It's lousy for everyone. All the cynical advice about not lending to family is serious good advice. If you want to be non-cynical about it, lend friends and family money so long as you'd be happy to think of it as a gift, but expecting to get paid back will make you miserable.
And I've gotten paid back by friends and family, but to keep yourself sane, you want that to be a delightful surprise.
Also, to thine own self be true, and it shall follow as the night the day, you cannot then be false to any man.
Sell the debt to a collector. They seem to pay from 1 to 10 cents on the dollar.
Money owed between friends/family remains a very awkward thing for me everyone
Fixed that for you.
Money owed between friends/family remains a very awkward thing for me everyone
HTML fail.
The real question is, are you rearranging your arrangements so that from here on out, you aren't fronting other people money anymore?
Good. I knew you moved recently, but perhaps you'd dug yourself a new hole.
Stanley, allow me to put your situation in perspective: My ex-best friend (she dumped me) died owing me $6,000.
But what LB and Biohazard said, absolutely. I lent it (while we were still friends and before she got sick) knowing I might never get it back.
I'm my siblings' banker and have lent and been repaid thousands over the years. I was sure they were good for it eventually, but I never lent them money that I couldn't afford to give if they weren't and I certainly didn't count on being repaid quickly.
Yammering on, business as usual.
10: Not so much dug myself a new hole, but finally finished off paying the old house's bills for September, which jacked up everyone's total yet further, and I haven't really been in town much to make the awkward, "Um, yeah, you definitely still owe me that money (plus some more more now)" phone calls until this morning.
12: I suppose what frustrates me is that I had a great system of paying all the bills each month and then promptly collecting everyone else's share to pay myself back. It was working swimmingly for years. Then...it stopped working but I kept paying the bills (because, hi, they're in my name, and it would fuck my credit, not anyone else's). Which is to say, I guess it wasn't a great system after all.
Also, I'm sorry to hear about the whole situation with the friend. That sounds deeply unpleasant.
I'm on both sides of that equation right now - borrowed money from my parents to finance a cross-country move, am owed money by an ex-roommate who was kind of a jerk about paying bills even when we shared the same space. I set up an automatic withdrawal every month to pay my parents back (slooooowly but surely) and am pretty sure I'll never get a cent from the ex-roommate. What really disturbs me about the situation is how much pleasure I get out of feeling morally superior to her.
Lending money is different from having roommates who dont pay the joint bills.
The only great answer is for the bill to be in their name. (utilities, etc.) Not paying their share of the rent sucks.
My suggestion is to get security. "I'll front you but you are giving me your guitar." Pawn-broker style.
Otherwise, you are just giving them money. Which is fine, if that is what you want to do.
I've done it plenty of times. Heck, I just agreed to help a friend with a case based on promises to get me some money. Ug. So stupid.
I once left Germany while still owing the last month's phone bill money to my roommate. I asked her to let me know how much it was as soon as she could, since I had set my German bank account to close and transfer my remaining funds back to me in the U.S. 40 days after I left. She emailed to tell me my share of the last bill about two months later. I replied asking for her IBAN, since I would now have to be transferring the funds internationally, and never heard back from her. I was living in the country and had a German bank account again several years later, and thought of transferring her the money then, but I no longer had any of her information. Oh well!
IME, friends who don't pay back, or whom you have to bother the shit out of to get them to pay back, are usually kind of shit people, and shit friends. It's one thing to be in hard times and unable to pay, or to forget (once) but otherwise it's a very inconsiderate thing to do, and often correlates with other forms of bad behaviour.
Semi on-topic: Debt, the First 5000 Years, is a really great book. Like, really genuinely great.
I think I left part of a phone bill with a roommate twenty years ago. I still feel bad about it, but had no way to contact him.
21: That's pretty much the definition of chutzpah, isn't it? Not paying what you owe to keep phone service on, then complaining that you can't call.
20: Thanks for the tip. Have just put it on hold at the library.
22: I was being serious. It was a dorm phone and we both moved out. I don't think he came back. And I never learned his last name.
I *told* you guys skipping the first meeting with the icebreakers was a mistake, but noooooooooo.
In Soviet Arctic, icebreakers come to you.
15: Once, to gain moral superiority over someone I loathed, I sent him an anonymous cash donation. It worked surprisingly well.
On the general "shake down" (shouldn't that be one word?) theme, I sort of love this:
The ultra-rich bankers, hedge fund managers and private equity executives of New York City have long enlisted private security firms to help safeguard them and their wealth. But as the mood on Main Street turns increasingly hostile, New York's financial titans are cranking their security measures up to 11.... One executive contacted Insite requesting help planning his escape from the United States in the event the federal government was overthrown, said Howard A. Shapiro, Insite's chief technology officer. The executive wanted to know how much gold to keep on hand and how to escape the United States by submarine in the event of a major incident."
(shouldn't that be one word?)
Just doing my part to needle Bob Seger.
The executive wanted to know how much gold to keep on hand and how to escape the United States by submarine in the event of a major incident."
Also, which dormant volcano craters were best for building a secret headquarters, and the addresses of four top Persian cat breeders.
29: The obvious solution is to give their money away and get jobs at Wal-Mart in Peoria. Safely anonymous, plus cheap food and ammunition.
29: I've recently been asked for some advice re firearms purchases by someone below the titan class but still well above the 99% level. The Brit riots and OWS were specifically mentioned as the motivation.
You know, they could keep the peasantry more docile by making sure they all have jobs and homes.
33: Did you give them actively bad advice? "You need an elephant gun! Nothing else has the requisite stopping power to calm rioters."
35: Heh. The problem is, I like this person. We haven't gone shopping yet so there's still time to not worry about it.
I'm at the airport! I know I'm slow to adopt technology but wow, I can chat with all my imaginary friends in the middle of an airport.
If you put the seat back on the airplane, I will personally come through the intertubes to scold you.
Oh, I don't. I prefer to feel victimized than to risk pissing someone off.
I haven't taken an valium but I still feel unbelievably relaxed. Like I stepped out of time for the afternoon.
39 -- Yay! I knew that my incessant whining here served some purpose.
Just to contrast with vw, not because I'm usually hopped up.
41- let's not lose sight of who's the victim here.
I'm glad the future is here, but I thought there'd be more commenting.
More commenting? Okay. I was thinking of this for serious social discourse in an urban environment. Add a low powered scope or red dot sight and it's ready to go.
http://www.lmtstore.com/defender-standard-model-16-with-sopmod-stock.html
Why are these assholes still in business?
Going to board now. I just want everyone to know that the last 10 comments were not our collective funniest 10 consecutive comments.
That for longer range work from his apartment balcony and an autoloading shotgun for getting to the helipad on the roof of his apartment building in case the rabble get inside. He can afford them both.
But the rifle actually looks like it might be a fun plinker. I have lots of ammo for it and a range is only about 40 minutes away.
This business about how putting the seat back on an airplane is an act of rudeness or somehow undesirable behavior is a new thing to me.
My richest friend is also, coincidentally (I think), the one with the most firearms. He has called me on several occasions from his local gun shop and asked me to read him Internet reviews of particular weapons that he was then examining for purchase.
Visiting his house is pretty fun: guns everywhere!
Seriously. "Get the office Glock" is something he says.
49 He could come shoot antelope.
50 Fortunately, the sound of the jet engines drowns out the tiny violins.
50: The problem is that mixing reclined and unreclined seats works poorly with cattle-class seat pitches. On a redeye with everyone reclined, no problem. But if you're trying to sit up and read/eat/work and the person in front of you is fully reclined, having a headrest in your face gets old after a while.
50: I will stop putting the seat back when they pry the button from my cold dead hands. Or when preparing for takeoff or landing. The latter is my preferred choice.
Would we be better off with more laws to the effect of "corporate officers can be personally prosecuted and imprisoned for the crimes of the company"? Fine levels escalate but nothing seems to happen.
55: Prosecuting corporate officers for their individual crimes would be a good start, and probably sufficient.
55: Might be better to spend time and money reducing the size of the holes in the colander (i.e., adding regulatory/enforcement personnel so there are more query/investigate points for both short-term and long-term frauds, and with luck a little less regulatory capture).
My richest friend is also, coincidentally (I think), the one with the most firearms.
Yes, I'm sure it's entirely coincidental that your richest friend is also the one with the most extensive collection of this particular expensive discretionary consumer good.
58: Maybe he's the most American, urple.
It's would also be quite a coincidence if he happened to have the nicest wine collection.
"For the love of God, Flippanter!"
When I lived in SF a couple of summers ago, it was rent + utilities. I tried to pay the utilities when I paid the rent after the first month and the roommate who had the lease said she'd just tally up the utilities at the end of my stay instead of doing it monthly. During the last couple of weeks I was there there was a bit of chaos involving a somewhat crazy now-ex boyfriend that eventually resulted in my roommate changing the locks. When I tried to get the bill for the utilities, she told me she'd eventually get to it before I left, then a few days later said she'd e-mail me after things calmed down.
I moved out and then about 7 months later I got an e-mail saying, "hey, I've been in Hawaii and now that I've come back I see that no one billed you for utilities. I'll send you a bill." I responded about a week later saying that she should send along the bill and I'd pay it. I thought about reminding her that I'd been expecting a bill and hadn't just walked out on it, but since she didn't seem to be accusing me of anything, I held off. It's been 8 months since then. I feel kind of bad about this, but I'm not going to make up an amount and send off a check just because of that.
55 56
Yes, adding laws seems kind of pointless when the administration has shown no interest in enforcing the current laws.
20, 27: Graeber has been involved with OWS, I think. Also, he had a post on the origins of money that was pretty great. I think it was at Naked Capitalism, but I can't remember.
64: I wouldn't feel bad if an adult said they would send me a bill I fully intended to pay, I had even reminded them a few times, and they never did it.
At some point (like after the second reminder) it becomes their problem to get organized, take care of their paperwork, or lose out.
How much guilt are y'all prepared to carry for the rest of your lives? That's the basic calculation to be made here.
It's not really serious guilt. I don't think about it really.
We had a similar discussion here several months ago re: the contractor who I've never paid for work done on my house. IIRC, a few commenters thought I was evil (LB most forcefully); most thought I was morally in the clear.
I was thinking about that. The difference, of course, is that the contractor had not only done the work for you but billed you for it. (And of course I didn't think you were evil -- if you look back at the thread I'm all over the place saying it's a close call.)
If I think of you as evil, it's because I just don't trust anyone that eats breakfast cereal dry.
The question is: for how long after the bill is due should you remain ready to pay it? Forever? In theory, yes, but at some point the person does lose out, no? Or no?
I'm thinking of this episode from a few months ago: our landlord here informed my housemate that he (landlord) had failed to cash/deposit two of the housemate's rent checks, one from 6 years ago, and a second from 7 years ago. He had cashed mine, but not the housemate's. So could the housemate please write a replacement check for two months' rent?
Hm. My housemate doesn't have his records for 6-7 years ago any more. For whatever reason, he didn't notice that these checks hadn't been cashed. He asked the landlord for the actual uncashed checks back; the landlord sent photocopies of them. Hrm.
I decided to stay out of it -- honestly wasn't sure where I landed on this. I'm not quite sure what ended up happening. Surely in the absence of the actual uncashed checks, housemate was under no obligation.
Urple, what happened with those contractors?
73: "Villains!" I shrieked, "dissemble no more! I admit the deed! -- tear up the planks! -- here, here! -- it is the beating of their hideous hearts!"
Speaking of accidental bad deeds, I think the new guy has taken my attempt to be more foppish* as some kind of a dress code directive.
*i.e. wearing a sport coat for no reason at all.
73: nothing. I never followed up again. (Evil, I know.) I'd followed up probably three or four times. I've never heard from them again and at this point I assume they're no longer waiting for the money.
You are attempting to be more foppish why?
It is interesting, though, how people seem to take dress cues from those around them. I could swear that my cow-orker didn't used to come to work in sweaters with unraveling sleeves and so on a few years ago, back when I used to wear earrings every day. For no reason, just because that's what I did.
(Most likely, the reason I haven't heard from them in so long is that my non-payment made them late on one of their key payables, and the small company was forced to declare bankruptcy and now the poor man's children are starving. I do feel bad about that. But, there are soup kitchens.)
One of my relatives was renting, along with a couple of other people, a house from someone who claimed to own the house. It turned out that the "owner" was a renter and that the real owner was at some remove - possibly directly renting to the "owner", possibly through another middleman - and located in China or Taiwan. At one point the "owner" decided to stop paying rent back up the chain and then disappeared. The real owner took the renters to court for rent, locked them out of the house, and apparently took a bunch of the possessions that were in the house.
When it finally got to court, the judge ruled in favor of my relative, telling the owner that the arrangements were done in such a way that he could only have a case against the "owner". My relative still had to move and had given up on getting his possessions back, but at least he didn't have to pay rent again that he'd been paying all along. I think his housemates might have settled before then.
I have decided I'm too old to wear sneakers to work (if you can call school that) every day, so I've started wearing oxfords when it's not rainy. It's too soon to tell if I've started a trend.
Soup kitchens probably manage to serve cereal with milk.
Shit. That was a joke but now I feel bad. Maybe I should prank call them, just to make sure their phones lines are still working?
work (if you can call school that)
If you're not teaching, then no, you can't.
83: yeah, I know. It's confusing, though, because I'm still going to the same place at the same time and doing approximately the same things (in some ways) as I was two months ago, when it was definitely work. And soon enough I'll be teaching, and then it'll be work again. So I think I'm just going to call it work, so as to avoid confusing myself.
You are attempting to be more foppish why?
Why let the coats just rot in the closet?
If you're not teaching, then no, you can't.
And even if you are, it's so easy that it barely qualifies as work.
||
Can I just whine that I'm still at work because I'm too stupid and lazy to get my work done during normal working hours? I'm often ineffective, but the last couple of weeks have been epic. I'm staying late tonight because I told myself that I couldn't go home until a very reasonable amount of work had gotten accomplished, and I have completely failed to focus on it. At this rate I should go home in November sometime.
\>
I have the same problem. Wearing a sport coat to work doesn't help. Coffee does, but only earlier in the day.
If it makes you feel any better (not that there's any reason it should), I could have written 88 (and am still at work). And whereas you have the benefit of at least getting your work done at the end of the day (or week or month or whatever) and having the only consequence be that it kept you there late at night, I'm billing hours, which means today, like most days recently, I'll leave very late but then will still have the objective records measure this day and this month as shamefully unproductive.
88: Ha. I went to a law library tonight. For fun not-work. Turns out there are a million words you can write about easements in one state alone and still not really address the specific situation that some random person on the internet might be confronting. But I really love the vibe at places like that ... probably because I am in one about once a decade.
Moby's doing well in rationalizing his foppishness so far:
(1) The coats were there.
(2) My costume is intended to make me work.
53: I completely understand why it sucks to have somebody reclining into your lap, but since that stupid little button and the 3 or so inches of extra room it affords you is about the only token of control one has to ameliorate a miserable experience, considering everyone who uses it to be the enemy strikes me as uncharitable, and a lost cause.
You may whine, but I, for one, will have no sympathy for I have joined the ranks of the productive. I have done more work in the last two weeks than in a looong time. Not coïncidentally (I think) I started taking B-12 supplements two weeks ago. If it's a placebo effect, don't tell me.
er, the other way around, I meant.
Coffee does, but only earlier in the day.
Which is why it is IMPERATIVE that it be available WITHIN THE DOMICILE at the time of awakening. I hope this is now clear.
Is B-12 in any actual food? I resist dietary supplements.
Some law libraries look like they'd be great places to work (from what I hear, in other places you'll get treated like a pretty low-level employee). But the trend in the US is towards law librarians having law degrees, with some masters programs specializing in law libraries not even admitting people without a JD, so I ruled that one out pretty quickly.
pimminowcheez you should argue with the archives on this one. I think everybody got so exhausted last time we went through it that they fell asleep standing.
Googling -- perhaps I will eat more liver. Or maybe not.
It's in meat and dairy. I too resist taking supplements, but I had an obstacle course race coming up that I had done no training for and thought it couldn't hurt.
101: first you must fell the mighty antelope.
Too bad I never finished that atlatl app.
I spilled not very hot coffee on someone's tray table on a recent flight. It was completely my fault, but the physical cause of the spill was bumping my hand into the side of the reclined seat in front of me: to avoid handing me the coffee directly over the person next to me, the attendant put it over the tray, but at a height where my hand was even with the top of the seat in front of me, so I bumped it immediately the moment I moved my hand towards me. With an unreclined seat, I'd have just moved my hand over my tray and put the cup down.
And then I found five napkins and cleaned up the mess.
99: This was the county one and was simultaneously depressing (get off at the 8th floor because the elevator is not working up to the 9th and wander through some halls that look like the asylum in 12 Monkeys until you find the stairs up to 9) and great (wonderful big old room with great working tables and walls of books full of potentially relevant information that is almost impossible for a layman to find anywhere else*).
*Other than, like, paying a lawyer.
I said "finished" in 104 where I meant "started".
92: Also, it is cold going to and from my office now that fall is upon us.
108: Your choice to live in a "cold shithole".
104, 107:
Shame. It would have been epic -- every Crossfitting-paleoeating lawyer on the west coast would have bought it and stormed the freeways of LA. The carnage, real and virtual, would have been unspeakable.
110: In my defense, I bitched mightily about moving here.
98: I resist dietary supplements.
B-12 and B-complex are awesome, though I know what you mean.
Eventually and in certain situations a person might should consider them; women are advised eventually to take calcium supplements, say. Maybe iron. It's no good to avoid supplements, like, religiously.
Nope, if eating food isn't sufficient to keep me alive and healthy, I consider myself unfit for survival. This is a standard I apply to myself alone: I have no objection to anyone else's use of supplements, of course.
114: It matters which foods you eat. And what exactly you do and don't consider "food". I'm sure Halford has opinions on this.
91: Yes. There are many very specific questions about property law, in particular, that seem like they should have answers but often don't, at least in a particular jurisdiction. I was all excited a couple weeks ago when I discovered one and started plotting how we'd take it to an appellate court, except it would have been very bad for our client if we'd have ended up having to appeal. And even if we'd made law on the subject, nobody would have cared, because the question basically never comes up.
I have no intention of looking for the link, but I recall an article just this week saying supplements do no good if you are healthy. Not sure how good the study was or how "healthy" was defined or if it was only a certain type of supplements.
||
I never know how I'm supposed to respond to things in the format "How cool is it when [certain thing happens]?" Am I supposed to guess? And in what units? It's like when someone goes in for one of those multi-variable handshakes. I just turn into a quivering heap of WTF.
|>
Way cool.
None. None more cool.
Fuckin' A, that's cool.
I have three semi-substantive work thingies to get done before I go to bed tonight. One is hateful, one is interesting but involving and not really that interesting come to think of it, and one is merely tedious.
117: I am also easily distractable. For instance, trying to get specifics on some basic definitions I appeared to stumble across the fact(?) that some of the fundamental concepts in property law in a place like Pennsylvania are not really codified in its laws per se but instead rely on English Common Law as understood in the 18th century. Am I way off on that? (Nothing hinges on it, just a tangent.)
Or when I am tracing my deed transfers back I come across a series of rapid deed exchanges for next-to-nothing between two parties in the late '30s midway through which Alex Kirstein bows out and his wife takes over since he has been declared a "weak-minded husband". And then I mentally add a few chapters to my history of a place saga.
126: it passes understanding how you managed to avoid becoming a historian. Halford, too, as I think about it. And a few others, I suppose. But especially you, weirdo.
117: I am also easily distractable. For instance, trying to get specifics on some basic definitions I appeared to stumble across the fact(?) that some of the fundamental concepts in property law in a place like Pennsylvania are not really codified in its laws per se but instead rely on English Common Law as understood in the 18th century. Am I way off on that? (Nothing hinges on it, just a tangent.)
Nope, that's probably pretty much correct. There's interestingish philosophical problems about shipping the common law around the world, and there's other problems about the common law and divergent court systems, but it works basically.
I have some infinite amount of unassigned reading to do so that I can understand the advanced material that my instructor neglected to teach me but still intends to test me on. This is fascinating, because I am learning things like: some people use "b" for a given parameter, while some use gamma. So when my instructor used both in a single equation, they probably meant the same thing.
Yeah, the common law of property is actually totally fascinating. Even a lot of state statutes are just attempts at codifying the common law, and judges treat them more like trail markers in the middle of a very long path than like new beginnings.
122: Part of the problem. "Cool" is not in my active vocabulary, unless I'm discussing temperature. I don't know how it happened, but I never installed "cool."
127: What part of "LACK OF FOCUS" did you not under
Look! A Jew Squirrels!
Tidelands/wetlands law goes into common law stuff, I think. You end up with individual states as property owners because the states are considered stand-ins for the sovereign (monarch). Or something like that; I don't remember the explanation. Some of these laws have been enormously important for certain kinds of development (like "made-land" shoreline stuff: ports, depots, warehouses).
On second thought, don't tell me. I'm sleeping.
133: you think historians are focused? Wherever did you get that idea? The joy of being part of the "master discipline" is that we get to study pretty much whatever weird thing captures our fancy in a given moment*, so long as it happened in the past (and not even that is carved in stone).
* Admittedly, moments have to last long enough to finish a book or article. But still.
135: for the fixed parameters in a multilevel model.
The mistakes you describe, Tweety, are not ones that would be made by someone who is good with math. I have to let you know: your instructor may not be good with math.
I'm more surprised Stormcrow didn't become a geographer, possibly of the historical variety.
Even better, most of those concepts in property law are originally feudal, with layers and layers of latter dodges to get around the fact that no-one really wanted trials by combat any more.
Shall we talk about property law as it relates to the banks of navigable rivers in Louisiana? The batture? Ordinary versus extraordinary high water marks? (I've never felt more useful in my entire life!)
139: I was thinking that, but as you know, many people of his vintage with his interests ended up becoming environmental historians. And by many, I mean very few. And by people, I mean scholars.
141: oh I know a great deal about that. I read a book!
138: that would certainly fit with her failure to be good with other things. She seems to have a lot of trouble with teaching, for instance.
136.last: I really need some focus. I'm doubting more and more as time goes on that my gamble of devoting the summer to research will pay off. But it was fun, in a totally bizarre thing to do as a "working holiday" kind of way.
137: In a class with no math you are doing multilevel models?
Louisiana, of course, isn't common law. Tricksy civilians.
145: Josh Marshall eventually finished his dissertation. (Though it's really weird that it never came out as a book. Or maybe it's not that weird. Last I heard, he wanted to shop it to trade presses. But the topic doesn't really work for the mass market. And I suppose he doesn't think it's worth the time or energy to publish it with a university press.) Anyway, if he can finish, you can too.
I would have thought so, but I'm beginning to wonder.
148: As long as I have the indulgence/cooperation of my advisor, which I have for now, it should be possible. But there's only so long you can leave something unfinished with the intent to finish. Also, excessive coursework busywork is really damaging my academic abilities. I'm not kidding, sadly.
139, 142: Yes, there's an alternate history where I follow a path something like that. You know, one where I actually finish the grad school application to U of Wisconsin in Geography rather than doubling down on rugby, drugs and self-loathing pinball.
But no worries, I'm a happy boy (happy boy)
Well, I'm a happy boy (happy boy)
Oh, ain't it good when things are goin' your way?
40: this seems unfair. I have taken a valium and I feel incredibly anxious. this is not, in fact, my crazy friend's fault, since I am obviously having some kind of breakdown. nonetheless, I submit the following a.m. text exchange:
merc: good morning! I soo love my house. woke up and made 1st great coffee and fresh-squeezed juice, my fav picture is actually pomegranates, it is beautiful!*
al: struggled with whether to give it to you because I wanted it! Should have gone back to snag the other 2.
merc: already put a grenade attached to it in the back. take it and get used to being called stumpy fuck face.
I wish he weren't so twitchy. or, no, apparently I like twitchy just fine, don't I?
*someone sent their grandma/grandpa's chinese watercolor paintings to the thrift store making a hideous mistake because they were incredible. the salvo's people had been lucid enough to make them relatively high priced ($80) but not absolutely so. in retrospect it was idiotic not to get the others, but I got the best, and it goes with the color of his accent wall beautifully.
Stormcrow send me an email.
VW, you have an opinion on the Montana dam case the Supreme Court is considering?
it also seems unfair that I didn't finish my phd just because my husband moved to a place without a classics department. really I should have shifted over to sanskrit math documents, obviously, there's loads of basic research missing there, but nooo, I had to go get fancy and start drinking all the time.
for some value of "obviously," obviously. although there are so many excellent indian mathematicians you'd think this wouldn't be so, but they don't appear to overlap enough with the sanskrit-knowing ones or something. when I looked into it at one point I thought, christ, even someone with my weak-ass math skills could find something useful here!
where useful=easy to write a dissertation about because there is no other pesky research. compared with every ancient philosophy topic ever.
Wait, what is this thread about now?
I am grumpy about liberals dismissing anyone who's ever been to a demonstration before as "alienating" them by being at an Occupy protest and not focusing on Citizens United and prosecuting CEOs. Jerks.
I was productive today, for once, but I am really starting to itch for some more remunerative and less ethical line of work. Nonprofit jobs are great for starry-eyed DFHs, but I am a cynical old reprobate. Currency perorates while bovine ordure perambulates, and that's a fact.
I didn't hear back from any of the ex-roommates who owe me money. I suppose I'll keep chasing after them for a while. Awesome friends I've got.
The father of an acquaintance of mine comes from a line of hillbilly rag-and-bone men. He somehow managed to make a fortune handling industrial waste for the government. Why can't I do something like that?
this thread's about smoked paprika. flippanter's fur and neb's agin.'
162: Did you confiscate their stuff and change the locks? That's what my friend's ex-roommates always did when he left owing them money. I think they collected at least 50% of the time.
This thread's about how I had a good band name idea at band practice tonight: The Aaron Nevitables.
165: Nah, I left after arranging a new lease for them and a new person (so that I didn't void the security deposit by breaking my own lease). So I can't very well change the locks at this point.
apparently I like twitchy just fine, don't I?
Yes you do, and boy is he playing to that.
sorry about your friends stanley. I took on a new sponsee recently. my sponsor said, fine, but don't lend her any money. now, you'd think the fact that I gave my dead sponsee the money for the drugs she ODed on would give me an iron-clad excuse to say no, but, noooo. I loaned her money. (but really, she was in dire straights! she got offered a good-paying (great-paying!) job but couldn't accept unless she went to the US for training and she had no money at all or enough clothes or even a credit card with any $ on it left. so if her colleagues invited her out she couldn't chip in, or afford a taxi, or have a fucking coat! I loaned her clothes too, so she would have something professional to wear to work for the first 2 weeks). has she paid me back yet? she has not. fuck.
165 is the traditional method, and better. natilo can you move laterally into industrial rags and bones somehow?
167: I don't know what to tell you then. I would be happy to accost your former roommates in the street and encourage them to pay up, but I fear the travel costs would be prohibitive given the small amount of money at stake.
170: I feel like there must be a way. I suppose I could go into homeopathy. For pets. Who are depressed.
171: I appreciate the solidarity, prohibitive travel costs notwithstanding.
Actually, I've been wondering if sales might not be a better career for me than it would initially appear. I had a meeting with an account executive for the local newsweekly today, and I could have done A LOT better than he did.
172: That will work but you will have to move to L.A.
And kept trying to talk over me when I was rambling on about stuff. And he was way too eager to give me the largest possible discount, right off the bat.
And he was way too eager to give me the largest possible discount, right off the bat.
Or so you were skillfully led to believe.
Unfortunately, I think many people read me as living in a van, down by the river, so I might have to work on that a bit for sales to make sense.
The problem with this country is that all the best scams are taken. Zuckerberg was pretty brilliant with Facebook, but what are the chances of repeating that? Minimal.
IT sales would be nice. "We'll have our guys talk to your guys and they can figure out all those technical details. 'Nother drink?"
178: Well, if they go any cheaper than that, it would surprise me greatly. If they're sending him out to chase down $300 accounts, it's no wonder they're getting thinner and crummier every week.
I've quite enjoyed some aspects of working in sales. It's sort of an interesting process to get good at.
In my experience, a good salesperson asks a lot of questions and then identifies a solution (one hopes, something the salesperson can sell, but sometimes not) that meets the demands of the answers to those questions.
It's a simple process but one that many people muck up (sometimes, of course, shyster-like, because they want to sell you something regardless).
100: now that you mention it, I wonder if I participated in a previous version of this argument and then forgot, and when it came up again it seemed familiar, and I thought, "hey look, they're arguing about it here, too, it must be a thing."
My god, I may be too old for the internet already.
181: Yeah, this guy was pretty young, and he really needed to work harder on doing the sincere "I know times are tough for you right now" thing. I'm seriously considering buying some online ads from him, but mostly because the boss and the board seem to be heading in that direction anyhow.
The most sales-y think I've ever done was temping at a Kohl's store grand opening and trying to get people signed up for a Kohl's card by offering them a 10% discount coupon. Of course, if you're talking about people who are really excited to check out the new Kohl's store at the strip mall, you already have a pretty good roster of suckers lined up. But if I'd been making a 50 cent commission on every application I would have made quite a bit more than the $10/hour they were paying me.
I can sell shit to normal people no problem. Sales jobs that pay well usually involve selling things to rich people, though, which more often than not means sycophancy. Which I can't stand.
184: Some rich people seem to like being told they're wrong, maybe because it so rarely happens. It's like the Donald Draper/Hilton dynamic. As long as you're being honest, it can work.
I've had to exude a lot of unctuous sycophancy for pretty lousy money in the past. Writing these asks to foundations and individual donors is a huge drag.
I dunno. I still maintain that the best job for me would be hanging out in the TMZ office and cracking people up with wiseacre comments. I was fucking brilliant at that in newsmeeting when I was a journalist. But, as with the pet homeopathy routine, that would also involve moving out to LA, which would probably not go so well.
I've got a friend doing development work in LA for a large non-profit, and apparently she spends most of her time drinking with rich old ladies who want to tell her about their various sexual escapades. She's a natural at that kind of thing though. You wouldn't believe some of the things that come out of her mouth -- or some of the things that go into it! ZING!
http://www.archive.org/download/gd1981-09-12.nak700.wagner.miller.105584.flac16/gd81-09-12d1t02.flac
113: B12 is apparently a mood lightener for me. Nothing in my life is any different lately except for the B12, which I started taking a few weeks ago.
I don't care if it's the placebo effect, the stuff isn't expensive and I'm happier.
I initially thought the suggestion was that industrial rag and bone would also require a move to LA, which seemed plausible.
I'm supposed to be taking b12 supplements because something immune disorder. I just get bored at a certain point. 16-18 pills plus 1 sachet? honestly. fuck, it's supposed to work, though. OK, just took one, plus 5 super-important pills I forgot this morning.
88
Can I just whine that I'm still at work because I'm too stupid and lazy to get my work done during normal working hours? I'm often ineffective, but the last couple of weeks have been epic. I'm staying late tonight because I told myself that I couldn't go home until a very reasonable amount of work had gotten accomplished, and I have completely failed to focus on it. At this rate I should go home in November sometime.
Perhaps it would be more effective to forbid yourself internet access until your work for the day is done. My productivity has gone up considerably now that I can't surf the web at work.
Stanley: you could always get a lawyer to write a nasty letter to your ex-roommates!
188: we are all happy to see a happier biohazard, even if we lack plausible theories of causality generally! also, might as well stick with the b12, right?
192: I second this. a lawyer with too much time on his/her hands.
I don't know how I've managed to do it, but in all workplace situations I've ever been in, I've restricted internet access to pretty much work-related stuff. I guess it helped that in a couple of places reading political blogs and keeping up with the news was work.
88 applies to me as well. Unfocused. Distractible. Unproductive.
168: I said, hey that was kind of twitchy and hostile, tone it down, but he changed the subject.
197: you're commenting on unfogged with the rest of us. revealed preferences much?
33: you should have told him to hold out for a full HACS MkIV GB analogue fire-control system and at least three 5.25" turrets. Digital computers are in league with the mob.
analog fire-control system? digital computers in league with the mob? I did not know that.
do I have time to go buy dining chairs for my client before 5? mmmmaybe. it's always shit to get a cab from there though.
I could go in the cold room of far east flora as well, god I love it, endless coolness and tulips and forced cherry blossoms and peonies...
Al, you definitely would have had fun doing Sanskrit math stuff. I helped my dad run a history of math conference back when i was in college and I think I enjoyed it as much as the Aristophanes confererence where I actually knew the source stuff. Plus Ancient Indian Secret math is a hot space for cranks, which always makes things more fun in some respects.
I've been talking myself through being glad I ended up with this life rather than grad school, but I'm still jealous of people who made the other choice. I'm happy, though, and that counts for a lot.
a lot of them are incredibly miserable, keep in mind, being ill-used as adjuncts teaching 5 course with no job stability. you're only jealous of the ones you see who got jobs, not the ones who [cough]had to go to law school[cough.] NTTAWWT.
no dining chairs. doing my little oprah workbook (no it's kind of huge actually.) they ask if you're afraid to do the work for various such as that another person might read it and I was writing, no, "husband x would never read my stuff like that, except after I died to try to figure out what went wrong." whaaa? since when am I thinking about that? fuck. I also don't want to do it before the kids go to bed because I don't want them to see me crying. but it's not necessarily bad to cry, I don't want them to think that. WASP heritage takeover; they're not going to show much emotion ever but they are allowed to have cocktails before lunch. it's worked for generations!!!
When I had roommates, we were all on the rent lease, and each of us had a different bill: gas and electric (one company) and long-distance, telephone and internet. We'd each pay the other. The easiest thing I found to do was to use paypal (ING Direct -- soon to be gone -- would probably work too). You'd send a bill to each other, and then you don't have to do the arithmetic.
I know somebody who gets vitamin B12 shots. I don't know whether that does something different, but he seems to find it helpful.
My Dad has to take prescription B12 (or did for a while), because he was severely anemic.
118: My doctor said no to multivitamins, except maybe if you're taking a oral contraceptive. She does tell me to take vitamin D and some calcium if I don't get more than 4 servings of dairy a day.
169: Could you have compromised by just lending her the clothes. There's money I haven't paid back, because I couldn't, and I know the person saw it as a gift at the time. Recently, I did send someone a $200 check which is what I think she put on her credit card.
If I didn't have clothes to wear to an interview, I'd be really grateful if someone lent me some decent clothes--or better yet helped me score awesome ones at a thrift store.
yeah, my doctor specifically said b12, so ok. anti-inflammatory? helping my immune system stop tripping out and eats me from the inside? something like that. I could go for some steroids.
209: yeah she didn't have any work-appropriate clothes, I had to loan her clothes to get through till her first paycheck. and they sent her to ohio for 10 days and she had literally not a cent to her name, no way to take a cab, no way to chip in for dinner, no money to by coffee? I just couldn't say no. meh, I'm a pushover.
That's what happens when you try to catch up by reading in the off hours.
198.2: of course. A graph could be made showing commenting times to demonstrate my prime distractibility/ avoidance times.
I actually volunteered to take care of the communual phone bill in the first student flat I'd lived in, which I should've known was not a good idea as it was the flat where some people not only blowed, but would think it a good idea to do a bit of heroin or coke at the weekend.
(The most clean cut kid you'd ever see also turned out to be the most fscked up after a year or so. Some people can handle their drugs, others not so much)
Ended up having to pay a substantial part of the phone bill myself, then moved flats without really trying to get it back.
191: An excellent idea, but there's still the enforcement problem. Although it doesn't help as much as you'd think: I was keeping offline at work for my first six months or so at the job, and I was still procrastinating. Somewhat less, maybe, but still an insane amount. My problem isn't so much that other fun things are more attractive than doing my work, it's that staring blankly at a wall is still more attractive than doing my work.
My problem isn't so much that other fun things are more attractive than doing my work, it's that staring blankly at a wall is still more attractive than doing my work.
Right. I went through an experiment where I self-banned blogs at work (including this one), and my productivity might have increased some (might), but the main difference I noticed was that my methods of procrastination were much less entertaining.
@215, 217
Right. I'm just old enough to have worked a bit during the pre-internet days and, hard as it is to believe at times, I'm pretty sure I managed to waste about the same amount of time without the web.
The web just allows me to waste time much more efficiently.
Also, sticking with the "shake down" theme, I received a letter from a collection agency yesterday. It was actually relatively polite, as these things go. But it was odd, because I knew I'd paid the bill months ago (before it was past due). Here's the text of the letter (in relevant part):
Acct#: 196544
Balance: $0.00
You account is seriously past due. We understand that times are tough and that is why we are here to work with your regarding your outstanding balance.
Our records currently show a past due patient balance of $0.00.
Please contact our customer service department at _________ so that we can work with you regarding your outstanding balance. We are willing to discuss payment plans and other alternative payment arrangements.
If you do not contact us at the number above within 5 business days, we will be forced to proceed against you with all appropriate legal action.
Sincerely,
Emphasis in original.
The thing about share-house obligation is that *there's always one* non-payer/non-washer/whatever, and the only thing you can do is to make sure it's not you. (My favourite - the only person in the flat with Internet access was also the one who refused to pay their share of the phone bill, as if we couldn't guess what all the looong calls to the same well-known national ISP dial-up pool number were.)
219 is really funny. You should send them a cheque. Or, better still, send them a cheque for $0.01, and then pester them for the refund of the "accidental overpayment".
219: we're still getting collection agency lettres for previous tenants of our house (which we bought more than six years ago). Incredibly annoying, but also sort of reassuring that these agencies are none too bright or efficient.
Re procastrinating at work, surely nobody works their full eight hours? Most people do well if they can get two-three hours of solid work in a day.
215, 217: I have always enjoyed this part from Something Happened* which expresses a somewhat similar sentiment.
I am bored with my work very often now. Everything routine that comes in I pass along to someone else. This makes my boredom worse. It's a real problem to decide whether it's more boring to do something boring than to pass along everything boring that comes in to someone else and then have nothing to do at all.*A book which was among 3 fat books which I bought on the first day of my first "real" job (another was The Sotweed factor, forget the third). I read them over my lunch breaks--the Heller was perhaps not ideal for that purpose.
Most people do well if they can get two-three hours of solid work in a day.
And yet somehow lawyers (not me anymore, but other lawyers) are expected to bill eight, and account for every six minute increment of time spent usefully.
222.last:
Few people think more than two or three times a year; I have made an international reputation for myself by thinking once or twice a week.OK, not really about work. But also:
A day's work is a day's work, neither more nor less, and the man who does it needs a day's sustenance, a night's repose and due leisure, whether he be painter or ploughmanor fucks around on the internet for most of the day.
216: Acquired by Capital One, who is not well-known for reputation for customer-friendly behavior.
Those who are paying attention expect service and terms to gradually deteriorate over time, as Capital One's culture spills over into ING
215
An excellent idea, but there's still the enforcement problem. Although it doesn't help as much as you'd think: I was keeping offline at work for my first six months or so at the job, and I was still procrastinating. Somewhat less, maybe, but still an insane amount. My problem isn't so much that other fun things are more attractive than doing my work, it's that staring blankly at a wall is still more attractive than doing my work.
The idea in part is that internet access (or whatever) is a reward for doing your work. Another idea is to make sure you always do something productive every day. It's the totally wasted days that really drag down your productivity.
Hmm. I may only manage 3 hours of high-intensity work in a day, but that doesn't make the rest of the not-as-focused portion of the day "not work." The client for whom I pulled together in three or so hours what may well be the best bit of writing in my life [/brag] happened to get a helluva a deal for its money -- me at my customary rate and my muse hopped up on cortisol for no extra charge.
Another idea is to make sure you always do something productive every day.
I am good at this, but it's not really compatible with a billable-hours model.
72
Hm. My housemate doesn't have his records for 6-7 years ago any more. For whatever reason, he didn't notice that these checks hadn't been cashed. He asked the landlord for the actual uncashed checks back; the landlord sent photocopies of them. Hrm.
I could picture myself doing this, honestly. I certainly should keep a better eye on my finances than I do - it's a constant source of minor worry/guilt/whatever - but even when I am checking things, I don't generally balance my checkbook like I was taught in my school's version of Home Economics, I just check a statement for charges that are unusually large or to businesses I don't remember buying things from. I hope something as big as two month's extra rent would jump out at me, but it's the kind of thing that would slip by my usual method.
177
And he was way too eager to give me the largest possible discount, right off the bat.
Happened to me once. I talked to a vendor in a booth in a mall and then tried to move on, genuinely planning to go back after I'd got something unrelated because his stuff looked like a good gift, but the vendor said that he could tell I wasn't really coming back and kept offering me better and better discounts. Can't say I feel sorry for him or guilty about taking the last discount or whatever, though. He was an asshole.
As for Internet procrastination, somewhere or other (maybe here, I should RTFA) I read that 20 years ago office jobs had downtime in lots of little ways, and as computers and the Internet made things more efficient (faxes instead of mail, e-mails instead of faxes, looking things up on a file server instead of going to a dusty archive, using ctrl-C and ctrl-V instead of manually retyping documents, etc.), people smoothly transitioned to time-wasting.
Another idea is to make sure you always do something productive every day.
Someone here suggested a while back that procrastinators should try to accomplish something, no matter how small, on ongoing projects each day, and I found it very helpful. So thanks!
Regarding B-12, I can believe that, as Moby said, that if one is healthy it's not going to do anything (unless one is vegan, sufficient intake isn't a problem). But I have a sort of blind experiment in my case, in that the few times I've tried a certain energy drink I found it much more helpful in maintaining focus than the equivalent amount of caffeine (but as I habitually disregard marketing I assumed this was coincidence or psychosomatic). It was only after I noticed the effects of my current regimen that I found out the drink was filled with B-12. Science!
227
... My problem isn't so much that other fun things are more attractive than doing my work, it's that staring blankly at a wall is still more attractive than doing my work.
Sounds like you need to work harder at psyching yourself up. "These obnoxious private sector lawyers think they are better than me just because they make twice as much money but I will make them rue the day they decided to sue the Great State of New York". Couldn't you collect disparaging quotes from tea party types about the general uselessness of government workers and post them on your walls for motivational purposes?
these stickers on etsy that you can maniacally freehand onto the wall are great, I'm telling you, people. it takes hours to do during which you can't think of anything. I mean, if you're manic and don't need to write anything for di's client. I suppose LB could crochet at work to similar effect, but it's too obvious. better than staring at the wall, though.
233: That sort of thinking does help under some circumstances, but I need the right sort of case for it. It's easier to get psyched for battle with statusy lawyers, but a good half the workload here is either pathetic pro se litigants, or struggling incompetent solo practitioners.
But yes, there's nothing quite as satisfying as schooling some fifty-something dude in an expensive suit who makes more than ten times what I do, and the chance to do that does get me motivated when it's on offer.
||
Kind of excited. My work cell phone benefit is no longer taxable.
|>
As for Internet procrastination, somewhere or other (maybe here, I should RTFA) I read that 20 years ago office jobs had downtime in lots of little ways, and as computers and the Internet made things more efficient (faxes instead of mail, e-mails instead of faxes, looking things up on a file server instead of going to a dusty archive, using ctrl-C and ctrl-V instead of manually retyping documents, etc.), people smoothly transitioned to time-wasting.
Those who weren't laid off, that is.
216 and 226: The European regulators made ING sell it's US division. I'm looking for an alternative. I have a Bank of America acct for the ATMs and a Nordstrom's checking, but I want an account that will easily let me transfer money electronically.
Ah, well then thanks be to you, Right Honorable Red Foxtailshrub.
OK, I'm an occasional now.
Everybody should take vitamin B. I quit taking it for about 10 years after taking it regularly for 20 because it thought it upset my stomach. Actually it was something else but when the stomach problems was fixed, I didn't start the B again.
During most of that tie I had no ability to concentrate on anything, I had trouble getting started, and I had no stamina. Even little things like laundry and shopping trips were a burden. So I wasted years of my life on 50 word blog comments. I figure I was functioning at about 10% efficiency.
In the last 3 months I've been back on the B and I've got my efficiency up to about 30-40%, which is as good as you can expect at my advanced age, of you're also an alcoholic.
Take a B-50 or half of one and give it about a month before you decide it's not working.
242: The difference is as dramatic for me. Assuming it persists, I'm wondering if I didn't lose a good chunk of the last 15 years for lack of a vitamin.
LB, if you want to get a big dose of vitamin B in food form, put brewer's yeast on popcorn.
1. Delicious!
2. Lots of vitamin B's (but not 12).
If you want to get very gourmet, I suggest the treat we lived on in college. Toast, butter, rubbed with garlic, brewer's yeast sprinkled on top.
Is brewer's yeast literally related to brewer's yeast? Because I drink a lot of homebrew.
I don't know. It is yellow and flaky and delicious with salt on popcorn or bread.
It appears not, and that I should properly be recommending nutritional yeast to you.
The yeast in homebrew *is* rich in B vitamins, as I understand it. Or maybe that's just what the homebrewers want me to believe.
I've always been told that brewer's yeast (and, consequently, most home-brewed and some commercially brewed) beer is a very good source of B-vitamins, and google seems to support this.
But! I'm not sure I would want to sprinkle brewer's yeast on my popcorn. I think nutritional yeast is the right suggestion there.
I've got my efficiency up to about 30-40%
Hmm, you attribute this to the vitamin and not the blog-commenting hiatus?
I'm not sure I've got the cause-and-effect on this straight, but the next time bob says something obnoxious, I'm going to recommend he start taking Vitamin B.
I recommend the commercial B-50's made out of industrial waste in smoke-belching factories in Ohio, but if someone wants to pay more for an inferior, less convenient product, who am I to argue?
My efficiency increase was in the last 3-4 months since I restarted the B. The hiatus did some good.
It wouldn't be that hard to make your own gourmet nutritional yeast out of
honey (high-fructose!) or molasses or agave nectar.
Nutritional yeast is awesome, yep.
What about wheat germ? (consults the internets) Okay, according to this -- just the first thing I looked at -- it's strong on B vitamins, as well as protein and fiber. I can attest that a jar of this stuff lasts a very long time, a year or two, in the fridge. Nutritional information on the label chiefly highlights vitamin E and folic acid (B9, excellent cancer fighter), but it seems the minerals are also not to be sneezed at. And protein, for the vegetarians/vegans among us.
Sprinkle into yogurt, oatmeal, cookies, thicker soups; I put a few tablespoons into homemade granola. It seems the difference between toasted and untoasted wheat germ is minimal.
Can vegetarians really eat yeast?
Maybe a more difficult question is whether there's any possible way a vegetarian could avoid eating yeast, even if they wanted to.
Yeasts are very common in the environment, and are often isolated from sugar-rich material. Examples include naturally occurring yeasts on the skins of fruits and berries (such as grapes, apples or peaches), and exudates from plants (such as plant saps or cacti). Some yeasts are found in association with soil and insects.[19][20] The ecological function and biodiversity of yeasts are relatively unknown compared to those of other microorganisms.[21] Yeasts, including Candida albicans, Rhodotorula rubra, Torulopsis and Trichosporon cutaneum, have been found living in between people's toes as part of their skin flora.[22] Yeasts are also present in the gut flora of mammals and some insects[23] and even deep-sea environments host an array of yeasts.
Do you know any vegetarians who avoid all beer and wine, because of concerns about the wellbeing of the yeast?
Yeasts are fungi, not animals? Consider my smartass schooled.
It wasn't a sincere question, Urple. I was trying, albeit unsuccessfully, to be funny.
242: Emerson, if you get off the alcohol at any point, try taking milkthistle for liver repair. It's no good if you're still taking the alcohol -- it doesn't cancel out ongoing damage -- but after a while off, once detoxed, it can help toward repair. Something to keep in mind.
When making a joke about eukaryotic micro-organisms, I'm strive to modify the words accordingly. This is known as yeast inflection.
Pars, how long do you have to be off the alcohol before that's good advice? Like, could a once-a-week drinker take it on dry days?
For some reason I just googled gastroenterology journal meta-analyses of milk thistle for liver disease. I do believe I'm procrastinating.
A once-a-week drinker doesn't really need to worry about liver repair, unless they're really genuinely binging that one night per week.
Even then, I think with a week to recover between binges it bounces back on its own.
And? What did you learn? (Hiatus from the trial process really sucks the adrenaline-fueled momentum, out of a person.)
Studies that found a positive effect seem likely to have been methodologically flawed, there isn't strong evidence that it's better than placebo, but it doesn't sound like it's bad for you and there wasn't enough research as of 2002 to make a really solid judgment one way or the other.
Yeah, but what if a person drinks only occasionally, but pounds the ibuprofen and acetaminophen and other liver polluting things the rest of the week?
268: I like to think that the number of medical claims made on Unfogged in the last day or so have aided your statistics procrastination.
I didn't google the B-12 thing, actually. Probably I'm biased by the relative science-yness of the names. Also the claim "B-12 makes everything more awesome!" seems tougher to google.
267: I honestly don't know; we'd have to research. I got this a few years ago from a hippy-dippy friend in the Pacific Northwest who's taken courses on botanical pharmacy, or whatever you call it. The kind of thing where classes include walking around the woods identifying native plants with various properties, then going back to the lab and studying preparations and consulting references. He wound up with a lot of dried plants and tinctures in his kitchen. Witch.
I looked into it a bit at the time, and the word about milkthistle seemed well-supported. He was firm that you must not think that you can stress your liver in an ongoing manner and just take milkthistle to counteract. I got the idea you need to be 'clean' for a month or two at least in order for healing to take place. I'm guessing on that, though.
For those who take regular medications that stress the liver, I don't know what to say. Research.
Hey, here we go: B-12 mildly increased performance in memory tasks vs. placebo in a sample of 211 women of various ages. That's not a meta-analysis, though.
I mean, it may not be scientifically rigorous, but googling "B-12 makes everything more awesome!" sems to produce useful results, for some definition of useful.
Huh, there's tons of B-12 in meat! No wonder I feel so fucking great.
but what if a person drinks only occasionally, but pounds the ibuprofen and acetaminophen and other liver polluting things the rest of the week?
I'd say that person should try to stop pounding the ibuprofen and acetaminophen, to be honest.
"Bison meat contains many vitamins but is highest in vitamin B12, vitamin B6, and niacin content. Bison meat contains enough vitamin B12 to be considered a major source of the vitamin, since one serving of raw bison meat contains 43 percent of the Daily Value."
So if you up it to 6-8 daily servings, you are golden.
281: Ah, but some people have inflammatory disease processes for which NSAIDs (maybe not tylenol so much) are the preferred treatment. Or people with high cholesterol who are treated with liver-destroying statins. Life, it will kill you sure as anything.
Also helpful for procrastinating: http://cheeseorfont.com/game/5220a6d68f
20: I'm loving the free first chapter. Besides the big-idea stuff, I had no notion the US was so resistant to having any bankruptcy law for so long.
283: Ah. Well, yes, I understand. Are there natural/nutritional alternatives to NSAIDs for anti-inflammatory purposes? I believe there are. I'd have to research thoroughly to say anything I'd consider complete, but green tea is good. Red grapes. I forget the rest.
I do hear you; I have a back problem for which 4 extra-strength ibuprofen (= 800 mg, I guess) every 4 hours was prescribed as the "therapeutic dose". I looked into that, talked to a few medical professionals about it, and the conclusion seemed to be that if this could be avoided in any way at all, that was advisable. So I declined to do that and started working out.
For the high cholesterol medication, I don't know. Exercise and lentils and kale. I'm freakishly lucky with cholesterol anyway. I wouldn't eat cheetos, though.
Oh man, I am definitely on TEAM B-12! When I'm feeling draggy and low-energy, I take one and it is noticeable. I don't take them on a daily basis though, just because the first strategy seems to work just fine.
My mum has B12 injections every 3 months (as do a couple of other people I know). She generally starts to get tired again after 10 weeks, and then spends 2 or 3 weeks arguing with the GP about why she can't have the next one sooner.
Is it something that can get toxic?
I'm not sure I'm understanding why anyone would have a B12 injection. Do some people not digest it well?
222: sort of reassuring that these agencies are none too bright or efficient.
I was just thinking earlier that I could start a collection agency!
1. Unethical behavior
2. More unethical behavior
3. Profit!!!
The most funnest think about B vitamins is the neon pee.
Anyone have any thoughts which brand of replacement hip impacts sex the least?
As far as I know, whatever my dad's got hasn't changed things at all.
Also as far as I know, my dad hasn't gotten laid since the Nixon administration. There may be better information out there, but I'm not asking.
289: Can things get too awesome? The question answers itself.
Not asking my dad either.
Didn't "B-12 injections" used to mean amphetamines, at least in the Kennedy White House?
290: If you're down on "intrinsic factor" you can't absorb it from food or pills. That results in pernicious anemia, which is nasty. Hence the needles.
287: Yup. Since I started the B-12 the mood, energy level, alertness, and the ability to concentrate are all improved.
I don't see any reason not to take it.
My father still brags about taking B-12 shots back in his legislature days in the '70s as a means by which he and his political buddies would prop themselves up between steak and martini binges. I always wrote it off as bs (although: 296.2, hmm) and not a very inviting image anyway, but clearly I need to rethink. I could clearly use some help remembering which pointless arguments on the internets I've already had.
I'm not sure I'm understanding why anyone would have a B12 injection. Do some people not digest it well?
I've been wondering through this thread why my mum doesn't just take pills. As per 297 though, she is a bit anaemic (has been on and off all her life), so I guess eating it has never properly worked for her.
Furthermore, I could clearly use some help remembering which adverbs I've already used.
If it hasn't been said above, alcohol consumption depletes your B-vitamin levels, so it's always good to supplement if you are a-drinkin'. Good hangover prevention, too.
299: I'm remembering some scandals from back then related to vitamin + amphetamines + steroids. Check out "Dr. Feelgood" AKA Max Jacobson.
yeah it was my impression the B-12 shots were loaded with dexedrine or whatever. but he also had some undisclosed auto-immune disease and was getting steroids legit for that? FUCK I wish it would stop raining, there are serious taxi-getting problems in narnia when it rains. I mean RAINS rains, like, soaked to the skin in the instant you get out from under the umbrella to get in the car. I better go order one now.
Ah, well then thanks be to you, Right Honorable Red Foxtailshrub.
Hooray! I have been having trouble with this one myself of late, because I am not going to campus every day. On toddler-watching days I could certainly check in on my projects during naptime or in the evening and yet it is so tempting to spend the time on something utterly mindless instead. Maybe some B-12 would help.
A visit to Dr. Jacobson:
[T]he usually crowded and chaotic Upper East Side office,...was open seven days a week from as early as 5:30 A.M. until 11 P.M....Though the blinds were always drawn, a visit to the Jacobson office was rarely private. In the reception area, patients scanned the room in search of stars, like tourists at Chasen's restaurant in Hollywood. Some people remained in the outer office for hours. Others, usually new patients, were ushered in immediately. The celebrity hunt continued in the rear, where patients waited for hours, either seated or stretched out on examining tables from which the interiors of other fluorescent-lit cubicles were visible. Intrinsic to Jacobson's mystique was his fondness for injecting patients in full view of one another.....
His office, described by one habitué as a "nut house," was notoriously dirty. Wastebaskets spilled over onto floors littered with broken hypodermic needles and crumpled paper wrappers. Shelves marked "METH," short for methamphetamine, were crowded with vials of the mood-lifting drug that Jacobson mixed with steroids, calcium, monkey placenta, and other, undisclosed ingredients.
Fun times! I also learned from that page that the German military consumed 35 million 3mg tablets of methamphetamine during the three months April, May, and June 1940 (i.e. the conquest of Western Europe). 35 million, in an army of about three million men! When you think about all the podgy old Bavarian reservists manning rail transport offices and field postal services, of course, that implies that the front line included some serious tweakers.
An amphetamine epidemic afflicted the United States between 1940 and 1970, in part fueled by physicians such as New York general practitioner Dr. Max Jacobson who legally dispensed the drug, believing until the day he died that it was harmless and helpful to his patients. Amphetamines became a federally controlled substance in the United States only in 1970
And what happened in 1971? The long-term trend for economic growth in the US dropped from 3.8% per year, where it had been since the war, to 2.7%, where it has remained ever since.
Irrational exuberance, indeed.
On-topic, I just got a text message from the ex-roommate who owes me the most money to come meet her at the local OWS gathering (she's been heavily involved in organizing) to pick up some skrilla. Huzzah: democracy in action PLUS money!