[Lounge #436]


This is the lounge. You can discuss anything you want, but you will do it kindly.

Status: Heavily Moderated; Previous thread

Comments

  1. Esteleth, statistically significant to p ≤ 0.001 says

    ^_^

    Local news from my Ass End of Nowhere Small Midwestern Hometown: the high school guidance councilor has been arrested.

    Some right-wing org took it upon themselves to post placards on public property extolling the Second Amendment. These placards included ads for a local gun show.

    After checking local ordinances (and the office that grants permits for placard-posting on public property), he removed them.

    He indicated that since the cops were apparently unwilling to enforce the law (against what, legally, is littering) he was going to clean up the litter.

    And now he’s been arrested.

    Ai-yi-yi.

  2. Ogvorbis: Heading down the Failure Road. Again. says

    cicely # 491

    Is this…in connection with the shut-down?

    The government shutdown. I do expect to go back to work when the GOP sees reason.

    Or giant winged porcupines fly out of my arse backwards.

    Whichever comes first.

    imaginesABeach @492:

    just keep in mind, it’s all for the greater good. What’s a little financial devastation when it prevents people from having access to health insurance?

    Even better. It feeds red meat to the rabid base.

    Ed Brayton has a post up on this. The GOP has no exit strategy other than surrendering and, if they do that, support of the shutdown will become a litmus test for GOP candidates. Scary that they are going even further right.

    Esteleth @ 501:

    He was arrested for removing gun show adverts from school grounds?

    Sounds like he needs a good lawyer.

  3. Esteleth, statistically significant to p ≤ 0.001 says

    Oggie @502

    He was arrested for removing gun show adverts from school grounds?

    No, they were posted around town.

    Sounds like he needs a good lawyer.

    The only writeup I’ve seen was on a wingnut “news” site, so this may not be true, but apparently the cops yelled at him and he responded by asking to be arrested.

  4. Ogvorbis: Heading down the Failure Road. Again. says

    Esteleth @503:

    Sorry. My mind co-mingled school and public property.

    SIgns on public lands are always contentious. We’ve had major political campaigns put signs up on a bridge owned by the NPS and they have been quite surprised when the signs are taken down and returned. We do allow signs (under a special use permit) but there are severe restrictions — no for profit, no political campaigns, etc. — and we still get a least a sign a week up there. The last sign with no SUP was one for Zombie Night Out, a fundraiser for something. Which would have been legal if they had gone through the one page application for a permit. But they had no idea that there could be restrictions on the use of public lands. But, yeah, advertising a for-profit event on public lands — state, local, federal — is almost always a nono.

  5. Ogvorbis: Heading down the Failure Road. Again. says

    And, because I have a bad cold, I have just shaved off my beard and mustache (this cold is a minor one, but there is lots of external drainage (if you have a strong stomach, I can elucidate further on that))). And every time I lick my lips or blow my nose, it feels really wrong.

  6. says

    Here’s some good news: a white supremacist has been jailed in Texas. About time.

    This is the kind of news I need to hear in order to balance the injustice and ridiculousness of the government shut down. (I’ve been posting about the shut down in the Elizabeth Warren thread — possibly off-topic for that thread. I set a bad example.)

    One of the senior leaders of the violent Aryan Brotherhood of Texas (ABT) – a man who ordered murders and other acts of violence – seems certain to spend the rest of his life in prison.

    Charles Lee “Jive” Roberts, a 68-year-old ABT “general,” was sentenced last week in U.S. District Court in Houston to 30 years in federal prison without the possibility of parole. He pleaded guilty in May to “conspiracy to participate in a racketeering enterprise,” becoming the first leader of the white supremacist group to strike a plea bargain and avoid trial. Authorities say Roberts admitted he had six people killed on behalf of the gang in 2011. …

    http://www.salon.com/2013/10/03/aryan_brotherhood_leader_sentenced_to_30_years_partner/

    Wish they had jailed the guy earlier.

    More information at Southern Poverty Law Center.

  7. cicely says

    Hekuni Cat!
    *pouncehug*

    Ogvorbis: I’m relieved. I was afraid that you’d been fired.
     
    Be sure to get pics of the giant, backwards-flying ass-porcupines. Or the reasonable Republicans. Whichever.
     
    ‘Cause in either case, you’re gonna need documentation, if you hope to be believed.

  8. Ogvorbis: Heading down the Failure Road. Again. says

    Lynna:

    Great timing. I just read that before I refreshed this page.

    I remember getting yelled at by a Lt. Governor of a western state because I would not allow him and his entourage into the fire area. He went off on me while I phoned the SECM at the incident so he could deal with it. The state troopers looked very embarrassed the entire time. He eventually did go through, escorted by the IPIO, the SECM, and the deputy IC. And the deputy IC thanked me, in front of the politician, for doing a great job.

    Heh.

  9. ImaginesABeach says

    Page 1 of this verson of the lounge includes several people saying that they don’t want to mention that there are things in their lives that are bad because OTHER PEOPLE have it worse. Could I just point out that this is essentially an internalized “Dear Muslima”, and if I told Person A to be quiet becuase Person B has worse problems, I would be offered space in the Thunderdome?

    Right now, the federal government shutdown is mostly an annoyance for my family (because my husband is furloughed and he doesn’t do well with time on his hands so he stresses me out) but we can last for a few months before it becomes a hardship. I’m entitled to be stressed, even though I can acknowledge that Kevin and Ogvorbis are MORE affected and others have bigger stressors in their lives.

    Bring on your stresses, your depressive episodes, your broken bones, as well as your stubbed toes and cats vomiting on the floor. I’m not a hugger, but if you need a hug, I do see a pile on the floor over there.

  10. Ogvorbis: Heading down the Failure Road. Again. says

    I can acknowledge that Kevin and Ogvorbis are MORE affected and others have bigger stressors in their lives.

    I can not, and will not, speak for Kevin and others, but I’m in pretty good shape, actually.

    If this goes long enough that I actually get unemployment compensation, I may actually get a bigger paycheck than my regular paycheck. If you average my last five quarters, that includes three forest fires with all that overtime. Add in not having to commute, and I may be in better shape now than before.

    Of course, my health insurance is continued (and I’ll have to catch that up after the furlough), so that could be stressful after the furlough.

    I do fall into the, “I shouldn’t complain because others have it worse,” but had never thought of that as an internal Dear Muslima.

    Damn.

    You are making me use my brain!

  11. says

    ImaginesABeach/#511:

    Huh. Now that you mention.

    Fine. Funny you should mention cat barf. I just cleaned up another hairball from the sunroom. And some rancid piss from under the basement litter box.

    I would not hate either job (well, okay, the piss does make me gag a bit), except that I’m the only one who ever does it. This is what really makes it the stressor, actually, somewhat indirectly. Don’t ask me to go into why, please, and I mean that. But it sure as hell is.

    Also, I’m looking for work. Also stressful. But I’m technically still employed, a while yet, have a pretty good resume, tend to find pretty decent positions when I work at it, and the market seems pretty okay for what I do around here (against what I was actually expecting, phenomenal, almost), so, yeah, honestly, could be worse.

    Seriously, anyway, US fed guys, here’s a virtual hug, and a hope somehow the @#$% @#$#ing @#$@s who caused the shutdown someday wind up in the clutches of a properly outraged mob or something. Seriously, that really only seems right, from here.

  12. Beatrice, an amateur cynic looking for a happy thought says

    I wanted to ask for advice about standing up to my bosses when they are trying to give me some work that is nowhere close to my job description and especially unfair considering my (nearly) unpaid trainee position (which ends in a couple of months), but SC definitely cemented my decision to rebel (http://freethoughtblogs.com/pharyngula/2013/10/03/excellent-work-denmark/comment-page-1/#comment-700045)

    I can’t be fired since they would have to explain why they are trying to make me do what they shouldn’t, I can’t be employed since government isn’t employing right now (except someone’s cousin or friend, and I don’t have connections) so I am free to get all badass on them.

    Thanks, SC!

  13. carlie says

    Could I just point out that this is essentially an internalized “Dear Muslima?

    I second the ‘damn’. Huh.

    Bring on your stresses, your depressive episodes, your broken bones, as well as your stubbed toes and cats vomiting on the floor.

    I am now picturing a statue of liberty with octopus tentacles sticking out all over, with that on the plaque at the base.

  14. ImaginesABeach says

    carlie – I had the Statute of Liberty in my head. I like yours better. The Statute of Pharyngula.

  15. dianne says

    Bring on your stresses, your depressive episodes, your broken bones, as well as your stubbed toes and cats vomiting on the floor.

    Can I bring you my “brain just did creepy but kind of amusing thing”?

    A little while ago I was working on a chart. I closed it fairly forcefully when I was done. At just that moment, someone somewhere in the building turned on a faucet, which emitted a squeak on starting that sounded remarkably like someone screaming.

    I briefly thought, “Holy fuck! The chart just screamed when I closed it!”

    It only lasted a fraction of a second before I figured out what really happened, but for that fraction of a second I had the terrifying and yet wonderful experience of feeling that reality was MUCH different than what I thought it was.

  16. The Mellow Monkey: Non-Hypothetical says

    Last night I had a dream that I was caught in the middle of a gang fight in some dark alley between atheists who were raised by fundamentalist Christians and atheists who were raised by liberal Catholics.

    Because my dreams are often cast with actors, this showdown involved Danny Trejo, Mary Steenburgen and Malcom McDowell.

    There was also a haunted mansion.

    My brain is awesome.

  17. dianne says

    @520: Write the screenplay. I’m sure someone in Hollywood would buy it. Or if you don’t want to sell out, produce it yourself. That’s what videophones are for, right?

    And, yes, your brain is way awesome.

  18. carlie says

    Wow. My dreams are “I have to go to the bathroom and every toilet I find is unusable”.
    My brain sucks. ;)

  19. carlie says

    …although I guess it would be worse if my brain let me use the toilet in my dream…

  20. dianne says

    My brain used to give me “unusable toilet” dreams but it’s gotten more creative over the years. Now I have dreams about it being critically important that I calculate someone’s creatinine clearance with no starting data except serum inulin and the patient’s favorite color or I have to actually build the region’s waste disposal system before I can use it or someone just flat out appears in the dream and tells me that although there is a perfectly good toilet right here, I don’t really want to use it because I’m asleep and the real world would get messy if I do.

  21. dianne says

    One of the tentacles should be a giant slide that leads down to a ball pit.

    Oh, yes. Another should be a water slide that leads into the pool.

  22. says

    I’ve adopted two kitties from the shelter–I usually adopt strays, pets people can’t take care of and not so well taken care of pets.

    They are the fucking cutest things ever. My god.

    To have healthy kitties instead of crippled kitties, sick kitties, diseased kitties or critically ill kitties is a nice change–it’s not uncommon for me to have to hold cats down and feed them as many as six pills a day (which kitties love, of course).

    The two kitties I adopted are currently chasing each other around the living room, all big eyes and long, awkward legs. I am ded of cute. One of them kept charging the door when we walked up to him, trying to climb the glass. We weren’t going to take a male cat, but how can you resist 2.5 pounds of fluff, trying to scale the door and yelling at you the whole time?

    I don’t know how shelter workers don’t have eighty pets apiece. There was this older mutt near the door who I just * liked * the minute I saw her face. If I hadn’t committed to the kitties, I would have taken her home instead.

    I should never, ever work at a shelter. I’d have ALL THE PETS.

  23. Nutmeg says

    I have “unusable toilet” dreams all the time. Also, dreams that there’s an emergency of some kind and I need to call for help but the buttons on the phone don’t work or keep moving around, or that 911 puts me on hold with elevator music.

    A few nights ago, I dreamed that two alternate realities were colliding at my grandparents’ cabin (which was sold when I was 9). One reality was this one, and the other was similar but very urbanized and covered in purple lava. I had to wait for the alternate realities to bounce off each other and make sure that I was in the correct one when they separated.

    And my night terror of a couple nights ago (grr, dumb brain) featured something that was big, navy blue, and on my ceiling. That’s all I remember about it. Least useful details ever, brain.

  24. says

    ImaginesABeach @511: I never thought of it as “Dear Muslima”-ing myself, but you’re right. I’m going to try to keep that in mind next time I put myself down for being depressed while other people have it worse.

    Which they do, and some of them who have it worse are right here *adds to heap o’ hugs*, but that doesn’t mean that I don’t matter, either.

  25. dianne says

    If it makes anyone feel any better, I think I have the country’s least impressive “how I am suffering due to the government shutdown” story: I just got a paper accepted for publication and because of the shutdown it’s…not in Pubmed yet! The horror, the horror!

    So, now everyone should feel free to complain about shutdown related suffering because yours is almost certainly more serious than mine.

  26. burgundy says

    Nutmeg @27 – I have the emergency-call-won’t-work dream sometimes too.

    Night before last I dreamed about sitting in on negotiations to end the shut down. There were only about half a dozen of us. There were three Republicans at the table. Including Louie Gohmert and Michele Bachmann. We didn’t reach a resolution, but in the dream everyone was negotiating in good faith.

    Come up with a less realistic dream than that. I dare you.

  27. dianne says

    Come up with a less realistic dream than that. I dare you.

    Challenge…not accepted. It’s utterly hopeless.

  28. Beatrice, an amateur cynic looking for a happy thought says

    burgundy,

    Come up with a less realistic dream than that. I dare you.

    A couple of weeks ago, I almost* dreamed about having a threesome with two very hot men.

    *these kind of dreams always end before anything really interesting starts going on, apparently I can’t even have sex in my dreams

  29. burgundy says

    Beatrice – is a hot MMF threesome really less realistic than members of the suicide caucus being willing to work contructively to end the shut down? I sure hope not.

    I had a dream once in which I had previously been Obama’s mistress (by which I mean, in the dream the relationship was long over.) I was worried about the news getting out and affecting his election chances. I’m not really sure if that’s less realistic than this week’s dream.

  30. Jackie Papercuts says

    Well, that was kind of awful.

    Upon moving my friend in we discovered that she was very sick. (We did not expect the peak of health, but she was in a worse way than I think even she knew.) Mentally, emotionally and physically, she was ill. It became clear that she could not get a job or apartment on her own. We helped her get treatment for her physical maladies and got her appointments for other services right away. I’m so proud of her for realizing she had to go if she wanted to get well. I’m happy she is out of a bad situation. After almost a week I tried to talk her into going to a shelter, because she is not well enough to be in my home and around my kids. She needed near constant tending, left messes all over the house, had no healthy boundaries and was resentful of me in no time. (I get to be on the receiving end of displaced resentment from time to time as a foster parent. I can take it from a kid. I can’t handle it from an adult.) She even started calling me “Mama”. I am exhausted. My husband jokingly told me to get used to looking and feeling like the mother of a two year old. Har, har…I can’t do that. So, today I arranged for her to go to a shelter. I explained that she did not have to go there, but she could not continue to stay on my couch. We are her friends, not a treatment facility. When I dropped off her things she stood off in the distance and watched me unload her stuff. The staff told me I was to leave them by the back door and that she would get them when I had gone. I have not heard from her since, nor do I expect I will. That’s perfectly OK. I’m not upset. I’m very happy that she is safe and where she can get the help she needs. I’m also happy to have my house back and not to have to worry about her and wait on her anymore. I’m sure I’ve disappointed her. For some reason she had some strange expectations. I feel good about it. I think that I cannot tell her to take care of herself, then turn around and not take care of me and mine.

    What happens from here is in the hands of respected professionals who help people find their way back to themselves every day. She really could not be in a better place or surrounded by better people.

  31. Jackie Papercuts says

    I typed too soon. I got a txt from her saying she had settled in.

    That’s reassuring. :)

  32. Esteleth, statistically significant to p ≤ 0.001 says

    WTF meal of the day:

    ~9 oz steak, chopped.
    Udon noodles, cooked.
    1 can Campbell’s tomato soup.

    Mix it all up.

    Remarkably tasty!


    :( I’m sorry to hear about your friend, Jackie. I’m sure you did all you could.

  33. morgan ?! epitheting a metaphor says

    Urgh…. I feel like a flattened cow pie. Did anybody get the number of that 18 wheeler that ran over me? You wouldn’t think something that big and nasty could do such a precision hit and run.
    More later when I feel slightly less sorry for myself.
    (TMI – I’m writing this from the throne room.)

  34. says

    So…Husband still has not heard back from Job. This is resulting in some interesting stress, because I now feel guilty for getting Job (which happens to be his dream job).
    We had plans for if he got it and I didn’t. We had plans for if neither of us got it. We didn’t make plans for if I got it and he didn’t.

    He’s not trying to make me feel bad about it, but it’s happening because I know how much he wanted Job, and I applied for shits and giggles, because it would be convenient if we both happened to get it. So he’s jealous and trying not to be, and I’m guilty-feeling and trying not to be.

    *sigh*

  35. says

    RE: Dreams @519-524

    Oh, god. The maze of unusable toilets, all in various stages of borked, plugged, full/overflowing with waste, seat covered in various substances (some rather alarmingly strange), bowl has been literally blown up with explosives, toilet is ripped off the foundation, and it all leads to one pristine stall. There it is. Clean. spotless. the perfect commode.
     
     
     
    …and it’s totally inaccessible. >.<

    mouthyb @526

    D’AWWWWWWWWWWW! Enjoy the kitties!

    =========

    So… we’re all familiar with the concept of Red Pill Blue Pill, right?

    What would happen if someone took both pills?

  36. says

    WMDKitty: The littlest one has now showed me his butt for the twelfth time (usually while doing slow laps of my face on my chest and shoulders.) That’s the one that kept charging the glass. I guess he really wanted to come home with us.

    He has a loud purr and an evil somnolence field. I just took an unanticipated nap because he got comfortable on my bewbs.

  37. carlie says

    Rawnaeris, I’m so sorry. spouse recently did not get a job that we were both 100% certain that he would, so I know just a little bit of how you feel. That’s an ever so much worse wrinkle. :(

    There it is. Clean. spotless. the perfect commode.

    …and it’s totally inaccessible. >.<

    In my version of the dream, that is the one that has no doors or walls around it, and right after I decide to go for it and dash over and pull down my pants, a marching band or some shit like that comes parading in and I have to give up and run away.

  38. Azkyroth Drinked the Grammar Too :) says

    Page 1 of this verson of the lounge includes several people saying that they don’t want to mention that there are things in their lives that are bad because OTHER PEOPLE have it worse. Could I just point out that this is essentially an internalized “Dear Muslima”,

    True.

    and if I told Person A to be quiet becuase Person B has worse problems, I would be offered space in the Thunderdome?

    That’s…inconsistent with past experience, but if the commentariat’s moved on from this, I’m very glad.

    (I mean, with a lot of the stuff that I found really troubling before it seems like it has, but I keep expecting a chorus of comments yelling “APRIL FOOLS!” >.>)

  39. jste says

    As it was, friend#1 was on her own with this crap, so I’m not surprised she got royally pissed off :-((( And yet these are people who are generally good on other issues – why do people never examine their (our) own damn blind spots?

    It’s in the name, I think. If you can’t see a blind spot, how do you know to examine it, unless someone points it out to you?

    Page 1 of this verson of the lounge includes several people saying that they don’t want to mention that there are things in their lives that are bad because OTHER PEOPLE have it worse. Could I just point out that this is essentially an internalized “Dear Muslima”,

    Huh. Learn something new every day.

    (So I might be about to get a bit ranty and nonsensical, but sometimes you just gotta unload…) Most of the comments on “other people have it worse” struck a sore point for me. My wife battles with depression and anxiety, and she’s occasionally expressed the thought “my life sucks, but other people have it so much worse and manage to get by ok, so I don’t deserve help.” It’s… frustrating. It shouldn’t matter. If you need help, you deserve to get that help, don’t you? If I could solve the world’s problems, I would, but I have to pick my battles, and I’d rather help the people close to me, and heal the problems that affect the people around me. Like, y’know, my wife. How do you help someone who thinks they don’t deserve help?

  40. A. Noyd says

    Fucking hell. A job offer just fell out of the sky at my feet, but I had to decline it because it involves doing something that an otherwise extremely minor disability makes impossible for me. Mad at the world now, both for this and all the bad shit everyone else in this thread is having to deal with.

  41. cicely says

    mouthyb, I know what you mean! If I had the means, I’d has all the kittehs at the shelter, you betcha!

    *hugs* and support for Jackie Papercuts. It sounds like she needed far more help than you could reasonably give her.

    *hugs* also for Rawnaeris. Is it too late for him to get better news about Job?

    And also *hugs* for A. Noyd; that does both suck and blow.

  42. says

    It’s not too late for good news for Husband for the Job. Right now our information is that he’s in the limbo of waiting for either accept/reject; I’ve got the accept, waiting for offer letter.

    The guilt on my end is I’ve been trying to leave my job for a year and a half or so now. So it’s bittersweet that the job I got is the one he wants.

    I feel dumb whinging that I got an awesome job that will let me get out of this dead end one I’m currently in. What I want is to do a happy dance.

  43. says

    WMDKitty: Especially when they keep blinking at you. Their eyelids get heavier and heavier, and they blink and blink and your eyelids get heavy and they’re warm and purring and Zzzzzzzzz.

    Cicely: ALL THE KITTEHS!

  44. Nerd of Redhead, Dances OM Trolls says

    By Doppler radar, storms to the north, south and west. I predict rain….

  45. thunk (sigh) says

    hey..

    not getting better. Still in bawling mode.

    and there was no pasta today.

    I want to be popular and creative and motivated to do Leadership stuff and be the well-liked leader of 10 clubs and hang out with my friends, but depression, and depression, and etc.

    so I know what things I need to do that will likely get me out of the hole (like transition? maybe brain?), but I can’t do even the most trivial. I hate you brain. let me do stuff.

    Well at least you never give me truly bad dreams. In the rare instances they are, I can usually abort. (lucid dreaming happens rarely, but it’s awesome when it does.)

  46. kittehserf says

    mouthyb – so envious of you having kittens! I can only adopt adult cats, kittens are a bit much for Mum to have around these days. Not to mention that rented house + destructor kittens = not a good idea.

    Re the internalised Dear Muslima – I feel that, too, as well as a mirror-image of it: not feeling free to tell about being happy, or funny, silly little things that happen, when others are going through horrible stuff. It feels like rubbing their noses in it. Anyone else have that feeling?

  47. Pteryxx says

    via Mano Singham, this interesting article breaking down how much everyone else in the USA pays to benefit the rich.

    http://billmoyers.com/2013/09/24/average-american-family-pays-6k-a-year-in-subsidies-to-big-business/

    4. $350 for Retirement Fund Bank Fees

    This was a tough one to calculate. Demos reports that over a lifetime, bank fees can “cost a median-income two-earner family nearly $155,000 and consume nearly one-third of their investment returns.” Fees are well over one percent a year.

    However, the Economic Policy Institute notes that the average middle-quintile retirement account is $34,981. A conservative one percent annual management fee translates to about $350 per family. This, again, is an average; many families have no retirement account. But many families pay much more than one percent in annual fees.

    5. $1,268 for Overpriced Medications

    According to Dean Baker, “government granted patent monopolies raise the price of prescription drugs by close to $270 billion a year compared to the free market price.” This represents an astonishing annual cost of over $2,000 to an average American family.

    OECD figures on pharmaceutical expenditures reveal that Americans spend almost twice the OECD average on drugs, an additional $460 per capita. This translates to $1,268 per household.

  48. kittehserf says

    mouthyb – in our house it’s adult humans in bad shape, these days! :P

    Kudos to you giving homes to older cats, though. I so agree about not being able to work at a shelter. I’d not only want to take all the kitties home, I’d be side-eyeing most of the prospective owners and saying “You won’t look after them well enough! They’re mine, mine!”

    My sister volunteers at her local RSPCA and I don’t know how she does it. Dogs, not cats, for her, but same thing applies.

  49. burgundy says

    @thunk – I’m sorry. I left an awesome job back in February because my depression had gotten so bad (this was after a year of being on and off FMLA and long-term disability.) I remember letting a bag of apples go bad because the idea of disposing of the apple cores seemed so overwhelming. (I was pretty much only eating in bed. I didn’t want to have smelly food trash in my bedroom. Therefore paralysis.) So I hear you about stupid depression brain. It beats you down and takes away your power to fight back. I hope things start looking up for you soon.

    @mouthyb: my last pair of cats (who came to me in middle age) had me basically running a cat hospice. Two years of sub-q fluids for renal failure, thyroid surgery, blood pressure medications, procrit injections, and so on. It was exhausting. So when I was ready for new cats, I got kittens in order to maximize the time before I’d have to do it again. And of course, one of them turned out to have a boatload of health problems. She’s had all her teeth removed. She’s on prescription food, and has been on and off steroids, and there’s just been way too much bloody diarrhea in my life these past 7 years. I was thrilled recently when I discovered that she’s back above 5 pounds again, finally. I think possibly I am just doomed to deal with sickly cats.

    I think it’s great that you’re getting a break from that, and wow do I miss having kittens. Yours sound awesome and adorable.

  50. says

    kittehserf: I’ve done that, as well. People who were critically depressed, people with debilitating injuries, people hiding from abusive spouses. In my sooper sekret dreams, I can afford to run big dorms for people who are being forgotten or mistreated (don’t tell, I have a reputation for meanness among people who don’t know me.)

    burgundy: My last one out of the pair before this died this last Monday–he had metastasized bowel cancer which lead to the release of histamines, triggering the inability to breathe. Toward the end, he had to take six pills a day, and it didn’t stop him from massive vomiting fits (blood, bile and everything that could possibly have been near his belly.) He was in ridiculous pain, and the vets couldn’t stabilize him or make him stop hurting (or keep him able to breathe.)

    The kitty baby currently purring on my bewbs doesn’t make everything better, but I’d like to have more than 5 years with a kitty before I mourn them, damn it. :'(

  51. Tony! The Immorally Inferior Queer Shoop! says

    (Last thread)
    CaitieCat @448:
    That was beautiful. Filled to the rim with compassion. My eyes are currently having difficulty staying dry.
    ****

    Mouthyb @526:
    Oh gosh, I know just how you feel. I can’t stay long in pet stores or the Humane Society bc I would want to take them all home. In my not so wildest fantasies, I have a beautiful home on multi-acre land, somewhere with no hurricanes, tornadoes, earthquakes, typhoons, blizzards, floods or volcanoes AND year round temperatures hovering around 75 F, low humidity, no air pollution and…yeah, I know.
    Still, I often long for a home on a stretch of land where I can adopt lots of animals and give them a loving home.

    ****
    There is a hurricane heading my way. Apparently it will deluge us late Saturday, early Sunday. NOT happy about that.

    Related to that:
    A: my parents drove up from Orlando to Pensacola to see me. It has been over a year and it was great to hug my parents. Even though I have to work all day every day they are here, they said they’d simply come back each day to the restsurant. Doesn’t hurt that they *loved* our food. My mom ate flan-which she did not like years ago when she first tried it. She loved it. Which was surprising to me, bc she has rarely encountered food she doesn’t like.

    B: I wanted to rhetorically smack some people at work tonight after the first-let alone 3rd-time hearing: “I cant wait for the hurricane!”
    Really?
    You think it is cool?!
    Yeah, first of all, a Category 1 does not mean ‘harmless’. It is potentially not as devastating as a Category 3, but it is still a force of nature. People can and do die in tropical storms, let alone Cat 1 hurricanes. Homes are destroyed. Businesses are devastated.
    Please…tell me…how does any of that sound cool or fun??!!

    I understand if someone is fascinated by meterological phenomena, but please do not lose sight of the impact natural disasters have on people and animals.

  52. Tony! The Immorally Inferior Queer Shoop! says

    What is ‘Hyperbole and a half’?

    ****

    Burgundy @530:
    Doesn’t Michele Bachman do everything with good faith?

    ::ducks::

    ****

    To all experiencing job/career instability/uncertainty/loss:
    My deepest sympathies. I hope things get better soon. Like yesterday.

    ****
    Dalillama:
    Wish there was some way to give you some of my energy. Hopefully this will not last long.

    ****
    Jackie:
    I hope things work out for your friend.

  53. Walton says

    New post up at The Feminist Hivemind: The fight for refugee and migrant justice continues.

    In my last post I wrote about the long and horrifying history of abuse and neglect at the Yarl’s Wood immigration removal centre, where hundreds of people, most of them women of colour, are detained. The latest allegations of sexual abuse, now confirmed by three additional witnesses, are only the latest in a long history of dehumanizing treatment of detainees.

    This week I attended two demonstrations – one outside the Home Office and the other outside 10 Downing Street – calling for the closure of Yarl’s Wood, and for a full public inquiry into the abuse of people in immigration detention. Many people attending the demonstrations had themselves been detained at Yarl’s Wood, or knew people who had, and more stories of abuse are emerging. According to some former detainee testimonies I have heard, male guards would enter women detainees’ rooms without warning, and sexual harassment and assault by guards were commonplace. Former detainees painted a grim picture of a place where living conditions and medical care were inadequate, with seriously ill people being offered paracetamol instead of proper treatment. Remember that many of the people held at Yarl’s Wood and other immigration removal centres are asylum-seekers who are survivors of horrifying persecution in their home countries, including torture, rape, homophobic and transphobic violence, female genital mutilation, and forced marriage. Some are held on the so-called “Detained Fast Track” while their asylum claims are processed, while others are detained for the purpose of removal – often being held in detention for months or even years. If you can, please sign the petition to demand a full public inquiry into abuses in immigration detention facilities.

    Unfortunately, these horrors are emerging in a political climate which is profoundly hostile to migrants and migration. And it seems to be getting worse rather than better. In a notorious recent incident, known on Twitter as #racistvan, the Home Office deployed vans in some of London’s most racially diverse areas, carrying billboards which exhorted undocumented migrants to “GO HOME OR FACE ARREST”. The Home Office also turned to more violent means, with immigration officers outside railway stations conducting “spot checks” to identify alleged “immigration offenders” – racially profiling people of colour, and intimidating and verbally abusing people who tried to stand up for their rights. Ministers have also proposed to deny migrants access to NHS services – similar to a policy already adopted by the right-wing Rajoy government in Spain, where a Senegalese man recently died of untreated tuberculosis after being refused treatment. They even plan to force landlords to verify their tenants’ immigration status, effectively turning housing agencies into unpaid immigration officers. And there is no plan to increase the meagre support given to asylum-seekers, who are not allowed to work or claim other benefits – leaving many families in destitution. Nor has the Home Office apologized for its role in the tragic death of Jackie Nanyonjo, or done anything to stop the brutal violence sometimes inflicted by the Home Office’s security contractors on those being forcibly returned to their home countries.

  54. birgerjohansson says

    Cute pics :-)
    ‘Beefy’ lion triplets the pride of Swedish zoo http://www.thelocal.se/50576/20131003/
    .
    Scandinavia and the world: Burning hot http://satwcomic.com/burning-hot
    .
    Why Swedish pop is the best in the world http://www.thelocal.se/50518/20130930/
    Homer Simpson: (grabs Swedish flag, starts waving it) “USA! USA! Oops!” (throws away flag, gets an American flag instead).
    .
    What’s the right band instrument for you, Part 2 http://www.gocomics.com/richards-poor-almanac/2013/10/03

  55. birgerjohansson says

    Ethics: Taboo genetics http://www.nature.com/news/ethics-taboo-genetics-1.13858
    .
    Right, left, wrong: People reject science because … http://phys.org/news/2013-10-left-wrong-people-science.html
    .
    Hairy black hole could show gaps in Einstein’s theory http://www.newscientist.com/article/dn24308-hairy-black-hole-could-show-gaps-in-einsteins-theory.html
    .
    New method speeds up stabilisation of chaotic systems –pacemakers or robots. http://phys.org/news/2013-09-method-stabilisation-chaotic.html

  56. strange gods before me ॐ says

    Hello! and thanks, carlie, chigau, David, Esteleth, Forelle, Kevin, opposablethumbs, and anybody I missed. Signs of the impending Hugularity are detailed in Thunderdome.

  57. Nick Gotts says

    Walton@571,

    There’s a petition here. I’ve heard there’s another one, launched by Alistair Campbell of all people on change.org, but for some reason I haven’t been sent that one.

  58. blf says

    I dream of not waking up underneath an overturned bed with a mildly deranged penguin jumping up and down on it shouting “Wakey! Wakey!”

  59. says

    *spots Giliell as she sneaks out*

    *sends Giliell flock of flying hugs*

    *adds more hugs to Lounge heap o’hugs for anyone else in need*

  60. Ogvorbis: Heading down the Failure Road. Again. says

    burgundy @ 530:

    Come up with a less realistic dream than that. I dare you.

    About a year ago, I dreamt of trying to get a giant (and holy (to dwarfs)) bottle of creme de menthe from Spam plant in Minnesota down to Florida. The dream involved lots of donuts and dwarfs driving Mini Coopers (picture the cop cars from Blues Brothes, but substitute Mini Coopers and axe weilding dwarfs).

    Yeah. Yours is still less realistic.

    =================

    Hugs for A. Noyd. That sucks.

    And for thunk. Depression really does suck.

  61. Ogvorbis: Heading down the Failure Road. Again. says

    And this is cool. They didn’t identify the dinosaur, but, to my semi-trained eye, it looks to be the fully articulated post-sacral vertebrae (with ossified tendons) of a Lambeosaurine or Hadrosaurine. Cool.

  62. says

    The littlest kitty follows us around the house and cries until we pick him up. He has the most startlingly baby like cries. He’s currently sleeping on my shoulders again.

    It’s funny–he was such a little fighter at the shelter, and now that we have him home, he appears determined to spend most of the day sleeping on one of us. It’s like being kitty furniture.

    The other kitty does non-stop laps of the house.

  63. says

    America’s right wing flea brains helped Russia write its anti-gay laws. Sheesh. Shades of Scott Lively and The Family in Uganda. Really? This is what we export?

    National Organization for Marriage president Brian Brown met with lawmakers to shape Russia’s anti-gay adoption ban …

    in Moscow for a meeting to discuss Russian laws governing adoption by same-sex couples. Among them was National Organization for Marriage president Brian Brown.

    As Right Wing Watch reports, Brown had previously worked closely with the anti-gay movement in France to fight the country’s marriage equality legislation (their efforts ultimately failed, and marriage equality is now the law of the land in France), and was now being summoned to Moscow to help shape Russian policy around gay adoption …

    Salon link.

    Right Wing Watch link.

    … The other event was a roundtable discussion on “Traditional Values: The Future of the European Peoples,” hosted by the St. Basil the Great Foundation – a Catholic group run by Konstantin Malofeev, the head of a private equity group and spirited anti-gay activist – and also sponsored by the Duma’s family committee, the right-wing Center for Social-Conservative Policy, and a new multi-party group of Russian MPs formed, with approval of the Russian Orthodox Church, to “protect traditional Christian values” and fight “aggressive liberalism” inreaction to Pussy Riot’s protests. Among the measures pushed by the group was the new law imposing jail time for “insulting religious feelings.”

    The National Organization for Marriage did not publicly announce Brown’s participation in this international meeting of anti-gay minds. However, his presence was mentioned by Revel in a blog post about the visit, in which he noted that Brown gave a “remarkable speech in the Duma.”…

    Video of Brown, and more details at the link.

  64. David Marjanović says

    Yay kitty pictures!

    drowning-in-modesty

    I do hope that’s not literal.

    Anyway, I need to run, so:

    Send Boehner a pacifier! CREDO Action will send a pacifier to Boehner for each signature this petition gets, so he can calm down the temper tea-tantrum.

    Interesting kickstarter:

    A Secular Solstice

    This winter, I’m holding a new kind of Solstice celebration. On December 14th, in New York City, hundreds of people will join their hands and their voices, singing songs and listening to stories about how humanity vanquished winter, and how much farther our species has to travel together.

    And across the world, people in smaller groups will gather to celebrate in a more intimate fashion, creating a new, secular holiday tradition.”

    They want to rent the auditorium of the Society for Ethical Culture, which seats 850 people.

    The idea expressed in the picture near the top of the page (I haven’t watched the video at the top) looks good. I’m just not sure how I feel about the let’s-have-rituals-like-religion crowd being involved.

    Ads for ivory keep showing up on Google, or so people without Adblock tell me while adding that “the population of African forest elephants has plummeted 62% in the past decade”. (The forest elephants, Loxodonta cyclotis, are now widely regarded as a different species from the savanna elephants, L. africana.) Petition to stop this. Warning: there’s something on the page that makes Firefox (at least) freeze for a minute or two. Wait it out.

  65. says

    New date for the rabid right wing revolution:

    Larry Klayman has finally set a date for his proposed uprising to remove President Obama from office: November 19. The Judicial Watch founder writes today that protesters will “descend on Washington, D.C., en masse, and demand that he leave town and resign from office if he does not want to face prison time” for pushing “his Muslim, socialist, anti-Semitic, anti-Christian, anti-white, pro-illegal immigrant, pro-radical gay and lesbian agenda.” …

    Right Wing Watch link.

  66. David Marjanović says

    America’s right wing flea brains helped Russia write its anti-gay laws.

    *facepalm*

    Yay for ecumene, I guess.

  67. says

    Combining football with an anti-gay agenda:

    Nearly 15 years, almost to the day, after Matthew Shepard was beaten, tortured and abandoned to die while tied to a fence in Laramie, Wyo., a group of football players from the University of Mississippi attended a performance of “The Laramie Project” and shouted “fag” and other homophobic slurs at the student performers retelling the events surrounding Shepard’s tragic death. …

    Link.

  68. says

    Jon Stewart nails the false outrage that Fox News is peddling about the government shutdown:
    http://www.salon.com/2013/10/04/must_see_morning_clip_jon_stewart_on_what_fuels_foxs_false_outrage_exploitation_engine/

    Scroll down for video. Excerpt below:

    … “Over on Bullsh-t Mountain [Fox News] has realized that this shutdown ain’t looking so hot for one particular party,” said Stewart.

    But not to fear! Fox News quickly fixed that by labeling it a “liberal shutdown” and blaming Democrats for closing historic, government-funded sites that are turning away everyone, including veterans.

    “Could there be a higher-octane fuel for Fox’s false outrage exploitation engine than wheelchair-bound WWII veterans?” asked Stewart, appalled.

    Fox had been winning the bullsh-t game, except, of course, then Minnesota Congresswoman Michele Bachmann inserted foot in mouth, saying that this period is “about the happiest I’ve seen members in a long time.”…

  69. says

    More bad news from Republican-controlled prison systems and Departments of Corrections. Corruption.

    The Florida Department of Corrections awarded a five-year, $1.2 billion contract to provide medical care for thousands of state prisoners in North and Central Florida to a Tennessee company that was sued 660 times for malpractice in the past five years. …

    A second contractor, Pittsburgh-based Wexford Health Sources, signed a five-year, $240 million contract in December to provide medical services to state inmates in nine institutions in South Florida.

    Wexford was hit with 1,092 malpractice claims — suits, notices of intent to sue and letters from aggrieved inmates from Jan. 1, 2008, through 2012. Records say Wexford settled 34 of 610 closed matters for a total of $5.4 million, as well as another case that ended in a $270,000 jury verdict against the company.

    The Department of Corrections, headed by Secretary Michael D. Crews, hired Corizon and Wexford to lead Florida toward millions of dollars in savings promised by the massive privatization of inmate healthcare enacted by Gov. Rick Scott and the Republican-controlled Legislature.

    Along the way, however, the corrections department never asked the corporations bidding for those lucrative jobs to disclose their litigation histories….

    http://www.miamiherald.com/2013/10/02/3666091/florida-prison-healthcare-providers.html

    So, poor medical care for prisoners, with some of that poor or absent cared resulting in death. Corruption on the part of the Florida Department of Corrections — and, of course, none of the million in savings for the taxpayers actually delivered.
    Miami Herald link.

  70. says

    Pat Robertson tells us how to stay well without Obamacare, just tithe to your church and all will be well (sounds like a mormon theme). On his “700 Club” broadcast, Robertson told an elderly woman to choose tithing over her husband’s healthcare.

    … The woman, who is “retired and living on a small pension and Social Security income” and “barely [has] any money,” asked Robertson if maybe, after a lifetime of tithing, she could prioritize her husband’s healthcare over her financial service to the church.

    Robertson’s response? Of course she can’t stop tithing. In fact, her husband is sick because she isn’t tithing enough. …

    Salon link.

  71. says

    The government shutdown is hampering prosecution of a civil rights case against fundamentalist mormons in the Utah/Arizona border towns of Hilldale/Colorado City.

    … The federal government is suing the towns, collectively known as Short Creek, claiming the elected and appointed officials, as well as police and utilities, discriminate against people who do not follow leaders of the Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints. …

    http://www.sltrib.com/sltrib/blogspolygblog/56954901-185/amp-case-federal-civil.html.csp

  72. says

    Moments of Mormon Madness, pornography category. The guy with the dubious distinction of downloading the most child porn in the state of Washington is a mormon.

    A Gig Harbor man described as an upstanding member of the community and his church has been deemed Washington state’s top downloader of child pornography, authorities said.

    Detectives with Washington State Patrol’s Missing and Exploited Children’s Task Force arrested 46-year-old Elwood “Woody” Anderson for allegedly trading in thousands of images of child pornography. “Right now, we’re talking upwards of 9,000-10,000 images,” said Lt. Ron Mead with the Washington State Patrol.

    “These are hardcore graphic images of underage children,” said Mead.

    A man who asked only to be identified as Tony watched as police arrested Anderson Thursday morning.
    “It surprises the heck out of me, actually,” he said.

    …Woody is married, the father of four girls, and according to Tony, one of the nicest people you will ever meet.

    “We knew him to be a very upstanding citizen, member of the community, and member of his church community with the Mormon Church,” said Tony. …

    http://www.kirotv.com/news/news/states-top-downloader-child-porn-busted-police-say/nbFZK/

  73. A. Noyd says

    @Lynna (#597)
    I watched the video at the link and completely lost it at the bit about the fetus with a small business making Merry Christmas muzzle cozies.

  74. carlie says

    Ugh. Reaction to allergy shot, again. (this is the second time in 3 months, only the second time ever). Now my system is full of epinephrine aftershocks and about 10 times the usual dose of antihistamines. I don’t think I’ll be catching up on anything, blog reading included, tonight.

  75. carlie says

    Biggest first world problem ever: a good friend gave me a bottle of hruškovica earlier this week, which is basically liquid gold as far as I’m concerned. I was intending on drinking some tonight, but thanks to the antihistamine overload, I can’t. Dang.

  76. Ogvorbis: Heading down the Failure Road. Again. says

    I know that Lynna is doing yeoman’s (yeoperson’s?) work in pointing out all the ways that the GOP’s temper tantrum is hurting Americans (and, soon, the world!), but I do have to point out one that Lynna has missed. The USAfCMI* has been shut down.

    I like Kraken spiced rum.

    * I’ll give you a hint — they have to wear unusual hats on the job **

    ** From an old edition of The TZT Zombie Thread***

    *** And if anyone remembers this one, I’ll be totally amazed.

  77. Crudely Wrott says

    Wi-fi connection reestablished. Was down for a day and a half due to non-payment of AT&T bill. NB; not my responsibility.

    (cue old Firesign Theatre line: “Oh! My iron lung is working again!)

    Blamelessly threadrupt but not lacking enthusiasm I offer this link to the science and technology section of nbc.com which is not bad at all. Nope, not bad at all. The sci-tech section that is. OK, the link is pretty darned neat too.

    Regions in space-time that are bigger on the inside than the outside — just like the sci-fi character Doctor Who’s TARDIS (Time and Relative Dimension in Space) time machine — could help explain the universe’s quickening expansion.

    These theoretical bubbles are named “Tardis regions.” They’re not a perfect explanation of how the expansion occurs, but they are a first step in making a model that is closer to reality, its proponents said. [Gallery: Dark Matter Throughout the Universe]

    “The idea was to get this proof of principle, that this is possible that you can do it,” Syksy Rasanen, a lecturer in theoretical physics at the University of Helsinki, told Space.com. “We’re not claiming the inside of the hole is realistic, but it’s the first model where we have an exact solution where structures that are distributed randomly in space have a significant effect on the expansion rate.”

    I loves me some cosmology.
    I loves me lots of it, too.
    The endless search for answers,
    Illuminates our view.

    But stop gap explanations
    That last a day or two
    Eat up our expectations
    And all our revelations.
    They’re all subsumed in new ones
    By the time we tie our shoes.

    Now what is sad
    What makes me blue
    (And I’m sure it’s sad for you)
    Is that our favorite answer
    Ain’t most likely 42.

    (RIP, Doug. And thanks for the encouragement. It’s OK. You had no way of knowing. You did your best. That’s OK.)
    __________

    Now I’ve got to catch up. (Yeah, right.)

    *In the mean time I’ll leave another heap of care and empathy in the middle of the Lounge. It’s all a haphazard pile and you won’t know what you’ve picked up until you actually pick it up. Don’t fret, it’s all really great stuff. Go on, help yourselves.*

    Heads upthread . . .

  78. Nerd of Redhead, Dances OM Trolls says

    I present Buttons, the crack cat.

    Reminds me of the cat we had after we moved when I was in elementary school. The cat and my mother had an afternoon ritual. Mom and the cat would lay on the couch watching the soap General Hospital together. The cat, of course, could not stand anybody else seeing this ritual.

  79. Ogvorbis: Heading down the Failure Road. Again. says

    With apologies to Woody Guthrie:

    GOP back East, they say, shut the country down one day,
    Sending all the workers to the unemployment line.
    All across Fox news they roll, gettin’ down with a friendly soul,
    They think they’re talkin’ a winnin’ game, but here’s what they find
    Now, the visitors at the National Parks all say,
    “We’re number fourteen thousand for today.”

    Oh, if you ain’t got the do re mi, folks, you ain’t got the do re mi,
    Why, you better go back to beautiful Texas, Oklahoma, Kansas, Georgia, Tennessee.
    Yellowstones’s a garden of Eden, a paradise to live in or see;
    But believe it or not, you won’t find it so hot
    ‘Cause we ain’t got the do re mi.

    You want to buy you a home or a farm, that can’t do nobody harm,
    But don’t take your vacation by the mountains or sea.
    Don’t swap your old car for a tent, cause they shut down the government,
    Better take this little tip from me.
    ‘Cause I look through the headlines every day
    But the bought-out corporate press always say:

    If you ain’t got the do re mi, boys, you ain’t got the do re mi,
    Why, you better go back to beautiful Texas, Oklahoma, Kansas, Georgia, Tennessee.
    California is a garden of Eden, a paradise to live in or see;
    But believe it or not, you won’t find it so hot
    ‘Cause everyone’s at fault but me.

  80. Ogvorbis: Heading down the Failure Road. Again. says

    Sorry. My 623 should be sung to the tune of Woody Guthrie’s Do Re Me,

  81. thunk (sigh) says

    heheh all thanks!

    I think I’ve swung around to the “let’s do shit” position now… but still. fun.

    Tests tomorrow, all this pre-college whoa stuff.

    Caine: You got snow? … am I the only one that likes it then?

  82. Ogvorbis: Heading down the Failure Road. Again. says

    Mildly drunk on Kraken. Watching Breakfast Club. WIfe and I are having fun identifying the kids we went to high school with (not Ally Sheedy and all, but the real life equivalents)/

  83. Nerd of Redhead, Dances OM Trolls says

    Dang, SNOW???? Glad I’m no longer in Day YooPee. About time for the first snowfall. Here in Chiwaukee, not even down in the thirties yet.

  84. Esteleth, statistically significant to p ≤ 0.001 says

    Horde Fund Update:

    We are almost there! In a few short days, we’ve raised JAL enough to tide her over until the 15th, when another batch of bills come due – and we’ve started chipping away at that.

    Covering those bills and getting JAL to November will be accomplished with another $200.

    *brandishes pompons*

    Go Horde! We’re awesome!

  85. Ogvorbis: Heading down the Failure Road. Again. says

    g’night.

    Why do I feel like I should apologize now?

  86. Esteleth, statistically significant to p ≤ 0.001 says

    *pre-emptively forgives Oggie*

    *gives Oggie Thin Mints*

    *gives Oggie a wicker basket of mixed grasses and eggs and a chocolate bunny*

    Ummmmmm

    *gives Oggie a plush D20 eight inches across and a bottle of lotion*

    Hope that helps.

  87. says

    S word, high winds, ice. Power is out. Hopefully it will be back on tonight or tomorrow, but until it’s back on, I’ll only be around for as long as my laptop battery lasts. (Optimistically, 3 hours or so.)

  88. chigau (違う) says

    Caine
    I’ve seen a number of yootoobs where people have connected small appliances to a stationary bike and peddle to power them.
    I’m thinking now of a large hamster-wheel…

  89. cicely says

    I wish to complain.
     
    *ascending podium*
     
    Over $200 dollars just last week for new tires, car inspection, and re-tagging…is there any particular reason why the fuel pump couldn’t have waited until next month to snuff it? Or, in view of the pending-ness of the necessity of replacing the defroster fan sometime ahead of the frost, the month after that?
     
    *gently beating podium with forehead*
     
    Thank you.
     
    *dismounting podium*

    *exceedingly gentle hugs* for carlie.

    I’m thinking now of a large hamster-wheel…

    Giant Space Hamsters!!!
     
    *singing*
    Spa-ham, spa-ham, spa-ham, spa-ham….

  90. says

    Chigau @ 632, nah, no slave labour here. If the power doesn’t come back on by 10:00, I’ll light up the propane heater and crawl into bed, where the ratties can pile up too, if they wish. They are all rather excited right now, they love the dark. :D

  91. Esteleth, statistically significant to p ≤ 0.001 says

    Cicely, do you need the Hordefund for yourself?

  92. cicely says

    Nonononono! I just needed to vent.
     
    We’d been sneaking up on the tires, expecting to have to replace them in about December, and had saved up for the inspection and tagging. The timing just sucked. And now, it’s sucking again.
     
    I’m pretty sure we can get an advance on Husband’s paycheck. We should be okay. Just…timing.

  93. Crudely Wrott says

    Oh, cicely (from #633)! Didn’t you know? Our machines have possessed sentience since early in the nineteenth century. The only reason that the fact isn’t more widely known, let alone broadly admitted, is that inventors, fabricators, distributors and corporate fat cats have just been too . . . embarrassed to admit it. See? Simple human pride. Again.

    Always expect complicated machinery to manifest multiple malfunctions simultaneously. That’s how they find meaning for their lives of servitude. Now, really, can you blame them? We’ve treated them like . . . things . . . for so long and stopped being thankful for all they do that it’s no wonder they conspire to confound us like they do. There is no reason to keep treating them like . . . tools . . . conveniences . . . things. How would you like it? I thought so. QED, human! Now, I’m human too and have, on occasion, treated a cordless power driver like a common hammer. Worse, like a handy stone! Oh! The machinery!!

    Please profit from my experience, some of it sorely and painfully gleaned from a lifetime of machine usage.

    To minimize such inconveniences it is recommended to follow the manufacturer’s suggestions for regular maintainence. Keep all fluids clean and up to the proper levels, changing filters as indicated in your owner’s manuals. You do have your owner’s manuals for all your complicated machinery, don’t you?

    Also, do not be stingy with praise and soft caresses when it comes to cars and lawn mowers, toasters and routers (wi-fi as well as wood). Tell them how much you love them and depend on them. They thrive on that. It motivates them to be faithful in serving you. Above all, keep them clean. A clean machine is a happy machine. Just imagine having to do grunt work every day with sand in your shorts and you’ll see what I mean.

    True facts, true story:
    I changed V’ger’s oil and oil filter yesterday and, while buttoning things up underneath, discovered that my oil pressure sensor was cracked and hanging on by a (plastic) thread. I obtained another sensor straightaway and installed it this morning. You know what? V’ger thanked me by making my oil pressure gauge display a higher reading than before! Now I’m driving with extra confidence just for spending $24.99 + tax and tending to V’ger’s more delicate and sensitive parts. Not to mention getting oil on my glasses and my hat.

    But, hey, V’ger’s odometer is only 134 miles shy of 225,000 total miles! Why, at this rate we’ll be back from the Moon in a little less than twenty fifteen years.

  94. Crudely Wrott says

    Edit my #637: There really is no such number as twenty fifteen unless you are saying what year it is or if you just have a funny way of speaking magnitudes. Apparently I fit both cases. My final sentence should indicate a time span of only twenty years given that V’ger is a 1995 model and the odometer indicates that now, after eighteen years en route, insertion into lunar orbit is immanent. We’ll spend a couple of years loitering there before beginning our return leg to transit back to Earth. Closer to twenty than two thousand and fifteen years by our reckoning.

    See ya’ll planet side! =)

    *ta pocketa pocketa pocketa*

  95. Crudely Wrott says

    Cicely:

    Crudely, you made me smile! Thanks!

    Well, shucks. I had to pass on a grin to someone! You just happened to get in the way!

    See, I’ve really had a wonderful day. A slew of neat shit has fallen from somewhere right on top of me and my grin is really more than one person can handle. Really, almost unseemly!

    I’d tell you all about it but if I tried I’d be typing till morning.

    Please, take good care of that smile. Keep it clean, give it lots of compliments and stroke it tenderly. If you do, it’ll last a long time. Yes, it really will. Here’s a wink to go with it. ;^>
    (my favorite emoticon, in case it’s not already obvious)

  96. chigau (違う) says

    Crudely Wrott
    I agree with cicely, #637 made me smile.
    and #639 has sent me to the bookshelf to find my Thurber.

  97. Crudely Wrott says

    Chigau, you came through. Nicely and quickly, I’ll add. =)

    I was hoping that someone would get the Walter Mitty reference.

    All Hail Mitty! All Hail Thurber! All Hail Chigau! All Hail the Horde!

    *there is no Horde but the Horde — the Horde is the Hordeliest and contains within it all that may be contained — the Horde is beyond Hailing for it won’t, yea, cannot stop — it can only be wondered at as it passes, pausing now and again to touch the head of a child, offering a meal to a needy or making of a fool a meal for itself and stuff like that there — ;^>*

  98. says

    Apologies for threadruptness, but am utterly spoonless and wanted to unreasonably bitch about my work. I do love it, honestly I do, and if I just had enough clients I’d be happier than a kitteh in a hugpile.

    But it’s SO EXHAUSTING having to do the back-and-forth with the client on how spaced out the bullet points are, and what font size is that, and why is it so tiny (BECAUSE YOU WON’T LET ME EDIT THE ENGLISH PART YOU WALLOPING GREAT BERK!), and are all the words in Turkish just as the translator gave them, because he thought there were more umlauts (or whatever they call them in Turkish) in the version he gave me, so could i check it again, and did I mention, dear client, I DON’T ACTUALLY SPEAK TURKISH, so I don’t know if it’s right and maybe that’s a question you should ask your Turkish translator cause today I’m just the Layout Ninja and that’s why i’m giving you PDF proofs?

    All i want to do is sit in my little cubbyhole doing my technical stuff, layout, translation, proofing/editing, whatever. I don’t want to deal with clients. i don’t want to LOOK for clients. I don’t want to have to take phone calls from clients.

    I just want a regular series of sets of technical specifications, and the time and space to work to those specs as a language engineer of sorts.

    Can someone magic-wand me up a business partner who would like to do all that stuff? Kthx.

    /work-y rant

    Nightnight, hordelings large and small and of undeclared size.

  99. Crudely Wrott says

    . . . musta forgot to Hail Tpyos . . .

    “. . . a meal to a needy one . . . ”

    (That’s happening even as we speak. Hailworthy, that.)

  100. says

    Gurg. That’s how tired I am, that I’m dropping misogynist slurs without thinking. Apologies, Hordies. Mea culpa mea culpa mea poco culpa.

  101. Crudely Wrott says

    @ CatieCat: I know, I know. ‘At’s OK. No matter what you agree to do, more will be asked of you; or just dumped unceremoniously in your lap. Kinda like “All jobs take longer”.

    Bear up, dear one. You’ll get through it and maybe, hopefully, get forgiveably late kudos.
    _____

    . . . happier than a kitteh in a hugpile.

    Now, that’s some real happy right there, I’ll guaran-damn-double-ty you! Thanks, CatieCat. I am now better armed to face my daily struggle.

  102. Beatrice, an amateur cynic looking for a happy thought says

    So… a Saturday*. Quiet here.
    That idea I had about standing up to my boss fell through. I had just the right words, but not the opportunity. I did inform some colleagues who will provide backup in explaining that it’s a bloody stupid idea and what the hell was she thinking!?**

    *er, Thursday in Ogvorbisland?
    **not in those words

  103. Beatrice, an amateur cynic looking for a happy thought says

    My contract ends in December so please hold some thumbs for me getting a new job (one where I would be getting a paycheck, please) before that, because another long stay at home without work is not going to help with this depression thingy I’m feeling.

    I’m very lucky in that my parents can provide for me, I’m not in financial troubles but still being completely dependent on them at 27 makes me feel guilty and a failure. All the nasty feelings I have about myself feed on each other and get really nasty.

    In other news, french classes started again and I exercise a lot so that’s good.

  104. Beatrice, an amateur cynic looking for a happy thought says

    That lion cub is so cute, she’s driven me into incoherence. Where incoherence means cutesy names and baby talk.

  105. says

    Thurber excerpt to start the morning (my morning at least):

    In the operating room there were whispered introductions: “Dr. Remington, Dr. Mitty. Mr. Pritchard-Mitford, Dr. Mitty.” “I’ve read your book on streptothricosis,” said Pritchard-Mitford, shaking hands. “A brilliant performance, sir.” “Thank you,” said Walter Mitty. “Didn’t know you were in the States, Mitty,” grumbled Remington. “Coals to Newcastle, bringing Mitford and me up here for a tertiary.” “You are very kind,” said Mitty. A huge, complicated machine, connected to the operating table, with many tubes and wires, began at this moment to go pocketa-pocketa-pocketa. “The new anesthetizer is giving way!” shouted an intern. “There is no one in the East who knows how to fix it!” “Quiet, man!” said Mitty, in a low, cool voice. He sprang to the machine, which was going pocketa-pocketa-queep-pocketa-queep. He began fingering delicately a row of glistening dials. “Give me a fountain pen!” he snapped. Someone handed him a fountain pen. He pulled a faulty piston out of the machine and inserted the pen in its place. “That will hold for ten minutes,” he said. “Get on with the operation.” A nurse hurried over and whispered to Renshaw, and Mitty saw the man turn pale. “Coreopsis has set in,” said Renshaw nervously. “If you would take over, Mitty?” Mitty looked at him and at the craven figure of Benbow, who drank, and at the grave, uncertain faces of the two great specialists. “If you wish,” he said. They slipped a white gown on him; he adjusted a mask and drew on thin gloves; nurses handed him shining . . .

  106. says

    Thank you Ogvorbis for this:

    I know that Lynna is doing yeoman’s (yeoperson’s?) work in pointing out all the ways that the GOP’s temper tantrum is hurting Americans (and, soon, the world!), but I do have to point out one that Lynna has missed. The USAfCMI* has been shut down.

    Actually, I think there’s a lot that I’ve missed. I slowed down on reporting, tapered off, and then gave up. I may be depressed.

    I did have a happy time recently. I visited Salmon-Challis National Forest lands which do not know they are closed. Apart from scattered ranger stations, the whole of the forest lands go on as before. Saw a lovely herd of elk, with Mr. Large-and-in-Charge Elk sporting a rack that reached back to his rump as he also ignored the government shut down. Fresh snow on the peaks, fall colors below. I am rich despite the fucking Republicans.

  107. says

    @Lynna (#597)
    I watched the video at the link and completely lost it at the bit about the fetus with a small business making Merry Christmas muzzle cozies.

    Yeah, the fetus with the holiday (excuse me, the Christmas) muzzle cozy business made me laugh out loud. Stewart fucking nailed the ridiculousness of the situation and made us laugh at the same time. Maybe we should just get all out news from him.

    Here’s Jimmy Kimmel on the government shutdown:
    http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/the-fix/wp/2013/10/03/congresss-dismal-approval-rating-as-demonstrated-by-jimmy-kimmel-video/

  108. says

    Let’s ignore the concept of separation of church and state, shall we? If we live in Alabama, yes.

    Montgomery, Alabama police are dealing with “Operation Good Shepherd,” which uses public money to field troops of Christian pastors. The Christian preachers/pastors/scammers go to crime scenes and pray. Then they evangelize. If you are victim, suffering already, you also get to be prayed over by fundamentalist Christians, an additional torture that, as a taxpaying citizen, you have funded.

    “What we’re seeing today, those seeds were sown a long time ago. I truly believe there has been a breakdown in the family. We have young people not being guided,” said Montgomery Police Chief Kevin Murphy.

    And Murphy’s police department is intent on providing that guidance via a cop-led, Christian outreach program.

    “What we want to do is combine the religious community and the Montgomery Police Department and we want to unite those as one,” said Corp. David Hicks during an interview on Irvin’s Christian radio program.

    Moreover, the department is frank about the evangelistic aspect of the program.

    “Anytime you find a group of people whose lives have been adversely affected – it could be a major fire in an apartment complex, it could be trouble in a given community, it can be a storm or a disaster – this gives us an opportunity to meet people and show them the kind of love and compassion that all human beings need,” said E. Baxter Morris, the MPD’s official chaplain. “There is an evangelistic advantage. That is, that once I float to your comfort zone, and we become one in our crisis, I determine what your spiritual needs may or may not be, and I may be able to share with you a word from Christ.”

    http://www.theatlantic.com/national/archive/2013/09/using-christianity-to-fight-crime/280038/

    If I am in crisis, I do not want to become one with Baxter Morris.

  109. says

    Thanks to all the attention being sucked up by the government shutdown, an important issue in Virginia is being ignored. There’s a race for governor going on and the Republicans in Virginia are getting desperate, so desperate that they are purging voter rolls. They are deleting voters likely to vote for the Democratic candidate.

    Heads up, people, this is a fundamental breach of voting rights.

    http://www.nbcnews.com/id/26315908/#53191070 (video, Maddow coverage)

    Washington Post link.

    Daily Kos link.

    Alaska, Arizona, Arkansas, Colorado, Florida, Georgia, Idaho, Illinois, Indiana, Iowa, Kansas, Kentucky, Louisiana, Michigan, Mississippi, Missouri, Nebraska, Nevada, Ohio, Oklahoma, Oregon, South Carolina, South Dakota, Tennessee, Virginia. Those in Pennsylvania can start worrying next year.

    Keep checking back, because purges may be ongoing. And alert your friends!

    All these states are now participants in the “Interstate Voter Registration Crosscheck,” a program administered by the Kansas Board of Elections (with help from Arkansas) since 2005 that purports to identify “potential” duplicate voter registrations. It is now offered by the state of Kansas as a service to other states at no charge. Twenty-six have signed on. Pennsylvania will implement only next year. …

    I started looking into this after rodentrancher posted a diary about a letter from the Accomack County, Va., registrar’s office informing him he had been removed from the Virginia voting rolls, on the grounds that he had moved to South Carolina.

    In fact, he had moved from South Carolina some time back, updated his registration properly, voted in Virginia last year and, on double checking, confirmed that he is no longer on the South Carolina voter registration list. Nevertheless, he had been purged from the Virginia voter rolls….

  110. says

    Who the heck are those guys holding us all hostage?

    We have the spectacle of a block of fanatical House Republicans that representing only 12% of American voters and 18% of American citizens, that is capable (along with the craven connivance of John Boehner) to tie the US government up in knots, and make the American economy into their hostage. … dysfunctional government remains locked in the grip of paralysis caused by this Constipated Congress. …

    Link.

  111. says

    Republicans can explain their shutdown strategy. Honest. I’m sure they can:

    “Because it, twofold.One is, is, that when you when you start to look, they say ‘clean CR?’ That it, it translates into into to truly a blank check, and, and so Obamacare is an issue for me and my constituents, but what happens is today is, we gotta figure a way to open it back up and, and with that, in opening it back up, when we start to look at these issues, it, it is critical that we make it, the decisions we, we make to be as least harmful as they possibly can be.” — Rep. Mark Meadows (R-N.C. [Meadows is the guy that circulated a letter, later signed by 80 of his GOP colleagues, vowing to oppose any spending measure that failed to gut the Affordable Care Act.]

    Rachel Maddow issued a challenge: can anyone diagram Meadows’ explanation?

    To make matters worse, less clear, Meadows followed up a couple of days later with this: “This fight now has become about veterans and about national guard folks that perhaps — reservists that are not getting paid.” That’s where the fight is today.”

  112. says

    Mormons have been sneaking their missionaries into foreign countries under false pretenses for decades. They are still doing so today. I think it is time they got caught and punished.

    When I was in Switzerland/Germany, they registered us all as construction workers. Then they had Elder’s sign power of attorney over to Sister Klaumuenzer…
    I of course refused, but she still applied for several foreign visa’s in my name.
    Assholes :|

    I was in Venezuela from 88-90. We were all there as tourists. We had an attorney who would would bribe a clerk at the immigration office to rubber stamp an extra few months after the allowed time had passed after you first arrived. Then each US missionary had to leave the country. We kept missionaries on Aruba and Curacao (I served on Curacao for 5 months) to pick up missionaries from the airport, show them around for a day and put them back on a plane. Then they’d enter again, dressed as tourists, pretending to speak no spanish and be allowed in again.

    When I went to Ireland in 1987, the Church said on my visa application that I was a BYU student (even though I hadn’t attended BYU in more than a year) and they applied for a student visa. I just had to fill out a few relevant fields and sign it.

    Once I got to the country, the mission AP’s [Area President – one rung on a complicated ladder of mormon hierarchy] took away my US passport when I was in an Irish government office getting a green card.

    The student visa had to be renewed every six months, which they did not do. So, when I left the country, I learned that I had been there illegally for 18 months.

    I remember thinking how cool that was back in the 1960s that the church lied on the visa applications. Silly me. Like so many Mormons, I got on board with the idea that anything was fair game so long as it advanced The Work of the Lord.

    http://exmormon.org/phorum/read.php?2,1040934

  113. Ingdigo Jump says

    I’m sorry I’m threadrupt and crossposting this and it’s pathetic but I could sort of use some kind words
    I hope no one minds but. I sort of need to vent somewhere. It’s incredibly stupid but if you could just endugle me, there’s some stuff I want to share about myself. I don’t usually share too much RL stuff but I felt the need to share some stuff today that I’m tired of hiding.

    http://blogingproject.blogspot.com/2013/10/they-always-smile.html

    They Always Smile
    This is a story about why I am the way I am; my confession if you will.

    From about the time I was thirteen I knew my father didn’t want to be part of my family. My mother and I were disappointments, signs that he failed in life. I tried most of my childhood and adult life to be a good enough child that he would want to be part of my life. I tried so hard to make it so I could believe that he loved me. When I turned 18 he left. With me now of legal age his obligation was done and he exited my life. I was left to pick up the responsibilities and to rebuild and clean up the mess he left. Where other people my age were dating or partying or focusing entirely on my studies I was trying to help put back the pieces of my family and build back up my mother’s crushed psyche. My mother still hasn’t recovered. I don’t know she ever will. I don’t know how you can ever fully recover from the idea that someone pretends to like you but can’t stand you.

    Even before I knew exactly what the problem was I knew there was something wrong with my father. My father yelled a lot. He broke things. He would become depressive and not talk to anyone after. He would disappear. I remember being always afraid as a child. One of my earliest memories was my father asking me to get him something from the basement and me hesitating afraid to go down. Not because I was afraid of the basement, but because I was afraid my father was sending me into some sort of trap to get rid of me. I was afraid the stairs were rigged and were going to collapse. That’s not the only memory I have of that fear. The same thing happened being asked to go to the shed, or go for a drive with him. I wanted to love my father, but I was so scared. I felt guilty doubting he loved me.

    I often had trouble at school; in addition to or maybe because of this. A few years ago cleaning out my mom’s old collection of my elementary school stuff I found the results of a psyche test the guidance councilor had run. In the notes it read that I was “going to have a lot of trouble coming to terms with who their father is”.

    When I was about ten years old, I did not have many friends. I was dealing with emotional problems and was a very fragile child. Even back then I felt anything I did wrong, any time I did not achieve perfection, it was letting my parents down and was ruining my family. Every less than perfect test wasn’t just some academic grade, it was a failed opportunity to try to earn the loving family I wanted. I thought that if I could be a good child that sort of thing might stop. But nothing I did was good enough (obviously). Every less than perfect grade would make me cry and beat myself up. Every failed sport or social activity the same. The other kids didn’t like me because of this obviously. I was the freak. The cry baby.

    Despite all this, I was recognized as “gifted”. Apparently, troubled but gifted. The guidance councilor pushed for me to enter more challenging classes and after school programs such as the Talented And Gifted program. That seemed to help with confidence. It was higher level material, thought puzzles, head start at advanced math etc. I thought I was getting better (in every sense of the word). I thought I could be someone people could be proud of.

    I even thought I had made a friend or two. That child’s name was Justin. I forget his last name, but it’s probably for the best. He was also in TAG. He was the golden child really. He really was everything I wasn’t. slimmer, athletic (or at least not clumsy), confident, collected, popular. Justin was in TAG before me and ahead in a lot of areas. He knew chess strategy and openings when I was just playing around with it, he knew the start of trig when I was learning algebra. That sort of thing. He always was smiling. Always.

    He had teased me a bit before, but had seemed to warm up to me when I joined TAG. Getting to talk and know each other more in a less stressful intellectual environment put me at ease. It let me open up more. Justin befriended me, he encouraged me to open up to him and talk to him. There was a lot of joking at TAG, some of it barbed at my expense but I was trying to learn to go with that. Occasionally a comment he said really hurt my feelings and I would get made but he would smile and apologize. he was always smiling. Always. I would always forgive him. because that was the right thing to do.

    It was about the time I started getting into some geeky things. I discovered the Star Wars books and loved them, started watching old twilight zones, and it was when Pokemon was first being exported into the states. I remember learning about this Pokemon game and really liking the idea, loving the first games. Justin seemed to share my interests and we talked about those sort of things all the time. He started having me join him and his friends at lunch. Instead of sitting alone we’d talk about Star Wars, Pokemon, ghosts and ghoulies and that sort of thing. I thought it was great that people seemed to finally start to like me rather than see me as some freak. Every day I could look forward to seeing Justin at lunch. He’s smile when I sat down across from him. He was always smiling. Always.

    Except there was a problem. Gradually I started noticing little…how shall we say…problems with the things Justin said. He seemed to love Pokemon and Starwars as much as me, but kept seeming to make elementary mistakes or say things that were blatantly false. I’m not talking about some bullshit fake geek girl stuff about trivia, but about basic things. Things that if you were being honest about liking the material should have known. I didn’t like this. I didn’t like being suspicious of someone. I thought it was just because of my father. I thought that I was crazy and stupid and beat myself up over being so untrusting. After worrying myself sick I tried an experiment, feeling full well that I was a freak for even thinking it. I would ask some questions of Justin or feed some obviously wrong info about the stuff we were talking about and see what he would do. He would correct me or ask why I was being stupid right? Then I could forget about the whole thing and move on. Justin never corrected me. He went along with whatever I was saying.

    I think my heart really did break when I figured out the truth. Justin didn’t like what I liked. Not even a little. He just was going along with what I was saying like some cruel improv act. He didn’t like me. Not even a little. He wasn’t my friend. He thought I was funny, not funny haha but funny pathetic. I was their pet freak. They laughed at me behind my back. For nearly a year Justin lied to me and he smiled when he did it.

    I confronted Justin at lunch about this and he admitted it. He said he was toying with me for fun. He smiled when he said it. He was always smiling. Always.

    I remember leaving the lunch room crying as people laughed at me. I had no friends. I had less than no friends. I was pathetic. I was a freak. Any sign of kindness was a lie. I had been feeling sick a lot after that. I didn’t tell my parents what happened. It was about two weeks after the laughing moved from behind my back to my face that I went to the nurse’s office feeling sick to my stomach. I had been there every day that week and was always sent back as a faker. I didn’t want to be there any more, I didn’t want to go to school. I didn’t want to face smiling Justin. So after two weeks while I was waiting for the nurse to finish with a another kid I took the laces out of my sneakers and tried to strangle myself.

    The nurse heard me gagging and stopped me. I was sent for counseling. They somehow concluded I would be OK to stay in school and classes, but made me go for weekly sessions with the guidance councilor. I wasn’t allowed to be in TAG anymore.

    I didn’t let myself make friends after that for a long time. I learned that people were cruel, people couldn’t be trusted. I learned people would toy with you and abuse you for no reason. I also learned that those sorts of people would abuse forgiveness. They would stomp on your heart week after week and then smile and apologize and guilt you into letting them close to you again. Other things just reinforced that. My father finally cut ties. My grandfather tried to steal the house from my grandmother. My uncle almost left me homeless A boss exploited my eagerness to please and abused me; meddled into my personal life and bullied me with threats and insults. A guy I met from online had me over and basically jumped me, wouldn’t take any signs or requests to back off or slow down and had to be fought off. Those events hurt, but I felt at least that I grew from them. I got very cautious of people. Very suspicious. I seemed to learn a lot of signs of lying, of abuse, of the horrible cycle of “forgiveness”. After a while I thought I had built myself back up. That I was stronger, I was smarter, that I was wiser and wouldn’t be fooled again. I could start to be more open, less guarded and talk to people again.

    Then today someone who seemed friendly on Twitter revealed that they were lying. They talked to me. They acted nice. They joked around with me. They acted as if they liked me. They didn’t like me at all. They were pretending to do so to hurt people and laugh behind their back. So here I am, feeling as if all those things just came flooding back and I’m a little kid again. Humiliated once again for letting my guard down even for a second. Hurt for letting anyone even a little close. It’s my fault. I forgot how people will lie. Somehow, I’m sure they’re smiling. They always smile.

  114. says

    Kevin: Sorry, kitties. Cute kitties.

    Nerd: The older one is like that. You can only pet her if she’s not looking at you (but she’ll back up to you and get impatient for pets, insistent little coerl noises and all.)

    CaitieCat: Oooooo, the fat kitteh belleh! *esplodes*

    Do you people know how HARD it is to be tense about anything with a kitty sleeping on your chest? He keeps stretching out and putting his tiny little paws on my lips, or around my neck. I have to do more stats analysis this weekend and I can’t even get tense about that shit right now. If I had known, I’d have bought kitties home more ofte–zzzzzzzzzzzz.

  115. awakeinmo says

    Ingdigo

    I’m so sorry. I do know a little bit of what it’s like to be chewed up and spit out by “friends.” Of course, the adults weren’t much help. “Just ignore them” doesn’t do much to mend one’s sense of trust, or to find real friends.

    I don’t wanna get too far down the horrible rabbit hole….just know that there are folks around who know how shitty that is, and…well….just hugs!

  116. cicely says

    Octopus Sex at Hydrothermal Vents

    Beatrice, I will cross all tentacles on your behalf.
    :)

    Ingdigo, I’m so sorry. Some people seem to just get a kick out of hurting people—I think, maybe, it’s a kind of emotional “bullying”, it lets them feel powerful and clever, and there are no visible marks, so it’s easier to hide. I was at the receiving end of some of this kind of thing, but not to the same degree you describe.
    *hugs and/or other gestures of support and comfort* if acceptable.

  117. says

    I’m kind of surprised at how much I like cats given what a crochety, ill-tempered beast the one I grew up with was. She only like being touched/petted on the head and the back of her neck, and if anyone tried to touch her anywhere else, or god forbid pick her up, extreme pointiness ensued (probably some of my earliest lessons in bodily autonomy; my parents alway sided with the cat whenever I got bit or scratched, and told me that’s how she communicated that she didn’t like it, and I should avoid touching her in the ways that got pointy). She wouldn’t tolerate any other animals, and I saw her chase alsatians off the property (we lived far enough out of town that a fair number of people would let their dogs run loose sometimes and nothing was really done about it).

  118. says

    Oddly, given my ‘nym, I’m actually a real dog person myself. I don’t mind other people’s cats, and will appreciate pictures and even cuddle time with a cat, but my nose is sensitive to their particular smells, and I find them hard to live with. Dogs on the other hand, their stinks don’t bother me (please don’t think I’m saying they don’t have them!).

    About the only thing that would make me move out of my apartment voluntarily would be the chance to have a place where I could have a dog. I figure I’d need about $3500 to make it happen, with moving and first/last rent and vet/adoption fees and a small fund to cover part of the possible vet costs because I don’t have any credit.

    But I really love the pics of people’s fuzzier and/or featherier and/or scalier cohabitants, in that bittersweet better-on-balance-than-not way. Kevin’s two particularly remind me of two of my partner’s cats; five years ago she had 8, since then they’ve all passed, one after the other, all in their teens after she’d taken them in as rescues (also two dogs, same recent outcome).

    Off to the theatre. My community theatre is playing Waiting for Godot, so in that spirit I will bid you all happy fish, and bicycle apple the marching peroration of Naples.

    /absurdism

  119. thunk (sigh) says

    Ingdigo: yeahouch. that is horrible, and again I’m reminded of how horrible people can be. *hugs*.

    At least the rain feels nice. a few severe storms but not the predicted major outbreak.

  120. morgan ?! epitheting a metaphor says

    I was just bipping around utube and stumbled on this. It occurs to me that it might be a good theme song for the lounge and all the beat up folks who come here for comfort and understanding.
    And Ingdigo, that was shit. Come home to the Lounge.

  121. carlie says

    Ingdigo, I’m so sorry people treated you like that. I’ve always looked forward to your posts, been impressed by what you write, always had you on my short short list of “people I really wish I lived in the same town with so we could hang out”. Really and truly. God, other people can suck so much.

  122. Ogvorbis: Apologies Available for All! says

    Cicely @633:

    Over $200 dollars just last week for new tires, car inspection, and re-tagging

    For many years, our minivans had a December inspection. And every year, it came to around $600. Every single year. No matter how careful I was to get the brakes, tyres, lights, everything, checked through the year, we always found ourselves having to find a way to inspect the car and still afford the trip down to Florida to visit Wife’s family.

    You have my sympathy.

    Now, our Taurus is inspected in August. And it sails right through and I do all the shit throughout the year. Do not understand.

    Beatrice @652:

    *er, Thursday in Ogvorbisland?

    I have not idea what the fuck day of the week it is. They appear to all be Saturdays.

    CatieCat @654:

    A very fierce lion cub. Very fierce. Ferocious, even. :)

    A carnivorous Shoop?

    I visited Salmon-Challis National Forest lands which do not know they are closed.

    I spent three weeks there back in 2000. At a really big forest fire. Don’t remember the name. First fire I ever went to.

    By the way, the USAfCMI is the United States Agency for Carmen Miranda Impersonators.

    =====

    Ingdigo Jump @668:

    Hugs to you.

    I still fear that, when someone is nice to me, they are setting me up. I had hoped that, as one gets older, that junior high behaviour got left behind. But assholes are still assholes. And you are not.

  123. Nutmeg says

    You know your cold is addling your brain when you spend three minutes staring at the freckles on your arm, deciding whether they form a Pacman or a stingray. And this is without cold medication.

    I hate cold-induced brain-fog, but it is an interesting mental state.

    (For the record, stingray.)

  124. David Marjanović says

    *heap of hugs for Ingdigo*
    *heap of hugs for Ogvorbis*
    *heap of pouncehugs for cicely, with milk chocolate that contains 35 % “exquisite Arriba cocoa from Ecuador”*

  125. Ogvorbis: Apologies Available for All! says

    Under the heading of mixed feelings: congress has voted to pay federal workers for the time we are furloughed. This is good. But this also may mean that federal workers, if the shutdown continues for another week or more, cannot collect unemployment. Which means that I will get paid. Someday. What if the GOP keeps this going for a month or two? If federal workers (including me) cannot collect unemployment, but I will be paid eventually (once the government is up and running again), then how the fuck do I pay my bills? These assholes do not understand what they are doing to federal workers, to private workers who depend on federal spending, and the entire fucking country. ASSHOLES!

  126. FossilFishy(Anti-Vulcanist) says

    Indigo

    I had a similar childhood. My father’s neglect and abuse came from alcoholism. The details are different from your life, but I have a blanket distrust of men as a legacy of that childhood. An unwarranted one I readily admit, but my emotions these 34 years after his death still remain.

    I’ve only ever had one close male friendship in my adult life, And wouldn’t you know it, he slid into alcoholism. I had to walk away from him and his life, and playing in the band we were both in, my last musical project, to keep myself from being dragged down.

    I have no good advice. I have no panacea for these deep injuries. I would give almost anything to possess such a thing, to have the power to fix these hurts completely, permanently. It would make my own flawed and troubled life worth all its difficulties to be able to be able to pull others back up to the light.

    All I can offer is understanding; I have some inkling of how you feel. It sucks in an almost literal sense. It pulls the joy and wonder from daily life to be on your guard all the time. It’s exhausting. On the bad days there’s never any energy left over for enjoyment. All that I hope for when I reach that state is to be refreshed enough by unconsciousness to carry on one more day.

    I offer understanding, such as it is, and a promise: I will never, ever lie to you. We haven’t had much interaction you and I, but I’ve read your comments for years. The person I see those words is someone I respect. Truthfully, without reservation.

    Be as well as you can be Ing. I hope that venting here can give you some measure of peace.

  127. Ingdigo Jump says

    These assholes do not understand what they are doing to federal workers, to private workers who depend on federal spending, and the entire fucking country.

    The tea party doesn’t. the Tea Party politicians I contest do. They hate federal workers remember.

  128. cicely says

    *wallowing in pouncehugs while nomming chocolate*
    *pouncehugswarm* for David.

    Oh, yes; and as an addendum to my 674, it also offers the band of tormentors a warm-and-fuzzy bonding experience, with an associated belonging-to-a-community high—and all at the low, low price of…you.

  129. Nerd of Redhead, Dances OM Trolls says

    Dang, Ogvorbis #686, that puts you between a rock and a hard place. We have a home equity line of credit we could use for a while, which we took out due to medical bills and to get some home improvements done.

  130. Ogvorbis: Apologies Available for All! says

    Ing @687:

    Yeah. The right wing has been vilifying all public and union workers right now that destroying the economy would be worth it if they can punish us.

    Nerd:

    Pretty sure I’ll be able to take out a low-interest loan through my credit union with no payments until I get paid. They know what I get paid, it gets direct deposited, I can (hopefully) get some loans for a little less than my normal paycheck (no Sunday differential) and pay them a lump sum when I get paid. I hope.

  131. says

    Ingdigo, I just got back and had time to read your post again.

    I want to second what was mentioned above, that I *always* look for your comments on a thread, and always find them insightful and furthering of the conversation in some way, showing genuine empathy where appropriate, sniny claws when appropriate. You’re someone I sincerely respect, your opinion on a given topic one of those I look for.

    And I started gaming at 12, but started Magic: the Gathering when I was 29, and played it at tournaments for several years, so you’ll get no judgeyness from me about your gaming and/or entertainment options. I enjoy Fruits Basket (an anime, quite unlike most of the ones I like, very much in the kawaii mode, and whose moral would probably suit a few people here), despite that I am nearer 50 than 15. So we can be geeks together, and if they make fun of us, then it’s us – not you, and not me, but us. And in fact that’s kinda how the Horde works, isn’t it? We for us? Screw ‘vs them’, we can be ‘for us’ without being ‘against them’.

    Sort of an N-Musketeers solution set. One for N, and N for one. But with less swordiness.

  132. Tony! The Immorally Inferior Queer Shoop! says

    Horde Advice Requested:
    I found out tonight that one of the guys who works in the kitchen has been and continues to be the victim of domestic violence. From what two other employees have said-one of whom is an owner-this has been going on for some time. The guy has a child with his girlfriend and works a lot, while she stays home with the little one. I could tell the two employees were incredibly sympathetic to him, and want to help somehow, but have no idea how. I do not know the guy well enough, but I thought maybe there was advice/info I could pass along so that he gets it.

  133. says

    Tony

    If he’s interested in pressing charges or seeking custody of the kids, document, document, document. This does mean going to the police and/or the hospital — even if nothing is done immediately, the incident will be on record, and there will be an established pattern of abusive behavior on her part.

    If he’s just looking to get out… I don’t know, and I wish I could help more.

  134. thunk (sigh) says

    my weekend tranquility has been rudely interrupted by a whole heap of essays I need to write apparently.

    ugh.
    especially when I’m too busy agonizing over having hair everywhere on my body. that’s seriously the thing that bothers me most.

  135. Tony! The Immorally Inferior Queer Shoop! says

    WMDKitty:
    Thank you. From what I was told he has chosen not to go to the authorities bc hehas no one to care for their child if she goes to jail. I had a hint of a good idea that I mentioned to him…the same you offer above: document.

    At one point the owner, J, started to say something about ‘two sides to every story’, at which point I chimed in with “both sides are not automatically equivalent. If he is not doing anything remotely comparable, I do not feel she has the justification for the abuse she heaps upon him.”

  136. Tony! The Immorally Inferior Queer Shoop! says

    Errr, slight mistake above. I have not spoken to W about this, nor will I unless and until I become privy to his situation, from him.
    “I had the hint of a good idea to be passed along to him…”

  137. Tony! The Immorally Inferior Queer Shoop! says

    Ogvorbis:
    Kraken is *delumptious* (delicious + scrumptious)!

    ****
    cicely @633:
    I totally had a visual of what a podium dismount would be like. Ha ha.
    More funny, I just imagined PZ doing a podium dismount

  138. Markita Lynda—threadrupt says

    How is everyone in North Dakota & Wyoming & Colorado & South Dakota? I hear that God has been smiting ND & Colo. with now for being mean to atheists and SD with tornadoes for being anti-choice.

  139. Tony! The Immorally Inferior Queer Shoop! says

    Ingdigo Jump @668:
    From the bottom of my heart and with every fiber of my being, I am so, so sorry for everything that has happened to you. As I started scrolling up to catch up on the thread, I saw your comment. As tired as I am, I thought I would read it tomorrow or skim through it real quick. But once I read your introduction, I was determined to read everything and I did. One of the things I very much enjoy is getting some peek into the lives of you folks. Seeing that you were going to share something personal jerked me out of exhaustion. As I read I just thought WTF?!! The way you were treated by so many people was horrible.
    But what really filled me at once with deep sympathy for you and seething rage?
    Justin.

    That just…I cannot even articulate how angry that makes me. You did not deserve that. You deserved (and still do) friends and family that genuinely care for you.

    Thank you for sharing your story with us.
    Please excuse the river of tears.

    (Btw, none of that was stupid)

  140. says

    Tony

    At one point the owner, J, started to say something about ‘two sides to every story’, at which point I chimed in with “both sides are not automatically equivalent. If he is not doing anything remotely comparable, I do not feel she has the justification for the abuse she heaps upon him.”

    *nodnod*

    It’s a common tactic for the abuser to paint themself as the “real victim.” i.e. If I responded to my abuser with anything other than absolute obedience, it was “my fault” and he “had to” “correct” me.

  141. ChasCPeterson says

    having hair everywhere on my body. that’s seriously the thing that bothers me most.

    hello.
    you’re a mammal.
    deal.

  142. Tony! The Immorally Inferior Queer Shoop! says

    How the hell did I miss the story about a grandfather disowning his daughter bc she disowned her gay son?!

    Dear Christine:

    I’m disappointed in you as a daughter. You’re correct that we have a “shame in the family,” but mistaken about what it is.

    Kicking Chad out of your home simply because he told you he was gay is the real “abomination” here. A parent [disowning] her child is what goes “against nature.”

    The only intelligent thing I heard you saying in all this was that “you didn’t raise your son to be gay.” Of course you didn’t. He was born this way and didn’t choose it any more than he [chose] being left-handed. You however, have made a choice of being hurtful, narrow-minded and backward. So, while we are in the business of [disowning] our children, I think I’ll take this moment to say goodbye to you. I now have a fabulous (as the gay put it) grandson to raise, and I don’t have time for heartless [expletive] of a daughter.

    [If] you find your heart, give us a call.

    —Dad

    http://now.msn.com/grandfather-disowns-daughter-for-disowning-his-gay-grandson-in-viral-letter

    Wow.
    I am all across the spectrum of emotions. From Ing’s tale, which I will not soon forget, to this one, with an all too familiar situation, but a rare, compassionate response I am riding a wave of intense emotions.

    One of which is a tremendous surge of pride, respect, love and appreciation for my father. I have shared my coming out story here in the past, which is an unpleasant memory. Made moreso bc my father’s reaction and the gulf that opened up between us for the better part of a decade. It was not until a few years ago, after writing a letter to my dad that the gulf shrank. Dramatically. Basically it was a glimpse into my feelings on many things growing up…two important points were the resentment I had as a teen being forced to accept more responsibility…the other? The rejection I felt after coming out. He and I have not spoken about the letter, but his words and deeds show that he listened to me.

    And now? When my parents came to see me tonight, their last night in Pensacola, my father wanted to share this story with me but his phone had poor connection. He was able to show me the headline. That would not have happened 10 years ago. We have never spoken about me being gay.

    He was insistent on showing this to me and disappointed that I could not read it while they were here.

    He wanted to share a story of a parent displaying unconditional love to a family member. This really feels like his way of saying ‘I love you, accept you and always will’.

    And that means so much more than words can say.
    Before they left, he told me how proud he was of the man I am. That was gratifying even then. But now, after reading the above story…it is one of the greatest gifts my father has ever given me. When he checks Facebook tomorrow he’ll see my response.

    By Odin, I think I cried a river.

    (My mother and I weathered my coming out with greater ease and our relationship is very strong–in case anyone wondered about why I focused on my father so much here.)

  143. Tony! The Immorally Inferior Queer Shoop! says

    Chas:
    You are way out of line.
    It is only bc this is the Lounge that I do not give you the response you deserve.

  144. kittehserf says

    Ingdigo – I just read your heart-breaking post. I don’t know you, I’m too new here, but … well, internet hugs, if they’re welcome. What people did to you was so wrong.

    *****

    Anyone recall I mentioned a coupla weeks back I was knitting a big striped jacket/coat? Well, it’s finished! Took just under a month.

    Presenting The Mick Aston Memorial Coat.

    (PS yes, I deliberately cropped the pic so the sign would read “who”.)

  145. Azkyroth Drinked the Grammar Too :) says

    alabama-residents-argue-that-offering-arabic-classes-in-high-school-amounts-to-indoctrinating-children-with-islam

    As opposed to indoctrinating them with the Church of England. >.>

  146. opposablethumbs says

    Ingdigo, that’s beyond-words horrible. I’m sorry people have been such utter shits to you and that it has hurt you so much. So, so sorry. I’d just like to add another hug to the pile.

    Tony, that’s one hell of a letter – and how cool is it that your dad particularly wanted to show it to you! I’m sure you’re absolutely right about the message there. (great that this kid has his grandfather in his corner. So sad that he needs a corner at all)

  147. Daniel Martin says

    I don’t know where else to announce this, but I’m looking for brave, chrome-using souls who are comfortable loading a chrome extension not from the chrome store to test out the chrome-based revival of my old greasemonkey killfile.

    Those interested can download the extension from https://github.com/fizbin/killfile-extension/releases. You’ll need to right-click and “save link as…”, then install it from your downloads folder. (Recent chrome makes it a few extra clicks to install from places that aren’t the chrome store)