uncertainty and momentum is at minimum Planck’s constant divided by 4 Pi.
I thought us engineers were supposed to know math.
jose:
October 5th, 2012 at 10:45 pm
Oh God the axe’d post. I hadn’t seen that method of dealing with trolls before. It looks effective against people who are breaking rules but not to the point of being worth banning…
My favorite has always been the hellban though. The banned user’s activity becomes invisible for everybody else (except mods) without any notification. Trying hard to derail a thread and seeing how post after post everybody absolutely ignores you can lead to pretty funny reactions sometimes.
JohnnieCanuck:
October 5th, 2012 at 10:54 pm
jose,
That’s positively evil. I like it.
FossilFishy (Νεοπτόλεμος's spellchecker):
October 5th, 2012 at 11:27 pm
Thanks for that Deborah. Truth is, I don’t care if I never speak to him again. We didn’t get along as kids and now we have pretty irreconcilable differences in beliefs. I’m treading lightly because I like his kids and hope that at the bare minimum they’ll see from me that atheists are not in fact immoral monsters.
In other news: Mrs. Fishy turns 40 today. Does anyone know a stretching and warm up routine for my liver? I suspect that it’s going to get a workout this evening. I’ve even bought a new shirt for the occasion. I know, I know, I’m a crazed spendthrift who’s in need of a televised intervention. I wanted to wear my wedding tie to the festivities and for some reason all my shirts that go with it have shrunk. Must be something in the Australian water…
harbo:
October 6th, 2012 at 12:32 am
FAR too intelligent for a tele-tubby.
chigau (悲しい):
October 6th, 2012 at 12:59 am
I’m in Vancouver for the long weekend.
My days are full but my evenings are semi-free.
Who’s about?
I’m off to catch up.
Alethea H. "Crocoduck" Dundee:
October 6th, 2012 at 12:59 am
Yes, it’s definitely something in the Australian water. I’m thinking, emm, lemmeseee, hops, yeast and malt, most likely.
My main alcomohol recommendations for overindulgence are 1. a glass of water between each drink; 2. eat something; 3. schedule a very quiet day of rest for next day.
Hekuni Cat, MQG:
October 6th, 2012 at 1:02 am
Caine – I don’t recognize the scent of my Halloween sleep pillow. What is it stuffed with? (I meant to ask before, but I forgot.)
jefrir:
October 6th, 2012 at 1:03 am
blogofmyself,
Long checkout times are usually available to
1. Research and academic staff
2. (Sometimes) Library staff – possibly because they know we’d just go in and change it if they didn’t.
In the library I work at, we get 6ish month loans (through to January or June), 40 books maximum, and no fines – it is heavenly. Some people do take the piss, though – I’ve come across professors who’ve had the same book out for 20 years.
There is probably a way to recall books if you need them urgently – speak to your library staff.
Tigger_the_Wing:
October 6th, 2012 at 1:13 am
Hi people! Sorry for the scare Josh, my honorary grandson! Great big granny hugs to all who want/need them.
Thanks all for the crossed tentacles! The ongoing pain, it turns out, was because the hospital had under-medicated me. A quick dose of fast-acting stuff plus a prescription for double-sized capsules and I’m feeling much, much better. I spent part of the lovely warm sunny day yesterday pulling weeds, while sitting down and chatting with the neighbours and their lovely kids. I’ve finished the baby Converse booties, plus I’ve nearly finished the fuzzy blanket (both for impending Number 5 Grandchild), just have a few ends to sew in.
Today is wet and gloomy, and I keep falling asleep trying to catch up.
Yay for new job for BossNurse! Yay for not being evicted!
Boo for homeopathetic SCAMs and arseholish friends and family members.
Yay/boo for people who have only the vaguest understanding of science and use the terms to support their beliefs anyway – yay because I love to mess with them (I had fun telling Number 4 Son’s fundie youth group leader that Dark Matter must be the souls of departed people and Dark Energy must be Angels) and boo because they prey on undereducated people.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Oh yes, that reminds me – every so often, the fundie youth group leader used to drop some leaflets or comment about YECism or similar even though, every time he did it, the group would laugh at the nonsense and shout him down. Number 4 Son would occasionally bring them home so we could take them to the local atheist meet-up for a laugh. I recently heard from a friend, whose youngest is still a member, that he has promised to cease and desist after a parent complained. Why is this particularly wonderful? Because the group is actually run by the fundie church in question. Yep, the parents of teenagers attending a youth group run by and in a fundie church have managed to ban the leaders from proselytising to the kids.
Ing:Intellectual Terrorist "Starting Tonight, People will Whine":
October 6th, 2012 at 1:13 am
So the A+ Forum seems to be smoldering. What gives may I ask?
Tigger_the_Wing:
October 6th, 2012 at 1:31 am
What do you mean, Ing? I haven’t looked at the forums for a few days as I’ve been somewhat preoccupied elsewhere.
Josh, Official SpokesGay:
October 6th, 2012 at 1:32 am
Tigger, I’m so glad to hear you’re feeling better. But at the risk of prying (angina makes me nervous for you, as you might imagine) just what was wrong, and is the medicine you’re now taking sufficient to put an end to the problem?
Tigger_the_Wing:
October 6th, 2012 at 1:55 am
Josh, it seems that the arsehole of a cardiologist I had in Adelaide (funny, I’ve met a nurse and a GP here in Canberra who immediately swore when I told them who he was) lied to me about my coronay arteries being completely clear and the spasms being of no consequence. The cardiologist who saw me at the hospital on Saturday said that five years ago, when I had the first angiogram (fortunately arsehole was on holiday so his colleague ordered the test and got me a diagnosis) it showed a 20% narrowing, increasing to 80% during a spasm. He’s concerned that five more years of high cholesterol might have increased the narrowing; he’s ordered another angiogram for Friday 12th October to find out how bad it is.
Tigger_the_Wing:
October 6th, 2012 at 2:03 am
Gack, speeloing! That coronay = coronary, of course.
For several years now, I’ve been taking 120mg isosorbide mononitrate slow release every evening and GTN spray for breakthrough angina. I’ve also been taking 240mg verapamil hydrochloride every morning to prevent the AF because I was originally on diltiazem hydrochloride and it had no effect on the arrhythmia. The hospital doctor switched me back to diltiazem because I have had no AF since the cardiac ablation and diltiazem is better than verapamil for angina. The problem was that he prescribed 160mg daily; the GP changed it to 240mg and has also given me a bottle of fast-acting 60mg tablets to take for breakthrough pain.
Josh, Official SpokesGay:
October 6th, 2012 at 2:29 am
Tigger, Gran-
Christing fuck. How do hearts (not) work? I’m so sorry. Tell those bastards to get in there and clean your arteries out if possible. Meds to stanch “break-through angina” are so, so not acceptable in the long-term.
xxoo
Pteryxx:
October 6th, 2012 at 2:50 am
oy Tigger. *offers anklehugs*
—
Ing: Dillahunty used a sockpuppet to make a point and the mods came down on it. Jason Thibeault just covered it with extensive linking:
http://freethoughtblogs.com/lousycanuck/2012/10/06/matt-i-really-think-you-owe-them-an-apology/
The resolution thread is here:
http://atheismplus.com/forums/viewtopic.php?f=4&t=1615
and if you want to see the actual sockpuppeting incident from the beginning, it’s this thread here:
http://atheismplus.com/forums/viewtopic.php?f=4&t=1502
Caine, Divisitrix du mal:
October 6th, 2012 at 3:00 am
Hekuni Cat:
Hops (homegrown), lavender and white sage.
Giliell, Approved Straight Chorus:
October 6th, 2012 at 3:38 am
Good morning
Why is there never wind on a Saturday (unnless it comes with heavy rain?) I’ve been trying to go kite-flying with the kids ever since #1 was 2 years old and so far we haven’t managed…
Also, Mr. asked where I had bought the hobby-horse head. I’m not sure whether I should be please that something I made from scratch looks like professionally made or to sulk because he thought I had to buy something like that…
beatrice
Oh dear, the damnation of carbohydrates. People avoid them and then think it’s the carbohydrytes per se that made them gain weight without realizing that they’re no longer having pizza, mac and cheese, fries, donuts, chocolate…
It’s like people going for all things fructose because fructose is made from fruit (I’m wondering what ordinary table-sugar is made from. Raw oil?) when there’s actually evidence that fructose is worse for you than succrose.
JOe
Big fat YAY!
But WTF rents. Although I’m spoiled by living in a low-rent area…
opposable thumbs
Thank you
dianne
There’s still enough left, I’m sending it directly.
Here’s the recipe:
For 4-5 hungry people
1 Hokaido pumkin
1 kg (about two lbs) of potatoes
2 onions
1 lb mushrooms
garlic
8 eggs
1/2 pint of milk, more or less
Salt, herbs, pepper, whatever floats your boat
-put non-stick paper onto a deep baking tray/cookie sheet
-grate potatoes, pumkin, onions
-clean and slice mushroom
-preheat oven (180-200°C)
-This is a lot of stuff. Fry in several portions just por a bit of tast in a pan, pour every portion on the tray in the oven. Best start with the potatoes since they take the longest, fray mushrooms seperately.
-Whisk eggs with milk and season
-When everything is fried, pour eggs over it and bake for 20-30 minutes. You could top it with some cheese, I served it with lots of sour cream.
blogofmyself
I guess that a prof needs it for a class. Around here they would often end up in the “Handapparat”, a place in the faculty library where the prof puts stuff so students can make copies.
deborahbell & Alethea
I have a similar reaction to simple Ibuprofen. I felt like I was hovering 20 cm above ground while I walked into things, walls and stuff.
akr3on
Probably a relative’s. Those monkeys come is orange and dark brown variety (if it’s the one I think it is). Took this picture last summer. You can see the dark one in the back.
Happy Birthday Ms. Fossil Fishy
Tigger
Yay for modern medicine!
Tigger_the_Wing:
October 6th, 2012 at 5:41 am
Giliell, yay indeed! Without modern medicine, I would be long gone. And thank you for that yummy recipe! I’ll have to omit the mushrooms from (and probably add a generous amount of freshly grated parmesan to) mine.
Pteryxx:
October 6th, 2012 at 5:49 am
random neat stuff – a new poster on A+ turned out to be Mike Samsa, “The Last Behaviorist”.
Most recent entries, worth reading IMHO:
http://www.thelastbehaviorist.blogspot.com/2012/10/william-lane-craig-on-animal-suffering.html
–
http://www.thelastbehaviorist.blogspot.com/2012/10/priming-denialism.html
sc_a942540180f51643a3a9fb823ce24e83:
October 6th, 2012 at 6:30 am
Sorry about the Google login streamfest. I’m @shanemuk on Twitter, and shamelessly want to use PZ’s Lounge to ask you all, IF you care about dragging Northern Ireland (yes, it exists) into the 21st Century, to sign the pledge to get our benighted politicians a copy of the Geek Manifesto, Mark Henderson’s lovely book about getting science & evidence into policy.
Find out more and sign the pledge here: http://answersingenes.blogspot.co.uk/2012/08/tiocfaidh-ar-lab-for-science-and-for.html
Go on go on go on go on…
*ends spam*
McC2lhu saw what you did there.:
October 6th, 2012 at 8:02 am
This has probably crossed the Pharyngula Lounge news editor’s desk already, but there’s now a kerfuffle over the famous end of WWII photo of a couple kissing. A little more insight and info, and suddenly the moment is skeezy. I’m despondent to see history changed, but the point is valid:
Linky to article.
It also needs someone to shite all over the MRAs in the comments. I didn’t see the article until just now before bed, so I’m a worthless contributor this close to pass out time.
McC2lhu saw what you did there.:
October 6th, 2012 at 8:37 am
Which sockpuppet is more famous now, Lambchop or Dillahunty?
Ogvorbis: broken and cynical:
October 6th, 2012 at 8:45 am
Well, since I have to ask, “Who is Dillahunty,” for me the answer is oblivious.
Ogvorbis: broken and cynical:
October 6th, 2012 at 8:46 am
Er, obvious. Not oblivious. Obvious. Obviously.
Gregory Greenwood:
October 6th, 2012 at 9:08 am
Has anyone else heard about these three Cabinet minsiters in the UK who are trying to get the limit for abortion access lowered?
The laughably entitled ‘Health Secretary’ Jeremy Hunt favours a reduction to only twelve weeks. He claims to have reviewed the evidence, but he clearly has no grasp of the issues at hand whatsoever. Then there are the Home Secretary Theresa May and the Women’s Minister Maria Miller (yup, that’s right, the Woman’s Minister wants to restrict abortion rights) who both favour a reduction from 24 to 20 weeks. Cameron himself is on record saying that he favours a ‘modest reduction’ without specifying what this would mean.
There is much blather coming from the government that this is all ‘personal opinion’ and doesn’t reflect policy, but it seems pretty clear to me that they are testing the water and seeing what response they get, and that if the public response is not extremely negative then a future attempt to further restrict abortion access is very likely indeed.
Already the UK anti-choicers (complete with their ever-present whiff of American dollars) have come out vowing to re-open the debate on abortion access. It seems that the issue is set to become as politicised here as it is in the US.
Audley Z. Darkheart (liar and scoundrel):
October 6th, 2012 at 9:18 am
Good morning, everyone!
Had a doc’s appointment yesterday– DarkFetus is still breech, but besides that all is well. According to my doc, DF is big enough to be delivered safely at any time now, so if I go into labor before my c-section date, it’s no biggie. Ooooooo, I’m so excited!
And now I’m off to make cinnamon rolls. :)
Ogvorbis: broken and cynical:
October 6th, 2012 at 9:23 am
Audley:
[KERMIT ARMS]
Yeaaaay!!!!!!
Doesn’t cinnamon come already rolled? :)
Improbable Joe:
October 6th, 2012 at 9:29 am
Yay Audley!!!!!
Tigger_the_Wing:
October 6th, 2012 at 9:36 am
Hooray, Audley! =^_^=
Gregory Greenwood:
October 6th, 2012 at 9:41 am
All the best Audley. Soon your life with be filled with the patter of little Dark Spawn feet….
Audley Z. Darkheart (liar and scoundrel):
October 6th, 2012 at 10:01 am
Thanks, everyone! ♥!
The only thing I have left to do is buy a car seat and boy, that shit is expensive. Thankfully, Mr Darkheart’s coworkers gave him a gift card to one of the baby stores in the area, so we’ll only be spending about half the amount. :)
Giliell, Approved Straight Chorus:
October 6th, 2012 at 10:03 am
Yay Audley and Dark Fetus!
Cinnamon rolls? You want rush things*
*Cinnamon is claimed to start and strengthen labour, but my midwife used to say: before you eat enough of it to have an effect you puke from the amount you’ve eaten.
Improbable Joe:
October 6th, 2012 at 10:03 am
To all the folks sending congrats and what-not towards me and my wife… thanks! We couldn’t have done it without you. Literally: a generous Horde donation paid for my wife’s 1500 mile drive to her current job, and kept me fed until her first paycheck.
Now we wait for the negotiations… and it doesn’t look awesome so far. BossNurse is certainly NOT getting the $105,000 she was dreaming about. In the plus column, the yearly bonus is 15% if she gets it, so that has to be part of the equation as well. Plus, we’re going to try to rent for at least $100 cheaper than we’re paying now, and we’re about to pay off our car so that’s $340 a month less than we’re currently budgeted for. If we can save $440 a month compared to our current bills, that’s $5280 a year. So my wife makes what she’s been making minus $5280 after taxes, we come out even.
Luckily for both of us, my wife works through recruiters who handle these negotiations so she doesn’t have to get her hands dirty.
Audley Z. Darkheart (liar and scoundrel):
October 6th, 2012 at 10:12 am
Giliell:
They weren’t homemade cinnamon rolls, but the kind that comes out of a cardboard tube. I’d be highly surprised if there was any real cinnamon in them at all. XD
And if DF comes this weekend… well, I’m not going to be upset about that in the least. I am so ready (and impatient!) for this.
Joe:
Love to you and BossNurse. Good luck in her negotiations!
Lynna, OM:
October 6th, 2012 at 10:16 am
Some Christian pastors are deliberately breaking the law today.
http://maddowblog.msnbc.com/_news/2012/10/06/14261077-this-week-in-god
Improbable Joe:
October 6th, 2012 at 10:24 am
… still shopping for the Official SpokesGuitar. :)
Audley Z. Darkheart (liar and scoundrel):
October 6th, 2012 at 10:30 am
Lynna:
For fuck’s sake.
Hey, if they want the freedom to spew commentary on the election, I have no problem with that. Provided, of course, that the federal government taxes the shit out of them.
chigau (悲しい):
October 6th, 2012 at 11:03 am
I thought the “separation of church and state” was about the state not promoting a particular church.
Does it also mean that churches can’t say anything about the state?
Improbable Joe:
October 6th, 2012 at 11:11 am
chigau,
It is more about the tax-exempt status of churches and other non-profit organizations in general. It isn’t a religious freedom issue, it is a tax policy issue.
Azkyroth, Former Growing Toaster Oven:
October 6th, 2012 at 11:27 am
This thing or this thing? Or another thing? Or does it matter?
dianne:
October 6th, 2012 at 11:29 am
And now I’m off to make cinnamon rolls. :)
Careful. I made cinnamon rolls and went into labor the same night. Since I made bread and cleaned the house the same day (the latter being EXTREMELY rare behavior for me, especially when spontaneous), I’ve always assumed nesting, not cinnamon induced labor. But if you’ve suddenly got the urge to bake…
Audley Z. Darkheart (liar and scoundrel):
October 6th, 2012 at 11:36 am
Dianne:
Maybe I should start baking and cleaning and just get this pregnancy over with! ;)
(I’m not feeling like I’m nesting at the moment– the apartment is a wreck and I could give zero fucks right now.)
deborahbell:
October 6th, 2012 at 11:53 am
@48 jefrir
When I worked at a public library in my teens, we didn’t get longer checkout times, we just didn’t have to pay fines and could renew indefinitely as long as there wasn’t a hold on the item for someone else. The 2 times limite on renewing wasn’t system enforced, and the fines weren’t linked to any record of them being paid, so the official way of dealing with employee and volunteer’s fines was to mark them paid in the computer.
Now that I live in a different state, I looked up volunteering at my local public library and found that employees and volunteers don’t have any privileges like that – they have to pay their fines and don’t get any extra long check out times.
@58 Gilliel
Yikes!
Rev. BigDumbChimp:
October 6th, 2012 at 12:22 pm
Those damn unappreciative women again
mythbri:
October 6th, 2012 at 12:41 pm
The LDS General Conference is happening this weekend, and I’m seeing on Facebook that the current “prophet” just announced a change for proselytizing mission eligibility:
Boys will now be eligible to go on missions at 18, if they’ve graduated from high school.
Girls will now be eligible to go on missions at 19, if they’ve graduated from high school.
I’ve had female friends who have served missions (not being eligible until they were 21), and I wonder if this will result in a change in the attitude that Elders (male missionaries) tend to have toward Sisters (female missionaries). The attitude was, basically, that women only served missions because they hadn’t gotten anyone to marry them yet.
It’s not equal, but it’s closer. And I’m not sure if women are allowed to serve for a full two years, instead of the 18 months they’ve been allowed.
Giliell, Approved Straight Chorus:
October 6th, 2012 at 12:46 pm
Audley
I so believe it. Those last weeks, you’re just fed up with being pregnant and just want it to be over and have that little critter finally where you can see them.
Azkyroth
this one. Don’t know the other one, so it probably doesn’t matter. Actually, the basic recipe is “grate any non-mushy veggie and potatoes”.
So, kite flying didn’t work, but we had a nice afternoon out.
Improbable Joe:
October 6th, 2012 at 12:49 pm
Damn right BDC… I spend at least two evenings a week, carefully crafting very specific things to shout at women who are complete strangers. I mean, it is HARD WORK! You have to hone your craft, learn the right way to pitch your voice to carry in different environments, all sorts of things. Plus you have to be age, race, and body-type specific, adjust for relative wealth and social status, and so on.
People think you can just stand on a street corner and shout “Hey, honey-lumps! Let me stick my pickle between your pearly gates?” and call it a job well done. I’m here to tell you that there’s an art to being a giant douchecanoe!
Lynna, OM:
October 6th, 2012 at 1:13 pm
In reference to #86, LDS General Conference and the change in age for young missionaries:
1. Stinks of desperation. Not getting enough 19 year old males? Change the age to 18.
2. Stinks of desperation. Too many young men figuring out by age 19 that the entire LDS Church is built on a foundation of bullshit? Change the age to 18 and get them while they are still vulnerable to brainwashing.
3. Stinks of desperation. Not enough young men signing up to waste two years of their lives? Sacrifice more of the young women as well. A lot of the young women are putting off having babies, (instead of putting the baby factory into round-the-clock production at age 18 like they should), so we might as well send them on missions.
4. Losing too many young men to college, armed services, and reason? Grab them while they’re younger.
Lynna, OM:
October 6th, 2012 at 1:16 pm
RollingStone’s Matt Taibbi weighs in on the presidential debate:
Krasnaya Koshka:
October 6th, 2012 at 1:17 pm
I know I only post when I’m in crisis mode emotionally but, yes, I am in crisis mode, again.
I’m in Thailand and it’s a beautiful country with beautiful people and I love the music here. (Seriously, my tastes are unimportant.)
Tonight, whilst riding in a tuk tuk, an old man on a Vespa shouted to me, “Are you making the best of it here?” He was right behind the tuk tuk and I didn’t imagine he was speaking to me. So I, of course, ignored him.
“You’re American, right?!”
“Are you talking to me?”
“Yes! They’re very gay-friendly here. You can pick up any girl you want.” I am very, very butch right now–meaning my hair is very short. In my experience, that is all it takes. Short hair.
It was then I noticed the two girls behind him on his motorbike. (He was behind me.) To me, they looked miserable. Maybe eleven years old.
“Yeah, I’m not a fucking pervert but thanks. I like my girlfriend, because she’s my peer. I think pedophiles are disgusting.”
“You think I am a pedophile? I’m not. Love these young women because they are young women.”
“Is your ancient penis more important than these girls’ lives?”
I had no clue how many more times I would have to say this tonight. And not just for girls. For boys, too.
“Why the fuck do you think your penis should be happier than these kids?”
mythbri:
October 6th, 2012 at 1:29 pm
Ugh, Krasnaya. That’s so awful.
Krasnaya Koshka:
October 6th, 2012 at 2:00 pm
mythbri, talking to these kids, it’s all they know. Some of them were very angry at me so I paid them. This is not optimal, I know. But, fuck, can America keep old men from traveling to Thailand alone? I suppose not.
What can keep men from preying on the weak? Why don’t they know better?
Lynna, OM:
October 6th, 2012 at 2:20 pm
“Cutting PBS support (0.012% of budget) to help balance the Federal budget is like deleting text files to make room on your 500Gig hard drive.” — Neil DeGrasse Tyson
pixelfish:
October 6th, 2012 at 2:30 pm
I see Lynna has diagnosed the missionary age change similarly to me. My comments were back on the Temple Film thread, because I keep forgetting about open threads, but since nobody’s on that thread currently, I hope you’ll forgive me if I repost them here:
So the first two sessions of the Church semi-annual conference went down in SLC today, and lo and behold, it gets announced that the age requirement for missionaries has been lowered, from 19 to 18 for men, and from 21 to 19 for women.
http://www.heraldextra.com/news/local/lds-church-decreases-age-requirement-for-missionaries/article_902a7538-0fd1-11e2-a5c8-0019bb2963f4.html
There’s some interesting things to unpack in this, but I personally see this as a sign that the LDS church is starting to bleed followers noticeably or they would never have taken this step.
For one thing, going on a mission means your first chance to enter Mormon adulthood and go into the temple. As we’ve seen from this video, that’s no great prospect BUT the younger you are, the more likely you are to be swayed by this. For one thing, even despite your age, you’ve finally been allowed to see the secret thing your parents and older relatives haven’t talked about…and you’ll be getting it practically straight out of high school, instead of 2 or 3 years down the road when you’ve possibly been exposed to the secular agenda of your higher education. Basically, they’re shoving kids into the “greatest” commitments of their religion even earlier.
Secondly, they lowered the women’s age requirement to the men’s previous age requirement. (They aren’t interested in equality between the sexes or BOTH genders would have had the same age requirements.) Previously, this disparity has always been explained that it is more important for women to get married and start families than to go on a mission and EVEN THEN women would be thoroughly grilled by their bishops to make sure that there was no potential return missionary who has been hanging around. This happened to my sister, who was planning on serving a mission when she met my brother-in-law. I like my brother-in-law and think he’s pretty decent, and he’s especially nice to me because he has two non-active/ex-Mormon sibs, so he’s probably the best BIL I could have hoped for, so I’m not sad, but still…the point remains: women are not encouraged to go on missions, but to get married.
But, what with no active encouragement to serve missions Just In Case, women were finding themselves with 2,3,4,5, maybe even more years before attending the temple, becoming educated and independent without that stamp of Official LDS Adulthood. (And it is a Big Thing in Mormonland. As an adult, I was sometimes excluded from gettogethers with older relatives because I hadn’t been through the temple and/or gotten married.)
My major (speculative, based on my experience with LDS values and the rhetoric around missions and gender roles) surmise is that the church is starting to discover that more young folks are either not making it to missions and marriage at all, or leaving the church more publically. Hence, lower the age requirements, get the kids into the temple, and get them invested before they know the full taste of adulthood and education.
Sad thing is, I think it would work for a while. Again, drawing from my own experiences, if I’d had a chance to serve a mission right after school, I would have jumped at it. (My German teacher had a pretty solid record of her students serving German language missions and I almost certainly would have gone to Europe.) So I would have gone to the temple earlier and had more invested by the time I started reaching full adulthood. I had the chance to slip away because my culture kept telling me that my only value lay in wife and mommyhood and thus kept me cooling my heels in school. So before I hit 21, I had lived on my own, visited a couple cities outside of Utah, seen enough of the world to realise I didn’t want to be stuck at the back of Plato’s Cave, and had a chance to let all the doctrinal inconsistencies marinate. And because I wasn’t married with kids nor had I gone through the temple, it was much easier for me to leave than it otherwise would have been. (Still not easy, mind you.)
We laugh at the temple movie and we see it as groaningly awful, but many Mormons don’t…and I think it’s largely because of the sunk costs and time investment and how everything was built up for them. Push them at it even earlier, and I think you’ll find a higher retention rate.
But not forever. Because information spreads and our cultures evolve. And make no mistake–they wouldn’t have considered going against a traditional age requirement if they weren’t bleeding members somewhere.
Lynna, OM:
October 6th, 2012 at 2:34 pm
Oh, that damned Congressional Budget Office! It is insisting once again on reporting the facts, inconvenient though they may be to Romney, who claimed that President Obama “doubled the deficit.” No, he didn’t, not for any meaning of “doubled” with which I am familair.
And now the CBO is reporting that “the Federal Deficit has dropped another $200 Billion to a level of $1.1 Trillion – which is the lowest level it has been since 2008 when the Financial Crisis began.”
The CBO projects that for 2013 is the deficit will be just $641 Billion. Obviously, this could change if Mitt Romney is elected and extends all the Bush tax cuts, plus adding his own.
Lynna, OM:
October 6th, 2012 at 2:42 pm
Okay, I think we already knew this, but it’s nice to have an official analysis. American newspapers give far more coverage climate change deniers and skeptics than the newspapers of other countries.
Link.
Dramatic graph of USA’s stupidity is included.
Lynna, OM:
October 6th, 2012 at 2:44 pm
Feeling sorry for your sister, pixelfish. Feeling sigh of relief for your luck. Things could have so easily gone the wrong way for you.
Lynna, OM:
October 6th, 2012 at 2:53 pm
Looks to me like Republicans are planning to win elections “retroactively,” as Think Progress has also pointed out.
Republican National Lawyers Association Plan For Losing Candidates: Challenge Absentee Voters.
So, having failed to have the courts uphold most of their voter suppression laws, Republicans have switched to plan B.
BTW, Rachel Maddow pointed out that even though voter suppression laws have been struck down for the most part, the States in which those laws were passed have been worse than lax in informing voters that those doofus-brained restrictions no longer apply. A lot of people still think the restrictions are in place, so they are likely to be discouraged from voting. http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/26315908/#49309743
Lynna, OM:
October 6th, 2012 at 2:55 pm
No comment.
Too fucking awful for comments.
http://thinkprogress.org/justice/2012/10/03/947981/court-requires-disabled-rape-victim-to-prove-she-fought-back-calls-for-evidence-of-biting-kicking-scratching/
Lynna, OM:
October 6th, 2012 at 2:58 pm
Add this to the list of very bad rulings by Republican dunderheads:
mythbri:
October 6th, 2012 at 5:10 pm
Just so it’s clear, my comment about the LDS mission rule changes wasn’t in any way approbation. If they were really interested in equality, then the rules would be the same. And to make kids eligible as soon as they should be starting college is exactly as Lynna and pixelfish have said. They might claim to value education, but I’ll bet that since younger people, including young Mormons, tend to be progressive they’ve probably lost a lot of members as they’ve gone through higher education. I know that’s what happened in my case.
I don’t think that anyone should go on those missions, but I was curious to see if making the mission rules closer would do something to minimize the dismissive attitudes that Elders have toward Sisters. There’s no way that they would in any way be eliminated.
In the structural organization of the LDS Church, no male is placed under the direct authority of a woman after he reaches the age of 12 and receives the first part of the “priesthood”. There is not a single time when he would report or answer to a woman in the context of the church after that. Women are only in charge of other women, and children. No organization that patriarchal could ever be equal.
Beatrice:
October 6th, 2012 at 5:11 pm
Spent a lovely day at a friend’s home. Traveled there with another friend who made quite a long trip just to make it to the capital. Luckily, she took most of the things I’ve been keeping for her when she left for home tonight (yes, she didn’t want to stay the weekend, I’m a bit hurt).
The friend we visited was celebrating getting her master’s degree. Most people were her relatives, of which I only knew her boyfriend and have met her brother and sister-in-law once before.
I survived!
Was awkward as usual and didn’t speak much, but I don’t think I was too weird.
Friend makes wicked cakes. Tried three different kinds and had to give up on the fourth because I couldn’t breath for how stuffed I was.
Her little nephew is the cutest kid in the world. Watching him dancing around was half the entertainment of the day.
mythbri:
October 6th, 2012 at 5:13 pm
@Lynna
If that rape victim had the intellectual function equivalent to a three-year-old, how in the fucking world does that make her capable of “consent”? A three-year-old child cannot consent, and neither can any human with the mind of a three-year-old.
I can’t even describe how I feel about the fact that someone got away with that.
Caine, Divisitrix du mal:
October 6th, 2012 at 5:50 pm
I just enjoyed watching a Momma Turkey and her two little ones wandering about the yard.
Beatrice:
October 6th, 2012 at 5:54 pm
I just realized that in that post above I implied that my friend’s boyfriend is her relative. He isn’t.
Too tired.
Good night
cicely:
October 6th, 2012 at 6:02 pm
Tigger: yay! for feeling better.
:D :D :D
-
If you’re talkin’ Jack-o-lantern, I’d go with the eerily pale blue pumpkin.
-
Exactly what I was thinking!
-
pixelfish:
October 6th, 2012 at 6:04 pm
@mythbri: No worries. I didn’t interpret your comments as anything other than noting that lessening the age distance might result in the elders treating the sisters better. :) Of course, if it does, it’ll be in the area of unintended consequences because as you note, there’s a lot the GAs could do to get the men of the church to treat the women of the church with more respect and they haven’t done any of it.
…
Mythbri and Lynna and our other ex-Mormons know this, but here’s a fun factoid about the priesthood roles for you never-Mos: In the absence of the father, a 12 year old son has the responsibility to lead family meetings before his mother does. Or the family’s Home Teachers–the dudes who come in once a month to preach at the family in the home.
carlie:
October 6th, 2012 at 6:18 pm
Glad you’re doing well, Tigger. A colleague of mine went in for a stress test, came out needing stents, just went in for the stents, and came out needing multiple bypass. Hearts are pains in the asses.
Had a weird cultural coincidence this week. A local video store is going out of business, and I stopped by Wed. and found they had Spirited Away. Had never seen it although I’ve heard all about how great it is, so snapped it up. Then a new Gravity Falls was on last night (fantastic show), and it had a monster called the Summerween Trickster, who was a dead-on homage to the No-face monster in Spirited Away. We would have entirely missed that reference if we hadn’t just gotten the movie and seen it. Ooooo. Maybe it was God, making sure that I got maximum enjoyment out of Halloween and Japanese spirit monsters. ‘Cause he’s like that.
Improbable Joe:
October 6th, 2012 at 7:10 pm
Well… if you guys don’t hear from me for awhile, it is because someone attacked me and I was either injured or I was forced to injure someone else. I fully expect my new neighbors to make a move on me sometime in the next couple of days. They are so so SO angry at me right now. Their dog tried to attack my dog so I called animal control. Apparently I’m the asshole for not tolerating their breaking the city ordinance against animal neglect and the constant barking and aggressive behavior from their dog.
This is not going to end well. I’m out of here in 35 days, if I can live that long.
The Sailor:
October 6th, 2012 at 8:02 pm
***lighting the Caine signal***
There’s a critter on my neighbor’s steps. I can’t tell whether it’s a large mouse or a small rat. I thought the tail was furless, but when I got closer it’s just finely furred.
It’s a dirty white with splotches of black on the ears.
Is this a (former) pet or a wild rat?
Portia:
October 6th, 2012 at 8:18 pm
Audley – yay! : )
–
I am a football widow again this weekend so I have been trying to keep busy (One of my things is to get mopey and dejected whenever SO goes to a college football game out of town. Maybe it’s because there are just so many this time of year). I made an awesome potato/sweetpotato/corn/kidneybean/greenbean/kale soup, and am about to start some bread for rising overnight. I did laundry and painted my house number on the mailbox I’m putting up this week. And I worked on a couple of other painting projects. Also stuffed 999 envelopes (yeah, I counted) for the fire department’s annual fundraising mailout. So, I think I’m almost distracted enough.
–
It’s interesting to me that the LDS church is so transparently trying to hook young people earlier and earlier. Hopefully they keep slipping out of the church’s grasp.
–
Also, on the church-taxation issue, I think Stephen Colbert said it the most succinctly when he had a pastor on this week who was saying that taxing political speech violates the First Amendment: “I wish I could get my political speech subsidized by the government like that!” /paraphrased
FossilFishy (Νεοπτόλεμος's spellchecker):
October 6th, 2012 at 8:36 pm
The booze be drunk. The cake be eaten. The copyrighted song be sung. The bouncing castle be packed away, and lost and lonely artifacts be gathered to await the worried’s call. Mrs. Fishy be well and truly launched into her forty-first trip round our merry little sun.
She wore a fun and funky yellow dress. I wore my matrimonial tie and shined my shoes. Daughter O’ mine wore her bling. All her bling. Who knew that plastic tiaras were bouncing castle proof?
There were aunts. There were Nana’s. Mother’s and cousins. There were friends of work and friends of play and friends of friends and children beyond count in their energetic superposition.
Stories were told. Again and for the first time. Jokes were made and laughed at. Puns were inflicted and the victims groaned while the perps beamed all innocent exterior over a chewily mischievous center. Eye-rolls were dispensed gratis between family members in that secret language of the oft heard tale. All the world’s problems were dissected, solved and returned to the queue to be re-solved next gathering.
The extroverts shone and preened and drew the eye, gathering energy aplenty to see them through the quiet times ahead. The introverts found the calmer corners, some watching, waiting for the right time to express their love and then make their escape. Though others stayed, happy to observe in quiet bemusement the doings of those for whom crowds are the very stuff of life.
This was humanity in all its weird and messy glory. This was the herd, the tribe, the pack, the troupe, gathered close to remember that we are all in this strange and wondrous world together, right here, right now, and never again. We whirl our way around the sun in this finite dance and how lucky
are we, that we don’t have to do it alone?
Life be well and truly celebrated here and now, in my little corner of the world. I invite you, one and all, wherever you are, whatever your circumstances, to share in that joy of being alive.
The Sailor:
October 6th, 2012 at 8:45 pm
“Who knew that plastic tiaras were bouncing castle proof?”
Not me! Sounds like a time was good and had by all.
FossilFishy (Νεοπτόλεμος's spellchecker):
October 6th, 2012 at 8:53 pm
Oh indeed Sailor, were I of a religious bent I’d say that that tiara was miraculous. ;)
I’m not sure if everyone had a good time but I try to keep an eye out for those in need and didn’t find any. Mind you, in any large gathering there’s bound to be a few not doing well. Here’s hoping that their troubles were at least not made worse by that evening’s festivities.
Menyambal --- Sambal's Little Helper:
October 6th, 2012 at 8:53 pm
Here’s a cute video from Canada’s national film board. The Log Driver’s Waltz http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=upsZZ2s3xv8 is kind of old-style, and the cartoon animation is a little odd, but I am liking the music. (The odd word in the chorus is “birling” which is Scottish for log-rolling, apparently.) I want to be a log driver.
Menyambal --- Sambal's Little Helper:
October 6th, 2012 at 8:56 pm
FossilFishy, thanks for the great description. It sounds like much fun.
Audley Z. Darkheart (liar and scoundrel):
October 6th, 2012 at 8:57 pm
Portia:
Yay!
I feel you on the “football widow” thing– this weekend, Mr Darkheart is attending a (small, local) gaming con, so I’ve got the apartment to myself. I was going to spend the night cleaning*, actually update my blog**, and maybe make a pan of brownies and watch a movie. At the rate I’m going, I’ll be lucky if I heat up a Pop Tart and play an hour of Resident Evil before passing out on the couch.
*Okay, I have done two loads of dishes, because I just can’t stand the thought of a dirty kitchen right now and somehow between last night and today my apartment exploded.
**Since I scheduled my c-section, almost everyone I know has been supportive and understanding. Almost everyone: I know some natural childbirth/”natural parenting” woosters that are blaming my docs for not being able to turn DarkFetus and acting like having a c-section is some sort of tragedy. I find this “natural at all costs” mindset to be both highly disturbing and, well, pretty anti-feminist.
Oh yeah, the two friends of mine who are the biggest pushers of this bullshit? Both are childless. *eyeroll*
birgerjohansson:
October 6th, 2012 at 9:02 pm
Isn’t the current LDS “prophet” senile?
So the change in policy would be the work of the clique who have silently taken over his job.
FossilFishy (Νεοπτόλεμος's spellchecker):
October 6th, 2012 at 9:03 pm
Your welcome Menyambal. And thank you for that vid. I haven’t seen that in years, a good nostalgic moment for me. Mind you, when I’m trying to shake that tune from my head in a week’s time I might feel differently. :)
Nerd of Redhead, Dances OM Trolls:
October 6th, 2012 at 9:06 pm
Finally got the storm windows up as tonight is the first scheduled frost in outlying (away from the Lake) areas. Official prediction near the Lake is just above frost. Best to be prepared. Need to find another a blanket/quilt/comforter for the Redhead, just in case. I’ll be fine.
Portia:
October 6th, 2012 at 9:18 pm
Audley:
Well, I’m glad we’re both making ourselves useful : ) Two loads of dishes is a lot of cleaning if you don’t feel motivated.
I’m going to start a new fall-themed painting, I think. Primed the canvasses and I’m ready to go with my late-evening energy burst .
I know it’s been discussed a lot here, but I don’t understand the gall of some people. If you are happy with your plans and your doctors, it really is unfeminist to try to tell you that you are Doin It Rong. I mean, I’m childless, and therefore don’t have any frame of reference for such an experience. Of course, people who *do* have kids and think they’re experts are just as obnoxious, I imagine. Sorry your woo-friends are so presumptuous. Combative Cousin is like that, very “wimmin have Natural Power™” and all that. She wants to be a midwife, no surprise. But I doula’d for our mutual friend, even though it’s what CC does for a part time living. Because I made a concerted effort to be supportive and carry out what the friend wanted, instead of being pushy about the Right Way.
–
FossilFishy: Happy birthday to Mrs. Fishy : ) And I love your writing. Your comment made me a little misty
trinioler:
October 6th, 2012 at 9:26 pm
Menyambal, its “old-style” because its old.
Its older than me.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Log_Driver's_Waltz
cicely:
October 6th, 2012 at 9:32 pm
Joe, be careful.
*worrying with professional virtousity*
-
Sounds like a heck of a party, FossilFishy.
:)
-
Audley Z. Darkheart (liar and scoundrel):
October 6th, 2012 at 9:40 pm
Portia:
Thankfully, it’s the moms I know are the ones who have been the most supportive. They understand that pregnancy and birth are processes that are full of surprises and that even the best made plans can go screwy pretty quickly. Even my own hippy, crunchy granola Mom is cool with my planned c-section and that is a bit of a shock to me.
Shaming women for doing what they think is best is pretty fucking ridiculous, in my book. No, a c-section is not what I originally wanted, but I’m not some child who needs her hand held while making a medical decision. And since I’m pretty sure that trying to deliver a butt first baby is pretty freaking dangerous, I’ll take the option that poses the lowest risk. I don’t need to suffer to prove my womanliness or whatever.
In other news, I just found out that my toaster has a Pop Tart setting.
Portia:
October 6th, 2012 at 9:48 pm
I like discoveries like that : ) Does it make a better pop tart?
Glad your mom and mom-friends are supportive.
I’ve run out of energy so the canvasses have one coat and the bread will be made tomorrow. Now I’ma make some pomegranate white tea and cozy up.
Josh, Official SpokesGay:
October 6th, 2012 at 10:08 pm
Advice from Quebecois Francophones? I’m in Quebec City for a few days and I want to be as non-obnoxious as possible. It’s clearly rude to just start speaking to people in English, but my French is very rusty. I’d like a way to graciously say so and ask if my conversational partner would mind speaking to me in English. What would you suggest?
“Je suis desole, mais je ne parle pas bien le Francais.”?
Something else?
Audley Z. Darkheart (liar and scoundrel):
October 6th, 2012 at 10:48 pm
What, Josh, you’re not just rolling up on people and shouting “English, motherfucker! Do you speak it?”?
chigau (悲しい):
October 6th, 2012 at 10:53 pm
Je suis American.
J’ai de l’argent.
FossilFishy (Νεοπτόλεμος's spellchecker):
October 6th, 2012 at 11:08 pm
chigau: That got a real LOL.
[Thinks back to highschool French class] Uhm, Il y a des castor la bas?
chigau (悲しい):
October 6th, 2012 at 11:16 pm
FossilFishy
Je n’ sais pas. Peut-être une petite mouton.
(Où est M. Thibault?)
ednaz:
October 6th, 2012 at 11:26 pm
FossilFishy – Thank You for your wonderful story. Sounds like your party was a big success.
kristinc, ~ringy dingy~:
October 6th, 2012 at 11:37 pm
Sailor — not Caine, obvs, but are you sure it’s not a baby opossum? The whole light-with-dark-splotched-ears sure sounds like it. (As does the hanging-out-on-porches. Do those neighbors have cats or dogs with outside food dishes?)
Although in my experience, very young baby possums are slightly larger than a rat.
pixelfish:
October 7th, 2012 at 1:08 am
@119 Birgerjansen: Current prophet is Thomas S. Monson. He wasn’t senile last I checked, but you really don’t want him to kick off before Boyd K. Packer, his number 2, goes, since Packer is the Ratzinger to Monson’s JPII. The prophet who was longest in and definitely senile was Ezra Taft Benson, former Bircher.
Menyambal --- Sambal's Little Helper:
October 7th, 2012 at 2:28 am
Oy. I just saw a video ad that was anti-Obama, although it pretended to be something impartial about the economy. It proved that the U.S. was in trouble by highlighting a state that had employment below the national average. I kept waiting for it to make the point, then realized that was the point—a state’s employment rate is below the national average, therefore the economy of the nation is bad. Vote Republican.
{Maybe, just maybe, they meant that that state should have been above average—it could have been Nevada, maybe, and that might make sense—but they never said that. It was like the opposite of Lake Wobegon.)
Crudely Wrott:
October 7th, 2012 at 2:29 am
An hour ago would have been more timely but I’d like to give a special word of appreciation to the the most worthy OM, Lynna.
You are an unending source of information and perspective. I am certainly not alone in finding your posts of great value. Thank you so very much for your efforts and your dedication and your tenacity. This thread is emblematic of many others and I always look forward to what you have to say, to reveal and to shine a bright light on.
Please, do continue for the continued benefit of all who read your words of experience and insight.
+++++++++++
And to Sailor, yes, the little critter was probably a young opossum just trying to find its way in the world. Can be safely ignored or studied; either way it will behave the same, mostly harmless.
Menyambal --- Sambal's Little Helper:
October 7th, 2012 at 3:46 am
Improbable Joe, I hope the dog thing works out. Dog owners can be nutso.
I once had a dog come into my yard and aggressively threaten me and my girlfriend. He got close enough to kick, which was my definition of too close, and I snapped one to his head. He ran yelping. So his owners came into my yard and aggressively threatened me.
—
Oy. The kids are having a sleep-over/movie night and I am chaperoning from down the hall. I’m too tired to research, to learn or to write, and I can’t take much more giggling.
Giliell, Approved Straight Chorus:
October 7th, 2012 at 3:52 am
Good morning
Yay, I found something that keeps Mr. at the Sunday breakfast table for longer than 5 min. Freshly baked croissants
Krasnaja Koshka
That’s so horrible.
We pay billions and gazillions for war. Why can’t way pay to get those families out of poverty so they won’t sell their children into prostitution?
JOe
Urgh, good luck. I really know that feeling. Since I called the housing agency because those construction workers are assholes who create serious health hazards I’m pretty uncomfortable to park my car here…
Not to insinuate that my car is similar to your health, of course.
+++
Holy fucking shit.
A) 3 years old cannot consent, so neither can people with the mental capacities of 3 yo
B) Consent is a NO until Yes. HOw could he be sure he had consent (given that the person is unable to give it anyway?)
Audley
Yeah, to put the process over outcome. Fucking bullshit. Who cares which way DF enters the world if the two of you are healthy and happy afterwards?
The goal of pregnancy and childbirth is to have a child, not to push something through your vagina under pain.
FossilFishy
Sounds like lots of fun
Caine, Divisitrix du mal:
October 7th, 2012 at 4:05 am
Um, that’s not much of a description. Rats are distinctive looking, so if it is a rat, should be fairly obvious. That said, I don’t imagine you’d find a wild rat that’s white. You can try to trap it and get it to a vet for identification, but I’d be careful, considering you don’t know what you have – a bite wouldn’t be good.
Kristin’s suggestion of a possum is a distinct possibility. Look at some pics on the net and see if that’s helpful.
Menyambal --- Sambal's Little Helper:
October 7th, 2012 at 4:40 am
Freshly baked croissants? Dang, Giliell, do you have any extra?
Audley, I agree with Giliell. Childbirth is right at the edge of human ability—big-brained babies and walking upright are not a good mix, and only recently have advances in medicine taken childbirth out of the major-killer category. Take every advantage of medical help you want, and if anybody tells you childbirth is a natural process, spit in their eye and tell them that was natural, too.
Giliell, Approved Straight Chorus:
October 7th, 2012 at 4:56 am
Menyabal
Help yourself
I admit they come out of a can, but baking them makes all the difference
Azkyroth, Former Growing Toaster Oven:
October 7th, 2012 at 5:10 am
Jesus. I just remembered…when I was about 13-14 my parents got a call, asking for me by name, from some asshole who was talking angrily about what sounded like “dead babies” in his yard, and claiming that his dog was sniffing around them. He announced that he was “pretty sure they’re yours” and threatened to hurt me if his dog caught anything. I handed the phone back to my parents and he claimed to have gotten the number out of the Alameda County phone book (it was an unlisted number and we lived nowhere near Alameda County). Unfortunately, at that point my parents insistently dismissed everything blatantly deranged as “obviously a joke” (this, Westboro Baptist Church flavor sites, etc.) and nothing was done. >.> I seem to recall the situation seeming too surreal to be frightening at the time, but in retrospect… O.o
Menyambal --- Sambal's Little Helper:
October 7th, 2012 at 6:13 am
I just remembered a time I was out for a bicycle ride with a group of friends, and a big dog came out on the road after us. Back then, we carried light aluminum tire pumps about a foot or two long, in little brackets on the bike, and we used them for dog defense, even though making contact could break the pump. Somebody swung a pump or two at the dog, and we got on away. A few minutes later, a car screeched up and a man jumped out and started yelling at us. His wife had told him that we were attacking his dog and beating it with hammers.
(Nowadays, I spray the dog in the face with a water bottle. Tire pumps are even smaller now, so they are useless. Pepper spray just seems too much like looking for trouble, somehow. But there are days I’m short on water … )
dianne:
October 7th, 2012 at 7:40 am
Josh, some anecdotal experience with countries where I don’t speak the language or speak it poorly, in case they help:
1. You might find that your French is better or at least more useful than you think. I was able to get around Paris without disgracing myself too badly (except in the accent department) with just high school French I hadn’t used in many years. Things do come back to you, especially in comprehension. Seeing a known but forgotten word will often bring it back into your active vocabulary.
2. It’s Canada. Most people will have a working familiarity with English, even in Quebec. They’ll probably switch if you are struggling. However, it’s my impression that people frequently appreciate you making the effort to try to speak their language, even if the effort is in the end mostly futile. (Could non-English speakers please tell me if this impression is, in their opinion, correct? Or should I be jumping directly to asking if they speak English and not making them suffer my bad accent, vocabulary, and grammar?)
3. Asking politely if someone speaks English, even if you ask in English, makes you embarrassingly more polite than the average US-American visitor.
dianne:
October 7th, 2012 at 7:49 am
Shaming women for doing what they think is best is pretty fucking ridiculous, in my book.
Yep. Childbirth used to be a killer to the tune of 30% of women who tried it. A study in Afghanistan found up to 1 in 6 women in rural Afghanistan died in childbirth (throughout their lifetimes, not in a single birth) and they (sometimes) have access to a certain level of care. Not to mention that having a stillbirth used to be the norm…
From my personal point of view, anyone who thinks giving birth by c-section makes you a failure can bite my (still living because of a c-section) ass.
opposablethumbs:
October 7th, 2012 at 7:59 am
fwiw, I think what Josh wrote is perfectly fine. Variants … j’suis désolé mais mon français est nul – ça t’embêterait pas si on parlait en anglais? [OR ça vous embêterait pas if the interlocutor is a person one would address as vous rather than tu]. Or just, on pourrait parler en anglais? for the second bit. nul is a bit slangy, roughly equivalent to saying “my French is useless/my French is rubbish. Would you mind if we spoke English?”. You can also give strict(ish) grammatical rules the shove and simplify the second part to ça t’embête pas si on parle en anglais? or on peut parler en anglais?
All the French I’ve learned is European, though. Looking forward to seeing what those with real first-hand knowledge say!
StarStuff, a soulless cunt:
October 7th, 2012 at 8:13 am
Yesterday was fun! We found about 30 species of herps, including a Siren species that has yet to be named and described!
Ogvorbis: broken and cynical:
October 7th, 2012 at 8:24 am
That’s fantastic.
I do, however, have a question. How does one know that one has discovered a previously undescribed species? Okay, more than one. What happens if one formally describes, in a published peer-reviewed paper, a description of a new species that someone else has already described (I understand about the primacy of the first description and that the new description becomes a junior synonym, but does it damage careers, create bad blood, or is it considered ‘normal’?)?
gillyc:
October 7th, 2012 at 8:24 am
This seems to be a good place to ask: can anyone recommend some books on Marxism? Pro, anti or neutral. I’m rather interested in it but not sure where to start! (Yes, I know it hasn’t really got much to do with Atheism but I think I’ll get a better answer here than anywhere else.)
StarStuff, a soulless cunt:
October 7th, 2012 at 8:33 am
@ Ogvorbis
Well, we knew because this species and a few others have been known to be distinct species for a while, but have been lumped under Siren intermedia. Apparently there just isn’t enough information known about these species yet to publish a paper (they don’t know their range, for example). My TA actually took us to that site to find one of these Sirens because he’s found them there before. (Also, my TA knows more about local herps than the book does. Probably even more than the professor for the class.)
Ogvorbis: broken and cynical:
October 7th, 2012 at 8:49 am
Starstuff:
That makes sense. And trying to find the range for a rare species? Oy!
Back in the 1970s, a biologist found a new subspecies of (I think) Canyon Tree Frog (Hyla arenicolor). I was a rather bright pink (more saturated than the Grand Canyon Pink Rattlesnake (Crotalus oreganus abyssus)) and was found in the pools along a small creek upstream from a very tall waterfall. He found hundreds of the little herps along the creek and set out to determine the range.
He spent the next summer checking every drainage within two miles of this creek and found none. There were still lots along the creek, but none anywhere else. Defined range? Check. Distinctive colouration? Check. Success! His chance to describe a new subspecies.
Then a thunderstorm came through that drainage during the August monsoon. When the biologist returned in September, the drainage had been scoured of trees and shrubs. And frogs. His count for the new subspecies dropped from hundreds to zero. Zip. Nada. None.
When I asked my dad what ever happened to this biology student, he told me that he was so depressed about losing that discovery and losing the poplulation, that he decided to become an MD instead. I have this vision of going back and finding that creek and finding it crawling with pink tree frogs. There’s almost no way that the gully washer could have killed them all.
Anyway, sounds like you had fun. I spent the day on a rattley passenger car being pulled by a steam locomotive through the rain. I think you day was more fun.
ChasCPeterson:
October 7th, 2012 at 9:25 am
sunscreen.
Hail Tpyso.
ChasCPeterson:
October 7th, 2012 at 9:29 am
I should add, that’s a cool story.
If you remember the specific waterfall’s location, I know people in the region who’d be interested.
Giliell, Approved Straight Chorus:
October 7th, 2012 at 9:40 am
Dogs with idiot owners:
Mr.’s former best friend has a dog he treats on the border of abuse (I’m not quite sure on which side of the border he is), which results in one massively agressive dog. This is combined with a “not my job to fence my animals properly” attitude (he once kept half the village chasing his highland cows because, fence, who? me?). So his dog escaped, ran into the garden of a friend of mine who has 3 children and threatened them.
His reply when she complained about it?
Well, if she didn’t want his dog in her garden she had to fence it in a way that would keep the dog outside…
What I also loved when I walked my neighbours’ dog were dog-owners who didn’t call back their dogs. The dog I walked didn’t get along well with most other dogs. It wasn’t that much of a problem as long as both dogs were leashed. I would keep him on a short leash, bring my body between him and the other dog and he would walk calmly past the strange dog. Only it doesn’t work that well if the other dog is unleashed and runs towards your dog to play. And if I called the other dogowner they’d reply “don’t worry, my dog doesn’t bite!” Yeah, mine does, fuck you. Don’t complain about your Yorkshire Terrier getting eaten by a 70lbs boxer dog if you serve it on a plate.
Beatrice:
October 7th, 2012 at 9:45 am
dianne,
Yes, my impression too is that non-English speakers generally like when you try to speak their language instead of trying directly with English. You might have to switch to English in the very next sentence, but you’ll get brownie points for trying. Just don’t try it with someone who has to deal with you quickly because there are thirty people in the line behind you.
A broken “Dobar dan”, even followed immediately by English, will earn you some love here.
ChasCPeterson:
October 7th, 2012 at 9:52 am
wow! And in October?
You must live in the southeast US. Or the tropics.
wut
(bing! SE US)
ah.
The problem here is that these putative species are defined and can be recognized only with genetic data. (My otherwise ignorant prediction is that their ranges will be bounded in large part by major rivers.)
Sirens are awesomely cool, btw. They’re probably the sister clade to all other living salamanders, which suggests a separate lineage for about a perzillion years.
Improbable Joe:
October 7th, 2012 at 10:36 am
Hey folks…
It is cold and raining and nasty out here. That makes me SO FUCKING HAPPY THAT YOU CAN’T EVEN UNDERSTAND! The noisy shit neighbors all stay inside when it is cold and wet and nasty out, so maybe I can have one goddamned day of peace and quiet. I wish it would rain every single day until I leave.
Speaking of leaving, has anyone done a big cross-country move in the USA?
Giliell, Approved Straight Chorus:
October 7th, 2012 at 10:54 am
Joe
May the rain fall often and heavily
*sigh*
Yesterday I cleaned up my craft-kitchen.
Result?
Can’t find my colour-charts anymore…
Improbable Joe:
October 7th, 2012 at 11:07 am
Giliell,
The perils of cleanliness, right? At least when my house is a mess, I don’t feel bad when I can’t find something. When my house is clean and I can’t find something, where am I even supposed to start looking for it?
I lost my keys here for 4-5 months, couldn’t find them, and it killed me because the house was so clean. I vacuumed at least once a week, laundry got done as often as the hamper got full, once a month I’d do a more in-depth cleaning, moving most of the furniture and such. No sign of the keys. Somehow, magically, my keys were under the sofa. The keyring got underneath and then embedded into the bottom of one of the legs. Every time I moved the sofa, the keys would move with it.
Lynna, OM:
October 7th, 2012 at 11:20 am
Crudely Wrott @136
Thank you very much. Too kind. [foot shuffling, blushing, pigeon chest and other pride-swelling manifestations]
Just to keep you up to date with important but nonsensical events, I bring you my summary of the October 2012 General Conference of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints (which I haven’t managed to entirely avoid because every media outlet in my area is broadcasting it live, including my local NPR station):
The Adversary is in your bed, under your bed, and in the Internet. He is sinking his claws into right now in order to make you do the following:
- weaken the sanctity of marriage (dog whistle against gay marriage)
- put off having mormon babies (dog whistle against contraception and abortion and uppity women)
- addict you to porn
- weaken your faith
- steal the minds and hearts of your children
How to fight The Adversary [mormon Satan]:
- spend even more time in church
- bring even more church activities (family home evening etc.) into your home
- marry those young women and get them pregnant [from old man's point of view -- it's always an old man's point of view]
- LDS-only Internet
- Send kids on missions at younger ages
- vote for Mitt Romney [heavily veiled instruction, hidden in generalities about the dire direction of the country]
- consider the Church your storm cellar and the rest of the world beset by tornadoes
- allow your children to participate only in church-related activities
- remain childlike as adults
- believe in
The AdversaryThe Boogeyman- pay your tithing
- pay your tithing
- pay your tithing
- vacuum under your bed
- pay your tithing
Lynna, OM:
October 7th, 2012 at 11:36 am
Remember Mitt Romney’s explanation for beheading Big Bird? “Is the program so critical that it’s worth borrowing money from China to pay for it?”
The reference to borrowing from China is a dog whistle to the far right. It’s actually an old John Bircher-type boogeyman that plays on fears of a commie takeover.
This meme is particularly strong where I live, in the Morridor (Mormon corridor), where John Birch Society meetings are regularly held. (They start the meetings with prayer, Pledge of Allegiance to the flag, sometimes singing of patriotic songs, and often a mission statement taken almost directly from “Believe, Obey, and Endure” mormonish guidelines.)
There’s just one tiny little problem with the “borrowing from China” zinger: it’s not accurate.
It’s difficult to find anyone in the media calling Romney on this lie.
Here’s a CNN source that says China holds about 8% of US debt: Who owns America? Hint: It’s not China.
Menyambal --- Sambal's Little Helper:
October 7th, 2012 at 11:46 am
Joe, I’m not sure what you mean by “a big cross-country move in the USA”. My furthest was from Seattle to south Missouri, but that was back when I’d throw out everything that I couldn’t stuff into/onto my vehicle. (I took the back seat out of two different cars because I’d used them to move more often than I’d carried passengers.) Nowadays it takes me many trips, and I’ve not moved further than the next county.
So I’ve no experience on hiring moving vans or companies, but I’ve returned something my sister used. It was a damn big box/flimsy storage building, which was strapped to a trailer, and came from U-Haul. They trailered it to her old house, she filled it up, they took it away, put the box in a big truck to here, put it on another trailer and we towed it, emptied it, and towed it back.
Which is just to say that you can rent/hire just about anything. You can also run into trouble with the locals if you leave any storage/moving container out of your sight for long.
It all depends on how much help, money, time and stuff you have. I’d take the opportunity to reduce inventory, then enlist all the friends/family/free help you can get.
But then, I’m the guy who has plastic storage bins stacked up in every room of the house, and has to get something out of one on a daily basis. (BTW, a tall plastic bin makes a great cat litter box, and a secure lid for one is nothing to be sneezed at.)
Lynna, OM:
October 7th, 2012 at 12:00 pm
Best political debate? Jon Stewart vs. Bill O’Reilly.
The Daily Beast reviewed the debate and posted video of the best moments.
Lynna, OM:
October 7th, 2012 at 12:22 pm
Joe, I’ve moved many times, but only across most of the USA once. I found that the U-Haul rental trucks were a far better way to go than the U-Haul trailers. My advice is to rent a truck.
Improbable Joe:
October 7th, 2012 at 12:23 pm
Menyambal,
I have a house full of stuff, so even reducing “inventory” is still going to require something large enough for lots of furniture. If we use a shipping container, we’re going to have same-day deliver and pick-up… I’m not leaving my stuff outside for the neighborhood to pick through as soon as I turn my back. It should take no more than 2-3 hours to load up a trailer if I have everything packed and staged by the front door.
Improbable Joe:
October 7th, 2012 at 12:24 pm
Lynna,
What’s the difference between the trailers and the trucks that makes the truck better?
Menyambal --- Sambal's Little Helper:
October 7th, 2012 at 12:39 pm
Joe, that sounds like good planning.
In my experience, driving a truck is easier than pulling a trailer behind a car, especially if the car isn’t made for towing.
I remember that U-Haul charges a lot less for a truck if you bring it back to where you got it. I’d look at the numbers on driving a slightly-smaller truck there and back again, then driving your own car there with the compact stuff—as opposed to renting a huge truck and a towing dolley to drag your car, for one way.
Improbable Joe:
October 7th, 2012 at 12:52 pm
Menyambal,
I’m travelling somewhere upwards of 1800 miles. Back and forth and back again ain’t gonna work. :)
I’ve been emailing back and forth with my wife, and the current plan looks like we’re going to go with a shipping container dropped off in front of our house, loaded up, and then picked up and driven for us. My wife is going to rent a van for the pets, and I’m going to drive my car. Or maybe I’ll drive the van and go nonstop for 30 hours so the pets aren’t too inconvenienced, but I’m not exactly sure yet.
Lynna, OM:
October 7th, 2012 at 12:53 pm
The trucks give you a sturdier box in which to place your belongings, better tie-downs too. They are easier to back up than a trailer. Some of the trucks come with a lift gate, and/or ramps that make it much easier to load heavy items.
Back to the dominant cultural event in the Morridor:
And now to give everyone the chance to suffer just a taste of the mormon General Conference. This is Ann M. Gibb, Second Counselor Young Women General Presidency, and the only woman to speak during the whole shebang. Link to video, Prozac smiling weirdo dissolves into tears at about 10:00 thanks to the “enabling power of the atonement,” brought on by God taking the life of young women while they are in college. “Humility,” “submission,” and “obedience” are repeated.
So, why choose the woman as your taste of mormon GC? Because the men have pressured her into being an even worse speaker than they are. This is the true horror. About 11 minutes of horror.
Boyd K. Packer made a speech, but I didn’t hear most of what he said because the whole episode was more like a slasher film in which the audience is just waiting for the actor to keel over.
Lynna, OM:
October 7th, 2012 at 1:23 pm
And …. [sigh] yet another Romney lie from the debate bites the dust.
How is the Romney campaign explaining this? Mitt didn’t mean to say what he said.
More coverage of this issue:
http://mediamatters.org/blog/2011/12/06/media-ignore-report-undermining-their-solyndra/184694
So, 87% of the 1705 loan guarantees went to power generation projects, and not to manufacturing projects like Solyndra. These projects have almost no risk of default.
Improbable Joe:
October 7th, 2012 at 1:25 pm
Looking at a company called U-Pack, they park a 17-foot trailer in front of your house, you load it up and they pick it up. They drop if off whenever you ask them to, and if you need it stored for a few weeks/months they do that too. Plus if you don’t fill the trailer, they give you a refund for the extra space.
Improbable Joe:
October 7th, 2012 at 1:34 pm
Lynna, wouldn’t it be easier to just say what Romney got right during the debate? His name, the president’s name, the moderator’s name, he showed up before the debate started and didn’t walk out in the middle, he knows what country he lives in, taxes exist… and not much else.
Lynna, OM:
October 7th, 2012 at 1:39 pm
Those super nice, Christian and mormon conservations reveal their teeth and claws and hate … again:
Patricia, OM:
October 7th, 2012 at 1:52 pm
Joe – Ask them why they will give you a refund for the unused space? Is it because they are going to use it to put someone else’s stuff in with your stuff? Is your stuff going to make stops along the way?
I’m very suspicious of “bed buggers” moving companies because my husband was a long haul truck driver for over 20 years, and I’ve heard bed buggers telling stories in truck stops that would curl your toenails!
Improbable Joe:
October 7th, 2012 at 2:00 pm
Patricia,
According to their website they do commercial shipping with the extra space, not household shipping. Decent reviews on Yelp and other sites. Although I suppose I could reject the refund and just keep the whole truck to myself, right?
Portia:
October 7th, 2012 at 2:04 pm
Good for them for weathering the storm of “Mormon love and kindness.” That religion contains so many bullies it’s a wonder that they don’t share a broader cultural reputation like Scientologists do.
I had leftover kale and I put it in a banana smoothie and I am very pleased. :)
carlie:
October 7th, 2012 at 2:14 pm
Oh no you will NOT. Please. Driving is ok, but do not try to go that far in a day, especially if you are the only human in the car. That’s a 2 day drive, minimum. The savings on not staying overnight at a crappy hotel is not worth getting into an accident because you’re so tired. Hell, if money is really that tight, get a few pieces of posterboard for 50 cents each so you can block the windows and sleep in the car at pre-determined rest stops. Seriously. I do a 20 hour one-way drive at least once a year, and it took a couple of close calls to realize it just isn’t worth it to not sleep at some point. Just don’t fuck around with that sort of thing.
Moving advice – start packing now. There’s a ton of stuff you don’t actually use and wouldn’t miss for a month or so. Label the boxes well.
Improbable Joe:
October 7th, 2012 at 2:15 pm
Kale and banana smoothie? Ummmm… um.
Portia:
October 7th, 2012 at 2:17 pm
Are you skeptical Joe? :) It’s surprisingly delicious. The kale gets blended so tiny that the only evidence of it is the fun green hue. I added a dash of vanilla too. Om nom.
Improbable Joe:
October 7th, 2012 at 2:17 pm
carlie,
I figured I could stop for naps, but unpacking the cats and packing them back up for three days and two nights seems… I can’t decide if it is worse to get them there as fast as physically possible, or try to get four cats and a dog in a hotel room twice.
Lynna, OM:
October 7th, 2012 at 2:26 pm
More from the mormon General Conference being held this weekend — this excerpt refers to the mormon apostles having decided to send young men into the mission field at age 18 instead of 19:
Elder Nelson said 18-year-old missionaries are “sweeter, purer, smarter.”
Improbable Joe:
October 7th, 2012 at 2:27 pm
Oh, and I’m starting packing on Wednesday. I’ve already taken apart the bed in the guest bedroom and packed up the linens. I’m doing laundry now and leaving all of it downstairs… I have a week’s worth of clothing I’m washing, and I’ll pack everything else when I have the money for boxes. This is actually one of those cases where it works that my wife isn’t here right now, because I can more easily close off entire sections of the house once I’ve packed and cleaned. Simple for me, not so simple with a “normal” person with my wife sharing the space. I don’t have any problem taking apart both beds, moving them downstairs, and then sleeping on the couch for a week.
Portia, I guess it depends how much kale? I’m doing that weird “wet working my mouth like a dog tasting something” thing, and trying to imagine how the flavors would combine. It is the combination that seems odd, I like the flavors individually.
Patricia, OM:
October 7th, 2012 at 2:28 pm
Commercial shipping could be anything from deadly chemicals to crates of paper clips. Just trying to give you a heads up, but sounds like you’re checking them out pretty thoroughly.
Last year we moved Marvin’s two bed, one bath house contents in one large U-Haul truck. The three car garage FULL went into a second large U-Haul. The garage got shoved into a huge storage unit, and about half the household contents, AND a Harley/two seater sidecar into another huge storage unit. Young able bodied relatives did the heavy work for pizza and beer, plus $50 bucks each as it took two days.
Lynna, OM:
October 7th, 2012 at 2:30 pm
From my post @173, “conservations” should have been “conservatives.” sheesh.
Improbable Joe:
October 7th, 2012 at 2:39 pm
Patricia, the issue is getting the pets moved on a budget. Four cats and a dog.
Improbable Joe:
October 7th, 2012 at 2:43 pm
Yummy dinner tonight. I’m making a cheeseburger, and veggie macaroni salad. CHEESEBURGER! And when I do a burger, I do it up right. On the grill, with bacon and red onion and bacon and portabella mushroom and bacon and pickles and bacon and fancy mustard and bacon and all on a nice bakery roll. And I like a little bacon on the side.
kristinc, ~ringy dingy~:
October 7th, 2012 at 2:45 pm
I like kale (or spinach) in a smoothie with some pineapple and fresh ginger. Yum. (It is close to being the only way I will consume kale.)
Lynna, OM:
October 7th, 2012 at 2:49 pm
Mormon apostle Dallin Oaks has attracted PZ’s attention in the past for making outrageously ignorant comments. At this weekend’s General Conference, Oaks did not disappoint:
http://www.sltrib.com/sltrib/news/55035771-78/church-mormons-oaks-faith.html.csp
From the comments section below the SL Tribune article:
Portia:
October 7th, 2012 at 2:53 pm
Re: Cheeseburger…*homer drool*
Re: Smoothie, the kale flavor doesn’t really show up a whole lot, I think that’s why it works for me.
Kristinc – Mental note to add ginger next time :)
Portia:
October 7th, 2012 at 2:57 pm
CREEPY ASS OLD DUDES.
Oh, and as to amount of kale, I put in like half a leaf and 3 bananas. Might add more next time.
Beatrice:
October 7th, 2012 at 2:59 pm
Kale with fruit in a smoothy? Interesting.
I’m not much of a fan of kale, but I might try that.
Improbable Joe:
October 7th, 2012 at 3:00 pm
Portia,
“Like half a leaf” seems like not enough to hurt anybody, especially if you add a bit of vanilla.
kristinc, ~ringy dingy~:
October 7th, 2012 at 3:20 pm
I use a cup of chopped greens to about half a cup of pineapple. Tastes like pineapple. *shrug*
Giliell, Approved Straight Chorus:
October 7th, 2012 at 3:21 pm
Joe
Could you rent a camping car instead of a van to transport the animals? So you could get proper sleep.
Or have your car driven down by somebody else* while you and boss nurse take turns driving the van?
*Dunno if that still exists, but some years ago a friend of mine went for a holiday in the States and basically organized his own transportation by driving cars for other people, like wealthy parents sending their darling son his car to college and such.
+++
What’s kale?
Ogvorbis: broken and cynical:
October 7th, 2012 at 3:24 pm
Somewhere out west of Deer Creek but I have no idea which drainage. Sorry.
And now, with 3.2 times more BS in every one!
An essential ingredient in potato, sausage and kale soup.
Beatrice:
October 7th, 2012 at 3:32 pm
Giliell,
Kale is sort of a bit like cabbage (at least my family insisted on exchanging them in dishes), except that it doesn’t taste very good.
Ogvorbis: broken and cynical:
October 7th, 2012 at 3:35 pm
Giliell:
Picture a cross between spinach and cabbage. The leaves are dark green with very thick stems (remove those as much as you can). Raw, it is crunchy, strong and a tiny bit bitter. Cooked, it becomes sweet but retains the very strong flavour. Excellent sauted with olive oil, a little bacon and some salt. Also very good steamed and served with some cider vinegar.
And I apologize for my initial response. It was so easy I couldn’t resist. Sorry.
Portia:
October 7th, 2012 at 3:37 pm
Og, don’t forget tossed in olive oil and oven-roasted. Mmmmm.
pixelfish:
October 7th, 2012 at 3:37 pm
@Lynna: Somebody on Twitter was pointing out that only few years back the big conference push on missionaries was about attracting Quality over Quantity. *snerk* But now suddenly it’s all about the Lord needing great numbers for his army and work and so on.
And I need to vent here because my chock-full-of-Mormons Facebook is all exultant and excited about the new changes. Which to be fair to them, is actually the most exciting thing the church HAS done in a while. But seeing them get all excited over this conference as extra inspiring is rather twitch-inducing. Specially as they ARE ALL responding to the dog whistle to vote for Romney, and talking about how this world is getting worse and worse and it’s the end times, just as prophesied.
(Side note: The whole storm terminology thing is so irritating to me. Complaining about my rights to medical technology and gay people getting married and comparing it to a storm—so much ARGH. It’s like complaining about the weather in Juneau when you live in Sandy Eggo.)
Giliell, Approved Straight Chorus:
October 7th, 2012 at 3:37 pm
Ahhh, Grünkohl!
It’s more popular in Northern Germany. Here, not so much.
Portia:
October 7th, 2012 at 3:39 pm
http://eatmorekale.com/
Ogvorbis: broken and cynical:
October 7th, 2012 at 3:41 pm
Oh, yeah. With some whole peeled garlic cloves and sliced onions. Comes out so nice and sweet.
Sounds like a nasty head cold coming on. Take care of yourself.
Portia:
October 7th, 2012 at 3:55 pm
olivesesame oil.Oops. Though either works, obviously.
mepmep09:
October 7th, 2012 at 4:02 pm
FYI/FWIW, for those who follow this sort of thing, I just heard Jacques Berlinerblau,* advocate of secularism – BUT NOT ATHEISM, NO-NO-NO! – being interviewed on (Sr.) Maureen Fielder‘s Interfaith Voices radio program (link). PZ discussed this guy last month, and a few others at FTB have as well (also, Berlinerblau wrote a book, natch). During the interview he did devote a few sentences to addressing Gnu Atheism, though with no trace of adoration (PZ addressed that in his September post).
*That guy’s name is one of the most Frenchiest-Germaniest combined moniker I’ve seen; then again, I don’t get out much, so that may not be worthy of note…
Lynna, OM:
October 7th, 2012 at 4:17 pm
pixelfish @199
Ah, I know all too well what you mean. I’m not experiencing the Facebook deluge myself since I defriended all but a few mormon friends long ago, but many of my ex-mormon friends are avoiding their Facebook pages this weekend thanks to the plague of hyped up church locusts. Says something about crowd mentality, I guess, as well about the ability of church-broke mormons to maintain their gullibility no matter what: http://exmormon.org/phorum/read.php?2,664732
Improbable Joe:
October 7th, 2012 at 4:31 pm
Giliell,
It took me a minute to figure out what you meant by “camping car” but once I did… PERFECT!!! I could probably tow my car behind one, and most of the extra cost would be saved on not having to get a hotel room and the gas for my car, plus way more convenience. I’m totally going to look into it, THANK YOU!
Tony •Prom King of Sunnydale High•:
October 7th, 2012 at 4:35 pm
Crudely Wrott:
Hear, hear!
I enjoy reading Lynna’s posts as well.
****
Giliell:
Yummy!
A fresh croissant with a light touch of butter is so delicious!
****
Lynna, OM:
October 7th, 2012 at 4:36 pm
More on ex-mormons suffering through Facebook manifestations of mass hysteria this weekend as their mormon friends trumpet their devotion:
Advice from Aussie ex-mormon:
http://exmormon.org/phorum/read.php?2,664684
Yes, it does look like Night of the Living Dead:
http://www.lds.org/general-conference/watch/2012/10?lang=eng&vid=1882743190001&cid=3
Ichthyic:
October 7th, 2012 at 4:42 pm
we’re talking about you in the Molly thread, Lynna.
:)
I just wanted to repeat what I said there:
I have a tremendous appreciation for all the work you have done over the years keeping us notified of the whacky world of Mormonism.
I’ve used things you’ve posted so many times in reference to mormon apologists all over the web, I would give you a special award myself if I could.
your value simply cannot be overestimated.
Ing:Intellectual Terrorist "Starting Tonight, People will Whine":
October 7th, 2012 at 4:42 pm
I love the storm terminology. It’s classic poorly chosen symbolism.
After all, what do you do for a storm? Weather it. You can’t stop it, you can’t change it’s course, you just have to hunker down and weather it. It is an inevitability. I love that they have chosen to grant that symbolism to gay rights and progressiveness. It’s a subconscious admission that they’re trying to change the course of a river.
Menyambal --- Sambal's Little Helper:
October 7th, 2012 at 4:47 pm
Kale? My sister dipped leaves in soy, sesame and garlic, I think, and dehydrated them. It made nice crunchy snacks. She gave me a big bag, but my cat got to it first.
—
Joe, I like the van idea. I suggest that each pet have a collar with ID, a leash and a carrier/cage. A helper would be nice, but if you have to stop more often, you’ll be getting a stretch and a walk, yourself. A storage bin with a lid makes a litter box. I’d not let more than two pets out of the carriers while driving, but they will all want to see and hear you.
Hotel rooms that take pets are possible, but it’s a schlep. I’ve slept in a van with pets a few times. A pillow, a pad, and a blanket, of course (a plastic bottle is handy, too). Overnight parking can be a challenge, but interstate rest areas don’t mind if you are inside the vehicle, and any big store lot will work—if you want quiet, find a state park or a commercial campground, and you might get a shower (truckstops sell showers, too).
Good luck to all.
birgerjohansson:
October 7th, 2012 at 5:06 pm
It is a teletubby that has run headfirst into the Black Monolith.
Or maybe a kid from South Park.
— — — —
Einstein letter on God to be auctioned on eBay http://phys.org/news/2012-10-einstein-letter-god-auctioned-ebay.html
dianne:
October 7th, 2012 at 5:08 pm
A fresh croissant with a light touch of butter is so delicious!
I agree, but for the very best croissants, the butter is redundant.
Ing:Intellectual Terrorist "Starting Tonight, People will Whine":
October 7th, 2012 at 5:10 pm
Also partner is taking their first drivers test
I would appreciate if everyone pray for them
…couldn’t hurt :-p
Ing:Intellectual Terrorist "Starting Tonight, People will Whine":
October 7th, 2012 at 5:11 pm
I don’t doubt them, it’s just that after 4 years of being the only driver in the family I am stressing over worry
Patricia, OM:
October 7th, 2012 at 5:16 pm
Had to go to the store. Sangria supply was low. o.O
Kale is much sweeter after it has been frosted. Usually I stir fry mine with garlic, olive oil and soy sauce. It’s also really good chopped up in salads with some oranges or fruit flavors added.
Patricia, OM:
October 7th, 2012 at 5:19 pm
Sure Ing, but who do we pray to Mercury?
Ichthyic:
October 7th, 2012 at 5:21 pm
just curious about something that sparked my interest a moment ago, when I suddenly realized I really couldn’t supply a good definition of what “fascism” means.
Ing and I were batting it around a bit in another thread, but it’s really kinda OT there, so I bring it here instead.
off the top of people’s heads, what is the first definition of “fascism” that comes to mind?
just curious.
Giliell, Approved Straight Chorus:
October 7th, 2012 at 5:30 pm
Ing
Failed mine the first time.
Still think I make a pretty decent driver nowadays (the only accident I ever had was when the car drove down the street without me)
Joe
Hope this works out
croissants
Jam and farmer’s cheese…
++
Who made it haöf past 12 again?
But I had fun, I’m making a Hootie (pun intended)
Patricia, OM:
October 7th, 2012 at 5:35 pm
tyrant. extreme and ridged laws.
\typing with one hand…
Ichthyic:
October 7th, 2012 at 5:40 pm
thanks patricia.
Hekuni Cat, MQG:
October 7th, 2012 at 5:42 pm
Caine:
Thank you!
Please give Vasco gentle hugs and pets for me.
And I hope your toe isn’t causing you too much pain.
Tigger_the_Wing:
I hope all goes well and you get proper treatment for your condition. *hugs*
Krasnaya Koshka – *hugs*
FossilFishy:
Thank you for sharing this wonderful story – and a belated Happy Birthday to your wife.
Improbable Joe:
October 7th, 2012 at 5:49 pm
Ichthyic:
Fascism off the top of my head means “nationalistic/racist authoritarian government”… close enough?
Ing:Intellectual Terrorist "Starting Tonight, People will Whine":
October 7th, 2012 at 5:50 pm
My going definition from the top of my head is a state noted by extreme nationalism and authoritative control of the government with privileges and punishments for obedience and disobedience to the state; maintained by heavy use of propaganda, selective law enforcement, militarization, violence, and populism/faux populism. Different from just authoritarianism in that it is largely a phenomena of democratic states that arises internally.
I’d argue that from my definition all fascist states are dictatorships (or some equivalent but being ruled by a committee/party rather than individual, probably still would have a figure head) but also faux democracies. They run on the idea that the party/dear leader is the voice/hands of some nebulous idea of teh people
Ing:Intellectual Terrorist "Starting Tonight, People will Whine":
October 7th, 2012 at 5:51 pm
@Ichthyic
I think facism really can claim that, but it is always at its core a military/police state.
carlie:
October 7th, 2012 at 5:52 pm
All good ideas. I also read once (don’t know how well it would work), that if you can’t find any of those places (WalMarts all let you park and sleep in their lots), to find the nearest police station, tell them you’re too tired to drive safely and ask them where you can park and sleep for a few hours. That way you at least don’t get ticketed for loitering or being a nuisance or whatever.
Alethea H. "Crocoduck" Dundee:
October 7th, 2012 at 6:25 pm
@Josh, my experience in Paris and Quebec alike is that *trying* to speak French gets you a long way. A few phrases of the hello, goodbye, please, excuse me and thank you variety are very helpful. And don’t worry about if you have a horrible accent; it’s always better to try than not. This applies to all countries I’ve travelled in, actually, but the French were notable for being quite mean if you didn’t try.
@gillyc – the Communist Manifesto is a very easy read. And you can’t beat getting it from the horse’s mouth.
@Ichthyic: Fascism = nationalistic totalitarian capitalism. The ultra-nationalism plus intertwining of industry/business and state is what makes it Fascist, rather than some other form of totalitarian despotism.
@Joe, when some of my family moved Sydney to Cairns (a similar distance), they found the best moving deal was one where they filled a shipping container, which was then loaded onto a train in Sydney and offloaded in Cairns. They drove their cars themselves, stopping a couple of nights along the way, but they could also have shipped them by rail if they’d wanted. Do NOT drive in one hit. There’s a road safety slogan here: “Drowsy Drivers Die”. No shit.
And kale is yummy. I like the Tuscan style, with long leaves, similar to silverbeet/swiss chard but smaller and finer. Have you tried the kale chips yet? Very light olive oil coat, shake of sea salt, roast leaves until crisp (about 5-10 minutes.) ZOMG delicious. A teaspoon of olive oil is enough for a bunch; I put it in a plastic bag and smooth the leaves about to coat.
Improbable Joe:
October 7th, 2012 at 6:26 pm
Well… any sort of recreational vehicle is out. The rental is almost triple what I’d pay for a van. Can still maybe sleep in the van to save a few bucks though.
Patricia, OM:
October 7th, 2012 at 6:37 pm
Have any of you been to one of these atheist conventions before? Naughty Marvin doesn’t want to wear a jacket and tie, but the thing is being held at the Portland Hilton for crying out loud. That has to mean swank of some level (highest?). I would hate for him to go and be mad through the whole dinner. Is casual OK?
Not much point in me donning a formal, my great niece (age 5) told me this morning I look like “The Gnome Wife” in her story book. *pouts*
Would it be prudent to call the Hilton? Sheesh.
Ichthyic:
October 7th, 2012 at 6:43 pm
close enough?
I’m not judging the answers, just curious as to what they are.
We see terms like “liberal” and “fascist” tossed around and redefined endlessly in media (like Feaux News, as mentioned by Ing), so it got me curious as to what people generally conceive the definitions are of these things now.
Improbable Joe:
October 7th, 2012 at 6:43 pm
Patricia, the Hilton isn’t what it used to be. Hell, they let ME stay there!:)
My advice would be to contact the event organizers rather than the hotel itself.
Improbable Joe:
October 7th, 2012 at 6:44 pm
Ichthyic, too bad we’re not “people generally” right?
Menyambal --- Sambal's Little Helper:
October 7th, 2012 at 6:51 pm
“In fascism, the people are for the state. In democracy, the state is for the people.” I forget where I read something like that.
It’s like those little bundles of sticks in the axe handles. Each individual is important only for what he contributes to the whole. The axe handle is the thing = the state is the priority.
In a democracy, the people have banded together to protect themselves/each other. The purpose of the state is the welfare of the people.
Or, something I just made up: Fascism is like a war ship, where the crew serves the vessel. Democracy is like a cruise ship, where the vessel serves the people.
Ichthyic:
October 7th, 2012 at 6:54 pm
…consider it just a selfish request for information. I think I get started thinking about this stuff whenever I read more of Richard Evans’ documentation of the history of europe and germany during the 1st half of the last century.
I keep seeing parallels that concern me.
Ichthyic:
October 7th, 2012 at 6:55 pm
Ichthyic, too bad we’re not “people generally” right?
good point.
Patricia, OM:
October 7th, 2012 at 7:56 pm
Joe – That’s a good idea. I’ll call FFRF in the morning. It’s always interesting to call there the person that answers sounds like they expect to get cussed out, but as soon as you identify yourself as a member the poor soul is so relieved you can almost feel the tension evaporate.
Ing:Intellectual Terrorist "Starting Tonight, People will Whine":
October 7th, 2012 at 9:00 pm
Anyone else having an issue that everything seems to load but never STOP loading?
Ichthyic:
October 7th, 2012 at 9:34 pm
I used to get that when there is a bad ad in rotation (has some broken scripting in it), which is why I now regularly use adblock.
since then, no, haven’t had that particular problem.
A. R:
October 7th, 2012 at 9:36 pm
I was just in a chip shop getting dinner, which reminded me of these. Thought I would post that for the benefit of you pea insurgents.
Ichthyic:
October 7th, 2012 at 9:40 pm
“… until they form a thick green lumpy soup”
could they have possibly made it sound any less appealing?
I’m sure it actually does taste just fine (for those that actually like peas, like myself), but really… change the description already.
Portia:
October 7th, 2012 at 9:42 pm
Even though I’ve never seen it described less appealingly, it still makes me want pea soup : )
Ichthyic:
October 7th, 2012 at 9:42 pm
btw, buffybot says my getting my residence is NZ is well timed, as she hasn’t caught me calling chips “fries” for over 6 months now.
I think I’ve acclimatized to the lingo.
Ing:Intellectual Terrorist "Starting Tonight, People will Whine":
October 7th, 2012 at 9:56 pm
ad block is on…killfile is also not working
A. R:
October 7th, 2012 at 10:00 pm
Ing: Nope, killfile is functioning well, adblock is functioning, but Zotero is a bi wonky at the moment for me.
Azkyroth, Former Growing Toaster Oven:
October 7th, 2012 at 10:02 pm
I suppose “Siren soullesscuntidae” is out of the question?
Pteryxx:
October 7th, 2012 at 10:38 pm
(random) via BB, the Oatmeal’s fundraiser for the Tesla Museum was successful:
Referenced article:
http://arstechnica.com/business/2012/10/with-the-oatmeals-help-nonprofit-buys-property-to-build-a-tesla-museum/
SCIENCE
Ichthyic:
October 7th, 2012 at 10:44 pm
ad block is on…killfile is also not working
hmm.
killfile still uses greasemonkey yes?
check your greasemonkey settings?
Ing:Intellectual Terrorist "Starting Tonight, People will Whine":
October 7th, 2012 at 10:45 pm
rebooted firefox fixed
Ichthyic:
October 7th, 2012 at 10:45 pm
…I just switched over to a new machine running windows 7 a couple weeks back, and haven’t gotten killfile running again myself.
Ichthyic:
October 7th, 2012 at 10:46 pm
rebooted firefox fixed
ah, crisis averted.
harrumble!
Tony •Prom King of Sunnydale High•:
October 7th, 2012 at 11:01 pm
Ing:
My laptop is currently experiencing problems similar to that. It takes forever to load pages and I frequently get timed out messages as well as the script is taking too long to load messages. I also have problems playing videos. The playback never stops buffering, so I can’t watch anything most of the time. I’ve followed the tips Windows provides, T has looked at my laptop (in the military, she worked on computers a bit), and the ever knowledgeable Richard has also been helpful. All of that is to no avail. I don’t have any malware or viruses either.
I’m glad T is letting me use her spare Macbook until a solution presents itself. Probably in the form of monetary expenditure on my part, which is looking to be NO time soon. I have a job and have finally started working, but we get paid every two weeks-which is different than what I’m accustomed to. I can’t work on the laptop until I get important bills paid for (such as the utilities and water bill which are likely to get shut off before I get my first paycheck..sigh).
Tony •Prom King of Sunnydale High•:
October 7th, 2012 at 11:05 pm
A.R. @239:
That’s just wrong.
Mashed peas…UN-nom nom.
You know the saying “bacon makes everything better”? Even bacon is powerless before the power of the Pea.
A. R:
October 7th, 2012 at 11:09 pm
Anyone else noticed that the “kill” option has been replaced with “hush?”
cicely:
October 7th, 2012 at 11:13 pm
What Crudely Wrott said @136
-
Two mediumish ones; western OK to KC; KC to near-Detroit. Then, near-Detroit to Springfield MO. With tons of stuff. All hail U-Haul and their wonderful vans! So very much better than a flat-bed with no sides!
If you’re going to be going in convoy, I suggest picking up a set of walky-talkies. That way, when you get separated (say, for instance, someone gets off at the wrong exit) you have a better chance to regroup.
-
Trailers can come unhitched; and once unhitched, the Dark Side of Physics takes over. Happened to my folks, when we moved from CA to NC.
-
But be fair—neither does cabbage.
Though I’ve never tried cooked kale. May have to give it a go.
-
*averting eyes from mentions of the Evil Vegetable*
*and also from the peas*
-
A. R:
October 7th, 2012 at 11:16 pm
Tony: Clearly you have never heard of the pie floater.
Amblebury:
October 7th, 2012 at 11:21 pm
Ah. I was waiting for someone to mention the Pie Floater.
Tigger_the_Wing:
October 7th, 2012 at 11:28 pm
Peas = deliciousness
Mushy peas = disgustingness
I also
dislikeloathe tea (except I can tolerate green tea with a Chinese or Thai meal), particularly the way the English serve tea, with milk and sugar. And I cannot cook Yorkshire pudding to save my life. (The less said about tripe the better).My mother, a Yorkshirewoman, accuses me of being UnBritish. =^_^=
kristinc, ~ringy dingy~:
October 7th, 2012 at 11:29 pm
I still don’t have Kill or hush. Rebooted Firefox, disabled and then re-enabled killfile in Greasemonkey, have even had two killfile updates to Greasemonkey in the last two or three days and still no joy.
Misterc, who is usually my Computer Stuff Farmboy, has zero experience with Greasemonkey so he is no help at all.
Tony •Prom King of Sunnydale High•:
October 7th, 2012 at 11:30 pm
A.R.
I have now.
I’m not sure if I should thank you for that or not :)
****
cicely:
I recall dining at a buffet* as a child. I somehow had kale on my plate (IIRC, my parents told me what it was). I tried to eat it, but the taste was bitter and bland at the same time. Of course that was raw kale, and I’ve since heard it can often taste better when cooked, but I’ve not tried to eat it since I was a kid.
*How do Pharygulites feel about buffets? I’ve encountered many people who refuse to dine at buffets. The usual cited reasons are not wanting to eat somewhere that other people could have touched the food (or sneezed on). When I mention that many buffets have the glass sneeze guards (I’m not certain that’s what they’re for, but they serve that function quite well) or that people are allowed to touch the food (I’ve yet to go to a buffet and see anyone grab food with their hands-even children), I get funny looks (like I said something wrong).
Personally I like them. They’re often affordable when you’re on a budget and usually have a variety of foods to appeal to a wide range of tastes.
strange gods before me ॐ:
October 7th, 2012 at 11:32 pm
I haven’t had time to try to figure out your killfile issue, kristinc. Busy time of year for me. I haven’t forgotten, though.
Not right now, but for that sort of thing I recommend NoScript and RequestPolicy.
Tony •Prom King of Sunnydale High•:
October 7th, 2012 at 11:37 pm
Tigger:
I recently found out that tripe is an ingredient added to many smoked sausages. I was briefly grossed out by that, which was odd given that I’ve never actually *tried* tripe. I’ve seen it at the supermarket (why are they *super* markets, rather than simply markets?) and yes, tripe *looks* yuck. Of course, many kinds of food look unappealing prior to cooking.
A. R:
October 7th, 2012 at 11:47 pm
Buffets: I tend to avoid buffets, if only because of my not knowing how long any particular food item has sat on the cart. Weddings where buffet service is used are an exception, as given the time-dependent nature of the event, any food item is not likely to have sat out for a particularly long stretch of time. (Yes, I have thought about this before.)
chigau (悲しい):
October 7th, 2012 at 11:48 pm
A. R
Yup.
http://freethoughtblogs.com/pharyngula/2012/09/28/lounge-371/comment-page-2/#comment-466642
kristinc, ~ringy dingy~:
October 8th, 2012 at 12:31 am
No worries, sgbm! I regard it as more puzzling than enraging or even frustrating. I seem to be the only one with this issue so I question whether it’s even solvable from your end *shrug*
strange gods before me ॐ:
October 8th, 2012 at 12:39 am
http://freethoughtblogs.com/pharyngula/2012/09/28/lounge-371/comment-page-2/#comment-466642
Don Foss made me do it.
Amblebury:
October 8th, 2012 at 1:15 am
SGBM, are there equivalents for Chrome?
(I understand you’re busy, you needn’t answer.)
Azkyroth, Former Growing Toaster Oven:
October 8th, 2012 at 1:21 am
Icthyic: this blog has a somewhat horrible search function, as I recall, but a useful discussion in various articles about the functional definition of fascism. At least one of the “fascist America” articles had a link to a paper in which their definition is expounded.
Giliell, Approved Straight Chorus:
October 8th, 2012 at 1:23 am
Good morning
Since were talking about brassica, tonight it’s red cabbage, just sliced and served with Tzatziki-style sauce. Dunno if it’s actually Turkish or mock-German-Turkish (Our beloved Döner-Kebap doesn’t even exist in that form in Turkey), but I love it. Together with a bit of pan-fried kebap and föat bread.
Love them. They’re quite popular for celebrations, but I also love Chinese buffets or such because I can try everything.
+++
re: fasicsm
The capitalism component is one that often gets overlooked. Fascism is always anti-labour pro-capital
theophontes (坏蛋):
October 8th, 2012 at 1:25 am
[threadcrupt and then some]
@ Amblebury
Opera (Link)
Firefox (Link)
(I might be reading you out of context here.)
@ Caine
Emergency scritches for Theo. STAT!
(Theo now has a new virtual sister called Ms Daisy. Spawnphontes has been adopting alley cats again. Oy Vey…)
Ichthyic:
October 8th, 2012 at 1:32 am
thanks azky, very useful.
Amblebury:
October 8th, 2012 at 1:37 am
Thanks.
I was thinking more of the equivalent of this:
for Chrome. I doubt I’ll find anything. The insidious tentacles (no offense intended, anyone) of Google reach far. Too far.
[ominous soundtrack sounds]
theophontes (坏蛋):
October 8th, 2012 at 1:39 am
Ms Daisy
theophontes (坏蛋):
October 8th, 2012 at 1:46 am
@ Amblebury
You could bribe SGBM with beer. He set up TOR for me remotely.
Also try “Shift+Ctrl+P” while in Firefox.
Or try using OpenDNS, which will allow you a whole array of protection methods upstream. (Link here.) You can check youtube for more info, setting up etc. (Sorry, off tor right now – you will have to find videos.)
Tony •Prom King of Sunnydale High•:
October 8th, 2012 at 1:51 am
You wouldn’t have thought it possible. Not in your wildest dreams would you imagine that on the 11th anniversary of the beginning of American’s longest war would police have the temerity to arrest war veterans standing vigil, reading the names of their dead comrades in arms. And yet…
Tony •Prom King of Sunnydale High•:
October 8th, 2012 at 1:55 am
Amblebury:
Does this count as ominous?
Tigger_the_Wing:
October 8th, 2012 at 3:33 am
Tony, that’s absolutely terrible. It should be only in The Onion or similar. Not actual, you know, news.
birgerjohansson:
October 8th, 2012 at 4:13 am
Medicine prize kicks off Nobel week (18 minutes from now) http://medicalxpress.com/news/2012-10-nobel-prize-season-medicine-award.html
Amblebury:
October 8th, 2012 at 4:13 am
Thanks muchly, Theophontes. I’ll look into it.
Yes that’s ominous enough Tony. ;)
I don’t watch that genre of film. Call me silly, but I find them really, really frightening. Mind you, this is the person who found Finding Nemo scary in (quite a few)parts.
Giliell, Approved Straight Chorus:
October 8th, 2012 at 4:27 am
Oh yeh gods, back from weekly grocery shopping.
I will never, for the love of life understand a system in which buying a glass of applesauce and then, for all I care throwing away the applesauce is cheaper than just buying a glass…
But I got Swedes, yay. They’re another vegetable that has fallen from grace: It kept millions from starvation during the wars, provided cheap and good nutritiun for poor people during the 50′s and 60′s and afterwards nobody wanted to eat them anymore…
Fell in love with them in Ireland and brought seeds back. My grandpa was actually quite happy to grow them again. Now it seems as the war-generation slowly dies out they’re making a slow come-back without the stigma attached.
Amblebury:
October 8th, 2012 at 4:32 am
Argh – Page Not Found message again, Theophontes.
Gilliel, I take your swede and raise you a parsnip.
And goodnight, all.
birgerjohansson:
October 8th, 2012 at 5:28 am
Gurdon, Yamanaka win Nobel medicine prize (Update) http://medicalxpress.com/news/2012-10-gurdon-yamanaka-nobel-medicine-prize.html
Alethea H. "Crocoduck" Dundee:
October 8th, 2012 at 5:58 am
My Mum used to make mash with a mix of potatoes and swedes. Lovely comfort food. In the US, a swede is a rutabaga, which is a wonderful word and I envy them.
Tigger_the_Wing:
October 8th, 2012 at 6:54 am
Hubby mashes swedes and potatoes together to serve with haggis. Yummy. (Except I now have to forego the haggis.)
I also like them roasted; every so often, I use the huge lidded roasting dish to cook an assortment of vegetables in the oven, drizzling them with olive oil. Once cooked, they are great re-heated, or added to soups and stews, curries and frittatas.
A typical assortment would be swedes, carrots, parsnips, turnips, pumpkin, potatoes, sweet potatoes, aubergine (egg plant), marrow or baby marrows (zucchini/courgettes), red onions, capsicums, whole heads of garlic, cauliflower and broccoli.
carlie:
October 8th, 2012 at 6:56 am
Like they think people aren’t doing that back in the kitchen at every single restaurant?
Audley Z. Darkheart (liar and scoundrel):
October 8th, 2012 at 7:06 am
Hey guys! This is my last week of work! Eeeeeeeeeeeee!
*Extends arms,
runswaddles around office making airplane noises*In other news, I saw Looper yesterday and holy crap, it’s good. Bruce Willis could only make time travel movies for the rest of his career and I’d be fine with that.
Tigger_the_Wing:
October 8th, 2012 at 7:53 am
Conga rats, Audley! =^_^=
Such an exciting time!
Portia:
October 8th, 2012 at 8:07 am
I laughed aloud, Audley : ) Yay for you!
–
I’ve been invited to join Rotary, and I’m trying to suss out just how religious-influenced it is. (Honestly, I’ll probably join either way, it’s a unique opportunity for networking). They open their meetings with a (sung) prayer, which I can suffer through. But the membership page sounds kinda…culty to me.
Is my Cautious-of-Religion meter overcalibrated? What do y’all think? Anyone have Rotary experience?
Re: Buffets. Sometimes I’m grossed out by how long something may have been sitting there. I had pasta salad off a salad bar last week that was absolutely rancid. So, I guess it depends on my mood. If I’m really hungry and want a lot of food immediately, a buffet is all that will do. There’s a Japanese buffet locally here with huge amounts of fresh sushi in addition to lots of regular buffet food. It’s a really great deal for all-you-can-eat sushi, especially since you can have a few of this roll, a few of that.
Giliell, Approved Straight Chorus:
October 8th, 2012 at 8:31 am
Woo-hooo, the Hootie is finished.
If that kid isn’t at least half as enthusiastic about it as I am she’s in trouble
Yay, Audley.
blf:
October 8th, 2012 at 8:38 am
I believe there’s a lot of moonshine from there, so perhaps. What it will be made from is not something on which I care to speculate (this is the Louche after all — there is a commendable lack of standards here…).
────────────────────────────
Sorry, my loche-generator was malfunction. Will do better next time.
────────────────────────────
Yes, or at least Jeremy Hunt, who is a clewless buffoon I’ve commented-on here in the Louche before. If memory serves me right — my Generalissimo Googel™-Fu is fooed right now — he’s a homeopathetic and other woo-woos supporter.
────────────────────────────
Five minutes? That’s an eternity. I’ve been known to inhale a pair of still-warm croissants in under a minute, and the mildly deranged pengion things I’m loafing…
────────────────────────────
Yeah, that’s what I’ve always done, even in the days of the long / big pumps. (For one thing, I tended to have my pump secured with a velco strap, so using it whilst mounted / riding was effectively impossible. Plus it’s doesn’t hurt the dog, but does indeed get it to back off.)
Also works on pesky long pigs, but more care is needed as they can then get really enraged and even stupider…
────────────────────────────
No. That is neither responsible nor sane. Go for one to one-and-half hours at a time, take a break, and end your day afte c.10 hours later, or as soon as you start feeling tired or showing symptoms of tiredness (yawning, drifting attention, …). Then get a full night’s sleep before resuming (either in a hotel / motel, or a sleeping bag on a quite roadside (but lock your doors!)).
Only cross-USA move my family ever did was by train — partly because we had a pet — which probably isn’t an option here for multiple reasons. So I’ve no specific advice beyond what others have said — start packing now, yadda yadda, … Except do not fecking drive for so long!
A. R:
October 8th, 2012 at 8:46 am
Nobel Prize for Medicine: iPS cells!
FossilFishy (Νεοπτόλεμος's spellchecker):
October 8th, 2012 at 8:53 am
Portia, I was invited to join Rotary also. The owner of the business we bought was a member and he said “Of course you’ll join.” Flatly, like it was a done deal. I demurred and equivocated every time he brought it up and eventually he stopped asking.
He’s religious and this town is very Catholic. I suspect that the culture of Rotary here would be heavily influenced by that because everyone that I know is involved is religious. That said, I’ve never seen anything that suggests that they are engaged in any kind of overt religious bias as far as the charity work they do. For instance, Mrs. Fishy spent a year overseas as an exchange student via Rotary and she and her family are most definitely not religious.
If I was you I’d ask for a list of the what charities and projects they are involved in to see if you can suss out any religious biases in how they apportion their time and money.
Esteleth, Elen síla lumenn' omentielvo:
October 8th, 2012 at 9:13 am
Well, everyone here in the stem cell institute is going batshit over the Nobel news.
In other news, I fucking HATE Time Warner. My internet has been down at home all weekend. >:(
blf:
October 8th, 2012 at 9:22 am
Halliburton finds lost radioactive rod in Texas. This was the rod lost about a month ago from an transport container that was neither properly secured or locked.
As far as I know, Rmoney hasn’t yet blamed Obama for the loss.
theophontes (坏蛋):
October 8th, 2012 at 9:27 am
@ Amblebury
For OpenDNS? That is a little strange. (It should resolve those type of problems – bit of a catch-22.)
@ Audley Airlines (& teh li’l passenger)
Yay!
@ Portia
{raises paw}
My folks are very involved in Rotary and have been for years. My pa, the atheist (though low key) was president last year (it rotates every year). In terms of religiosity, it will most likely reflect the immediate community. It is generally a secular organisation.
Rotary is quite sociable and easygoing, though joining does more or less imply that you will work towards social goals. This can be hard work, but at the same time very rewarding.
You get to meet people from all over the world too (as Fossilfisshy indicated), via the exchange programs. The friendships formed often last a lifetime.
I don’t (at least from my own experiences) see any reason why an atheist shouldn’t enjoy Rotary -it is a very good vehicle for getting involved in eductaion and community development. No gods required.
Improbable Joe:
October 8th, 2012 at 9:29 am
Hmmmm… would it be too cruel if I towed my car and put the pets in the car to be towed? It is cool weather, and I can leave the windows cracked pretty wide if necessary because the cats will be in carriers. I could save SO MUCH MONEY that way.
Portia:
October 8th, 2012 at 9:29 am
Thanks for the tip and very cool that Mrs. Fishy had a good experience. I remembered that the invitee sent me a powerpoint presentation called “2011-2012 in review” which detailed the club’s activities. The list of charitable causes includes blood drives, Red Cross(™?), secular programs for at-risk youth, literacy efforts, area volunteer fire departments, child abuse prevention, and building houses in Guatemala. The closest it gets to religiosity is Boy Scouts of America. I got tired of reading the list, but so far it looks ok to me.
Thankfully this area is not overly religious. I mean, there is a general expectation that you’re Christian, but it’s not rabidly Catholic or Baptist or anything. So hopefully I don’t get invited to church. Then I will whip out my excellent demurring skills.
It might be the flower-child homeschooler in me, but all the seemingly gratuitous structure sort of rubs me the wrong way. (“If you miss a meeting you have 2 weeks to make it up!”) But my grandpa is a “charter member” so it’s sort of expected of me. At least the great majority of the dues ($316 out of $360) goes to paying for the food at the weekly breakfast meeting. (7:15am every Tuesday…now that will require willpower…).
Portia:
October 8th, 2012 at 9:33 am
Thanks theopontes! I appreciate the reassurance. I do look forward to doing the work for their causes. (Doesn’t hurt that they donate to my fire dept). I’m glad I don’t have a whole lot to worry about with regards to the godbotting :) I think it will be fun to help with the events they have. One of their beneficiary organizations works with victims of domestic violence, which is a cause close to my heart.
blf:
October 8th, 2012 at 9:34 am
Thirsty driver? Or an example of DUI(drunk driving)? (Or just tired?) Rallye de France: Petter Solberg crashes into vineyard (video):
I particularly like the telegraph pole falling over and going BOOOOM! at the end, complete with sparks / fireball. Hilarious. (Albeit if someone had been hurt it wouldn’t be so funny.) The scenes shot inside the car are pretty good too.
At it needs now is a Yakety Sax soundtrack.
Rev. BigDumbChimp:
October 8th, 2012 at 9:35 am
Though I don’t use
killhush file, I could be motivated to do so if it was changed to Shut-yo-mouth file.Portia:
October 8th, 2012 at 9:35 am
Joe
That sounds ok to me, as long as you make frequent stops. /not a pet expert.
Just don’t strap them to the top of the car. ;)
–
I should add that I only say that about the dues because I am poor :)
chigau (悲しい):
October 8th, 2012 at 9:35 am
Joe
I don’t like the idea of putting the critters in the towed car.
Unless you stop and check on them frequently.
Rev. BigDumbChimp:
October 8th, 2012 at 9:38 am
How skittish are your animals Joe?
My labradufus would probably be fine, my husky, not so much.
Improbable Joe:
October 8th, 2012 at 9:41 am
Yeah, no pets in the towed car. On a sunny day the car could still get hot even with the windows open. Still thinking about driving my own U-Haul truck though. I will save so much money over shipping my stuff and then renting a van for the pets. The cats will be stacked two-high in the back seat of the car, but what can you do?
blf:
October 8th, 2012 at 10:07 am
Trebuchet.
I don’t know if the mildly deranged penguin gives lessons or not om launching kitties… ‘though she will do many different things for cheese. And MUSHROOMS!
Lynna, OM:
October 8th, 2012 at 10:10 am
I don’t want to hear it. Too embarrassing.
I collate and conclude more than I create.
But I appreciate the appreciation.
blf:
October 8th, 2012 at 10:23 am
Mes reding scills is gone downhoo. I reads that as “I copulate and conflate more than I croissant.”
Fortunately, I failed to comprehend what I first read. It’d be a bit worrying if I mistook you for a croissant…
Improbable Joe:
October 8th, 2012 at 10:38 am
No launching my cats!!
Audley Z. Darkheart (liar and scoundrel):
October 8th, 2012 at 10:39 am
God, I could murder a croissant right now.
Everyone:
I can’t thank you enough for your love and support. I’m in the home stretch now and you all have definitely helped keep me grounded.
In other behbeh news: Just finishing up the last minute arrival prep: bought/installed a car seat (finally!) and called my insurance company to find a pediatrician for DarkFetus (soon to be DarkInfant). Come to find out, not only is my little sister’s (she’s in her 20s now, mind) former pedatrician still practicing, but he’s still in the same office and he accepts my insurance.
That kind of blew my mind. I wasn’t expecting to come across any docs that I have experience with, let alone one that comes with high praise from my Mom. I think this just got a hell of a lot easier. :)
Richard Austin:
October 8th, 2012 at 10:45 am
Joe:
Any chance you could bribe a friend to share the driving responsibilities? One-way flight isn’t generally that expensive (relative to renting things or such), depending on to where you’re moving.
I’ve done 700 miles in a single go (well, stopping for gas and bathroom), but that was in my toy and not a van and also mostly on the 5 here in California. But as a SoCal guy, driving is kind of what we do (my first public-road-driving-experience was taking my mom to work and back, downtown, in rush hour).
Improbable Joe:
October 8th, 2012 at 10:54 am
Yay Audley! Woohoo!
Richard, I have my wife to help, which is why I was considering the whole “towing the car with the cats in it” thing, and my wife and I could take turns driving. We don’t know anyone else here well enough to ask them to help… part of why we’re moving, we just don’t fit here.
I can do 650 miles pretty easy. I just figured if I could do 250 more a day I could shave a whole day off the drive.
Caine, Divisitrix du mal:
October 8th, 2012 at 11:01 am
Theophontes:
Delivered! Same to Ms. Daisy.
Improbable Joe:
October 8th, 2012 at 11:08 am
Oh… and I’m watching “Dexter” and I’m amazed at how much the lead actor looks like my old roommate Bucky. Amazed because I always thought if anyone would be a serial killer, it would be Bucky.
Ing:Intellectual Terrorist "Starting Tonight, People will Whine":
October 8th, 2012 at 11:10 am
@Improbable Joe
Ugh…Dexter is one of those shows I followed for the first season and then gave up on. I enjoyed it but it got Dan Browned for me. I couldn’t get beyond the psychology and that the show is basically a vampire story, just with serial killer as a stand in for vampire.
Pteryxx:
October 8th, 2012 at 11:11 am
*cheers Audley*
Joe, with two drivers you should be fine, as long as y’all can sleep in the car as needed and somebody can handle staying awake late at night when the other person isn’t necessarily awake to help poke at them. (And stops, plenty of stops, for the pets’ sake as well. After a while the landscape rushing by can get disorienting, and walking around a stationary rest stop for a while really helps.)
I’ve done long solo drives, over 2400 miles (with a bit of hotel in that case)… many short breaks for the ground to hold still, and being comfortable enough in the car to get *some* sleep at need, made it possible.
Hekuni Cat, MQG:
October 8th, 2012 at 11:14 am
theophontes – Ms. Daisy is beautiful!
Audley – Congratulations! I’d tell you to celebrate, but you obviously have that well in hand. :D
Richard Austin:
October 8th, 2012 at 11:18 am
Joe,
Depends on the roads. I don’t know which direction you’re heading, but if you’re taking something like the 10 across the country (such as coming towards SoCal from Florida), I could see *maybe* 800 being reasonable (mostly because of higher speed limits; that’s still probably 12 hours driving). I’ve driven 12 hours (that was only 400 miles, but it was PCH), but it’s tough and I don’t know that you’d want to do it two days in a row. And that still wouldn’t get you the 1800 in two days.
And, yes, the extra hour or two makes a huge difference, fatigue-wise. Especially in bad weather, and we’re starting to get to the wet seasons.
Improbable Joe:
October 8th, 2012 at 11:18 am
Pteryxx, We’re on “two drivers and two vehicles” now. So there’s no good plan. We’re also on “no room for a second driver in either vehicle even if we had one.”
Crap, this is sucking more and more. I’ve got a month to figure this out though. I also need to start looking for a place to live, which is going to be HARD from 1800 miles away.
mythbri:
October 8th, 2012 at 11:20 am
Just catching up on the thread since yesterday, and I have the following (thread-appropriate) rants to make:
Facebook Mormonocalypse October 2012:
As Lynna has so thoroughly documented, it was the LDS General Conference this weekend. I didn’t care to watch any of it. But that doesn’t mean that I was free from seeing and hearing about it absolutely EVERYWHERE. Facebook was abuzz with the new mission rules, 99% of them positive. “Yay! Divinely inspired!” “Yay! Finally equal….ish. But not really.” “Yay! There is a living Prophet upon the Earth, get thee to church, heathens!” My eyes were aching by the end of the day, they were rolling so hard.
There was one comment about the new mission rules that was not positive, and it was from a non-member friend of a friend. She politely expressed her annoyance at all of the intrusive religious posts, reminding people that not everyone that they’re friends with shares their religion or their point of view. She expressed concern over the new mission rules, as she saw them as another way to make it harder for young women to go to college, and get education – characterizing it as a transparent attempt to retain the membership of college-age women (I would be very interested to see the retention records broken down by demographics right now).
She had several people rage at her for being critical, flounce, un-flounce, re-flounce, and un-friend her. Judging by what Lynna says about the Adversarial Internets, they probably saw that she was acting as an agent of Satan by voicing her concerns in the same way they were voicing their religious fervor. :P
Government and Green Funding:
I can’t disclose too much here, but I work as the safety and health coordinator of a semiconductor manufacturing company. The parts we manufacture are used exclusively in solar application, so yes – you could call us a “green technology” company. 90%, if not more, of my co-workers are Republican/Libertarian/Conservative, and it’s driving me fucking nuts. They keep spouting off ridiculous shit about the economy, about Obama, about everything that they see as oppression of their poor little white male selves. It’s completely maddening.
Anyway, one of their favorite hobbyhorses is Solyndra, the company that “Obama funded” that went out of business. Supposedly it’s this HUGE SCANDAL that PROVES OBAMA CAN’T MANAGE THE ECONOMY and also that CLIMATE CHANGE IS A HOAX USED TO BILK THE GOVERNMENT OUT OF MONEY.
Here’s the punchline. Are you ready for it? Okay. Here it is.
Our company has government funding.
Eh? Eh? Hilarious, no? We are a GREEN TECHNOLOGY company with GOVERNMENT FUNDING. OH, IRONY!
Yeah, these guys’ “principles” end at the lining of their own pockets.
Ing:Intellectual Terrorist "Starting Tonight, People will Whine":
October 8th, 2012 at 11:23 am
Anyone else catch Santorums “You can kill things you love, maybe to eat them” line?
Improbable Joe:
October 8th, 2012 at 11:26 am
Ing,
The fun thing about “Dexter” is, you can skip 3-4 seasons and get right back in like you didn’t miss anything! 5 minutes to skim the Wikipedia entry and you’re all set.
Ing:Intellectual Terrorist "Starting Tonight, People will Whine":
October 8th, 2012 at 11:30 am
@Improbable Joe
Eh…still bugs me that it’s basically Interview With a Vampire in Silence of the Lamb’s clothing.
But I did want to see John Lithgow as a villain
Esteleth, Elen síla lumenn' omentielvo:
October 8th, 2012 at 11:38 am
So, my internet was down all weekend. So, to fill the void in my heart, I went on a Sims marathon.
Was fun!
Only, at some point my game picked up a bug. That bug being the “Sims forget to get dressed after bathing” bug. Also, the “the modesty blurring goes away” bug.
I realized this when I was doing my pan-around-the-house action to check on anyone, and there was my Sim, cheerfully gardening in the nude. And then getting the mail in the nude. And then playing fetch with the SimDog in the nude. And then going to work in the nude.
The oddest thing? Sims don’t have genitals. Their bodies are vaguely Barbie-and-Ken-esque in that smooth uncanny-valley sort of way.
Pteryxx:
October 8th, 2012 at 11:39 am
gah Joe, sorry, didnt’ catch that you’re caravanning now.
Patricia, OM:
October 8th, 2012 at 11:41 am
Just got off the phone to FFRF – dress for the convention can run from tux to sweat pants. WTF? So I informed her that the motto for Portland is and she said, oh well keep it weird then.
That isn’t helpful, I don’t have a wet suit.
Improbable Joe:
October 8th, 2012 at 11:44 am
Pteryxx,
To be fair, the plan HAS changed a half-dozen times in the last 24 hours. Without the pets, I would consider selling my car and flying.
Improbable Joe:
October 8th, 2012 at 11:46 am
Patricia,
Then I’m guessing a shirt with a collar, tie optional. Maybe you could ask another member who has attended a similar function?
Beatrice:
October 8th, 2012 at 11:48 am
Caine,
while you’re here: Give some love to my namesake for me. I’ve been neglecting her lately. Is she doing fine?
Esteleth, Elen síla lumenn' omentielvo:
October 8th, 2012 at 11:48 am
Joe, I have moved a distance of 1,000 miles (1,032, according to GMaps, and 17,546 according to Apple Maps). I drove.
Here’s what to do and what not to do:
Do not attempt to drive all of that in one day. Yes, it is 17 hours according to the navigator. But that should not be within a single day.
Do stop every 3 to 4 hours if not more frequently to grab a bite to eat, stretch your legs, and rest.
Do stop every 6 to 8 hours if not more frequently to get a hotel room to SLEEP if you have multiple drivers. If you are the only driver, stop more frequently.
That 1,000 mile trip? I did it in three days. There were two people to drive. We drove the first 450 miles in one day (this took about 8 hours), then stopped for the night. The next morning, we drove the next 500 miles (this took about 8 hours), then we stopped for the night. The third day, we drove the final stretch (about 90 minutes), then began the process of unloading. Those two eight-hour days of driving with two divers, swapping every 3 or 4? Was pushing it.
Esteleth, Elen síla lumenn' omentielvo:
October 8th, 2012 at 11:50 am
Also, y’know, animals cannot be kept crated for that long. They will need to be walked and allowed to relieve themselves.
Improbable Joe:
October 8th, 2012 at 11:55 am
Esteleth,
Animals are just going to have to suck it up? I mean, really. I can’t “walk” a pack of cats.
Audley Z. Darkheart (liar and scoundrel):
October 8th, 2012 at 11:55 am
Mythbri:
Sounds like the people my dad works with. Needless to say, they’re all about , but none of their jobs would exist without government (defense) contracts. *headdesk!*
I also had a coworker that was livin’ free or dyin’ while he took advantage of as many government programs as possible– heating assistance, vouchers for high speed internet access*, stuff like that. You see, it’s just different for him, ‘cos he works hard and just can’t get ahead, unlike those lazy poor people who depend on the governemt to give them everything. He also railed against “socialized medicine” while at the same time having no private insurance and literally tens of thousands of dollars of medical debt.
There’s just no understanding some people
*It is (was?) a program that NY instituted to help out businesses and the economy in rural counties. The thought was that internet providers wouldn’t improve service in sparsly populated areas without a guaranteed customer base and local business would benefit from actually having reliable access to the ‘tubes. I’m not really sure how well it has worked, though.
Esteleth, Elen síla lumenn' omentielvo:
October 8th, 2012 at 11:58 am
Joe,
A cat if crated for too long will soil their crate. And trust me, you do not want to deal with that.
And for the record, you can in fact take cats for a walk. They make harnesses and leashes (LGT store selling such items) for cats.
Janine: Hallucinating Liar:
October 8th, 2012 at 11:59 am
That is good, Patricia. I would hate for you to show up wearing two wetsuits at the same time.
Beatrice:
October 8th, 2012 at 12:02 pm
Caine,
I never asked you, which Beatrice is the ratlet named for? Considering other names, I somehow doubt it was just because you fancy the name.
(you’ll get virtual chocolate&coffee cake if it’s for Much Ado About Nothing Beatrice)
Audley Z. Darkheart (liar and scoundrel):
October 8th, 2012 at 12:03 pm
Improbable Joe:
My parents moved from Idaho to New York with three cats (they were caravaning, too)– would you like me to ask my mom how they handled it?
Also, Esteleth is correct. For years, my job consisted of me being on the road for 8 to 10 hours a day and still much more than 11 or 12 destroys me. Don’t push yourself, ‘cos it’ll just lead to an accident.
Improbable Joe:
October 8th, 2012 at 12:10 pm
Esteleth,
Just so you understand, I’m NOT HAPPY ABOUT THIS. I have four cats who have never been outside or on a leash. If I lose one of them opening the crate at a rest stop, that’s a million times worse than them being inconvenienced or uncomfortable for a few hours a day for a couple of days. I drove three of these cats 12 hours in one day last year, to get to this fucking hellhole. Other than being whining complainers the whole day, they were fine. A little food and fresh water ever couple of hours, and I just grabbed out the poop and changed their blankets when they got soiled.
But since we’re going to need at least three days anyways, I’m thinking we’re going to stretch it out to four or even five days. If we drive 5 days, we can do six hours of driving with an hour worth of stops, and then plenty of time running loose in a hotel room.
Esteleth, Elen síla lumenn' omentielvo:
October 8th, 2012 at 12:12 pm
Okay, fair enough. I hope you don’t think I’m nagging.
I think doing it in 5 days sounds like it could work well.
mythbri:
October 8th, 2012 at 12:15 pm
@Audley
Yeah, that’s pretty much how my co-workers are. The cognitive dissonance is very much audible, as we all work in a small cubicle farm. Occasionally I fantasize about just shouting random, witty rebuttals to the stupid political stuff they talk about (like, “THAT’S HYPOCRITICAL BULLSHIT!”), but I have to work with these people.
I’m the only feminist godless liberal among the bunch. So lonely! ;)
Improbable Joe:
October 8th, 2012 at 12:21 pm
Esteleth,
I appreciate that you want my cats to be taken care of. Me too! But money… we don’t have any clue how much we’ll be able to allot for the move. We’re going to do the best we can, but sometimes that’s not the ideal. Ideally, we’d have $10,000-15,000 for the move and we could spend $3000 on an RV and $3000 on moving our stuff. As it is, we might only have $3000 or less to move everything. That means caravan and things being tight and packed, and two extra days on the road means two more nights in hotel rooms, which stretches the budget even more.
Caine, Divisitrix du mal:
October 8th, 2012 at 12:22 pm
Woohoo! I just got permission from Piotr Naskrecki to use his photo of Micrathena cyanospina as an embroidery on canvas project. Now I just gotta do it.
Patricia, OM:
October 8th, 2012 at 12:23 pm
Janine – Thanks, my wardrobe dollars are going to drop to almost nothing, now that all I need is a blue skirt, white blouse and red pointed hat. *SNORT*
Improbable Joe – There isn’t anyone I can ask. We two are the only atheists in Wasco County.
Caine, Divisitrix du mal:
October 8th, 2012 at 12:24 pm
Beatrice:
Two Beatrices – Shakespeare’s and you. ♥
Nutmeg:
October 8th, 2012 at 12:25 pm
The longest drive I’ve done was 1252km (778 miles) in one day. We did that with two drivers, and we only stopped to use the washroom, buy gas, and eat very quickly. It took 13 hours. I didn’t feel like we were pushing it, but we were driving on divided highway across the Prairies in summer, so conditions were pretty ideal. I could have gone another couple of hours if necessary, but it wouldn’t have been pleasant.
I would not want to have to move long distances with pets, and especially not in a hurry. Good luck, Joe.
Janine: Hallucinating Liar:
October 8th, 2012 at 12:28 pm
The part in which I explain my joke.
Janine: Hallucinating Liar:
October 8th, 2012 at 12:32 pm
And for some reason, that reminded of the story of the naked vicar who fell on a potato.
Got to love the classics.
Patricia, OM:
October 8th, 2012 at 12:34 pm
Caine – How do you do that heart icon?
Pteryxx:
October 8th, 2012 at 12:35 pm
I *have* driven 16 hours in a single day, solo, but with no pets and I wouldn’t recommend it. Heck, I wouldn’t dare try it again NOW.
Joe, might research pet-friendly hotels along the route *now*… and price them. Some of them have 1 or 2 pet limits and some charge pet fees ranging from token to exorbitant. There’s a ton of internet info out there, sorry I’m not more help atm.
—
Other news – Natalie Reed’s back and no longer homeless:
http://freethoughtblogs.com/nataliereed/2012/10/08/back-to-work/
She could use donations, folks.
Improbable Joe:
October 8th, 2012 at 12:38 pm
Janine:
TWO WET SUITS?
I mean, one suit is unusual enough but what the hell. Not my thing, but not my place to judge if he’s not hurting anyone. The second suit though? Just seems like overkill.
Patricia:
I thought maybe you could email someone who has attended a FFRF event, go on Twitter or Facebook, something like that?
Improbable Joe:
October 8th, 2012 at 12:40 pm
Pteryxx,
OR… we just don’t tell them we have 4 cats. Have to tell them about the dog, of course. My wife has already started looking, so I’ll assume she has that part covered. :)
Caine, Divisitrix du mal:
October 8th, 2012 at 12:40 pm
Patricia:
& hearts ; remove the spaces.
Nerd of Redhead, Dances OM Trolls:
October 8th, 2012 at 12:41 pm
♥ = ♥
Janine: Hallucinating Liar:
October 8th, 2012 at 12:42 pm
Heart icon?
Sorry. I love the song.
Beatrice:
October 8th, 2012 at 12:44 pm
Caine,
You’re so sweet. ♥
One large slice of chocolate&coffee cake sent your way
Janine: Hallucinating Liar:
October 8th, 2012 at 12:47 pm
Heart
Funny, I normally hate songs like this.
Patricia, OM:
October 8th, 2012 at 1:14 pm
Oh, thanks! I ♥ it.
Joe – No facebook or twitter for me. The two wet suits thing is from a year or so ago when a fundie preacher got caught in a compromising situation which also involved multiple dildos… you know, typical convention wear! :D
Lynna, OM:
October 8th, 2012 at 1:20 pm
Okay, I’m total sucker for these photos of Obama as the baby whisperer.
http://www.dailykos.com/story/2012/10/08/1141538/-The-Baby-Whisperer-Obama-Photo-Diary
The Obama photos are followed by a few photos of Romney holding babies who want the fuck out of there.
trinioler:
October 8th, 2012 at 1:21 pm
You know what? That has to be the best part of being a politician, the sheer number of babies you get to hold and kiss. So adorbs.
Lynna, OM:
October 8th, 2012 at 1:29 pm
Salon’s Joan Walsh weighs in on Romney’s foreign policy speech:
Yep, that’s Mitt. His message is, “Do what I tell you to do.” He wants to be President of the USA so that he can run the biggest business of all, planet earth.
Improbable Joe:
October 8th, 2012 at 1:31 pm
trinioler: Or the worst part. Depends on how you feel about babies.
Pteryxx:
October 8th, 2012 at 1:34 pm
And then he can squeeze all the profit out of it, abandon it and move on to the next one!
Patricia, OM:
October 8th, 2012 at 2:28 pm
Just got my flu shot, yay! While I was waiting of course the usual jackass had to start in to tell everyone within shouting distance how stoopid it is to get a flu shot. You can’t reason with flu shot fools. *snort*
Improbable Joe:
October 8th, 2012 at 2:32 pm
Shit, flu shots. My wife has been “borrowing” flu shots from work for me for years and years.
Audley Z. Darkheart (liar and scoundrel):
October 8th, 2012 at 2:50 pm
Patricia:
Yay! Now you can visit DarkFetus when she’s born! ;)
I’m getting my shot on Friday.
Patricia, OM:
October 8th, 2012 at 3:01 pm
Audley – Yay, when I send more knitting you can be sure it’s cootie free. The convention knitting is decided on, Mr. Darkheart’s egghead. I have it cast on and packed. It’s the only thing packed… :D
Audley Z. Darkheart (liar and scoundrel):
October 8th, 2012 at 3:07 pm
:D :D :D
Lynna, OM:
October 8th, 2012 at 3:21 pm
Well, you could have predicted this, right? Todd “legitimate rape” Akin has been endorsed by the NRA.
Lynna, OM:
October 8th, 2012 at 3:25 pm
And in more NRA news: “defeat Obama” ads paid for by the National Rifle Association are being aired:
You can view the ad here.
trinioler:
October 8th, 2012 at 3:26 pm
Fucking Ronald D. Moore. Saw his name on the credits as a producer for Roswell(currently watching it).
Now I know how the series will end. Godddidit.
Fucking Moore.
Improbable Joe:
October 8th, 2012 at 3:37 pm
trinioler,
I’d laugh if I wasn’t still so angry, all these years later. “Fucking Moore” indeed. I can accept all sorts of hand-waving if it makes some sort of sense and doesn’t undermine the whole damned thing, but the Goddidit ending of BSG was clearly a matter of lazy storytelling and treating the audience like idiots. Same with the whole last season of Lost, come to think of it. It isn’t “we’re telling a story with a spiritual message” it is “we didn’t know how to answer any of the questions we raised, so we’re just going to say “magic” and run away.”
Beatrice:
October 8th, 2012 at 3:41 pm
Oh, Roswell. I forgot about that series. I wonder how it ended.
I remember the first season and I’m pretty sure I watched the whole second. Third season is a bit blurry. I got seriously bored, skipped episodes and at some point just gave up.
Most series should just wrap it up after the first season. There are exceptions (hello, Buffy and Doctor Who), but I would have, for example, remembered Lost and Heroes much more fondly if they finished after season one.
Improbable Joe:
October 8th, 2012 at 3:53 pm
Beatrice,
The first season of Heroes was awesome. And then the second series reset everything and was crap. And then the third season was just like the first two and I gave up after a few episodes, and then I have no idea. Suck suck suck suck.
Beatrice:
October 8th, 2012 at 3:57 pm
Just read the ending of Roswell on wiki. I doubt it looked any less crappy than it appeared in the short summary.
Ing:Intellectual Terrorist "Starting Tonight, People will Whine":
October 8th, 2012 at 3:58 pm
@improbable Joe.
Thazts how I feel about ME3 and xfiles.
trinioler:
October 8th, 2012 at 4:04 pm
There’s also DS9. He’s the one responsible for that ending. Oh and he tried to do the same with TNG, but Roddenberry ably stepped on that one.
Improbable Joe:
October 8th, 2012 at 4:06 pm
Ing, I thought X-Files could have ended with the first movie and been awesome.
Beatrice:
October 8th, 2012 at 4:12 pm
I ♥ X Files. I sorta skipped a lot of episodes towards the end because Mulder Scully – will they won’t they (of course they will) got really really old, especially since everything else suffered because of that plot line.
But Scully was totally one of my heroes when I first started watching X Files.
trinioler:
October 8th, 2012 at 4:21 pm
My female fictional hero is Cordelia Vorkosigan. I am in love with her. ♥
Patricia, OM:
October 8th, 2012 at 4:30 pm
Egad! Someone has given me a cleaning cootie. Over the weekend, and today, I’ve cleaned out all my summer clothes, M’s summer clothes. Sorted washed, and boxed up all the summer bedding. Rewashing and sorting all the fall and winter clothes, and bedding. The worst thing was sorting out the gawd damned sock drawer. I’ve put that off for years, it
isn’twasn’t fit to be a rats nest! Now I’m too tired to haul in the donation boxes.(must be all Joes talk of moving that inspired me)
Improbable Joe:
October 8th, 2012 at 4:31 pm
That’s right, blame me for everything… make me feel like Rebecca Watson.
Beatrice:
October 8th, 2012 at 4:33 pm
Has anyone ever seen Rebecca Watson and you in the same room at the same time?
Giliell, Approved Straight Chorus:
October 8th, 2012 at 4:35 pm
Good evening
Longest drive: 1.500 km, aka 1000 miles on a holiday with Mr. Wasn’t planned like that. You know kids, this was in the olden times when people used maps and GPS systems cost thousands of bucks. Our plan was to drive about 1.200km and then sleep in a cheap hotel around Barcelona*. Only we somehow managed not to find one and then just had to drive on. The next one we found was 300 km further. It was a hard day. The remaining 1.000km to Sevilla were a piece of cake after that.
*If you’re ever driving around Europe, Etap of Formule 1 hotels are cheap, clean, devoid of any luxeries and often close to the motorway.
+++
So, I got #1 for a nice fotosession showing off her new Hootie**
**Yes, I’m bragging. I’m seriously in love with it.
As I’m not allowed to have some 15 minutes unadultered fun with my daughter my mum went like “why do you want to take her pictures now?” “Why do you want to take so many pictures?” “Don’t you have enough pictures?”***
I told her that I like to have pictures of the stuff I make. I admit I didn’t tell her about the internet because those pictures will mean that a pedophile will come and murder her. So she went inside and told my sister I should stop lying, she knew exactly that I was planning and preparing a fashion collection. Seriously, that’s what I dream of…
By now that’s seriously only a passing acquaintance she has with reality…
***The age of digital photography where you take 120 pics to get half a dozen acceptable ones especially when taking pics of a kid on a rubber horse…
cicely:
October 8th, 2012 at 4:39 pm
Tony: I once, yes, at a buffet, accidentally got a leaf of what I was told was kale on my plate. Being an adult, I thought I should at least try it. It seemed oddly stiff (“plastic-y” was the word that sprang to mind), and I didn’t at all care for the taste of it.
As for buffets, I like them; partly for the affordability, especially if you’re having a reunion of college friends, for instance, some of whom are low on funds, and partly for the variety, hence the increased likelihood that everyone can find something to their liking…plus, you aren’t stuck with an unlikable veggie side to go with your entre, as you may be at more pricey restaurants, or given a choice from a limited list of options, all of them yukky. Plus, you get to look at it first, and decide whether it looks palatable before the plate appears at your table.
I have seen a kid grab food from a pizza buffet; his parents were mortified.
-
Yay!
*visual of Kermit the Frog flailing his arms*
-
What about, say, a snorkel/goggle set up (I’m sure there’s a better way to describe that…), with swim fins—and maybe something Shakespearean rented from a theatrical/costuming shop? Or, wait…weren’t you the one that, some time back, went to a Steampunk wedding? Maybe something along those lines? With or without snorkel and fins?
And now, I can’t get an image of swim fins worn with spats out of my mind….
-
Aratina Cage:
October 8th, 2012 at 4:42 pm
I was under the impression from interviews, having just watched it on DVD, that the DS9 ending was a ‘gift’ from Ira Stevens Behr: Star Trek fans had turned Kirk and Picard into gods of a sort, so he wanted to comment on that tendency of fandom to deify the lead captains by making Sisko into an actual god.
Beatrice:
October 8th, 2012 at 4:42 pm
Hootie… the hood… *dies of cute*
—
I wanted to have a rubber horse like that, but my parents never wanted to buy me one. Mother’s friend’s daughter had one, but never let me ride it. On the other hand, I had to share my toys with her.
/first world problems
//childish resentment
Improbable Joe:
October 8th, 2012 at 4:44 pm
Oh, and I totally missed the buffet conversation. I LOVE the Chinese buffet. I don’t even have to be particularly hungry or broke, either. I just love having a big choice of flavors. When my wife and I go to a chain bar & grill sort of joint like Applebee’s or TGIFridays, we’ll order a bunch of appetizers for the same reason.
Giliell, Approved Straight Chorus:
October 8th, 2012 at 4:46 pm
beatrice
You do know that they make them in an adult version
:)
My sister already ordered her hootie for christmas *gg*
cicely:
October 8th, 2012 at 4:50 pm
*hug*
Only in meatspace, mythbri!
-
Patricia, OM:
October 8th, 2012 at 5:08 pm
cicely – Yep, Naughty and I went to the steam punk wedding at Oaks Amusement Park in Portland. I dressed as the Queen Mum, and he went in top hat and tail coat suit. We were a splendid pair of old ducks, but that was a costume themed affair.
cicely:
October 8th, 2012 at 5:14 pm
Patricia – Well, you did say “keep it weird”!
:D
-
Pteryxx:
October 8th, 2012 at 5:14 pm
Surly Amy news! She just announced she’s releasing lots of images of her artwork under Creative Commons, so folks are free to use them as avatars or wherever.
http://skepchick.org/2012/10/free-the-art
Whole stack of pendant images here:
http://www.flickr.com/photos/surlyramics/sets/72157631716917552/
Patricia, OM:
October 8th, 2012 at 5:33 pm
Cicely – I’d hate to make Richard Dawkins wet his pants laughing at a hillbilly effort to look like royals! :O
Has anyone tried pearl barley/pomegranate salad yet? Looks like something I missed.
http://cookwithwhatyouhave.com/2011/12/08/barley-and-pomegranate-salad/
carlie:
October 8th, 2012 at 5:39 pm
What I notice about those campaign pictures (and others I’ve seen) is that Obama really likes babies. Most of the times you see him with one, he’s nuzzling its head, playing “mimic the face” games, and otherwise snorgling them. Romney seems to be just using them as a photo op.
Improbable Joe:
October 8th, 2012 at 5:45 pm
Wow… did you know that Linda Ellerbee is still alive, and working for Nick News? Amazing. I remember her from when I was way young, and she’s apparently still doing good work.
Audley Z. Darkheart (liar and scoundrel):
October 8th, 2012 at 5:50 pm
I received a package from CafePress today* containing a super cute blue onesie (size 6-12 months) that says “future feminist” across the front and I can’t figure out who it’s from!
*Okay, I know that there wasn’t any mail delivery today, but it was in my mailbox when I got home from work. It was prolly crammed in Asshole Sister’s box by mistake.
Improbable Joe:
October 8th, 2012 at 6:01 pm
Audley… anything else you want/need? I’d like to send something along your way.
A. R:
October 8th, 2012 at 6:20 pm
Is there photographic documentation of this?
cicely:
October 8th, 2012 at 6:20 pm
Email sent to Printer of Shirts. Soon, we shall see if the cicely can haz wheelz? project is even feasible.
*tentacles selfishly crossed on own behalf*
-
Janine: Hallucinating Liar:
October 8th, 2012 at 6:30 pm
Lynna, just in case you have not seen this. I found this in Google Play, The Deseret Bookshelf LDS E-Reader.
opposablethumbs:
October 8th, 2012 at 6:34 pm
Semi ‘rupt and next few days may be more busyness (i.e. flailing desperately to catch up with things I ought to have done days if not weeks ago) so I’ll just take this opportunity to say YAAAAAYYYY Auldey!!!!11!!1
I was just thinking of you today, in fact, as I got into a discussion about women’s reproductive rights (thank you, Jeremy Hunt the “I just picked this number out of my arse” abortion time limit fuckwit). And thanks largely to the Horde, I was able to put across a fair proportion of what I wanted to say! (I didn’t have to say absolutely everything, so far – though the exchange may continue tomorrow – because I wasn’t entirely on my own: one of the other participants turned out to be a good bloke and was totally on the right lines). It still felt like a bit of an achievement, though, as I am shite at argument. So, thank you Horde for masses of helpful info and for inspiration!
Audley Z. Darkheart (liar and scoundrel):
October 8th, 2012 at 6:37 pm
Joe:
We’re pretty well set, but if you’d like to shoot me an email (you can find my email addy on my blog) I’m not one to say no to gifts. :D
Audley Z. Darkheart (liar and scoundrel):
October 8th, 2012 at 6:38 pm
*high fives* to opposablethumbs!
chigau (悲しい):
October 8th, 2012 at 7:01 pm
We’re home.
Kitteh’s like, “Nice to see you. Feed me.”
Back to normal.
a_ray_in_dilbert_space:
October 8th, 2012 at 7:09 pm
I think Obama actually likes campaigning and likes people. Willard (Mitt)…not so much. In less than a month we’ll know just how stupid the American people are.
dysomniak, darwinian socialist:
October 8th, 2012 at 7:12 pm
Two things: First, though it hurts my Oregonian heart to point this out, the slogan “Keep Portland Weird” was in fact lifted from Austin, TX (however having never been to Austin, I will happily assert that Portland is far more bizzare than they could ever aspire to).
Secondly, I have no idea what all these complaints over the ending to BSG are about. The final shot of the series, where the Galactica comes up over the horizon of the moon, was the absolute perfect capstone to that series. Nothing happened after that. Nothing.
Improbable Joe:
October 8th, 2012 at 7:29 pm
Audley, shot you an email.
chigau (悲しい):
October 8th, 2012 at 7:30 pm
Improbable Joe
If you haven’t read this, it contains valuable™ information™ about moving pets by car.
http://hyperboleandahalf.blogspot.ca/2010/11/dogs-dont-understand-basic-concepts.html
Caine, Divisitrix du mal:
October 8th, 2012 at 7:35 pm
A_Ray! *pouncehug*
a_ray_in_dilbert_space:
October 8th, 2012 at 7:35 pm
Audley, I will be wishing you well.
Caine, Howdy!
Janine: Hallucinating Liar:
October 8th, 2012 at 7:37 pm
Try watching Slacker, dysomniak, before you declare that Austin could possibly be weirder than Portland, Oregon.
Improbable Joe:
October 8th, 2012 at 7:38 pm
chigau, that was adorable. Luckily, cats are less prone to giving a crap, and this is the third time we’re moving the dog so we know how she reacts. She hates the packing phase because she thinks we’re going to leave her, she LOVES being in the car, and as soon as she gets a new neighborhood to explore on the end of a leash, she’s happy.
The cats? Throw a couple of towels on the floor, make a bed, and throw a blankie on a sofa, and the cats are sleeping within minutes… problem solved!
Caine, Divisitrix du mal:
October 8th, 2012 at 7:43 pm
A_Ray:
So glad to see you back here! What you been up to lately?
strange gods before me ॐ:
October 8th, 2012 at 7:45 pm
Amblebury,
Apparently not. I don’t use Chrome, so I don’t know.
I do expect that Ghostery for Chrome would be of limited but nonzero use. It should block some cross site requests (I think; the Firefox version does, at least), but only those which are in its blacklist.
And OpenDNS is fine for what it does, but it doesn’t do what you’re asking about here.
+++++
theophontes,
Not when you bork the link.
+++++
Portia,
Rotary is basically Freemasonry with more potlucks and less Luciferianism. As theophontes said, it’s no more religious than what your local community thinks is the baseline of public religiosity that normal people should display.
FossilFishy’s advice is good.
+++++
Not a definition, but think of it like a paint chip chart to hold up and see if you’ve found the right shade of brown: Eternal Facism — Fourteen Ways of Looking at a Blackshirt.
deborahbell:
October 8th, 2012 at 7:49 pm
@108 pixelfish
My mother left her husband a while back, and in the process of telling me how that came about, she told me that before she actually did it, she went to talk to her pastor to see if it was alright. He wasn’t available, so she talked to the guy who leads the singing on Sundays, and he gave her permission to separate from her husband. Her reason? He was violent with her to the point she had called the police on him. Then after the police left she went to church to get permission to leave him. Then she stayed for a month with a family at church, and they talked into going back to him, to “be Jesus to him”. That didn’t work out and thankfully she is out of the house and has her own rental house that she’s signed a lease on, which indicates she plans to stay gone.
@110 Joe Oh dear, be safe.
@259 Tony
I sometimes enjoy the variety of food on a buffet, but I find them not a particularly good deal for me, personally. I generally can only eat one fairly small (for a buffet) plate, and the whole point seems to be to go back several times. There is a Japanese buffet that has a very wide variety and good food, as well as unlimited sushi on the buffet near us – it’s pretty expensive but I really enjoyed that for the variety and being able to have a little of several different types of meals at once. They never change what is on it, though, so I got bored of it after a while.
@261 Tony
My ex-boyfriend had a business partner for a while that was Vietnamese. Either his or his wife’s parents lived with his family, and they cooked a lot of fairly traditional foods. They made awesome egg rolls and showed me how to roll them, and they were always inviting us over for dinner. One day the dinner had a very strange conglomeration of addins into rice, including tripe. I ate it, to be polite, but I didn’t like the tripe. It was odd looking, feeling, and tasting. And, I think they are called supermarkets because of being large, larger than food markets used to be. :)
@370 Beatrice
I watched Roswell with a gay guy who had a crush on Max a few years back. I don’t remember how it ended, really, but it seemed to peter out vaguely, if I remember correctly.
@371 Joe
I’ve been told what happened to Heroes was they tried to keep putting out new episodes during that really long writer’s strike. So they had unqualified writers writing it because the qualified ones were on strike.
@374 trinioler
Well that explains that.
@394 Audley
Any chance you would want a crocheted baby blanket? I love making them.
strange gods before me ॐ:
October 8th, 2012 at 7:53 pm
And now I notice that you already responded to FossilFishy’s advice.
I’m pretty tired.
Rawnaeris:
October 8th, 2012 at 7:53 pm
Hey, Josh, OSG, this may be moot if you are still in Canada, but you have an email from me.
Have fun!
Josh, Official SpokesGay:
October 8th, 2012 at 7:55 pm
A belated thank you to everyone who helped me with my inadequate French during this trip to Quebec City. It’s a relief not to struggle along with my Franglais now that I’m back in Vermont. Every time I spoke I felt like I was in a French and Saunders skit:
“Are you gonna do the accent?”
“I AM doing the accent! ‘Har are yeeww?’”
Actually, my accent isn’t bad. It’s my vocabulary and grammar.
Josh, Official SpokesGay:
October 8th, 2012 at 8:17 pm
Conversation at dinner in Quebec City with hosts at grand banquet:
SpokesGay: “It’s difficult to remember the correct gender when one’s mother tongue has no gender for nouns.”
Table Companion: “Tongue?”
SpokesGay: “Err, ‘la langue?’”
Table Companion: “Ah! Oui . . .sa langue!”
Table Companion: “If you’re not sure, just default to ‘le [noun].’ Never say ‘la [noun]‘ if you’re not certain.”
SpokesGay: “Pourquois pas?”
Table Companion: “Because it’s feminine. It’s like saying, ‘la mec.’ ”
SpokesGay: “That’s sexist. Why is that worse than ‘le femme’?”
Table Companion [with perfectly baffled look]: “Eh?”
chigau (悲しい):
October 8th, 2012 at 8:26 pm
Josh
I’m glad you had a good time in Québec.
You shame most Western Canadians who still refuse to admit that they understand un petit peu.
(and I still had to copy/paste the é)
Improbable Joe:
October 8th, 2012 at 8:31 pm
deborahbell,
I’ve decided that I’m safe, and no one in this neighborhood is stupid/crazy enough to make a move against me. It isn’t the dog, or the gun… I think it is the magazine pouch. I’m convinced that my ability to reload a couple of times before I run out of ammo makes me extra-scary to the neighborhood. I think it takes me from “guy carrying a gun to scare people off” to “dangerous lunatic who plans on shooting until everyone is dead.”
And I can live with that. :)
Heroes. Oh, Heroes. Poor Hiro Nakamura. He went on a hero’s journey in the first season, and came out of it as an adult and a warrior. Then they erased all of that and made him an immature fanboy again. And then they did it again in the third season! It is the same reason I started to hate Scrubs… there would be character growth, and then they would erase it for no good reason. I don’t expect my characters to be the same in season 4 or 5 or 8 as they were in season 1.
carlie:
October 8th, 2012 at 8:34 pm
Hi, A-ray!!
Congrats, Audley! Counting down!
I spent the weekend taking the plunge into making my own storm windows. Booyah. We have a bay window that has never had storms on the two side panels, because the prev. owners who put it in got it used without them, and it builds up fuckin’ ice in the winter and I’m finally sick enough of it to fix it even though I don’t know what I’m doing. Got the bay panels scraped and repainted, then got frames cut and painted and mostly put together. Next payday will be buying the plexiglass and mounting them.
We do recipes, so we can do home improvement too, right? ;)
Cheap-ass storm windows when you don’t have any decent equipment: (requires screwdriver, paintbrush, saw. Optional: drill, miter box)
Buy flat 1/4″ moulding, equal amounts in 1″ width and 1/2″ width. The plastic stuff is great, because you can put all kinds of screws in it and it won’t split even though it’s thin.
Measure your window opening 10 times or so, from all directions and in all corners, to be sure you have the measurements right.
Cut the moulding about 1/4″ shorter than the measurement (to get a 1/8″ gap on all sides at the end), miter the corners if you’re fancy and have a miter box. If not, cut straight edges but remember to cut the side pieces 2 inches shorter to account for the overage on the end pieces. Then go back up and check the pieces in the opening to be sure.
Lay the thinner moulding on top of the thicker one, lining up the outside edges, so that you have a piece that is twice as tall on the outside edge as on the inside. This gives you a 1/2″ lip to set the glass in when you get it. Wood glue it down, and put a short screw into the ends about 4 inches from the edge and clamp or weight it until it dries. Do on all pieces.
Prime and paint all the pieces before putting them together, because it’s a lot easier that way. You can nail the pieces together, but I used small flat corner braces on the inside edges (on top of the thin pieces). That way the whole thing is still a little flexible to adapt to the opening (it’s not exactly plumb). Pre-drill holes for screwing into the window later. You might also want to drill out a couple of half-circles at the bottom for weepholes.*
Put the frame in the window to make sure you did it right. Then measure the opening in the frame, including the “lip” portions. Go get a piece of plexiglass (Duraplex and Optix are brand names), have them cut it there to size. Put a bead of window/siding/weather caulking on the inside edge of the lip, put the plexiglass in and set. Set the window in the opening before it dries entirely, so you can still adjust it into the space if needed (be sure the weepholes are at the bottom), screw in, then weatherstrip caulk around the edges if it’s permanent, put up peel-and-stick foam weatherstripping if you’re taking it off in the spring. If you didn’t put in weepholes, take a couple of leftover bits of moulding and use for shims at the bottom to prop it up a bit, then leave a couple of gaps in the caulking/weatherstripping to be weepholes.
*disclaimer – I’ve only made it to this part so far. The rest is the Plan.
carlie:
October 8th, 2012 at 8:41 pm
Oh no, Community has been delayed indefinitely!
This is the darkest timeline. :(
chigau (悲しい):
October 8th, 2012 at 8:45 pm
re: Hiro Nakmura
Masi Oka, in one of those ‘meet the cast members’ things, responded to an audience question,
“So, do yuh really talk Japanese or is it faked?”
with a few sentences in Japanese
(“Yes, I really speak Japanese, you dumbass.”)
and then, in English,
“And that’s how season three ends.”
trinioler:
October 8th, 2012 at 8:47 pm
Carlie:
NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO.
carlie:
October 8th, 2012 at 8:50 pm
trinioler – here is the info. I has a sad.
Josh, Official SpokesGay:
October 8th, 2012 at 8:54 pm
I did have a good time and I wish I could have stayed longer; it’s a beautiful city.
Speaking engagements where your words are being translated on the fly into four languages are awkward, though. Lots of idioms and humor won’t carry through.
Anyone who’s had a smattering of instruction in romance languages shouldn’t have too much difficulty with basic, conversational phrases to get one through the day. Saying the words and reading the words isn’t nearly so hard as understanding the spoken word at normal conversational pace. A lot of my French came back to me (though one does feel stupid and clumsy) quickly, enough to ask for things but only to get a rapid-fire response I couldn’t understand:
Cashier: “Bonjour!”
SpokesGay: “Bonjour! Je voudrais du (de? un?) numero sept, avec les frites et avec le V-8.”
Cashier: “[rapid-fire French response indicating she knew exactly which chicken sandwich meal I wanted, and would I like it to stay or carry out. Though I had trouble processing this in real time.]”
SpokesGay: “Pardonnez-moi. . mon Francais n’est pas bon, je suis desolee.”
Cashier: “That’s OK. We can continue in English.”
Sigh.
Rawnaeris:
October 8th, 2012 at 8:55 pm
trinioler, you broke my browser. Or, well, you broke this thread.
Good job. ;-)
Portia:
October 8th, 2012 at 8:56 pm
SGBM
I like your description, it made me smile. Thanks for your input. Though, I would note that there’s also less overt sexism in Rotary : )
trinioler:
October 8th, 2012 at 9:09 pm
I’m kind of proud of that for breaking the thread. :D
*pages Jason*
Esteleth, Elen síla lumenn' omentielvo:
October 8th, 2012 at 9:14 pm
WHAT.
I…
…what
ಠ_ಠ
Esteleth, Elen síla lumenn' omentielvo:
October 8th, 2012 at 9:29 pm
Also, “Dalek/Tribble slash” yields 297,000 hits on Google.
Tony •Prom King of Sunnydale High•:
October 8th, 2012 at 10:08 pm
Amblebury:
To each their own.
I would recommend John Carpenter’s Halloween (only the original) for a few reasons:
1: Alfred Hitchcock was a tremendous influence on the creators involved in innumerable horror movies. IMO, while John Carpenter owes much to Alfred Hitchock, he didn’t try to mimic his success. Rather, he took the baton and ran with it (in a slightly different direction).
2. Halloween is a slasher film, yes. It is considered by some to be the father of the slasher film (Psycho might be considered the grandfather), so the tropes of that sub genre were new to the public. Even watching the movie through jaded eyes, one can enjoy seeing the genres stereotypes in their infancy.
3. John Carpenter’s abilities as a director are on full display from the beginning of the movie. There is a sequence in the beginning that I find impressive, even by today’s standards. This is largely due to how the sequence was filmed, what it conveyed, and how subtle it was.
4. Spoilers-
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
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There is no blood in the film. The film isn’t a horror/torture porn film. It isn’t a mindless hackfest.
5. Unlike so many horror movie villains, Michael Myers has a personality. He isn’t treated as a sympathetic character though. He’s clearly a monster with no redeemable qualities.
6. The score. Love the score. It creeps me out to this day.
Tony •Prom King of Sunnydale High•:
October 8th, 2012 at 10:12 pm
Lynna:
You’re embarrassed by your awesomeness?
Ichthyic:
October 8th, 2012 at 10:31 pm
that’s what you get for reading worldnutdaily.
you either read it for yuks, or else avoid it to preserve sanity.
Improbable Joe:
October 8th, 2012 at 10:33 pm
Carlie and trinioler:
I’m hoping Community doesn’t come back until the spring. Otherwise, I expect NBC to air the episodes out of order, on random days, and skipping weeks without notice or good reason. They’ll show 2, take a week off, show 3, switch days and show 2 more, take 2 months off, and then show the rest of the episodes on Wednesdays at noon.
Tony:
Gotta disagree with you about Halloween very slightly. I’d say that Michael Myers has NO personality. If I recall correctly, he’s credited in the first film as “the Shape”… which is AWESOME!!! He’s almost like a force of nature with rudimentary will, rather than a person or even a monster.
You know what’s a good horror film? The Ring. Yeah, it is a “remake” of a J-horror flick. It is one of the few that manages to be as good or better* than the original. Like Halloween there’s not any blood to speak of, and there’s a whole lot of mood and atmosphere in the first half rather than excessive jump scares and cheap shock. Just a really well-made suspenseful film, with a super-intense ending.
Cool story about The Ring, and why I hold it in such high regard: I saw in on Halloween in the theater when it first came out, before the whole thing was spoiled by word-of-mouth. The theater was pretty much silent through the whole film, minus a couple of gasps during the few jump scares through the first 75% of the film. Then the climax came, and I’m not going to spoil it for the few of you who haven’t seen it.
You know how normally in a horror movie there’s a jolt and people scream and then they giggle and laugh and maybe yell at the screen? Not this fucking movie. People screamed at the jump scare, and then the theater was filled with moaning and gasping and the creaking sound of people pulling hard against the arms of their seats, and then the next jump and the whole thing repeated, and then silence except for heavy excited breathing as there was a slight pause in the action, and then the big reveal… and big scream, big exhale of air, and not a single giggle or laugh or funny outburst. People were scared out of their fucking minds, and there was a sort of group dynamic where the fear spread across the whole audience, and we were all sort of amplifying each other, and it became a unified fear. It was one of the most amazing experiences I’ve ever had with a film.
kristinc, ~ringy dingy~:
October 8th, 2012 at 10:33 pm
Class today. Group discussion of research papers, our chosen topics thereof, and our tentative thesis statements.
The guy who thinks he’s hot shit, otherwise known as B, says that his topic is “should everyone have the right to vote”. So, offers the prof, some alternate research terms might be suffrage or disenfranchisement. Blank look from B. “Do you know what those words mean, B?” asks the prof. Nope. No he doesn’t.
So the prof explains what those words mean and then asks for a more detailed explanation of the topic: is B thinking of a specific population of people, for instance? “Well,” says B, “I can read you my thesis.” OK, fine.
What’s B’s thesis? “Uneducated and uninformed people should not be allowed to vote because their votes ultimately cause more harm than good”.
Cue incredulous laughter from the prof, the librarian who was in the room, and about 25% of the class.
These people, man. These fucking people.
Improbable Joe:
October 8th, 2012 at 10:38 pm
kristinc,
That’s so fucking funny that it restores my faith in… wait, no. It restores my hope that most the worst people are ultimately too stupid to cause permanent damage?
Rawnaeris:
October 8th, 2012 at 10:41 pm
*lightbulb*
I just realized I’m on TET/Lounge because I feel like it. For fun. I actually don’t have any personal crisis that I need help dealing with for once.
chigau (悲しい):
October 8th, 2012 at 10:42 pm
kristinc
Can the class get together and buy a dictionary for B?
JAL: Snark, Sarcasm & Bitterness:
October 8th, 2012 at 10:44 pm
Why did only 25% of the class laugh at dumbass B? Was the rest shock and disbelief?
Sorry, I’m just imaging everyone else in the class buying into that crap since I’m in a state where the majority of people do…
chigau (悲しい):
October 8th, 2012 at 10:44 pm
Rawnaeris
Yay!
Have some grog!
Improbable Joe:
October 8th, 2012 at 10:46 pm
Rawnaeris,
Isn’t that the best reason to be anywhere, doing anything? Isn’t it nice not to have a bone to pick, or a score to settle, or a wound that needs patching over? Sometimes we all need advice, or a place to vent, or some assistance with something. And sometimes, it is cool to just talk movies or music or celebrate someone’s good news or just shoot the shit.
Rawnaeris:
October 8th, 2012 at 10:46 pm
Thanks chigau (悲しい)!
The grog’s on me tonight!
kristinc, ~ringy dingy~:
October 8th, 2012 at 10:48 pm
Then towards the end of class I was so punchy that when the prof quickly ran over the principle of moods, like so:
imperative mood: go to the store!
declarative mood: I went to the store.
interrogative mood: did I go to the store?
… I ended up putting my head down on the table and giggling nearly till I cried because I was helpless to imagine anything but Nathan Fillion describing the acting advice he got when he worked on soaps.
Improbable Joe:
October 8th, 2012 at 10:50 pm
Speaking of which… Marshall has just decided to re-release the Dual Super Lead amp from all the way back to 1997. Wait, what? Based on the price, I’m guessing the new ones are made in China or possibly Vietnam. Oh, wow… I just zoomed in on the PDF of the manual. Made in Vietnam. Wow. The classic British amplifier brand is outsourcing to Vietnam.
Patricia, OM:
October 8th, 2012 at 10:54 pm
A.R. – We were a splendid pair of old ducks. And no I haven’t seen one damned picture of us, even though the brides hired a photographer and we signed up for several shots.
I blame Improbable Joe, he made Rebecca Watson fuck it up.
So there.
Improbable Joe:
October 8th, 2012 at 10:54 pm
… I’m not exactly knocking Vietnam as a country, but my dad left a couple of feet of intestines in Vietnam back in the early 1970s, and neither Sylvester Stallone nor Chuck Norris led a rescue mission to get them back.
ibyea:
October 8th, 2012 at 10:56 pm
On Heroes:
I saw season one and two. From what I hear, season 3 plot was random plot events. It sucked as much as season 2. When I heard that, I gave up on the show. I wonder what went so wrong after season 1.
Improbable Joe:
October 8th, 2012 at 11:03 pm
ibyea,
I think what went wrong is that maybe stuff that works in comic books doesn’t always work in a live-action prime time format. There’s sort of an overlap between comic books and soap operas, where you’re allowed certain cheesy plots because they work in that genre and nowhere else. You can’t really try to play gritty realism on a network drama where there’s time travel, amnesia, shape shifting, mind control, plus daddy issues for everyone!
Hekuni Cat, MQG:
October 8th, 2012 at 11:03 pm
Congratulations, Caine!
Patricia, OM:
October 8th, 2012 at 11:18 pm
*SNORT* What the hell does Texas know about being weird? Those cow punching, Bush loving peckerwoods couldn’t BBQ their way out of the back end of a 1979 Toyota. And when it comes to beer, we got the Beard.
ibyea:
October 8th, 2012 at 11:18 pm
@Improbable Joe
But it worked so well for season 1!
Improbable Joe:
October 8th, 2012 at 11:24 pm
ibyea:
*grins*
Yeah, it works ONCE. They threw the whole kitchen sink at the show the first season, and by the third it was all “really, time travel again?” and “Oh, look… another shape shifter.” They really hit every single awesome mark in the first season, and then everything else started feeling like covering the same ground.
ibyea:
October 8th, 2012 at 11:27 pm
Also, I heard that all of a sudden, Clair Bennett turns lesbian in either season 3 or 4. WTF? There was no hint of that in season 1 at all!
Improbable Joe:
October 8th, 2012 at 11:32 pm
ibyea,
Yeah, that was the point where I checked out for good. It was “college experimenting” or some such nonsense. Mostly it felt like “let’s get chicks making out, people will watch that!” ratings-based writing.
A. R:
October 8th, 2012 at 11:55 pm
Patricia: Quite unfortunate! I’ve always loved Morning dress, though I find myself with few occasions suited to it.
Patricia, OM:
October 9th, 2012 at 12:17 am
A.R. – Quite right. We did receive multiple compliments, and M was wearing a genuine early 1900′s suit & topper that has survived in my family. Two cut aways, two trousers, and two sets of spats. The topper is collapsible. No pairs of gloves survived. He watched a lot of BBC specials to learn how to sit properly in a tail coat. Marvin is pencil thin, ramrod straight, and has a thick silver beard that would make Edward VII jealous.
Morning clothes should never go out of style.
dysomniak, darwinian socialist:
October 9th, 2012 at 12:22 am
Bah, Slacker might make for an interesting day down here in sleepy Ashland, but even even Eugene would make Linklater’s jaw drop.
Patricia:
I take it you’re referring to to Rogue’s new… special yeast?
theophontes (坏蛋):
October 9th, 2012 at 1:15 am
@ ARIDS
Hai!
@ SGBM
*blushes*
{slinks off to offer up libations (beer, of course) to the Boltzmann Brontosauri in the sky.}
@ Portia
This has not always been the case. It is only in the last few years that Rotary has made overt efforts to rid itself of (again, no doubt reflective of societal medians) sexist tendencies in the organisation. The role of “Rotary-Annes” (geddit) was in the past less formal and more as “support role”. They got rid of that legacy without the world collapsing into chaos.
Though Rotary is very socially engaged they could be described as the right of the left. (Though it is not particularly surprising that a large organisation is far slower to react to social dynamics than individuals. It forms a framework for action by groups and individuals to be more progressive though.)
The above in my own limited experience (in South Africa) at least.
Ing:Intellectual Terrorist "Starting Tonight, People will Whine":
October 9th, 2012 at 2:14 am
Someone mentioned DS9 before. I’m trying to get through it and I tell you it’s a chore. It’s almost like they were dedicated to have every good episode followed by suck. I just slogged through “The Explorers” that is the stupidest piece of garbage ever produced on Trek.
strange gods before me ॐ:
October 9th, 2012 at 2:18 am
It is true that Boltzmann Brontosauruses can materialize anywhere, but if you see any in the sky, you’d better run away from the shadow.
Eh? How is it leftish in any way? Mind, I don’t know how they function ini South Africa, and I do live in a more conservative part of the USA than a lot of other commenters, but around here Rotary is pretty much the Chamber of Commerce. Are you sure you’re not equating “helps people” with “the left”? The number of Republican and Libertarian and at-best-swing-voter Rotarians I’ve met is pretty big compared to the occasional Democrat.
+++++
Not really relevant to the rest of this comment, just something I found earlier:
http://hgs.oxfordjournals.org/content/23/1/1.abstract
https://anonfiles.com/file/9d226c5498cf550961b5c21f71a88aee
blf:
October 9th, 2012 at 2:51 am
The worst album sleeves of all time: “From breasts and balls to the Beatles, Guardian readers pick the worst album sleeves they’ve ever set horrified eyes upon — featuring a line-drawn howler from Neil Young, space-cartoon rubbishness from Def Leppard, an unfortunate back-seat mishap with some chewing gum…”.
I suggest not imbibing anything whilst viewing unless you like snorting drinks up your nose / all over the screen.
Even if you don’t imbibe, you’ll need to wash and rinse your eyeballs afterwards. Scrubbing the residual afterimages out of your brain is also recommended.
Amblebury:
October 9th, 2012 at 3:53 am
Eh, my father-in-law is a Rotarian (for thus are they called) here in NZ. The sandwich-making branch, i.e. the women, are referred to collectively as The Inner Wheel. Geddit?
They do things such as sponsoring immunisation programs in other Pacific nations. Their primary function though, just from my casual observation is to serve as a back-slapping boys’ club. Leftist they are not.
theophontes (坏蛋):
October 9th, 2012 at 4:20 am
@ SGBM
People think I am moping ’cause I am always looking down.
Not at all!
I am ever vigilant… looking out for growing shadows on the ground – in the shape of Brontosauri.
It is rather hard to translate Southafricanese into Usaian.
You should read: people who are established in society and financially self sufficient. Privileged even (indeed they can afford the time and expense of such involvement to a greater extent than most). But certainly eager to fight social iniquities (a trait of the left). It goes far further and deeper than “helps people”. I don’t know to what extent such animals exist in USA.
You would have a grand time in RSA. It maps in many ways to the USA. Both culturally and historically, but in a rather through-the-looking-glass way. “Strange hybrids”, you might say.
John Morales:
October 9th, 2012 at 5:17 am
theophontes, iniquity and inequity are different things.
blf:
October 9th, 2012 at 5:23 am
Former archbishop of Canterbury attacks gay marriage at Tory conference (in the UK):
Are there Nobel Prizes for Obliviousness, Godwinning, Scare-Mongering, Plain Olde Lying, and Unrationality? Possibly also Frothing At The Mouth and Having Yer Panties in a Twist. We have a serious candidate here for all of those (albeit Rmoney or RLyning of the USAian thugs have perhaps a better claim on the Plain Olde Lying award).
Beatrice:
October 9th, 2012 at 5:26 am
PSA: If there’s a sign on the elevator door saying “Out of order”, don’t enter the fucking elevator because you hope it will work just for you because you’re special.
Had to get an old lady out of the basement. Luckily, the elevator just took her to the basement instead of getting stuck somewhere higher and/or between floors.
Giliell, Approved Straight Chorus:
October 9th, 2012 at 5:43 am
beatrice
Did she notice the sign?
+++
Ahhh, don’t you love it when people are very generous with your time?
So, my plan for this morning was to pick up a certificate at office A, put it in an envelope together with other stuff, take it to office B, go see my therapist and then rush the fuck home because my housing company told me there’d be somebody who needs to look at the pipes at 12 o’clock.
Well, the person in office A clearly didn’t think it necessary to be present during her office hours and of course I couldn’t come back after my therapy session because I needed to get home in 30 minutes (18 miles distance, including a 1/2 mile walk). To be home at 12 for somebody who hasn’t turned up yet, 45 minutes later…
I need to make a serious phone call, I guess he’ll turn up as soon as the other person answers the phone…
blf:
October 9th, 2012 at 5:49 am
Better signs might be…
● Flamethrower testing in progress
● ↓ This side up ↑
● Danger! Peas!!
● If you can read this, you are too close
● Parachute required by law
● Frequent eruptions of boiling lava
● Gravity has been discontinued for maintenance. This elevator will float away into space
● Suicide bombers only
● Reserved for politicians
● Contaminated, Radioactive, and Frequent Electric Shocks
Or just put a kraken inside.
Beatrice:
October 9th, 2012 at 5:57 am
She said she did. (could have just been embarrassed that she missed it, I guess, but people regularly pull something like this (just as our lift regularly breaks down))
—
I don’t think I’ve ever had a repairman come on time. I love when they call from the car, claiming they are in the street right across from mine and that they’ll be over in 5 minutes… just to come an hour later.
Beatrice:
October 9th, 2012 at 6:01 am
One out of three. Might be two, there is something seriously wrong with that one dog.
ImaginesABeach:
October 9th, 2012 at 6:25 am
More from Chris Kluwe, Minnesota Viking and the object of my brain-lust: http://blogs.twincities.com/outofbounds/2012/10/08/out-of-bounds-blog-no-16-matthew-22-39/
He’s such a good writer.
broboxley OT:
October 9th, 2012 at 7:35 am
Once was in Lorado TX and got a “rescue me!” call from Tulsa Oklahoma at 9am. Drove there, arriving about 9:30pm, spent the night and drove home to atlanta. (vacationed ruined) Drove to Atlantic City the next day to visit a friend, spend a few days then drove back to Atlanta. Now as for pets on the road, Almost every motel6 (with very rare exceptions) take pets. I have the motel6 app on my phone as we travel with our dog. Motel 8 is sometimes pet friendly.
Audley Z. Darkheart (liar and scoundrel):
October 9th, 2012 at 7:43 am
Hello a_ray! It’s good to see you! Thanks for the well wishes.
Deborah:
I def won’t say no to a handmade blanket! (And I feel like you can probably never have too many.)
Carlie:
I want a NASA/shuttle style countdown.
Also booooooo to the shitty Community news.
blf:
October 9th, 2012 at 7:45 am
Man gets community sentence for Facebook post about dead soldiers:
The first amendment is important. The above suppression of free speech happened in an alleged democracy.
The Grauniad is publishing this in the UK. Notably, it is repeating exactly what Mr Ahmed wrote. Whether or not the autocratic nutters will now try to “punish” the newspaper, the author, or the editor remains to be seen.
So what that that Mr Ahmed’s opinion / statement is offensive to many people. So fecking what! Using two examples from USAlien, so are Westboro’s many statements, and also the Innocence of Muslims. Yet neither making them nor repeating them will cost the makers a fine or even time in court.
blf:
October 9th, 2012 at 7:55 am
US Protestants no longer a majority, says study:
Improbable Joe:
October 9th, 2012 at 8:16 am
broboxley,
I think my wife mentioned Motel 6 as a pet-friendly place. This should be fun.
I think I mentioned earlier, I drove 12 hours to get here with three cats in the car. I came really close to losing my shit, because there was no single five-minute stretch without one of the cats complaining about being in the carriers. And then once once got started, they’d start talking among themselves. By about hour #9 I started responding to them in cat as well. It got pretty fucking surreal, let me tell you.
blf:
October 9th, 2012 at 8:58 am
Pakistani girl shot over activism in Swat valley, claims Taliban:
Charming.
Also in the article:
Is this where the USAlien thugs go to learn ethics, welfare, responsibility, and justice?
birgerjohansson:
October 9th, 2012 at 9:24 am
Martin Rundkvist at the Aardvarchaeology blog has a request for readers:
“Let’s make a list of religious prophets! But only the ones who, having convinced their faithful followers that they spoke the word of God, suddenly received revelations to the effect that *God totally wanted them to fuck children or adolescents*. I know of three to start with. Let’s have some more, with references!”
.
Martin has already listed Muhammed, Joseph Smith and David Koresh. More examples?
— — — — — — — —
Protists: Scientists reclassify eukaryotic microorganisms http://phys.org/news/2012-10-scientists-reclassify-eukaryotic-microorganisms.html
Energy-efficient graphene membranes may lead to enhanced natural gas production, less CO2 pollution http://phys.org/news/2012-10-energy-efficient-graphene-membranes-natural-gas.html
Selective tumor treatment: β-galactosidase releases active agent from prodrugs http://phys.org/news/2012-10-tumor-treatment-galactosidase-agent-prodrugs.html
Scientists identify genetic signatures for aggressive form of prostate cancer http://medicalxpress.com/news/2012-10-scientists-genetic-signatures-aggressive-prostate.html
Vitamin variants could combat cancer as scientists unravel B12 secrets http://phys.org/news/2012-10-vitamin-variants-combat-cancer-scientists.html
broboxley OT:
October 9th, 2012 at 9:29 am
female? have an opinion? Voice that opinion? get trashed. Black? Get really trashed
http://www.theblaze.com/stories/twitter-explodes-after-black-actress-endorses-romney-as-the-only-choice-for-your-future/
broboxley OT:
October 9th, 2012 at 9:32 am
#478 Jim Jones, Chuck, and Brian David Mitchell come to mind immediately
Esteleth, Elen síla lumenn' omentielvo:
October 9th, 2012 at 9:37 am
Today in little things that make Esteleth giddy:
I got a new parking space!!! ^_^ ^_^ ^_^
*dances wildly*
Why am I so happy?
WELL.
My old parking space was a “lockbox” space. Which is to say, there is such a parking shortage here that the lots have three deep parking. Like, two cars with a third sandwiched between them. One of the outside cars has to have a little lockbox hanging on its door, containing a key to the car.
Hella uncool!
Previously, I was assigned to a lockbox space. I now have a non-lockbox space!!
*happyflail*
Now, what else was I going to do today?
…oh right. Seminar!
Bernard Bumner:
October 9th, 2012 at 9:42 am
30-60 years for Sandusky.
He continues to deny.
Nerd of Redhead, Dances OM Trolls:
October 9th, 2012 at 9:49 am
Welcome back ARIDS. You were missed.
Audley:
Remember the “hold” at T minus nine minutes while all systems sychronize? I think you are there.
Audley Z. Darkheart (liar and scoundrel):
October 9th, 2012 at 9:49 am
Birger:
Joseph Smith?
Audley Z. Darkheart (liar and scoundrel):
October 9th, 2012 at 10:05 am
Nerd:
:D Awesome.
How’s the Redhead doing in the chilly weather? Does it bother her much?
Therrin:
October 9th, 2012 at 10:08 am
In Portland, formal means socks under the Tevas.
carlie:
October 9th, 2012 at 10:09 am
What.
The.
Fuck??????
I could see having an emergency page to make that person come move their car, but leaving a key? No fucking way. Besides the fact that a lot of cars have damned expensive keys, what with the electronics and all.
blf:
October 9th, 2012 at 10:18 am
French solution is to leave the handbrake off so the (locked) car can be pushed out of the way. Usual method of “pushing the car out of the way” is to ram it with another car (not necessarily your own, I’ve seen people ram their car into car A, ramming car A into car B, and then occupy the spot formerly containing car B). The ramming is usually bumper-to-bumper, but from the dents you’d never realize that…
Janine: Hallucinating Liar:
October 9th, 2012 at 10:37 am
If slavery were so God-awful, why didn’t Jesus or Paul condemn it?
Ethical monsters like Arkansas State Rep. Loy Mauch are too fucking stupid and self centered to realize that a big fucking government is needed to keep a segment of the population enslaved. Slavery was the reason why the southern representatives insisted on having a militia, the owners needed a way to suppress uprisings.
Please, someone try to explain to me why the Tea Party are not fucking racists!
blf:
October 9th, 2012 at 10:51 am
The theebuggers aren’t racists or bigots ‘cuz they say so. So there. Pffffft! And unlike you stewped liturdal nazi gay uppity mooslin athiset commies, they don’t make babies in public. So they’re not f***ing either. Pffffffffffffft!!!
Matt Penfold:
October 9th, 2012 at 11:00 am
Amd calling someone a bigot is just like how the Nazis killed the Jews. How do we know this ? A former Archbishop of Canterbury has said, and would such a person lie I ask you!
Audley Z. Darkheart (liar and scoundrel):
October 9th, 2012 at 11:02 am
Janine:
It’s not racist if you’re simply pointing out ™.
(I just barfed a little.)
Rev. BigDumbChimp:
October 9th, 2012 at 11:11 am
Arkansas making it big in the news for fuckneuttery today
Rev. BigDumbChimp:
October 9th, 2012 at 11:13 am
or, fucknuttery, you choose
Janine: Hallucinating Liar:
October 9th, 2012 at 11:20 am
Because the society that the religion came from had slaves and it was accepted as being proper. Frankly, most of us have a more ethically based view of this than they did. Why does Loy Mauch want to have a regressive view of humanity?
Because it was the only way for all of the very different colonies to band together against England. They were not forming a government because the colonies of the Carolinas and New England had so much in common. They did not. It was the only way to fight against England.
And yet the US came close to civil war many times in the decades before 1861.
How limited is a government that needs a well armed militia to suppress a slave uprising. Shit, this is not a new concern; one can read about this in The Republic by Plato. A slave owning society will become a tyranny if it is not already one.
Wrong, when one attacks the Battle Flag of Northern Virginia, one is attacking a government and a religion that is grounded on racism. Loy Mauch needs to defend the idea of why it is ethical to hold a segment of humanity in bondage.
Esteleth, Elen síla lumenn' omentielvo:
October 9th, 2012 at 11:33 am
I once got in an argument with someone who I have approximately 25% sequence identity over the Civil War and slavery.
The conversation went something like this:
Me: The issues being fought over in the Civil War boil down to slavery.
Cupcake: No, not all. Property rights were a huge issue.
Me: As in the right to keep other people as property, i.e. slaves?
Cupcake: Ugh! Why do you have to keep saying “slave” like it is a dirty word?!
birgerjohansson:
October 9th, 2012 at 11:33 am
Audley Z. Darkheart,
Yes, the glorious founder of the LDS church got himself some very young brides once he gave himself licence to bonk multiple wimminz. Or not-quite-yet wimminz.
Broboxley, thank you.
Examples of other pedophile phrophets will be appreciated.
— — — — —
Good news
I had helped provide a hundred posters about a missing cat for his owner.
The cat was returned today after a volunteer group who provides for homeless cats identified him through the ID chip. Since the cat went missing September 20, I had not been hopeful.
.
The local shop is selling off some cat food at a discount, since they are altering the inventory. I am buying some of the stuff to donate to an 80-year old lady who spends all her time to take care of cats waiting for new homes.
— — — — — — — —
“If slavery were so God-awful, why didn’t Jesus or Paul condemn it?”
They were obviously arseholes. Next question.
— — — — — — — — —
Since the Taliban value martyrdom, let’s deny it to them.
Next time you catch a member of a death squad, give him a massive dose of insulin or whatever. Then send his permanently comatose body back to his fellow killers and let them provide for him.
Audley Z. Darkheart (liar and scoundrel):
October 9th, 2012 at 11:35 am
Is it me or is “The Only Political Solution” shades of “The Final Solution”?
Esteleth, Elen síla lumenn' omentielvo:
October 9th, 2012 at 11:37 am
Um.
Firstly, hello ethics!
Secondly, insulin overdose is fatal in some people.
Thirdly, explain to me how this is not torture.
Fourthly, “I didn’t actually kill him myself” is not an acceptable defense for murder-for-hire.
broboxley OT:
October 9th, 2012 at 11:47 am
Rev BDC #493 you mean there is a republican FOR post partem abortion?
cicely:
October 9th, 2012 at 11:50 am
:)
-
Nature’s napalm, I choose you!
-
Yeah, Mauch and Fuqua made the news here in Springfield last night.
I wanted to be surprised by them.
But I couldn’t.
:(
-
Huzzah!
And Huzzah! another time.
But I like medicine to be performed ethically….
No huzzah.
-
cicely:
October 9th, 2012 at 11:51 am
Make that, “practiced ethically”.
-
Esteleth, Elen síla lumenn' omentielvo:
October 9th, 2012 at 11:54 am
I have a long-shot dream of one day winning a Nobel. Thankfully, the Beeb has crunched the numbers.
In order to win a Nobel, I need to:
1) Become male
2) Get married
3) Ditch the glasses
4) Move my birthday
5) Wait 40 years
and
6) Go to Harvard.
Sounds eminently doable.
Janine: Hallucinating Liar:
October 9th, 2012 at 11:59 am
Reminds me of a fear a friend of mine had. She was part of a group of four women taking a cross country trip through the US. They decided not to make a stop in Alabama, driving straight through. They were all immigrants from Iran. They all were moved while still teens in the late seventies in the wake of the revolution. Too many people assume that they must be just like those who took the American embassy hostage.
Janine: Hallucinating Liar:
October 9th, 2012 at 12:00 pm
Esteleth, would you become a straight male?
Louis:
October 9th, 2012 at 12:09 pm
[Flies though]
[Waves to all and sundry]
Louis
AJ Milne:
October 9th, 2012 at 12:09 pm
(Lawls…)
If it makes you feel any better, I spend much of most winters in Québec, and I still have lots of conversations that wind up going that way. Roughly as you experience: I can make myself understood just fine (sometimes, apparently, now, I can even pull off French that isn’t horribly Anglo-accented), but keeping up to what comes back is way more hit and miss.
Quite seriously, good for you for trying.
Nerd of Redhead, Dances OM Trolls:
October 9th, 2012 at 12:13 pm
Six weeks ago, she was OK in sweat pants and a short-sleeve tee. When the house finally cooled off, the main floor went from about 80 to 70 (furance set point), and the sun room would dip into the mid-60′s at night and early in the day. Now she wears sweat pants, a long-sleeved tee, a sweat shirt, and a sweater or robe to keep warm. Until I got the fans out of the windows and a space heater installed in the sun room, her left hand would also get cold.
In bed, she used a sheet and thin blanket all summer, and frequently sweated up a storm. Now, she’s added two more blankets, a quilt, and a lap blanket for her feet (she always liked a lot of covers so this isn’t necessarily new) and isn’t sweating much.
Lunch went from cold sammiches to cream of X soups. So there has been an effect.
We’re working on winter wear. For example, I just ordered a pair of leather mittens basically for her left hand, which fists up when cold.
Esteleth, Elen síla lumenn' omentielvo:
October 9th, 2012 at 12:21 pm
Janine,
Considering that I am a lesbian now, I would presume that if I became male, I’d maintain my attraction to women, rendering me a het man.
chigau (悲しい):
October 9th, 2012 at 12:34 pm
Hi Louis!
Esteleth, Elen síla lumenn' omentielvo:
October 9th, 2012 at 12:36 pm
Louis!!!
*runsjumpstacklehugs Louis*
*refuses to let go*
cicely:
October 9th, 2012 at 12:46 pm
*slipping beer into Louis’ quickly moving hand*
-
Tony •Prom King of Sunnydale High•:
October 9th, 2012 at 12:46 pm
Joe:
I tend to agree with you, though I would add that season three-IIRC-was caught in the Writer’s Strike and suffered as a result.
I’m still waiting for the resolution to NBC’s Surface, which ended on a massive cliffhanger.
I’d say the twisted sense of humor he displays when dressed up with the sheet and glasses definitely shows personality. So too was the scene where Laurie finds the headstone. He wasn’t trying to just kill her. He was toying with her.
Aratina Cage:
October 9th, 2012 at 1:01 pm
Another atheist misogynist gleefully exposes himself to sunlight: http://freethoughtblogs.com/almostdiamonds/2012/10/08/thats-fucking-effective-bitch-to-you/#comment-128385
birgerjohansson:
October 9th, 2012 at 2:06 pm
cicely,
I would not actually induce brain damage, even on a teenage-kid-killing slimeball.
But I might harvest one of his kidneys before turning him over to the cops.
(I watched Family Guy on TV, so I am into violence-thinking mood)
— — — — —
“Yeah, Mauch and Fuqua made the news here in Springfield last night”
I am just listening to the TV in the other room, where Sideshow Bob is chasing another group of Springfield residents.
Swedish TV run two Simpsons episodes after two Family Guy episodes. It’s great for unwinding after a long day.
— — — — —
Seasonal temperature change: Some bugs migrate indoors. When I pulled on my boots I noticed two bugs (the species with two “antennae” at the rear) had been hiding in the shadow underneath. They are not dangerous, but gross.
Improbable Joe:
October 9th, 2012 at 2:08 pm
Tony… wow. I can’t believe I forgot the sheet and glasses! Time to watch it again.
Esteleth, Elen síla lumenn' omentielvo:
October 9th, 2012 at 2:11 pm
HEADDESK.
Amherst has a (deserved) reputation for political leftism. And this sort of shit goes down there.
Worse, some Amherst grads I’m friends with are discussing this on FB – and trotting out the !!! FREE SPEECH !!! CENSORSHIP!!! argument. UGH.
gillyc:
October 9th, 2012 at 2:17 pm
Alethea – belated thanks for the book rec! (I’d gone to bed by that point and forgot to check back yesterday.)
birgerjohansson:
October 9th, 2012 at 2:25 pm
Amherst…how young do the boys have to be to think that is funny?
— — — —
Herr Doktor Wiki has translated the insect species as “earwig”.
Apparently there is an endoparasitic fly species that prey on them. Good to know.
— — — — — —
I just figured out a humane solution to child killer storage (Taliban or other): cryopreservation. An article at Physorg claims at least 600 water molecules are required for an ice crystal to form. And evolution has already invented molecules that inhibits the process.
So once we find such a molecule small enough to pass the blood-brain barrier we can send the worst creeps to a future where they can remodel the brains of psychopaths.
birgerjohansson:
October 9th, 2012 at 2:38 pm
“Intervention reduces sexual risk behavior and unintended preganancies in teen girls, study finds” http://medicalxpress.com/news/2012-10-intervention-sexual-behavior-unintended-preganancies.html
Now, to motivate the decision-makers to provide the (short-term) funds (for something that will save lots of money and reduce misery).
cicely:
October 9th, 2012 at 2:43 pm
Corpsicles!
-
NelC:
October 9th, 2012 at 3:03 pm
Just a heads-up to other Brits: the BBC are running a series of Conspiracy Road Trips after the 9/11 one-off from last year. This week is the Creationists’ turn, and this lot are even worse than the 9/11 conspiracy theorists as far as rationality is concerned. It’s painful to watch. I couldn’t make any sense of anything they said. Even the Christian presenter was thoroughly exasperated with them.
A. R:
October 9th, 2012 at 3:06 pm
I’. not sure how to say this other than: There’s a banner ad for something called “Atlas Shrugged II” on this page…
kristinc, ~ringy dingy~:
October 9th, 2012 at 3:16 pm
Misterc boughted me a new laptop! *bounce*
It came from the pawn shop, and you would think that even if the person who hocked it didn’t have the sense to wipe everything off of it, the pawn shop would do it as a matter of policy, but no. Misterc has found a layer of password protected something or other that is taking him for EVER to get into. I bet it’s either pron, or really bad poetry.
Janine: Hallucinating Liar:
October 9th, 2012 at 3:36 pm
I fucking hate, hate, hate the fucking Catholic Church!
Archbishop tells a mother to reject her gay son or she too will end up in hell!
Pro-family, pro-life, pro-people, pro-respect my fucking ass.
This is just promoting bigotry, hatred and ignorence.
What reason do ex-catholics need to come home.
Fucking burn the fucking institution to the fucking ground!
FUCK!
Richard Austin:
October 9th, 2012 at 3:51 pm
Uhm, yay for new laptop!
\o/
But… Make sure to not put it on any network or allow it to talk to anything you hold near and dear until it’s been totally wiped and rebuilt. Nasty little viruses and rootkits and such can be hiding there to steal your toys and burn down your house – or at least start spamming or such across the internet, in probably more realistic terms.
As for the password-protected stuff: I understand the challenge, but breaking any kind of protection scheme is, I believe, a violation of law (like, having the tools to do so is illegal in many places, even on your own devices, and if it’s any kind of stolen goods, you could be in a lot more trouble if you crack the password and someone finds out). Just be careful.
fastlane:
October 9th, 2012 at 4:13 pm
Yikes. I know I don’t post here (at least in the lounge) very often, but I just found out I’m a possible match for a bone marrow transplant.
Anyone done this or know anyone first hand that has? I’ve heard it’s moderately painful, but outpatient procedure.
If they don’t need actual marrow, they do another procedure where they give me some kind of injection for 5 days that causes cold/flu like symptoms, then hook me up to something similar to a dialysis machine for 4-8 hours.
Neither sounds pleasant…..
On the plus side, I could be saving someone’s life. (A 58 year old man somewhere, is all they tell me, which is enough, really.)
fastlane:
October 9th, 2012 at 4:15 pm
*runsjumpstacklehugs Louis*
I totally read that as *runsjumpstacklesleghumps*
Which also works, mind you…just shows where my mind is.
kristinc, ~ringy dingy~:
October 9th, 2012 at 4:35 pm
Oh, no fear. Misterc works in IT and is our resident malware-paranoiac, so he’s scrubbing it completely clean.
As for the juicy files, meh, they weren’t juicy. Just crappy illegally downloaded movies and music.
kristinc, ~ringy dingy~:
October 9th, 2012 at 4:39 pm
Blargh, my school’s skepticism club recently became affiliated (right word?) with the Secular Student Coalition, and they’re trumpeting that soon they’ll have interesting new speakers and talks, but I can’t go because the meetings are on a weekday when I have to pick my kid up from school.
Also, the Latin@ club is hosting free Latin dance lessons 4 times a week, every week, but I won’t be able to go, because they’re on weekdays when I have to pick my kids up from school.
Hekuni Cat, MQG:
October 9th, 2012 at 4:47 pm
Louis – *pouncehug*
Hekuni Cat, MQG:
October 9th, 2012 at 4:50 pm
fastlane:
I don’t know anything about bone marrow transplants, but I admire you for your willingness to consider being a donor.
dianne:
October 9th, 2012 at 4:51 pm
fastlane, FWIW, bone marrow collection for transplant is usually done under anesthetic so it doesn’t hurt to have done, although you’ll be a bit sore afterwards. The flu like symptoms from neupogen (I presume they’re still using neupogen) aren’t even close to universal, so you have a good chance of simply having five days of annoying injections to deal with for peripheral collection. And several hours of having an IV in each arm so being unable to do much. Not a lot of fun, but probably not terribly traumatic either.
Best wishes for a side effect free donation!
Setár, genderqueer Elf-Sheriff of Atheism+:
October 9th, 2012 at 5:26 pm
GOOD NEWS, EVERYONE!
Phalloplasty is now covered under BC’s public health service!
Only problem is, because it doesn’t involve handouts to major corporations or the 1%, at $24,000!!!!!! per operation it’s SO EXPENSIVE that we can only afford five per year. This works out to a whopping $120,000 in a budget that totals billions, under a government that’s spent the past ten years funnelling many of said billions into the pockets of corporations and the 1%.
Shades of Big Bird. Seriously…I’m happy that it happened, but holy fuck way to drag your feet and bumble about doing it as little as possible because neoliberal excuses.
Improbable Joe:
October 9th, 2012 at 5:59 pm
I am going to have to lay down the MOTHERFUCKING LAW with my wife. She does this… this… thing! She’ll leave me cryptic messages, or start conversations with “sit down, we need to have a conversation about something” and then long pause while I start to worry. And then 95% of the time it is something like “In March of next year, my parents want us to go to X with them, and they’ve got their timeshare points to get a huge cabin if we go with them” or similar.
Or today, where’s she’s been dealing with state survey in the building she’s running. She doesn’t really care how badly the building does on inspection, so long as there’s no sign of patients in jeopardy. She’s been there three weeks, she’s out in 3-4 more weeks, so as long as nobody is in danger of dying, it isn’t really her problem. If there ARE signs of danger, it might attach to her licence no matter how long she’s been there.
She sends me a text about 10 minutes ago: “OMG nooooooo”
Does that mean something bad happened? Or is it in response to a text I sent her 30 minutes before, joking that it could be worse and be her permanent job? I don’t know, and she hasn’t responded.
kristinc, ~ringy dingy~:
October 9th, 2012 at 6:10 pm
How are you married to my husband?
Improbable Joe:
October 9th, 2012 at 6:12 pm
kristinc,
I didn’t realize we were sharing an alien shape-shifter-spouse?
carlie:
October 9th, 2012 at 6:13 pm
Louis! *snorgle*
Joe – my husband used to do the same thing. It drove me crazy. Luckily a few times where I just lost it and told him DO NOT DO THAT seemed to work. He still doesn’t understand why saying things that way sets me off, but he’s figured out that it does, and that he ends up unhappy when it does.
kristinc, ~ringy dingy~:
October 9th, 2012 at 6:17 pm
carlie, I eventually got the same message pretty much across to Misterc. My method was less direct and mainly consisted of an anguished yell of AUUUGHHHHHHH deployed consistently, with appropriate facial contortions, during those interminable I-will-pause-to-let-you-freak-out moments.
carlie:
October 9th, 2012 at 6:18 pm
OMG, Chris Kluwe is selling “beautifully unique sparklepony” and “lustful cockmonster” t-shirts. Website here.
He says on Twitter: “Half the proceeds go to my charity, Kick For A Cure, the other half goes to Minnesotans for Marriage Equality.”
I think this could do with a little signal boost from the PZ machine. For Minnesota!
carlie:
October 9th, 2012 at 6:20 pm
Plus, due to requests, his t-shirts go up to a 2x in women’s and a 3x in men’s. Because there seems to be nothing about him I can’t love.
Improbable Joe:
October 9th, 2012 at 6:37 pm
Well… I just got off the phone with my wife. We need to all of us have a little talk. :)
Good news is that my wife has officially accepted the offer for the new job, they came up $4000 a year on the salary. After taxes and all, it comes out to about $120 a paycheck. Doesn’t seem like much worth arguing over, but $240 a month is enough to upgrade from an OK rental home to a really nice one.
Bad news is that the bonus we were planning on using to move doesn’t normally get paid until she’s worked there a couple of weeks. She’s trying to convince them otherwise, but we don’t know what they’ll do. Maybe she’ll have to work a few weeks and let them put her up somewhere until the bonus comes in. On the positive side, that means she’ll have a few weeks in town to actually house-hunt, versus us having to move into a place more or less sight-unseen.
And tomorrow. Tomorrow I’m going to the pawn shop and getting my motherfucking Les Paul back.
Pteryxx:
October 9th, 2012 at 7:05 pm
RAWR *all the thumbsup*
Audley Z. Darkheart (liar and scoundrel):
October 9th, 2012 at 7:18 pm
Carlie:
Have you seen his hair? :-/
Seriously, I ♥ Chris Kluwe. Dude is beyond awesome.
Improbable Joe:
October 9th, 2012 at 7:31 pm
Pteryxx, fuck yeah! I can’t believe I pawned it two months ago. I can’t believe I’ve been living through this nightmare for so many months!
You know what? I’m taking myself on a date tomorrow! Lunch, a movie, maybe coffee after? I’ll pick up my guitar on the way home.
ifcunning:
October 9th, 2012 at 7:45 pm
Another shy lurker. Punch in Australia is having an interesting discussion about genetic screening and pregnancy termination. I work with a group of elderly men with Down Syndrome and would be interested in the thoughts of this wise commentariat perhaps posted on punch.
http://www.thepunch.com.au/articles/We-are-all-much-more-than-the-sum-of-our-DNA/
carlie:
October 9th, 2012 at 7:46 pm
Audley – at first I only saw pics of the dorky hair and liked him even more, then I saw the Johnny Depp thing I think you were talking about. But hey, it’s all good. :D
Audley Z. Darkheart (liar and scoundrel):
October 9th, 2012 at 7:49 pm
Yeah, the Johnny Depp thing. :p
deborahbell:
October 9th, 2012 at 7:55 pm
@473 Audley
Ok any colors you like/hate?
I’m feeling more like myself. I found myself enjoying driving the other day (nothing scary, just enjoying the process of doing it safely and getting where I wanted to go, which is normal for me). I suppose life will continue after breaking up with BF. It’s been a little over a month, but it was a couple months earlier that I realized it was inevitable.
Is it too soon too have a crush?
deborahbell:
October 9th, 2012 at 8:02 pm
@39 kristinc
I dated someone who thought if you called him and he didn’t answer and you called immediately right back, that something horrible was happening and you absolutely needed his attention right this second. He would answer the second time, but be freaked out, and might answer in a work meeting or something. So I learned not to do that. The only reason I did was because his ringer was on permanent silent and he sometimes didn’t hear it the first time.
carlie:
October 9th, 2012 at 8:17 pm
Dr. Horrible is on tv right now. I haven’t watched it in so long, although I have the whole thing memorized. So good.
Esteleth, Elen síla lumenn' omentielvo:
October 9th, 2012 at 8:25 pm
I thought this mandatory ethics course would be a rather boring regurgitation of shit I already knew, but:
There are IACUC standards for grizzly bears.
Someone sat down and wrote them.
Also, apparently, there are labs who keep them. :D :D :D
dianne:
October 9th, 2012 at 8:38 pm
There are IACUC standards for grizzly bears.
I wrote this on PET too, but I keep thinking…transgenic grizzly bears. Probably myosin KO grizzly bears. That could be scary.
Portia:
October 9th, 2012 at 8:52 pm
theopontes
Rotary-Annes. I think I just threw up in my mouth a little.
Amblebury
Yeah sounds like my picture of the “equality” of freemasonry. No, thank you. The club here seems pretty well balanced, with lots of prominent female Rotarians. (Ah, yes, that is what they are called).
Joe
EXCELLENT.
Deborahbell
This makes me happy!
This makes me happy too! : ) Can I see pictures of the blanket after you’re done with it?
Portia:
October 9th, 2012 at 8:53 pm
Re: Chris Kluwe shirts…awesomesauce. That guys just keeps batting a thousand. (Touchdown Celtic!)
Audley Z. Darkheart (liar and scoundrel):
October 9th, 2012 at 8:54 pm
Deborah,
We are avoiding pink at all costs*. The nursery itself is pale green/white/tan if you’d like to keep things color coordinated, if not, I’d love a bright yellow blanket.
Too soon for a crush? Naaaaaah. I think it’s normal and healthy. ;)
*Okay, okay. I’ve received some beautiful baby clothes that have pink details. I’m just trying to nip the WHOA PINK! thing in the bud.
otrame:
October 9th, 2012 at 8:54 pm
Here is some commentary by three members of the House Armed Services Committee concerning the years of sexual predation that took place at Lackland AFB during basic training, AIT (speciality training) and even flight training.
Emphasis added because for some reason, it seems appropriate.
Portia:
October 9th, 2012 at 8:55 pm
Oh, and he was on Wait Wait Don’t Tell Me recently (9/29?) and was pretty funny and likeable. Yep. Just won’t quit being kickass.
cicely:
October 9th, 2012 at 9:40 pm
*confetti&fireworks&champagne*
with *bacon*
-
Dr. Horrible is made of concentrated Awesome. I don’t care what my sister says!
-
FossilFishy (Νεοπτόλεμος's spellchecker):
October 9th, 2012 at 9:49 pm
Good luck with that. The Small Fry’s favorite colour as a three year old was black. She loved it. Her fairy princess dress for her 3rd birthday party was a black tutu. She also told us that she wanted her room in the new house to be painted black. The plan was to get a midnight blue to paint the ceiling and put stars on it as a compromise.
Then she started kinder. Her favorite colour became pink within a month. I said to her “I don’t mind that your favorite colour is pink, but you know that it doesn’t have to be right?” so many times that now as a five year old she rolls her eyes and says “Yes Daaad, I know! How many times are you going to tell me that?” if it ever comes up. A couple of months ago pink was on the outs and now it’s purple. Partly to shut me up I’m sure, and partly because Mum’s favorite colour is also purple.
ImaginesABeach:
October 9th, 2012 at 9:58 pm
So, I’ve had a serious case of brain-lust for Chris Kluwe for a while now. But before we all leave our partners and go chasing after him, I should point out that he appears to believe that there is a god. Although Chris (can I call him by his first name?) even does an excellent job of wielding the religion club, so I’m inclined to forgive him this one flaw. I posted this yesterday, but will post it again. http://blogs.twincities.com/outofbounds/2012/10/08/out-of-bounds-blog-no-16-matthew-22-39/
Portia:
October 9th, 2012 at 10:02 pm
*sniffle* This is why you shouldn’t have heroes.
FossilFishy (Νεοπτόλεμος's spellchecker):
October 9th, 2012 at 10:22 pm
[plugs guitar in. Fires up amp. Stomps all the distortion pedals. Turns amp up to 11.5. Picks up pick. Forms E power chord...reconsiders. Down tunes to D. Hits D power chord and with pick hand extended in the sooper-sekret clenched tentacle sign lets it ring until the feed back frightens the cows.]
chigau (悲しい):
October 9th, 2012 at 10:32 pm
So, I’m speed-reading to catch up and I agree with all the Chris Kluwe ♥ing but I was taken aback by this
because I read it as
More beer, less speed.
Portia:
October 9th, 2012 at 10:33 pm
Well, from what I hear, herpes isn’t super fun either.
Menyambal --- Sambal's Little Helper:
October 9th, 2012 at 11:20 pm
Chris Kluwe looks like he’d be super fun.
Herpes or no.
Tony •Prom King of Sunnydale High•:
October 9th, 2012 at 11:24 pm
Re: Chris Kluwe-
When I’m not scraping pennies together to pay for gas and cat food, I’m sooooo buying both shirts.
As for his theistic beliefs…well no one is perfect. Given the strength of character he’s shown thus far, I wonder how deep his faith runs. He didn’t invoke god during his beatdown of that bigoted politician, IIRC.
****
carlie:
I recently saw Dr. Horrible for the first time (it was one of the many things K and I watched before he departed for his cruise). Although I knew the Joss Whedon’s brother had done it (and that Neil Patrick Harris was involved), I knew nothing more. I was pleasantly surprised. It was quite enjoyable.
****
Audley:
Tony •Prom King of Sunnydale High•:
October 9th, 2012 at 11:27 pm
Audley:
Ok, nix the nursery walls. I was skimming the Lounge and missed the part where you mentioned the paint color.
Of course it’s never too late to pain the walls a nice bathroom pink.
I think there’s *someone* in the Lounge who can spare some pink from a bathroom… :)
deborahbell:
October 10th, 2012 at 12:40 am
Audley: yellow sounds like fun!
Portia: sure, I’ll post pictures. I have some pictures of other things I’ve made, too.
Both: Thanks, I’m glad to be getting over it wicket than I thought. I think an apartment of my own will cost less than I thought too, so I may be able to move out soon. Here we go!
deborahbell:
October 10th, 2012 at 12:40 am
Quicker that is.
ednaz:
October 10th, 2012 at 2:03 am
And tomorrow. Tomorrow I’m going to the pawn shop and getting my motherfucking Les Paul back.
Ohhhh Yeaahhhhh!!
Setár, genderqueer Elf-Sheriff of Atheism+:
October 10th, 2012 at 2:15 am
StarStuff gave me this awesome recipe for Mug Brownies yesterday. I’m going to make some more. With salt this time. =D
ednaz:
October 10th, 2012 at 2:18 am
Deborahbell – Hee hee!! *thumbsup*
Menyambal --- Sambal's Little Helper:
October 10th, 2012 at 2:23 am
Yay for getting the guitar back! Mine’s “only” a ukulele, but when I can’t play, I miss the peace and relaxation it brings … although I’m sure yours is kind of the opposite.
—
As it happened, I got two meals today, both at home, both out of the tub of rice and leftovers I mixed up yesterday. Which meant my dirty dishes consisted of two of the big spoons I eat rice with (Indonesian/Thai style). The teen, on the other hand, decided to impress her boyfriend by stir-frying up some shrimp and noodles. I just went in and pushed drawers closed, and compacted all the dishes she’d used into one tall sinkful, which I may have to wash tomorrow. Two plastic colanders? My new wok? Shrimp? (I think I’m allergic to shrimp.)
It smelled good, though, and looked really good. I can’t say as much for the boyfriend, sadly … no, he seems a nice kid.
theophontes (坏蛋):
October 10th, 2012 at 2:40 am
@ John Morales
Indeed:
I’ll go with … *flips coin* … iniquity.
@ Portia
That sounds more like my folks club. My ma doesn’t go to the meetings as she finds them boring. She uses it more as a large arsenal of professionals and assorted dogsbodies to help her fight the good fight. (I have been roped in in the past too.)
Alethea H. "Crocoduck" Dundee:
October 10th, 2012 at 2:49 am
Joe, yay for the guitar!! Rock on!
Audley/Tony, my BFF can spare you huge amounts of pink paint. She’s renovating and the shops all seem to want to thrust it on her, in a nasty shade she calls “menopause pink”.
And on a personal note, I wish to announce that I am now level 8 on fitocracy and I am, the site tells me, awesome. TAKE THAT, YOU DAMN SOB!!
Alethea H. "Crocoduck" Dundee:
October 10th, 2012 at 2:54 am
* No, that’s not what you may be thinking. It’s “Shortness Of Breath”. It says “SOB” on my medical records.
Setár, genderqueer Elf-Sheriff of Atheism+:
October 10th, 2012 at 3:13 am
Wow, the salt actually makes a difference. Makes them better =D
I really must try them with brown sugar next time.
Giliell, Approved Straight Chorus:
October 10th, 2012 at 3:25 am
Good morning
Waves at a flying louis
kristinc
That sounds mightily familiar. Only better, I can’t go to classes cause I have to pick them up. Currently I’m trying to get the autumn holidays organized…
Joe
Oh my goodness, I know that.
I really, really needed to drill it into Mr. that there are certain phrases that are usually meant to spell trouble. And that he’s fucking not going to use them if he doesn’t mean trouble.
Yay!
fastlane
Yay for being a possible donor.
I registered many years ago, but so far nobody needed my special snowflake marrow
Audley
Good luck. I failed. It worked well until the first year of kindergarten when #1 suddenly realized that the rest of the world draws strict lines.
On Monday there were rainclothes on sale. The ones with the warm lining for autumn and winter. I would have bought one pink pair, but when I made it to the shop they were already out in her size*, so I had to get other ones. They made 4 versions: a boy one, a girl one, two unisex ones. Only that the unisex ones are blue and decidedly boyish as well. Because heaven forbid that a boy might end up in something that could be meant for girls. But funny enough, the pictures on the package of a girl wearing them did the trick. I asked her which pair she wanted to take to kindergarten: the one this girl wears or the one that girl wears…
Actually, her favourite colour is yellow. We stocked up Mr.’s wardrobe with colourful t-shirts in yellow, orange, green, turquois. My favourite colour is blue anyway.
And words like “girl-colour and boy colour” are forbidden here (clue in MRAs whining about their first ammendment rights in my living room ;))
I guess the only thing we can do is to limit the crap we allow in our house and to set an example ourselves. The tools box is mummy’s box, that’s mummy’s powerdrill, daddy helps mummy putting up a cupboard…
And we really have to pay attention to this. Because we slipped into a habbit of Mr. driving at the weekends because I have to do it all week while he uses the bicicle at work. And our kids got the impression that I’m only allowed to drive as long as Mr. isn’t here.
*that’s been a rule ever since she was born: no matter what her actual size is, it’s out.
NOte to myself:
Must remember to hit “Submit” after “Preview”
Beatrice, anti-imperialist anti-racist Islamophobiaphobic leftist:
October 10th, 2012 at 3:28 am
*shows off a fancy new nym*
blf:
October 10th, 2012 at 3:30 am
Ah, thanks for explaining. I was going mildly deranged penguin trying to work out if you mean Senate Office Building or Switched-On Bach.
Giliell, Approved Straight Chorus:
October 10th, 2012 at 3:45 am
beatrice
I notice. Do you want to share a story?
Amblebury:
October 10th, 2012 at 3:54 am
Hello, and good night.
Seems to be all I can manage of late. Must try harder.
I know, I could give that heart thing a go:
&hearts
Nope.
blf:
October 10th, 2012 at 3:54 am
The tradition of rum (and probably sodomy but not sure about the lash) is alive and well — well, actually, vodka… Judge wonders what to do with the drunken sailor:
Beatrice, anti-imperialist anti-racist Islamophobiaphobic leftist:
October 10th, 2012 at 4:00 am
I’ve had encounters with Rebekah at B&W. She’s been… generous with descriptions of my faults and put me in the category of anti-imperialist leftists which then get dissected even more thoroughly than I personally was.
And I got put in the same category as Walton, which I’m totally taking as a compliment (even though I don’t agree with all of his positions).
Amblebury:
October 10th, 2012 at 4:01 am
One parting thought. Just look at how these wee gels grow and thrive on their diet of peas. Adorable!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=to7uIG8KYhg
My attempt could be hideously deficient in postification skill.
Beatrice, anti-imperialist anti-racist Islamophobiaphobic leftist:
October 10th, 2012 at 4:05 am
Amblebury,
So cute. That moment when they smile and look at each other before they both start dancing. Eeeeeee
(Take that pea-haters!)
blf:
October 10th, 2012 at 4:06 am
blf:
October 10th, 2012 at 4:09 am
Hum, that’s odd… Seems my previous post is empty for some reason?
It was supposed to be: Late afternoon in Gale Crater.
Ichthyic:
October 10th, 2012 at 4:12 am
I wrote this on PET too, but I keep thinking…transgenic grizzly bears. Probably myosin KO grizzly bears. That could be scary.
come on.
Obviously the end goal is simply to produce an army of grizzly bears with lasers on their heads to complement the marine-based army of sharks with lasers on their heads.
didn’t you get the memo?
blf:
October 10th, 2012 at 4:19 am
Cleaner is vacuuming right now… and driving me nuts! It has to be the world’s LOUDEST vacuum cleaner, with added soundboards, amplifiers, a honking huge speaker stack, and carefully positioned acoustic mirrors and sounding boards.
And it’s still in the other room, behind a closed door.
(Oops, nope, the door is opening now… Runs away, ears covered…)
Giliell, Approved Straight Chorus:
October 10th, 2012 at 4:25 am
beatrice
I’d take that as a compliment, too *gg*
+++
Shitty news: My cousin had a miscarriage :(
Just called my aunt on totally unrelated matters and she told me that it happened last night.
+++
Unrelated matters where “things my mum said she had said”.
Yes, I know this sounds like middle-school but with somebody probably suffering from Korsakoff’s syndrome*, you need to check with the alleged sources.
*no, not my armchair diagnosis. My therapist’s armchair disgnosis.
Beatrice, anti-imperialist anti-racist Islamophobiaphobic leftist:
October 10th, 2012 at 4:34 am
Oh, Giliell, I’m so sorry for your cousin.
birgerjohansson:
October 10th, 2012 at 5:14 am
Giliell, I am also sorry.
carlie:
October 10th, 2012 at 5:37 am
Oh, I’m sorry, giliell.
carlie:
October 10th, 2012 at 5:38 am
I am stunned at how many conservatives are complaining with a straight face that the president is being petty and desperate by “bringing up Big Bird”. Dudes, ROMNEY BROUGHT IT UP. SEVERAL TIMES. Since when is responding to something bringing it up???
Beatrice, anti-imperialist anti-racist Islamophobiaphobic leftist:
October 10th, 2012 at 5:42 am
carlie,
In the same way pointing out racism is racist.
Oh, that was rhetorical, wasn’t it?
carlie:
October 10th, 2012 at 5:54 am
Beatrice – it’s just so…blatant. I honestly don’t understand how people don’t see right through it. Willful blinders, I guess.
Beatrice, anti-imperialist anti-racist Islamophobiaphobic leftist:
October 10th, 2012 at 6:10 am
Is there someone who can explain to me the point of services requiring a birth certificate not older than 6 months?
The fact that I’ve been born in this country is unlikely to change. Unbelievable, I know.
carlie:
October 10th, 2012 at 6:17 am
<blockquoteIs there someone who can explain to me the point of services requiring a birth certificate not older than 6 months?
The fact that I’ve been born in this country is unlikely to change. Unbelievable, I know.
I have to re-register my documents with my health insurance company every five years. I can see address checks, but one of the documents required is a birth certificate, which I have to provide every time. I guess the fact that they have it on file already doesn’t count.
Giliell, Approved Straight Chorus:
October 10th, 2012 at 6:49 am
That would mean the baby’s no older than six months…
Well, at least here all I can get is a validated copy. But, no, I can’t explain it to you.
Carlie
I think often it’s just less work for companies to have a standard procedure for everybody than looking at cases individually. We have declare every year that no, our daughters are not earning their own money yet so they can stay on Mr. health insurance*. They’re in kindergarten…
*They wouldn’t end up without any, they would just have to get their own accounts.
+++
OK, I can’t decide between laughing and crying. I mentioned before that my mum sees my #1 as “rightfully hers”, because her mother took care of her firstborn as well a lot. Well, I think she has finally realized that this is not going to happen. So she told my sister (who’s been living seperate from her husband for the last 2 years and turning 40 next year) wouldn’t it be nice if she had a baby now? You know, it would be so sweet and she didn’t have to care that much for it at all, she would happily care for the baby…
+++
Thanx everybody. Dunno what my cousin will do now. The pregnancy was a rather unplanned “Oops, i though I had hit menopause a bit early” one. The doctors were supportive, telling her that if she wants to try again there’s nothing against it, but we’ll see. Maybe they’ll just be content being grandparents…
Audley Z. Darkheart (liar and scoundrel):
October 10th, 2012 at 7:15 am
About the pink:
Yeah, yeah. I know, school age means OMFG! Pink!!, but I’m okay with that. When DarkFetus is old enough to make her own choices, she can can do so (within reason). Until then MOAR COLORS!
She’ll be here in two weeks. Squee!
broboxley OT:
October 10th, 2012 at 8:21 am
#101 Giliell, huh, Rule around here is the grans leave when you leave
chigau (悲しい):
October 10th, 2012 at 8:31 am
Somebody said the ‘s’ word.
Audley Z. Darkheart (liar and scoundrel):
October 10th, 2012 at 8:38 am
Squee?
chigau (悲しい):
October 10th, 2012 at 8:38 am
snow
Portia:
October 10th, 2012 at 8:41 am
Tony
Good point. That was refreshing. Whenever somebody tries to combat religious bigotry with Totully Tolerant Jebus™, I facepalm into next week. They don’t seem to realize they’re just proving their source of moral guidance is worthless because it can be interpreted in any way at all.
Deborahbell
: D
I read “wicket” three times trying to figure out what slang I didn’t know…
Hooray! Good luck with that adventure : )
theophontes
I do, too. : /
Giliell
I’m so sorry. I hope whatever they decide to do re: trying again, that they are happy.
*****
For your facepalming pleasure, and text conversation I had with new pseudo-employer yesterday (he texts me random things sometimes along with the typical “Here’s a new client, have X,Y,andZ ready in 2 hours!”
Him: I have a splitting headache. Argh. 2:13 PM
Me: Get an oil diffuser for your office, peppermint oil is awesome for headaches. 2:14 PM [Note: I know it has no magical properties, but I have found it soothing since a nurse friend recommended it for my migraines]
Him: A what ? 2:16 PM
Me: A candle with a little glass bowl over it to put scented oil into. 3:09 PM
Him: I’d be looking mighty gay w- that. 3:12 PM
Improbable Joe:
October 10th, 2012 at 8:43 am
Good morning folks!
Audley, a little something for DarkFetus is on the way. I hope it fits once before being outgrown entirely! (and not pink)
Giliell, my condolences to your cousin and your whole family.
Devil horns up to my peeps! Which is funny, because the Les Paul is for sweet, soulful music. The Hellraiser guitar is for the Satan-approved stuff… I can’t believe nobody thought to call a guitar “Hellraiser” before 2006!
Portia:
October 10th, 2012 at 8:50 am
And now, thanks to Setár, I am repeating “I will not have a brownie for breakfast” over and over again.
Improbable Joe:
October 10th, 2012 at 8:55 am
Portia,
That’s better than my chant around meal times: “Sriracha is NOT ketchup! Sriracha is NOT ketchup! Sriracha is NOT ketchup!”
blf:
October 10th, 2012 at 9:00 am
So have a croissant instead.
OrAnd bacon.And cheese (but be quick else you may suffer a mildly deranged penguin raid).
And MUSHROOMS!
(But no peas.)
broboxley OT:
October 10th, 2012 at 9:05 am
http://blogs.ajc.com/mike-luckovich/2012/10/08/109-mike-luckovich-cartoon-trick-or-treat/ funny on a few levels
Portia:
October 10th, 2012 at 9:20 am
Mmmmm….bacon….
(I went healthy. Trying to find the critical mass of kale that can be added before it stops tasting like a fruit smoothie. Not sure it exists).
chigau (悲しい):
October 10th, 2012 at 9:24 am
it’s snowing
blf:
October 10th, 2012 at 9:29 am
…Kale?
(Has the window open otherwise it’s too fecking hot with the sun shining. Fortunately, the Mistral is not blowing.)
Audley Z. Darkheart (liar and scoundrel):
October 10th, 2012 at 9:33 am
Chigau:
Don’t say the ‘s’ word!!
(Although it’s in the mid 50s here, so no threat yet.)
Joe:
Yay!
birgerjohansson:
October 10th, 2012 at 9:38 am
“Malala Yousafzai has bullet removed from head after Taliban shooting” http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2012/oct/10/malala-yousafzai-bullet-removed-taliban
Yippeee!!!
— — — — — — — —
Quantam research will yield ‘super-computers’: Nobel winner http://phys.org/news/2012-10-quantam-yield-super-computers-nobel-winner.html
Eventually…this may be even furher away than hydrogen fusion.
Pteryxx:
October 10th, 2012 at 9:46 am
Amblebury:
I memetick’d it in my horribly sloppy mind as “(fresh) hearts AND SOME (semi) COLON!”
& hearts ;
♥
Hope that’s helpful, if disgusting. ;>
chigau (悲しい):
October 10th, 2012 at 9:49 am
s-word
Harry
opposablethumbs:
October 10th, 2012 at 9:59 am
I’m sorry about your cousin, Giliell :( – hope they’re OK (is it very blinkered of me to assume that as it wasn’t planned in the first place and they are grandparents they might decide it’s for the best? I hope they’re all right, anyway).
Re the thing with your mum and #1, wow. What a thing to say to your sister – sounds seriously out of touch with reality.
Joe, we want to hear some guitar playing soon! Can you link to an audio file or something? ::iz ignorant of the magical ways of tech:: (maybe after you’ve moved, though. You’re going to be busy …)
Nerd of Redhead, Dances OM Trolls:
October 10th, 2012 at 10:05 am
They’re taking care of a mold problem at work, and chased all those who worked in that building out for the day. Now to attack some stuff on the home todo list while keeping an eye on e-mail.
carlie:
October 10th, 2012 at 10:13 am
Woo-hoo! Mold day! You can make mold angels, and have moldball fights, and build mold forts…
blf:
October 10th, 2012 at 10:20 am
Ah, so it’s snowing mold then. Ok, got it.
(Wanders away confused for the day…)
Ogvorbis: broken and cynical:
October 10th, 2012 at 10:29 am
Ahhhh. This could explain why Wife will sometimes react to discussions in ways that, to me, seem out of proportion. “Honey, we need to talk,” seemed like a reasonable way to broach the subject that I have to shift my vacation time in late December.
Sometimes saying less says more.
That sucks.
Since it is a Democrat responding to it. The double-standards in political discourse in this country (the USA) are mindblowing.
A big part of the problem is that we have right-wing newspapers and TV news networks and centre-right newspapers and TV news networks. There is, outside of the web, no real national centre-left or left-wing news source which means that whatever happens will be viewed through a conservative lense. And the few times that anyone in the main-stream centre-right media reflect actual reality, they are, of course, accused of being commie radical left wing stooges.
Lynna, OM:
October 10th, 2012 at 10:39 am
Rachel Maddow presented a nice roundup last night of the synaptic sludge that the Republican Party brings to the House Science Committee.
video: http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/26315908/#49352563
jose:
October 10th, 2012 at 10:44 am
Jen’s probably wrong.
Ogvorbis: broken and cynical:
October 10th, 2012 at 10:49 am
Can you provide some context?
Lynna, OM:
October 10th, 2012 at 11:00 am
Mitt Romney and his staff have told so many whoppers and have taken so many different sides on every issue that they can no longer keep their stories straight. Every day now starts and ends with new “oh, fudge” moments.
All that walking back must have them exhausted. At least they are getting their exercise.
Link.
The back story on reproductive rights per Mittens is that the platform of his party calls for a constitutional amendment to ban all abortions, and Romney has said on tape that he “absolutely” supports a “Personhood” bill. Does he not realize that the Personhood bill has consequences, one of which would be to ban all abortions, and another would be to ban several forms of birth control?
Let’s see, what else? Oh, yes, Romney would be “delighted” to sign something, anything that would end all abortions “period.” He wrote an article for National Review that laid out his “pro-life pledge.”
Planned Parenthood …. “get rid of.” WTF, Romney. Excuse me, what the H E double hockey sticks, Romney. This is bad even by your standards.
Lynna, OM:
October 10th, 2012 at 11:05 am
Best of luck to everyone getting rid of mold. That stuff is tenacious. I am saved only by living in a desert environment, which doesn’t entirely preclude mold, but which does hit mold where it hurts.
fastlane:
October 10th, 2012 at 11:05 am
Gilliell
Is there a high demand for snowflake marrow?
I hope we get some video or at least audio, of the Les Paul…
carlie:
October 10th, 2012 at 11:10 am
AAAAAAA NNNOOOOOOOOOOO.
That’s the kind of opening for “I want a divorce” or “I’ve been diagnosed with cancer” or “we’re entirely bankrupt because I invested everything we have in Beanie Babies”. It’s several times worse if it’s “We need to talk later, when we have some time”. Lesser things should be “We need to talk about x”, at minimum, “We need to talk about about x because (short version) y” is better. The problem with just “we need to talk” only is that it implies that the thing is so traumatic you can’t even say it without a huge amount of preface. And “I need to talk to you about” is worse than that, because it implies something you are going to impart onto the other person, and it will not be pleasant.
Lynna, OM:
October 10th, 2012 at 11:10 am
Jon Stewart produced a great bit blasting conservatives for their new-found skepticism over Bureau of Labor Statistics jobs reports. Before the unemployment rate dipped to 7.8%, they loved the BLS. Now the BLS is part of a conspiracy to make Obama look good.
Video and text: http://www.latimes.com/entertainment/tv/showtracker/la-et-st-jon-stewart-jobs-truthers-jack-welch-fox-business-20121009,0,4639743.story
“What else would explain why, after unemployment has been steadily declining for the last year, that now suddenly, right before the election, it suddenly declines a little more?”
Lynna, OM:
October 10th, 2012 at 11:17 am
Another tale of cluelessness: Republicans are hiding how happy they are to have US embassies attacked: Oh boy, something has gone wrong, must be Obama’s fault. And to ice our cake, that effing Hillary bitch’s fault.
Republicans do have some ‘splainin’ to do. But with nanoseconds between accusations and facts being presented that should give them pause, no clue causes neurons to fire. Nope, they are entirely innocent.
cicely:
October 10th, 2012 at 11:23 am
Giliell, I’m sorry about your cousin. *hug*
-
:)
-
Whereabouts?
-
Tony •Prom King of Sunnydale High•:
October 10th, 2012 at 11:33 am
blf:
You had me until the shrooms. May I substitute a hard fried egg instead (and who wants my yolk?)
****
Giliell:
I’m sorry to hear about your cousin’s miscarriage.
****
Portia:
I wonder what he thinks is wrong with being gay…
No free toaster oven when you come out of the closet is the only thing wrong with being gay. I’m still waiting on mine 16 years later.
jose:
October 10th, 2012 at 11:37 am
The Maddow video is frightening.
@Ogvorbis: her tweets regarding the homeless guy.
Lynna, OM:
October 10th, 2012 at 11:40 am
This is fun. Republicans regularly confuse the numbers they may frequently call, (adult hotlines, Hot Horny Girl lines, etc.) with public service hotlines. They give the wrong number to their colleagues and to the media. Sometimes they even post the wrong numbers on their websites.
Portia:
October 10th, 2012 at 11:40 am
Tony, this is the same guy who told me he has “no problem with lesbians” but that gay men “gross him out.” I posited that that attitude comes from the idea that men doing something “womanly” is the worst thing evar and he hasn’t brought it up again since.* Thankfully.**
I think gifts to celebrate coming out are a great idea :)
*It was the quickest rebuttal I could come up with on the spot.
**Yeah, I know that’s not technically how that word should be used but I know of no other succinct way to say that. So much for concision, after this parenthetical.
Lynna, OM:
October 10th, 2012 at 11:49 am
Exercises in Obscurity. I’m going to recommend to Mitt Romney that he write a book with that title.
He was pretty damned good at obscuring both himself and his intentions before, but after the debate and the unveiling of Romney Used Car Salesman Extraordinaire, he has been forced to employ seven veils of obscurity. Tax plans lend themselves particularly well to the seven veils treatment. Link.
Lynna, OM:
October 10th, 2012 at 11:59 am
Clinton comments on the first presidential debate:
http://www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2012/10/10/paul-begala-on-why-bill-clinton-s-still-got-the-magic.html
Funny video excerpts of Bubba in action
Beatrice, anti-imperialist anti-racist Islamophobiaphobic leftist:
October 10th, 2012 at 11:59 am
I took a peak (I accidentally made a pun!) and it looks like she’s complaining about a homeless guy masturbating in front of her. I don’t get what’s wrong with that. I think we can (should be able to) agree that people shouldn’t masturbate in public.
Lynna, OM:
October 10th, 2012 at 12:03 pm
Longer excerpt from Bill Clinton’s speech nailing the jello to the wall:
http://www.examiner.com/video/bill-clinton-ridicules-romney-s-debate-performance-dubbing-him-moderate-mitt-1
“It was like one of these Bain Capital deals, you know, where he’s the closer. So he shows up, doesn’t really know much about the deal and says, ‘Tell me what I’m supposed to say to close.’ The problem with this deal is the deal was made by severe conservative Mitt.”
Ogvorbis: broken and cynical:
October 10th, 2012 at 12:04 pm
jose and Beatrice:
Okay. I was not accusing anyone of anything, I was asking for context. Not much I can do as far as checking those tweets out as I cannot access tweets from this computer (don’t ask). Without seeing the tweets (in context (which is why I brought it up (again — NOT trying to accuse anyone of anything!))) I’m not going to comment on any second-hand information. Sorry to have brought it up.
Beatrice, anti-imperialist anti-racist Islamophobiaphobic leftist:
October 10th, 2012 at 12:04 pm
And there goes my pun when I spell it wrong… :(
peek
Beatrice, anti-imperialist anti-racist Islamophobiaphobic leftist:
October 10th, 2012 at 12:09 pm
Ogvorbis,
I don’t think it was in any way implied that you accused anyone of anything.
Now that you are apologizing for no reason, I feel guilty for possibly somehow prompting you to think you have to apologize. Sorry.
…
“And that is how a circle of endless apologies began”, says a very old Beatrice, trying to type “sorry” with her rheumy fingers.
Portia:
October 10th, 2012 at 12:13 pm
I went and looked at Jen’s tweets too, and the one that made me cringe said something like “Hey homeless people, if you want to masturbate buy a house”
…I just went to fetch a link and it looks like it’s been scrubbed from her account.
Beatrice, anti-imperialist anti-racist Islamophobiaphobic leftist:
October 10th, 2012 at 12:14 pm
Ogvorbis,
/joke
*chocolate* instead if it was a bad one
Ogvorbis: broken and cynical:
October 10th, 2012 at 12:14 pm
Beatrice:
When someone shows up with a short statement (in this case, ‘Jen is wrong’) with no other context, I have a strong need to ask for clarification. I have been trying very very hard to not be accusatory when I ask for clarification but, given my recent past, and how many times my request for either context or clarification has been quite mean-spirited on my part, I feel the need to be careful. Especially when, in a situation like this, I have no way to actually read what is going on. Again, jose, I apologize — I was not making any editorial comment on your comment, I was just wondering what was happening. Sorry.
Beatrice, anti-imperialist anti-racist Islamophobiaphobic leftist:
October 10th, 2012 at 12:15 pm
Ooooh, and it seems like I did a sloppy job of reading those tweets (unless that one was erased before I went looking).
Portia:
October 10th, 2012 at 12:17 pm
Beatrice, it looked to me like it was at the top of her feed, said it was posted 16hours ago. Might have been the first to go when she started deleting. But then, I only looked because of your comment directing me there. Anyway. Yeah…icky icky classism.
AJ Milne:
October 10th, 2012 at 12:18 pm
Listen, I do understand the (spells it out, out of sensitivity) s-n-o-w thing is a divisive issue, here. Quite possibly at or near the level of p-e-a-s…
But after it was mentioned above, I checked and confirmed that my nearby mountain is opening in six weeks now. And thus I now feel the giddy need to share all the same, divisiveness or no, much as do people insufferably and freshly in love and with new kids and pets and born-again-type religions and so on.
(/You must love snow. It just wants to love you. Come unto snow and fall down and worship, all ye snowfidels. Say, do you mind much if I come in for a few hours and rabbit on endlessly about how snow changed my life, etc…)
Portia:
October 10th, 2012 at 12:19 pm
aaaaaaaaaand, now I’m the one confused. jose directed me there, not you, Beatrice. Sorry.
broboxley OT:
October 10th, 2012 at 12:24 pm
#151 AJ Milne, fully agree. I would much rather not shovel snow than not mow my lawn
jose:
October 10th, 2012 at 12:33 pm
I used to help in a shelter. I don’t claim to know every homeless person in the world, but in the time I spent there, nearly everyone who did shockingly inappropiate things was mentally ill. Especially when alone. There’s a good chance this is the case. Many spend their days sitting on the sidewalk, just watching people pass by. If he had followed her that would be another matter entirely.
Tony •Prom King of Sunnydale High•:
October 10th, 2012 at 12:44 pm
Portia:
I hate the “gay sex grosses me out” meme. Unless one is being asked to participate in sexual activities, why would anyone even think about the sexual activities of someone they’ve just met? When I meet a heterosexual person, I don’t immediately think about what type of sexual activities they partake of.
****
In a moment of silliness, a young girl faces suspension for pink hair:
****
AJ:
All this time posting here and I’m just now learning of an anti-Snow faction of Pharyngulites? I like snow.
On Christmas.
Possibly on New Year’s Eve.
That’s it.
Having lived in Northwest Florida for 10 years though, I’ve forgotten what snow looks like.
(and there’s no contest between the evil Peas and snow).
Ogvorbis: broken and cynical:
October 10th, 2012 at 12:51 pm
However, fresh raw snow peas are heavenly. As are snow peas lightly cooked in a Chinese stir-fry. Or snow peas in home-made egg rolls.
And peas, themselves, are excellent in fried rice.
Snow? Back when I could ski, I loved snow. Now, though I enjoy driving in it, I dread it. Shovelling snow bites.
chigau (悲しい):
October 10th, 2012 at 12:57 pm
The only people I know who really like snow are Inuit.
Tony •Prom King of Sunnydale High•:
October 10th, 2012 at 1:04 pm
Ogvorbis:
Ok, if we ever meet IRL, we’re going to a Chinese restaurant specifically so I can give you all the peas from my fried rice (do you want the carrots too?). I’ve never like veggies mixed in with rice (whether it’s Mexican or Chinese food).
A good friend of mine took me to lunch a few years back and giggled uncontrollably as she watched me spread the rice out and pick out the veggies.
****
Along those same lines, I detest pulp in orange juice. When I was a child, my parents would buy the frozen concentrates that you had to thaw and add water to. Unfortunately, back then there was no such thing as pulp free OJ. My mother walked into the kitchen one day to watch me straining out the pulp from a pitcher of OJ. IIRC, it took about a half hour (I was a child and the strainer was really small). She chuckled and walked away.
AJ Milne:
October 10th, 2012 at 1:04 pm
Oh. Suuuure. One of those ‘holidays-only’ Snowians.
cicely:
October 10th, 2012 at 1:25 pm
I like snow.
On postcards. And pictures. Yards is okay, rooftops to a modest degree…but not on roads. There are too many idiots and fools low-flying their cars without regard for others’ lives and limbs as is.
If only it didn’t have to be so damned c-c-cooooollld.
-
Once the peas have in any way shared pan-space with the fried rice, the rice is tainted and must be discarded. Carrots should be in large enough chunks to allow for easy removal; I hate when they put tiny little shreds of carrot in my food, but at least they don’t ruin everything they touch.
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Richard Austin:
October 10th, 2012 at 1:26 pm
Tony:
I’ve heard this as a response before: “But, by identifying as specifically ‘gay’ and forming communities and parades and such, you are the ones who are bringing up sex – because that’s what being ‘gay’ means. I don’t identify as ‘straight’ when I mean people, and I don’t explicitly go looking to hang out with other straight people to talk about being straight.”
The notion that everyone is assumed straight until stated otherwise, and therefore straightness not needing to be discussed, came as a bit of a shock to him.
kristinc, ~ringy dingy~:
October 10th, 2012 at 1:28 pm
How can it be a “non-human” hair color if it’s on a human?
Tony •Prom King of Sunnydale High•:
October 10th, 2012 at 1:35 pm
kristinc:
That’s exactly what I was thinking.
kristinc, ~ringy dingy~:
October 10th, 2012 at 1:43 pm
My kid’s elementary school used to have a rule against “crayon colored hair”. I always wanted to go into the office one day holding a brown crayon and ask what color I should dye his hair so he wouldn’t be in violation of the dress code.
Maybe someone else did exactly that, or else the school board got clued in some other way that crayons come in every fucking color, because at some point the rule quietly disappeared.
Improbable Joe:
October 10th, 2012 at 1:44 pm
opposablethumbs:
Recording will come as soon as I have the money for a microphone and a decent audio interface thingy. I’m not that good of a guitar player but I have pretty good tone, and I’m not wasting my one positive thing by recording into an iPhone or webcam microphone.
Ogvorbis:
The proper way to start a conversation is “Honey, we need to talk about our vacation plans in December”… Carlie covered most of it. Things that aren’t a big deal don’t need a long preface or a wait for later or a come sit down and I have to wait until you’re seated and I’ve taken several deep breaths first. “I want a divorce” needs that, and so does “I’m thinking of quitting my job and becoming a professional bowler.” Conversations about things that aren’t dramatic don’t require a dramatic buildup. You can say “hey, there’s an issue with the vacation we need to talk about when we get home” or “when you get a minute, I need to explain this month’s budget to you.”
Specificity eliminates unintentionally creating feelings of dread and horror.
chigau (悲しい):
October 10th, 2012 at 1:46 pm
I prolly shoulda bought those snow-boots when they were on sale…
Audley Z. Darkheart (liar and scoundrel):
October 10th, 2012 at 1:46 pm
You know what? Fuck snow.
/winter time blasphemy
Maybe I’m wrong, but the whole attitude always seemed so… intrusive. I mean, upon meeting a straight couple, does anyone immediately try to imagine their bedroom habits? Then why the fuck are you doing it when you meet a gay couple?
cicely:
October 10th, 2012 at 1:51 pm
I think eating peas is icky…but I don’t waste a lot of time on imagining what other people do with peas in the privacy of their own bedrooms.
-
Lynna, OM:
October 10th, 2012 at 1:53 pm
The “Little House on the Prairie” series is being abused. Tea Partiers are using it to beat the 47% about the head and shoulders:
http://www.salon.com/2012/10/10/little_house_on_the_prairie_tea_party_manifesto/
Audley Z. Darkheart (liar and scoundrel):
October 10th, 2012 at 1:53 pm
And the An(n)als of Online Dating has done a fabulously eloquent job of making my point for me.
http://www.annalsofonlinedating.com/post/24713865757/how-do-you-feel-about-musical-theater
Tony •Prom King of Sunnydale High•:
October 10th, 2012 at 1:57 pm
Audley:
You are so right.
****
What region would you rather live in? Sounds like you’re not a cold weather fan.
Lynna, OM:
October 10th, 2012 at 1:59 pm
Yet more coverage of Mitt’s magical tax plan:
http://www.salon.com/2012/10/10/mitts_magical_tax_plan/
kristinc, ~ringy dingy~:
October 10th, 2012 at 2:00 pm
Ummmmm, IIRC Laura Ingalls Wilder’s daughter was a Libertarian, and edited Wilder’s manuscripts specifically to highlight the Ingalls family “independence” and further her pet cause. There is straight up untrue shit in those books. (Never mind that even in her edited version, the Ingalls were pretty well in starving miserable grinding backbreaking poverty for years and years and when they did finally achieve stability it was BECAUSE OF GOVERNMENT LAND GRANTS.)
Hekuni Cat, MQG:
October 10th, 2012 at 2:06 pm
Giliell, my condolences to your cousin.
chigau:
:( :(
That’s a word I don’t like to hear in October.
broboxley OT:
October 10th, 2012 at 2:40 pm
Dunno about white folks back in the day but the tribes did a boatload of sharing (intratribe) anyhow. Even today at home when hunting,you ensure that elders got a few of the choice goodies first.
Audley Z. Darkheart (liar and scoundrel):
October 10th, 2012 at 2:44 pm
Tony:
Well, it’s a trade off. I’ve lived in the northeast my entire life and I’m not going to lie, it’s pretty sweet here. I mean, yeah, our weather sucks, but the fundy-to-normal person ratio is pretty low, we aren’t currently fighting over reproductive rights or marriage equality or anything like that AND we have amazing food.
If I could live someplace purely for the weather, I’d probably pick the southwestern US. The rest of the southwest doesn’t really thrill me, though.
Improbable Joe:
October 10th, 2012 at 2:56 pm
Tony:
You know, this brings up a fundamental issue with evil, cruel people. It isn’t enough for them to not like something, they have to focus on things they don’t like with laser-like intensity and live constantly on the attack against people who engage in things they don’t approve of. Sex between gay people, feminist blogs, Atheism Plus forums, YouTube videos they don’t agree with… some people live in this constant state of “I don’t like it/you, I can’t stop staring at it/you, so it is YOUR FAULT!”
I mean, I don’t like anything about American Idol. I just don’t watch it! I don’t feel like I need to make anti- clothing, buttons, stickers, websites, whatever. I certainly don’t watch every second of it in order to make ridiculously detailed attacks on it. “Gay” sex? I’m not having any, but you knock yourself out. It is only “gross” if you decide to have noisy gay sex on my lawn or something. Otherwise, I’m sure it is gross when you poop too, that doesn’t mean I think about anyone pooping when I see them out in public.
Nick Gotts (formerly KG):
October 10th, 2012 at 3:08 pm
Improbable Joe,
Congrats on your wife’s job!
But you could say the same of Elizabeth Cady Stanton / Nelson Mandela / your favourite activist. Whether focusing on things you don’t like is good or bad depends on what those things are!
Lynna, OM:
October 10th, 2012 at 3:08 pm
The danger to women if they speak out in Pakistan does not seem to have diminished.
http://nymag.com/thecut/2012/10/14-year-old-pakistani-activist-shot-by-taliban.html
http://www.reuters.com/article/2012/10/09/us-pakistan-schoolgirl-idUSBRE8980EB20121009
Beatrice, anti-imperialist anti-racist Islamophobiaphobic leftist:
October 10th, 2012 at 3:14 pm
Did anyone ever figure out why FTB won’t allow links to pharyngula wiki (and is there a way to fix it)?
Giliell, Approved Straight Chorus:
October 10th, 2012 at 3:25 pm
Good evening
A) Where am I going to put all these Halloween lights I’m currently making?
B) Who’s going to eat all the applesauce that’s currently still in the glasses needed to make them?
+++
Thanks everybody.
I hope that whatever my cousin does, she doesn’t give herself shit for this. I know I did back then, asking myself what I’d done wrong.
+++
So, took the kids to the zoo this afternoon* and #1 dared to do what she wanted to do already last time: volunteer to let the big Aguja land on her arm**. I think she was a bit afraid afterwards and we talked about it later tonight. And she was afraid that after it ate that chicken, its poop would stink. I think the dead chicklet might have been more frightening than the eagle itself.
I said yes, that’s a good point, but on the other hand, she eats chicken and her poop stinks as well. At which point she almost wet herself laughing, so I hope that was a good closure of the Aguja incident.
But I’m seriously impressed with her. She really developed a knack with animals I wouldn’t have thought possible a year ago.
*Yes, we do that often. It’s half a mile away and we have an all-year around ticket.
**She’s huge but they say the tamest and most gentle bird they have. She’ll always sway away or land on the ground if she doesn’t feel it to be safe for both of them.
Portia:
October 10th, 2012 at 3:27 pm
That. Is. SO COOL. Awesome for her for getting up her nerve.
Tony •Prom King of Sunnydale High•:
October 10th, 2012 at 3:35 pm
Nick:
That’s true.
However, how often do anti-choice activists, or opponents of same sex marriage work towards progressive goals? In broad strokes, they bear similarities to Stanton or Mandela, but one doesn’t even have to get into the nitty gritty details to see that some activists are working to discriminate against an oppressed people, while other activists fight for equality, fairness and progressive values. The line in the sand may likely be: “I don’t like [topic x]. I want to speak out against it. Based on the available evidence, does it negatively affect a group of people?”
For the anti-choicer, they might dress their argument up in , but the available evidence contradicts their opinion AND they fail to acknowledge the adverse impact anti-abortion laws have on the autonomy of women.
For supporters of marriage equality, they look at the discrimination faced by same sex couples and see the demonstrable harm done by denying them fully marriage equality.
So I’d tweak your comment:
“Whether focusing on things you don’t like is good or bad depends on what those things are and whether or not they negatively impact others.”
mythbri:
October 10th, 2012 at 3:46 pm
Have to do a threadgrumpt about Al Stefanelli’s post about A+ and Schrodinger’s Rapist, and how people are trying to make him “feel guilty about being a white man.”
Grump.
Harrumph.
Grrrrump.
Thanks. Back to your lives, citizens.
cicely:
October 10th, 2012 at 3:46 pm
Giliell, back when Son was a kid we had a Friends of the Zoo membership, and went to the zoo here almost every weekend. There’s a picnic area, and goodness knows walking the zoo itself was terrific exercise; in the edges of the Ozarks as we are, there are a lot of steep hilly bits. Which unfortunately means I can’t go any more. :(
-
Aratina Cage:
October 10th, 2012 at 3:58 pm
@Audley Z. Darkheart
Prezactly. I mean, gay men aren’t the ones who came up anal beads, are they? And then there is saddlebacking…
@broboxley
Yep. It’s a wonderful tradition.
Portia:
October 10th, 2012 at 4:17 pm
Me: 2 is good. as long as I’m out by 4. 3:58 PM
Him: I like in & out. 4:01 PM
…you would think an attorney of all people would be cognizant of what constitutes sexual harassment. Brb everybody, I need to take a shower.
Improbable Joe:
October 10th, 2012 at 4:25 pm
Nick:
I don’t think the comparison is really accurate. The difference is that the activists you mention were focused on changing a system/society to better mirror their viewpoint. The assclowns I’m talking about claim a similar viewpoint and seem more focused on… pwnage, for lack of a better term. Lots of people loved Thunderf00t’s “why do people laugh at creationists” videos, and didn’t realize how absolutely poisonous that sort of attitude is. A lot of the “community” seems focused on crushing other people, rather than creating positive change. We sort of ran out of creationists to destroy, so now we’re turning on each other… and while criticism of ideas is a good thing, hypocritical hyperfocus on destroying enemies is a bad idea… especially when said “enemies” don’t fucking care about you.
And… maybe the Lounge is not awesome for this. Guitar!
opposablethumbs:
October 10th, 2012 at 4:40 pm
mythbri, I read that post. Big disappointment – way to not get the point :(
Could hardly see the screen for all the strawfeminists strewn all over.
carlie:
October 10th, 2012 at 4:51 pm
What about snow peas?
About the Ingalls family – Um, yeah. They had their 160 acres of LAND GRANT. And I’m pretty sure they would have taken just about any government assistance possible during the Long Winter. And all those other times they almost starved to death. And maybe Mary wouldn’t have gone blind with better medical care when she had scarlet fever. And maybe Laura’s son wouldn’t have died in infancy with better medical care. Sheesh.
Portia:
October 10th, 2012 at 4:53 pm
Well, Carlie, among their virtues was their acceptance of Gawd’s True Will.
Patricia, OM:
October 10th, 2012 at 5:27 pm
I’m at work, and it’s sooooo quiet. Not one veteran.
Nerd of Redhead, Dances OM Trolls:
October 10th, 2012 at 5:36 pm
Tonight is another step in the Redhead’s potential mobility. She is going to a Musical at the theater in Lincolnshire with one of her friends. First outing without my assistance except at the house.
Tony •Prom King of Sunnydale High•:
October 10th, 2012 at 5:49 pm
Nerd:
Great news indeed!
kristinc, ~ringy dingy~:
October 10th, 2012 at 6:00 pm
Once she was blind, how the heck does anyone think she was able to go to that school they were so excited about, if it hadn’t been built/subsidized BY THE GUBMINT and she couldn’t travel on trains subsidized by THE GUBMINT.
But they paddled their own canoooooooooooe!
deborahbell:
October 10th, 2012 at 6:25 pm
@75 theophontes
I wasn’t aware of that definition of iniquity. I know it only as a religious word for sin.
@99 Beatrice
Eh? There are dates on birth certificates now? I have two: my original hospital birth certificate from when I was actually born, and the reissued long form birth certificate issued by the state when my step father adopted me when I was 8. Naturally the original hospital birth certificate has my birth name, not my current legal adopted name, so if I use it for anything I have to also give my original copy of my adoption certificate.
Perhaps they think you might have lost your birth certificate and someone else found it and is using it to impersonate you, and a newer copy means you recently provided sufficient proof of your identity to acquire it, so it is more likely to be really you?
@107 Portia
Yeah, I usually post on the computer, using a Notepad file to type in as I read the thread, and then cut and paste that into the text box. But I wanted to answer you guys quick last night from my phone, and that was an autocorrect guess (I use swype, so it was guessing from a trailing line what word I was attempting to send) and I didn’t reread until after I posted.
How do people usually post pictures in here? I don’t have a website, my pictures are on my computer and my Facebook account.
@113 Portia
I’m having breakfast troubles myself. I don’t feel like eating at 6:30 am, which is not really morning yet for me. I can’t eat fatty/greasy foods like cheese, bacon, or eggs for breakfast, because it upsets my stomach first thing in the morning, and I am hungry too soon if I eat something simple like a muffin, and either way I find that I usually don’t actually eat the food, just pick at it on the way to work because I just don’t feel like eating. I’m ravenous by 10 am when my first break is though. I’m thinking about trying to find a lean protein that isn’t greasy for breakfast instead.
@170 Audley
That makes a lot of sense. The other thing that I find tiresome is the endless speculating about who is gay and who isn’t, and people who are so determined that they can tell. I figure it’s not my business unless they want to tell me or if I am dating them.
@177 Joe
When I was a teenager I thought all sex was terribly gross, and wondered how people stood themselves after having done it. I used to look at the married couples sitting together in church and wonder how they could stand having done that. It took a while, but I grew out of that.
Improbable Joe:
October 10th, 2012 at 6:34 pm
deborahbell,
Yeah, well… I’m still horrified about seeing myself doing it. It just looks so silly.
deborahbell:
October 10th, 2012 at 6:37 pm
I went and looked at an apartment today. It was really nice. I think I could like living in a nice one like that, and it was cheaper than I expected for where I live. And close to my work, which the house I live in now isn’t.
And then driving home I felt rather overwhelmed. It’s scary to move out on my own again after having been living with BF for years. It’s scary to be alone. To be solely responsible for bills and my life and such. It’s hard to make decisions like this by myself, without talking things over with him and making a joint decision. And moving is going to be such a pain – I don’t have much furniture or kitchen stuff anymore.
I think I’m going to spend some time tonight looking at budgets to see what’s really possible.
Tony •Prom King of Sunnydale High•:
October 10th, 2012 at 6:44 pm
Deborahbell:
For breakfast, have you tried oatmeal? Perhaps with some of your favorite fruit on top. You could also try English muffins with some sort of jam/spread you like or even just butter. Also I’m curious about the upset stomach you get from certain foods in the AM. Bacon I can easily understand. Even cheese. The eggs are throwing me though. Can you eat boiled, steamed or poached eggs? No grease with that preparation. There is fat, so that is a possible factor. I’m just curious. I don’t mean to criticize.
carlie:
October 10th, 2012 at 6:55 pm
Yay, Nerd!
carlie:
October 10th, 2012 at 6:56 pm
Yay, deborabell! Change is always scary.
Ichthyic:
October 10th, 2012 at 7:04 pm
First time I really realized that a LOT of people engage in “watch it because I hate it” behavior was Howard Stern.
He even admitted that at least half of his “fans” were people who actually hated everything he did, but felt compelled to listen anyway.
Improbable Joe:
October 10th, 2012 at 7:09 pm
Ichthyic,
Life is too short for that sort of nonsense. And I find that (especially online) when people slip into a certain mode it is hard to slip out of it. If people give you positive reinforcement for being an asshole, you’re going to be an asshole constantly. If people give you attention for being sad, you might find reasons to feel sad to get that attention.
Markita Lynda—damn misogyny!:
October 10th, 2012 at 7:18 pm
Something to promote / get / share: Einstein and Eddington, with Andy Serkis as Albert Einstein and David Tennant as Arthur Eddington.
deborahbell:
October 10th, 2012 at 7:18 pm
@199 Tony
I’m thinking of fried eggs. I have actually eaten boiled eggs for breakfast (boiled the night before, so they are cold) and I don’t remember having a problem. I like poached eggs also, but that takes more time and attention than I usually want to give breakfast in the morning.
When I was a teenager oatmeal often made me nauseous. It’s a different thing than the difficulty with greasy foods in the morning. I don’t know if it was anything other than teenage growing pains, but I don’t really like oatmeal today.
strange gods before me ॐ:
October 10th, 2012 at 7:25 pm
theophontes,
While that eagerness may correlate with leftism, its presence is not sufficient to establish leftism. Milton Friedman wanted to end poverty by introducing a negative income tax. While a NIT could be part of a leftist system, his wasn’t, because he coupled it only with a flat tax, and an ideological unwillingness to involve government in any more specific antipoverty programs.
How is what you’re talking about different from noblesse oblige? Groups of people volunteering outside of government, collaborating to address social problems, is entirely consistent with right-wing libertarianism — indeed the purported capabilities of such groups (ignoring the effects of economic downturns on charity) is a favorite libertarian talking point. Certainly some of the members of Rotary are leftists, I know, but I don’t yet see how you can say that of the group itself, at least considering what you’ve said about them re South Africa. Are they agitating for government to take up leftist policies?
+++++
Beatrice,
It ended up in the spam filter because, when I had it linked in my nym, another blogger at FtB started deleting my comments (or deliberately, maliciously flagging them as spam (I’m not sure which)).
Ed Brayton’s tech person(s) should be able to fix it sitewide. So presumably the way to fix it is to email Ed. Also you can ask individual bloggers to whitelist it on their blogs, like PZ has here.
Menyambal --- Sambal's Little Helper:
October 10th, 2012 at 7:31 pm
deborahbell, I used to eat steak for breakfast, because the protein stuck with me all morning. (I could not do sugary food for breakfast.) Not a big greasy steak (yum), but some lean round steak with a little pepper and salt in a pre-heated nonstick skillet. Not a lot of trouble, fairly fast, and damned manly. (Two slices of bread/toast, and you have a sandwich.)
I like rice with/for breakfast, but it does tend to leave you hanging later in the morning. With some protein, it’s good all morning. I loved congee, which is rice boiled into porridge, at the Asian breakfast places where they had a buffet of things like peanuts and fish to top it with—I haven’t made it myself, yet. So I make a big pot of rice, store it in the fridge and use the microwave—if you have some boiled eggs already peeled, or protein of choice, you don’t have to spend much time making breakfast. (When I’m lazy, I just make a BIG bowl of something, microwave it the next morning, eat some, put it back in the fridge, and repeat until my wife stops me.)
My wife likes oatmeal. I like poached eggs on toast, if I have time. But greasy bacon and fried eggs, or cereal, or pancakes, just leave me feeling ermph.
(Speaking of feeling ermph, I mentioned peanuts and fish, meaning two separate bowls, but some places they were both in the same bowl. The fish were little bitty, whole, and seemed to be mostly eyes, and cannot possibly have been eviscerated. They may have been fermented, and certainly were salty. I thought of it as “guppies and peanuts” and tried to focus on the peanuts. I don’t recommend that for breakfast, I just was remembering.)
carlie:
October 10th, 2012 at 7:32 pm
Deborahbell – have you tried peanut butter for breakfast? It’s good on toast, in a sandwich, or with banana. That’s decent for some protein without the greasy feeling. Baked beans can be a breakfast food, too (or any bean dish or soup), for more grease-free protein.
I’ll eat just about anything for breakfast – I’ll mix and match any food types when I feel like it. One of my favorite breakfasts is leftover dinner from the night before. I’m usually hungry in the mornings sometime before I leave, but I’m the same way with my stomach being a bit touchy on what I eat.
a_ray_in_dilbert_space:
October 10th, 2012 at 7:33 pm
Caine asked for an a_ray update.
1)Way too much gardening–we’ve got 1/2 acre of gardens now, and they grow more weeds than anything else. Even so, a fair year for asparagus, tomatoes, green beans… Freezer is full of tomato sauce, peaches and other goodies.
1a)The wife has taken a real shine to baking bread with freshly ground flour. We have a hand grinder–so I’m developing a good arm workout.
2)Way too much work–They want me to develop some high-level strategies, while still being buried under satellite projects. I reckon I’m booked at about 2.5 FTE if I did all the work I’m supposed to.
3)Other companies are trying to recruit me away from the Integrated Worldwide House of Rocket Engines (IWHORE), so a couple of interviews back near here my aging parents live–we’ll see.
4)Another trip to the gem and mineral show in Brazil–some really nice tourmalines, emeralds and imperial topaz, but not many rare minerals.
5)To much of just about everything–so much so, that when I tried to go into detail, I’d run out of time before I had to get back to work…hence this pathetically inadequate missive.
Take care, Hon. If not posting, I’ll occasionally lurk buy.
Improbable Joe:
October 10th, 2012 at 7:48 pm
How to cook eggplant?
John Morales:
October 10th, 2012 at 7:50 pm
Improbable Joe:
Use heat.
Nerd of Redhead, Dances OM Trolls:
October 10th, 2012 at 7:54 pm
Flame thrower until totally carbonized. ;)
Actually, I usually add it to the less used side of the propane grill and cook until easily pierced by a cooking fork.
carlie:
October 10th, 2012 at 7:55 pm
Eggplant:
Slice, put between several layers of toweling with weights on for about an hour, bread, fry.
Or any version of imam bayildi, or ratatouille(both of which are variations on eggplant, tomato, onions, garlic and a little sugar, all cooked in olive oil).
Markita Lynda—damn misogyny!:
October 10th, 2012 at 8:00 pm
Ha! Spokesgay, A.J. Milne: all I have to say is, “Merci” and the waiters in Quebec know I’m an anglophone.
Markita Lynda—damn misogyny!:
October 10th, 2012 at 8:07 pm
kristinc @530, I suggest that you ask the club if they would alternate two different days of the week–it’s worth a try.
Improbable Joe:
October 10th, 2012 at 8:15 pm
Thanks Nerd and Carlie. I’m going to try the frying style, although it is too late tonight to start prepping eggplant.
Also, for the six of you who care, I have picked out a new and improved Horde-Hammer, Official SpokesGuitar. More reasonably priced and all that. :)
John Morales:
October 10th, 2012 at 8:22 pm
Improbable Joe, Google is tricky for you?
carlie:
October 10th, 2012 at 8:29 pm
Why ask that, John? Of course you can look up stuff like recipes, but it’s more fun getting recommendations from people you know and like as to what they make and enjoy.
Improbable Joe:
October 10th, 2012 at 8:34 pm
Carnivore warning:
Speaking of recipes, I’m not sure what to do with the ground lamb meat I bought. I decided to check out the farmer’s market today and wound up with all sorts of weird organic locally grown/raised crap.
broboxley OT:
October 10th, 2012 at 8:34 pm
on voting green
http://www.salon.com/2012/10/10/camille_paglias_glittering_images/
broboxley OT:
October 10th, 2012 at 8:39 pm
of course I posted the above before reading to the end. Her poking at atheism is absolute crap. Art? Seriously? Well she is an Art professor….
broboxley OT:
October 10th, 2012 at 8:40 pm
ground lamb is awesome in chili, a true basque treat
John Morales:
October 10th, 2012 at 8:45 pm
carlie:
You’ve answered your own question. :)
(How to tie one’s shoelaces?)
carlie:
October 10th, 2012 at 8:50 pm
I’ve never understood the double bunny ears method, myself. I’m definitely a loop around and through person. :)
Nerd of Redhead, Dances OM Trolls:
October 10th, 2012 at 8:53 pm
[Lifes little puzzles]Ordered the Redhead some leather mittens. The direct route from San Francisco to Chicago appears to go through El Paso according the tracking information from the USPS. [/lifes little puzzles]
Portia:
October 10th, 2012 at 9:02 pm
deborahbell
I’m not a web savvy person but you could use imgur. I think.
I was going to suggest boiled eggs for breakfast. Stuff like cottage cheese works for breakfast for me, too, if that sounds good to you. I like adding jam to it for breakfast time.
YAY
Oh, I understand. I am so glad you took such a big step. I also know how intimidating budgeting can be when it’s not something you’re used to or haven’t done in a while. Good luck, and if you’ve already done it, I hope it went ok. (And thanks for the update).
Menyambal
That sounds great.
I learned this evening that I have more practice before I make a decent loaf of bread.
John Morales:
October 10th, 2012 at 9:04 pm
FWIW, one can make chips out of eggplant.
(Coat with oil and spices as desired, then bake)
Azkyroth, Former Growing Toaster Oven:
October 10th, 2012 at 9:09 pm
Maybe the texture? I know I had problems with that, and steel cut oatmeal solved them…just not the prep time problems or how soon afterwards I start getting hungry again. D:
cicely:
October 10th, 2012 at 9:15 pm
Still no word from the Printer of Shirts; I’m getting antsy.
Anybody have experience of silk screening tee shirts? Is it hard? Ridiculously expensive?
-
Great news wrt to the Redhead, Nerd! Huzzah!
-
I used to get nauseous eating anything in the morning for about the first 2 hours after I got up…or about the same time it took/takes my brainz to boot up in the morning. This last five-ish years, though, for some reason the stomach becomes cranky if I haven’t thrown it a sacrifice within about half an hour. Weird. I ate oatmeal for a while, then it started giving me horrifically painful intestinal gas. These days it’s a lof-fat mozzarella cheese stick and bagel.
-
Yep. :)
-
Plus sometimes a recipe doesn’t give helpful hints that more experience cooks know…and you can’t ask a posted recipe about substitutions, and face it, most places don’t have Pharyngula’s fast response-and-feedback. Also too, recipes sometimes outright lie about number of servings, or cooking times, or stuff like that.
-
Improbable Joe:
October 10th, 2012 at 9:21 pm
cicely,
I did screen printing years and years ago, and I don’t remember it being THAT hard.
cicely:
October 10th, 2012 at 9:28 pm
I’m starting to think that Printer of Shirts is not interested in my business…and that maybe I should just look into cutting out the middleman altogether.
-
erikthebassist:
October 10th, 2012 at 9:29 pm
Screen printing is all about the prep, once the prep is done it’s easy and quick to knock out shirt after shirt, or whatever it is you’re printing on. It’s about the cheapest method for mass producing logo’d paraphernalia out there.
A decent screen printer should be able to knock out a job in a couple few hours. Again, that’s almost all prep. The it’s seconds per item plus drying time, which all depends on humidity and temperature.
erikthebassist:
October 10th, 2012 at 9:32 pm
“then it’s seconds” even
broboxley OT:
October 10th, 2012 at 9:47 pm
eggplant, slice thin, fry in olive oil then stack it in a pan like lasagna and treat it the same way with tomato sauce and cheese
Portia:
October 10th, 2012 at 10:06 pm
Random updates while I wait for the melatonin to kick in.
Exterminator came today to chat about …exterminating. Yay! Maybe I can stop waking up with new spider bites.
strange gods before me ॐ:
October 10th, 2012 at 10:10 pm
So I was going to ask, “and how does Camille Paglia deal with the fact that 1 vote for Jill Stein is mathematically equivalent to giving 0.5 votes to Mitt Romney?”
Then I saw:
She knows and is perfectly okay with giving half a vote to Romney, because she wants Mitt Romney to win!
Hekuni Cat, MQG:
October 10th, 2012 at 10:10 pm
Nerd, I hope the Redhead had a great time on her solo adventure.
cicely, have you looked at spreadshirt.com* [direct link to the page about opening your own free store]? I’ve purchased t-shirts from spreadshirt.com, but I don’t have any personal knowledge about selling .
*This is my first attempt at linking. It works in preview. :D
kristinc, ~ringy dingy~:
October 10th, 2012 at 10:39 pm
Sorry, Camille, I don’t think I can possibly have heard you right. Mitt Romney is a what now?
consciousness razor:
October 10th, 2012 at 10:41 pm
That’s totally the kind of thing a super-liberal green partier would honestly say, once you make the slight interpretive adjustments above. I’m sure that’s how broboxley read it.
Menyambal --- Sambal's Little Helper:
October 10th, 2012 at 10:50 pm
I read the atheism part of the Paglia article (thanks for the link). I had particular trouble with her slamming atheism because Hitchens drank a lot. I am not a follower, mindless or otherwise, and I can sort out Hitchens’ works from his habits. The same goes for what she said about Dawkins.
The other part that stuck was her complaint bout a university giving students a presentation on consent. Letting young folks know, in a legal way, that it’s not alright to run up to other people and start humping them, is not spying on them or telling them how they have to act.
—-
As breakfast food, don’t forget corn. “Grits” are capable of going sweet or savory, and can be made fairly easily, even from instant packets (for cheesy grits, just add Velveeta). I grew up eating cornmeal mush, and sometimes scrapple, which is leftover mush with meat bits stirred in, sliced when cold and fried for eating. Polenta is Latino ground-corn mush, with assorted ways of cooking. Corn tortillas are available in many stores, and MUST be heated to be edible (one/two minutes in the microwave is easiest) and if you can get them fresh-made, you are in luck—fill, roll, scoop or just smear. I buy hominy in bulk cans, and warn you that it pops in the microwave—sweet or savory, it’s just unground grits, and a lot faster.
chigau (悲しい):
October 10th, 2012 at 10:50 pm
Breakfast:
fruit smoothies!
(Hand-held blenders can be inexpensive.)
kristinc, ~ringy dingy~:
October 10th, 2012 at 10:57 pm
Couscous is lovely either with bits of vegetables and/or cheese, or topped with a poached egg. It cooks fast too.
strange gods before me ॐ:
October 10th, 2012 at 10:58 pm
In her defense, Camille Paglia is an idiot.
See: idiot.
chigau (悲しい):
October 10th, 2012 at 11:16 pm
This is going to be soooo useful!
theophontes (坏蛋):
October 11th, 2012 at 12:01 am
@ SGBM
People who are capable of helping (socially and financially) less fortunate people actually doing so? Agreed, there is a large group of disparate people who can and do as such. When do they step out from under such a broad brush term?
You may be giving the answer as to that criteria with:
I cannot speak beyond my own limited experience in answering this. I would say generally no. There is not a specific political agenda from the organisation that I am aware of.
In the specific case I raised though, members do take up more political positions and try to push policy and action in the local government. Though Rotary may take a neutral stance, it nevertheless provides a platform for tackling social issues. In this case you have people, working through the organisation, holding the government to account on their responsibilities towards marginalised communities and individuals.
Tony •Prom King of Sunnydale High•:
October 11th, 2012 at 12:13 am
Menyambal:
OOOOOOOH!
New food!
I’ve never heard of that dish. I don’t believe I’ve ever tried porridge. Is it similar to oatmeal, grits, cream of wheat or couscous? Does it matter what type of rice is added to it?
You’ve got me excited to try something.
I simply must add that to my Bucket List O’ Food.
****
Joe:
I’ve never cooked eggplant myself, but I have watched someone cook it and I’ve watched how it can be prepared in a restaurant.
One of the easiest cooking methods is roasting it in the oven. I’d say cut the eggplant into long strips, drizzle with EVOO, season however you like (personally, my standby is garlic powder & salt, red pepper flakes, and ground pepper), then put it in a roasting pan. Cover that with foil and cook it for maybe 10-12 minutes @ 350º.
You could also do pretty much the same thing in a saute pan.
****
kristinc:
I know hearing the truth can be difficult, but it bears repeating:
That’s what she said right?
Boy does it ever. I came home from work about 2 hours ago and was somewhat hungry. I roasted thinly sliced, boneless pork chops and while I let them cool, I cooked
waaaaay too muchcouscous. By the time I plated the dish, my pork chops were still quite warm. I successfully burned a small portion of the couscous in the bottom of the pot [because I have a habit of getting distracted when cooking for myself], but decided to add some butter, milk, spices and a dash of corn starch and made a gravy, which got rid of the burnt stuff (again, since I like stuff that’s slightly burnt, the flavor didn’t bother me).Now I have enough couscous for the next few days.
****
deborahbell:
My roommate T likes to spread peanut butter over red delicious apples in the morning along with a protein shake.
theophontes (坏蛋):
October 11th, 2012 at 12:15 am
@ chigau
Hope this linky works: Idiot.
Menyambal --- Sambal's Little Helper:
October 11th, 2012 at 12:16 am
Thanks, strange, for the link.
I was reminded of another case, with I think the opposite kind of person. Mary Renault wrote some great books about ancient Greece http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mary_Renault . Seriously, go read them.
She wrote about homosexual lovers, and gained a great following among gays. But she didn’t support the gay pride movement. She felt that identifying oneself by one’s sexual orientation wasn’t right, as sex wasn’t what a person was all about. There was some confusion.
===
“Mexican”-type chili makes a good breakfast food for me sometimes. I make a big pot, cool that to lift the grease off, and divvy it up into small containers. It has meat protein (try it with pork) as well as whatever vegetable matter you add (you can thicken with cornmeal), and goes well on spaghetti, tortillas or rice. You might not want to breath spices on people, but I find “hot” stuff wakes me up in the morning (see the moniker—sambal is chili paste).
Tony •Prom King of Sunnydale High•:
October 11th, 2012 at 12:36 am
SGBM:
Ugh.
I just read the link you provided to Camille Paglia’s wikipedia entry. There was so much fail there I don’t know where to begin.
This gem really stood out to me:
Oh gee, she’s trying to tell other people how they feel by diminishing their personal experiences and choices. Such a sterling example of humanity she is.
More like a condescending, pompous, arrogant fuckwit.
strange gods before me ॐ:
October 11th, 2012 at 12:38 am
That was my intent. ;)
Anyway, thanks for your response. It sounds like it doesn’t put them on the left, but the networking can be a vehicle or amplifier for the politics of whoever gets involved.
Tony •Prom King of Sunnydale High•:
October 11th, 2012 at 12:40 am
Menyambal:
It sounds like she didn’t understand the nature of privilege. She likely hasn’t had to question her sexuality. It was not something she needed to assert or fight against. As such, the twit really shouldn’t have spoken about something she knew nothing about.
chigau (悲しい):
October 11th, 2012 at 12:51 am
theophontes #247
If I grok the site and google translate serves … that kinda sucks the fun out of calling someone an idiot.
theophontes (坏蛋):
October 11th, 2012 at 1:02 am
@ Tony
A breakfast mainstay here. Delicious with pickles, roast peanuts and accompanied with Chinese donut sticks.
Always a problem in a pan, as it likes to suck up oil. I have taken to blanching slices in boiling salted water prior to use. (They need a bit of a head-start.)
What works really well: Slice them in half down the middle and score the flesh with x-shaped cuts. baste with finely chopped garlic in olive oil (add your favourite herbs/spices) and barbeque over the coals. Give them time to get really soft and caramelise and burn the skins slightly for extra taste.
Make lots, ’cause the remainder you can scoop out into a bowl the next day. Add lemon juice, corriander, fennel seeds … whatever you enjoy,… some fresh fine chopped garlic (never enough!) and olive oil. Mash well and eat on fresh baked sourdough bread. Omnomnom….
strange gods before me ॐ:
October 11th, 2012 at 1:13 am
Menyambal: it’s hard to imagine what Renault would say on the subject today if she were still alive. I say it’s hard because she evidently didn’t come at everything from a default “contrarian supporting the status quo” standpoint like Paglia does.
+++++
Tony,
Yeah. Paglia also insisted on referring to Chaz Bono as “Chastity”.
PS: Renault was a lesbian, so we can assume she’s dealt with straight privilege.
Tony •Prom King of Sunnydale High•:
October 11th, 2012 at 1:14 am
Ok, so today is National Coming Out Day:
I’m queer.
Alethea H. "Crocoduck" Dundee:
October 11th, 2012 at 1:18 am
Tony, congee is usually made with a shorter grain rice, or broken rice. Cook it in stock (chicken is usual) to what we westerners normally think of as overcooked so it starts going mushy. It should be like a thickish soup. Here’s a simple one (uses Jasmine rice): http://www.abc.net.au/tv/pohskitchen/stories/s3063499.htm (AUS coriander = US cilantro)
theophontes (坏蛋):
October 11th, 2012 at 1:22 am
@ chigau
Yeah, along the line of “individualist”. A dreadful indictment back in the day but rather par for the course today.
It can also mean “unskilled”. Or more broadly something like “couch-potato” compared to the athletic prowess one was expected to display. Also: “Lacking expertise”, “ignorant” …
Link.
theophontes (坏蛋):
October 11th, 2012 at 1:27 am
PS: Sorry, borked link:
Link to The History Guide. This is a series of easy-to-read lectures on Ancient and Medieval European History. The topic above is referred to in Chapter 6.
Tony •Prom King of Sunnydale High•:
October 11th, 2012 at 1:33 am
SGBM:
…
That’s so odd then. The cultures she lived in (Cape Town and London) were overwhelmingly viewed as heterosexual, so obviously, if you were straight it wasn’t something to put on a big show about. But if you were gay, you had to deny that aspect of yourself or face strong social consequences. When queers started publicly announcing their sexuality, being able to self identify was a huge moment. Moreover, she seemed to fall prey to the idea that homosexual is all about the sex. Despite being a lesbian, I wonder if she ever came to understand that sexuality is part of who we are, but it is not *all* of who we are. One should no more define a homosexual man by his sexual behavior than one would a heterosexual man.
Alethea H. "Crocoduck" Dundee:
October 11th, 2012 at 1:44 am
I am tired and I don’t want to go to the gym even though it is Gym Day. Somebody please tell me to go to the gym.
Giliell, Approved Straight Chorus:
October 11th, 2012 at 1:53 am
Good morning
Yay for Nerd and the Readhead
Deborah
Best luck with the apartment.
And if you feel alone, there’s always the Lounge
+++
(gay) sex grosses me out.
I think it tells more about the person who says this than about the sex other people have. I mean, it’s reasonable to assume that most couples I know have or have had sex. And the parents I know are sure to have had sex. But somehow the first thing that doesn’t cross my mind when somebody introduces me to their partner or shows up with a kid is “IIIIIIIIIeeeeeeeeehhhhhh they had SEGHS*!!!”
++++
Breakfast:
Since I’m on Thyroxin I NEED brekfast. I faint without and no, fainting in public into a strong man’s arms is NOT romantic. It’s just scary.
I generally have something like Cornfalkes, Wheetabix or Porridge.
+++
Why do that? Enough energy was wasted on growing the damn thing.
+++
Joe
Shish Kebap
Mix meat with an egg, garlic, garlic, onions, garlic, spices, garlic.
Form “sausages” around a wooden skewer and barbecue
Alethea
Go to the gym!
Please.
*BTW, where’s Brownian? I understand that Louis is busy, but those lines aren’t getting shorter by themselves.
theophontes (坏蛋):
October 11th, 2012 at 1:54 am
GO TO THE GYM!!!!2!!!@!!! DAMNIT!!!!!
theophontes (坏蛋):
October 11th, 2012 at 2:00 am
@ Tony
Linky.
Alethea H. "Crocoduck" Dundee:
October 11th, 2012 at 2:05 am
But but the bloke doesn’t want to go either and he’s offering to buy me drinks.
oh ok damnit I’ll go to the gym.
birgerjohansson:
October 11th, 2012 at 2:10 am
Um, the “Yippeee!!!” remark was about Malala surviving, not about her getting shot in the head.
Sometimes I overdo the “keep posts short” thing.
opposablethumbs:
October 11th, 2012 at 2:38 am
Yay for the Redhead – hope the outing goes/went well.
You went to the gym, right, Alethea? Good on you! I’m going in an hour or two …
blf:
October 11th, 2012 at 2:48 am
Well, there wouldn’t be much time to waste, since people don’t do much of anything to peas. It’s what the peas do to people. And it’s horses which are often involved. Not houses. Easy mistake to make. (Hint: The one with a door is house. Unless it’s wooden, on wheels, and outside the gates. Then it’s a horse.)
────────────────────────────────
Same as squash: Cover in concrete. Throw into sea. Prepare something edible.
────────────────────────────────
Not the squash recipe.
Tony •Prom King of Sunnydale High•:
October 11th, 2012 at 3:24 am
Beatrice:
The Everyday Misogyny thread @B&W is giving me a fucking headache. So many people have tried to inform ianmacdougall how wrong he is and the nitwit just digs deeper and deeper. Now he’s got emily isalwaysright sticking up for him.
Beatrice, anti-imperialist anti-racist Islamophobiaphobic leftist:
October 11th, 2012 at 3:47 am
Yeah, Tony, I’ve seen.
I feel like I’ve fallen into a strange alternate universe. Or something out of Twilight Zone.
Tony •Prom King of Sunnydale High•:
October 11th, 2012 at 3:49 am
Giliell:
No vampire is going to bite you, you garlic lover :)
I’m right there with you. I think I put so much garlic in my food that I don’t know what the stuff tastes like anymore. But it sure smells good at least!
****
deborahbell:
I can’t believe I didn’t think of this earlier. Turkey sausage is a great alternative to other breakfast meats. I sometimes slice some up, toss in the oven (with garlic, salt n pepper) just to warm up (most of the turkey sausage I’ve seen is already cooked) and then toss into a bowl of grits. It’s scrumdeliumptious.
****
Alethea.
Paging Alethea.
Please pick up your phone.
It’s the gym calling.
Your presence is requested.
****
theophontes:
I’ve never seen that symbol before.
That’s awesome!
Thank you!
****
Joe’s question about eggplant has me wondering if you can eat that raw. I suppose you can, but is that any good? I mean broccoli and carrots are delumptious served raw. Some strange people around the world like raw cucumbers (which are apparently the fourth most widely cultivated vegetable in the world).
Yes, cucumbers are on my list, along with cauliflower, peas, mussels, clams, coleslaw, green beans, oysters, sauerkraut, brussels sprouts, and more. I just realized a theme among the foods I don’t like. Too many of them are vegetables. I can’t think of a grain or meat product that I don’t like.
****
blf:
before you toss the squash in the ocean, can I haz the seeds? They’re so good.
Also, if you have a dog, you can give the squash to them. My roomie E has an American Bulldog who loves squash. My dog Krystal, is a little more finicky.
****
Peas, Obi Won. They’re my only hope.
Tony •Prom King of Sunnydale High•:
October 11th, 2012 at 3:51 am
Beatrice:
I meant to add that I saw what you and LeftSidePositive had to say, and it seemed so simple to grasp, yet some people just don’t get it.
Tony •Prom King of Sunnydale High•:
October 11th, 2012 at 3:53 am
blf:
What if it’s a talking horse with an owner named Wilbur?
(was Ed his first name or last?)
Beatrice, anti-imperialist anti-racist Islamophobiaphobic leftist:
October 11th, 2012 at 4:01 am
I’ll need to add politically correct to my name.
It’s getting too long.
Alethea H. "Crocoduck" Dundee:
October 11th, 2012 at 4:02 am
OK, I went to the gym. I’m home now. Thank you. The bloke says I’m a better man than he is, and called me Gunga Din. He seems confused.
Tony •Prom King of Sunnydale High•:
October 11th, 2012 at 4:32 am
Christopher Lambert is one of 10 action stars of the 80s who has drifted into obscurity.
****
Beatrice:
Ha ha!
Now I’m engaging in confirmation bias because I gave supporting citations for Victim Blaming.
****
Really? An iPad mini?
Beatrice, anti-imperialist anti-racist Islamophobiaphobic leftist:
October 11th, 2012 at 4:32 am
Did someone paint a giant “Kick me” sign and stuck it to my back, somehow making it noticeable only to commenters on B&W? Because every fucking commenter there seems to want to chastise me for something, from fucking Rebekah to ianmacdougall.
People say same things I do, but then I get all the incredulous bullshit from Ian who must be respected because he comments there long.
I think I’ll go back to just reading Ophelia’s posts.
blf:
October 11th, 2012 at 4:52 am
Peas: Check.
Brussel sprouts: Check.
More: Ah, more? Never heard of such a food…
But, but, but, mussels? Clams? Coleslaw? Oysters??? Sauerkraut? Cauliflower? What about heathen (even if it would be cannibalism)? I mean, like (er, don’t), oysters! Heathen!!
Sounds like a challenge…
Tigger_the_Wing:
October 11th, 2012 at 5:20 am
Conga rats on making it to the gym, Alethea! You are a batter man than me, too, Gunga Din! =^_^=
Tigger_the_Wing:
October 11th, 2012 at 5:21 am
Batter? Better, of course. I think the eggplants have invaded my previous comment.
Beatrice, anti-imperialist anti-racist Islamophobiaphobic leftist:
October 11th, 2012 at 6:04 am
Mmm, eggplants in batter, fried.
Giliell, Approved Straight Chorus:
October 11th, 2012 at 7:06 am
*dum-dum-di-dumm* Electric tealights *dum-dum-di-dumm*
+++
Have you ever encountered the (usually) past middle-age man who, for some reason (illness, death, divorce) is no longer supplied with cake by his wife and now takes great pride in baking or learning how to bake?
Funny how those vain women’s activities like talking about the advantages of silicone moulds suddenly are all worthy of their time.
Met one of this specimen today. And of course he felt entitled to all the women’s time to tell him what is what. But at least he was friendly, so no grumpy feelings, just marvelling at how things turn from “womanly and unworthy of pursuit” to proper manly achievements…
+++
beatrice
Well, you got yourself two nice examples of reasonable people (raised by wolves and living on a different planet). Kind of glad I’ve taken my leave from B&W
broboxley OT:
October 11th, 2012 at 7:47 am
#258 theophontes
from your link, bit of a stratch dont you think? Sumerian afterlife
sumerian afterlife was either zombie, vampiric or sitting around eating clay. Not much to look forward to but there all the same
Audley Z. Darkheart (liar and scoundrel):
October 11th, 2012 at 8:13 am
Tony:
I feel like there’s already an iPad mini– it’s an iPod Touch.
If everyone will permit me to briefly whine:
I am so done with this pregnancy thing. My back hurts, my feet hurt, my fucking ribs hurt. I can’t get out of my chair without feeling like I’m gonna topple over. I’m hungry 24/7, but I can only eat a little bit at a time and I can’t ever take a full breath.
I am so fucking sick of being tired and uncomfortable and I still have 2 weeks to go. Is it bad that I hope that I go onto labor before my scheduled c-section just so I can have my body back?
chigau (悲しい):
October 11th, 2012 at 9:01 am
Hang in there Audley!
Soon you can have a beer!
Improbable Joe:
October 11th, 2012 at 9:17 am
Giliell,
See, now this is why I’m glad I learned how to cook and clean and generally take care of myself when I was a kid. Years before I moved out of my parents’ house, I didn’t depend on my parents to take care of me. Plus, my parents both worked and split the chores so I never saw anything as “women’s work.” I joke with my wife that a woman’s place is the hell out of my kitchen.
Improbable Joe:
October 11th, 2012 at 9:18 am
Audley,
It isn’t bad that you want to hurry up and go into labor. It would be bad if you took up bungie jumping or bought a trampoline to hurry things along.
birgerjohansson:
October 11th, 2012 at 9:20 am
Indonesia Gang-Rape Victim Reportedly Expelled From School For ‘Tarnishing Institution’s Image’ http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/10/10/indonesia-gang-rape-victim-expelled_n_1955753.html
-Fuck these motherfuckers!
— — —
giliell:
*dum-dum-di-dumm*
“We are farmers, dum-di-dum-di-dum-dum dum-dum”
carlie:
October 11th, 2012 at 9:21 am
Audley – why do you think there are so many old tales out there on how to induce labor? ;) Hang in there!
opposablethumbs:
October 11th, 2012 at 9:27 am
Hang in there Audley! Not long to go now … and soonish you’ll get your body back {hug}. My sympathies, I remember I bloody well wanted mine back. Hope you’re getting backrubs/footrubs/Nice Cups of Tea as and when.
Audley Z. Darkheart (liar and scoundrel):
October 11th, 2012 at 9:27 am
Hmmmm… a trampoline….
opposablethumbs:
October 11th, 2012 at 9:28 am
Oh, I went to the gym too, Alethea – didn’t see you there, though, so I must have just missed you.
Audley Z. Darkheart (liar and scoundrel):
October 11th, 2012 at 9:29 am
Thanks, everyone.
Nutmeg:
October 11th, 2012 at 9:34 am
*hugs* and *squidz* for Audley. You’re almost there!
Giliell, Approved Straight Chorus:
October 11th, 2012 at 9:59 am
Audley
I so know that feeling. Get the fuck out there now or I’ll make you! #1 went 5 days over her due date and I was shouting, cursing, crying and being generally miserable. For the love of life, apart from the actual danger for the fetus, I can never understand how somebody would go for 43 weeks without induction.
The saying goes that heavy duty sex can start labour ;)
Audley Z. Darkheart (liar and scoundrel):
October 11th, 2012 at 10:01 am
Yay squidz!
Portia:
October 11th, 2012 at 10:07 am
Please accept this virtual toaster oven. : )
——
Audley
I’m sorry you’re hurting. I’m excited for you that the time is so close at hand to hold DarkInfant in your arms, instead of your insides :)
broboxley OT:
October 11th, 2012 at 10:08 am
audley, no horseback riding after drinking a bottle of castor oil
chigau (悲しい):
October 11th, 2012 at 10:14 am
Paging Dr. Freud.
carlie:
October 11th, 2012 at 10:27 am
Well, in that it starts the whole process in the first place…
Audley Z. Darkheart (liar and scoundrel):
October 11th, 2012 at 10:39 am
Giliell:
Thankfully with a planned c-section, I know I won’t go over my due date (it’s actually 4 days before she’s due). My docs also have a “cut off”– I can’t remember the exact number of days they’ll let you go over, but it’s only 4 or 5 before they recommend being induced.
And heavy duty sex hasn’t started labor yet, so I’m feeling kind of cheated. :p
(Not sure how true it is, but what I’ve heard is that sex brings on labor only after you’ve started dilating. No such luck here.)
Portia:
Thank you. I took a walk around the warehouse and things seem to be, ah, loosening up a bit, so I’m not feeeling quite so bad. Uncomfortable, yes, but the pain has definitely dulled.
In other news, I’m trying to draft an email reminding everyone at work that my medical leave starts on Monday, so if anything comes up they need to contact the new supervisor or the sales staff. I’m running into problems with closing the email– I’m trying to say goodbye without sounding too sappy (I really do like most of the people I work with and I will miss them. Plus, they don’t know whether I plan to come back or not). Blast!
Audley Z. Darkheart (liar and scoundrel):
October 11th, 2012 at 10:42 am
I could just close with
I suppose.
chigau (悲しい):
October 11th, 2012 at 10:43 am
Audley #300
What’s wrong with sappy?
Leave them weeping!
Audley Z. Darkheart (liar and scoundrel):
October 11th, 2012 at 10:48 am
Chigau:
You know, it would be amusing to make a bunch of Jersey Tuff Guise™ all blubbery. :D
cicely:
October 11th, 2012 at 11:16 am
Link followed; tab duplicated. Thanks, Hekuni Cat! I will definitely check it out!
Also: *hug*
-
I said “with” rather than “to”, but other than that, you’re preachin’ to the choir, blf; and I further note that unlike Horses, houses are seldom intrinsically Evil. Any Evil has to be grafted on later by Unnatural Means.
I would also argue that anyone performing vegesexual acts with peas, whether in the privacy of their bedrooms or not, has probably, at some point, met up with a Horse. I just don’t spend a lot of time fantasizing lingeringly about such unfortunates.
-
Word. Though a well-proportioned and unscarred eggplant may, together with various colors of bell peppers and other inedibles, be arranged to make a colorful and attractive centerpiece. You just don’t want to stick a fork in it.
-
*hugs* and sympathy, Audley. Ah, I remember the feeling all too well; sick and tired of feeling sick and tired. Son was a week early; coulda trimmed another week offa that and I wouldn’t've minded atall.
My mother went a month into over-time with my youngest brother. *shudder*
-
What to Expect When Expecting (in the Village of the Damned).
-
Beatrice, anti-imperialist anti-racist Islamophobiaphobic leftist:
October 11th, 2012 at 11:22 am
cicely,
I hate you
cicely:
October 11th, 2012 at 11:29 am
Beatrice,
My work here is done.
*flourishing cape*
-
Improbable Joe:
October 11th, 2012 at 11:36 am
Audley, Why not this:
Edison out!
*drops mic*
Nutmeg:
October 11th, 2012 at 11:40 am
I haz a happy: I have graphs and tables! Yay, successful data analysis!
I haz a sad: My advisor is busy writing grant applications and won’t be able to admire my pretty graphs until November.
I haz an intimidated: Therefore, I must do brilliant things with this data between now and then.
…I think I’ll go work out.
broboxley OT:
October 11th, 2012 at 12:13 pm
under today’s WTF
http://blogs.telegraph.co.uk/news/brendanoneill2/100183130/darkies-is-a-disgusting-word-but-people-shouldnt-be-given-suspended-jail-sentences-for-saying-it/
please someone tell me he has the facts wrong
thunk, Blob Alert!:
October 11th, 2012 at 12:17 pm
Hia all.
I’m sort of tired, distracted, and bitter right now, partly because of the workload, and partly because of Mittens (seriously, these “debates” are farces).
So I’ve relapsed to lurking. Bleh.
Audley: Good luck with the immediate pre-birth, and C-section!
The rest of you, hope you’re well.
Rev. BigDumbChimp:
October 11th, 2012 at 12:25 pm
Octopus Opens Food Canister While Fending Off A Shark
chigau (悲しい):
October 11th, 2012 at 12:40 pm
Hi thunk.
Don’t overwork yourself.
Audley Z. Darkheart (liar and scoundrel):
October 11th, 2012 at 12:49 pm
Thank you, thunk!
I’m still stuck on this email. So far I’ve got:
And I kind of dead end there. Dammit.
vaiyt:
October 11th, 2012 at 1:17 pm
Haha. Oh, who knew I was doing it wrong all this time?
Not.
opposablethumbs:
October 11th, 2012 at 2:08 pm
Well I like aubergine. In moussakas, or sliced thin and dipped in a thick spicy batter with plenty of garlic and fried … mmmmmmm.
What’s with all the anti-aubergine sentiment. I even like peas sometimes. Hah.
Damn, I’m in a stroppy mood this evening.
Nakkustoppeli:
October 11th, 2012 at 2:09 pm
While salting and pressing does have its advantages (the eggplant will absorb less fat), it isn’t necessary. Eggplant can be fried on a hot skillet (the water content is high so they can take a lot of heat) as it is, just diced. Some sweet peppers, onions, tomatoes (and whatever carlie said) could be added. I’m not a carnivore anymore but I think I could have formed the lamb into patties and eaten it with the eggplant back when I was.
Another thing to do with eggplant would be making a casserole:
Grease a casserole dish, put some fresh carrots and other roots (parsnip, parsley root, maybe even some potatoes), black and white pepper, some fresh mushrooms, onions, garlic, sweet peppers and celery stalks in the aforementioned dish, put the egglant on top and add some water (as little as possible) and bake in the oven (200 C) until everything is suitably softened (maybe 45 min to 1 hr), then add some tomato paste, basil, oregano, thyme and sour cream (or smetana or creme fraiche if available) and mix everything up and put it back in the oven and keep it there until boiling restarts.
If some ingredients are unavailble leave them out or substitute with something else. The juices of eggplant, celery stalks and fresh mushrooms provide most of the liquid, so not much water is needed and the flavors will not be diluted. Tomato paste and sour cream should not be added too early because the roots won’t cook properly in acidic conditions.
—
My condolences to Giliell and good luck to Audley Z. Darkheart!
Improbable Joe:
October 11th, 2012 at 2:20 pm
Eggplant thin-sliced and fried, along with tomatoes and feta? As a side-dish for the ground lamb with garlic, onion, and fresh mint? Maybe some tzatziki on the side?
Nakkustoppeli:
October 11th, 2012 at 2:34 pm
Sounds very good. Go for it!
Improbable Joe:
October 11th, 2012 at 2:46 pm
Well, I’ve got the eggplant and the cucumber both salting. Lovely, but I sort of wish I’d started, ummm… yesterday?
Giliell, Approved Straight Chorus:
October 11th, 2012 at 2:47 pm
Well, you can have all of mine.
++++
*dum-dum-di-dumm*
I can haz Halloween
We’re going to eat a lot of applesauce….
Audley Z. Darkheart (liar and scoundrel):
October 11th, 2012 at 2:53 pm
Okay, maybe someone can tell me what it is about being pregnant that makes people want to tell you about all of their fertility problems?
Sorry if this makes me a callous asshole, but no, random dude at work, I really don’t give two shits about your wife’s IVF treatments. I don’t care how many years it took her to conceive; this whole conversation is unprofessional and kind of creepy. Just get the hell out of my office, okay?
(Friends and family and [Loungers] are, of course, exempt. But random strangers? Coworkers? Friends of friends of friends? Yeah… not so much.)
Beatrice, anti-imperialist anti-racist Islamophobiaphobic leftist:
October 11th, 2012 at 2:55 pm
I really hope those jars look bigger than they really are, because you’re not going to eat just a lot of applesauce. More like enough to make you hate apples for the rest of your life.
Cool lamps! Did you draw that yourself or bought a pattern? In any case, they’re pretty.
—
Joe, I usually leave aubergines salting for half an hour, hour tops. Unless they are really really bitter.
Often, I just fry them right away.
Fresh cucumbers… Now there’s something I’m not very fond of.
Improbable Joe:
October 11th, 2012 at 2:59 pm
Audley, now I’m glad I didn’t decide to tell you about that time that my penis jumped off and replaced itself with an eggplant for three months while it was on followed Phish around for a summer. That would have been embarrassing for me and I guess it would have bothered you something fierce.
Tony •Prom King of Sunnydale High•:
October 11th, 2012 at 3:00 pm
Audley:
Not much longer now at least.
I just bet you’re eager to get pregnant again real quick like…[ducks]
****
Portia @296
Thank you.
Why do I see My Little Pony all over it?
****
thunk:
Stay well. Don’t work yourself too much.
Tony •Prom King of Sunnydale High•:
October 11th, 2012 at 3:03 pm
Joe:
I really hope your Eggplant penis didn’t look anything like this. It looks a bit heavy and oddly colored.
broboxley OT:
October 11th, 2012 at 3:04 pm
Audley, I am also numbed by driveby TMI at work example from the other day
“My doc said I have the womb and ovaries of a 27yo”
I didnt know her first name at that point in time.
AJ Milne:
October 11th, 2012 at 3:08 pm
I’m taking breakfast notes. I mostly do heavy protein-type stuff for the kids (they’re fond of chicken and turkey bacons and eggs); and as I have mild issues with heavy greasy stuff, but am still looking for some protein, it’s usually a bit more into the blueberries and/or grapefruit and cured cheeses area for me.
… my own contribution/suggestion: fruit compôte is pretty awesome, if you have fruit around that goes a bit too mushy just to eat as is (I kind live on berries, so this does happen on and off), and happen to be nocturnal like me, and more functional at night anyway. Mince and and cook the fruit into compôte the night before, which you can then store in the fridge a few days. Nice with oatmeal or on a slice of something crusty. Try something like steel-cut oatmeal, maple syrup, fruit compôte with something tart in it, like cranberries. This is actually a breakfast with some serious mileage in it and not a lot of work, and you can do the same deal with the oatmeal (cook the night before, chill into a few serving sized dishes, microwave in morning, keeps a few days).
On the more fun recipe front, I have now managed to make ganache-filled truffles work. And my tempering skills are now frickin’ formidable again, if I do say so myself.
… but the ganache kinda needs work. May post in here once I’ve got both winning techniques and proportions, but it’s really not there yet.
opposablethumbs:
October 11th, 2012 at 3:09 pm
Thank you Giliell! Om nom nom :-D
(and it’s vegetable soup tonight, using up all yesterday’s leftovers from the roast vegetables we had, plus extra spinach, plus sprinkling in the leftover rice at the last minute so’s it won’t get soggy. With parmesan on top. Yum.)
opposablethumbs:
October 11th, 2012 at 3:11 pm
Which 27yo did you nick them from …?
Maybe that’s only appropriate if at least one of the interlocutors is an Igorina or an Igor.
Audley Z. Darkheart (liar and scoundrel):
October 11th, 2012 at 3:14 pm
Joe:
What bothers me the most is you wingwang was following Phish around. Ugh. Jam bands.
Giliell, Approved Straight Chorus:
October 11th, 2012 at 3:20 pm
beatrice
It’s embroidery (machine done).
The jars are 720ml for the small ones. The big one was 1,5l of gherkins which I donated to my sister and grandma. Too much dill.
Audley
Hey, remember, pregnant = not actual person anymore. Only actual person container.
Also remember: you’re done tomorow. Then two weeks of waiting and then DF eviction.
Esteleth, Elen síla lumenn' omentielvo:
October 11th, 2012 at 3:28 pm
Breakfast foods:
I make a portable breakfast, carry it to work, and eat while doing my morning e-mail. It works well. My usual breakfast is a bagel (usually honey whole grain) with cream cheese (usually chive and onion) with tea.
I have never once eaten eggplant (to my knowledge). What does it taste like?
Giliell, Approved Straight Chorus:
October 11th, 2012 at 3:32 pm
Cardboard
chigau (悲しい):
October 11th, 2012 at 3:36 pm
I was going to suggest kleenex.
Beatrice, anti-imperialist anti-racist Islamophobiaphobic leftist:
October 11th, 2012 at 3:37 pm
eggplant:
The texture is a bit spongy. It’s a bit bitter, but (unless you are unlucky and buy the really bitter one) it gets sort of sweet after cooking.
I can’t say that it reminds me of any other food, so no comparison.
carlie:
October 11th, 2012 at 3:38 pm
Slimy cardboard.
But good.
Improbable Joe:
October 11th, 2012 at 3:40 pm
Eggplant tastes like… the white part of a strawberry?
Beatrice, anti-imperialist anti-racist Islamophobiaphobic leftist:
October 11th, 2012 at 3:41 pm
Er, my description didn’t make it sound appetizing, did it?
But I like eggplant. In moussaka or just fried in batter, in tomato sauce or smashed into a paste with garlic, olive oil and spices.
kristinc, ~ringy dingy~:
October 11th, 2012 at 3:42 pm
I think sliced and pan fried eggplant with garlic tastes smoky and creamy. Sort of in the bacon family of flavors, although not similar to bacon in texture at all and, I hasten to assure, NOT an actual substitute for bacon (but a great pairing). I like it in a sandwich or on crackers with a smear of cream cheese and chunks of pan fried zucchini.
My usual breakfast is a big smoothie. About 1/2c of plain yogurt or kefir, 1.5 cups of fruit and vegetables a combination of fresh and frozen, some virgin coconut oil and some lightly sweetened green tea, or OJ or even lemonade. Gets way more servings of fruit & veg into me than I would actually sit down and eat first thing in the morning.
Esteleth, Elen síla lumenn' omentielvo:
October 11th, 2012 at 3:42 pm
These are not exactly glowing recommendations, people. :/
kristinc, ~ringy dingy~:
October 11th, 2012 at 3:43 pm
I’ve only ever found eggplant spongy once, btw, and that was before I learned to cook the ever loving crap out of it.
Beatrice, anti-imperialist anti-racist Islamophobiaphobic leftist:
October 11th, 2012 at 3:49 pm
I cook the crap out of it in combination with tomato sauce, but when I fry it in batter I leave it in the pan for a short time. I would describe the texture as a bit spongy, but good. Can spongy be good at all?
Eggplant is strange. You either love it or hate it.
But I saw a recipe for eggplant slices with chocolate and now I want to try that. I’m just afraid of wasting chocolate in case it tastes like shit.
carlie:
October 11th, 2012 at 3:49 pm
It’s only slimy if you don’t drain it enough before cooking, hence smashing it under stuff for a few hours first.
Portia:
October 11th, 2012 at 3:51 pm
AJ, I have made ganache filled truffles to delicious effect, but tempering chocolate had been a failure so far. Any advice?
(I also recommend the combo of brownie/ganache truffles, if you have stale brownies or cake, mix it up and it’s super tasty).
Beatrice, anti-imperialist anti-racist Islamophobiaphobic leftist:
October 11th, 2012 at 3:54 pm
Interesting.
I like eggplant with little draining before (hour at most, none for some dishes).
I guess draining it well would be better for first timers.
cicely:
October 11th, 2012 at 3:59 pm
Squashy cardboard. Like a box that something has soaked through.
-
carlie:
October 11th, 2012 at 4:05 pm
It’s just not a by itself kind of food. Peas, green beans, broccoli, carrots, those are things you can eat by themselves. Eggplant, not so much. It has to have tomatoes, or breading and olive oil, or sauce, or something. Just like how you wouldn’t eat a straight zucchini, because ugh.
Beatrice, anti-imperialist anti-racist Islamophobiaphobic leftist:
October 11th, 2012 at 4:09 pm
Like, raw?
Ew, I agree.
Lynna, OM:
October 11th, 2012 at 4:09 pm
Mr. Deity has posted a new video. This one takes on Mormonism and Racism.
YouTube link.
Tony •Prom King of Sunnydale High•:
October 11th, 2012 at 4:19 pm
Beatrice:
I want to try the “encase in concrete; throw in sea” technique myself :)
****
Restaurant manager ordered to pay $15K to waitress for asking to see her nipples
Was the manager unaware that this is sexual harassment?
Or did he simply not care?
****
Former President Bush and Presidential hopeful John McCain had more support among Latinos than Mitt Romney
No surprise there.
****
Testosterone can make men more honest?
Ogvorbis: broken and cynical:
October 11th, 2012 at 4:20 pm
Ah. You are filled, filled I say, with the joys of impending motherhood! This is a magical time in your life, the creation of a new life through the magic of Gawd! And you are doing the one thing that Gawd! designed you to do so stop complaining and make me a sammich!
(In case no one gets it, that is satire/irony/attempted humour.)
=========
Wife and I had dinner out last night and one of the items of discussion was how much fun it would be to open up a restaurant near, say, MIT, or RIT, or Stanford, or University of Chicago, or one of the other universities with a really strong math and physics programme. And name the dishes using different mathematical and/or science words. Such as:
Avacado’s Number: an avacado sandwich
Chicken Planck’s Constant: Fried chicken strips
Mach One: Triple-caffeine coffee.
Can anyone else think of other possibilities?
Portia:
October 11th, 2012 at 4:21 pm
not sure if rhetorical, but most assholes just don’t care. They are entitled to treat you like an object, and you will shut up and take it.
Giliell, Approved Straight Chorus:
October 11th, 2012 at 4:25 pm
Ogvorbis
Yes, they can serve π
And gravy-ti
Nutmeg:
October 11th, 2012 at 4:31 pm
We Canucks don’t have a National Coming Out Day that I’m aware of. And I can’t come out to my folks today, because it’s my dad’s birthday. (“Happy birthday, Dad! I’ll now crush any remaining hope you had that one of your kids would turn out straight!”) But I’m celebrating NCOD anyway, by drafting an email to my brother. I’m not planning on sending it today. I’ll need to re-write it at least 5 times before then. But it’s a start.
I don’t need a toaster as my coming-out prize. But I could use a kettle. Are those on offer?
AJ Milne:
October 11th, 2012 at 4:39 pm
Re tempering chocolate, secrets:
Clean and dry everything. Dry well ahead of time, let the atmosphere take any moisture you might miss.
Chop chocolate at arms length. As in: don’t touch it any more than you have to. Tap off board into top of double boiler (2/3 portion) and clean, dry glass measuring cup (1/3 portion) with blade of knife. I don’t know if this is essential, but what it means to me is: washing your hands will be less trouble, and that’s less water around, again, which is also what you generally want.
Chop the 1/3 portion very fine–you can be a bit lazy about the 2/3, not the 1/3. And you can ‘cheat’ a bit, if you’re impatient: a little more than 1/3 in the seeding portion means things will cool a smidge faster. As long as it’s very fine, you’re unlikely to wind up with unmelted lumps you have to fish out. And cooling a little faster means less opportunity for bad things happening. If I’m doing like a pound and its in those little 2cm^3 lumps, I’ll do like an extra lump into the 1/3 portion.
Keeping the water under control, cooling the top of the boiler fast: have a clean, big, soft tea-towel type thing handy right next to where you’re working. Moment you hit 115, pull the top of the boiler off and right onto that towel. Keep that around for the later portion where you’re bringing it back up to 89, too. Just means more control of the water and vapour, again, less to go wrong.
Make sure your centres are all ready to go before you try coating. Again, just less messing around, and it’s easy to keep the tempered chocolate in the zone while you’re working if you can work faster.
Turn the burner off the moment you pull the boiler off. You can get the heat you need back fast enough, and you really don’t need much.
Portia:
October 11th, 2012 at 4:43 pm
AJ Milne
Thank you! I look forward to trying it again.
Nutmeg
Coming right up. Tis the season for tea, eh?
Tony •Prom King of Sunnydale High•:
October 11th, 2012 at 4:49 pm
Lynna:
Thanks for that link to Mr Deity.
I’m having a blast listening to his videos!
broboxley OT:
October 11th, 2012 at 5:05 pm
eggplant parmigiana tastes a lot like chicken parmigiana. Put it in a sub roll and party on
Patricia, OM:
October 11th, 2012 at 5:10 pm
I feel like I’m in the Twilight Zone…2nd day with no veterans coming in. I’ve knitted two inches on a sweater so far.
kristinc, ~ringy dingy~:
October 11th, 2012 at 5:11 pm
Yeah, eggplant tastes like whatever you cook it with, and if you cook it *entirely* by itself it’s kind of blah. In a curry, cubes of eggplant are a bit less mealy and squashy than potato, but similarly neutral sponges for the sauce.
Tony •Prom King of Sunnydale High•:
October 11th, 2012 at 5:16 pm
Ogvorbis:
Heisenberg’s Uncertain Pasta
Steady Steak
Energy=Meatloaf + Carrots squared
For drinks:
Quantum Mai Tai
For a buffet:
Natural Selection
****
Nutmeg:
So your brother isn’t heterosexual?
Have your parents made their opinions on gay people known?
Improbable Joe:
October 11th, 2012 at 5:28 pm
Well… that was the best dinner I’ve cooked since my wife left town. The eggplant turned out well. The lamb was minty goodness, and the tzatziki turned out better than I hoped. I had a slice of buttered bread with it and called it a meal.
Richard Austin:
October 11th, 2012 at 5:33 pm
Hrm, maybe you can have an appetizer of String (Theory) Cheese, with it cut into Calabi-yau manifolds.
I wonder if the extra dimensions make it more or less fattening…
Nutmeg:
October 11th, 2012 at 5:38 pm
Portia: Thanks for the virtual kettle. *sips dark chocolate mint tea*
Tony: No, my brother’s gay. He’s 30 now and has been out for ~15 years. My parents have come around to being supportive, but my dad has some lingering homophobia that comes out when he’s had a couple of drinks.
It’s an interesting situation. I don’t have to be scared that they’ll freak out. But because I’m supposed to be “the straight one”, I worry more that they’ll be disappointed. On the whole, though, I’m pretty lucky.
Nerd of Redhead, Dances OM Trolls:
October 11th, 2012 at 5:41 pm
Better check to see that the Lilac Berets of the Pullet Patrol™ weren’t out front on guard duty.
Portia:
October 11th, 2012 at 5:41 pm
Nutmeg, where do you find this delicious-sounding tea?!
Tony •Prom King of Sunnydale High•:
October 11th, 2012 at 5:44 pm
Al Stefanelli is leaving FtB.
****
Did you know that Office Depot is trying to teach gay people that they’re born this way? Nah. Of course they aren’t. But the American Family Association sure thinks so.
****
Nutmeg:
October 11th, 2012 at 6:04 pm
Portia: Here. It’s the only kind of tea I’ve found that has just enough caffeine to keep me alert but not enough to screw with my sleep patterns.
carlie:
October 11th, 2012 at 6:07 pm
Gamow’s Gumbo
Tompkins tomato soup
Subtraction Stew
Gelatinous Giant
Portia:
October 11th, 2012 at 6:12 pm
Thanks Nutmeg : )
Nerd of Redhead, Dances OM Trolls:
October 11th, 2012 at 6:16 pm
Ferments Last Theorem (a heavy stout)
Boils Law (a cup of tea)
Moffet-Fieser reagent (raisin bran muffin)
AJ Milne:
October 11th, 2012 at 6:26 pm
Good luck with the chocolate, Portia.
If the stars align properly I’ll be trying to do some white chocolate over bits of later this eve. But much depends on how other bits of life go and how fast some ganache comes to useable temperature, as to whether I get that far.
Whole plan is: make some ganache (with dark chocolate, and with a somewhat modified recipe from last time to make it a little less trouble at room temperature–gonna tweak cream amounts down a bit, butter and chocolate up a bit), adulterate some of it with coffee, some of it with mint, leave some of it just ‘chocolate’, then try to temper some white chocolate I just snagged and use that as a coating. End result: three flavours of white chocolate-covered truffles.
I’ve never actually tempered white chocolate before, and, honestly, the quality of this stuff is a bit of an unknown. But I’m ever hopeful. Tastes pretty good, kinda snaps off when cut, so: crossing fingers.
(/Yeah, I guess I’m on a bit of a kick. Honestly, I think it’s probably mostly a ‘not because it’s easy, but because it’s hard’ thing… That and, you know: chocolate.)
Alethea H. "Crocoduck" Dundee:
October 11th, 2012 at 6:40 pm
Hey everybody, Maureen Brian guest posted at Ophelia’s. She is awesome!
Portia:
October 11th, 2012 at 6:43 pm
I get on kicks too, with different kinds of treats. Yours sounds delectable.
Tony •Prom King of Sunnydale High•:
October 11th, 2012 at 6:44 pm
So I’m listening to the Thinking Atheist podcast #75, and wow…several of the callers are conservative atheists or libertarian atheists. I can’t understand the mindset of either one.
Portia:
October 11th, 2012 at 6:57 pm
Watching the local congressional debate on tv. GOP incumbent just said: “No I don’t support the DREAM Act. Unless they want to serve in the military or go to college. Then that’s fine, they should have a path to citizenship.”
Gah. The stoopid.
thunk, Blob Alert!:
October 11th, 2012 at 7:02 pm
Cause obviously, the court system is better than the EPA at environmental protection!
Incidentally, does anyone know any resources for dealing with blithertarian arguments?
Ogvorbis: broken and cynical:
October 11th, 2012 at 7:55 pm
This is strange.
I am watching the Pittsburgh – Tennessee game (insert insults about my viewing habits here). And, for some reason, the game is being broadcast in Spanish. Which is weird. A long string of Spanish (of which I understand about 1 word in 10) with ‘Steelers’ and ‘Polamalu’ tossed in.
cicely:
October 11th, 2012 at 8:20 pm
Or like how I wouldn’t eat a funny zucchini, or a curved one, or a gay one (more vegesexuality?), or any zucchini at all, because ugh.
-
:) :) :)
Awesome idea for a restaurant! Hmmm…Uncertain Tea, available either Iced or ‘Radioactive’ (Hot)?
-
Portia:
October 11th, 2012 at 8:35 pm
Nail ‘im to the wall, Joe! This is everything I’d hoped it would be.
kristinc, ~ringy dingy~:
October 11th, 2012 at 8:35 pm
You guys remember “The Flea” by John Donne? I can’t believe I’m saying this, but my English Lit instructor completely reversed my opinion on that poem.
Using Donne’s actual biography as, apparently, one of London’s biggest social celebrities / most eligible bachelors and quite the hit with the laydeez, he frames it as one side of an ongoing affectionate debate between lovers, wherein the speaker has constructed this elaborate and irreverent metaphor basically to make his lady friend laugh. As if she is intelligent and appreciates cleverness, and he knows it, and they’re jousting with words. OK so the topic of their jousting is whether she’s going to put out, but it’s way less squicky now.
So there you go, I am Fair and Balanced.
A. R:
October 11th, 2012 at 8:38 pm
Biden is currently hammering Ryan into the ground on Medicare.
broboxley OT:
October 11th, 2012 at 8:41 pm
Nice how Joe brings in Palin and Panels. Ryan is trying mightily but Joe appears to have his number
cicely:
October 11th, 2012 at 8:42 pm
FSM, I hope so!
I had this horrible nightmare, last night; Biden and Ryan were debating, and Biden was tanking. The polls next day showed Repubs winning in November by a solid 20% margin.
*shudder*
-
A. R:
October 11th, 2012 at 8:46 pm
cicely: No worries, Ryan looks like an entitled asshole.
Improbable Joe:
October 11th, 2012 at 8:52 pm
You folks seem surprised at Biden’s performance, but you shouldn’t be. Remember, Republicans always attack where Democrats are strong to defuse them. They went after Kerry’s service because it was honorable, and they go after Biden’s “gaffes” because he’s powerful at the podium.
In 2008 people paid attention to Sarah Palin’s clownish performance, but what they missed what that Biden would have clobbered McCain or Palin or both at the same time. There were a couple of moments in that debate where I was just like “yep, Obama’s the next president.” And of course, a smart presidential candidate picks a running mate who fills in the gaps. Biden is strong where Obama is weak, and debating is one of those places.
cicely:
October 11th, 2012 at 8:55 pm
A.R.: Yes, he does…and so does Rmoney, always…and yet I’m certain that he’s going to carry MO.
-
Tony •Prom King of Sunnydale High•:
October 11th, 2012 at 8:57 pm
I haven’t engaged in much debate with friends on Facebook. I just had a small debate with a friend on the merits of National Coming Out Day.
I can’t facepalm any more than I have already.
Portia:
October 11th, 2012 at 8:59 pm
I’m not particularly surprised by Joe’s performance, but I am eminently pleased.
I got in a small tif with a facebook friend who used the “t-word” to refer to the GOP. I pointed out that it is derogatory to trans* people and she immediately retracted and acknowledged it. It was a happy moment, and positive reinforcement for my fear of speaking up about stuff like that.
broboxley OT:
October 11th, 2012 at 9:00 pm
I like Joe and have sent money to him when he was running for the top job. He is wiping the floor with the kid. Aside from that I think the moderator needs a squirtgun on both of them in a few spots
Improbable Joe:
October 11th, 2012 at 9:03 pm
kristinc:
No… was I sick that week? :)
broboxley OT:
October 11th, 2012 at 9:15 pm
time for popcorn!
Tony •Prom King of Sunnydale High•:
October 11th, 2012 at 9:16 pm
So much for thinking dating K could possibly lead somewhere. I was wrong. Fuck, that was one of the only bright spots in my life right now.
I can’t fucking stop crying.
I’m so tired of being alone.
Portia:
October 11th, 2012 at 9:17 pm
Tony, I’m so sorry. That’s no fun. :( Wanna say what happened?
broboxley OT:
October 11th, 2012 at 9:18 pm
ryan weaseled Joe speaks from the heart
carlie:
October 11th, 2012 at 9:19 pm
*big hugs Tony*
*also a tub of ice cream*
*also a pile of kittens*
cicely:
October 11th, 2012 at 9:20 pm
*hugs* for Tony.
See, now, if I had the Hoverchair 10000….
</lame attempt at humor>
-
broboxley OT:
October 11th, 2012 at 9:21 pm
nice slide Joe! get planned parenthood in there. Well done!
Portia:
October 11th, 2012 at 9:23 pm
I hope Paul Ryan is happy, I’m so irritated that I’ve caved to my cravings and made a brownie-in-a-mug. Shockingly successful first attempt. Except my tongue is burnt from trying to eat it to fast. Over and over. Pro-tip, add chocolate chips.
broboxley OT:
October 11th, 2012 at 9:24 pm
now the debate is over I will go back to dreaming of a green win. If the registered voters who dont vote all voted green it would be a real landslide. I suspect the noseholders will win in the end :-(
Prediction President Obama wins in a squeeker, senate remains about the same and the repo’s pickup a few more seats in congress
broboxley OT:
October 11th, 2012 at 9:28 pm
aww Fuck Tony, Im pishing about politics and you are hurting :-( Im sorry man. You are a unique human being. You are not alone, we are with you
A. R:
October 11th, 2012 at 9:55 pm
Ryan had his arse handed to him on a platter made of 47% Medicare, 47% Foreign policy, and 6% honey badger.
ibyea:
October 11th, 2012 at 9:58 pm
See why regulations on toxic chemicals is important? Otherwise, you get toxic spillages that come out of places like Paul Ryan’s mouth, thereby contaminating the environment.
Tony •Prom King of Sunnydale High•:
October 11th, 2012 at 10:04 pm
Thanks everyone.
It’s so frustrating. It used to be that I couldn’t get a relationship to last more than a few months. Now I can’t even dating to work.
****
Portia:
It boils down to a difference between how two people approach dating. From my perspective, communication is highly important when dating and/or trying to build a relationship. K has been gone for about a month. His room prevents him from Skyping or making phone calls, email, or anything. He works 15-17 hours a day. I get that. But when we do get the chance to chat, it’s by text, and he reveals nothing about himself. I ask how his day went, or what a typical day is like for him, and I get nothing. I tell him I miss hearing his voice and would love if he would leave a voice message on my phone (something I did for him) so I can hear him. I get nothing. Conversely, I composed a few poems and sent them to him. They were cheesy, which is something he said he appreciates. I did that to keep the lines of communication alive and to show a side of myself to him. He never asks about my life, how I’m doing. He’s said in the past that he’s not big on revealing much about himself, and later followed up with how hurt he was in his last relationship. I thought I could woo him over (hell I thought I was succeeding). I was hoping he would open up and I could learn about him, but nothing. My frustration built over the past week when I heard nothing from him for over a week. Yet during that time I saw Facebook updates a few times. I’m sorry, but if you have time to update your FB status, but not to contact me, what does that say about your priorities? Like I said at the beginning, I think his idea of dating, and mine just don’t mesh up. I hoped that would change (he’d made comments prior to leaving that he agreed with me about communication and he’d work on that). I guess I was wrong. Perhaps the age gap had something to do with that (he’s 25, I’m 37). In any case, I’m so over living here in Florida. There are so few options for me. I know I hinge perhaps a bit too much of my happiness on building a relationship, but I can’t change that. It’s important to me and it frustrates me to no end that I’m a hopeless failure in that department.
Portia:
October 11th, 2012 at 10:13 pm
Everyone needs different things in different proportions in their life. I’m really sorry that he’s so bad at such a simple aspect of relationship building and maintenance.
Definitely sounds like a him-problem. “Talk to me now and then” is pretty fekkin’ basic. Sometimes age does make a difference. As a 25 year old, I can be pretty dumb and inconsiderate now and then. Though I have the same “Open up to me, damnit!” frustrations with the 33 year old I’m dating. So maybe I don’t have an answer. I just have sympathy and hugs and mug brownies to share.
Cry it out, don’t blame yourself, and know you are appreciated and heard here. Where would you go if you could move out of Florida?
ChasCPeterson:
October 11th, 2012 at 10:16 pm
Paul Ryan is the fratboy’s fratboy.
thunk, Blob Alert!:
October 11th, 2012 at 10:37 pm
Ouch, Tony.
My sympathies, but coming from the position of not being able to find anyone to date either.
*hugs*
trinioler:
October 11th, 2012 at 10:48 pm
So one of my friends has a plea to the Horde:
I am a transman (female-to-male), and I am also gay (androphilic). Well into my transition, I am proud of my identity in many ways but I am only very new at expressing my sexuality. As a woman, I was familiar with accepting the “male gaze” and took in much of society’s training in regards to that, including a focus on appearance and evoking feelings of lust in others. I am now challenged with forming a new identity for myself as far as things that I do to make myself feel sexually attractive and to attract others. I don’t know yet how to do this as a man, let alone a gay man, and fear of violence often colors my interactions. Things this might include are fashion, grooming, flirting behavior, and level of openness about sexual topics. On one hand I feel that I should go with my gut and try to use this as “authentic”, but another part of me feels as though it is unexamined and there could be a better answer other than falling back on societal training. I miss feeling attractive. Please help. Thank you.
theophontes (坏蛋):
October 11th, 2012 at 10:55 pm
@ broboxley
Time fore more cartoons of Ryan and Rmoney: Linky.
@ A.R
sekrit messarge @ #64 to politburo (Much to Chas chagrin ;)
@ Tony
*hugz*
Tony •Prom King of Sunnydale High•:
October 11th, 2012 at 10:56 pm
trinioler:
Damn. I wish I had some advice for your friend. Gay people have a lot of crap to deal with. Trans people have the same shit and more to deal with. The advice I might give a gay person isn’t likely to work with a transgender person.
I wonder if there’s a blogger who’s trans and gay that might have advice (and a forum for asking questions for that matter).
McC2lhu saw what you did there.:
October 11th, 2012 at 11:23 pm
If you’re already feeling misanthropic, it’s best not to read the story and watch the video the girl posted before she killed herself because of a disgustingly overextended barrage of bullying. This is one of the most tragic and disgusting displays of behaviour I have seen in a very long time. This has blown my anger management control completely out of the water. I would be driving through people’s front doors and throwing hands if I was this kid’s parent. I want to do it now and I didn’t even know the poor girl.
Very sad story about Amanda Todd from Coquitlam, BC.
A. R:
October 11th, 2012 at 11:41 pm
McC2lhu: Oh, I… Oh.
chigau (悲しい):
October 11th, 2012 at 11:42 pm
Tony
*hugs*
(I got nothin’ else.)
chigau (悲しい):
October 11th, 2012 at 11:47 pm
McC2lhu
Looks bad but is there a text somewhere?
The Vancouver Sun always crashes my net book.
Tony •Prom King of Sunnydale High•:
October 12th, 2012 at 12:01 am
I’m just now getting around to reading the recent Birth Control study. It made sense to me long ago that if women had greater (and easier) access to birth control that abortion rates would likely go down. Anti-choice activists should be thrilled (of course we know they’re not; they don’t want people having sex unless it is to have babies during marriage). Seeing the results of this study though…wow.
Contraception.
It’s highly effective.
Nutmeg:
October 12th, 2012 at 12:08 am
*hugs* to Tony. I’m sorry things didn’t work out with K. You’re a good, caring person, and you deserve to be happy. I hope that you can find a way, whether it’s in Florida or somewhere else.
Menyambal --- Sambal's Little Helper:
October 12th, 2012 at 12:17 am
Tony, an “ouch” on the dating thing, and a )hug( for you. It sounds like you just found out the guy isn’t suited, which is what dating used to be for. You sound like a right good person, especially since you are helping trinioler. I hope things go better for you.
It makes me glad that I am married, except now I have a daughter who is dating …
====
Recipe:
“Pulled” Roast Beef — cheap, easy and darkly falling apart.
Chuck roasts are found at the cheaper end of the meat department. It looks like a very thick, not very good steak (and sometimes is found as chuck steak). This method cooks it so it is easy to clean out the gristle and all.
Put a chuck roast into a pre-heated deep skillet, and sear it both sides. Season with black pepper, garlic powder and soy sauce, when and as you choose.
Reduce heat, add an inch or so of water, cover with a lid and let it simmer for about five hours, to preferred state of tenderness. I like it when the meat separates into strands when pushed with a fork.
Keep an eye on the water, so it doesn’t go dry and burn. If you like the meat caramelized, use less water and let it go dry at the end. If you like the meat more moist, keep the water up and add soy sauce or other flavor—the juice is good stuff.
I sometimes add carrots, potatoes and onions to the pan, toward the end.
Obviously this could be done in a slow cooker, or in the oven. I just find the skillet handier. I tried cooking it overnight a few times, but kept waking up with my tummy growling.
If you let the meat cool, you can easily separate the good stuff from the connective tissues, and have a pile of chunks you can shred apart. Or just separate it while hot with a couple of forks. Or, what I usually do, just put the whole thing in the fridge, pull out chunks with a fork to heat for meals, then throw the tangled remnants to the dogs.
I am serious about the shredding part. If you need a knife to cut it, you haven’t got there yet.
If I cook it ’til dry, it makes good sandwiches and Mexican dishes. If I cook it moist, it’s almost stew, and good over rice and many other things.
(I have used this method on a pork roast, and got “pulled” pork as good as some barbeque joints.)
chigau (悲しい):
October 12th, 2012 at 12:21 am
Ogvorbis’s Restaurant must have a menu item that is “Schrödinger’s … Something”.
It isn’t a pizza until you open the box…
The bill may or may not be in that little plastic folder…
Menyambal --- Sambal's Little Helper:
October 12th, 2012 at 12:23 am
Yeah, you’d think the anti-abortion people would be all for contraception and alternate sexual practices.
chigau (悲しい):
October 12th, 2012 at 12:23 am
ooops
I’ve probably invoked one of those
Explain What Schrödinger Really™ Meant demons.
lexie:
October 12th, 2012 at 12:25 am
Oh no. I’m so sorry Tony. *hugs* if you want them.
Trinioler – I don’t have any brilliant advice but if they would be happy to contact ZJ she might have some good advice, since she is trans and bisexual/pansexual (no sure which she identifies as), she’s also lived as a gay man. Or if they don’t want to actually contact Zinna, then they could read her blog as some of the stuff she writes might help plus there are lots of queer people who hang out there who might be good contacts for your friend.
Hekuni Cat, MQG:
October 12th, 2012 at 12:36 am
cicely – *returnhug* I’m glad I could help.
Tony – *hugs*
ednaz:
October 12th, 2012 at 12:53 am
I’m sorry, Tony. *hugs*
Setár, genderqueer Elf-Sheriff of Atheism+:
October 12th, 2012 at 1:10 am
-kittens Tony-
As someone who seems to do nothing but blow up social situations, especially when potential romance is involved…I feel you. Lots. Like, really lots.
-more kittens-
-and some hugs too-
—
Crossposted from the Atheism+ forum:
Open Letter to SJ ‘Allies’ — On “Big Tents”
Atheism+ is not a big tent. It’s not intended to be a big tent.
Big tents are for and by the privileged. Marginalized people may exist inside a big tent, but the will of the big tent will always be skewed towards its most privileged members — see the Democratic and Republican parties in the United States.
This is a small tent. This is a tent of the marginalized. This is where we go when we’re sick of people in the big tent trying to push us around.
And we’re not trying to get you to join our damn tent. You’re free to come in if you want, but we reserve the right to toss you out on your ass if you don’t follow the rules and respect the people this tent was built for.
If you’re an ally, you’re not trying to get in our tent. You’re trying to get us to move our little tent into your big tent, to make it a bit bigger. Fine. We’ll do that — just, we’re going to have some demands to, namely, that we get recognized as much as anyone else in the big tent, since you invited us in as equals. Which also means that we get to keep our little tent to ourselves, just as you have your rooms in the big tent that you retire to at the end of the day. We’re not demolishing our tent and giving you the fabric so you can expand yours. We still need our tent as a safe space. You do not have a right to come into our tent and tell us how to run things just because we’re in your tent. If you start disrespecting us in our tent, we still reserve the right to toss you out on your ass into your tent.
What’s more, if you don’t recognize us, if you try to shove our tent to the back, if you let other members of your ‘big tent’ of supposed allies throw rocks at us and spraypaint derogatory graffiti over our tent, or worst of all if you refuse to adequately defend us when we get attacked by the tent that wants ours gone? You’re not our ally at all, you just want us in your tent to add to the body count. If that’s the case, then we’re going to pack up and leave. We don’t want to be in your tent if you’re not going to protect us.
This is not a big tent, and we’re not interested in making it a scrap of fabric on your big tent.
chigau (悲しい):
October 12th, 2012 at 1:43 am
Setár #424
I think I disagree.
(All this tent metaphor is confusing me.)
Atheism was by far the easiest part and done while I was a child.
Getting rid of my racism and ethnocentrism and sexism and genderism and transism is still on-going.
I don’t identify as “Atheist” first, am I still welcome in the Tent?
—
I’m for bed but I will be back
tomorrowlater.McC2lhu saw what you did there.:
October 12th, 2012 at 1:46 am
Chigau @414:
Try turning off your Javascript. If the video won’t load, a handful of people have posted Amanda Todd’s full video on YouTube (search for her name).
If you still have troubles getting the news text let me know and I can copypasta the article and email to you.
The ultimate crowd-sourced victim blaming and web predation. I wish parents would start teaching their kids to exhibit some bravery. If enough of them nodded heads and stepped in when Amanda was being bullied maybe the girl would have maintained some semblance of hope and not killed herself.
chigau (悲しい):
October 12th, 2012 at 2:11 am
McC2lhu
Thanks.
I found it on youtube but I can’t handle it.
I would appreciate a text version of her cards.
(I think)
You could post it here.
opposablethumbs:
October 12th, 2012 at 2:25 am
Tony, I’m so sorry :(((((. Virtually squishing you very hard, as long as you don’t mind being virtually squished.
Setár, genderqueer Elf-Sheriff of Atheism+:
October 12th, 2012 at 2:29 am
chigau #425: this is really the key paragraph –
It’s directed at the privileged asswipes who whine and complain about how we A+ forumgoers are “losing allies” by prioritizing the safety of our space above their feelings and tone-policing, acting like they have the right to run roughshod over us because they’re willing to admit that we exist.
Like how the corporatist Democratic establishment runs roughshod over progressive America, because “big tent” and “can’t scare the independents” and all sorts of other privileged crap from the rich white establishment that runs the party.
McC2lhu saw what you did there.:
October 12th, 2012 at 2:31 am
Chigau @427. Completely understood. The music from the vid started up while looking up the site link and I started tearing up. I did a search and I think it’s too soon for anyone to have transcripted the cards from the video yet. There’s no way I could do it right now in my mood. If one turns up later I will give you the heads up.
Giliell, Approved Straight Chorus:
October 12th, 2012 at 3:26 am
Good morning
This does not look like a good day.
First it started way too early with the little one waking up 2 hours before her usual time. That means massively tired kid in the afternoon.
Then I dropped her off throwing a gigantic tantrum because the evil adversary (aka me) made her walk the whole 500(?)m to the kindergarten. Because there’s nothing worse than having to walk for the sole purpose of getting somewhere.
+++
Tony
I’m so sorry
*adds puppies*
I definetly agree with the others: sounds like him problem.
*hugs*
*booze*
*chocolate*
nutmeg
I’m sorry that your parents have that attitude. Kids aren’t for fullfilling their parents’ expectations. Not for grandchildren, not for becoming X, not for being straight, or cis.
Giliell, Approved Straight Chorus:
October 12th, 2012 at 3:51 am
How come that no English source has yet managed to get their basic facts right when it comes to German church tax?
And the current legal squibbles about this.
No, German christians and Jews don’t pay 9% of their income. They pay an additional tax that is 9% of their income tax. On top of the income tax.
Duh, that’s not that difficult to understand.
nms:
October 12th, 2012 at 4:09 am
Here’s a transcript of the Amanda Todd video posted above. The transcript might not be 100% accurate, but isn’t not really a video I wanted to watch over and over.
This is a story about someone who was apparently entirely surrounded by terrible people.
[I've edited the colors to make this rather triggering story harder to see: you'll have to select the text to be able to read it. --pzm]
Setár, genderqueer Elf-Sheriff of Atheism+:
October 12th, 2012 at 4:16 am
NMS PLEASE SPOILER AND TW THAT SHIT. I just derealized in the middle of work and had to confabulate the last three digits for the weight of the truck I ticketed out, from reading that ><;;;
nms:
October 12th, 2012 at 4:20 am
Shit, I’m sorry. I had a trigger warning up there, I’m not sure what happened to it.
nms:
October 12th, 2012 at 4:23 am
I should have posted it somewhere else and linked to it. I’m really sorry.
Setár, genderqueer Elf-Sheriff of Atheism+:
October 12th, 2012 at 4:24 am
I should also note…Amanda Todd is from Vancouver BC.
My neck of the woods.
birgerjohansson:
October 12th, 2012 at 4:24 am
*RAGE*!!!!!!
Setár, genderqueer Elf-Sheriff of Atheism+:
October 12th, 2012 at 4:35 am
If anyone wants a bit of amusement after being reminded of how fucking horrible the world is even in “liberal” bastions such as Vancouver, here’s a frog playing with an ipod touch.
Giliell, Approved Straight Chorus:
October 12th, 2012 at 4:48 am
What the fuck is wrong with those kids? And what the fuck is wrong with adults who raise their kids to be that shitty? The only appropriate reaction to somebody trying to kill themsleves is shock and compassion and asking “what can I do to help them?”
McC2lhu saw what you did there.:
October 12th, 2012 at 5:18 am
nms: Maybe one of the mods can ask PZ if it’s possible to stick a trigger warning in #433. I would have been distracted enough to have forgotten to put one in myself. Or he could redact it and you could re-post with the warning.
Nick Gotts (formerly KG):
October 12th, 2012 at 5:32 am
I’ll email PZ about #433.
opposablethumbs:
October 12th, 2012 at 6:06 am
How can anyone be that much of a shit, to treat that poor kid like this? After she attempted suicide, ffs. Fuck.
Beatrice, anti-imperialist anti-racist Islamophobiaphobic leftist:
October 12th, 2012 at 6:20 am
I hope those little shits are enjoying some nightmares right now. Although, I doubt it, considering their complete lack of ability to empathize with a fellow human being.
They should be identified from the facebook messages and called for a little talk with the school counselors, in the company of their parents or guardians. Even if they are not currently engaging in any bullying, they need some serious help. Some may change by growing up without any help, but others will stay the same little shits.
Giliell, Approved Straight Chorus:
October 12th, 2012 at 6:25 am
beatrice
This requires the adults not to be shitty assholes. But if they weren’t, how did they end up with kids like that. Guess they’re more of the Wooly Bumblebee sort.
Beatrice, anti-imperialist anti-racist Islamophobiaphobic leftist:
October 12th, 2012 at 6:31 am
Giliell,
Yeah, I know.
I’m hoping that at least schools would wake up instead of letting their students kill each other.
I suggested that kids’ guardians attend counseling with the kids so that they either get the same lessons or learn how to deal with hateful little shits. If I found out my child was involved in something like this, I think I’d need a counselor to help me deal so that I don’t say or do something that will just worsen the situation.
Giliell, Approved Straight Chorus:
October 12th, 2012 at 6:45 am
beatrice
That’s true, too.
I mean, around here it’s standard that if something horrible like this happens there are profesionals rushed in to help everybody deal with the situation.
I also think that my kids have been banned from Facebook indefinetly…
Giliell, Approved Straight Chorus:
October 12th, 2012 at 7:08 am
I’m just…
I think I’m pulling a draw with Caine
My tutorial just got featured on Urban Threads
StevoR:
October 12th, 2012 at 7:15 am
Watching the news
They’re scalping two years olds
With bombs
In Syria
I saw it on the news.
A 14 year old in critical condition
Who dared to fight for new
New ways of living, thinking being
Our species roams on Mars
By robot proxy.
We split the atom, found higgs boson
Still don’t know what’s rape.
Legitimate or otherwise
Too many think ‘s jape.
I watch the news and see the wonders
Horrors that are us,
Which will prevail
In our troubled tale
Angels better or worse.
I see the news
A thousand lives are affected even more.
Dunno what to say and say it wrong
And life goes on and that’s da bomb.
So many die.
We don’t know why
Perhaps no why at all.
Starvation, suffering babies squall
We can do nothing sweet fuck all,
I watch the news & hate myself and life and that shit.
What can we do, what can we say?
At least we know
Is that okay?
Humanity our nature dual
We battle with ourselves
Where will it end and to what end?
Who knows what tomorrow brings?
Audley Z. Darkheart (liar and scoundrel):
October 12th, 2012 at 7:19 am
Tony:
:( :( :(
*hugs* *kitteh snuggles* *chocolate glazed donuts*
StevoR:
October 12th, 2012 at 7:22 am
@401 broboxley OT
Seconded.
So much shit and pain in the world.
Things so fucked up.
This too shall pass, and Tony, respect and support from someone messed up who barely knows you but dude, best wishes and internet (((hugs))) if you want them from me.
trinioler:
October 12th, 2012 at 7:23 am
Damn, that sucks Tony.
Sorry to hear that. :(
StevoR:
October 12th, 2012 at 7:25 am
Also, there’s still a lot of good people and good things in the world too in case this reminder helps.
broboxley OT:
October 12th, 2012 at 7:26 am
#411 McC2lhu saw what you did there.
I didnt read anywhere in the article where the original bully who put her boobs on facebook was prosecuted for posession of child porn? That should get him a few years in jail. Then he can be bullied for a while
StevoR:
October 12th, 2012 at 7:31 am
@408. trinioler :
Tell your friend -
Be who you are, be brave and good and strong
Forgive yourself in case of fail
We all are human still,
We bleed, we love, we cry, we live
We cannot be who we’re not
hafta be who we are and live.
I wish your friend luck and all the best and online hugs if they help.
Not alone, unique.
Worthwhile.
Respect and hope.
I send your way
For what its worth.
Good luck.
FossilFishy (Νεοπτόλεμος's spellchecker):
October 12th, 2012 at 7:32 am
Amanda Todd. That is so horrific that I’m not letting myself really think about it. I was bullied, amongst all the other joys of my youth, and I damn near didn’t make it, though the bullying was only a small part of that. I’m forty fucking six years old and I still struggle with the aftermath and have to work hard at remembering that there is joy in the world.
I’m going to work harder at that. The fucking necrotic pustules that drove Amanda to her death will make my part of the world a little brighter, a little better, because anger is energy and I am most certainly angry. Alchemy of emotions, that’s the way, I’m going to be the fucking Isaac Newton of this, turning anger into joy in a way that he never managed with lead. Tomorrow the adrenaline will have worn off but the memory of Amanda will remain. I will soak in that catalyst of a reminder and use it to be better, be more forgiving, more compassionate, more joyful so that good may come out of evil.
FossilFishy (Νεοπτόλεμος's spellchecker):
October 12th, 2012 at 7:34 am
Tony. That sucks. I went through a period where everyone I dated wanted a type of relationship that I was uncomfortable with. Sometimes really uncomfortable. All I can say is hang in there and be true to yourself and your needs. It’s worth that wait to get it right.
Beatrice, anti-imperialist anti-racist Islamophobiaphobic leftist:
October 12th, 2012 at 7:35 am
So,yeah, two other girls were also shot in the same attack as Malala. One of them is still in critical condition.
There is this thing that always annoys me in stories like this one (for another example look at shooting of Gabrielle Giffords).
I understand that they are both important people. Malala is a symbol of youth fighting against bigotry. They are special. I get that. But I’m so saddened by the way other people who were hurt (or, in Giffords attack, killed) in these stories get completely erased. It’s probably an irrational pet peeve of mine, because no one else seems bothered, but it makes me angry every time.
Yes, I agree that Malala did extraordinary things. She deserves admiration. I just wish that people wished speedy recovery to those two other girls too. That people were angry in their name too.
We have special people and we have collateral damage. It seems that those two girls were just collateral damage to both the attackers and all those opposed.
/end possibly irrational rant
StevoR:
October 12th, 2012 at 7:39 am
@458. Beatrice, anti-imperialist anti-racist Islamophobiaphobic leftist :
You have a very good point and I wish them both – all three of the Taliban shooting victims – a speedy recovery as well.
Beatrice, anti-imperialist anti-racist Islamophobiaphobic leftist:
October 12th, 2012 at 7:42 am
Let me add some *hugs* and *chocolate* to that giant pile of kittens and puppies you got there, Tony.
FossilFishy (Νεοπτόλεμος's spellchecker):
October 12th, 2012 at 7:42 am
Beatrice
Nothing irrational about that. Compassion for victims, regardless of their notoriety, or lack thereof, is a very good thing indeed.
Beatrice, anti-imperialist anti-racist Islamophobiaphobic leftist:
October 12th, 2012 at 7:44 am
StevoR,
I hope you don’t think this was something against you personally. I was prompted by your comment, but it’s an observation of almost every reaction I’ve read the last couple of days as well as things that have been bothering me in other similar cases.
StevoR:
October 12th, 2012 at 7:48 am
@ 399.Portia -11 October 2012 at 9:23 pm
Not-a-pro-but tip :
Add a bit more of a splash of cold milk to lower temperature to better drinking levels?
StevoR:
October 12th, 2012 at 7:53 am
@462. Beatrice, anti-imperialist anti-racist Islamophobiaphobic leftist
No worries. Fair enough. Thanks.
I’m pretty messed up and thoughtless, overtired and too drunk more’n'half the time so, yeah.
I know that I say a lot of dumb stuff at times and better that you correct me than not.
StevoR:
October 12th, 2012 at 7:55 am
No I don’t take it personally.
broboxley OT:
October 12th, 2012 at 8:17 am
I have no real insight but I am assuming that the person in question has seen Robert Eads Documentary Southern Comfort
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=R6JIWD2DNyY and should attend any gatherings of likeminded folk such as http://sccatl.org/content/
Ogvorbis: broken and cynical:
October 12th, 2012 at 8:33 am
Tony:
That sucks. I am sending some Jonny Walker Black through your USB. I know it is early in the morning (where I am, anyway, and I am an AMERICAN so the world should damn well operate on my schedule! (sorry about that snark — I work with assholes)) but enjoy.
The bullying account by Amanda Todd, so depressing. I wish to hell I was surprised. I swear middle and high school is made up of three groups of people — abusers (who also run the student council, are the star athletes, and run all the clubs and the yearbook staff), victims, and those who are very good at hiding in plain sight. And, when I was in middle and high school, and I saw someone, male or female, become the victim du jour, all I could think was how happy I was it wasn’t me. Usually wasn’t me.
=======
Right wing coworker, this morning, was complaining that Joe Biden kept interrupting Ryan, that Biden hogged almost all the time so that Ryan couldn’t actually express his world-saving philosophy, that the questions were rigged by the liberal and international media to make Ryan look bad, that Biden lied the entire time, and that Biden only looked good because the debate was pre-recorded and edited. What the fuck does one say to someone who is that detached from reality? I did ask him, if it was pre-recorded and edited, why Faux Newz used exactly the same footage as everyone else. He had no answer except to claim that the liberals are willing to lie, cheat, throw voters off the voter roles, commit voter fraud, and use cheap shots (like Big Bird) to throw the election.
Luckily, because of our schedules, I only work three days a week with this particular example of Conservasaurus detatchedi.
SC (Salty Current), OM:
October 12th, 2012 at 8:49 am
“Honduras: Now Open for Political Murder”
Audley Z. Darkheart (liar and scoundrel):
October 12th, 2012 at 8:51 am
So… it’s my last day of work. Woo hoo!
Oggie:
Prerecorded and edited? Damn, C-Span totally fooled me, I guess.
Ogvorbis: broken and cynical:
October 12th, 2012 at 8:54 am
And, amazingly, every single network edited it in exactly the same way. Apparently, they edited out the intelligent, useful and pragmatic things that Ryan said.
Portia:
October 12th, 2012 at 8:58 am
I did have cold milk with it for both temperature control and deliciousness, but deceptively, mug brownie is a solid. Well, sort of. A fudgey solid. I encourage everyone to try it.
Audley
HOORAY! *confetti* and soon, *champagne*
broboxley OT:
October 12th, 2012 at 9:02 am
well pre-recorded for the west coast anyway. I was emailing friends live before they actually saw was I was emailing about
Ogvorbis: broken and cynical:
October 12th, 2012 at 9:03 am
No more work. So now, and after DarkFetus is born, you will be sitting around eating bonbons all day?
Seriously, get plenty of sleep now. For both you and Mr. Darkheart, sleeping through the night will be a dream for the first 4 weeks to 18 months (your mileage may vary, of course).
Therrin:
October 12th, 2012 at 9:04 am
Hard to argue with this argument.
Audley Z. Darkheart (liar and scoundrel):
October 12th, 2012 at 9:11 am
Oggie:
I love the smell of desperation rolling off the conservatives. They’ve convinced themselves that Biden is the court jester and Ryan is some sort of wunderkind and now they have to invent conspiracies to back their shit up.
Makes me lol.
It’s funny that you mention bon bons ‘cos my SiL just sent me a text welcoming me to the “Moms Who Sit Around and Eat Bon Bons All Day Club”. :D
Broboxely:
Uh, the debate was live of the west coast, at least on C-Span. I mean, hell, I was following Wonkette’s live blogging and I’m pretty damned sure they’re based in LA.
Portia:
Yay! *happy flail!*
Audley Z. Darkheart (liar and scoundrel):
October 12th, 2012 at 9:13 am
Also: Any baked good out of a mug (brownies or chocolate cake) is teh awesomee.
Ogvorbis: broken and cynical:
October 12th, 2012 at 9:15 am
You have been taken in by Teh Conspiracy!11!
Yeah, it does smell of desperation. If Mitt was ever actually honest about what his proposals would do to the middle class and the poor and students and children and education and everything else, the 30% who have embraced disreality would either explain it away through massive doses of cognitive dissonance or, more likely, claim it was an evil liberal plot.
And enjoy the bonbons.
AJ Milne:
October 12th, 2012 at 9:18 am
I’m sympathetic, here, and I am glad someone’s speaking out for Shazia and Kainat. And absolutely, I think they were heroes, too. Shazia, incidentally, has commented upon Malala’s actions since the attack, and proudly, and spoken about what an inspiration she is. After having been shot and speaking up like this, under these circumstances, this is no small thing.
That said, I think it’s a bit much assuming the relative inattention to them on the part of those condemning the attack makes them ‘collateral damage’ to the same.
… more to the point, I’m not too impressed to see any implication left on the table that somehow there’s equivalency between a) those who shot them, and b) those concentrating more on Malala’s having been shot.
Malala’s narrative is more front and centre, more obviously compelling, easier to relate and immediately understand, mostly, I’d expect, so people do focus upon it. That’s a big part of it.
I’ll add: I don’t expect you were exactly going this far, here, but there’s this meme that keeps surfacing in these things, especially this sort of conflict. This demand made of those standing up to the Islamists that they consider the ‘collateral damage’.
There’s a dimension to this I’m sure you do understand, but still, I think I’m going to bring it up anyway: in most violent conflicts, aggressors are well aware such things will be said.
And so they use it as a lever. All the time. Hell, terror states routinely choose in attempting to silence activists that threaten them not to threaten the activists but to threaten their family. Similar techniques are used to silence those who may be in jurisdictions they can’t easily reach–especially those who’ve fled to emigrant communities–if they have family back home.
It’s a great piece of moral jiu jitsu. What, so you think you’re so brave? When what you’re doing is putting someone else at risk? Pfft. Shut up. You’re just making it worse for them
… and note, critically, the ‘shut up’ in there.
Shazia and Kainat were heroes, however. I’ll give anyone mentioning this much, anyway. They were girls going to school in Pashtun Pakistan. That alone makes them pretty insanely brave. I’ve little doubt Shazia and Kainat were well aware sitting on that bus next to Malala put them in additional danger, too. I know there’s a blurb somewhere out there of Malala mentioning a classmate asking: ‘Will they attack our school?’
So I expect she was very aware, and they were very aware of what the attention meant. A chance to make a point, make a difference, sure. And a target painted on your head.
Malala would have lived with that, day by day, as did any number of people in such struggles, wrenched by anxiety and misgivings. They’re standing up, but someone else may die for it, too. Maybe they talk to those people. Maybe they don’t. Maybe those people tell them, look, I know, but I’m with you, let’s hope we get through this, you just do what you have to do. Maybe they all lie awake nights thinking they wish it were simpler.
So yeah. A mite uncomfortable with implications of equivalence. And maybe not so much a subject for the Lounge. But anyway.
carlie:
October 12th, 2012 at 9:41 am
Tony, you did the right thing. Think of spending the next year, two years, whatever, always wanting the SO to pay more attention to you, and deeper than that, wanting him to want to pay more attention to you. That is a soul-sucking kind of pain, there. Even when two people both like each other a lot, that kind of incompatibility will always make the person who wants more feel bad.
Improbable Joe:
October 12th, 2012 at 9:54 am
Tony,
Sorry to hear that the whole dating thing didn’t work out this time. I have to agree with Carlie that you’re better off out early rather than later, when the other person isn’t nearly as interested as you are. I’m all about the value-added relationships, where you get back more than you put it. When you’re putting in more than you’re getting out, it is like you’re slowly bleeding to death, and that’s no way to live.
Audley Z. Darkheart (liar and scoundrel):
October 12th, 2012 at 9:58 am
Awe, the guys in the office chipped in and bought baby clothes for DarkFetus.
And now I’m crying at work. Crap dammit.
chigau (this space for rent):
October 12th, 2012 at 10:07 am
Audley
It was supposed to be the Jersey Tuff Guise™ crying!
But that was very sweet of them.
Audley Z. Darkheart (liar and scoundrel):
October 12th, 2012 at 10:17 am
Chigau:
They were a little sniffly, trust me.
Esteleth, Elen síla lumenn' omentielvo:
October 12th, 2012 at 10:24 am
…that awkward moment when you realize that the reason why your data make no sense whatsoever is because you did the experiment wrong.
RIGHT THEN.
Esteleth, Elen síla lumenn' omentielvo:
October 12th, 2012 at 10:29 am
Last night I switched to a new skein of yarn for the blanket I’m making for the DF. It is progressing along now! It is about 8 inches wide (and 56 inches long).
Esteleth, Elen síla lumenn' omentielvo:
October 12th, 2012 at 10:30 am
48 even. Because I know how to add. *facepalm*
trinioler:
October 12th, 2012 at 10:31 am
Awww @ Audley.
Esteleth, Elen síla lumenn' omentielvo:
October 12th, 2012 at 10:40 am
A segment of the DF’s blanket. When done, it will look like this (except red, obviously).
This will, eventually, be 4 feet square. Which is a bit big for a newborn, so I suppose it is okay that it won’t be done in time.
*hollers at the DF* HOLD TIGHT, HONEY! YOUR MOMMY DOESN’T WANT YOU TO COME OUT YET!!
Lynna, OM:
October 12th, 2012 at 10:40 am
Paul Ryan, abortion, and Supreme Court Judges: Ryan was well and truly outed as the extremist he is on the abortion issue. This time he didn’t get to weasel out of answering by saying that women are really interested in economic policy, so forget that abortion stuff.
Video of this section of the debate is available here:
http://maddowblog.msnbc.com/_news/2012/10/12/14393044-ryan-abortion-and-unelected-judges
Audley Z. Darkheart (liar and scoundrel):
October 12th, 2012 at 10:45 am
Esteleth:
No no no no no! Mommy wants her out RIGHT NOW!
Esteleth, Elen síla lumenn' omentielvo:
October 12th, 2012 at 10:48 am
True story: I used to baby-sit for a couple that had their second when their eldest was just past three.
Before the birth, the elder kid was told that there was a new baby inside mommy’s tummy, and that soon it would come out, etc etc etc.
So, not long after the birth, the new baby was fussing and crying (as babies do). Cue older kid saying: “Mommy! Can you put [new baby] back inside you?”
Pteryxx:
October 12th, 2012 at 10:49 am
*threadrupt, waves to everyone*
LYNNA SIGNAL AHOY
Someone on A+ forums asked a question that ONLY YOU! can answer!
My searching and my thin stash of Lynna citations turned up nothing. Could you provide some links I can pass back to A+?
That comment’s here:
http://atheismplus.com/forums/viewtopic.php?f=20&t=1983&p=30771#p30721
Lynna, OM:
October 12th, 2012 at 10:51 am
Did anybody else notice that, during the debate, Ryan added yet one more story to the list of “proving Romney is human” stories? It was yet another tale of Romney helping a fellow mormon.
Yep, that’s right, we still have no tales of Romney helping human beings who are NOT mormon.
Yes, the Nixons are mormons. That makes them worthy of Romney’s help.
And this bit about Romney giving 30 percent of his income to charity has got to stop. First, it is inaccurate. And LD$ Inc. is more of a multilevel marketing scheme than a charity. That church ends up giving a few dollars per member per year to charity. They say they give more by counting all the “volunteer” work they do.
Debate transcript.
Portia:
October 12th, 2012 at 11:00 am
I may or may not have screamed at the tv last night
“TITHING IS NOT CHARITY“
Esteleth, Elen síla lumenn' omentielvo:
October 12th, 2012 at 11:06 am
Romney is indeed willing to help out people who fit his standards. Which (while not nothing) is FAR different from actual charity.
Lynna, OM:
October 12th, 2012 at 11:07 am
Pteryxx @492
Signal received.
Send them to the Mr. Deity video at YouTube Link.
Online textual references: http://www.i4m.com/think/history/mormon_racism.htm
More here: http://exmormon.org/d6/drupal/Racist-history-of-the-Mormon-Church-and-Mitt-Romney
From Great Moments in Mormon History:
Yes, Joe Smith gave one, just one, black man the mormon priesthood. Mormons like to point this out as proving that mormonism was/is not racist. One man does not make up for 126 years of prejudice against all other black, brown, and Native American persons.
http://www.i4m.com/think/history/mormon_history.htm
Improbable Joe:
October 12th, 2012 at 11:32 am
OK, now that we got the eggplant out of the way… :)
What do I do with the navy beans and the butternut squash. Do I combine them with some bacon or chorizo? Do I make soup out of the beans, and then honey-roast the squash? Both? Actually, since I’m cooking for one I could actually do both. Maybe I don’t want to eat soup several days in a row, maybe I don’t love the squash in the beans and can have the roasted squash instead?
broboxley OT:
October 12th, 2012 at 11:42 am
Okay, someone explain this one real slow
tithing is not charity
I dont give money to any priest pastor rebbe or imam
but if I did so they could afford to study, buy food for the needy, paint the church or take cooked meals to the elderly or gamble it away in a casino I would consider that charity
broboxley OT:
October 12th, 2012 at 11:46 am
improbable joe, ferment the squash into something useful or throw it away
slow cook the beans with sliced jalapeno’s green peppers onions, cilantro (coriander for the colonialists) and garlic
when the beans are mushy add chopped ham or 1/2 cooked bacon or cooked chorizo or all three. Cook for a further 30 minutes
make cornbread FEAST!
Improbable Joe:
October 12th, 2012 at 11:51 am
You guys are like an edible plant hate group!
Ogvorbis: broken and cynical:
October 12th, 2012 at 11:51 am
This is just my take on it, so ignore it with a grain of salt.
Tithing, giving 10% of your income to the church, is basically membership dues. If you do not tithe, your good standing in the church is called into question. Boy Scouts are a charitable organization but the dues paid to be a Boy Scout are not considered a charitable contribution, they are membership dues. If you decide to give more than your required membership dues then it would be charity? Does that make sense?
Improbable Joe:
October 12th, 2012 at 11:52 am
… insert “folks” where previously typed “guys”…
Tony •Prom King of Sunnydale High•:
October 12th, 2012 at 11:58 am
carlie:
I have never once thought about it that way. This puts a new perspective on a lot of past attempts at relationships.
****
Joe:
Wow. Again, I never viewed past relationships through that lens.
Looking back over the last decade, I’ve put more into dating people than I’ve gotten out of it. I can think of 6 people in the last 5 years where that’s been the case. Sadly, unless my memory is wonky (which it may well be), the last time I dated someone who treated me as well as I treated him was in 2003, when I briefly dated someone in New Orleans, LA.
Pteryxx:
October 12th, 2012 at 12:00 pm
Lynna, thank you for all the references. Do you have any on misogyny? It’s much less well covered.
chigau (this space for rent):
October 12th, 2012 at 12:04 pm
Improbable Joe
No kidding!
I think some of these people don’t anything.
chigau (this space for rent):
October 12th, 2012 at 12:09 pm
Hey PZ!
We’re on page 3!
nms:
October 12th, 2012 at 12:09 pm
Thanks, KG and PZ.
Ogvorbis: broken and cynical:
October 12th, 2012 at 12:11 pm
Eggplant (Yeah, I know I’m late)
Cut eggplant in half and roast. Scoop out pulp and dice. Add sauted onions, garlic, cheese and some herbs, put it back in the eggplant shell and roast until heated through. Peas can be added for colour, flavour and texture.
Portia:
October 12th, 2012 at 12:19 pm
In my view, tithing is not charity in large part because so much of it goes to evangelizing. Paying to try and recruit people to your religion is not charitable. As Lynna noted, little of the LDS revenue goes to “actual” charity as we would colloquially define it.
Ogvorbis makes another excellent point wrt tithing. I completely agree.
broboxley OT:
October 12th, 2012 at 12:23 pm
Squash was grown by indians to get containers and decoration they didn’t eat the damn things
Indians ate seeds, fruit, leaves and roots, not vegetables
corn
beans
casava
tobacco etc.
Its my story and Im sticking to it :-)
Esteleth, Elen síla lumenn' omentielvo:
October 12th, 2012 at 12:25 pm
Good news everyone!
According to the stain I just did by accident, my glasses to not hydrolyze calcein! They are not alive!
Lynna, OM:
October 12th, 2012 at 12:26 pm
Paul Ryan and Mitt Romney have a habit of claiming that people agree with them when those people manifestly do not.
AJ Milne:
October 12th, 2012 at 12:27 pm
So in case anyone’s wondering, the white chocolate tempering thing didn’t work out so great.
I mean, sure, it tempered. Seems to be reasonably glossy, set up in minutes, as tempered stuff is supposed to do…
But in the zone, the stuff was maddeningly difficult to handle. Really thick, difficult to get to and keep at temperature–best guess is either the specific heat is a lot higher than dark stuff, or conductivity is lower, and, obviously, viscosity of this stuff at 87 Fahrenheit is a lot higher as with dark at 89. So I got like eight truffles out of a pound of chocolate before the whole thing became an unmanageable mess, and each truffle is this freakin’ huge blob of white chocolate, with, somewhere in each, presumably, the centre…
Not sure if that’s the material I used or what. But anyway. I’m probably going to have to go back to dark stuff just to cover the rest of the centres I’ve got. Which do seem pretty promising, anyway. Mint and coffee and unadorned chocolate ones, as planned, and my ganache is now a lot easier to handle, too.
broboxley OT:
October 12th, 2012 at 12:29 pm
Og and Portia thank you, so stipulated 10% tithes is a membership not a charity. Fair enough, so Romney only contributes 20% of his income to charity then. That is still a sizable percentage of money being handed to others. Still cant buy your way into people liking you but still a chunk of change
Portia:
October 12th, 2012 at 12:33 pm
Bummer, AJ.
On tithing. Another thing: you pay so you can stay cool with gawd (or whatever) and keep all your brownie points and get safely into paradise. With charity, you do it for its own sake. Ideally, anyway. Not to mention the disgusting extravagance of modern churches, which is paid for how? Oh yeah, tithing.
Aratina Cage:
October 12th, 2012 at 12:35 pm
@broboxley
Charity usually means it will be used for people in need and not a business transaction. While it may seem like that is what is happening at smaller churches where the tithing is doing little more than paying for utilities and groceries for the priest, it is still the price of being entertained every week. Ask yourself, would they still tithe if the priest was not entertaining them regularly and/or not doing something church related?
Of course one should never have to go without food and shelter and other necessities of life, but why obfuscate the act of tithing to pay for the priest and the temple, etc., into this idea of charity and not just call it like it is: payment for the entertainment? The unwillingness of most people to look at churches as businesses is the problem.
Also, tithing has been found to hardly even go toward charitable actions at the broader level with well-organized church groups, especially the nationwide ones: http://www.secularhumanism.org/fi/vol_32/4/cragun_32_4.pdf
Portia:
October 12th, 2012 at 12:35 pm
Simultaneous posting, broboxley, didn’t mean to pile on. You’re right, that’s a lot of money. I’m willing to bet it’s from a place of “I’m running for office for Pete’s sake!”
PZ Myers:
October 12th, 2012 at 12:39 pm
Yes, finally, a NEW THREAD.