This is the lounge. You can discuss anything you want, but you will do it kindly. I need a nap so bad.
Status: Heavily Moderated; Previous thread
Pharyngula
Evolution, development, and random biological ejaculations from a godless liberal
This is the lounge. You can discuss anything you want, but you will do it kindly. I need a nap so bad.
Status: Heavily Moderated; Previous thread
my first thought: “Too small to ear-tag yet. Could still genotype, with determined Sharpie-wielding.”
Portcullised!
I WAS going to say that I am almost finished the first draft of my second novel! I have three more things on the checklist that need to be finished before I can call it a day. The first novel is midway through its third draft (I just need a lighter laptop so I can work on it on the train…)
“I need a nap so bad.”
Me too.
Pteyrxx,
That’s good news. Although it’s getting better, the NHL still has a race issue it needs to deal with. Simply put, playing hockey as a youngster costs money, more so than many other sports, so minorities are extremely under represented in the NHL.
They would do well to spend a lot more money bringing the sport to poor communities. It’s an investment that would pay off in the future for sure.
Giliell, I agree, thanks =)
Hi, Physicalist! Love your comments on Rationally Speaking!
Just stumbled onto the following on YouTube.
You guys remember that “Beware the Believers” rap that failed to promote Stein’s vehicle?
Well, this is a little like that, but this one made by somebody in the camp of real science: “Evolution vs Creation Rap: Darwin Schools Cameron.
enjoy.
Weeee! New Lounge!
Only 7 lounges left before Lounge #420!
I fear I may not have the required things needed for Lounge #420 because saving up for the WiS2 conference has made me unable to afford most other things.
Speaking of which… I booked the hotel! It’s going to cost $478.61 (that’s with taxes and stuff added). $530 was donated, which means I have $51.39 to donate to CFI for the WiS conferences…
Vaya Con Dios are going to play in Zagreb as part of their farewell tour. Yay!
A new lounge exists. And lo, PZed looked upon it, and declared that it “Was nice, but needed more tentacle”
and lo, there were tentacles.
NateHevens, resident SOOPER-GENIUS… apparently…@7
you might appreciate this from a Washington State University lab.
How’s WSU’s graduate Anthropology program?
:D
Did anyone here besides rq and David send me an email recently?
Giliell from L.412:710
*raises hand* Ummm, my younger brother did something similar in first or second year in university – didn’t get kicked out of uni because it was off uni property, but got drunk with some friends and pointed a toy pistol out a second floor window at a passer-by and told him he was going to kill him as a joke… Got the special ops team on the job. He wasn’t allowed to leave the country for two years’ probation, but because he hadn’t been in trouble before and wasn’t in any trouble during, and had all kinds of references for good behaviour, it was struck from his record once his time was up.
If he’s been a good kid, I really hope the system will give him a similar chance. But getting kicked out of uni, that just sucks.
Parrowing
I hope discussing kissing didn’t make you feel bad (although it sounds as if it did). I didn’t mean to put any pressure on or awaken any bad feelings, but it looks like I may have – I apologize! But you have no reason to feel bad for not liking kissing. You’re a great person anyway!
FossilFishy
I think I’m going to have to steal some curriculum ideas from you. Let me know how the trebuchet-building goes (I’ll be expecting photos!). In the meantime, the kids hone their LEGO skills.
And yes, I’m looking forward to the development of the Hornettes. The vocalists are amazing. I’ll see if I can dig up any other videos or recordings.
+++
Took the kids to see a modern ballet/orchestral piece for children today (Husband won the tickets from the radio – a first-time event in our family!). The piece was a new composition from a local composer based on Jules Verne’s Around the World in 80 Days. The music was great, most of the dancing was ok except for two specific individuals and one group, but what disappointed me most was that Middle Child asked me to wear a tie (picked out a nice one of Husband’s, too) to the event (since he and Eldest would be getting all prettied up as well), but changed his mind at the last minute. :( After I changed my shirt, too, to make sure it was a reasonably tie-able shirt. Oh well, next time I’ll insist (at least he knows I’m game).
Oh, and I know it’s not anymore, but happy Gagarin day. On this day 52 (that’s 4 times 13, for those counting like the Mayans) years ago, the world realized we can actually get off this rock and survive.
And I sign off with some dating advice. Slightly related to previous conversation.
Good night!
A week or so ago I posted in another thread that I was worried abdominal pain I was having. To Caine, opposablethumbs, cicely, and anyone else who may have noticed/cared in that allies-on-the-internet kid of way, results came back normal. Mystery pain is probably hormonal mystery pain, but not what-the-heck-is -that-on-your-ovary kind of mystery pain. See, the clenched tentacles worked. All praise Cthulu and the Dark Lord Myers. I shall sacrifice an appropriate number of brain cells to Acolyte Nerd’s grog.
Denverly
Yay for not-so-bad mystery pain.
—
in other news:
I was going to put-away the snow shovels for the season but we’re under a snowfall warning.
Spring.
Bah.
@ Asher Kay (#5)
Thanks. I might do some posts on emergentism, physicalism, and standard arguments for dualism chez moi in a couple weeks. It’ll have to wait until after this deadline, though. And right now I’m going to go get that nap.
Denverly
Hooray for the diagnoses, and tentacles crossed the pain stays gone.
chigau
I hear you. We had almost melted out on Monday, and then got a winter storm. I am so tired of white, and cold, and shoveling.
Hey theophontes and anybody else all current with String Theory and M-Theory and Multiple Universes and all that!
I just posted a blog post in which I beg for information/education.
Anyone wanna help out?
Also, I’m gonna post this in the Thunderdome. Hope that’s okay… :-\
Back, finally. The guy who yesterday got out of his car and yelled at my mom, then punched her car, when they were stopped at a red light after he tried mightily but unsuccessfully to stop her from getting over a lane and got flipped off for going out of his way to be a shitbag, then followed her all the way to my daughter’s school where she was dropping said daughter off to class, had his car parked outside the school (though he wasn’t visible) the next day (we’ve never seen it before and it didn’t seem like he knew the neighborhood streets, she said). So I was helping her file a police report.
Any other suggestions?
I…enjoy kissing but often not for extended periods. In large part because I don’t breathe well through my nose.
I haven’t followed this thread, and won’t, but I’ve seen the kind of argument described.
I have the following thoughts:
1) Stopping people from being subject to physical violence is legitimately an extra-high priority and should be a concern of everyone’s. If a case in which it genuinely matters comes up, people who are subject to physical violence can reasonably be said to have it worse than those who generally aren’t.
2) This attitude and its cousins played a major role in developing the level of built-up anger and hurt that spilled out in those posts that everyone was so concerned about a few days ago, and figured prominently in the interactions that left me in a deep state of cognitive dissonance where I felt like Pharyngula SHOULD be a Safe Space to discuss my feelings but had learned painfully that it wasn’t, that kept it built up for years until it sort of spilled out when I was chemically disinhibited and reminded of it.
3) I recall reading somewhere that at one point at least one medical association considered cocaine to be “non-addictive” because it didn’t exhibit the exact same dependence pattern as heroin. This absurdity is perhaps instructive.
4) Aside from the issue in 1), it almost seems like having the working or “official” definition of “oppression” tailored to the specific harms and marginalizations your group experiences could be a kind of privilege in itself…a sort of lesser version of the way common white male concerns are usually recognized as “broadly relevant”.
I’d be interested to know too. So far the message I tend to get usually seems to be “the fault is ALWAYS with you.” :/
Just a heads up to PZ and Chris, and anyone else with a WordPress site, this just broke:
Wordpress sites under brute force attack
If you have a short admin password you’d best change it to something much longer and hard to guess and quickly.
Hi, you can ignore this. I’m just testing to see if I am able to post anywhere on FtB.
Sorry if this has been done, I truly don’t have time to read all the threads…
“Lord” Monckton has been causing some hilarity in Australia.
http://www.stuff.co.nz/national/education/8545516/Sceptics-ire-amuses-but-views-retain-sting
auntbenjy, I hadn’t seen that before. From your link:
Heh.
(What a clown)
Oh, it’s a cute little squidgy sleeping! Here’s one of ours:
http://i.imgur.com/WS8hPqt.jpg
@auntbenjy
FTFY
Hi, all.
Sorry I’ve been absent.
I needed a break. I promise I will try to be smart (and cowardly) and stay the fuck out of threads (like ‘those boys’ lives will be ruined! (not even going to read it)) that I think I might not be able to handle. I’ll try to be boring.
@auntbenjy.
The Engineering department at the University of Auckland invited him to speak. I was disappoint, but the talk was rather amusing. We pointed out that a number of his graphs were very crudely drawn in MS paint(!) and I think we may have convinced the two people in the audience who were genuinely unsure, as the graph was on display for five minutes while he accused us of insulting him.
The flat earth society was there as well, so it was a relatively amusing talk.
Denverly: Very glad to hear that Worrisome Mystery Pain didn’t turn out to be Incredibly Worrisome Serious Condition Requiring Drastic Measures! Now, if only I can get those tentacles unknotted….
–
Fixed that punctuation for ya.
–
Azkyroth:
*wide-eyed with alarm*
Shit!
–
Ogvorbis!!!!
*hug-pile*
We were beginning to worry.
I would describe you as more “Scratched and Dented” than “Broken”.
And you are not a Failure!
–
thrashed and threadrupt, pardons.
welcome back, Ogvorbis. <3
Azkyroth @19: warn the school, too. Describe the car, the incidents, everything; give 'em a copy of the police report so they can call the cops directly he shows up again.
re being misunderstood: only thing that's ever worked for me is leaving the conversation lie for several days and coming back to reread it later. If I've been an arse, it's usually pretty darn clear to me by then.
Makes me sound like a gas dryer that’s on special this week.
Ah, but I know what is inside my head and just how I failed. A definite advantage.
Azkyroth:
Seconding Pterryx. let the school know what is going on.
And as for misunderstanding? My default position is that I have failed to express myself properly. Which really doesn’t work because that means that I feel obliged to restate my position. If I still feel like I am being misunderstood after the restate, I carefully read what I have actually written (both times) and try to figure out what I am actually saying. And if I still don’t understand, I usually just back off. No matter what I have to say, others will (usually) say it better than I ever could.
A very high quality gas dryer! A bargain at thrice the price!
:)
–
Crip Dyke:
All ready forty minutes early?! Way to go :D Hope you are having a few beverages and relaxing appropriately. *high five* for getting through the week.
Ogvorbis:
*megahugs*
You’re not a coward
Glad to see you.
rq:
I won tickets on the radio once, and it was my first concert: Alice Cooper. I was obsessed with him then, when I was sixteen. Super fun. Glad the family had a good time : )
I figured y’all would enjoy the offerings to Typos, plus I would’ve made it worse trying to fix it on my phone ^__^
I am home now, exhausted.
Rachel Maddow is going to have to do without me tomorrow, I fear.
Sorry for making everyone needlessly jealous.
I haz a sad, but my car is as yet unfixed, and I can’t justify the expense of renting a car for something that’s juts for fun like that.
It’s sort of blending in with the rest of the sad I’ve got going on though. I feel like I’m sad most of the time nowadays. Blarg.
Ogvorbis,
Like I try to be nice. :)
(WB!)
…okay, the police report was filed online using the link for “Assault” on the “online police reports” page on the local police department’s webpage. When it was accepted, it was apparently with the code “SUSP – Suspicious Person”. Anyone know if that’s as inappropriate as I think it is?
I don’t know what you mean by inappropriate?
Technically the guy committed a battery, though.
The difference is immaterial in this situation, though, I would think.
*HUGS* for Ogvorbis, and welcome back. You’re not a coward, that’s just plain smart.
Hugs for Portia and Azkyroth, too.
Not sure why it would be; a person doing that sort of thing definitely fits the category of ‘suspicious behaviour’ insofar as that means ‘likely to be involved in something violent, and therefore should possibly be investigated if violence is committed by someone described similarly. There may be information I missed, though.
Awwww. :) That makes me want to hug you :)
(Wass “WB”?)
It sounds like the sort of report you’d file if you saw someone snooping around your gate. A crime was actually committed here.
Portia, Welcome Back.
I don’t have enough ‘w’ for the length of “aw” that went through my mind.
I love it.
John Morales:
So we’ll both be trying? That sounds accurate for me.
Hi, Portia.
John, did I ever tell you about my uncle, Euripides?
Azkyroth:
I wouldn’t stress too much about the label. It probably covers a broader swath of behaviors than it sounds like.
well I’m also threadrupt as yay. it’s a moderately quiet period in school work..
So I have time for the daily agonizing self-introspection thing again. it’s annoying, because then I can’t help like feeling like shit. and yuck.
Oggie!
Oggie!
Oggie!
*hugs*
Welcome back!
(I was about to come looking for you.)
Hey thunk, good to see you.
I empathize with the Introspection Messiness. I’m sorry : ( *hugs*?
Hey, it’s Oggie!
Dude, strategic retreats are important and respected.
thunk
Have a *hug*.
Hey Ed and PZ(and me, yikes!), better check this out:
Wide-scale attack against WordPress blogs reported
I changed my password : |
Welcome back, Ogvorbis! *hugs* We all need to take breaks sometimes.
I’m going to miss crowepps.
yes. the agonization is mainly due to a disconnect between the way I perceive my gender most of the time and how I want to perceive it.
Both of these viewpoints are valid, I just felt the really relic need to choose between one of two binary options. which is flawed for eleventy bajillion reasons, as you all know. Also, because stereotypical feminine traits felt a bit weird to me, and I couldn’t quite decide whether it was due to being unused to it, or just being too cis. Which is flawed too, because gender expression =! identity.
so yes, I know why I beat myself up, and I know it’s fundamentally silly. :)
Ogvorbis:
Good to see you again.
You would have to try mighty hard to be boring.
****
Denverly:
I am glad your mystery pain turned out to be not too bad. Hopefully you will overcome it with quickness and be back to normal soon.
thunk
Have another *hug*.
I won’t offer advice other than a grandmotherly “It will get better.”
Good morning!
*hugs* for Portia and not seeing Rachel Maddow :( I haz a sad for you.
*megahugs* for Ogvorbis, who may be dented but less than broken and definitely not a failure, and who would have a hard time being boring.
round of *hugs* for anyone else who wants or needs, they’re free for today only! (May be replaced with gesture of affection of choice – or drink/cocktail of choice, but then Tony has to be involved since my repertoire is limited.)
Azkyroth
That label covers also the fact that he seems to be lurking around the school/engaging in stalkerish behaviour, which makes him a very suspicious person. It’s a heads-up for the police to be aware of the kind of back-gate snooping that you seem to have in mind, even though it comes after the fact of a real violent event.
Also, what Pteryxx said about warning the school and giving them the information.
I hope things are resolved soon – *hugs* for you, too?
rq:
Don’t be sad for Portia. See, she’s totes gonna drive down to Pensacola to pick me up, and we’re going to drive cross country, touching on as many Hordeling home towns as we can before we see Rachel Maddow (hopefully she’ll be wherever we land).
Tony
Because that’s just so much more convenient and less time-consuming than just going to the show? ;) A heck of a lot more fun, sounds like… I want to come too! As long as you travel the world afterward. Because we’ll all write super-blogs about our travels and make sooooo much money off our writing.
+++
I don’t like the idea of patented human genes. At least, not the already-naturally-occurring ones.
And another reason gay marriage should be legal. Or at the very least, gay relationships more widely accepted as perfectly normal and competent to make decisions for each other.
Good morning
Ogvorbis!!!
*pouncehugs*
Just glad you’re ok (for a given vaue of “ok”)
rq
Yeah, it sucks, and I’m sorry for him and especially for his parents, but I also think that the college did everything right.
You can’t have students on campus who scare other students to death “as a joke”. The young woman he threatened shouldn’t have to deal with running into him on campus and in the dorm. I’m damn well not going to abandon my stance on those things because I really like the “kid” who got in trouble.
I hope he can get to another university, should he decide that he still wants to do something with his life. He wasn’t the most ambitioned student before, to put it mildly, and it doesn’t seem like this incident shook him up à la “fuck I need to change something”.
I said it before and I’ll say it again: “boys will be boys” is also a hate crime against boys. Because some day they’ll just behave the ame way that got excused all their lives and suddenly they find themselves in a situation when somebody sensibly says “no, unacceptable”. And then they feel oh so unjustly treated, probably by the evil feminazis.
FoooossilFiiishyyyy!!!
re: trebuchets for children
Interestingly enough, by pure coincidence, the children’s program usually on Saturday mornings (the educational one) has a segment on today about medieval weapons, including a short lesson on how to make a bow. It’s not quite a trebuchet or catapult, but it’s a start!
Giliell
I completely agree – the university did everything right, and I really think that someone’s past behaviour (or other ‘favourable’ characteristic) shouldn’t determine the punishment they get for a certain thing/fuckup now, esp. something as serious as threatening people with [fake] weapons just for fun. I just think that his past behaviour, combined with his future behaviour, should work in his favour to show that he is capable of learning from his mistakes (and I would extend this benefit to absolutely anyone in a similar situation, which I know doesn’t always occur in real life).
It’s a shame the incident doesn’t seem to have shaken him into introspection; in my brother’s case, seeing as how he missed out on two incredible professionally-related summer jobs in the States and (I think) an internship in the States, it was a huge kick in the ass to get some of his act together.
I can’t believe I haven’t asked this before:
where does “pouncehug” come from?
Tony
I’ve always thought of it as a combination of that happy-pounce that cats do when they’re happy sometimes, and a regular ol’ hug.
It all started as an innocent dance-off.
And I like cicadas, as long as they don’t make too much noise and there aren’t too many of them.
rq:
I feel silly.
I should have expressed myself better. I can figure out the “kitty pounce meets hug”, but what I am curious about is where it came from (and who created it)? In my haste to make my comment, I failed to ensure I asked the proper question.
(Note to self: phrase questions such that answers I receive are what I seek:: this is nothing against you rq)
****
I continue to be pissed off at the asshole who manipulated and violated Ogvorbis. To see such a good man refer to himself as a broken failure is frustrating.
Ogvorbis- from what you have said in the time I have been here, I see no broken failure. I hope one day you can see what I-and others-see in you.
****
Portia or Dalillama:
Any chance either of you are awake? I haz a question to send via the emailz.
rq
Absolutely. Nobody wins if he never gets professional training or a degree and stays at home until his parents kcik him out and remains on welfare for the rest of his life.
Dunno if he’s going to face criminal charges as well (or a bill from the police).
It’s his job to figure out that the consequences are those of his behaviour and not of people being unfair to him.
Tony
See, that’s what I thought you were asking, but seeing as how the Lounge is always quiet this time of day/Saturday, I felt I should make some noise. :)
I’m not offended that you don’t want to hear my answers. (They’re not the right ones.) :)
Repeated for truth-value and support.
Tony,
I associate it with David Marjanović.
Late in, but still: Ogvorbis : keep plugging along old chap. we’re cheering you on. Go at the best pace you feel comfortable with.
Denverly – glad to hear it’s hormonal and no what-the-heck is involved. Thank you for passing on the news (and I hope the pain is vanquished).
.
Yay Ogvorbis!!!! You’re back!!!!! I’m glad you’re back!!!! I may have to engage in a very un-Brit-like pouncehug, doncher know. (I’m very glad you’re back)
.
Portia I’m so sorry if you don’t make it to the talk. Hope you get another opportunity before too long (and sympathies for the whole feeling-down-all-the-time-just-now thing. I can sympathise :-(
.
hugs to thunk. Glad you’re here. People here are the best, like you are.
.
Azkyroth, hope the school pay attention. It’s good that they should take this seriously and I hope the police do too.
.
::waves:: to rq and parrowing and Giliell and FossilFishy and Tony and chigau and cicely and Dalillama and Pteryxx and and and actually there are too many of you. ::waves:: to Horde.
*Waves* back to opposablethumbs
*
I’m sorry that happened to your mom and daughter, Azkyroth. What an unpleasant and creepy asshole that guy is.
*
Don’t worry, rq, it wasn’t the discussion here that made me feel bad. The thoughts just popped into my head and I realized that I was almost certain to get a different response here than I would anywhere else. I was right :). Thanks to you and FossilFishy.
And speaking of, that situation you described FossilFishy seems very familiar (I don’t mind it but after a LOT of experience, I’ve realized that pot just doesn’t do much for me, so I don’t seek it out anymore or partake often). I’ve been you in that situation and I’ve also been the one watching as others put someone else in that position, wanting to say something but feeling afraid to and not knowing whether I should. I feel more confident about it now, but should the situation ever arise again, I’ll remember my Fishy friend and feel even better about saying no if I want to or supporting others who say no.
*
Nice to see you again, Ogvorbis :)
*
I’m sorry that your car wasn’t able to be fixed in time, Portia :( . Hopefully there will be another opportunity for you to see Rachel Maddow speak. I’m also sorry to hear you’ve been feeling sad lately. *hugs* and *bunnies*
*
I’m glad that your test came back normal, Denverley. I hope you are able to figure out what’s causing the pain and are able to manage it soon.
Argh. That scumbag forced-birther is sliming up the Thunderdome again, all happy to use Gosnell as a big “gotcha”. Ugh.
threadrupt.
It’s 6:40 am here. I’ve been up since about 3:30 am yesterday.
I’m going to bed now.
The conference was awesome.
So was the housefire that kept us all up all night, in a different way.
(No one was hurt, but I did feel sad for the dog that was running around yipping at us, really confused about what was happening to her home).
Ok, I’m going to try to pass out now. Will catch up with y’all in a bit.
Oh, Portia! Hugs and hugs, and let us know what you need.
Eeeee! I don’t want to highjack thread dedicated to crowepps, so I’ll enthusiastically wave to Algernon here, in hopes she takes a look in the Lounge.
Good to read you, I hope you’ll decide to hang around again!
—-
Also, hugs for Portia, I’m sorry you missed Rachel Maddow.
—
Azkyroth,
Damn, the situation your mother is in sounds a bit scary. Better let the school now that some suspicious and dangerous guy is hanging around. *hugs*
D’oh! Right, Portia deals with other people’s fires, not having those of her own.
Also very glad to see Algernon post.
@ Azkyroth
I used to be a 911 dispatcher. Suspicious person has a particular connotation: it lets the cops know that the intentions of the person in question are unknown. It’s used differently in different departments I imagine (I only know how it was used in 2 places, my work and one other), but where I was it wasn’t a trivial thing. The officers are actually more at risk when they don’t know what they’re trying to address, so trying to put it in a more specific category when you’re really not sure ends up possibly misleading the officers into thinking they know how to address something. That doesn’t typically go well. It’s better that they know up front that it’s a situation where the intentions of the person in question are unknown.
Plus, the other thing is that if you did it online, there’s not the back & forth with someone who’s been doing it for a while. I imagine their system defaults to “not sure what’s happening” much more than a 911 operator would do.
Finally, the police officers in any city nowadays have computers in their cars, and if they don’t (tiny town, on horse patrol, what-evs), there are dispatchers radioing information. The complete info will get read. If the dispatcher is anything like the super-competent people with whom I worked, they also mentally juggle different things of different severity and different immediacy. They’ll do a good job of bringing priorities around.
Oh, I know that one. But you’re wrong. You’re a great person. *I’m* the one that more appropriately analyzes my success or failure than outsiders analyze me, based on my interior secret failings.
Crip Dyke: More Broken Than Thou
I would like to obsess about how truly, truly awful I am, but maybe instead we could each have some chocolate and try to laugh at how our brains hate us. :P
*dumps an enormous chocolate bar in front of Crip Dyke and Ogvorbis and all the rest of us horrible awful folks to share*
No Maddow & now a fire?
Crud, Portia! Let us know if you need the Horde to do something.
*tries to pouncehug Ogvorbis but misses*
Ouch.
Hi all, I have a lovely basket full of fresh hugs for all in need. Spring in Finland is just around the corner (I saw it crouching there earlier) and next summer’s status has been upgraded from ‘never gonna happen’ to ‘plausible’. So, yay, I guess. Despite the sad news about Joan.
I am not a fan of people who use open threads to write an online book about an issue that is important to them and since this concerns clinical research and is a bit off-topic for this blog, I will refrain from doing so myself. If you care about the ethical conduct of human subjects research and/or the research reputation of the University of Minnesota, however, the case of Dan Markingson and a current petition to Governor Dayton for an independent investigation of psychiatric research misconduct at the U of MN may be of interest to you. It is a disturbing case getting international attention and it needs transparency if the U’s reputation is to be upheld.
Here is the link to the petition: http://tinyurl.com/markingsonpetition
Here is a link to a blog post (my blog) with additional supporting material about the case: http://tinyurl.com/markingson
following up on #80: yes it’s a real issue, not just someone blog spamming. With a friend, the mother of Dan Markingson (the patient who committed suicide) started a Change.org petition to demand an investigation into U of MN.
PZ signed the petition last month, but the discussion didn’t mention the consent forms or financial conflicts of interest: http://freethoughtblogs.com/pharyngula/2013/03/14/call-for-an-accounting
To be fair, he might not be permitted to bring up those aspects himself, if he even knew. The articles I linked below have come out since then.
Direct link to Change.org petition:
https://www.change.org/petitions/governor-mark-dayton-of-minnesota-investigate-psychiatric-research-misconduct-at-the-university-of-minnesota-2
New questions about identical patient consent forms – MinnPost
Summary of the investigation as U MN’s top attorney leaves for a new job – MinnPost
Thanks Pteryxx (#81). I don’t even work for the U, but hesitated posting anything on my own blog given the aggressiveness with which the U has gone after critics on this topic, so certainly understand that others need to be even more circumspect.
For me, as someone who works in the rare disease patient community, this has much further reaching implications. We very much recognize the value of clinical research and have been at the forefront of advocating and recruiting for studies in rare disorders. If the protections meant to ensure patient safety are missing before, during and after participation, however, I’m not sure it is even ethical to encourage participation (and I’m positive the U of MN is not alone in this–just getting the lion’s share of exposure due to this case). Particularly concerned about the ‘sovereign immunity’ stance taken by the U and upheld by the courts, as that means no person who has been harmed as a victim of research misconduct at the U of MN has standing to seek relief in court. How can this be? At the very least, this aspect of participation needs to be clearly spelled out in the informed consent process. Imagine how that would read on a consent form and how honesty about this would impact recruitment. This is a bad situation that needs attention over and above justice for Dan Markingson.
Moar hugs for thunk, Crip Dyke, and anyone else in need of them. Also, hazelnut-coffee brittle.
Tony
I’m awake now, anyway. Feel free to send me an email, if the question still pertains.
RE: Pouncehugs, I’m not certain what the origin is, but I’ve been seeing them for as long as I can recall on the interwebs; it’s not new, I don’t think.
Crip Dyke – I hope all goes well with your exams. *hugs and chocolate* Also, Will at Skepchick was extremely helpful. Thank you so much for the suggestion.
cicely – *pouncehug* Congratulations on acquiring your new wheels.
Are the players in your D&D campaign now broke? My players never seem to keep money (of any amount, large or small) in their pockets for long. Of course, I have the exact same problem when I’m a player. :D
Caine – I’m so sorry your pancreas is giving you more trouble. *lots of hugs*
chigau – I hope you have recovered from your root canal trauma. *hugs*
Obvorbis – *gentle hugs* I’m glad you’re back; I was worried. You are definitely not a coward.
Denverly – I’m glad your mystery pain isn’t a serious problem. Feel better.
Azkyroth – *hugs* for your mom, your daughter, and you. Please take care.
Portia – *hugs and chocolate* May you live in less interesting times for a while.
thunk – *hugs* I’m glad you’re back.
Tony – Pouncehugs weren’t created; they evolved. Cats were probably involved though.
algernon – *waves*
Pteryxx – *anklehugs* for general awesomeness. I really appreciate how often you provide context and links.
Something tickling at the back of my brain makes me think that visual media were involved; possibly a comic(s), deviantart, something of that nature.
Is giving someone a pouncehug the same as glomping them? If not, what are the differences?
Do both feet/back paws have to be off the ground at the same time?
That’s Tony Perkins, president of the Family Research Council, coming up with yet another bizarre reason to be against gun control legislation, while simultaneously be for buying moar guns.
One wonders if Perkins knows anything about the heavily evangelical Christian influence in the Air Force, as just one example of many facts that would smash his factoids like Thor’s drunken hammer. Can a hammer be drunk? I’d like to think so.
World Nut Daily picked up the nonsense from Perkins and is spreading it around. Since World Nut Daily is one of Michele Bachmann’s trusted sources, I think we have not seen the end of this conspiracy theory.
America’s most religious metro area is Provo, Utah.
No, Provo, that is not a distinction of which you should be proud. Mormons being proud in the Deseret News.
From the Gallup Poll link:
Patriarch Kirill, head of the Russian Orthodox Church, is afraid of women. Well, he has a point. Women will likely be one of the forces exposing his patriarchy as a fraud.
Kirill said Tuesday that feminism was a “very dangerous” phenomenon offering an illusion of freedom to women who should focus on their families and children.”
More blathering from the cowering Kirill:
Pat Robertson thinks everyone, but especially leaders in the USA, should abandon all efforts focused on a Middle East peace process.
It seems our new Secretary of State, John Kerry, is inviting the “wrath of Almighty God to fall on this nation” by working for peace in the Middle East. There will be divine retribution.
Second-degree burns on four fingertips. Owie. :(
New batteries in The Behemoth as of yesterday.
Need to go grocery shopping — partner is coming up for a few days. And crap… I don’t have a human to drag with me.
Tony:
I’m up too now (Yeah, 2pm, feels good :) )
All:
I’m sorry for the ambiguous way I worded the comment in my sleep-deprived haze. Someone else’s house burned up last night. Mine is just dandy. (Though I am more cautious than ever now about not running dishwasher or dryer when I am absent or sleeping). You all are so wonderful and kind and compassionate to immediately offer help at the first hint of distress. *pile of hugs*
Also thanks for all the sympathy about missing Rachel. I bet she’s knocking it outta the park right as I type : ) Someday the chance will come again. It’s just as well I was planning to not go, at this point, because without any sleep I would have been miserable.
Esteleth:
Ooowwww… Chocolate milk with a straw? (It’s chocolate you don’t have to pick up).
Pteryxx/michelemanion:
Holy crap. I got nothin’ else.
Northeast Pharyngulites – Roy Zimmerman is doing a concert at a library in Middleburgh, NY on Wed. May 1 at 7pm. Anyone interested in a meetup?
Opposablethumbs
AFAICT, glomps are indeed the same as pouncehugs.
Lynna
Due to my recent viewing habits, I kept reading the Orthodox primate’s name as Crilly
@90
What I don’t get is that many women (from what I have heard) are drawn to orthodoxy because it doesn’t disappear women the way other christian faiths do. Why he would want to alienate women is beyond me.
I hate weddings. Religious ones, that is.
And I also know why god is so scarce in the third world: he keeps popping in to Catholic weddings to spread his blessings around (today, you are even closer to god!) and make sure people are discussing the fertility of the now-wife and the Fruit of Love that are Children in Marriage (marriage makes people
more equal (I admit, I snorted out loud at this point, but quietly)!).
(It was a nice, pretty, artful church and the music was great but it was the first time I actually made a point (to myself) not to participate in any of the responses. It was odd but strangely liberating. And the children behaved.)
And then the groom’s father made a very distasteful, sexist joke that everyone thought was funny when opening the official portion of after-church ceremonies (May your wife be a snake only three days in the year! May your husband only think of other girls/women only seven day a year, and only in his dreams! *this is me retching on the inside*).
And I realized I really, really don’t like how I look right now, and I hate the clothes I have available for such occasions but I have no money to buy something all-purpose yet decent, never mind the amazing, bargain, all-purpose dress shoes I lost back in the fall (good for choir concerts and special occasions with dancing!).
*sigh*
I guess it wasn’t a great day. And I can’t shake that feeling of an imminent *crasssshhhhh*.
+++
Portia
Glad the fire was dealt with well, I’m glad there were no casualties, and I’m glad you’re ok! *hugs*
*hugs* and finger-free snacks for Esteleth, I hope healing is quick!
*roundofhugs* for everyone else.
rq,
Haven’t been to many weddings, only two, but it looks like a lot of weddings are just expensive exercises in sexism and misogyny.
rq:
Lotsa hugs. I hate hate hate losing things that I like. I know that feel. I’m really sorry you don’t feel good. I think you’re really great, and I have all these hugs here if you’d like one.
Ow, Esteleth. Sorry to hear about the fingers, hope you have plenty of ice to distract your nerves. Second degree? Shit.
Barry Smitherman, a Republican who oversees the Texas oil and gas industry tweeted an image listing the GOP senators who voted with Democrats to go ahead and have a debate on gun control legislation. The image is illustrated with a depiction of a noose with a “treason” label.
So, yes, some Texas Republicans think that merely agreeing to debate, (let along vote on), gun control legislation is a hanging offense.
For those not following this story, Republicans had previously filibustered a proposal to move gun control legislation out of committee and onto the floor for debate. Using this maneuver they wanted to prevent the legislation from even being put to a vote.
http://www.motherjones.com/mojo/2013/04/barry-smitherman-railroad-commission-noose
More Republican nonsense surrounding the issue of gun control:
Eden Foods, the “oldest natural and organic food company in North America,” doesn’t like birth control and they don’t want contraception covered by insurance that they, as employers, offer to their employees. They had their lawyers file a complaint that included the company’s belief that “these procedures almost always involve immoral and unnatural practices.”
More here: http://www.salon.com/2013/04/11/organic_eden_foods_quiet_right_wing_agenda/
Made bean soup today.
We found some actual country ham — the real stuff!
I made it with navy beans, roasted yellow sweet pepper, roasted onion, roasted garlic, and diced country ham. For those who haven’t had country ham, it has a truly unique and unusual and unusual flavour. Good stuff.
And I smoked a Gurkha Beauty. Wow. Good stuff.
*hugs* for thunk.
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*waveback* to opposablethumbs.
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*hugs* for Portia.
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Minnie!
*pouncehug*
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Hekuni Cat: *pouncehugback*.
Took the new wheels out for a roll today; a much easier wheelchairing experience than the old chair! Plus, the old chair is now in the possession of one of my SCA acquaintances, so it’s good all around.
–
What happened?
–
hia all. I feel much better today, it seems.
It’s been a really good hair day, among other things. Just the minor accomplishments in life.
Cracked seems to have hit a new low with Adam Tod Brown’s weird list about how we shouldn’t feel sorry for some types of “victim.” Apparently, heckling Daniel Tosh when he shows up to do an unannounced set is exactly morally equivalent to him joking about the audience gang raping you.
And then when I made the ever so terrible faux pas of remarking on Facebook that people should be called out when they’re that hateful, a friend (the same one who told me the rape in the first episode of Game of Thrones was okay because “Drogo wasn’t trying to be a jerk!”) got all FREEZE PEACH! on me and wanted to have a nice logical discussion about how necessary it is to make terrible jokes about rape and to not be swayed by emotional reactions.
Bah.
Hugs to all of you who want it.
… … … … … … … … … … … …
An evangelical Republican who died recently once got disenchanted with the Bush administration after it turned out the whole “compassionate conservatism” thing was just a PR trick.
I have tried finding more information about the subject, but a good starting point would be remembering the name of the guy…I have spent two hours trying to locate articles about his passing away with no success. My interest is based on the inherent conflict between cleptocracy advocates and religious Republicans (who sometimes may have some vestigal social conscience).
… … … … … … … … … …
Gagarin was one of those “heroes of the Soviet Union” who actually deserved to be called a hero. A symphatic person who would use his prestige to help ordinary people who wrote to him about their troubles.
Esteleth
Ouch.
MM
Assholes everywhere.
thunk
Good to hear you’re feeling better.
I have a foster kitten! His name is Parsnip and he is 2 days old. And I’m freakin’ worried about him because he can’t pee well even with tons of stimulation. I’m gonna take him to the E.C. after another try and have them drain his bladder with a syringe so he can start ’empty’ and see if that helps. Hopefully he needs a little more time to mature and will be okay. :/
Oh geez! Good luck with him, rowanvt.
Tentacles crossed for little Parsnip.
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thunk:
When your hair is part of your gender expression, and that’s what’s’ giving you consternation, I don’t think it’s a small thing at all. *high five* :)
thanks, portia.
things seem to be settled down. never mind the moderate amount of homework.
Hugs to all who want them. And may your days be as fabulous as mine.
*scoops up hugs, snuggles into ’em*
Moderate amount of homework sounds like a manageable amount. Glad it’s not crushing.
Also glad to hear you sounding cheerful, happy for your good day.
Hello All! Caught up to 110
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cicely
I haz a happy!
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Portia
I was relieved when I realized you were working at a fire.
Also
Why? I don’t know anyone who has too much fun. You work very hard, you deserve some enjoyment.
Also, a Rachel Maddow speech is fun AND educational. I hope the next time you get a chance to see her, you are not exhausted and are able to throw any guilt(?) out the window. : )
*unsolicited advice* I throw guilt out the window. When it goes through the screen, it seperates into thousands of tiny pieces and is dissolved by the sunlight (this works in moonlight also).
*unsolicited advice*
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Ogvorbis
Yay! You are back! : D
You are
not boring
not scratched and dented
not a coward
not a failure.
You are a kind and compassionate person. You are helpful. You share your knowledge with others. You make remarks that make me snort pop out of my nose. You tell wonderful stories about your family.
We are lucky to have you. ♥
–
Seconded.
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chigau (違う)
Is your tooth pain gone? Are you feeling O.K.??
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rq
Sorry for a lousy day. ) :
Sending a *hug*.
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Tony
Is it O.K. if I send you a *pouncehug*? : )
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Hope to catch up some more. : )
Esteleth – Ouch! I hope your fingers heal quickly.
rowanvt – Good luck with little Parsnip.
opposablethumbs:
In my head, it is more like the way Tigger tackles Winnie the Pooh in that overly enthusiastic and very happy fashion, so the back and front paws can be off the ground (and ultimately on the person in question) at the same time.
Parsnip pulled a ‘white coat syndrome’ on me and 15 minutes before the vet came in (long wait, but I was a good client and was patient) he decided that, with stimulation, he was going to pee A LOT. His bladder is still quite big, but now I know he can actually release urine in a reasonable amount. Vet did an ultrasound to make sure there was nothing wonky inside (for free, wonderful vet!) in part because he has some edema under the skin on his belly. But she thinks that might be due to the super watery formula his old owner was feeding him.
So, so far things are looking good even though I get to do stimulations every 20 minutes until his bladder is a normal size. No sleep for meeeeeeeeeee!
ednaz
My tooth-pain is gone because antibiotics + root-canal.
scientific medicine ROCKS
He urinated a bit more for me just now before eating. Very happy, and he eats like a champ. I shall be a terrible person and photograph him at his next feed.
He’s a weird looking one. He has markings like a hooded rat!
Azkyroth
I am so sorry for what you and your family were put through.
I hope the police get to work quickly to resolve this to your satisfaction.
Hope you are feeling O.K.
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Minnie The Finn
Spring in Finland sounds SO nice. : )
May I take a hug from the basket?
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michelemanion
Will check out your link.
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Caine
I hope you are feeling better.
*very gentle pat on the shoulder*
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Esteleth
OUCH! and I’m sorry!
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WMDKitty
Yay! for new batteries!
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Mellow Monkey
I am sorry you’re being subjected to jerky people. : (
Can I send you a beverage?
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rowanvt
So glad Parsnip is getting such excellent care from you.
Goodness! How long will that be?
chigau (違う)
I Loves Me Some SCIENCE!!
Can we haz some rum, now??
@Ednaz, probably just through most of tonight. The formula his old owner was giving him was so thin the vet thinks he’s hypoproteinemic and that’s resulting in some edema on his tummy. No free fluid though. But with proper nutrition his bladder is gonna being able to do its work better so it’s going to fill faster. But he should balance out pretty quick. I’m glad I have Tues/Wed off to catch up on sleep.
ednaz
We can always haz rum.
[sometimes it tastes a bit like beer or wine]
—
[meta]
I wish that everynewbe who skips to the bottom to comment on a thread (without reading the other comments) is greeted by something like rowanvt’s #121.
What, Chigau, so they can have a giant moment of “what the fuck sort of conversation did I just walk into”? XD
I know a woman who does not believe in atheists.
She says things like – ‘They say they’re atheist, but they’re really agnostic.’
These are people she knows and likes and works with.
The other day she said – ‘These people say they’re atheists, but they still go to funerals.’
She rolled her eyes like it was a big joke.
I said to her – ‘Wether they’re atheist or not, they have had a loved one die. They want to pay their respects and say goodbye.’
She said – ‘Oh…yeah.’
I don’t know if I made a dent or if she just didn’t want to hear any more about it from me. But I was glad I said my piece.
Baby steps.
Sometimes I have to laugh at how I must sound to others. There are days at work where it seems all I do is hold penises (for catheters), palpate testicles (checking for cancer), clean vulvas and stick things (thermometers, my gloved fingers….) up butts.
On animals. Which makes it better, I guess? But geez we are so inappropriate at work on those days. “All I’ve done all day is play with penises! Why can’t I get butt duty???”
I get strange when I get tired. It’s only going to get worse.
rowanvt #126
Yup.
How many times have we seen someone read the OP, skip to the bottom and post a topic that was dealt with in 200 comments yesterday?
—
By itself should prevent anyone from commenting before they read the other comments.
rowanvt
So glad to hear your good news! Especially being able to catch up on Tues/Wed. : )
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chigau (違う)
Hee hee! : D
Maybe a new rule: Every 10 comments there shall be an out of context comment about foster kitten care that doesn’t mention the word “kitten”. :P
It would be nice to not get to rehash all the things previously said with person#9684316879864687341.
rowanvt
Just read your 128
: D : D : D : D
Glad to hear you’re feeling better chiqau. Though I must say: Science, puleeez! It was the sacrifice I did for you of a Humboldt squid under the gibbous moon using the widdershins ass of a jawbone that did the trick. ;)
Oh hanky-hell Esteleth, your tale of digit immolation had me doing the squidgy dance. Have this soothing balm made from only slightly used squid guts.
Glad to hear you’re doing well today thunk. Been missing you round these parts.
Ogvorbis, there’s no shame in taking all the time away that you need. There’s nothing I can say that hasn’t been said before, but I’m going to try it anyway:
You are a kind, compassionate, intelligent, valued member of this community. A world filled of people like you, people who do good, who care and try their best despite the evil that’s been visited upon them would be a world vastly improved over the one that is. One generation of people like you and the cycle of abuse would slam to a stop so suddenly that history would ring with it for millennia.
Thank you for being who you are.
Thank you for sharing your story.
Thank you for giving me hope. If only I could return the favour.
Parsnip says “Am asleeps. Leave alone. No wanna potty.”
http://img203.imageshack.us/img203/5396/parsnip2days1.jpg
Huh. Okay, my senior project group is not gonna like me for this. My calculations suggest the way we decided we weren’t going to make a scraped surface heat exchanger might be better after all.
Hmmm.
FossilFishy(Anti-Vulcanist)
Since your post was serious, I’ll be innapropriate and say I Did Enjoy the drumming video (from Way Back in the thread).
: D
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And the masterful piece you wrote upthread.
*ducks and runs out*
: D : D : D
FossilFishy
So that smell of burning gutta percha was you?
Thanks!
Portia, Dalillama: for the life of me, I cannot remember what the heck I wanted to ask. Ah well, it may come to me again.
****
Portia:
Glad to hear you are ok. At first, when reading the responses to you, I thought the fire was in your home. Then I read for comprehension.
****
Esteleth:
Ouch! I hope the burns heal quick.
****
Beatrice:
Having not been to many weddings (and the few I went to were years before my awareness of social justice, feminism, et al.), so I am curious what you meant by ‘weddings are an exercise in sexism…’
****
rq:
Glad you survived the experience :-)
ednaz:
I welcome any and all hugs, no matter how they come?
I do wonder what a pouncehug combined with Pteryxx’s anklehugs would be like…
I also like your response to Mrs “no such thing as atheists”.
Partner is visiting for a few days, I’ll probably be scarce.
Hey Tony!
In order
Yay!
I would like to see that. : )
Thanks! That’s the first time I said something about atheism in meatspace.
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How are things progressing at work?
Oh, fucking hell.
I could use some backup — this jackass is still pushing the anti-psych bullshit, and I’m tired.
WMDKitty
I hope you have a very nice visit. : )
Good morning!
Tony,
I haven’t had my morning coffee yet, so I’ll give just a short answer.
If you go to a traditional wedding, half the customs come off as sexist. One example: a friend of mine (my age – 26) got married a year and a half ago. One would expect that she ditches some old customs that are really fucking sexist, but she did the “Dance with the bride” thing. Men pay her to dance with her. I heard some do it by putting money into the bride’s cleavage, but I doubt/hope most women wouldn’t agree to that. (She had two cousins standing there with baskets for the money). Then there’s the bouquet tossing. …
It just looks really humiliating to me. But then again, maybe I should have written that weddings here seem to be exercises in getting the money you invested into it back, preferably with lots of extra.
WMDKitty,
Have a great time with your partner!
Good morning
Probably already forgot half the things I wanted to say…
Azkyroth
Shit, those people are scary.
People who become violent and threatening for no reason whatsoever.
(((hugs)))
rq
Yeah, I got especially amused by the fertility crap at catholic weddings.
They are a bit more bearable than funerals, because the occasion in itself is at least happy.
rowanvt
Cuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuute
warning cute kids story + TMI
The little one entered when I was on the toilet
She: You have a vagina*, right?
Me: yes I do
She: We’re both girls
Me: Yes, most girls have a vagina
She: Yours is furry!
*pars pro totum
Good Night All
Pleasant Sleep : )
In what has been the closest thing I have had to a religious experience outside of an astronomical observatory, I had the numinous pleasure of observing Lucy’s bones (or Australopithecus afarensis, if you prefer) in person at the Bowers Museum in Santa Ana, CA. I thought I had better get a firsthand look at them before they go back to Ethiopia next week for good. I have a fear of some religious nutter trying to destroy them at some probably not far off future date, trying to prove…whatever it is superstitious credulous gits think they can prove with Teh Stoopid, so I didn’t want to squander such an opportunity. You should stop by and take a look if you’re in SoCal this week and want to envision a much larger family portrait than just your Auntie Mildred and that horribly gassy dog she totes around, sitting next to that cousin that has never been seen without a finger up his nose to the n’th knuckle. Lucy is very cute, in the fleshed out version, albeit shorter than expected for a rellie and only slightly less hairy than Mildred.
Following on from my comments in the last thread: I support the Yarl’s Wood Movement for Justice.
Also, I am glad that Ophelia has written about Jackie Nanyonjo.
Good to see you, Ogvorbis. It’s been a while. (I haven’t been posting here much for the last few months, either.)
rowanvt
That is the single most adorable little baby cutey kitten I have ever seen. It’s so tiny!!! (And I’m glad to hear things seem to be on the mend – may progress continue!)
ednaz
As per the usual, I have missed you, but hello anyway! *waves*
Tony
As Beatrice mentioned, traditional/religious weddings are very sexist. I mean, the church part goes without saying, but (as an example) the post-ceremony celebrations in Latvian weddings are all about the division of labour in the home, becoming a man/woman (as opposed to being a boy/girl), how many children will the couple have, how much money will the husband make, etc. I know Husband’s mother was horrified that we (I) wanted to cut out many ‘essential’ parts of the after-ceremony-performance (which, these days, isn’t so much a free-for-all party (which I prefer) but a carefully choreographed performance complete with games, activities, humiliation, and practically no free time for dancing at all – oh, and lots and lots of toasts for the men (because, as I learned at a wedding last September, women don’t drink alcohol), like the waking of the bride and groom. This is where first they put the couple to sleep (by placing an axe under the bed – for a first-boy-child! yay! – and lots of noise and horrible jokes, and then they wake them in the morning, with lots of noise and a whole brouhaha about did-they-have-sex.
Actually, some of this stuff is less about sexism and more about humiliation.
Anyway. Husband’s mother was upset that we didn’t want to do the whole waking thing. I hate that kind of attention, it does not put me in a good mood esp. in the morning, and I was 5 months pregnant at the time and it was just too much of privacy invasion.
That’s the long story.
Giliell
It’s a happy occasion, until the priest goes on and on about how children are only good children if conceived in wedlock, etc. Single/unmarried mothers/fathers be damned for all eternity, god will burn you up in hell! (But that’s mostly implicit rather than explicit.)
Also Giliell re: kids and TMI
I’ve got the same question from Eldest –
“Where’s your penis?”
“I don’t have one.”
“Oh. Girls don’t have one?”
“I don’t.”
“Why is it hairy?”
“Because when people get older, they start growing more hair.”
“Oh. Is that why dad’s penis is also hairy?”
“Yes. Yours will get hairy eventually, too.”
“Oh. Sort of around, like this? [showing with hands]”
“Yes.”
“[Middle Child], too?”
“Yes.”
“Oh.”
A very meh conversation, which, I suppose, is how it should go.
Another point on “Beatrice should never have kids” list.
I am horribly self-conscious about my body and I can’t imagine having this kind of frank conversation with my kids… or being caught on the toilet without getting really upset. I read what you (Giliell and rq) write and think how great you are with kids and how people should totally use this kind of no big deal approach, but at the same time I don’t believe I would be able to do it without lots of mental effort and later being upset.
I hate my brain. I can deal with not having kids, I’m not entirely sure whether I really want them or not anyway. But this is obviously making me all kinds of awkward around people, especially combined with being convinced that people find touching my body revolting. :/
… I’ve also become vary of anyone touching me, so I react with flinching from casual touch. WHich is really weird since I crave touch and recoil from it at the same time. I don’t really have any trauma in my past to make me react like that.
That’s why I give virtual hugs, they don’t make me feel weird.
Beatrice- I have two kids, but bathroom time is absolute private time. As is changing time. We make liberal use of the locks on the doors. So not everybody has to be entirely open in that regard.
Liquid nitrogen. They are “cold burns.” Which arre physiologically indistinguishable from “conventional” burns, just caused by a temperature gradient in the opposite direction. In this case, LN2 is negative 320 Fahrenheit or so.
Parsnip’s bladder is still a little large, but so much better that he can go the normal 2 hours between feeds/potties. He also likes to go a little before he eats, and a then go a lot more after. He also ate his biggest meal yet with me. Probably downed close to 10 mls, the greedy little thing. He looks like a pingpong ball with legs attached now. :P
And now to get ready to go to work all sleep deprived wheeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee!
Glad to hear Parsnip is doing better, rowanvt! Now, here’s to hoping you are doing okay with all that sleep deprivation…
Well, this shall be known as the year in which spring wasn’t. On Wednesday I was wearing my winter coat, today I ran around in a T-shirt and it was more than sufficiently warm.
I’m also very, very naive.
I thought my aunt was coming from Berlin to give my sister a break. Stupid me. My parents have gone on a holiday…
rq
Nah, not in Germany, German priests aren’T stupid because unmarried parents are way too common and quite often wedding and baptizing will be a joint event, or the older children are already the flower kids. After all your clients pay a handsome church-tax every month and you don’t want them to leave.
beatrice
As carlie said, lots of this is parenting style, not a mandatory requirement. I grew up in a house with no locked doors, and as long as everybody is comfortable with it it remains like that.
If there wasn’t enough reasons to love this place already, here I find folks discussing a topic (nudity and privacy) in a calm and reasonable manner. I guarrentee that that topic would start a nuke throwing parenting on many sites.
We’re pretty casual about it too, but there is a code phrase that is non-negotiable. If someone says “Can you please leave me in peace.” they get left alone, no arguments. And that includes if the Small Fry says it to us, provided of course she’s in safe place etc.
…parenting war…
There are moths bigger than my thumb attacking the windows and I’m typing on an iPad. That’s my excuse and I’m having it tattooed on my ass the next time I go to Melbourne. :)
Goodnight to all. It’s been a weird day in a weird world, but then, aren’t they all?
Tony:
Here’s a vomit-worthy example of pretty common attitudes about weddings, at least here in the U.S. This video made the rounds on facebook with lots of “OMG THAT IS THE SWEETEST THING EVAR.” Another way weddings are sexist is that they retain a lot of the transactional elements that they have had throughout history. “Who gives this woman to be wedded to this man?” is still a really common verbatim part of the ceremony ’round my parts. Whichever bridesmaid catches the bouquet is supposedly the next to get married. And they’re all supposed to riotously clamor to catch it, because if they’re single, that’s obviously a problem. Let’s see, what else…like rq and Giliell said, there’s lots of humiliation, but it seems mostly for the bride. The biggest one I can think of is the garter-fetching. It always struck me as squicky how everyone hoots and hollers as the groom sticks his head up her skirt (because he has a right to, now, is the undertone I get from the ritual) and grabs the garter, only to salaciously sling it to his buddies. Right down to the color of the dress the bride wears…did you know it’s white to symbolize her sexual purity?
ednaz:
You’re right about guilt. It’s a good policy…I just have a terrible guilt problem generally. I am working on it, though. I like the visual of throwing it out the screen ^___^
I’ll be sure to be more careful in the future when I talk about fire, and clarify. :)
Beatrice: Oh, I feel awkward and self-conscious about my body too. And I have never wanted children of my own, and long since vowed never to have them. So you’re not the only one to feel that way. It’s perfectly okay not to want children.
Just as I was going AFK I realised there’s a soft, squidgy little misogynist troll on the Anthropology thread. I really really have to go AFK, I can’t stay to chew: I’m hoping that the sninyfang signal can be lit.
Sorry wrong link: Anthropology thread here.
I chewed a little on the chewtoy. : )
Hope you aren’t too worn out from the jerks at patheos, WMDKitty. Also hope your visit with partner is wonderful. Thanks for letting us know you’ll be away.
wedding thingies
We totally and absolutely banned all games, traditions and things from our wedding. Didn’t stop my mother from throwing rice at me. I threw a “bouquet”. Actually I threw several small bunches of roses, one for every young woman present, which mostly meant children. My bouquet remained with me, together with the flower-wreath I had in my hair. I also had a red gown.
I remember reading about conflicts between the church clients and especially the RCC because people increasingly think that weddings, baptisms and funerals should be somehow about the person who’s at the centre and the chrch being annoyed that no, you can’t have any old pop-song just because it means the world to you and your partner and is the perfect symbol of your love and commitment to each other. It’s gotta be approved by Jesus.
I don’t think they’re faring very well with that because for many church-goers in Germany it’s not about belief but about tradition. My two BFFs are a submarine Roman Catholic and a Lutehran Sexton who both believe neither in god nor in Jesus.
rq
Don’t answer if you don’t want to, but is your vagina an Object of Wonder™ to your boys the same way Mr.’s penis is to the girls?
More parenting stuff
From tomorrow on, the great “get dressed, get a dinosaur” fun commences.
I’m sick and tired of having a fight with them about getting dressed every. single. morning and. every. single. evening. So I made them little cards where they can collect stamps. If they get dressed within 10 minutes they get a stamp. If they have 10 stamps by the end of the week (for the first weeks) they can swap their cards for a little dinosaur toy.
Now, since they’ll sleep over at my in-laws on Tuesdays (I come home very late from work on Tuesdays and will have to leave very early for school on Wednesdays) I needed to inform my mum-in-law about the rules. My dad in law turned to his wife and said “we never had those problems with our kids”.
Mum in law said: “No, but they also didn’t have to get dressed themselves at that age, only if they wanted to”
Mr. remembers that his mum put out his clothes while he was already well into secondary school…
Salon published an article about Beatles songs that were never released, not officially released anyway. Some of these songs were satires of anti-immigrant sentiments. Apparently, some people felt the satire was subtle enough to be mistaken for anti-immigrant statements. Some subtle, some not so subtle.
How the right wing operates in the voter suppression arena:
Much, much more here: Link. The virtue of this article is its scholarly approach and the fact that it doesn’t restrict itself to generalities. The details are all there.
Saturday Night Live on the U.S. Senate’s approach to gun control. Video at the link:
http://www.salon.com/2013/04/14/must_see_morning_clip_snl_mocks_gun_control_proposal/
Excerpt:
Portia
Actually that one’s apparently a sort of folk-etymology; the white wedding dress started as a social climbing/conspicuous consumption thing. Queen Victoria got married in one, and after that, people started wanting them to show that they were aspiring to be like the queen, and that they could afford a quite expensive and easily ruined dress (in the days before good bleaches and cleaners, it was really hard to get cloth that white to start with, and you’ll never get even the slightest spill or stain out of it.).
Rowanvt
Oh, what an adorable little kitty.
Bill McKibben, writing for Rolling Stone, covers the organized resistance to the fossil-fuel industry, and the support for organizations attempting to address climate change.
Excerpt:
As a follow-up to my post @169 on voter suppression laws, here’s a Rolling Stone article on the Five Most Outrageous Facts About Our Broken Voting System
Excerpt:
Details at the link.
Fucking bankers and hedge fund managers! Most of them anyway. Why are some organizations still trusting these guys? And inviting them to speak and to sell their wares to the unwary?
More details here: Matt Taibbi, writing for Rolling Stone
Dalillama:
Interesting, I (obviously) didn’t know that was the origin.
I guess my statement should be amended to the perception of the reason for wearing white. All those jokes about “She shouldn’t be wearing white, amirite?”
Another excerpt from Matt Taibbi’s article about Dan Loeb simultaneously soliciting and betraying pension funds (see comment #174):
Mormons, particularly Utah mormons, are still discussing apostle Boyd K. Packer’s latest foray into the wilderness of illogic and anti-gay sentiment. Of gays, Greeks, and an LDS apostle
Portia
Can’t argue there. Indeed, as an indicator of cultural misogyny that’s a pretty strong one: In less than a century, a custom that started as social climbing got reinterpreted as being about women’s sexual history.
Giliell, rq:
Interesting. To the best of my memory I do not recall having any conversations with my parents like that when I was young.
I do have a memory of waking in the middle of the night to (I think) use the bathroom and hearing strange sounds coming from my parents bedroom. To me it sounded like my mother was in trouble. I asked ‘mommy, mommy, are you ok?’ as I opened their bedroom door-to see what I now know was my parents having sex. I do not recall what happened after that, but I *think* there was some comforting by my mother at some point (of the ‘tuck you into bed and reassure you mommy is ok’ variety).
****
ednaz:
I have a more detailed answer to give about how the job is progressing to give later (and on the laptop), but the short version is interesting, tiring, informative, aggravating. Pretty much like many peoples’ jobs, I imagine.
Ugh, good point, Dalillama. As usual, sexist crap gets worse the more you think about it : p
=============
More and more often the only redeemable aspect of SNL is Weekend Update. Really, SNL? Blackface? With a black actor in the scene so the blackface actor can literally get approval during the scene? Yuck.
DC has introduced a transgender character into one of its mainstream comic. Transgender Barbara appears in Batgirl #19.
The Virginia Mall Shooter announced his upcoming crime spree on 4chan.
Link.
I guess I never had much reason to think about marriage in anything but a general sense. Am I to take it the subtext of ‘wearing white’ is a woman’s sexual purity? As if a woman should not have sex until married. Fuck that.
Tony
That’s the thing about kids catching their parents having sex (especially when the parents don’t notice it): lots of sex looks like and sounds like one hurting the other, even without any added kink.
And if you can’t make sense of it, that’s quite disturbing.
While naked bodies were never “hidden” at home, I grew up with some strange ideas about sex. My parents made sure I knew the technical baby-making details, but never the sex and fun and fun without somebody else part, so I grew up believing that people only have sex to make babies.
I was shocked, I tell you, shocked to find out that they still had sex when my sister discussed contraception with my mum.
Tony
That’s what they say, yup. The white dress allegedly symbolizes virginity/purity.
I have had conversations with coworkers about parents having the sex talk with teens. Many people I spoke with never had much of a talk at all. I know I never had one. It makes me wonder how, if at all, parents have this very important conversation with their children. I think I have heard of some that give the talk at several stages of development, rather than once as a teen. I think I recall some of the Horde parents talking about teaching their kids the anatomically correct terms for sex organs, as well as personal autonomy, which is great IMO. With all the religious furor over sex education in schools, I really worry that young people are not getting any accurate information. If parents do give info, how accurate is it, especially if they have not learned much either. ‘On the job training’ is not the way to learn about STIs or contraception, autonomy, pregnancy, etc.
Damn, I just realized that problem is likely worse for those who are queer. I did not know much of anything the first time I was with a guy.
Dalillama:
Now I wonder why purity is so darned important. I thought children were the sole purpose for marriage (according to church officials). You do not need to be a virgin to have children. And why are men not required to be virgins? I can see the misogyny a mile away, but the why of it eludes me.
Tony
As I recall, there was a health class that parents could opt their kids out of, and I wanted to do something else with that part of my day, so I asked to be excused on the grounds that it was going to be tedious and annoying, and I already knew the material. My mom made me go over the basics of safer sex and the like, agreed that I had it covered from my own readings, and I got out of the class.
Tony,
Men have to “shop around” before chaining themselves to a woman. Women have to stay untainted by other men’s touch. It’s like men were afraid of not measuring up or something when they came up with that one.
Tony
The short answer is patrilineal descent. Who you are, what you inherit, etc. are based on who your father is, and in a society without DNA testing the only way to be sure that a particular man is the father is to ensure that the mother has never had sex with any other men. In pre-Christian Ireland, for instance, descent was reckoned through the mother, so the Clan Chief’s heir would typically be his sister’s eldest son, and in that culture women (married and unmarried) had very nearly equal opportunity to take lovers without anymore social disapproval than men would suffer.
Are my legs supposed to tingle after running/walking? This feels weird.
—
Crip Dyke –
Processing your email, preparing response.
worn out, Portia:
*supposed* to be worn out? I do not know. But after various forms of exercise I have felt tingly. Whether it is biking or weight lifting, or running, etc. I do agree it feels funny.
Twitchy, I meant twitchy. My thighs keep twitchy.
Funny. Yeah. : /
Portia,
My thighs do the same after excersize.
Shit. I just chipped my front tooth. Fuckfuckfuck.
It doesn’t hurt and it isn’t obvious, but it’s there. Fuck :(
…and I’ve heard about those spell-checker things, but do not hold with them, nossirree.
Giliell
re: @167
Yes, it is.
While we’re pretty open and casual about nakedness (mostly due to the fact that we do the whole country-sauna thing as a family (just us, no one else, though!), so it’s all out there regularly), I’m still the only anatomically-female in the family, so I’m bound to get questions about why I look different. They want to touch too, though, something I am not comfortable with, and I usually just say it’s because I don’t want other people touching me there (“Is that because you pee from your bum?” <- this was a puzzle: how can I pee without a penis?) and that nobody else but them is allowed to touch their private parts (unless it's myself or Husband helping them pee from time to time, although Eldest is growing out of that unless he's asleep).
Interestingly, Eldest has most interest about it (mostly because of the age he's at), but I remember him asking questions when he was ~3, while Middle Child, at that age now, doesn't really wonder about it (not openly, at least – then again, Eldest discovered himself at an earlier age than Middle Child, so it's probably just an individual thing). We'll see.
I'm hoping that by not making a big deal about body parts, at least some of that ability to communicate openly will transfer to conversations about sex and other more serious topics. I know it'll still take work and effort and a certain gathering-of-courage, but maybe it'll be easier if those things aren't considered 'special' or 'weird' to start with. [/socialexperiment]
I also grew up in a home without locks at all, although nakedness as such wasn't as much of a casual affair as it is now. Except when we were kids, we ran around naked during the summer with the neighbouring kids.
Never caught my parents having sex, either, only heard them sometimes.
Thanks Portia.
I think I’m going to take a half hour to run to the store for cookies.
Crip Dyke: Fueled by Tea, sugar, and nutritive food… in that order.
rq
Yeah, sometimes we need to teach our kids that parents have bodily autonomy, too.
I only now managed to teach #1 that no, I don’t won’t her hand down my clevage anymore. A side effect of breastfeeding nobody tells you about. She’s not the only breastfed kid I know for whom, for years to come mummy’s breasts mean comfort long after they’re weaned.
But I got more and more uncomfortable with it, especially since my tits can be very sensitive.
+++
And I think that one of the most uncomfortable/hilarious moments as a teen was when I noticed that my mum was trying to get my dad into bed but he didn’t…
Oh, and YAY!, construction of the baby-quilt for a friend works as planned…
Kids these days.
Oh, and for Tony – how to train a wife. Because, see, not only pure, but well-trained is Prime! (And yes, it’s all about the patrilineal descent. Proven fertile women used to be the thing, now it’s all about who’s your daddy – even though, if a woman is cheating on the side and in secret, paternity may still be in doubt… for which consequences are dire.)
For some reason I read this as
Seemed quite reasonable ;)
One of the first cracks in the wall of Christianity for me was when I was telling my college Baptist Student Union group about the wedding dress I had chosen, and mentioned it was a light shade of ivory because pure white looked awful with my skin tone. The leader of the BSU, the guy who was the adult employee paid to run the place, who was in his late 30s, snipped “In my day, we had a saying about girls who didn’t wear white”, and left no doubt as to what he meant. I’d seen Christianity used as a social weapon plenty of times, but never on something quite that minor, and he was obviously not joking. So, there’s that.
*leaves piles o’ hugs as appropriate*
Neat little article by Marcotte: Secular lies of the Christian right
Thank you, FossilFishy. I’ve been having some weird ups and downs and some bizarre dreams in which I, as an adult, am the perpetrator. They are scary and I was realy starting to wonder if this was something I would do. I don’t think so, but damn they scare me.
I don’t know if I have hope, but I’m glad I give it to others. Maybe I’m a carrier?
Good to see you, Walton.
Shit. Sometimes (no, quite often, actually) Idespair of humanity:
From Rawstory.
Then again, the fact that a fellow officer filed the complaint shows progress.
I guess.
Ogvorbis:
I’m glad he was fired, anyway. : /
*hugs* for you.
Alright, so I’m having a crappy day and doing that thing where everything is awful and bad and terrible and blah blah blah. But, I still have the willpower to not facebook stalk S. There’s a tiny part of my rational brain squeaking “That will only make you feel worse!” and I listened. Go me.
Speaking of S, I probably have to see him next week at a bar association event and of course I’m already stressing out about it. We haven’t spoken in a month, since I told him I wasn’t having a particular brand of his bullshit. He has been ignoring me since. Our acquaintances in the legal community don’t know we’re no longer “an item.” Painful awkwardness all around!
/whinewhinewhine
Portia
Oh, no question. I’m impressed that a fellow officer felt safe enough to actually file the complaint.
Sorry your having a tough day. Hugs to you.
Ogvorbis, I’m glad when you’re around and FossilFishy’s right that you add to the world. I saved this for you:
Motivational Megafauna, they’re extinct but they are proud of you
Thanks, Ogvorbis.
Pteryxx, I love that link.
—
Now I’m gonna have a cigarette and get to work on stuff I need to file tomorrow. : p
Thanks, Pteryxx.
By the by, do you know why you can never hear a pteranodon take a piss?
Oggie:
*raises hand*
oooohoohoooh I know I know!
“I posted this on my facebook and my friend said: “I prefer to read it as a pro-choice argument for keeping zygotes unarmed.”
I’m dying of laughter.
*glares* Sheesh, you people and your potty humor.
*perches over somebody’s car*
Portia:
Shhhh. Just wait. I want ot wonk if Pteryxx knows that one.
Er, all hail Tpyos?
I want to know if Pterryx knows that one.
Ogvorbis, your pugilistic prurience has not been passed over. (ptui!)
(I trust I’ve pressed home my point…) ;>
chigau: Hurray! for gone tooth pain! Science FTW!
–
rowanvt: Thanks for the itteh bitteh kitteh update! A *tiny scritch* for Parsnip, and a *hug* for you.
:)
–
WMDKitty: You just go on, have a good time with Partner…don’t think about us…we don’t mind at all….
</anti-sarcasm&non-guilt-trip>
–
Beatrice: *completely-unweird-virtual-hug*. As a bonus, and regardless of all the jokes about catching computer viruses, a virtual hug is contagion-free. :)
Mind you, I quite like Meatspace hugs, too; just not from everybody.
–
Dinnertime!
Portia, speaking of S, Captain Awkward today might be helpful (not sure how much, ‘cuz not quite the same, but still how to get over someone who won’t leave you alone).
carlie:
You are spot on. I read that about an hour ago, and it had me in tears. Aside from the Other Woman (and other specifics) business, it was incredibly on point. The general advice is always helpful, but this one…dang. Thanks for the heads up, though, I welcome any future stuff like that that you see :)
Sorry I was too slow, but glad you saw it! :)
I have to say, it was sad reading about euthanizing the Golden Retriever of Love. I’ve had a couple of Darth Vader friendships in the last few years, and learning of the Golden Retriever was comforting, but realizing it needs to be put down sometimes was difficult (yet helpful).
Killing hope is hard, I agree, carlie. This
is like she’s inside my head. It’s ridiculous…
(If anyone else cares, this is what we’re talking about: http://captainawkward.com/2013/04/14/465-life-after-darth/#more-5359)
Portia: *hugs* and plenty of moral support for you in your upcoming Painful Awkwardness with S and the Bar Association Event.
–
Thank you very much, cicely. I’m sure I’ll whine at you guys all about it afterwards : )
(It occurred to me the other day that since my BFF got a GF (like a year ago) and S bailing out of my life, I have a serious lack of a BFF, a person I can call or text for no reason or any reason. I have my mom, and we email all the time, and she is always there, but I just don’t have…a meatspace person anymore. And it makes me kinda sad. But it also makes me all the more glad to have you all. So thanks. ♥)
Portia
Which is a sign of progress in itself, really. Also, *big Hugs* for impending awkwardness.
Ogvorbis
Dreams are dreams, nothing more. While I don’t mean to diminish the effects of such nightmares, the only danger is that they’ll impede your sleep, add to your stress levels, and generally do what nightmares do. *hugs*
Beatrice
Comfortable *hugs* to you as well.
4 hours ago I hadn’t yet read the 100 pages or so of aiding, abetting, conspiracy, and common intention.
I’m about 8 pages from done (bot interrupted by kids & am not cooking dinner), and I think I really understand it, despite blowing it off completely when busy earlier in the year.
I think I might just be prepared for the exam tomorrow… Constitutional came down to the wire getting everything read & organized [thus forgetting my copy of the constitution]. Contracts I had about 40 min to spare. Think I might be just as well off this time…and I slept 9 hours on Fri & 8 last night. I was scared those 17 hours would come back to bite me, but not so far…
Crip Dyke:
Those hours were well spent.
I’m actually pretty good with conspiracy, but it sounds like you are too :)
Portia. we’re so happy to be here for you.
You’ve been very kind and thoughtful in talking to me about general principles knowing that we’re dealing with different legal systems.
:heart: back.
Crip Dyke, you make me wish virtual hugs could be IRL hugs. I, of course, don’t feel like I’ve been all that helpful to you, but I’m glad you feel differently :)
I’m very impressed with your criminal-law intake in such a short period, too! I always did marvel at the folks who managed law school with a family. I just had myself to be concerned with and that was hard enough!
Crip Dyke: Best of luck on tomorrow’s test!
I believe that tradition calls for you to break a leg, but I’d give it a miss, if I were you.
;)
–
Crip Dyke:
Good luck with the exam tomorrow.
Fingers, toes, and tentacles crossed for you!
Sometimes I hate technology.
My cellphone decided yesterday to not function for a few hours, no matter what I did. Then it miraculously (as in ‘walking on water’) decided to come back on (of its own volition). This morning I woke up to a phone that would not charge, no matter where I tried (at home, in the car, at work). Of course my battery was low as well. I will receive my replacement phone on Tuesday. So no phone tonight or all of tomorrow. I work all day Tuesday, so no chance to get the phone and bring it to a retailer and have them switch all my info over. Then I work Wednesday morning, and *hopefully* I can get off work in time to get to a Verizon dealer. If not, then it will be Thursday. It couldn’t be as simple as walking in and swapping my phone for a new one. :: le sigh ::
Oh, man, Tony, that’s a bummer : (
Thanks for the hugs, Dalillama. Consider them heartily reciprocated.
@Portia
If you ever come to the PNW, either side of the border, LMK.
Been known to happen.
@ everyone…
Settled in for the night, if I have any discipline at all, I won’t be back til tomorrow morning.
:hugs: for consenting all and sundry
or is that:
for all and sundry consenting
….
I think grammatically they both kinda work & both kinda don’t. have at it any grammar nerds who wanna.
Night, Crip Dyke, take care and good luck.
I’ll let you know if I’m in the area :)
I hear you Tony, but when it works it’s damn near miraculous. For. Instance, I’m sitting on top of a hill in a pine plantation resting my legs before I ride back down on a race trail called Uzzi. (From shop to top 50 min. A new pb.) And yet I can still see how you folk are doing half a world away. We live in an age of commonplace wonders and uncommon annoyances. Tis a fine time to be alive.
FossilFishy:
No argument there.
Compared to all that technology has done for us, as well as what it continues to do and will do in the future-from saving lives (of so many wonderful living beings on this planet) to extending lives, from peering deep into the universe to seeing on a microscopic level, from bringing us across the world to taking us to the moon and more–technology is a wonder (and all the people, of all shapes, sizes, genders, nationalities, sexualities, and beliefs who helped create all the wonderful tech we have–no forgetting you).
I
thinkknow I can deal with temporary first world problems.Portia:
So when are we taking that cross country trip and meeting up with every Horde member in the continental US?
@ Crip Dyke- You can do eeeeet!
I spent most of the day practically asleep on my feet, I am so exhausted from this kitten. Fortunately, he seems to prefer feeds every 3 hours so I can get some better/more sleep tonight and be ready for work tomorrow. The clients were very patient with me today after I explained that the kitten had kept me up most of the night.
Gonna go feed and then crash into bed for a while again. Hugs for everyone who wants one!
I am drawing a blank here.
I was reading something recently about “American exceptionalism”, and remembered an Index of some sort that compared the United States with other countries (and the US was found lagging behind in so many areas). What’s the name of that Index and/or a link to a site that talks about this?
Gah! I hate brain farts.
Tony
I don’t know if this is what you’re looking for but the CIA World Factbook has a tonne of comparative charts.
You can google it.
I won’t link ’cause oooh CIA.
I am proud to be the first male Slayer…
Nate:
Shame we can’t get to Lounge 420 by 4/20…
Tony
What was that about being the first male Slayer?
I wonder, if we ask nicely, would P-Zed or Chris put up a 420 thread on that Most High Holiday?
(Mods/Community Watch folks — Please pass on the request to our Overlords?)
So, I have an absurdly underexplained lab to figure out, got allotted the most time consuming part of the calculations for it, and it’s due tomorrow at Midnight. By “lab” I mean “do calculations from a horribly formatted data set gathered over several hours and distributed by the instructor with no lab handout or guidelines aside from vague verbal explanations by him and the lab tech.” WHO THE FUCK DOESN’T PROVIDE WRITTEN INSTRUCTIONS FOR AN UNDERGRADUATE LAB ASSIGNMENT?!
I volunteered to do a FMEA analysis on my MechEng senior project for another class and give the rest of my group talking points for it, and that presentation is Tuesday.
And tomorrow I still have to find time to meet with my group and my boss and discuss the fact that I just determined that we may have to go back to a series-of-tube-in-tube scraped-surface heat exchanger design (because six, 4 1/2in long and with an interface tube of 10in nominal diameter stainless pipe, or 20 stacked 24in coolant plates, with one scraper each in both cases and sealing issues for each unit, will do it), and convince my group of it, when they’re heavily invested in the plate idea, which means I need to have calculations to show them as to WHY the tube-series is better, and that has to happen by 18:30 tomorrow…and we need a complete design drawing package by next Wednesday morning. :(
And I’m still underslept. Also, my ex did not see her daughter at all this weekend, but txted me at 7 this evening to announce that she’d been busy moving again, just when I was starting to really hope she’d finally been annihilated by a bolt of divine retribution. :(
Good morning
College starts again this morning and I’m feeling shitty again.
I know it will get better but damn.
*hugs* for each and all of you
WMDKitty:
It’s from PET. Part of my Horde name.
*hugs* all around, and thanks for the support yesterday, which I sort of left hanging because I didn’t come back to the computer after complaining about my marginally crappy day. Sorry for being so rude!
Portia
I’m so behind you on the whole S thing, I have my pom-poms out (virtually; it’s tough to go to market with pom-poms in hand), and I think I’ll email you about this one!
Giliell
*hugs* for you, too.
rowanvt
That’s great news about the kitten being better, but I certainly hope you get some extra sleep soon! (Baby animals, they’re all the same, cross-species and all…)
Annnd… more later.
Giliell
I’ll take two. *hugs back*
I don’t know if there is something in the air or what, but it’s apparently “feeling shitty” day all around. Take care. We’ll slog through the day somehow and tomorrow will be better.
Yes, tomorrow will be better!
Also, I hope Justin Trudeau will be better for Canada (and hopefully the Liberals will get it together next elections), because after reading this whistleblower’s letter about the Harper government, I’m scared of the Conservatives winning again.
And if anyone ever wondered what Latvians are like, here you go. And yes, we’re all like that, right down to the top hat. ;)
So at least I Made it here and it looks like I am at the right place at the right time. And I don’t think I’ll ever like typing on tablets
*hugs* to Azkyroth and your daughter
I need to win the lottery soon.
rq:
Up for a fire call and of course I have to check in and of course I see your smile-inducing comments : )
(Thumbs crossed for lotto winning).
Night/morning everybody.
Good luck with the call, Portia! Keep safe (email later today).
rq,
Do you first have to start buying lottery tickets, or have you already got that one covered?
Thanks, rq. I’m home safe now, trying to get sleepy again. (It takes 3 and a half hours to set a capsized semi to right…yeesh). I look forward to your email, but no rush. : )
Beatrice, I hope you’re right about Monday. : p
Giliell, hope your day is going great.
because now I am sleepless, I’m fiddling around on facebook.
I can’t make heads or tails of this image: Racist theist eagle firefighters?
Thank you for the good Parsnip news, rowanvt. Hope it continues to go well!
Good luck for the next exam, Ms Crip Dyke, I have every confidence that you will continue to knock their socks off. All the socks, obliterated by your mighty competence and skill!
It would be rather awesome if you and Portia were to meet up some time. You would probably cause some sort of implosion in the fabric of reality, due to such a concentration of Good-People and Lawyer in the same place at the same time :-) (I know nasty-lawyer is a bit of a cliché and you two are living proof of the opposite, but the only lawyer I really know personally in meatspace is someone I’d much rather avoid so it sort of makes me feel you two are even more special. If you see what I mean. Not sure that sounds quite how I meant it to sound.)
My sympathies for the ongoing process of disengagement re S, Portia. I’d just like to send you these {{{virtual transatlantic hugs}}} if I may.
I’m suer they are a charming bunch of bigots, Inquiry launched after Islamic group holds segregated lecture:
Unfortunately, this time no-one stood up to them.
Mr Stirling Moss is a legendary racing driver back in the days when it was outrageously dangerous. He’s also a bit of a right-wing crackpot (e.g., he supports the UKIP — all you need to know about those nutters is they have(? had?) Monckton as their shadow Science Minister), so perhaps it’s not too surprising that …Stirling Moss: women lack the mental aptitude to compete in F1:
Antarctic ice melting at record rate, study shows:
The mildly deranged penguin is not happy.
Progress. France’s legalization of gay marriage is very likely to be passed (despite a very noisy protest from the raping children cute and the other usual idiots). And, Ireland to hold gay marriage referendum:
Writing about the so-called “evolution” by various USAlienstan cupcakes towards legalising gay mariage, Gary Younge, also in The Grauniad, shows why he’s one of my favourite writers:
rowanvt
Don’t cat moms lick the kittens genitals/bums to make them pee ?
blf
I hope global warming stops for the sake of the MDP, but really, it would help if she stopped nuking everything from outer space.
Beatrice
Yes and no. Husband buys the lottery tickets, but we never win (besides occasionally making back the ticket price). So maybe I should start buying them. ;)
I’ll make sure never to ask for photoshop help from the internet.
And then there’s this: Really? Little Red riding Hood?
No, no, not from outer space. In outer space. You know, pesky planets where herds of cheese don’t roam, or they raise peas, or are infested with hors— hum, perhaps you have a point.
They’re also disturbingly racist, and are benefiting politically from stirring up hatred against immigrants. I saw a UKIP billboard the other day saying “Stop open door EU immigration. Enough’s enough.” I guess they’re not even trying to hide their xenophobia any more. And these fuckers are actually getting votes. :(
blf:
Yesterday I made chicken pot pie. With onions, garlic, sweet red peppers, asparagus, carrots and peas. Yes, peas. And I sprinkled some nice Welsh cheddar over the mashed potatoes used for the upper crust.
Don’t nuke me, bro!
Apparently, yes. Good grief. Banned Books & Censorship (blog):
A newspaper report from 1990 adds:
In a few minutes of quick searching, I have not been able to determine if either ban is still in effect, or if other school districts have also banned the book / edition.
Ogvorbis,
Oh Bog. My lunch/dinner is still at least an hour and a half away and this sounds delicious.
It contains peas. And chickens are stoopid enough to share barnyards &tc with horses. Also, the generic “Welsh cheddar” could be a form of British Industrial Cheddar™ — known to the rest of the world as Toxic Biohazardous Contamination and generally avoided. (Unfortunately, it’s not powerful enough to kill the peas.)
Nuking from orbit is probably not sufficient. Or safe.
━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━
For dinner last night I made a Gratin Dauphinois–Macaroni & Mozzarella di Bufala Cheese dish. No peas or horses. Unfortunately, no MUSHROOMS! or garlic either (it was thrown together from leftovers and none of those were leftover).
Living in a country that doesn’t import cheddar (at least not to any stores I know), I will take almost any cheddar I can get. I did buy some abomination in Slovenia last time that could be descried as Toxic Biohazardous Contamination and I’m not falling for that one again. Unfortunately, that might mean no cheddar for me. :(
Slow morning [Pharyngula Standard Time]*.
Have the Overlords gone into hibernation?
—
*I’m assuming We™ don’t do that daylightsavings crap.
When One™ is the source of Enlightenment, what’s the fecking point?
Yes. We® are all Little Candles In The Dark.
Shall WE sing?
@265-
I use gauze squares. :P When I had my last dog, he would help potty the kittens for me. My current girl is afraid of babies and will run away from while doing the nervous drooling.
And it seeeems to meee
You lived your life
Like a caaanndle innn the winnnd…
Sorry, wrong song? All this talk of candles, and Elton John came to mind.
Ohhhhh-kayyyyy, so you give the gauze squares to the Trebuchet ammo to piss on and then lick them?
rq
That’s a good song.
As long as it’s the original not that other one.
—
blf
Please.
Parsnip doesn’t weigh enough to make good ammo.
He needs to be fed and fattened for a while.
I refuse to comment on the licking thing.
—
♩hooold me closer tiny da-a-ancer♫
Illegal food: step away from the cheese, ma’am (I added the hyperlink):
The mildly deranged penguin is happy! This means there will be more of the stuff locally…
The article goes on to discuss other banned foods (not just cheese). Some more cheeses:
Cheny & Bush ][ banned (effectively) Roquefort!?!!1! Then they are not only genocidal warmongering kleptomaniac delusional creeps, but actually evil.
(Yes, a serious comparison of Cheny & Bush ][‘s atrocities to a trade spat about cheese would be insulting to their victims.)
Apparently, the 300% duty — it’s apparently no longer in effect — is in retaliation for the EU banning beef from USAlienstan stuffed full of hormones. Not sure if the horsemeat content was too high or too low.
Also, nothing else which got an increased duty in that pointless round of tit-for-tatism, my pensis is longer than your’s-ism, had such a huge duty imposed. The obvious guess is that was extra “punishment” for being made by “cheese-eating surrender monkeys” (the sheer vindicative evilness of Cheny & Bush ][ is hard to understate).
I share this sentiment.
+++
So, I survived the day
First class is a very intense gramar class. Lots of work, second class, I can’t tell yet, lecturer is not the best organized one. Last class, booooooooooooooooooooring. Composition for beginners. Don’t need it in the sense of education, but need it for the credits…
chigau, Apologies if I upset you (I am getting a sense that I might have from your comment @282).
The mildly deranged penguin seems to agree with you. Starting flying lessons when extremely young doesn’t work very well. Besides being a bit lightweight — making the flight path difficult to predict — mom (even if an experienced flyer herself) seems to take considerable exception and will actually chase Her Penguinistaness. Well, try to chase… End result usually involves a pair of tights, some oatmeal, and a Ray Comfort CD. It ain’t pretty…
Opposablethumbs:
You are so sweet. Thanks for the hugs.
—
Beatrice,you said today would be better. *whiiiiiiiiiiiine*
rq:
Thanks for the email, I’ll get one back to you once this day calms down :)
You see I’ve forgotten if they’re gree-eeeeen or they’re bluu-ooooooo
[mumble mumble humhum hummm]
What Iiiii real-ly mee-ean,
Is yours are the sweeeee-test i-eyezzz… I-aaaaaaah’ve ever seeeen!
*hugs* for everyone.
I pruned the roses. A lot.
I hope they survive (but the book said it was ok!).
Some Mad Science, from Animals Talking In All Caps.
–
We now own my ass, free and clear!
Yes, today saw the last payment on it, and we are no longer in partnership with the [redacted] Medical System on ownership. Okay, so it took all of the remainder of our tax refund, and it merely clears the decks for our shared ownership of The Husband’s Absence of Gall Bladder, but hey, at least we won’t be paying on both projects concurrently.
–
rowanvt: *hugs*. How long will Parsnip be on such an intense feeding schedule?
–
Giliell: *hug*. Mondays are shitty by nature. All we can do is ride them out.
–
Monday. The Horses and the peas took control of it long ago; that’s the way They are—give ‘Em an inch, They’ll take 1/7th of the week.
–
Exaggeratedly-patriotic-to-the-point-of-caricature theist eagle firefighters?
–
…and Prancer, and Vixen, and Comet, and Cupid♫….
–
blf
No no. Not upset at all (well maybe the licking thing)
wait
The MDP flies?
That BBC thing was real?
Sssshhhhhh!!!1! The penguins don’t like the word to get out…
Woooo dentist had a cancellation and can see me tomorrow at a time when I don’t have three things scheduled! And a semi-local auto repair place can see me this afternoon. I just hope it’s not an expensive problem.
Portia, I love your icon.
I know I’ve been spamming the list with law school finals updates. Anyone who’s been to law school will tell you it’s a stress fest and that first year, and especially first year exams, are by far the hardest part of the very hard thing.
Thanks for your patience. I will try not to try it.
Which of course segues into ExamNews(tm):
It’s 10am here & I don’t have to leave the house until Noon…and I slept for 3.5 hours last night… and I’m done.
What the heck?
I can’t decide whether to start in on property right now, or just have some OJ and a bagel. I feel like an Architeuthis at the surface!
Thanks, Crip Dyke, I love it too! :) In the interest of attribution, it’s By Sarah Hamilton via http://society6.com/srahhh
I vote OJ and bagel. Cut yourself some slack.
@ cicely:
Belated congrats on your wheelchair. I remember what a big deal it was when I got my power chair. It wasn’t covered by insurance ‘cuz i can walk, but my bones were so bad I couldn’t get out of the house more than 2x a week. Ugh. Plus, y’know, it’s just fun to go outside. So I got it at a bad time, but kept it for spins in the park with my dog so I didn’t have to worry about how long she wanted to play, etc. etc. Used it for Walk for the Cure one year. Good times. Made an awesome difference in my life…until the joystick fritzed and I couldn’t get a new one. Oy.
But all that is secondary to what I wanted to say which is: That link was F’n stellar. Great photoshop job, awesome way to bring it around to the inability to move one’s head at the end. Just amazing.
–)->
Evangelical Christian and Mormon groups that encourage adoption of infants from Africa and other countries have used religion as an excuse to break lots of ethical boundaries. Mother Jones has posted a new article that highlights the personal stories of some adoptees, and that also provides some details and statistics. As you might imagine, christians adopting children in order to “save” them turns out to be, all too often, a scam.
The Mother Jones article focuses on evangelical christian adoption programs, but if anyone is interested I can provide links to similar abuses within mormon adoption programs.
Home schooling in evangelical christian homes was not up to par.
Black African children were required to do more household chores, farm work, construction, etc. than while children.
There are cases of physical and sexual abuse.
Excerpt:
Portia,
I said tomorrow as in Tuesday :P
And it will be better. It better be better or else…
It was delicious. Very good.
Welsh Colliers Cheddar. Made in Wales.
Sort of like spermecetti, I guess.
=======
For dinner tonight:
Grilled pork tenderloin (smoked salt and brown sugar) with an apple butter glaze; asparagus baked in phylo with butter, Romano and Parmesan Reggiano cheese; and a salad with English cucumbers, sweet red peppers, sweet green peppers, sweet onions, red onions, chives and scallions (all diced together with a little salt, olive oil and red wine vinegar added).
@Cicely- Parsnip has decided he eats better on a 3 hour schedule (a first from my kitten experiences, but he prefers it) for now. At a full 2 weeks old, he’ll be dropped to every 4 hours. Then every 5 at 3 weeks old and every 6 hours at 4 weeks old which is when weaning begins and will stay on the every 6 until fully weaned.
But as he is currently only 4 days old, I have 10 more days of getting up every 3 hours. x_x
Crip Dyke
Ditto what Portia said at 293.
Your schedule sounds intense; if you have time for a breather, do it.
cicely
I hereby present you with this Certificate of Ownership, to be filled out for Your Ass. Congratulations! :) *confetti&sparkles*
+++
re: Mondays
I swear, Mondays are a time-warp or something. This is the third Monday in a row where I totally, completely lose track of time (not in a good way). I’m usually really good with knowing about what time it is/how long things take, but these Mondays… It’s like I turn around, and suddenly it’s after 6PM and I still have to feed Middle Child and Youngest (since Eldest and Husband are home only ~8.30PM due to piano lessons). Which is what I don’t understand – we’re less people at home, we do the same thing as any other day, and yet somewhere, I’m losing an hour or two. And I end up rushing the tail end of the day and feeling shitty for being unproductive*.
*This does not apply to today; I pruned (most of) the roses, I took out the garbage, we did the grocery circuit, fed both children the requisite amount of times, got them asleep the requisite amount of time, did a small translation-correction job, read my book and got dinner done (not in order), so I’d say I’m pretty good for today. But it still took more time than (I thought) it should.
The one thing I haven’t done is called the water supply people about that contract they were supposed to email me back, because I’m scared of them (irrationally) and I know we have to pay the water bill, and we can do it without the contract, but technically we need the contract, and we could sign the one that has the wrong Husband’s name on it, but I’d rather one with the correct name and I emailed them about it two weeks ago because it’s a hassle to actually go there (small rooms, large stroller, two children… yeah) and they haven’t even emailed me back… Somebody needs to kick me about this. [/unreasonablefears]
@Crip Dyke:
Alas, I can only dream of a powered chair (lasers! shark-flingers! napalm-cannon! disintegration ray! serious force shielding! ), but it’s so nice to not be limited to places that provide chairage of some sort, while not having to worry that Insufficiently-Heavy-Duty Chair will abruptly suffer a Fatal Exception.
And I agree with you in all respects about the link.
:) :) :)
–
My Mondays, doubly so. Today is Saturday in the Ogvorbisverse. All you calendarist oppressors get to suffer through Monday today, but my Monday is not for another two days. Thppppt!
Collier’s Powerful Welsh Cheddar? I recall that. Not British Industrial Cheddar at all.
The mildly deranged penguin has just taken off…
Today is my Friday. :P I get two whole days off starting tomorrow in which to feed kitten, sleep, and stare at my snakes while demanding they hurry up and lay their eggs so I can feed them.
That’s the stuff. Excellent cheese.
The cheese is currently sitting under a bowl of peas. Good luck with that.
I just reread that.
Erm, what was the MDP wearing, exactly, and what did she take off? Please be specific?
So the guy’s car was outside the school this morning again. I spoke to the principal, and had mom forward her a copy of the police report, and they’re going to be handling it. In the mean time, I helped mom figure out a different route to take to drop daughter off on the days I have class the same time school starts for her.
On an unrelated note, I want to send this to my mom but I’m pretty sure she’ll just Be Insulted instead of fucking learning from it.
:) :) :)
–
Do Not Want!
:( :( :(
–
Azkyroth,
Oh crap. I hope police and the school deal with him.
—
Any news about Caine and her misbehaving pancreas?
Azkyroth
:/
Notify police he’s showing up still/again?
I’m glad the principal sounds forthcoming, and also glad there’s an alternate route.
But still… Ew. *hugs* if you should want!
Is Anton A Hall a.k.a. AssholeAtheist.com in here?
If not, does anyone know anything about him? I’m debating him regarding the existence of rape culture on twitter right now and the character limit is a pain in my rear. But then given what I’m debating him on, I’m not sure if I should continue, or if anyone has experience that says I’m wasting my time…
8^)
Lynna
I would be amazed if there were cases where there wasn’t, given who we’re talking about. Something seriously needs to be done about those people.
Azkyroth
Ugh. *hugs*
I had an interview this morning with Parking Enforcement, it seemed to go well, so hopefully something comes of that.
Dalillama:
Tentacles crossed for you.
Azkyroth:
Yikes! I’m sorry you all have to deal with such threatening creepy behavior. I’m glad the school is proactive.
Dalillama
Setting out a jar of fresh thumbs for you.
Not that I’m particularly creative, but I saw a bit of myself in the highly sensitive personality. Although, I would like to know the definition of unusual perceptions, as used in this sentence:
This article is terrible, horrible, no good. But the comments have quite a few gems, surprisingly!
http://www.askmen.com/top_10/dating/top-10-subtle-ways-to-tell-her-shes-getting-fat_1.html
Crossposted on the Thunderdome:
Two bombs at the finish line of the Boston Marathon.
Live stream of the finish line on CNN
http://www.cnn.com/video/?/video/cvplive/cvpstream2&hpt=hp_t1#/video/cvplive/cvpstream2
:(
*yawn*
Off to bed soon
Crip Dyke
My very best for exams (results)
I know it’s fucking difficult to get any serious studying done when there’s kids around.
cicely
Yay on wheelchair and paid bills.
You showed the horses who’s the boss.
Azkyroth
Are you taking pictures?
Sorry if I overread that, but it might be really important later to have evidence.
Boston: Fuck. I hope the body-count stays at 3…
But I make a prediction: There will be action taken. That would not happen if somebody had gunned down those people
I guess you do what you have to. ;/
Good luck :)
On a happier note: A new barbecue sauce:
1 cup apple butter
4 Tablespoons cider vinegar
2 Tablespoons Worcestersheerschire shauce
1/4 cup catsup (or ketchup, or kestup, or . . . )
dash of garlic powder
salt and black pepper to taste
Heat in a saucepan until all is mixed thoroughly. I just had it on pork tenderloin in my first barbecue of season. Mmmmm.
That’s it, Ogvorbis, I’m going to stop working and eat something.
I’ve actually done enough work for long enough that I don’t feel guilty! Woo!
Seriously though, that sounds amazing.
So there’s this cat, lives somewhere within a block of here, that thinks xe owns the neighborhood. Bully Cat decided to come in to our yard and give Gracie shit.
I had the (dis)pleasure of walking right into the middle of a cat fight.
Gracie’s okay — a little rattled, but okay.
Dang, trying to follow a Redhead recipe is playing Calvinball. I’m making a chicken paprikash from a recipe book we bought shortly after we were married. The chicken is cooking, and suddenly I hear “I usually use two peppers and two tomatoes”. The recipe calls for one of each, which were already added. Good thing I bought two peppers and two tomatoes….back to the chopping board…
I, on the other paw, am a bit upset at Bully Cat.
So I just became a member of the board of a local nonprofit, taking over as volunteer coordinator, which puts me on the board mailing list. I just received an email from that list, regarding volunteers, with the following signature.
I am distressed and annoyed, and uncertain of how best to respond.
Dalillama:
Is this a religious nonprofit, or secular? Is this religious statement in conformance with their mission statement, etc.?
Entirely secular, and it absolutely is not. It is currently located in a church, but that is a business arrangement; we rent space from them, and are currently seeking space elsewhere.
Dalillama:
Is there a national/statewide office you can contact about this inappropriate use of the charity’s name?
Ugh, Dalillama. I have no advice but lots of sympathy.
I figured I should go ahead and leave this here: if anyone wants to get in contact with me, I’m on twitter or you can email me at “improbablejoe” at the gmail thing.
Oh hey, iJoe. Hope you’re well.
Hi IJoe! *hugs*. Sorry I’ve not been on the email, I’ve been kind of wrapped up in stuff at home.
Ogvorbis
No, we’re it. The organization is a tool library, and we serve a particular area of town. There are similar organizations covering other areas of town, but there’s no actual affiliation between them; they’re all independent. We’re under the aegis of a larger group in the sense that we don’t have our own 501c[3] charter, so we’re under theirs. To clarify, there is organization related content in the email; the stuff I posted appears to be this person’s standard signature (Which also makes the email virtually unreadable, as it’s all in bold and in multiple colors.)
rq
I’m a bit surprised they didn’t look at similar work with other performers. I took a long time to realise, and many friends never worked out, that I used performance and public speaking roles as masks to hide behind. It’s extremely easy to be confident when it’s not _yourself_ doing it.
As for that heightened sensitivity – as I recollect from far too many years ago, that was a part of those magic moments when everything just seemed perfect, a bit out of this world. A few differences in choral/chorus from solo performance but that might just be a function of what you concentrate on in the two environments.
Dalillama:
That was it for me. Shot my bolt. Sorry.
========
Just helped Boy do his local taxes on line.
Couldn’t find his w2
Figured we could print out his tax form online from company A Online Service. Couldn’t find it. Spent 45 minutes on the phone with the help desk. They couldn’t find it. While on hold, went to company B Online Service and there it was.
Took 3 minutes to file his taxes on line, including creating the account.
Aaaaaaaaaaaargh!!!!!!!!! Sometimes I really am an idiot.
And heading for bed. Wondering what nightmares this latest attack will bring.
Hey, at least they probably won’t be scout related, right?
Ogvorbis:
*hugs* if you want them. Have some decaf earl grey to get you sleepy.
: (
Ogvorbis
The thought is appreciated anyway. *hugs* and goodnight.
Hugs Oggie.
Sleep dreamless.
—
I changed some of my passwords (at long last).
But (of course) I keep forgetting them.
Fortunately, my habit of using mild expletives with the occasional number and upper case substituted means I can find them again after a few trials.
…And now, 2 exams remain.
If I didn’t ace that exam, there’s no justice in criminal law.
*hugs* and a wish for sleep without nightmares for Ogvorbis.
Heck, for everybody.
–
So, I feel yucki about Boston – it’s home to a number of friends and even more families of freinds (don’t know how I keep picking up connections to there when I’ve never lived anywhere close to there). The ones that are closest to me are all accounted for, btw.
So I feel a little weird posting this here, but my partner & I tell stories to the kids every night at bed time. We call the make-up stories. Well, I worked the Flying Spaghetti Monster into one a few weeks ago, and it seems to be slowly occupying more & more kid conversation space.
And now?
They just invented the Flying Yakisoba Monster.
I :hearts: my kids
Crip Dyke:
Well put! and well done.
*high five*
CripDyky
焼きそばの飛行鬼
yakisoba no hikou oni
yakisoba’s flying demon
That’s cute, CD : )
(pssst…if you wanna make a ♥ it’s ♥ :) )
I heard about the bombing twenty minutes ago. I’m in the shop, crying, snot running out of my nose. And do you know the worse part? If someone were to walk in and see me they’re more likely than not to think that I’m being stupid about it. After all, I didn’t know anyone there and I’m on the other side of the fucking world. I hope that someday public displays of compassion are not thought distasteful, I won’t live to see that world I’m afraid.
*bighugs* for FossilFishy and Crip Dyke.
and by CripDyky, I hope you know I meant Crip Dyke.
yes, the rum is helping.
FossilFishy:
You know you can let out all that compassion here.
Compassion for your fellow humans should never be denigrated.
I was in much the same boat when I heard about the explosions.
I was at work trying to do some training of new employees. Hearing about the destruction, injuries and lives lost brought tears to my eyes.
My heart goes out to all those injured, killed and their families.
Hi Improbable Joe.
You are missed here.
(I also wonder how SGBM is doing)
re: crying in the shop
No man is an island entire of itself; every man
is a piece of the continent, a part of the main;
if a clod be washed away by the sea, Europe
is the less, as well as if a promontory were, as
well as any manner of thy friends or of thine
own were; any man’s death diminishes me,
because I am involved in mankind.
And therefore never send to know for whom
the bell tolls; it tolls for thee.
Holy crap chigau, I’m ashamed to admit I’ve never read the whole thing. Thanks for that.
If I were 10% as articulate as Fishy, I wouldn’t need to quote someone who died almost 400 years ago.
Cross posted from the Boston terror thread:
See?
Wow.
And here’s the really whole thing.
http://en.wikisource.org/wiki/Meditation_XVII
too bad about the God stuff
I’m so fucking tired chigau. All I have is words and they can no more stop the bombs than prayers of the faithful. The best I can hope for is to amplify and disseminate the fact that there ARE good people in the world. That these hateful destroyers, and the inevitable compassionless assholes who will twist these events to further their own harmful agendas are a shrieking, roaring, minority. But that’s not enough, it’s never fucking enough. This burden I place upon myself is unrealistic, and truth be told, there *is* more I could be doing that I’m not, concrete, realistic things,. I fucking hate this. Okay, I’m going to go and work now, I’ll don my reading glasses and a focus close on greasy hands and recalcitrant bike parts. I’ll be alright. I’ll be better than anyone who suffered injury or loss in Boston today. May you all be well, may your loved ones be well and may tomorrow see a flourishing of unexpected hope.
sgbm ॐ was busy for a while and segued that into a break.
FossilFishy
Words have Power.
Keep on doing what you do.
*hugs* and hand-cleaner
…made dark chocolate/lady gray truffles
They are excellent
Ugh, today feels like another Monday.
Just ran into a “Pro-life” atheist on another blog. Can’t wait to here how this person makes arguments for robbing a woman of her bodily autonomy. So far, this person is proving to be a tone trolling asshole.
@ Tony
SGBM is keeping well: “just spending more time offline than usual”. I am sure a little heresy will be all that is required to invoke the ever expanding shadow of a Boltzmann Brontosaurus above one’s noggin.
mildlymagnificent @333
Yes, what you say about the public face – I think it was in grade 10 when I discovered that I could fake it well enough for people to believe me (believe that I was social). It was exhausting, sometimes, and I know at parties, I’d last about an hour and then I’d have to take a walk on my own just to get re-settled and replace the outgoing persona. Strangely, I joined the debating club before I’d realized this, so I may have already been processing these things subconsciously.
And what you say about music… It would be interesting to hear about other branches of music (classical, choral, etc.), because I still find myself getting lost (in a good way) in certain passages/pieces from all genres of music. Although in some way, I think it’s more accepted for classical musicians (pianists, violinists) to be outwardly more introverted (classical music being an intellectual exercise) that there may be less of that doubling in characteristics. Conductors, on the other hand… At the same time, though, they’re putting so much of themselves emotionally out on the stage for the audience, which is extroversion at its most extroverted (is that how they would classify it?).
+++
Husband’s ‘shy’ friend is coming for a visit, finally. He always ‘just stops by’, and ends up chatting with Husband for half an hour… outside. I/we ask him to come in, but he’s all like ‘nono I have to go’ and then it’s another 20 – 25 minutes. You know how that feels? It feels like ‘I don’t want to talk to your wife’ to me. And if he wants to talk to Husband alone, that’s great (by all means), but it’s a bit hurtful when (a) it’s never phrased/presented like that (just stopping by for a minute!); (b) it’s rarely a particularly convenient moment for us (once we were literally packing up the car and kids to head out of town and I ended up doing everything about twice as long as it should have taken); and (c) it’s always excused as ‘he’s just shy’ (socially inept, anyone?).
But I think he’s actually coming inside for coffee this time. I’m pretty sure it’s only because we live outside of the city; if we were still in town, it would be the same old routine of no-I-won’t-come-in-but-I-will-talk-for-a-long-time. This is a Big Event. ;)
[/whinging for no good reason]
Being neither learned nor eloquent
I will simply say
Hugs and ♥ for everyone tonight
Arrggghhhh!!!1! Parents need to know homeopathy does not protect against measles, says MP:
Kudos to the quack group for acknowledging that water isn’t an effective vaccine. (I omitted the text where they went on to blame the problem on rogue quacks.) What I have no idea about — albeit there may be something at Bad Science or the quack-watching site whose name now escapes me — is whether or not any of quacks say, on their websites / ads, that water is effective. There was an incident with Malaria treatment(? prevention?) some years ago where individual quacks insisted water was effective despite, as I now recall, at least one of the quack groups insisting none of their quacks would ever say that. It would not surprise me if a similar-ish sort of lying is going on here.
ednaz
You? Not eloquent?
Ha.
blf
But you see, homeopathy works – my friend said so! Her daughter’s urinary tract infection was cleared up in two whole months using homeopathy, and all conventional chemical medications did not work at all!
(And then the whole family came down with whooping cough, but that’s a whole other story. Chose drugs for that one.)
Good morning
Rq
Yay for the friend finally coming for a real visit
But I, too, had to learn that probably it’s not about me but about them.
Small rant
New media are changing our lives rapidly and one of the things is that we’re suddenly expected to be available 24/7 When I started college few people had internet at home, so when class was over for the day the lecturer had to wait until the next week. Now they send you a mail at 7 pm which you read at 11pm but they still expect you to have the shit printed and prepared at 10am the next morning. There is no real free time anymore.
Good thing
The new “get dressed, get a dinosaur” routine is working out really well. Mornings have become a lot better
Nutters vs. nutters, Round twenty-something zillions, Nigerian Christian group threatens retaliation over Islamist attacks:
This most be highly sophisticated theology since I totally fail to understand it.
55 killed and more than 300 injured in bomb attacks in Iraq.
Suggested amendments in bold.
The Everyday Sexism Project: a year of shouting back:
The mildly deranged penguin suggests offering every misogynistic nutter a packet of dried cooties.
Thanks Walton@369 – good to see you posting! Of course, Iraq is a haven of peace and tranquility compared to neighbouring Syria, where there’s a clamour* for “western intervention” a.k.a. another neo-colonialist adventure in the Middle East, even more dangerous than Iraq.
*I was going to say “growing clamour”, but thought I’d better check my impression that it is growing. I started putting “time to intervene in Syria” into a well-known search engine, but had only got as far as “time to inter” when Prof. Google completed the phrase for me. But looking at the dates on articles, calls for intervention seem to have come in waves – roughly one last June-July, one October-December, and one February-April this year.
Nick: Good to see you too.
On another note, I have to concede that back in 2010 you were right about the Tories, and I was wrong. Not only have they been systematically dismantling the welfare state and making things worse for the poorest people in Britain, they’ve also been fighting a war on immigrants. Theresa May’s anti-immigrant rhetoric is becoming terrifying. And yet no one in the British media is talking about the death of Jackie Nanyonjo, or all those who have died in immigration detention centres recently.
FINE, I GET IT.
Goddamn….
Turkish composer and pianist convicted of blasphemy on Twitter:
If he’d pointed out that the stripper factories and beer volcanoes are a tavern and brothel, would he have been prosecuted for “blaspheming” the FSM? Or does that only happen to people who put peas in their pasta sauce?
Well, I’d not like someone peasing in the pasta sauce.
Looks like you don’t have to wait until you go kaput for your huri, just “marry” one for a month: Wealthy Muslim married men’s sex tourism. Virgins only.. I’d never heard of that practice, but apparently there’s been a recent case where the
slavegirl ran away and spoke out, Teenager exposes India’s ‘one month wives’ sex tourism:Charming. I suppose yer average wingnut would be Ok with this, as it’s between one man and one “woman”. Girl. Child.
Giliell
I know it’s not about me, but it just feels really rude. And I’m annoyed that I’m annoyed at this friend, because he’s one of Husband’s friends who I’ve actually liked all along.
But I guess the world isn’t exactly revolving around me. Slowly getting that message.
+++
In better news, the sun is out in force again today (+23 degrees in the sunshine! Actual air temperature closer to 15, still decent) and I managed to rake most of the yard (the parts reasonably dry or not under snow, that is – this is sort of what it looks like now).
Sowed some radishes and basil with Middle Child, mostly experimentally – the package says ‘from March’ but it may still be too early in the season. (Radishes are hardy!, I keep telling myself. So is basil!) We’ll see.
blf
This is what other intoxicated animals look like. How does the MDP compare?
re: 379
The monkey video at the bottom has video proof for why apes became bipedal.
You can’t carry a drink on all fours.
Good news (maybe you have heard it long ago, this is the first time I learned about it)
Amina in Tunisia escapes from detention http://freethoughtblogs.com/maryamnamazie/2013/04/16/amina-i-will-continue-the-struggle-in-tunisia/
“Swedish divers in shock underground cave find” http://www.thelocal.se/47158/20130405/
They are in for a nasty surprise when the cthonians reclaim that cave.
Nope, birgerjohansson, I’m pretty sure only Gollum would be coming to reclaim his cave, and since he fell into a volcano in Iceland, I think the divers are ok.
“I really love the fact that clicking on topic links makes pop-up ads appear!” – said no-one, ever.
I understand that banner ads are just the way things are, and I don’t mind them. But I’m smart enough (barely) to click on ads I’m interested in, I don’t need them opening up anything at all. I especially don’t need ads opening windows when I click on blog content instead.
Any chance we could go back to ads that just, yanno, advertised?
Thanks!
@ Azkyroth
Your comment went straight over my head.
Top 10 TV aliens: “Do you know your Medusans from your Zygons? Your Gorn from the Volge? And just how scary were the Zanti Misfits? …[W]e take a look back at the good, the bad and downright obscure of TV aliens”.
No peas or horses.
This is really, really, good, A Point of View: Science, magic, and madness:
Go read the whole thing. Now.
(Found via Bad Science.)
Anri:
If only there were a way of disabling pop-ups and redirects on browsers!
The tag line was just too perfect to resist (my emboldening), Tinned food can’t replace fresh — but it can be just as good): “Almost all of us buy tinned food, but not all tins are equal (cannellini beans good, peas bad). …”.
@Chigau, #343:
ZOMG, that’s Sooooooo Perfect!!!!
I got them the book Tasty Baby Belly Buttons a long time back, and they love it. The Red onis chasing when they hear children’s laughter or happy noises and the green onis when they hear children angry or crying. Now both big little and littlelittle play games with inventing all kinds of *new* onis that chase after you and try to eat your belly button for entirely different reasons…and some onis that do entirely new things, like “hug”.
So they are already familiar with oni as a concept. Yakisoba no hikou oni will make a lovely addition to the collection.
BTW: “hikou” pronounced “Hee Koo? or something else?
@ Portia:
♥ you for the ♥ lesson.
My reaction to watching the video of them swimming through the underground tunnels: “NO NO NO GOD NO MAKE IT STOP NO NO ARGH NO”
That was worse that watching the videos of walking El Camino del Rey and tower climbing.
carlie
I watched the beginning and I thought to myself, I could do El Camino… crawling, but I could do it.
But I realize that I couldn’t. Not in the state it’s in now, probably not ever.
*shudder*
(How long until there’s a theory about how it was a special walkway built by aliens for weird ritual purposes? See, it’s that kind of perfectly human technological feat that gets idolized by posterity…)
Crip Dyke #390
I’m glad you like it.
hee kooo is close enough.
El Camino… I think I could do it. Or at least try. The worst that can happen is that I fall to my death. No biggie.
Diving through underground tunnels? Having those walls suddenly start closing around me, while I slowly choke to death in panic or start flaying around and injure myself on the walls while I’m slowly choking to death after I knocked off/used the oxygen? No thanks. I’ll pass. Really. At least El Camino del Rey looks amazing (and open, lots of open space good).
I don’t have much to say about Boston, so I’ll just leave this here to go along with ‘For whom the bell tolls’ above.
Forgive me, distant wars, for bringing flowers home
I, on the other hand Beatrice, could do the underwater caves easily. I love water and under-water. It’s the heights that get me, in the end.
I’ve been reading all the posts about the Boston bombing, and I posted one comment in PZ’s latest offering, but in general I don’t have anything to add. I called my daughter that lives in NY to check on all of our friends and relatives in the northeastern states. She followed everyone on Facebook and was able to report that no one in our immediate circle was injured. Still, I cried. It’s just so frustrating to see that much stupidity in action.
On another subject, The New York Times posted an article today about a nonpartisan review that concludes:
Cheney and Bush are still semi-hiding from this truth. They ought to be in jail.
Oh Bog, as if I needed another reason to be scared of seeking professional help for depression.
The guy who managed to get himself a position of head of the Psychiatry department in our largest medical facility believes in possession (Hitler was obviously possessed), and of course exorcism.
That‘s one of our leading psychiatrists.
This “scientist” approves of faith healing too. *spits*
One for the menz!
rq,
I like and hate swimming in the sea. The feel of the water is amazing, but having that large dark nothing under and around me is a bit scary. If I start thinking about it, I can “feel” something brushing against my leg or “see” something from the corner of my eye.
A bit of good news: scouting troops that welcome gay members are growing. I think they will eventually succeed in breaking the hold that the Boy Scouts of America have on scouting. In some states, mormon-oriented troops have degraded Boy Scout troops enough that, even without the despicable campaign against gays, those troops should have been disbanded long ago.
Gay-Friendly Scouting Organization Doubles Its Numbers in One Year</i?
Excerpt:
Today’s Pop Culture Shock Therapy.
–
Always check for Magic, first; then check for Traps, second! Only then should you consider entering a surprise cave—no telling what the surprise may be!
–
Peas Bad.
Words to live by.
They sometimes lurk in caves, y’know.
–
carlie, you cannot make me click on those links. Again.
The first time was enough; I’m convinced.
–
I just realized that we don’t have any more peas, the last went into the risotto on Sunday. O.O
Frozen peas added to the shopping list. Thanks for reminding me, blf & cicely!
cicely:
Words to live by.
WARNING: bit of a link dump.
How the Boston Marathon tragedy revealed the best side of social media
This is only cool if the dolphins have lasers attached.
A thoughtful perspective on the Thatcher grave-dancers.
Some of the butterflies I hope to see this summer.
Analysis of the Chelyabinsk meteor continues.
Knitters: anyone want to knit me this hat? I’ll pay you – yarn+labour+shipping
+handling?
And for anyone who needs the help, this is what I look like when I hold thumbs for you (yes, it’s a repeat because it’s cute!).
Ack, too many links in that one, straight to moderation… *sigh*
Beatrice: Don’t thank me; when the treacherous little green bastards get you—as, of course, they will—I want it understood that I am not in any way complicit in your mushy demise.
I do not ally with peas or Horses.
–
Hekuni Cat:
*nodding vigorously*
Yep. Unless you have a reeeeeally unimaginative DM.
Also, of course, have your saves pre-calculated.
–
And one more for the road:
clean tar sands = magic fairies?
Sounds about right.
Home sweet fucking home
Tuesdays are not for those faint of heart because they basically mean that I’m 13 hours on the run.
Oh, I was home in between college and work for like 45 minutes to pick up the kids’ stuff (they’re sleeping at their gran’s) and work.
Now a shower, the laundry, finding out where I have to be tomorrow, then bed
Hi folks,
I’ll just leave this here:
#banpressurecookersnow
*hugs* Giliell. Congrats on getting through that day.
—
I want a nap now. No time..
—
Josh, tell me that’s not actually trending. Please.
Fucking fuckheads.
Pressure cookers have a purpose that is not limited to killing things.
Nah, nothing will come of it. The Big Pressure Cooker Industry will just ramp up their glossy advertising so hobbyist pressure cooker collectors can feel good about themselves. (A very few might actually learn to use them for canning!)
It’s really insensitive of pressure cooker control advocates to use this tragedy to push their political agenda.
Oh, wait. That one’s not even snark.
I’m totally trolling, sorry that wasn’t clear! Thing is, it wouldn’t surprise me because we are, in fact, that fucking stupid. And it would sail along with none of the angst over gun control, I’m sure.
As a proud pressure cooker owner, they’ll get mine from my warm, tender-cooked dead hands.
Oh, I didn’t think you were proposing it, Josh. I was unclear. I was just incredulous that people would satirize the issue like that, the damn day after. It sounded like what it was, conservaturd gun nut satire. I was just hoping you hadn’t gotten it from real conservaturds. Twitter dashed my hopes.
I’m actually sympathetic to a certain use of the “ban pressure cookers now” satire. It’s not b/c I think there’s at all a comparison with guns. The comparison is with the things that TSA does, banning all liquids b/c liquids were used in one attack. There really is an authoritarian control response that needs to be satirized and fought.
Of course, I’m insulated enough that when I saw that, I reacted with glee looking for lefties lampooning gov’t security excess. Instead I get NRA types who think banning nail clippers in checked luggage is great, but banning guns from checked luggage is a tremendous violation of their 2nd amendment rights. They wen’t and got a permit for that gun and everything. They’re permitted for F’s sake. Don’t you realize that any yahoo can buy a nail clipper?
Sigh. Sometimes I wish that my worst imagination of how bad the world could possibly be was actually the floor for how bad the world could possibly be.
Well, notice they’re not calling for the ban of gun powder, which was the actual incendiary material involved.
As I was growing up my mother often used a pressure cooker to prepare meals. We were so poor that we didn’t have indoor plumbing. That pressure cooker was often cooking beans, a cheap and nutritious part of our diet. One day, the cooker blew up. I was about five years old, entrusted with the task of feeding my baby brother. I swear my mother grabbed the baby out of the highchair, and picked me up to rush out of the kitchen before the sound of the explosion had dissipated. From the other room we peeked around the corner to survey the damage. The ceiling was covered in beans. The lid had blown off, but otherwise the pressure cooker was intact.
I thought then that I would avoid pressure cookers for the rest of my life. I didn’t know that bomb makers could force pressure cookers onto any of us.
In other news: “The Excel Error Heard Round the World” — We all know that Paul Ryan and various other Republicans have used faulty or questionable statistics, math, and logic to promote fucking insane budget plans. Well, now it turns out that some of the stupidity related to economic predictions can be traced back to a couple of fools who do not know how to code an Excel spreadsheet.
Let me be clear. I made that up for pure snark. I know off no one actually proposing banning pressure cookers, but I wouldn’t be shocked.
Jared Bernstein weighs in on the Excel error heard round the world (see comment #417). Nice chart.
Why is it that, whenever a child (a sample child, not a specific child) is mentioned in a text, it is referred to in the female pronoun? (Babies sometimes get the male pronoun.) [/partlyrhetorical]
*Based on personal observations of children mentioned in official and unofficial texts and not to be considered as a sweeping statement indicting absolutely all official and unofficial texts out there.
modern pressure cookers do not explode in the kitchen.they just don’t.period. Its an obsolete myth from Ann older time and long gone appliances.they are popular the world over. Its only Americans that go nuts about them. This is not going to help.
And wow. Apparently, just cleaning the CD can fix it and stop the skipping.
Although the victory is bittersweet… This means I have no more excuse to keep from playing those particular children’s songs ad nausem every. single. evening.
With this cheerful thought, I am to bed.
Good night to all, I hope my potential 405 comes out of moderation, and *hugs* for those in need, together with commiseration or congratulation, as appropriate.
Sorry for tablet typing.
Josh @421
My experience of the flying pressure cooker lid, plus the bean-strewn ceiling might be considered pre-modern since my mother’s kitchen equipment was all ancient. However, I postulate that she may have just failed to seat the lid properly, and/or the pressure-relief valve was defective. I was too young at the time to investigate.
I remember my mother cleaning beans off the ceiling. That must have been quite a chore, but I remember thinking it quite entertaining.
*looks around*
Pressure cookers, pressure cookers everywhere.
Just went to the hometown dentist. I feel so happy I could cry. He didn’t charge me at all to drill off the rough spot made by the chip I put in my tooth*. Money is stressing me out this week ($315 to get the car fixed, yuck), and his kindness is such a relief. I mean, he spent 5 minutes on it, but still. He has expertise and tools and staff and everything and he just decided to be nice. (Probably helps that he knows my family and whatnot).
Entertainingly, his receptionist told me when people talk to her about the new lawyer in town, they call me by my mother’s name, and she has to correct them. :) I told her it’s a good thing I like my mom so much, because that happens a lot with how much I look like her.
*The chip was so tiny that he just smoothed out the bottom of my top front teeth a tiny bit. (Which was actually good because I have long front teeth and the unchipped one was sort of rounded at the bottom. Win-win!) The original chip was totally not obvious to the casual observer, and now the irregularity is all but imperceptible. I can feel a rough spot with my tongue, but it’s not sharp like it was before. More nail file on my tongue than “take off three layers of paint” sandpaper. And no fractures in the tooth (which I expected, given that it was a very low-force impact). I’m so relieved. I feel so lucky to have access to a local practitioner who cares about me as a person and is so kind and fair and good.
Rock on, Portia. Good for the dentist and lucky for you.
Back to property. This ist he exam I’m going to fail if I’m going to fail any of them. Property is just … not my thing.
Property is a beast, for sure. That’s tomorrow?
Yeah. Sigh. I’m not even studying productively ‘cuz I gotz the nurrvvzzz.
also, I hate it when I have to do this:
see what I did there?
Gallows humor, I hate it when it passes unnoticed, but perhaps that’s my poor execution?
Ha. Sorry I missed it. :)
I presume there’s a curve. I also know you’re damn smart. You feel like you don’t know enough property, but everyone else knows less. (It’s Machiavellian, but we both know it’s how to get through this). You can do this. I have confidence in you.
Need something to cheer you up? How about Michael Voris (man voted “Worst Hair on the Internet” 3 years in a row) lamenting the decline of Real, True Catholicism.
Now, mind you, this is the guy who thinks that a Catholic Monarchy is the only way to go, so he is a raging nutcase, but the numbers he cites in this little piece are encouraging as hell to those of us who would like to see that evil empire go away.
I saw it, Crip Dyke – and the second time, too. Further to Lynna’s post at #401, my kids are in Navigators, and I usually refer to it as “sort of like the Scouts, but without the homophobia and religious bigotry”.
Hopefully the link will work – looks rather odd in preview…
And yet, banning pressure cookers would actually be far, far, far easier to pass than actual useful gun control.
Besides, the 1% have cooks, so it wouldn’t affect them making it even easier.
Well, if it would be simpler, you could use the 1% attitude towards property: What’s mine is mine, and what’s yours is mine.
I am so far behind the times, but just found this out and it makes me happy. Boggle the Owl is still around! I had noticed quite awhile back that it had turned into a spam blog, and I thought the person who did it had just stopped. Turns out they had just switched to a different URL! Boggle the Owl loves you. Now I have many pages of Boggle to catch up with.
from Jenny Trout’s blog:
I have never seen Boggle the owl before. But now I seem to have something in my eye…
Portia: Hurray for your kind-hearted dentist!
–
While I was missing Boggle there was a pretty amazing one about feeling suicidal.
Ogvorbis:
I once joked – near the beginning of the year, that possession is 9/10ths of the law, therefore I couldn’t get less than an A-.
Since I’m assuming it’s more right-wing lying, does anyone have a source that refutes the claim that the Affordable Care Act stipulates that doctors will be paid less after it takes effect than they are now, to the tune of the new salary being 5-10 times lower?
Carlie, obviously the Boggle ain’t for me.
(Your link didn’t amaze me, it irritated me)
5-10 times lower?
You’re dealing with morons. We are not going to give doctors no salary while asking them to pay 4 to 9 times their old salary into the system.
Sigh. Innumeracy’s cost to society is incalculable.
This time, I see what you did there. (Right?)
I know I got that one :)
Thanks for the joy-sharing, cicely and Crip Dyke : )
Crip Dyke (Is it okay if I call you CD?)
Feel free to shoot me a line if there’s any way I can try to help with Property. And remember, it’s nobody’s thing.
carlie:
I like your link.
Yep. Intentional.
Feel free to call me CD.
I may shoot you a line, but while there are bound to be a lot of similarities in, say, tort or contract or criminal law – at least in basic concepts – the property systems are *so* different. Or at least so I imagine. Who knows. If I get my self organized & do my last minute reading & I come up with a question I’ll send it on even if there’s little chance you can answer it. Don’t worry: I won’t expect you to be able to.
You can help more on Torts, if you wish.
Oooh Torts, I like Torts.
I gave a short lesson on torts during our emergency responder training tonight. It was the Legal and Ethical Duties section. I couldn’t get the instructor to understand the “Not-Revokable” is not the same as “Effective.” I didn’t belabor it though because I’m sure I’m the only one who cared. I’m getting better at knowing when not to press a point. (Yay incremental maturity!)
I’ll be as helpful as I can.
When you wake up, rq, I could totally make that hat, it looks fun : )
Jayne hat.
Shades of the Darwin Fish.
I need to email someone for advice on dealing with a suicidal friend. Can anyone help?
my email is bravoportia at gthingy.
Portia
This
http://pharyngula.wikia.com/wiki/Postponing_suicide
is at my finger tip
What is going on?
I have a friend who told me he once was on the verge of suicide recently. He’s going through a tough divorce. I pressed him about getting an individual therapist becasue seeing the couple’s counselor isn’t good enough in this sort of situation. And told him to call me whenever. I’m pretty sure he knows I mean it because we are family sort of friends. He posted a facebook status about death just now. (Turns out to be a line from a Greek tragedy). I’m just sort of freaking out.
I’m messaging with him and he’s being kind of cagey. Worrying.
Portia
I don’t do facebook so I don’t know what that means.
Can you get him on the phone?
Shit. I should have told someone. It sounds like he made an attempt recently. Shitfuckshit. But people closer to him than me know, and they are watching out, it sounds like.
Should I call him or should I ask if he wants me to call him?
If this is happening right now and there are people in meat-space nearby they should get on it.
phone him
I appreciate the link, chigau. I remembered it but couldn’t find it.
I don’t know whether I should send it or not. Gah.
He is alone, he’s drunk and taken pills and apparently people were there and decided to leave him alone. I’m on the phone now and don’t know what to say. This is happening now.
Portia
If you can keep him communicating you may help in the postponing
FUCK
“God will choose in the end, and I think he’s just trying to choose early”
where are the meatspace people?
Portia
can you call 9-1-1?
Portia, *hugs*
Do you have a number of any of his family members or some friend who lives close?
Keep him talking. If there’s any way to call or signal someone else who can go physically to his location do it. If all else fails, assuming you have a mobile and a land line, get the other one and dial someone who might understand the situation and hold the phone so they can hear what you’re saying to him. If he hangs up, call emergency services. Better an unneeded embarassment than a dead friend.
chigau’s suggestion about calling 911 is better
I sent a text to a person he said knew about the situation, who is a paramedic and can hopefully help.
Apparently EMS was there earlier and left him and his pills at home. He says he just wants to go to sleep.
In these situations there’s no fucking way to tell just how likely they are to go through with it. When I had the knife to my wrist I was contemplating just how hard I was going to have to saw to do it right. But if you’d been talking to me on the phone, hell, if you’d been talking to me in person and been unable to see my hands you’d have never have know how far gone I was. My aspect was so flattened by that point my emotions just didn’t show.
Shorter: assume the worst and apologize later if needs be.
He’s two miles away.
well, crud, Portia
Sorry I wasn’t around earlier. Can you get him to say whether he’s taken *more* pills since EMTs left? Do EMTs have a legal right to force someone to come with them? I didn’t think so. But police certainly do, and the EMTs could call the police. I have literally no idea about the police’s ability to confiscate meds in that situation. Is there a rule against suicide? Does attempt law apply? If so, and he’s admitted wanting to die and taking an unspecified number of pills, can the police confiscate as “evidence”?
Seems a really thin pretext. I don’t know what other power cops would use.
I’m not in favor of such means, BTW, at least not in a generic sense. I’m in favor of low-coercion responses. In immediate situations, some tactics are justifiable that wouldn’t be for strong and persistent ideation without an attempt.
LMK if you wanna talk. I obviously have a lot to do but I can spare some time.
Portia
If he’s taken pills, especially if he’s taken more since EMS left, he should on no account go to sleep. I would frankly advise you call EMS to his location again. If that person who you texted can get to him they should, and if you can get to him in meatspace, that would not be a bad thing. He should not be alone right now, and he should not be asleep right now. *Hugs* to you, and also to him.
I’m going down there, he syas i can have his pills
So I was sitting there at the bar, after a 12 hour day at work. I had a few drinks and a couple of shots. I was tired, but other than that, everything seemed ok.
I fucking hate this.
I don’t know where it came from or why.
All of a sudden, I felt this wave of sorrow and realized I couldn’t hold it back. I knew I was going to just let loose soon. So I close my tab out, left the bar and drove home.
I cried all the way home.
I know it’s petty.
It’s silly.
In the grand scheme of things, my sadness really isn’t that important.
But, to this day, I just cannot shrug it off.
I can’t say “oh, you’re single? Great. Enjoy it.”
Instead, I say “you’re single? There’s something wrong with you you fucking loser. No one wants you because you’re screwed up. Other people out there who treat their SO’s like shit get to have what you dream of. You don’t imagine some fairy tale romance. You know that things aren’t all hunky dory all the time. You just want to know what it’s like to have a boyfriend. You want to know what it’s like to build and develop a relationship. You want to know what it’s like to share your life with someone you care about. You imagine vacations. You imagine arguments. You imagine dinner…movies…arguing over which way the toilet paper goes…painting the house…buying groceries. You know there is an element of fantasy to it that reality won’t match up to. Yet you still long for it. You suspect that the odds are against you…that the relationship will fail and you’ll be back to being alone. But you still dream…you still fantasize…you still hope that ONE day. ONE fucking day. You won’t be just a piece of meat. You won’t be just “that guy that someone wants to fuck/get fucked by”. You’ll be the guy that someone wants to actually date. You’ll be the guy that someone else thinks of the way you think of him. You’ll be the guy that someone else wants to spend their life with. But that time wasn’t 15 years ago. It wasn’t 10 years ago. It wasn’t 5 years ago. It wasn’t 5 weeks ago. That time has never existed. That time is the time that you’ve never had. You can only imagine what it’s like. You look around and sometimes it feels like other people get to experience the joys of intimacy and sustained relationships, and love and joy, and all you can do is to look from the outside in on relationships. You get to only imagine what it’s like. You’re going to die someday and you’re never going to know what it’s like to be in love. Because you lack the gene or whatever it is that fucking everybody seems to have that you don’t.”
Yeah.
Sorry to dump that in here, but I needed to release somewhere.
I’m going to go home, go to bed, and cry myself to sleep.
Not too cheery here, today.
Time for a musical interlude: Eleanor Rigby
Here I am talking about my stupid issues and Portia is going through something important.
Portia:
I think being there for him could be extremely beneficial and could prevent anything tragic occurring.
I had my daily windows not responding meltdown
Portia
tell us something when you know
Tony
big *hugs*. Your problems are also important. I’m sorry to hear that you’re not doing well, and I wish that I could do something to help, besides electronic hugs. If anything occurs, do let me know, though.
Portia
Second what chigau said. Let us know when you know, or if there’s anything else we can do for you.
Tony
*hugs*, so many *hugs*!
Portia
*hugs* and I hope he backs away from the edge!
9-1-1 is probably best.
OMG. Tax season is over. Thank the fsm. First day off in 6 weeks. I’m brushing my teeth and going to bed knowing I don’t have to work in the morning and I am so happy. I had to leave my house today due to my ‘velvet leash’ (ipad/work email) going “ba-ding” every 10 minutes on my supposed “day off”. I hope the Horde is doing well. And has either (in the usa) filed their taxes or an extension. Happy after Tax Season (in usa) to all!
Tony
It’s not silly, not in the least. It’s human to want, to dream, to hope for things beyond your current reach. You’re human, and more: you’re a profoundly caring, empathetic person. A good person who deserves all the joy that life can bring. Your time on the outside will allow to you appreciate those joys far more when they come your way. A faint comfort that I know, pitiful in it’s inadequacy. I’m sorry that it’s taking so long to find a partner. All I can offer in the interminable wait is the all love and caring that an internet friend can give from the other side of the planet.
Tony:
Your problems are not less than Portia’s. I want solace for you every bit as much as I want it for Portia, and don’t you dare try to minimize that b/c we know each other over the internet.
1. There is no magic gene.
2. There is no magic person.
3. There is meeting someone who’s good enough and who thinks you’re good enough at a time when you can both treat each other well enough to make it work.
It’s not something that happens everyday, and yet, look! It happens every day. Whatever your weaknesses and whatever your strengths, it can happen for you, when you’re ready. You just have to buy a lot of tickets before your number comes up.
When I was writing, people would tell me how many rejection letters to expect for each acceptance. They told me to cherish the rejections because it was one rejection closer to acceptance. It’s a lot rarer to find someone to settle down with than it is for a writer to sell pieces or a researcher to pass peer review. So you have to deal with more rejections. But they all count.
Hugs to everyone.
Do please let us know how you are and how your friend is when you have news, Portia.
CD
Yay for happy dentist news, Portia.
Assorted hugs, Nice Cups of Tea or confetti as appropriate – how is it possible I’m getting threadbare (a less severe form of threadrupt) again? I blame … I think I blame the insecurities this time.
Swimming in the sea is brilliant, but I think I can only manage to go out any distance if it’s a flat-as-a-pancake day. Last time was … last holiday. Maybe about 5 or 6 years ago?
Tony:
You always say that everyone’s trials and tribulations are important and worthy of hearing and empathy. Don’t sell yourself short. *hugs* for you, and sympathy and love.
All:
I am back home, and I think we are in the clear. I have his sleeping pills on my own nightstand, but he drew the line at me taking him to the hospital or his case of beer home with me. I also included the option of him sleeping on my futon, but that wasn’t appealing to him. And by not appealing, I mean he put on his stubborn, stern voice that I know means he isn’t budging.
I asked if I could come get his pills from him when he told me over the phone that the paramedic acquaintance who came had said he should see a doctor and he refused. He said I could come get them so I talked on the phone to him the whole two mile drive over there. When I knocked he said “Hang on a sec someone’s here.” He had been telling me all the reasons he’s worthless and he hates life. I said we could keep talking, and he did. It seemed to help. I kept encouraging him to let me take him to the hospital, but he’s adamant against it. (CD, theoretically a mentally ill person may be transported to the hospital against their will, but I don’t know exactly what the criteria are for that. The cops were at his house earlier too, and I know they can do it but again they probably have a higher threshold). He said he took 6 of his sleeping pills.
I tried the “What are you looking forward to?” gambit on the phone but it backfired. He said all he wanted was to make his kids’ lives better and he felt he could do that by leaving their lives. Ack.
I got a text back from the paramedic acquaintance and he said that he was there earlier in the evening and he had agreed to talk to Friend in the morning and thanks for letting him know. So apparently he wasn’t that concerned.
Friend expressed deep appreciation for my coming over and listening and caring. I think that helped. I hope it helped. I compared depression to the flu over and over again. I told him I would bring my friend soup if they were sick, and this is no different.
Thank you all so so so much for being the wonderful supportive knowledgeable people you are.
FossilFishy:
You really gave me a eyes-wide-open moment with your experience of not showing signs of self-harm. Thank you for showing me how necessary it was to go over there.
You too, chigau.
Thank you all for your support and advice.
Thank you, Dalillama, rq, Beatrice, Tony, Crip Dyke, chigau, FossilFishy. And you too for the song, JM.
I will be okay. I’m a little shaken. I am so worried I did something wrong. I was really insistent about the hospital. And the beer. He promised he wouldn’t drink it but I don’t know why he wouldn’t let me have it for the night.
Portia
I’m glad things have settled for the moment! Yay you! ♥ (Also, belatedly, yay for fixed tooth!)
As for the beer, well, some people have a deep and abiding love and attachment to their beer. I know some people like that – they’ll let everything go, but the beer.
Tony
What Crip Cyke said so well.
+++
I have a small issue with this article on polygamy, mostly because it defines polygamy as ‘1 man + many women’ (implicitly), rather than any multiple-partner arrangement. Any more experienced poly people want to weigh in on this?
Oh, shit, I thought I refreshed only shortly before writing – but now I see I missed the really important stuff. Portia I hope your friend is OK. I hope you are able to help. And that you are driving carefully, even now.
Tony, of course what you said matters! Don’t feel for one second that because it’s a different type of issue that it doesn’t matter. Come to think of it we probably all feel that sometimes … hell, I do it all the time. Fwiw, I think you are a really great person – intelligent, compassionate and with great integrity. I would a million times rather have spent my evening with you last night than where I did.
Portia
The behavior you’re describing would be a borderline instance here, as far as the police intervening, but presumably they know more about how things work locally than I do. You’ve done all you can, from the sounds of it, and all you can do is all you can do. Check on him again in the morning, though.
Tony
Fossilfishy said it better than I did.
Oh, and CD, you are too kind, but you focus on your exam, lady!
Thanks, rq. I think I’m still sort of in my rescue-mode and need to unwind.
Thanks for the yay for tooth. :) You too, opposablethumbs.
Oh and re: beer. He first said I could put it in his truck, lock it, and take the keys. I was skeptical, and said so. He admitted he had spare keys. Then he said he has full access to his neighbor’s garage fridge which is full of beer. And said he wants to keep his beer because he doesn’t want to walk to the neighbors. This sequence of statements made me concerned he was going to keep drinking. But like he pointed out as he ushered me out the door, I had done all I could do. (Short of sleeping on his floor, which I felt awkward about after he confessed having feelings for me.)
*moarhugs* for Tony. You really are wonderful. You’re too wonderful to not find happiness. Thirding or fourthing CD.
Opposablethumbs, thank you for the well wishes and concern. I am safely back in my bed and contemplating calling him in an hour or something to make sure he’s good. He promised to text me by 7 am when he’s up to check in.
Dalillama:
Thank you for the reassurance. I need it. Posted my last before I saw yours.
I didn’t see FossilFishy’s to Tony until just now either. Wonderfully put.
rq
Night, Dalillama. Much appreciated.
I’m turning in as well. Thanks again, everyone.
*hugs*, ♥♥♥♥, and sweet dreams/sunny day to everyone.
Portia, what you did and said sounds wonderful to me. I have no experience in this kind of situation, but I think what you did could mean a lot.
Good night, Portia and Dalillama!
I hope the night is full of restful sleep.
I’m (We’re) off to see if the ice is moving in the river. Flooding season has begun everywhere else (happens every year, when it gets warm enough for all the meltwater to swell the rivers and break up the ice and push it up on the banks and into houses).
We’re up on the upper level of the city (up a rather high, steep hill – if the flooding gets to us, it means half the town is completely under water), so we’re ok. But I’ve never seen the ice go. It’s supposed to be an impressive sight. (I saw the aftermath of one such massive ice-going, will have to dig up some sample photos. Giant blocks of river ice flattening greenhouses.)
Wow, rq, that sounds like something to see all right. I’ve only ever seen such things on TV – rivers hardly ever even freeze here (unless they’re tiny ones, maybe). Of course it has happened … but the last Frost Fair on the Thames was in 1814, a bit before my time :-)
opposablethumbs
A bit before your time? ;)
And I’m sorry to say we had to miss out on the sight after all, today… We got most of our abbreviated grocery run done when I discovered Middle Child is running a fever. Because he never asks for his mittens to be put back on, or for his hood to be tied a bit tighter; he never complains that he’s cold. Except when he’s sick. :(
If he’s ok in the afternoon, we’ll try again tomorrow (also, less chance of rain tomorrow). Don’t want to miss it.
Oh no for Middle Child running a temperature :-(
It’s so hard to wrangle multiple small people, I’m always impressed when anyone gets out of the house at all! (and I’ve only got two … some things get so much easier when they’re older. Just as other things get harder! :-) )
Oh man – hugs to Portia, hugs to Tony.
It must be the day for it – I’m in the middle of a row myself with a very depressed friend. It’s that argument where the funk they’re in makes them interpret everything I say or do as an attack no matter what it is, and I’ve never been good at dealing with that kind of thing. I’ve at least figured out by now not to engage the substance of the accusations because trying to say they’re wrong about that just feeds into the idea that they’re all bad, but apologizing and saying I didn’t mean to make them feel that way doesn’t get me very far either. Blargh.
John – I think you and Boggle are diametrically opposed entities, like matter and anti-matter. ;)
It turns out that Huge Work Project wasn’t as done as I had hoped and I’m still threadrupt, but it looks like cicely got new wheels and I just wanted to take a moment to say yippee!
…not putting them there in the first place?
My own personal solution has always been to assume that websites that used them were far more interested in pocketbooks than their own content, and that they believe their visitors were so stupid as to buy something just because a flashing light went off above it. This prompts me run my own form of adblock: a script on my Personal Processor saying “don’t go to that website again”.
In other words, the ads are an apparent assumption that FTB considers its target audience to be the sort of people that buy stuff from pop-up ads. If so, I’m not the target audience.
I’m letting them know that.
“Astrophile: A handy guide to planetary parking spots” http://www.newscientist.com/article/dn23378-astrophile-a-handy-guide-to-planetary-parking-spots.html
If you have an extra planet stored somewhere you could save a lot on storage costs by reading this.
Also, useful for looking for planets that are not visible in preliminary surveys.
Hi there
I’m not sure if I can keep up with this term’s workload, but I#m trying.
So, no worries if I become a bit scarce around here.
big hugs to Tony, Portia and rq
Anri:
Ads? What ads? :)
You’re doing a good job of ignoring your script, then.
Not quite — the assumption is on the part of the advertisers; FTB is just the host.
But that’s not the script you claim you run, is it?