are there implications if there is in fact a culture-wide segregation that occurs (to an extent) when people start having babies?
Well, obviously not just this one particular segregation, there are others.
I hardly ever see my friends who've had kids, so I do wonder if the OP last paragraph is the real issue. (That the divide you're noticing is bechilded/child-free, and not gay/straight.). I also wonder if there's an easier way for me to see my bechilded friends, as I miss them.
You could have a foal of your own, Stanners.
2:Well, I took from the post that the segregation from her gay child-free friends, as a subset of child-free friends, was a loss of something particular and different, and I would assume, something more than "I interact with gay friends" Not that there is anything really so wrong with a pro-active reaching-out toward differance
Is h-g worried that, without constant support and reinforcement, she will become a Republican and go to Santorum rallies? Texas is hard country.
And we get smaller as we age. This is life.
I also wonder if there's an easier way for me to see my bechilded friends
Offer to visit them at their house, and to bring takeout? Invite them over to your house for a gathering that starts at 4?
Neither of those suggestions in 6 to say that it's super easy and you're just doing it wrong, Stanley. But those are ways we have recently seen bechilded friends.
I have recently been smarting from the bechilded/child-free divide myself.
The problem is that the times when I am free and looking for company don't line up well with the times those with children are free and looking for company. It also gets wearing to always have gatherings on their turf, on their terms. I have no pull to invite people over to my house, so I am constantly the extra single person over for dinner.
Thread-jack for advice on making baby-parent friends without going to potentially horrifying "mommy groups"?
6-the-first is an optimal strategy. Bring a six-pack too.
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In geographical/political non-homogeneity news: State representatives on Friday advanced legislation to launch a study into what Wyoming should do in the event of a complete economic or political collapse in the United States. Well, OK, but it included an amendment to include study of: Conditions under which the state of Wyoming should implement a draft, raise a standing army, marine corps, navy and air force and acquire strike aircraft and an aircraft carrier. In trying to determine the level of irony the amendment represents, I found this things-aren't-here-like-where-you-are* quote from an interview with the legislator who introduced the amendment:
Well not only the budget, I think there are four big areas that are going to dominate. That would be wolves, education, redistricting and the budget. Now those are four really big areas and we've got twenty days to fight our way through those.Fighting their way though wolves--best Congressional reform idea ever.
*CC and teo excepted.
|>
Where would Wyoming park an aircraft carrier? Yellowstone Lake?
things-aren't-here-like-where-you-are
Things are there like where they are?
Explicitness thy name is Stanley.
12: Stop thinking so small, Stanley! Obviously they mean a flying aircraft carrier, like S.H.I.E.L.D. has.
13: I think maybe, "things here aren't the way things are where you are". Something like that, only more confusing.
I have felt myself becoming the kidless gay that didn't quite fit into the lives of bekidded friends. I mean, it's a mutual thing of course. With effort you can get around it and without much you can wait it out (I think the first few years of kiddedness really are necessarily so kidocentric that relations across lines of kiddity take some adjustment from both sides in ways that fade a little once nobody is in the most intense throes of kiddery) but the path of least resistance is often to seek one's own kind, kidwise.
Hmmm. Some days I feel like we don't know anyone but lesbians with kids. On the other hand, why would we need to know anyone else?
Offer to visit them at their house, and to bring takeout?
Especially your friends with small kids would appreciate this more than you can possibly imagine. Visiting childless friends with your kids in tow in really no fun, because so much of your attention is taken up making sure the kids don't break something. While you can let them run wild in your own house. And believe you me, we all miss adult conversations.
We actually see lots more of our gay friends than our straight ones but, oddly enough, not our gay friends with kids.
*CC and teo excepted.
And on that note, I'm off to the sled dog races! Which in my case means literally just stepping out the front door of my building, since they race down the street right there.
dwarflord always says, "someone has to sing bass". He's a tenor, so this makes me worry a little.
From the OP:
Possibly the real divide is breeders/child-free. That both are absent from my local circle seems like a failure on my part.
I think it happens to very many people once they have kids, and to many of the child-free once friends have kids. Scheduling difficulties, attention span issues, pretty understandable.
I do have one friend, recent adopter of a child, whom I'm actively uncomfortable seeing: when our college reunion was imminent a couple of years ago, she'd said repeatedly that she was apprehensive about attending because she was so lamentably childless: it would be emotionally difficult for her to see all those fellow classmates with families, and to answer questions about her child-related status. Fair enough, we feel what we feel; now that she has a child, I'm in turn not quite comfortable in the knowledge that she apparently finds childlessness a terribly sorry state of affairs.
2: I've also been suffering from this on the child-free side. Unfortunately my friend doesn't live in the same country so I can't drop by. I can't even get them to call me/pick up my calls. Also they only want to Skype and it drives me crazy because I don't really want to look at their baby and spend all my time secretly checking myself out.
I feel like there's a power imbalance - I can't get any compromise and just have to go along with whatever scraps they have left after the baby.
It has actually totally ruined our once great friendship. I fear I'll explode in anger once their baby gets old enough they would like to talk to me again. Bad idea, right?
Also, I feel like people are going to say "It'll be different when you have kids!" so consider that said already.
24.last: Saying that is a bannable offense, as I think everyone knows.
As one of those without children, I have to second the advice Blume gives. shiv and I both like children and small children in particular adore him for reasons that escape us (every toddler we've met automatically trusts him and wants him to be their friend), and so we like seeing our friends with their kids, too. But to see them and have adult conversations usually means a) bringing takeout and/or beer b) being fine with a relaxing night in consisting of conversation and board games and c) being flexible with earlier start times. No biggie, but we're rapidly becoming the only childless couple in our circle of friends, so it makes sense to be flexible.
24: I wouldn't make that inference. Someone who really wants a child can find it tough to be around other people with children without thinking that it's horrible for other childless people to have made a different choice.
I wouldn't make that inference. Someone who really wants a child can find it tough to be around other people with children without thinking that it's horrible for other childless people to have made a different choice.
I know. I'm pretty sure that she thinks "You poor thing" about people without children, but right, maybe not. I fear that I'm projecting onto her, or being preemptively defensive when it's not called for. I find it upsetting, to be honest: I'd ideally discuss the matter with her, but doubt that she has the mental/emotional/psychological space for it. Since she has a new kid, and all. (She is also the friend I described here quite a while ago who said in college when I disclosed that I'm adopted, "Oh, I'm so sorry; adopted children suffer from inferior attachments, emotionally and psychologically" -- or words to that effect. We had a rilly big fight. Now she has adopted, herself. My thinking is that sharing any of my feelings about this would be making it all about me, which is totally inappropriate: she has a new baby! Yay!)
they only want to Skype and it drives me crazy because I don't really want to look at their baby
Ultimately it's going to be very hard to maintain a friendship with someone with kids if you don't like their kids. If looking at their baby is something you find that off-putting, then you might be better just cutting your losses now.
"Liking their kids" ≠ enjoying gazing upon them while talking to their parents.
For infants those kinda are the same thing.
I'm assuming here that we're talking about a baby that's being held here, not that there's a computer pointed at a crib with the parent talking from off-camera (which would be super weird).
Furthermore, it totally makes sense that people with infants prefer hands-free modes of communication. And once you're using a computer to call instead of a phone, what's the downside of video?
My sense is that (some) new parents are filled with little more than thoughts of their kid(s), and that's perfectly understandable. If bridges are to be built, or gaps overcome, it takes a willingness on the part of both parties (those with child and those without) to periodically be willing to put these friendship-related conversations on the table.
In other words, Heebie is right.
Skyping with my (childless) friends is very different from talking on the phone with them. (Actually there's only one friend who I do much of either with. She wants my kids to know her.)(And she's GAY.)
Anyway, she and I can't have intimate visits on Skype in the same way. Occasionally, if the kids wander off. But in a lot of ways it's me and my friend trying to prompt the kids to talk and interact.
I don't see how Skype interactions can be as intimate as phone conversations at all, whether there are kids or not.
The phone requires a kind of listening and cuing and response that visuals override, and can obliterate. So I say.
I would have killed to have friends who showed up with takeout when I had kids. Instead, there was absolutely nothing unless I provided the food and entertainment and hosted (always for other families with kids) and it was kind of annoying that my local friends knew I was melting down and didn't offer to do anything, though one of them came over with a pie a few weeks ago. One online friend offered to travel to become a real-life one if I needed it and I got other kinds of wonderful support that way, but it was somewhat frustrating that local people (oh, my brother's awesome girlfriend excepted! She BABYSAT all three of them so Lee an I could do a neighborhood stained glass tour!) knew I was miserable and did nothing. Oh well, though.
The moral of the story is I'm one of those new-parent people and I have no idea how to keep friends. Invite people over and cook and clean, apparently, but that sucks. And I'm even gay!
Speaking as a childless person who really likes hanging out with kids, clearly it should be incumbent upon me to do more of the inviting/set-up stuff than I do. It's just so easy to get into (or never leave) the mode of thinking that "hanging out" implies going to a bar, at night, and drinking and talking about adult stuff. Adult books, adult mIovies, adult plays...you get the idea.
Also, it has to be said that, as a carless person, logistics of getting over to a friends' house with kids and then back to mine at the end of the night can get complicated and seem like a huge imposition, even with multi-adult households where it's easy enough for someone to stay home with the kids. I should just get a bike.
Fucking Wyoming. They're going to mess up the wolf thing yet again. (Had a long chat with my son about this today. He'd ridden a chair earlier with an Idaho wolf biologist, who had strong views on the wolves.) Fucking Wyoming.
I have definitely become aware of the fact that being a single/childless/queer person, in a smaller community, does make one an unwelcome presence. Everyone says to you that it's really great that you're you, but I'm also extremely conscious of the fact that the only people who have invited me to do anything, and the only people who have accepted my (frequent) invitations to do things, are other single/childless/queer people. Couples invite couples. Couples with children invite couples with children.
This weekend I've been participating in a group discussing heteronormativity in our community, and when I attempted to express that, although it's not openly homophobic, I and my single/childless/queer friends have felt a bit like it's fine for us to be around as long as we're not talking about anything that might make heterosexual married people feel uncomfortable, I was told, by a well-meaning colleague, that I should keep in mind that if I'm about to say something that would make *me* feel embarrassed or uncomfortable about my personal life, I should remember that it's always my right to keep all of that completely private. You know, if I might be embarrassed. Which I might be.
I am actually great with kids in person and if I lived close, I'd totally be fine with hanging out with the kid or babysitting. Also their kid is particularly awesome and loved me when we met in person.
The Skype thing comes in because they point the camera at the kid on their lap (so I can't see the parent's face), who gets bored and squirms and cries or is entertained with a toy. I think the idea is that the kid will come to 'know' me. Which I don't think will actually help the kid be comfortable with me right off the bat anyway.
Video really is not as intimate as phone calls. I wouldn't mind a video to see the kid and admire their new skills but I want some time to talk to my friend. When you're long distance friends, you just normally have to try harder to keep the friendship up (or at least I do because I also hate talking on the phone), and that might mean compromising and talking on the phone with baby in hand occasionally. I mean, if you let a friendship drop for 2-3 years (even if your reason is awesome), it's not going to be the same.
40 happened in a group discussing heteronormativity?!
Maybe it was, like, A Celebration of Heteronormativity.
It's so heteronormative, and full of such WELL-MEANING straight people that they *literally* cannot imagine how it would feel to be queer or single. The meeting was on/for/about students, and I was, in fact, commenting on the fact that, even to me, the queer presence on campus basically doesn't seem exist to faculty. I think being queer/single is something they think of as "for the kids," as long as they don't want to talk about it, and if they do, they should be reminded that they don't want to say anything that would embarrass them later. And that goes a hundred times more so for faculty.
I responded to my colleague that it sounded like the plot of A Single Man.
The phone requires a kind of listening and cuing and response that visuals override, and can obliterate.
So speaking on the phone is more intimate than in person conversations, with those same visuals? This strikes me as quite odd, as I think most people feel exactly opposite.
Also fantastic was this week when I hosted a prominent gay writer, and during an amazing dinner when we were discussing the lack of queer presence on campus and the silencing nature of heteronormativity, two colleagues, emerging from a side-conversation, pipe up with "Well, you guys must be so much more exciting than us. The 'queerest' thing that ever happened to me was definitely having a baby!" Yeah, that's pretty queer, FULFILLING YOUR HETEROSEXUAL DESTINY. She went on to discuss at length how having a baby is sort of equivalent to being a gay person. Yeah, pretty much.
Hah, wrote 45 before reading 41. It's probably just because I hate phone calls but am comfortable with Skype that I feel this way, but it probably also has a lot to do with having to conduct many months worth of a relationship over Skype.
Of course, the way I feel in 46, but no one would ever express to someone's face, is probably why het/married/childed folk don't want to be friends with the queer/single/childless. The same is true for any privileged person rejecting a relationship with a less-privileged person. It's not that you necessarily hate them for what they are, but you'd be about a billion times more comfortable if we all pretended that everyone's position in society were exactly equivalent and that no one ever struggles on account of gender, sexuality, race, disability... (Exhibit B: Every single white person in this conversation this weekend has said some form of "I don't see race.")
I don't know the specifics of APB's friend dynamics in Collegeville, but I can imagine that as a singleton it would be harder to become friends with already bechilded people than it is to maintain friendships with people you knew before they were parents. Having years of friendship to draw on makes it easier to go into maintenance mode when the kids come along. Also, I love my friends' babies largely because I love my friends, whereas I'm not sure I'd have that attachment to new potential friends' kids.
I have old friends who have since formed heterosexual marriages w or w/o children, sure. But I'm not afraid of new kids either, or of having conversations about kids, or marriage. But the idea that it just isn't worth it to make friends who aren't exactly like you in every demographic way is really foreign to me. It took me a long time to figure out why every single person I've met here who is single, non-white, queer, whatever, hates our little town and talks about how it's the least friendly place in the world, but never says a peep about why, other than one doesn't have friends.
probably why het/married/childed folk don't want to be friends with the queer/single/childless. The same is true for any privileged person rejecting a relationship with a less-privileged person.
Nothing at all in this designed to provoke a fight.
Nothing at all in this designed to provoke a fight.
And you got a problem with that? Huh?
My working assumption is that other people are bored by my kids, because I'm bored by other people's kids.
Therefore, if you've got small children, perhaps they can all entertain each other.
If you've got older children, or just babies, or are child-free, or are a grandparent, or anyone else, then my working assumption is that you don't want to hang out with me and my small children, unless you indicate otherwise. (I'm happy to hire a baby-sitter, but it takes advance planning.)
Stepping to one side of 52, Buck and I certainly suffer from dyadic withdrawal and not socializing all that much at home with the kidless. Some of that's social shame: when they were little, our place was untidy and they were prone to demanding attention from us in a way that would mean being rude to adult guests -- with other parents, you can feel comfortable ignoring your guests for twenty minutes or so while the kids are being needy. For non-parent adults, I kind of felt that they'd think I was a boring incompetent jerk if they saw me managing an evening with the kids around.
Now, there are different issues: they're twelve and ten, but both kind of think they're twentyfive and should be part of any adult conversation. Which means either 'go to your room and don't emerge' or making sure that the conversation is one that I'm comfortable with they're being full participants in. And also, even in a conversation that I'm comfortable with their being full participants, there's a fair amount of enforcing their manners by making them shut up and not monopolize the conversation.
None of this makes it impossible to have new people over, but it's so much easier and with less potential for shame if we stick with either old friends or other parents.
Another way to put this is that it's really non-standard these days to be able to insulate guests from your children in your own home. But even reasonably pleasant children can be embarrassing and difficult in anything but the most completely relaxed old-friends socializing. Other people's children annoy the crap out of me frequently: I accept that as the price I pay for inflicting mine on them. With people who don't have annoying kids, I'm just asymmetrically embarrassed.
All kidding aside. Reading about Tokugawa forest management (I'll get there) and the conflicts over rights of daimyo, village headmen, older families, villagers I decided that Corey Robin is full of shit.
Privilege and hierarchy are always connected to material advantage or gain, the access to and power over/control of the distribution of resources. Think about racism or sexism and you will see what I mean. I don't think you ever have hierarchy for its own sake, contra Robin.
Therefore, any conflicts between the child-free and childed (see I got there) either are on some level about competition for resources (e.g., school funding) or do not involve privilege or hierarchy.
Myself, I like kids around as part of the neighborhood landscape, like trees. And don't need to be entertained or protected from annoyance when visiting friends or family. "Make yourself at home" means where's the bookshelf or game machine, you chat among yourselves.
57.3 cont:Is the problem that the host sees the guest as competing for time and attention with the kids?
Unnecessary for me. I don't want the nice clothes, fancy meal, sparkling conversation. I don't want the show. When I visit people I like, I want to share what you love and how you live.
Now that's flattering.
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Unfogged dream: Everyone is at Heebie's for a meet-up on a Friday after work. We're all looking at the addition, padding around in stocking feet, and the hardwood floors are a little squeaky. JRoth is there, and is apologizing, dejectedly, for all the parts of the project that didn't work out correctly. Of course, everyone is being nice to him, but when he slinks off, Heebie is like "Yeah, I knew I should have gone with my gut and gotten all 17 rooms done in wall-to-wall shag carpeting. That's what you get for listening to architects!"
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59:So Roth says:"It's a Nightingale Floor for the safety and security of your family."
58: It's more that I have minimum standards for the amount of attentiveness I owe a guest in my house, unless we're already very very close. With my kids around, I may not be able to meet that standard (in any implicit competition, the kids win -- it's not about starving the kids of attention for the guest, it's the reverse) and so I'm ashamed.
49: But I think it's worth remembering that parents often feel that it's the childless who are privileged--certainly, in academia. For while parents are privileged ideologically, they're not privileged materially: they're told all the time how crucial their parenting is, but they're not given the resources they need to do it without considerable sacrifice. And rather then sorting out which form of privilege is worse, which group is really, truly the underprivileged group, I think it's more interesting to ask why we keep having this crabs-in-a-bucket debate.
Even 'not-privileged-materially' is tricky: I'd guess that parents are on average likely to be better off than non-parents. All else being equal, the non-parent is better off than the parent, as having fewer necessary expenses. But all else usually isn't equal.
what, in academia, isn't a crabs-in-a-bucket debate?
56 is only about a generation old, yes? when I was a kid we could be told to go outside & play. In the street!
Getting divorced is a great way to have the best of both worlds! Go for it, people.
The e-invitation for a friend's party last night read "It's a grown up night. Please leave the kids at home."
i am 100% supportive of the idea of a kid free event, and of making that explicit, but something in that phrasing rubbed me slightly the wrong way. Not sure why.
My approach is a combination of having people over after Jane is in bed, failing to be appropriately ashamed about chasing her around when I should be talking to other people, socializing with people during work hours, and not being all that sociable to start with.
Yeah, part of 56 is a social change, about how unsupervised kids are supposed to be. But that's somewhat less applicable for adult socializing in the evenings after work, when even in the halcyon days of the past when adults were adults and kids knew their place, children were mostly allowed indoors.
Part, from my point of view, is apartment living: if the kids are in the apartment, they can't stay out of the way of adult guests unless, e.g., we bar them from going to the kitchen for a glass of water. It's possible to train children to be seen and not heard, and also seen as little as possible, but we haven't done that.
66: I'm sounding whiny here, and mostly making excuses for being as lame as I am. But one kid Jane's age is much more adult-socializing compatible than more and older kids: you don't really need to make your conversation age-appropriate around her, because she's not following what's going on anyway, and a bunch of other factors.
Jane is my favorite baby. Sorry, all the other babies I've ever met.
68: Oh, I know it!
69: Mine too. (SHOCKING.)
Also, I don't think my approach is all that great. It hinges significantly on being a social drip most of the time.
Oh, I forgot, also, that part of my approach has been mounting a good PR campaign on Jane's behalf. Behold! Pictures of Jane doing adorable, personality-displaying things adorably! Do not behold! Stories of her lesser moments or photographs with gross substances smeared on her!
46: She went on to discuss at length how having a baby is sort of equivalent to being a gay person.
Try as I might, I can't figure out what this means. Something about being socially isolated?
I don't know of a better approach for a kid who's Jane's age.
Once they're Newt and Sally's age, I think the successful approach for socializing at home with people who aren't already so close that I have no vestige of social concern around them is to have, over the past decade, brought them up well enough that they are charming for a short period of time and then reliably invisible. I have not done this.
I don't understand why anyone should be defensive about their privileges. I'm white, and I benefit from that. If every time someone brought up the fact that they feel marginalized by their non-whiteness, even if I am not the one marginalizing them, I would *not* respond by telling that story about how one time a black guy was rude to me on a bus, or that with great whiteness comes great responsibility. Why is the cultural privilege of heterosexual marriage any different? When you mention having a spouse or a child, does everyone come up to you and say, "That's, um, really brave of you to admit, but you should know that you don't have to tell us about your private life. You can keep it private"?
Hey, maybe there is some area of the world I've not been to where only queer relationships are immediately validated and recognized publicly by parents, coworkers, friends, holiday cards, films, TV... Of course I'm not saying that the experience of child-rearing or marriage is simple or easy or blissful--of course not--but you can hold your spouse's hand in public without anyone harassing you or acting like you're being obscene. I don't even think those are kinds of difficulty that can be compared for the purposes of some kind of competition, in the hopes of arriving at an equivalency that negates privilege.
72: You're doing yeoman work in this regard. If your blog hasn't made some previously ambivalent acquaintances decide to get knocked up, I'd be surprised.
73: I couldn't figure it out either. It had something to do with feeling estranged from her body? Queer in the sense of not being similar to the feeling of her wedding day? I have no idea.
65: How would you phrase it?
67: also culpable: open-plan architecture and/or guests expecting to be in the kitchen. Or it's just mismatched expectations. Maybe every guest in the kitchen is OK with meeting an opinionated kid, or should be.
75: Yeah, I really don't think any two kinds of difficulty can be profitably compared directly as if they were on the same scale.
I think straight parents are obviously privileged compared to non-parents, single people, queer people, and so on. On the other hand, I think conventional adult socializing is an awful lot easier for non-parents. That doesn't make non-parents 'privileged' in any overarching sense, but it does mean that they're probably likelier to have people over to drink in their homes.
75.2: we're not there yet, but I'm sometimes amazed at how far my life is down that path. My bosses are gay couples from whom I get Christmas cards, gay couples are the bulwark of my church, and my kid is so totally used to same sex parents from her own friends that it's really nothing at all for her.
Now, don't get me wrong -- this is life in a bubble, and even in the bubble don't try being a trans person. But still.
79: I'd certainly agree about New York; I can definitely see how isolating it would be to have a difficult-to-transport child in a city full of adults-only spaces. I would be tempted to move to some neighborhood like Park Slope where it's easier to get around and more child-friendly. But then again, you might find yourself sucked into loathsome bourgeois conversation about preschools and real estate.
In my little town, however, I know for a fact that coworkers in my position get invited to other people's houses. All those people are married. Couples visit couples. They also get their teaching contracts renewed. I'm sure that's just a coincidence, right? Right?
81.1: I'm not really sure what you mean about transport -- getting from place to place with children isn't that much of an issue, it's having adults drinking in the house without either the children annoying the adults or the adults behaving in a way that I'm not completely comfortable with around the children.
81.2: There, if you think that what's going on is that married couples don't want to be your friend because you're single, that's probably a large part of it. Part of it may also be that they're worried about their capacity to host in an adult-acceptable manner, and while they feel they can count on other parents to cut them slack for it, they think that single people may find them annoying or incompetent. But you're the one who's actually dealing with these people -- if the latter explanation doesn't ring true at all, then it's probably not what's going on.
81.2: It may well not be a coincidence, alas: a lot of departments ask themselves whether any given faculty member is "a good fit", and sadly, well ... off-duty socializing can be part of what they consider 'fitting'.
82.2: Young married het couples without kids were mostly those I was thinking of. A few with.
Oh, if it's not about kid juggling, than I don't have an explanation other than unfriendliness. They don't accept invitations or extend reciprocal ones? Then they just suck, and it does look as if they're shutting out anyone different.
Again, I don't think it's meanness. I think it's "oh we wouldn't want to impooooooose," where it doesn't feel like an imposition with other hetero married people. I had plenty of friends in straight couples in New York. This is a new feeling for me, and it makes me immediately recognize the like 10 single/queer faculty on campus as allies. People can be perfectly friendly at work, but invitations will be rejected with the kind of blankness with which I would reject an invitation to a sorority party thrown by my students.
75.1: When you mention having a spouse or a child, does everyone come up to you and say, "That's, um, really brave of you to admit, but you should know that you don't have to tell us about your private life. You can keep it private"?
I don't mean to be glib, but this really made me laugh: it's a wonderful thought experiment.
I like babies. Gout, on the other hand, really sucks.
I've heard that it's about as bad as pain gets. Are you getting treatment for it?
86: (bitter humor ahead)
so it might be possible to frame invitations that would lead them through the thickets of assumption to the
unny clearing of mutual humanity, but it would be a full-time campaign. You need a faculty wife!
LB, don't your kids make drinks and food? That's perfect for adult parties! They can be like little waiters.
Also party manners is something all kids (adults) should learn. How not to dominate conversations. How to draw other people out. How to have a polite conversation about something completely and utterly boring. How to disagree with someone without yelling. How to change the subject. Maybe having strange adults around could be a learning experience (with or without the strange adults' knowledge?).
That said, kids from about 5 to 14 are my favourite to talk to. They have their own (strongly held) opinions and are often fascinatingly knowledgeable about something (dinosaurs). Plus they're usually super curious (and then I have to explain and justify myself in ways that adult conversation often doesn't require me to).
88: Gah, Natilo. Is this a not-unanticipated accompaniment to the gall bladder removal somehow? Not to go overly solicitous again, but have you reported it to your doctors? Is there anything to be done?
I don't find other people's children boring (well, unless they're in the fourth trimester, when they're objectively boring). I wonder if find other people's children boring is more common when you have your own children? Childhood development is fascinating.
91: LB, don't your kids make drinks and food? That's perfect for adult parties! They can be like little waiters.
Mime waiters.
89: There's not that much to do, really. I'm trying to stay hydrated and elevate my feet, and I've got lots of Percocet due to the surgery. Mostly though you just have to wait until it goes away. Right now, I can just barely stand to stand up & shuffle to the bathroom, 15 feet away. And that is a sore trial that takes about 5 or 6 minutes to complete. The pain is more intense than even the gallstone pain, although it's less worrisome, as I know what it is and it's in the extremities instead of right at my core. The pain I have not experienced yet that I wish never to experience is that of an orbital pseudo-tumor. A friend of mine, who has a similarly high pain tolerance to me, had a couple of those and he said it was just transcendently awful. Beyond even herniating a disc in his back. Way beyond.
All of this is true, but you learn by getting things wrong. I find I am less than completely comfortable at having new people around for my kids to rub the rough edges of their manners off on.
I'm making them sound horrible, and they're not -- actually, they're quite reasonably well behaved. And they're just fine in mixed adult-kid situations with old friends or other people with kids or so on. But it is an added stress in having new people around them in a primarily adult context -- monitoring their manners, and controlling annoyingness without making the event unpleasant for anyone.
92: I suppose if I had thought about it, I could have predicted that the dehydration & enforced inactivity would have led to a gout flare-up. It started while I was still at the hospital. But I doubt it would have made much difference in my actual treatment plan.
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Speaking of privilege on this day of awards, a fabulous animated .gif wall of Oscar winners and losers.
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95, 98: I'm keeping my fingers crossed for you.
My surgeon told his med student shadow that people like me were "dangerous" because our pain tolerance was so high that we would happily eat a cheeseburger while experiencing pain that would leave regular people writhing on the floor, begging to be put out of their misery. Which was awfully nice of him, I thought. And even so, gout is debilitatingly painful for me. The Percocet and Aleve cut the worst of it, but they don't make it any easier to stand up.
99 is really fun, but I don't get why it's almost all women.
My sympathies. The only personally experienced analogue I have is after I drowned (eek) half a dozen years ago: everything hurt, so bad. Could barely make it to the bathroom (in the hospital, on watch lest I have a heart attack, which apparently was a concern, not that I knew which end was up myself). Morphine drip, and frankly, some inadvertent crying on my part.
Hang in as best you can, my friend.
The (Alanis?) irony is that the most anti-aristocratic of all commenters has the aristocratic disease.
Stay well. That sounds awful.
104: The real Alanis irony is that today is the last day of the big show, and I never got to see it. Barely even got to watch any of the rehearsals. I feel pretty sad about that, actually. The notices have been good, as have the houses, and everyone on FB is saying how great it is. Oh well. Thanks for the well-wishes, all.
103 sounds super terrifying.
Natty, that sounds awful. I'm sorry.
real Alanis irony
Something about this phrase bothers me.
The other day on the radio a woman said that the first time she tried Greek yogurt was "ironically" in Greece. It took me a second to realize that she was using the word "ironically" ironically.
103 sounds super terrifying.
It was. Apparently when I woke up after CPR on the shore, I kept saying over and over again, "I'm so afraid. I'm so afraid." I know I went to a small space and didn't know who I was. I don't recommend drowning, in any case.
On a lighter note!
91.3: Plus they're usually super curious (and then I have to explain and justify myself in ways that adult conversation often doesn't require me to).
This, yes. Once upon a time I found myself discussing and explaining my long(ish) fingernails to a couple of young ladies aged, oh, five and eight. They were a-wonder about them and wanted, variously, to know (a) how on earth they came about, (b) whether I could stand them, and (c) if I thought they were good. We talked for ages -- I have no idea what the adults were talking about.
The other day on the radio a woman said that the first time she tried Greek yogurt was "ironically" in Greece. It took me a second to realize that she was using the word "ironically" ironically.
Maybe she was just stupid.
"Ironically" has been beaten to a bloody pulp at this point. We may have to give it up altogether. Get out the thesaurus, society.
110: Our local in-joke on this topic concerns a first year cultural studies PhD student who heard something referred to as being redolent of "postmodern irony" and asked, apparently sincerely, whether there was any other kind of irony?
I don't mean this little-bitchily but I thought "drowned" included in its meaning "to death." Does it not?
I was thinking the same thing -- some time ago ttaM referred to having been 'electrocuted' and I had the same question.
Some people die and then are resuscitated.
115, 116: Hard to say, and no worries about little-bitchydom. I'd have been dead (was dead? apparently not quite yet?) had I not been fished out of the water and revived. I was floating face-down and wasn't breathing at the time, but obviously wasn't irretrievably brain-dead. I'm fine with "almost drowned". I'm not sure it matters.
I really don't want to threadjack to the point of such morbid thoughts -- though there are things I myself think about, say, the moral acceptability of water-boarding here -- and just wanted to express sympathy with Natilo about pain.
Well, I didn't want to threadjack with my gout, but there you go, it just happens sometimes. Almost drowning is way more interesting than gout. And scarier. The scary thing about gout is that it tends to seem like I am malingering, since I don't usually get much in the way of swelling or redness during my attacks. (This time there is visible swelling, however.) Also, holding my foot funny yesterday made my knee seize up, and I was freaking out that I had somehow caught lockjaw at the hospital, even though I had a tetanus shot just last year.
When I was in the hospital I decided that I am going to host a huge gumbo party this summer, with the best ingredients from the best local fishmonger and the farmers' market and stuff. I need to figure out if there is a local source of Andouille sausage though. I might have to order some online. Anyone have any suggestions for a favorite brand?
120: If you're not stuck on proper Andouille, Conecuh sausage from Alabama is absolutely amazing and what my Louisiana-native supervisor uses to make gumbo.
http://www.conecuhsausage.com/default.aspx
Hope you're feeling better soon.
122: Cool! I will bookmark it.
I'm fine with "almost drowned". I'm not sure it matters.
I think the difference is that if you'd been fully drowned, you'd have come back with psychic powers.
75.2: we're not there yet, but I'm sometimes amazed at how far my life is down that path. My bosses are gay couples from whom I get Christmas cards, gay couples are the bulwark of my church, and my kid is so totally used to same sex parents from her own friends that it's really nothing at all for her.
I was having this conversation with a younger het married couple I'm friends with a little while ago, and they pointed out that the only other married people they knew were all gay/lesbian.
And yet, I note that even in downtown SF, it's still remarkable to see same-sex couples holding hands.
Maybe it's that folks in SF are too full of ironic detachment to hold hands; I don't see many straight couples doing it, either.
Alternative hypothesis: no-one in SF is actually getting laid. Test that one to destructions, gemmunz.
parsimon, I am horrified by the drowning story but pleasantly astonished that you have (had?) long fingernails.
Well, I haven't met Jane, so emdash's kids are definitely my favorite unfogged babies I've met. No offense Jane and Baby O!
120: Kramarczuk's? That's where my grandmother gets brats and polish sausage. I know they have andouille, but have never had it.
it's still remarkable to see same-sex couples holding hands.
I'm mostly straight, but when I was once seeing another woman, it didn't take many occasions to realize how fraught such a simple thing was. Just not funny at all.
131: yeah, I apologize if 126 was downplaying how much more fraught it is for non-het folks. Woo privilege!
127.2: pleasantly astonished that you have (had?) long fingernails.
I don't know why it's astonishing -- they just grow that way!
I don't know why I'm defensive about my fingernails.
Nat, you probably know already, but since you mentioned only other meds, I'll note that allopurinol or probenecid work for teh gout.
OT bleg (because the hivemind is my preferred wiki): Is there a significant difference in the quality of surge protectors? Is the marketing of certain surge protectors as better for one type of appliance than another just marketing nonsense?
Sincerely,
Amped up in Austin
rfts, any chance you're going to bring Jane east for our 15th reunion this summer, so Blume can issue a judgment on our children's relative cuteness?
rfts, any chance you're going to bring Jane east for our 15th reunion this summer, so Blume can issue a judgment on our children's relative cuteness?
134: They're not thought to go with the rest of your self-presentation? However irrationally? Learning that you had long *hair* wouldn't have surprised me, and it also just growed.
I have an ill-formed thought about how assigning every imaginable trait to exactly one category (heteronormative, racial, whatever) makes the whole system more robust and pernicious.
rfts, any chance you're going to bring Jane east for our 15th reunion this summer, so Blume can issue a judgment on our children's relative cuteness?
Alas, I think we are going to be too caught up in the glorious experience of moving (3/4) cross-country for Providence adventures.
I have toenail fungus otherwise I'd paint mine just to strike a blow against the patriarchy.
130: That (and Surdyk's) immediately leapt to mind. I will have to check them out.
135: I've only had about 5 other serious gout attacks, only two of which were even close to this bad, so the only thing gout-specific I've tried is indomethecin, but I'm going in to see my GP on Tuesday, and will definitely raise the issue with him.
I wonder if I could paint my fungus-nails the color of regular nails and strike a blow against ugly feet?
142.2: Yea, a doctor probably knows better than a guy on the internet. I don't know how bad it should be before you try those.
Wikipedia says they will make you wait a week even if they want you to take it.
145: The sausages? I'd probably just break down and get some bratwurst at the supermarket.
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Someone very close to me wrote a novel, completely unexpectedly, and I'm reading it, and I loathe it.
Advice? This is someone with a very small support system, in which I place a decently big role.
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128: Too difficult to choose between them. As a child-unit considered singularly, they're unbeatable.
147: This sounds like a job for half-truths.
Half-truths and medications to lower uric acid for everyone!
149
Someone very close to me wrote a novel, completely unexpectedly, and I'm reading it, and I loathe it.
Advice? This is someone with a very small support system, in which I place a decently big role.
More info needed. Why did they write the novel? Are they going to try to publish it? Do you loathe it because it isn't to your taste or because it's technically incompetent? Would you be jealous if the novel was a big success?
They wrote it as a critique of the finance industry, but it's a critique of the idiots populating the finance industry, not the industry itself. They're kind of gleeful about the industry itself.
It's written well enough for an editor to clean up to John Gresham level of writing, if they liked the concept.
I would be delighted if it were a commercial success.
I loathe it because I can't stand the characters, or the setting. It's also completely right-wing, although I'm sure the author thought he was being mainstream. For example, there is a professor, who is an insulting caricature of liberals. Or, "equal lending practices" is trotted out as an arcane regulation that asshole regulators are going to force you to comply with, to get their kicks. Etc.
139: They're not thought to go with the rest of your self-presentation?
Ah. I have long(ish) fingernails, and long fingers as well. They go together somehow. I am never sure what my general self-presentation is in the blogosphere.
I don't really understand 139.2.
Is there a significant difference in the quality of surge protectors?
Jammies, who is an electriciangineer, says "Not really. There are some that are rated to handle higher surges, but..." and then he shrugged. "What is she trying to protect?" he asked.
"What is she trying to protect?" he asked.
Yeah, Kraab. What fiendish surge sensitive devices are you hiding, huh?
For Judgmental President, it sounds like 149 gets it right.
I kind of want to bluntly say that parts of it are offensive.
Also, I need to just read the damn thing, but I end up making so many notes because I get ticked off, and then start nit-picking. To the effect that I read ten pages at a sitting.
Should I just read it with my eyes half-closed and not say anything?
Judgy Pres, what does your friend want from you by way of comment?
That's a good question...I think he'd probably be open to hearing criticisms, but he also feels like it's taken a huge amount of time already, and he'd most like to start shopping it around.
136: My non-technical understanding is that there's almost as much marketing nonsense about surge protectors floating around as about sound equipment. Monster is the biggest offender.
159: You could always go for the dodge: "It's not my cup of tea, but with a good editor, which all the best writers have, of course, you could probably shop it around." It sounds to me like that's more or less what you've said here. On a personal relationship level, I'm not sure how well I'd be able to maintain the friendship, what with the right-wing and all.
Well, Judgmental P., you've already admitted that it has the potential to go commercial, with a good editor, so maybe that's what you could say.
157: oh I hate that. I have the hardest time reading things I disagree with because I peel off into mental disagreement every three words.
you've already admitted that it has the potential to go commercial, with a good editor, so maybe that's what you could say.
This is true, and something I could say. I do think people would enjoy reading how the finance sector is run by idiots bobbling around like Tweedle Dee and Dum.
On a personal relationship level, I'm not sure how well I'd be able to maintain the friendship, what with the right-wing and all.
It's family. And someone who needs support, in other ways. He still thinks of himself as an Obama Democrat, but he's massively uninformed about politics, and so the finance sector has filled that void.
163: It's driving me absolutely nuts. I'm half just venting here, because it feels like the worst homework assignment ever to wade through this.
165: hey, worked for The Da Vinci Code.
Honestly, hur-hurring about libtards is probably a better way to have a midlist first novel be successful.
Sorry, President, that sounds really unpleasant and like any outcome is going to be way less than great for you.
I found that having a child gave me a lot more privilege than I had as an unmarried but partnered lesbian. I definitely feel like we're in the parent club and even some of the people who were nice to me before are just more accepting because I'm now like them. And I suspect that to neighbors who would have thought of us as "those girls" or something we're now "that sweet little black girl and her moms." And I have no trouble being all up in the PTA talking about my partner or whatever (though I keep my status as a non-legal parent pretty quiet because it sucks!) and no one really bats an eye. It's outing and norming at the same time, which is not at all to say that having a baby is like being gay, wtf?
It sounds like it would be completely legit to say "You really conveyed the worldview you meant to. There was enough there for me to have a strong emotional reaction to it, although I'm not an audience who agrees with the thesis." I mean, at least you could detect the message, so it was that coherent.
It sounds like it would be completely legit to say "You really conveyed the worldview you meant to. There was enough there for me to have a strong emotional reaction to it, although I'm not an audience who agrees with the thesis." I mean, at least you could detect the message, so it was that coherent.
Maybe something like "It's a pretty conservative message, you know. But it's a quick read that people can sink their teeth into."
"I think it really has a lot of commercial potential! I feel like it has the bones of a book that could go very far. I must admit, I disagreed with parts of it quite strongly, but that also means you're provoking a reaction, which you want to do!"
AND THEN, when said neophyte author says "oh, what parts?" you can guiltlessly lay on the smackdown for like four hours straight.
"Great book, but your description of the finance sector makes my balls hurt."
it feels like the worst homework assignment ever to wade through this.
Oh, drat. If it's family, though, there's not much more you can do besides engage in the artful dodge.
having a baby is like being gay
Maybe the women meant "Both involve your genitals, sometimes, but they don't have to, because you could adopt and be a celibate gay person."
Someone told me that having kids is helpful for getting tenure, because your kids can play with the other professors' kids, and your older colleagues will be more sympathetic when your case comes up. Whereas, if you don't have kids, you have to work and publish as much as everyone else thinks they would if they didn't have kids.
Also having a baby often stops the tenure clock. Try leasing one, though, so that you can try it out.
having a baby is like being gay
If anyone can figure out what the woman thought she meant by this, it would be a public service.
"This is more profound and better written than anything Ayn Rand ever did."
Maybe because you can't get legally married to your baby in most states?
Reading a bad novel that you are required to finish is like having a baby. Both seem way too common in high school.
180: Which seems unfair since you can adopt your girlfriend.
Fine, babies come out everybody's butt. Share and share alike.
Leasing a baby for six months would probably improve my time management skills.
Ok, this is awesome: In the same round-table with students I had last week, we were talking about "Woe is the state of uninformed teenagers in the abstinence only era!"
Everybody was on the same page. I have no idea how sexually active they are, and I assume there is a giant range, but most of them openly said "I didn't know anything in high school! I learned it all in college! I wish I could go back and tell myself stuff." Which could mean relationship advice, birth control, or who knows.
In the course of that, one student says "A whole group of first years had NO IDEA that you can get pregnant from anal sex! I had to set them straight!"
Of course, I said "What?" and made her spell it out, to everyone's delight. All she meant is that technically semen is so spermy that the general mess might get in the wrong hole.
But seriously. These kids are traumatized about the possibility of pregnancy. The anal sex is not going to get you pregnant.
Possibly partly because they consider abortion both unspeakably taboo and completely unobtainable.
147: I am in the same fix. Awful. I'm using the skim & generalities method.
Is this going to be like the time that it turned out a half-dozen people here had all been on Jeopardy?
And I mean 188 in the sense of probably squicked out pro-choice college students, who would at least consider an abortion if they were pregnant in a less conservative area.
187: it's unlikely, but if you do get pregnant, God wills that you carry your TURD BABY to term.
187: So they now know about santorum, right?
What if you get pregnant with twins and they have anal sex in your uterus?
Re: the awful book
Will it be too upsetting to your relative to say something along the lines of "I thought the descriptions of the idiots who run the financial industry were great, but I think you should take another look at that professor character -- s/he didn't ring true to me, and I know a lot of professors"? Or, "you know, I've read a number of articles about that whole "equal lending practices" issue, and I think there are a couple of points that you should clarify for those readers who haven't done as much research" -- although obviously, if there's like 10 billion other things, it is going to turn into a 4 hour smackdown no matter what.
Also, you might want to point out that have a book be a moderate commercial success basically equals making just a tiny bit more than your advance, and seeing it selling for a nickel on Amazon within a year.
If you get pregnant with identical twins and they dispute paternity, you could probably really confuse some family court judge.
187: All she meant is that technically semen is so spermy that the general mess might get in the wrong hole.
Jeez. Do they know about how you shouldn't put the penis in the vagina after it's been in the anus? Not to put too fine a point on it or anything, but probably people should know about that. Too.
Are these people having sex without condoms?
189: !
195: The professor bit was so fucking annoying. He thinks the answer to everything is "Have a stimulus! And another! And another!" and the fool never stops to think that eventually loans have to be repaid. What a stupidfuck!
But yes to the 10 billion things and four hour smackdown. I just don't know.
(The last part seems a tad cruel.)
For example, there is a professor, who is an insulting caricature of liberals.
Can't you tell him that reliance on lazy cliches weakens the impact of an otherwise good story? Even if it's not otherwise good?
The thing is, if you think it's publishable (and your judgment's worth anything, but it probably is) then it's really remarkably good.
Can't you rave over it as amazingly competent, and you should really send it to publishers, and if this is your first novel, you should really write another?
And then gripe about the things that annoyed you. Separate out the enthusiastic praise and encouragement for the competence and possibly publishability, from the 'I think you got a bunch of stuff wrong, and were rude and unfair about the sort of person I tend to agree with."
200 is, of course, exactly what about five people have already said.
Can I re-appear here and bitch about new outrages, over the next four weeks, as I read it three pages at a time before I have to put it down?
202: No, that sort of behavior is absolutely anathema to this blog.
As long as no characters are named "Dagny" and no vampires sparkle, why not?
The thing is, if you think it's publishable (and your judgment's worth anything, but it probably is) then it's really remarkably good.
I'd say it's a great topic for a book. People would love to read about rich assholes in the finance industry. Whether that's enough to carry it, I can't say.
But yes, the rest of the comment stands.
206: Just because he paid for dinner? No way.
Sorry, 206 to 202.
I'm mildly worried about these kids who might? apparently? think that they can have anal sex worry-free. Seriously, though, heebie, did you talk to them about using condoms?
209: No, they were hyper-concerned about pregnancy. They're clear about condoms.
I'd be tempted to point out blithely that no-one gets pregnant from gay sex.
210: I don't understand. Condoms are a protection against not just pregnancy but also sexually transmitted diseases. They're having anal sex without condoms?
I realize you don't what they're doing, but it sounds as though they're viewing condoms strictly as birth control, and having anal sex (unprotected) because hey, you can't get pregnant that way.
This student was recollecting how she chided other, younger, not-present students for their misconception that you can't get pregnant from anal.
I'm pretty sure this student uses a condom when she eats a banana.
So, wait, she thinks it's possible to get pregnant from anal sex even when using a condom?
I'm pretty sure this student uses a condom when she eats a banana.
God designed the banana so they'd fit.
214: If you are going to use the same condom vaginally, you need to turn it inside out for sanitary reasons.
she thinks it's possible to get pregnant from anal sex even when using a condom?
No.
I'd be tempted to point out blithely that no-one gets pregnant from gay sex.
If you have gay sex with an incubus, that incubus may later have straight sex with a woman, impregnating her with your sperm.
Abstinence education is doubly fucked up if it focuses chiefly on avoiding pregnancy, is all I can say.
I know that's not news, but damn it makes me angry. I know people who are HIV+.
I can't think of a better use for the internet than asking, if you were going to buy a person unfamiliar with The Simpsons a season of the show, which season would it be? No offense to parsimon's HIV+ acquaintances.
218: Is "gay sex" reserved for men, and women have "lesbian sex"? I tend to use "gay" to refer to both women and men (who are homosexual).
I meant because I was asking something silly, rather than because HIV+ people don't like The Simpsons (though I've heard tell that that's the case, and also that they don't tip well).
if you were going to buy a person unfamiliar with The Simpsons a season of the show
Well, it depends. Do they speak English? If no, do they have language at all, or were they reared in some sort of small box? If the former, season 3. If the latter, maybe season 7.
220: In my opinion, Seasons 3 -7 would be great. Season 4 might be my favorite.
He's young, nine years old to specific, and was reared in NorCal. So yes, a box of sorts: a box of awesome.
Thanks, Moby. (By the way, it's a sad day, you disappointments, when the only straight answer comes from Moby.)
Mr. Blandings never lets me down. Ever.
222: I don't know The Simpsons well enough to offer an opinion on the question. On the HIV thing, I take it pretty seriously, as you will have gathered, but I don't need to publicly wring my hands in a place where people presumably already get it.
Mr. Blandings never lets me down. Ever.
Try asking him about California wine.
My advice was good! Anything from Season 2 through Season 10 will be great. The earlier seasons are probably better for a kid, as they have less topical references that will go over his head.
To be fair, I wasn't trying to distill the critical judgement of society. I was on the wikipedia page looking at the episode titles and remembering things from long ago.
218: Is "gay sex" reserved for men, and women have "lesbian sex"? I tend to use "gay" to refer to both women and men (who are homosexual).
It is not possible for a woman to have gay sex with an incubus.
Sing "Why Must There Be a Morning After?" backward and she will leave.
Incubi are necessarily male? I did not realize that for some reason. Because I never thought about it.
Only women can have gay sex with succubi.
Anything from Season 2 through Season 10 will be great.
Season 10, really? I dunno, man.
When a supernatural being wants to have sexual relations, she doesn't even see gender.
238: okay, maybe nine. I went back through and watched the classic seasons recently, and I tell ya, 9 was pretty solid with winners.
(I didn't actually get to 10.)
Season 3 of Seinfeld was obviously the best, though.
233: But you posted 218.2 as a response to a direct quote from me, and you know better than parsi that I'm female.
(A mathematician, of Noether: "Well, I know her to be a great mathematician, and I believe her to be female.")
I'm sure there's an urban fantasy noir with a legal plot point turning on whether sex with incubi and succubi is bestiality or not. I suppose 'demons' could be a third, non-human, non-animal thing. Never been quite clear on whether the biblical angels lying with daughters of men was considered a good thing or not.
243: I'm not sure what the fact that I responded to a quotation of yours has to do with anything. You made a blanket statement that no one gets pregnant from gay sex. The thrust (ho ho ho) of 218 was that there is* a way to get pregnant not, admittedly, directly from gay sex, but which essentially involves gay sex, namely, the gay sex between a man and an incubus that precedes straight sex between a woman and that same incubus.
* granting some plausible demonological assumptions
244: angels possess humanity, so I don't see why demons shouldn't also.
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As much as it drove me crazy when the press ganged up on Al Gore and John Kerry, I have to confess it amuses me now that the shoe is on the other foot.
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"I have some friends who are NASCAR owners" is a really unfortunate attempt at pandering.
That's really wonderful. My family was talking today about the "I love American cars! My wife has a couple of Cadillacs!" thing.
Relating to a sidebar story: Is there anyone who is not a pro-Israel fascist who honestly believes that "Israel Firster" is some kind of anti-Semetic slur? It's such an obviously accurate descriptor of AIPAC politics (although, really, "Likud Firster" would make the distinction even more meaningful.)
Alan Dershowitz is a Muppet known as Shanda fur die Goyim.
I thought "Israel Firster" referred to the order in which the bombers hit Iran.
In your clause 'If you have gay sex with an incubus', {me} may not be what you meant by 'you', but it would be very odd if I wasn't *included* in the set meant by 'you'. So you seem to be assuming that I could have gay sex with an incubus. I don't believe I could, although I could, as you usefully remind us, get pregnant from a sequence of events that included someone else's gay sex with an incubus.
187 et seq: Not sure the mineshafters put much distance between themselves and the heebie u. kids in the clarity and understanding department tonight.
One has surely encountered the impersonal use of "you" before, and even impersonal uses with implicit restrictions on the universe of discourse that can be deduced with reference to what is required by the way the term is later used. This is especially obvious in 218, since what I responded to was not "I do not get pregnant from gay sex", but "no-one gets pregnant from gay sex". Of course I could have been pointing out that, since some particular one, namely you, can get pregnant from gay sex, your statement is incorrect, but it is much more natural to read my statement impersonally, subject to the qualification that, since I am talking about gay sex with an incubus, the impersons spoken of are male.
Queer sex could involve turkey basters.
Queersingle sex involves two turkey basters having a conversation in funny voices.
In your clause 'If you have gay sex with an incubus', {me} may not be what you meant by 'you', but it would be very odd if I wasn't *included* in the set meant by 'you'
Incidentally I don't think this is remotely right; suppose we were talking about US politics and you made some statement about what might possibly happen in the Senate. ("No-one does X.") If I responded by saying something of the form "No, if you perform the following procedural maneuver, then …", I don't think that it's implied that you are included in the set meant by "you", since you, not being a Senator, can't do anything procedural in the Senate. Nor do I think this odd.
Letting M = man and W = woman, the following schedule of copulations:
W/M, W/W, M/M, M/W,
W/W, M/M, M/W, W/M
M/W, W/M, W/W, M/M
M/M, M/W, W/M, W/W
is a greco-latin bi-square.
Google results for "schedule of copulations": disappointing.
Ah, Hofstadterish. I was putting the reality-slip in the wrong place.
Badoomp-sshhhh.
This courtship ritual is hot. Is hot! Is hot?
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An exquisitely new etiquette question presented itself at tonight's Oscar party: when a friend shows up at the party during the second half of the ceremony, ought one tell her that her ex-boyfriend was just up on stage as a producer of the Best Documentary winner?
If my phone had still had any battery, I would definitely have asked the Mineshaft. I went with "no."
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Heh. she just figured it out and texted me.
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Who among us does not own NASCAR?
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Actually, this kinda endears him to me. Obviously I am almost the worst person in the world for Romney to target, but still, it does make me think fondly of him.
I would have said yes. Unless it would have actually upset her.
I'm pretty sure this student uses a condom when she eats a banana.
God designed the banana so they'd fit.
Kid B was complaining recently (as she frequently does) that all her class did in PSHE (personal, social, health education? Something like that) was talk about jobs and "if you were an animal, what would you be?" whilst another PSHE class were putting condoms on a cucumber.
I said I thought a cucumber sounded a bit misleading, not to mention intimidating, and wondered what was wrong with the traditional banana. And then she rolled her eyes and left the room.
Actually, this kinda endears him to me.
Endear might be a bit strong for me, but I have been feeling a bit of pathos/bathos (?? not sure) for Romney. Here is this totally calculated guy who seems to have a compulsion for just this sort of gaffe. Simultaneously he needs you to know how totally fucking rich he is, and have an intense desire for your acceptance even though he's a plutocrat. Push-pull, push-pull.
There's some messy unconscious dynamic there that finally makes him seem real in a way nothing else could. Not so helpful when it comes to electability, though.
Is there anyone who is not a pro-Israel fascist who honestly believes that "Israel Firster" is some kind of anti-Semetic slur?
Spencer Ackerman apparently.
205
I'd say it's a great topic for a book. People would love to read about rich assholes in the finance industry. Whether that's enough to carry it, I can't say
If you are really having trouble reading more than 3 pages at a time maybe it isn't actually any good. The Da Vinci Code is pretty horrible but I didn't have much trouble finishing it (although I thought it got worse as it went). Are there published books in the same general genre that you can compare it to? Does the author have personal experience with the finance industry and its inhabitants?
As for its politics and carictures of liberals I think comments are relevant only to the extent that these things are likely to impair its commercial prospects (assuming commercial success is the main objective).
Advice? This is someone with a very small support system, in which I place a decently big role.
If you think it has commercial potential, then it doesn't really matter whether you personally like it. You can lie about that bit. But make the conversation about publishing options and marketing (and getting dsquared to re-write it). Also you need to point out from the get go that the odds of them making a cent out of it or selling more than a few hundred copies are disappearingly small. In the unlikely event they can interest an agent it would help, but not much. Most published novels, even good ones, vanish without trace.
OT: She made me go shopping for real, non-protein-bar-based foodstuffs. Now I have arugula and baby spinach in my crisper, instead of the usual firearms, vintage jeans, ginger ale, etc. This domestication is all your fault, reprobates.
274 I'm beginning to like the sound of this woman.
274 is sweet. I'm happy for you two. It's important to have a little space for yourself in a relationship, so maybe you could keep the firearms in a little dorm fridge some place (?). I'm certain you will feel better though, with a healthy diet of leafy greens and regular sex.
251
Relating to a sidebar story: Is there anyone who is not a pro-Israel fascist who honestly believes that "Israel Firster" is some kind of anti-Semetic slur? ...
It certainly has the potential to be used as an anti-Semetic slur. And like "niggardly" it has the potential to be misunderstood. So politically correct types may tend to avoid using it which means that using it may carry unwanted connotations.
Obviously this is a fraught topic in a world where calling Obama articulate can be taken as a slur.
275: Of course, until you let her read the threads from the first week you were dating, the entire relationship is based on a lie.
Just saying.
They say 'America First' but they mean 'America Next', in Washington, in Washington
A sign of hope:
http://libcom.org/blog/world%E2%80%99s-biggest-ever-strike-india-28th-february-2012-24012012
Gout Watch: Still there, as bad as ever. I hope I can fucking walk tomorrow. Barely able to bathe last night, but it was worth it. Definitely going to remodel the bathroom with a low-clearance shower stall at some point before I am truly old and infirm.
251 277
Also of course sometimes even bad faith accusations can be effective debate tactics.
274: She clearly loves the height of your trees.
281 - gout can be cured, can't it? I thought that was the gist of the radio programme I was vaguely listening to a couple of weeks ago. Sending lots of sympathy and hope you can get some drugs soon. (Also, I missed the gall bladder thing? Hope you're doing okay with that too.)
I am skipping to the bottom now to say that I an wishing natilo the best and that I am one of the weirdos described in 101. I am too sick to read the Internet. or, perhaps, have realized how unhelful it is. I am cheating, on the phone. also the oxycontin isn't working as well as it might. also on whatever side the migraine is on, when I breathe in, it hurts when the air passes over my nose hairs. I declare this officially a bridge too far. anyway that was mostly moping when it was meant to be cheering. so sorry natilo! feel better soon!
the height of your trees
As an aside, that really is one of the strangest things Romney has said this campaign. I liked Michael Moore's defense of the statement, though: "Well, he does have that right. The trees in Michigan are just the right height. In Wisconsin, they go way -- you can't even see the top. In Ohio? Just a bunch of shrubbery."
When I had gout (I was 17 and it remains the most painful thing that ever happened to me), it was "cured", in the sense of "got better subsequent to", with heroic doses of aureomycin, careful diet and extensive bed rest. Not an easy process; I hope it's better these days.
Raise 'em French style and you get to keep your gay friends.
287: Felix Gilman did some pretty good riffs on it via Twitter:
Hu-man Michiganoids! I also love your lakes. I love their nitrate levels. I love their cold, breathable depths and plentiful wrigglers.
I love the beautiful women of Michigan, and the strong, hard-working menfolk, so similar to my own fleshsuit.
285. 289: I think for gout, "cured" means "did not suffer a reoccurence", which of course is always contingent on that not happening. There are some diet things to do, and I have been trying to do them (staying away from organ meats and asparagus), but as with this incident, best laid plans can go agley if something unusual happens in your life. Most of the attacks I've had have really been fairly minor -- as I said above, this is the first one where I've actually seen the typical redness and swelling that make gout "fun to diagnose" according to my GP, because it almost always looks just like the illustrations in the med school textbooks. Overall, I do need to make staying hydrated a higher priority, but it's easy to backslide on that, especially when I'm busy/stressed. Oh well. It's arts lobby day at the Capitol on Wednesday, so perhaps I can score a couple of extra points by hobbling through it on crutches.
I can imagine making some similar comment about tree height, or some other natural feature. Something along the lines of 'the trees look just like they should!' to indicate that it matches some internal vision I have.
Definitely going to remodel the bathroom with a low-clearance shower stall at some point before I am truly old and infirm.
Not a bad idea. Anyone can get injured, and there are days when a handrail is a godsend. I hope you feel better.
Flippanter, I'm glad to hear about your fridge. Domestication isn't all bad.
I can imagine making some similar comment about tree height, or some other natural feature.
Yeah, so can I. I certainly feel when I go back to New England (roughly when I cross the border from CT into MA) that things look right: the trees are the right height and of the right kind, the hills/rock formations are 'normal', and so on. It's comforting - a coming home feeling. I can't really fault Romney for this one, as odd as it may have sounded.
274: Oh, I missed this! Good work, Flip, you have her fooled into thinking you're reformable. (IMO guns in a fridge are okay as long as you don't take them out frequently. If so, the condensation will cause rust. I keep the kitchen gun in the oven.)
What temperature would it have to get up to before the ammo went off?
I suppose if you don't bake much, the risk of absentmindedly preheating the oven is small.
296: My use of the stove's oven is nil, it's still full of cake baking stuff. I use a toaster-oven.
I found this re temps: In his book "Gunshot Wounds" Vincent Di Maio describes various experiments where ammunition was heated in ovens. He says that .22 long rifle cartridges detonate at an average of 275F, .38 Special at 290F and 12 gauge shotgun shells at 387F. The interesting thing about these furnace experiments was that in all instances the cartridge cases ruptured, but the primers did not detonate. In fact the primers were removed from some of the ruptured cases, reloaded into other brass and fired.
So, perhaps scary bu not very dangerous unless you look in there while the ammo is cooking off.
It's wise to keep a gun in the kitchen if you want to safely cook lobster. They have friends.
I figured you were a non-oven user if you were storing things there. It just struck me funny that you were advising the oven as safer than the fridge for storing explodey stuff.
I figured no one would really store guns in either place, I was riffing from "The President's Analyst".
I also doubt that Flippanter stores guns or designer jeans in his fridge. His task now is monumental, however: he mustn't let the arugula or baby spinach moulder. Possibly Lunchy will have to come over to 'help' him use it properly.
Vintage jeans, parsimon, not designer jeans.
Right, you store designer jeans in the cupboards.
Everyone knows you keep your jeans in the oven on "keep warm."
I just put them in there when they're dirty, on auto-clean.
Right, you keep your vintage jeans in the freezer, not the fridge.
Of the world's two male kitchenistas, which is Flippanter?
Underwear is properly kept in the salad spinner.
In contrast, the clothes dryer is not an ideal salad spinner.
Actually, I have a vague memory of someone in my college coop doing that. Washed greens tied in a clean pillowcase, and put in the drier on 'fluff' -- no heat, just air.
But I'm not sure if he actually did it or just talked about it.
(Also, I should confess that I didn't know Biohazard was joking. Look, I'm east coast city people, I don't know from gun ownership. Possibly normal gun owners put them in the fridge/oven. How would I know?)
(This sort of ignorance is why the Democrats will never win the South, right?)
Hm, it's probably just me, but the people linked in 307 seem insufferable.
Musacchio also thinks there's something fun, and even a little bit glamorous, about her refrigerator/closet.
Blay, who uses her kitchen cabinets to store accessories, shoes and look books
What is a "look book"? No, never mind, I'm not going to google it.
Can I take the link in 307 as proof positive that hipsters are stupid?
288 was supposed to be directed at natilio and alameida.
313: Maybe it's just the reporting. I'm trying to be charitable.
314: I was wondering if you were talking to my ileum and duodenum separately or what
I'm cheating again! thanks BG! also, yay lunchy! those pre-washed greens they sell in NYC in the resealabke bag are fine, you don't have to do anything to them. the challenge will come in the summer when you cut to a montage. I'm sorry I was just looking at the notes here. I mean, go to the farmer's market, where the arugula has not been grown hydroponically and you really truly must wash it and dry it and roll it up in a clean dish towel and put it in the fridge and then eat it, like right then. feh. just buy tomatoes and stuff.
God I hate rocket. Disgusting bitter limp wiry stuff. It's worse than dandelions (and dandelions are free). When did people start thinking it tasted nice? When did it become compulsory to put it in sandwiches? Aargh.
312.last: a look book is a collection of found images that are seen as interesting, or important, to a "look", i.e generally a fashion collection, but also other things these days.