I shocked myself today as well, when I barely suppressed the urge, in class, to say, "those clever yids!".
Perfect!
I have a whine that feels entirely self-indulgent: I have been offered a job that (for job-related political reasons) I essentially cannot refuse (without serious consequences on my ability to get another job in the future). Said job is not exactly what I had hoped to find in my new position.
But given where people are at these days, whining about a job offer not being perfect feels self-indulgent in the extreme. And yet. Whiiiine.
1: Suffering from TOS Stockholm Syndrome?
I get shocked a lot at work these days, when touching the door frame, window frame, filing cabinet, or refrigerator. It only started after I bought new dress shoes, with a little blue horseshoe-shaped gel insert built into the heel.
I got shocked a lot the first winter I was on the east coast.
A drumming-themed post seems like the appropriate place to note that if you've always been meaning to masturbate to Levon Helm but never got around to it, better do it now.
I work in a baroque bureaucracy. I keep making the egregious mistake of asking permission to do things the way I want rather than forgiveness for already having done them that way.
The Pulp concert tonight was awesome--I was about three rows back from the stage--but I probably would have enjoyed it even more had I had another drink or two.
It also would have been better if I'd gone home with an attractive stranger, but that almost goes without saying.
I actually have an even more petty grievance, but it'll wait till tomorrow.
7: I have a client who is sort of unsafe living without more supports. Some of the higher-ups don't want to deal, probably because he lacks social skills (by which I mean that he's grossly unaware that people have social obligations in public and has absolutely no ability to read people) and elicits strong feelings So I called his psychopharmacologist yesterday who doesn't work for our agency. The receptionist went to look for her right away when I mentioned the guy's name. She thinks it's totally unsafe, and I kind of let her know some of the problems to get her support so that she would push a little bit harder. I didn't ask my supervisor first.
I only had a few precious hours this week between interview trip #1 and interview trip #2 for finishing my job talk for #2, but I spent all of it ejecting fluids from my body due to food poisoning. Now I have to teach one of my classes, get on a plane, and show up in a place I've never been before with no suitable clothes, no suitable job talk, and a wan aspect. Also, all of my students are emailing me bullshit about extensions and feeling confused and stuff, and I'm like, dudes, stop forgetting everything the instant you aren't looking right at my face.
re: 7
My boss - or rather the director of the projects I manage -- is very good at that. She'll just ask me to do something, or I'll just do it and tell her how it was done, and then we worry about squaring it with her/my bosses later. Who usually, of course, don't have a fucking clue* and would have no useful input even if asked, but want to make sure they can take the credit if it goes well.
* intelligent people, but these are largely technical decisions which they i) want to scrutinise, but ii) totally lack any of the knowledge or skills to actually do so, and iii) when they do have input always make things actively worse.**
** I don't try to tell them how to suck up to donors, or navigate the labyrinthine bureaucracy in which they are embedded, which is what they are good at [and it's a necessary function, I'm not knocking them in general].
7. Bureaucratic procedures are designed to avoid any blame for anything ever attaching itself to anybody. If you don't mind putting your hand up occasionally, they can IME be ignored most of the time. But I would recommend making sure there's a paper trail.
MATLAB is taking too long.
Also, one of my fellow first years keeps asking me to do her class work for her, which, what? No.
15.2 "You can't afford my rates. Sorry."
Shortly after I awoke to discover the ringing in my hear had ceased, the city started in with a jackhammer on the street outside my window. I'm all for jackhammering the street, but 7:45am, guys? Let's wait till a good solid 8am, shall we?
You're very sure because you've already tried hitting on her and were rebuffed? Details.
I'm a week behind in posting an online test because I underestimated how much work would be involved in switching to a new textbook. This is just one of many subjects on which I get "Why haven't you done this yet?" emails on a regular basis.
I've been relatively good at being less grumpy with students this year due to much better working conditions, but man am I ever tired of students complaining to me after getting their grades that they didn't understand the assignment. Did it ever occur to them that understanding the assignment is, like, a pretty big part of what one gets a grade for? They say it like their grades shouldn't count. It's not that they want to revise the paper, which I would let them do. It's like they want me to re-grade their work as if I didn't actually give them a specific assignment.
Did it ever occur to them that understanding the assignment is, like, a pretty big part of what one gets a grade for?
You should maybe write that on the syllabus followed by "And this means you, asshole."
Also, remind them that there is no automatic A for a dead roommate if they are implicated in said death.
You should maybe write that on the syllabus followed by "And this means you, asshole."
Or just add a bullet at the top of the list of requirements: "Work out what the sentence above means (20)".
I was going to suggest the "What we've got here is failure to communicate" speech but I forgot that it didn't come with mirrored shades. But you could do the hat, the accent and the blackjack.
I have been known to answer questions about assignments, if asked!
One of my favorite students emailed me last night to say he really has no idea why he did so poorly on his last paper, that he "must have grossly misunderstood" what the assignment was, and I was like, dude, there were like 10 bizarre typos on the first page alone. Did you read your work before turning it in? This hardly merits a reconsideration of my pedagogy. Then he was like, oh yeah, I did it at the very last second and didn't put much effort into it.
This class I'm in (the one with the fifteen hour exams) is taught by most members of the department in series, but the primary professor is the most famous member of the department, a man who is really into a different phase of his career, one involving book tours and invited talks, and who I was somewhat surprised to find teaching a class at all. The grading process -- involving the famous professor and his off-site research assistant trying to wrangle every other professor in the department-- has been something of a clusterfuck, enough so that some of the students proposed going to Prof. Famous to complain. It sounded like they were going to bring along an actual document not unlike a list of demands, which seemed like it could definitely backfire. I responded as gently as possible (in part because I have less reason to complain than many others) that I wasn't convinced this was a great idea, only to have one of the other G1s (also with no reason to complain) respond with:
"I agree with everything [ Sifu ] said. We don't need to be like Luther nailing his theses to the door, now, do we? The job [ RA ] is doing must be rather similar to attempting the herding of cats, mm?"
Now, instead of team gentle talking-down, I'm on team hapless, condescending cliche. Thanks for your support!
The problem with not usually wearing makeup is that when I find myself too ghastly looking from a cold to go to court without something to hide the red nose, I'm not really sure if I've done it right. I put on some foundation and suspect that I look like a mime.
30: do people look surprised when you speak?
That is, surprised before the casual F-bombing in court.
No, the judge looks her in the eye and says, "Fuck you, clown."
I'm on team hapless, condescending cliche.
We're going to send your academic career to a nice farm in the country where it will have plenty of room to run.
Maybe wearing the black suit with suspenders and a horizontally striped shirt was a mistake.
(27 -- I've been looking for a link to a clip of SNL's Camp Beau Soleil skit. Maybe one of our clever youngsters can find it. Meantime, I've had a nice time looking over the ep list for that season.)
Ask the Mimeshaft. For questions you really *don't* want the answer to.
Are mimes ever like "Here, let me write it down on this pad of paper. That's much easier." ?
Sure, but more often they just go through the motions.
I can never tell the difference between the mime-writing-with-invisible-ink and mime-doesn't-realize-pencil-has-no-lead gags.
Let alone mime-masturbating-an-invisible-dog.
J/rgen H/bermass was just starting to teach some courses at NU while I was there. He had a full professor who was essentially acting as his teaching assistant. This professor, in turn, had two graduate student TAs.
That was also when I realized that the main difference between analytic and continental philosophy was a yawning cultural gap in expectations about how long you should natter on before you get to the fucking point.
That was also when I realized that the main difference between analytic and continental philosophy was a yawning cultural gap in expectations about how long you should natter on before you get to the fucking point.
At what point, are you justified in doubting the existence of "the fucking point"? 400 pages into a book? 90 minutes of a lecture? 50 years of a life?
43: I never was able to read more than a couple of pages of his stuff at a time. Fortunately, he's apparently a big deal so paying attention in class was enough to get the main idea. Even more fortunately, I've forgotten what that idea was.
My girlfriend and I might buy a house soon. I'm OK with the problems we're expecting - we can afford them albeit just barely, the place is livable as is and just needs improvement, the place is almost definitely a solid investment - but we are expecting so many problems that I'm a lot more worried about unexpected problems than I would be otherwise.
I'm tired and cranky and don't feel like going to work. Do I win?
As I understand the rules, a continental philosopher has two write two volumes of commentary on another philosopher before they are allowed to write a book advancing an original thesis.
48: Yes! You win! I'm giving you the day off!
We're all tired and cranky and don't feel like going to work.
51: Not true! I'm tired and cranky, but I'm already at work.
Anyway, it's too late, essear. Sir Kraab already won. I can't give everybody the day off.
Could the rest of us have work outside on the lawn?
This whole makeup-inexperience thing continues. I had forgotten that blowing my nose would remove the foundation, leaving a traffic-light like nose in the middle of a white face. I now look more like the classic American circus clown than like a mime. Court in half an hour.
54: Pre-apply foundation to your hanky?
54: Sorry LB! I would have given you the day off if you asked.
53: Moby, you can work outside on my lawn. Bring your lawnmower please, because mine died.
I took the day off without asking peep first. Do I still get the day off?
I've got a bruise on my face from going to the dentist yesterday. At first, I thought it was just LB trying to put make up on me, and tried washing it off, but it didn't move. Also, it keeps raining at inconvenient times.
57: I don't even have an lawnmower.
54: you see, if you were an English lawyer, everyone would be distracted from that by the fact that you were wearing a ridiculous wig.
Someone in my parents' village keeps his lawnmower in their garage and cuts their lawn as a thank you. They inherited this arrangement when they bought the house. They also have a window cleaner who comes on the train and bus from about 40 miles away, with his bucket. He only does bungalows, because taking a ladder on public transport would be silly.
Sorry, there were no complaints in that comment.
58: Taking the initiative! I respect that! Yes!
59: Did your dentist punch you when you refused to pay the bill?
54: Perhaps opposing counsel will turn out to be afraid of clowns.
60: Too bad! Can you at least trim my hedges then?
My oven has a problem whereby it trips the entire house if it goes over a certain temperature. We've been putting up with it for quite a while, but the certain temperature is slowly getting lower.
63.2 No, I love my dentist. I would pay (fuck it, I *do* pay) just to go there and recline and have her look after me and feel her ample bosom (she has an ample bosom, definitely not breasts or anything) gently push against the side of my head. I guess my cheek didn't like being shoved around roughly.
Probably. I did wonder earlier this year if cleaning it might help.
Over a month ago, an upstairs neighbor's jacuzzi tub sprung some sort of leak, resulting in an entire tub's worth of water flooding into the ceiling of my office. (Twice.) The ceiling caved in, which necessitated tearing up the recently replaced hardwood floor, and also required moving most of my office into my bedroom. Office and bedroom have been uninhabitable for the past month, meaning I've been living upstairs and sleeping on the couch. Repairs to the floor are promised to take place this week. The ceiling, who knows. I've moved past being cranky about it and am now mainly pretending I live in a studio apartment above a dank, cave-like construction zone.
69: Let's just say that I have personal experience that carbonized cheese is a resistor.
Just make sure you turn up at court in tiny car and you'll be fine.
70 goes way beyond the petty grievance remit of this thread. Sounds fucking awful.
LB, from one hapless and inexperienced makeup user to another, one word: Powder. It turns out that it helps keep the foundation on in the first place and is handy for quick repairs. Powdering one's nose: not just a euphemism.
(Actually, a few other words: loose powder and a good quality brush. Go to Sephora and throw yourself on their mercy.)
Fucking rules of evidence, how do they work?
Thanks, peep! I did at least decide to work from home because I had an early morning* conference call and at this point it clearly wouldn't make sense for me to drive to the office.
*8 a.m. is the crack of dawn for some of us, ok?
Go to Sephora and throw yourself on their mercy.
We've already got one thread about relationships.
76: 8 a.m. is ridiculously early for a conference call. Working from home is a good idea, and no need to worry about actually doing any work.
After googling the famous Professor rob mentioned, I learned that there exists a field of study called action theory. I'm going to have to look in to that.
peep is in charge of my life from now on.
OP.2: 'Triboelectric effect' is new to me. Or was I just not paying attention back in the day?
80: Excellent! Now, go do something fun!
I'm at work and about to faint because my blood pressure is so low! Yay!
I'm at work and about to faint because my blood pressure is so low!
Not a petty grievance. Sorry. Last time that happened to me they took me to ER and kept me in overnight. Carbs!!!! Now!!!
83: you should work standing on your head. Or try driving your blood pressure up by reading some Crooked Timber comment threads.
Or just go home.
Also, 84. And if you do decide to go home, DON'T DRIVE.
You could ride a train and pretend to be Tom Friedman. That should get your blood pressure up.
Chris y might be right about the carbs. I know that my doctor is always on about how important it is to stay adequately hydrated when your blood pressure is naturally low.
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It has been almost exactly a month since Ben posted that "We Are Young" song, so I suppose the "We're Not Young" parody is right on schedule.
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A friend is driving me to the airport in a few hours, so all I have to do is stay upright enough while traveling. But I'm quite weak. I might check a bag.
As I understand the rules, a continental philosopher has two write two volumes of commentary on another philosopher before they are allowed to write a book advancing an original thesis.
This is only true if you take "continental" in "continental philosopher" to literally mean "philosopher trained on the European continent". There are analytic philosophers there these days (even natively), and continental (as a school of philosophy) philosophers from the good old US of A.
This one is something of a timeless/hoary classic/chestnut/cliche in my complaint repertoire but I'm on my way to jail.
Also some guy I think is sort of an idiot anyway was, out of the blue, a complete asshole at me on fb last night and it ruined part of my evening. (This might raise the question: why are you fb friends with him? As usual, I have no notion why.)
87: You mean a cab, right? The cab driver will tell you about the time he gave a ride to an annoying reporter with a mustache.
This one is something of a timeless/hoary classic/chestnut/cliche in my complaint repertoire but I'm on my way to jail.
So, what was it this time, smartypants? You tried to rob a bank? Again?
I'm managing an employee who basically does good work but he's ignoring my instructions to get the work to me within a reasonable time period. So now I have to be the jerk that threatens serious consequences for noncompliance. I hate being the bad guy.
73: Thanks, but I've actually gotten used to it. And it's not as if I was using the bedroom for anything. But that's a separate grievance.
95 -- have you introduced that employee to Unfogged? Sounds like he'd fit right in.
I see the thread veering off in the direction of non-petty complaints again, so I offer this as a corrective:
I'm sleepy.
97: Has anybody ever introduced their employee to unfogged on purpose?
95 - If only I didn't say so much about my work!
Also, it's so dry here that I'm always getting shocked. Even touching the plant in the hallway causes a shock. The other day I shocked my poor bird, who was very displeased.
97: And, then, we can have a ATM thread about what to do about an employee that doesn't get his work done on time. We'll all tell you to fire him.
He'll get the message, and you don't have to be the bad guy.
The other day I shocked my poor bird, who was very displeased.
O.K., I'll behave. Just one question. What did the chicken do?
I told him I was thinking about going back to eating meat.
There's a band in City Hall Park playing Tangled Up In Blue for National Library Week. This does not seem to me to be a natural or obvious mode of celebration. (Court was contentious but inconsequential. It's hard not shaking hands, though -- I didn't want to spread disease, but it feels really weird looking at an outstretched hand and saying no.)
I was going to complain that I'm going to Salt Lake City next week but on just an overnight trip so I probably won't have time to try for a meet-up. But now that I know how mean LizSpigot is, maybe it's better this way.
My office carpet is particularly good at generating static in the winter. Usually I end up getting zapped on the doorknob of my office, but if the door's been left open for some reason I carry around the charge until I run into some other grounded thing in the lab, often enough a power supply or capacitor. There's an instant where I think I've just fucked up and gotten my stupid ass killed before I register that it's just static and I'm still alive.
I'm nice to timely people! Let me know if you'd like any recommendations for stuff, especially if it's food related. We have really good food in SLC.
Speaker Christine C. Quinn and Council Members Jimmy Van Bramer and Vincent J. Gentile present New York City Library Day in City Hall Park on Wednesday, April 18th from 11:00am-2:00pm. Join The Brooklyn Public Library, New York Public Library and Queens Library in City Hall Park To Celebrate National Library Week with live entertainment: Brooklyn Public Library's "Lost In The Stacks" and Queens Library's "Dewey And The Decimals".
Librarians aren't always the best musicians, but we are pretty darn clever coming up with the band names.
106: I tape a wire to my thigh and run it out the bottom of my pant leg so that it drags on the floor. I assume this is common because I often hear of people who are grounded.
Peeps always get torn apart this time of year.
Further to 105: Liz & gswift, any chance you'd be available for a late-ish evening meetup on Thursday?
I think it'll be hard because I have to fly to Las Vegas the next day and I have a bunch of projects backing up, but maybe. Can I email you?
104: but it feels really weird looking at an outstretched hand and saying miming no.
What's the first rule of Mime Club?
115: I'm apparently among the first 10,000 people to have made that joke on the internet.
I tape a wire to my thigh and run it out the bottom of my pant leg so that it drags on the floor. I assume this is common because I often hear of people who are grounded.
Aha, a fellow member of the Antaeus Brotherhood, I see.
110: If you just piss yourself at regular intervals so your pants, socks, and shoes are always damp you can save yourself the trouble.
Now that I think of it you only really need to piss on your shoes.
Does rubber conduct, even when wet?
In the name of the greatest people that have ever trod this earth, I draw the line in the dust and toss the gauntlet before the feet of tyranny, and I say gratification NOW, gratification TOMORROW, gratification FOREVER!
Damn it, I posted 122 in the wrong thread.
121 if wet with something salty it will conduct. I think you're safe just pissing on your shoes every half hour or so. Depends how fast it dries, I guess.
I think if I pissed every half hour, it wouldn't be very salty urine.
125: And here I thought he'd been dead for years.
127: That's why it's so massive.
I'm here for you if you need anything else made explicit.
The first Google result for Colorado School of Mimes and a subsequent result that takes the Google search more literally.
I'm here for you if you need anything else made explicit massive.
In the land of the blind, the one-eyed man is king.
People of the internet! Although I have not bought flights, I have reserved a cabin at Big Sur, which surely commits me (and my family) to 2 weeks in CA in August!
We'll be in LA from the 4th through the 8th, then Bay Area/Sac from the 11th through the 16th. Plans are highly vague, and I doubt that I can manage 2 proper meet ups, but perhaps I can meet some of you.
Sweet. Whereabouts will you be staying in L.A.?
No idea. I'm going to stay with 1 person who live I don't know where, and visit another who lives in a similar location.
Wait, my mail program has succeeded. We'll be in South Pasadena much of the time. Maybe in Ventura the rest?
Wait, surely not Ventura. I was misreading a map. I'll let you know.
Cool, South Pas is around the corner from me. Ventura is not.
Ah, Ventura. This is what I am most proud of accomplishing on Unfogged.
Would love to see you, JRoth.
I will host the Sacramento meet-up! For sure! All y'all should attend to meet JRoth and front porch and eat.
I can see why that would be your favorite accomplishment, Halford.
Megan's front porch is a fine place to meet and eat. If you're inclined to eat a place.
Solvang is in a different county.
Thank you, k-sky. If you are ever out our way again...
I'm really looking forward to a big bowl of rice-a-roni with Halford, a steak with k-sky, and then draining a river in order to reap the salmon with Megan. Oh, and I'll finish up with a quick run to McDonald's with Neb. I've heard their apple pies are exquisite.
But if we do actually have a meetup, I promise to bring you a cheese plate for dessert.
149: He's going to be too busy hanging out with Von Wafer.
150: And I will eat it for an appetizer. Thank you.
I have reserved a cabin at Big Sur
UNFOGGEDNONACON!
Have some fun, out on ol' Highway One.
Bad transit I guess. But it does meet the 'e' lipogram requirement.
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I was just invited to come gawk at Babe Ruth's will, which is in a conference room here for some reason. (I think the will itself as an artifact is the subject of litigation, rather than the will as legal document, if you see the distinction. But I don't actually know what's going on with it.) I feel as though my chance to look should have gone to someone who would have been more blown away, but what the heck.
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155: I assume you're going to write your name in?
155: Presumably somehow related to this? (Bit form nearly two years ago.)
The last will and testament of Babe Ruth --complete with a shaky, misspelled "Georgge HermanRuth" signature -- had been missing for at least nine years, stolen from a Manhattan court house [Surrogates Court] only to wind up with a Long Island memorabilia collector, The Post has learned.
Sounds right, although the signature didn't look all that shaky to me.
But that's got to be it -- the Surrogate's Court archivist was in the conference room with it.
146: Solvang is in a different county er i et andet land.
der er fastsat for dem
Liz & gswift, any chance you'd be available for a late-ish evening meetup on Thursday?
I'm around but that vegetarian Liz might be faking knowing where the good places to eat are.
162: Turns out my meeting won't be over until 9. LizSpigot & I were contemplating, via e-mail, lunch. Any chance you (or any SLC lurkers) would be free then?
162: What, you don't like Sage's? I also suggested Squatter's.
It's my day off so pretty much anywhere and anytime works for me.
I should mention in an I have no idea if this is actually going to happen kind of way that I might be in SLC next November with the family. Buck's got a conference, and it seemed plausible that we might pull the kids out of school for a couple of days and I'd go skiing with them while he schmoozed. If plans solidify, I'll post or email about meeting up.
(G, how old are your kids? Mine will be 11 and 13 by next November, they're approximate peers, right?).
Yeah, pretty close. Mine turn 15 and 13 this summer.
I am interviewing for a new job tomorrow. Unfortunately, this job is not back in the Twin Cities, but in Ann Arbor. Ann Arbor. WTF?
165: Awesome.
Hate to tell you, gswift, but I'm also a vegetarian (though not a vegan). I'll let you two fight it out as to where we should go.
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NMM to Dick Clark.
Sickos.
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I'll let you two fight it out as to where we should go.
I'm actually not picky at all so wherever she thinks another vegetarian would like best is totally fine.
168: Same thing, it's in one of those "M" states out there in the middle of the country.
Best of luck.
168: Good luck, Chopper!
Of all the places I've lived, Ann Arbor is the one I'm most nostalgic about.
Sage's is a vegan restaurant with sandwiches, salads and more substantial dinner options. I think that's our best vegetarian restaurant. We also have Vertical Diner, which is vegan breakfast food and sandwiches, but it's more impressive if you're vegan since there are great breakfast options available if you eat eggs. If you're really into veggie burgers, though, Hire's Big H has some great options.
In summary, I recommend Sage's unless you're wild about vegan breakfast food or veggie burgers.
Sage's is a vegan restaurant with sandwiches, salads and more substantial dinner options.
GOOD LORD THE HORROR MAKE IT STOP.
but it's more impressive if you're vegan since there are great breakfast options available if you eat eggs
???
Actually, salads are OK, but I'm hoping that GSwift has a license to terminate Seitan and Tempeh with extreme prejudice.
I mean, Seitan is like poison.
177: I'm guessing there's a "not" that got left out just before "vegan".
Halford I think the bacon is making you engage in repetitive behaviors; you should watch out for that. Might be early-onset frontotemporal dementia.
177, 180: if you are vegetarian but eat eggs, who cares if you can find great vegan breakfast options? Great breakfast is easy, with MAGIC EGGS. But if you're vegan, a place that has great breakfast options for you is impressive indeed.
177, 180: Sorry, yes, if you're not vegan.
Halford, that link about seitan is so funny!
Okay the link in 179 is pretty funny.
The game/exotic meat store around here now has a paleo section on their website.
My doctor was spouting some of that paleo talk and I had to spend the morning trying to figure out how Halford co-opted her. Now I'm eating yogurt for breakfast and I'm not as hungry but I really miss my cereal!
188: It's a good thing the chicken feet are organic because you just don't know where those other chickens have been.
I don't want to let 118 pass unapplauded.
Now that Dick Clark has died, we're going to have to hear the same 12 annoying seconds of "American Bandstand" over and over again for the rest of the week.
Even I'm bored of talking about meat, but everyone could use more python in their diet.
everyone could use more python in their diet LAYDEEZ.
obvious but necessary:
everyone could use more python in their diet trousers.
I just want to point out that I went the extra mile in making the science accurate in 181.
Tempeh is fine. The protopaleos were all about fermented food until they realized they'd lose more weight if they cut out more food groups they preferred bacon to everything.
Seriously, though, I understand that python meat is an effective chelator for seitan poisoning.
The protopaleos
What, like, the Austalopithecines?
My sister's neighborhood is heavily Indonesian, and when I was visiting her recently we ate at a very good Indonesian restaurant. The tempeh was fantastic.
I had whole wheat pasta for dinner and I'm still alive. I'm invincible.
Halford, I read this WaPo article about a HS CrossFit (& Paleo) enthusiast and thought that your marketing is amazing. about a high school CrossFit (& Paleo) enthusiast and thought that your marketing is amazing.
I have to admit, at times the author seemed to be treating her subject, unfairly, as a bit of a freak.
My petty complaint: My clonipin prescription ran out, and just when I need it most. Called the doc for a refill, but didn't have time to pick it up. I have to rely on my second prescription, buspirone, to make it through the next two days. The next two days will prove to be heinous, chaotic, and exhausting, on a large scale. A very large project is coming due, and the opening date is non-negotiable. One anxiety medication might not do me. (Hell, what am I saying, the pot should count as anxiety med #2. But two probably won't be enough either.)
This is clearly a first world problem, if not a petty complaint.
189:
If you decide you can't stand it any more, wait snd have cereal for dinner, NOT breakfast. It will have fewer adverse consequences on energy levels.
sorry wrenae, are you in the U.S.? Because here klonopin has to be a paper script.
205: Yes, I am in NC. I left a message for the doc, so I may not actually have a refill waiting as I had hoped. Thanks! I'll call her again. I'd hate to have to drive out there for a paper script.
202 -- What a badass. A 380 lb deadlift is really pretty impressive for a 17 yr old girl. There's a little bit of nonsense in the article about CF necessarily leading to "getting big" though (CF doesn't make you bulk up, really the reverse, that's kinda her own thing) and the article was weirdly focused on her appearance. Still, I basically see the rise of strong women as the only effective and realistic solution to the body image problem, and this is one example.
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Newt just asked me "Hey, do you know who Dikembe Mutombo is?" Apparently the comprehension passage in today's state test was all about him. I managed not to crack up too conspicuously.
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I did a 65 lb deadlift yesterday. That was my max weight. If I had to rank the 17 year old and myself, by deadlifting weight, I would rank her first, and me second.
I did a 65 lb deadlift yesterday. That was my max weight. If I had to rank the 17 year old and myself, by deadlifting weight, I would rank her first, and me second.
See, sometimes that math PhD comes in handy after all.
Yeah, I can't do a 380 pound deadlift and am not really close. I don't know why I went with "really pretty impressive"; that girl is a total badass.
207: Still, I basically see the rise of strong women as the only effective and realistic solution to the body image problem, and this is one example.
The rise of physically strong women? In a deadlifting a bazillion pounds sense of strong? Geez, I hope not.
I was getting kind of excited about maybe trying crossfit but then I saw that reebok commercial and it looked like, basically, dorky dude-aerobics with weights, and so I haven't followed up.
The top women crossfiters in the world can't deadlift 380 (they can do a lot of other stuff very well).
The rise of physically strong women?
Yes. People are always going to be body conscious, so the only hope is to change the body that's admired into something that's about being functional and awesome, not starved and skinny-fat.
that reebok commercial
Sigh. I know.
"skinny-fat"? Is that like saying "hourglass-shaped"?
People are always going to be body conscious, so the only hope is to change the body that's admired into something that's about being functional and awesome, not starved and skinny-fat.
By "people" do you mean women here?
Without strong IP laws, the skills to make commercials like that wouldn't exist.
Yeah, she's badass.
the article was weirdly focused on her appearance. That's what bugged me.
Good luck, Chopper!
I kind of wish I'd attended a school in Ann Arbor.
213: I'm gonna try it. It will be interesting to see if I survive the first week.
I deplore this increasing CrossFittization of Unfogged.
Soon ya'll'll all be lots healthier than I (am).
219: Halford, I just want to observe that the entire world is not necessarily worried about having a body that is admired.
do you know who Dikembe Mutombo is?" ... today's state test
I hope this was a biology test.
217: The "skinny butt" picture about halfway down the linked page is something I kinda wish I could unsee.
213: dorky dude-aerobics with weights There was a crossfit gym on my block which I noticed before I had any idea what crossfit was, and man, that's exactly what it looked like to me. Or worse; dorky hipster dude aerobics with weights, for guys with ironic handlebar mustaches.
Really I just want to run more. If only that didn't injure me in novel ways every time I tried it.
I should put together a quick cash-in soundtrack album; "Jazzerfit"!
I hope this was a biology test.
Sex ed, surely.
I dispute 226. I think everyone, everywhere is concerned about that.
Is the Reebok ad you're talking about the one I found on youtube about the benefits of containerization for long distance trade that makes the important point that helicopters can be used for point to point delivery when port to port isn't good enough, or is there another one?
I just ran fartleks. It's a strange feeling to run at an all out effort and I can only manage it briefly if I want to finish my full run. Aside from that, I always feel like I'm going to trip and hit my face on the sidewalk.
229: Injury is what I'm trying to avoid most of all. I'm going to take it slowly and see what happens. The people I saw at the CF place here looked good without looking extreme; no anorexics, no hulks in green or otherwise.
232: Ha! Gandhi! Do you think he was concerned about that? I think not! (Or maybe he was, I have no idea.) I think we do need to be careful about generalizing from our own rather narcissistic environment. Halford said that everyone has a body image problem, and the best answer for it was for people to become physically strong: but no, people can and do also turn their attention to other things. There's only so much time in the day; some people are scrabbling for scraps from dumpsters; some people are raising 7 kids; perhaps they suffer from body image problems along with, but let's be serious here.
I'm trying to avoid Type II diabetes and put off angioplasty until past 65. Avoiding injury is a concern only in that it would require me to run less, hence eat less, in order to meet my main goal.
Gandhi had a huge body image problem. Those weren't hunger strikes, the dude was anorexic.
232: Ha! Gandhi! Do you think he was concerned about that? I think not! (Or maybe he was, I have no idea.)
Maybe you have no idea, but I do, and it's as already stated.
237: Yeah, but you (I) can become immobile while discovering a case of soda has gotten considerably heavier in the years between 50 and 70, or if one's loss of proprioception makes stairs something one should have thought about.
Running is good. It's not the only good.
I tried biking. It didn't agree with me. This winter, I'm thinking of trying swimming.
ONE'S BODY IMAGE IS TRAGIC; A MILLION, A STATISTIC
Indeed, I had no idea Gandhi was anorexic.
Perhaps I need another example, then, of someone who isn't concerned that his/her body be objectively admired.
If I could find a picture of my uncle Bubba I'm pretty sure I could convince anyone that he doesn't give a fuck what anybody thinks about his body.
Gandhi just wanted to look good naked. If you're going around in a loincloth and sleeping naked with girls a generation or two younger than you a bit of body image anxiety is only natural.
Stalin on the other hand believed in anorexia as state policy.
245: And that was pre-Viagra so add in some performance anxiety. The man was a total twitching wreck.
I think Halford's transference of the body image problem from being skinny to being Crossfit level fit doesn't solve the problem (for women), frankly. It's another angle or dimension of desirability that's just as difficult to attain and maintain. This is not a solution. It simply says: here's another way you can do it.
Mostly because he didn't eat enough meat. Some bacon, some weightlifting, he would have been a new man.
247: Trying to figure how to get free of the British was his "think about baseball."
I prefer to read 250 discussing George Washington (badly).
248: To be strong is a healthier goal than to be the skinniest girl in ninth grade in that trying to get there is less likely to kill you.
I can't believe I missed the complaining part of the thread. Nothing ever goes right for me!
It was more like stickball during Washington's time. [I think we all know what the next sentence here would be.]
248, 252:
I do think that "Difficult to obtain, and healthy" strictly dominates "Difficult to obtain, and unhealthy".
Any standards that manage to discriminate at all will be "difficult" for some people. For example, some people have to work harder at being nice/socially smooth, and never reach the levels true naturals can attain.
Halford's formulation seems to suppose that being objectively admired in one's body is a priority, so that then it's just a choice between achieving admirability in a healthy or an unhealthy way. It is not, however, always the priority.
You should seek to be subjectively admired for your body.
It is better to be feared for your body than admired for your body.
The hell? We're relegated to Standpipe's blog?
258: Does smell count? That would be easier.
It is not, however, always the priority.
Right, so an unhealthy ideal is no problem. Girls should just get over it.
Parsi, I don't think Halford's point is about people seeking admiration from others for their bodies -- its about what kind of bodies they admire, or seek to have. It's not so much about attracting attention as it is setting goals.
Now, people can surely make themselves crazy trying to look like the crossfit hot bodies. It is a healthier crazymaking than the current thinspo standard, but it would be even healthier to adopt a more expansive definition of the appearance of health, and healthier still to have personal definitions of health not so bound up in appearance.
261: ? I hope it didn't seem like that was what I was saying. Rather, there's only so much time in the day: you can train like the young woman profiled in the link in 202. You can also study science or practice music or work for the student newspaper and write. You can do some of each of these things. It's always better to have a healthy/strong body image goal, obviously, than an unhealthy one.
Speaking of diet plans, I think somebody hacked Emerson's Twitter account.
263 without seeing 262, with which I agree.
263: Wasn't it a NYTimes article that pushed the notion of CF types as Harry Crews karate crazies? No doubt there are such groups but that's not what I observed.
The only local crossfit gym I know of is on the road where people keep getting killed in strange ways.
Topic-adjacent, Heebie's observation about how you feel fat before you look fat because your clothes feel different to you before you look different to other people holds up. I find myself citing it almost as frequently as I recommend the perfect outfit.
I agree with Halford, in part because I think that people are by and large going to care what they look like naked, and in part because the goal of a strong, healthy body admits of a wider range of natural body types, is closer to being attainable, and trying to get strong and fit is probably better for you than trying to diet yourself into a different body shape.
There's nothing in there that says being attractive needs to be one's sole or primary priority.
I find myself citing it almost as frequently as I recommend the perfect outfit.
To wit?
271: Yes, the part that is Washington Blvd.
269: I just got hung up on the universal nature of the kindly advice: persons worldwide who are struggling mightily just to hang on don't care about this whatsoever, obviously. "People" doesn't actually seem to mean all people.
I'll leave off this now.
Most people in the world are delightfully thin already!
Admit it, Halford! Admit that some people have different priorities than other people! Admit that you were generalizing! Admit it, damn you!
273: Most probably care about being as healthy as conditions permit, it makes hanging on a bit easier. The ill effects of sitting behind a desk, steering wheel, or large trough of food all day is probably not a big factor.
re: 264
Yup. I'm getting phishing messages from him. Coincides also with attempted facebook hijacking. It's enough to make one paranoid.
Oh god this thing that I am doing is making me mad. So, on this project we are working with people we don't normally. And there was this thing that we needed to do, which they haven't done before, and we have, but they wanted to take ownership and do it. So that was all good --- I tried to do some stuff to help out on it and was told firmly to bugger off, they would handle it. All good.
Today, I found out that despite the fact that it was meant to go out almost a fortnight ago, it still hasn't. And that deadline was pretty hard, like. I mean, kinda absolute.
ARGH.
And they didn't do a very good job on it either. BLARGH.
In positive news, I ran into a friend from high school i used to have a crush on, and finally managed to do something about it, and that ended quite well, so that was quite awesome.
264. Could be. I had an incomprehensible private tweet purporting to be from him this morning.
re 11: way to go BG. My struggle with the bureaucracy is much more petty and selfish - just trying to order my next book from amazon so it doesn't take 3 weeks to get it from the university bookstore.
I will say that the Italian flair for bureaucracy far outshines anything they've ever put on the fashion runway.
Possibly phishing spam now arriving from CharleyCarp's twitter account.
Does anybody have an email for him (or Emerson)?
Heebie's observation about how you feel fat before you look fat because your clothes feel different to you before you look different to other people holds up.
I think this may be less true the shorter you are. You can see the difference of just a few pounds on me. Which /= "look fat," but still, it is visible.
286: Yes to both, and it's a common twitter spam virus. If they change their passwords, they should be fine.
Eating wheat gluten causes twitter spam.
Eating twitter spam causes weak glutes.
Weaking glute spam causes twitter eat. Spammer cause weaks glute cause. Cause twitter spam weak glute-eat? No dissasemble! No dissasemble!
Also no spell disassemble apparently. Off to the scrap heap.
Confidential to MN: We're into triple digits. I think it's safe to assume the next one is fake.
To reach comity on the question of CrossFit, I think Halford should post a photo of his own body and we can all decide whether or not we want to look like him. That seems reasonable, huh?
295: But for god's sake, wear underpants this time, Halford!
179 really is funny!
(CA and pals called poison control in high school because one of their cohort had eaten a few bites of the house dieffenbachia* and his tongue swelled up and he couldn't speak. Poison control apparently was laughing too hard to give any advice straightaway.)
*"I'm so bored I could eat houseplants! said CA's friend, as he chomped the houseplant commonly known as "Dumb Cane."
I think it's probably more correctly called a virus. I clicked on the link from Emerson, and the same message got sent to a bunch of people on my list. I've DM'd people not to click on the link -- if someone gets it indirectly from me, (a) sorry and (b) don't click the link.
I am sad that Unfogged has moved from swimming to Crossfit.
At least Tia is still on my team. Where is JP!?!?
And, at the same time asilon was asking Halford to post his picture, she messaged me, begging me not to post pictures of me in my bathing suit.
I assume people have alerted Emerson using other media? He hasn't changed his password yet - new spam tweet from his account 17 minutes ago.
301: I'm in my fucking kitchen trying to develop a "winning" entry for a contest in which our organization has been well-placed in the "other participants" category for the last decade. But this year we're going to WIN! by leapfrogging the 250 to 499 other organizations which have routinely placed ahead of us...
...oh wait, swimming. My sinuses barely allow that anymore--I do need to try a saltwater pool, not sure if there are any available in the area, however. Probably at some fitness place. You know, the bad kind that manufacture fat people.
303.1 is my first world complainionship entry. Maybe I can win that!
301.3 - uh, that must have been a virus ...
First world not-so-complaint: My boss told me to stay home today and not get snot all over her nice clean office. (She was much pleasanter than that.) I'm not actually feeling that bad, just coughing up lungfuls of junk, but I'm nothing if not compliant. Woohoo, sleeping in, having several cups of coffee, and then considering a nap. Or perhaps some stupid TV.
I have finished eating lunch and now have to get back to work. Right now this feels like something to complain about.
I wanted to go swimming today but I seem to be all stuffed up with a cough. I am going to train up to swimming a mile. But probably not today.
This list of shit to read is very interesting for sick/work-dodging people.
Does anybody besides the media and a few lefty peaceniks even care about US atrocities in Afghanistan anymore? I mean, at this point, with the urination and the midnight murder sprees and the black sites and the posing with corpses all the time -- can't we just assume that at any given moment, US soldiers are committing a wide variety of atrocities all over Afghanistan, and the vast majority will never be prosecuted? And 1 in 3 of them are coming back crazy. Go figure, huh?
I haven't even gotten to work yet. I'm feeling drained today. I have a hard time writing this without coming up with some offsetting positives.
311: Gotten to lunch. I'm at work. Oh am I ever at work.
310 -- Dog bites man.
I was IMing with an Afghan friend in Kabul the other day, in the immediate aftermath of that citywide series of Taliban attacks. He was (a) safe and (b) surprisingly blase. Thirty plus years of war will do that, apparently.
To the OP, I just stabbed myself in the finger with my pencil.
414: Why, Sifu? Was it giving you itself?
308:
Cala! That is the perfect time to swim. Get that junk out in the pool! Then, get in the steam room!
Do people get their junk out in the steam room where you swim?
306: I was thinking yesterday that when your opponent offered to shake your hand you should have just grabbed his arm and wiped your nose all over his sleeve. I think that is Universal Mime for "Sorry, I hab a cold."
At least Tia is still on my team.
Tia was just talking about trying crossfit.
298, which drew tears of hilarity, was a good antidote for the Gulf doom post.
310: Do you mean "in the US"? Oh, I'm sure there are people who cheer the news. I realize I don't know what the high-water mark was for public outrage about such things. Wild guess would be the 1990s, but I think that's probably wrong, and just more of my grim, qualified 90s nostalgia ("remarkably less bad!"). Pulp, Radiohead and Pseudo-Tupac all played CA in the past week, so maybe we can muster some outrage. Oh, and a sex scandal! I should drive south, buy a pack of Nat Shermans, and party like it's 1998.
310: The Afghans aren't really an honor-driven society, so I'm certain they won't be bothered much by the treatment of corpses.
321. No, also they're not Muslims by and large, so they won't care about them remaining unburied either.
re: OP
I had a camera away for repair, and repairman knew I needed it done and with me by tomorrow. I paid him for the work, which he had completed a few days back, and was expecting it Wednesday or today at the latest. He just emailed me from the post office. I think the odds high that he's missed the last collection. Fuck.
310: Does anybody besides the media and a few lefty peaceniks even care about US atrocities in Afghanistan anymore?
Dunno - I haven't checked on, say, the right-wing blogosphere, or the people at the local diner at 6 a.m. every morning. I think the US Dept. of Defense cares a great deal (sort of, at least when it goes public).
But yeah, we can probably assume soldiers are losing their minds in Afghanistan; I read something not long ago about how incredibly difficult it is not to come to view the entirety of the people and environment that puts you under such deep stress as an alien, vicious, non-human other.
||
Does anyone have an opinion on the best available juice extractor? I'm prepared to spend three digits to get a top-of-the-line consumer model, but I don't want to overpay for a model that delivers average performance.
|>
best available juice extractor
Do you need an extractor, specifically, or would something like a vita-miz work?
321, 322: Clearly the various corpse desecrations are not enough, and should be wrapping them in pigskin like various warbloggers were hooting and gibbering about back in 2003.
(and, yes, I feel vaguely ashamed of myself answering that question while ignoring the discussion of atrocities in Afghanistan.)
This juicer review, which ultimately settles on the Omega 8003, is informative.
Now that I have voiced the above flippant vileness, I will say: WTMFF can we actually do about it? Are there any pressure points left? "Not voting for Obama" is of course useless. Cheap outrage starts to feel like hypocrisy to me. I am trying to find ways to put cash behind my outrage over the oil spill, but I can do fuckall about a war. Right?
326: The intended recipient is looking for a real macerating extractor, the kind you can put random vegetables* in and out comes pulpy juice.
*or possibly bits of desecrated Afghan corpses.
309: This is great! I love reading non-fiction.
329: Don;t worry it's not like you're the World's Worst Macerator or something.
330: Thanks, oude. I knew one of you herbivores would come through for me.
330:
A cheaper Breville was even featured in the excellent documentary, Sick, Fat and Nearly Dead, which is about a man named Joe Cross who cured a chronic skin disease by doing a 60-day juice fast.
We are to assume that this reviewer is less credulous in evaluating technical claims about the products, I take it?
331: Cheap outrage starts to feel like hypocrisy to me.
I don't see why, or why it's "cheap" outrage.
Some of the problem with soldiers going bonkers has to do with multiple and/or extended deployments. Some has to do with the fact that we've increasingly peopled our on-the-ground forces with anyone we can dredge up for recruitment (whether or not they have a history of aggressive tendencies, say). Some has to do with a macho culture and a god complex -- and that's the fault both of our American culture writ large, and of failures of oversight on the part of military higher-ups. And some, it seems, is a function of a military attempting to engage in counter-insurgency measures, intended to win the hearts and minds of Afghan citizens, when in fact most members of the military are not trained for that whatsoever.
There are, at least, things to say about all this, and any number of people are talking about them. Public outrage and pressure does have value.
Sorry if I sound like I'm lecturing, but damn, not all outrage is cheap.
336: For real. I like that reviewer a lot, but I almost posted something about ignoring all the woo. I blame San Francisco. (Seriously, also all the shit about the nutrients being affected by being crushed in a certain way -- no.) There are good links! But people who are really into juicing are weird.
I saw that documentary, and had mixed opinions about it. The lead dude converts an obese follower, who calls him halfway through the movie for help, recognizing that his health was failing and his own habits would kill him. I still think that phone call for help (and his struggles the first few weeks) is one of the bravest things I've ever seen.
I can only recall the title of that movie as Fat, Cheap and Out of Control.
...about how you feel fat before you look fat because your clothes feel different to you before you look different to other people...
Alas, sometimes people see you without your clothes and the gig is up.
Having been skinny without doing anything to make this happen for most of my life, what I have found in the period since this ceased to be true is that a big psychological barrier to doing anything about this (it's hardly the world's biggest tragedy but...I liked how I looked twenty pounds ago) is that the extra me doesn't feel extraneous. I don't know how to explain this. It just feels like part of me. It feels like "well, there's really no way to get rid of this."
I was weirdly into juicing for a year this one time. I don't think it matters a lot whether you get the very top of the line one; rather more that you get the right kind. If you want to juice leafy stuff, it has to be the macerating kind. A regular one will not get much juice out of spinach or wheat grass. And I have this hunch that, by the time you're in that realm of Juice Seriousness, there's not like a Jack LaLanne late night infomercial cheapo model.
342: What's crossfit? Oh, I am such a kidder.
Alas, sometimes people see you without your clothes and the gig is up
One hopes "people" won't be so cruel!
341: It doesn't sound like you've put on weight -- it sounds like you've regained a part of yourself that was missing. Congratulations!
340: Have you been talking to my wife?
I missed the whole Crossfit conversation! Damn!
It's un-fucking-believable how steep the learning curve is, the first few weeks. It's amazing how much more I'm capable of. I mean, I was pretty wimpy and now I'm differently-wimpy, but it's still exhilarating to see rapid progress.
I haven't lost a single pound. Whatsoever. My goal wasn't to lose weight, so meh, but my point is more like LB's occasional point: the "Eat right and exercise and the weight will naturally shed itself!" decree applies to young adults and possibly men in general, but does not apply to me.
I feel super great, though.
Glad you are liking it, Heebie. (Not that I do Crossfit.)
I was weirdly into juicing for a year this one time.
I totally read this in the context of crossfit and imagined smearcase seriously hitting the steroids for a year.
I mean, if I lost weight I wouldn't complain. I'm not holier-than-thou. But it hasn't happened, and I'm not too worried about it.
FWIW, I have trouble buying the skinny fat guy's argument/claim about why people gain weight in their 20s/30s, since I had much, much more muscle and strength at 25 and 30 than I did at 15 and 20, yet I was much skinnier (less body fat) at those younger ages.
Also, AB told me the other day that she's read that the whole "muscle burns fat even at rest" thing is hugely overstated. Like, it's a real phenomenon, but it's a real phenomenon that's worth a pat of butter* a day in terms of calories burned.
* made up measure to suggest order of magnitude
"Eat right and exercise and the weight will naturally shed itself!" decree applies to young adults and possibly men in general, but does not apply to me.
Gets harder for the men as well. Aren't you about my age? (I'm 35) I do powerlifting type workouts with some crossfit/endurance stuff thrown in and I've definitely had to get stricter about my diet to keep my bodyfat down.
AB told me the other day that she's read that the whole "muscle burns fat even at rest" thing is hugely overstated.
This is my impression as well. Like, the crazy-muscle woman probably has 5-6 lbs more muscle than the soft marshmellow woman, which burn...right, about a pat of butter, a day.
Aren't you about my age? (I'm 35)
Yup, 34.
350: smearcase's roid rage is on a remarkably slow burn.
Like, the crazy-muscle woman probably has 5-6 lbs more muscle than the soft marshmellow woman
I bet it's closer to two or three times that much.
Yeah, exercise will, once you hit a certain point, not make you lose weight, and neither will "eating right" as conventionally defined. You need either calorie restriction (bad) or . . . well, you know where I'm going with this.
The problem is that nearly everything good (beer, bread, Swedish Fish) has grain in it.
I just read the article. Noticed a couple things.
Finding prom and homecoming dresses hasn't been easy -- ... "It pretty much has got to be backless and strapless because not many girls are built like she is," Blaschke said.
I had to get rid of one of my favorite dresses because the waist got loose, but I couldn't zip it over my lats. Small price to pay for pull-ups, but it was a nice dress.
And she took up Crossfit to support crew? We had a dancer at our gym who thinks that dancers desperately need to lift, so their backs don't go out in their twenties and thirties.
Some very light googling leads to a lot of people who've thought about it really hard. The chart this guy has about halfway down the page claims that the max amount of muscle that a 6'5" guy would be able to gain is about 12 lbs.
I don't like to google very hard because I don't want to bulk up.
So, for someone who hates running and doesn't have a lot of time what with a 90 minute commute, what's the best way to work out enough to prevent weight gain and maybe lose a few pounds.
So, for someone who hates running and doesn't have a lot of time what with a 90 minute commute, what's the best way to work out enough to prevent weight gain and maybe lose a few pounds?
I don't know how much muscle men can gain, but from watching them at the gym, I will say that gainers have to work just as hard as losers to re-shape their bodies. It takes an equal monomania about eating.
I do know men who've gained 35-50lbs, but that's up from their early twenties, when they were still shaped like kids. I bet a lot of it is the natural increase that men get across their chest and shoulders.
368: You should submerge them in water to measure the density and see if that's really all muscle.
I will say that gainers have to work just as hard as losers to re-shape their bodies.
Don't call them losers.
360: And she took up Crossfit to support crew?
Right, which has led to her being recruited to the US Naval Academy or some such, for the rowing team. Her athletic/Crossfit habit isn't a supplement to her life, but its principal mechanism.
So, for someone who hates running and doesn't have a lot of time what with a 90 minute commute, what's the best way to work out enough to prevent weight gain and maybe lose a few pounds?
A 90-minute commute sounds super shitty. That's awful.
Would it be possible to bike for 30 minutes towards work, and then pick up mass transportation from that point on? Or some variant thereof.
Heh. I do a body composition test in a dunk tank occasionally, which was enough to tell me that a summer of swimming put about a pound of muscle across my back. It was four days a week of swimming, on top of my regular lifting. So that's a benchmark for how much muscle people can put on.
Not really possible to bike. I have nowhere on my apr. to put the bike. I have a decent number of doctors appointments, so I get home around 7:40. I've got a Y membership that I don't really use much.
Or, how long would a bike commute be all the way? Boston's funny with public transportation: if you're unlucky, the fastest way to get someplace might be way out of the way. Not that this is likely, but if your distance as the crow flies is under fifteen miles, you might save time and fit in your workout for free.
(If it would all be in traffic, you'll need Tweety to give you a pep talk. I'm useless about traffic.)
Obviously, 375 crossed with 374. There goes that idea.
I bike around what I think are the relevant areas all the time; they're basically fine. One option would be to take public transit partway and then get a hubway bikeshare bike.
I spend a lot of time going places in the community by bus and don't always leave from the office. I think that if I rejiggered my schedule I could go to the Zumba class on Fridays.
They're putting in hubway stations all over cambridge sometime soon.
I have nowhere on my apr. to put the bike.
Folding bike?
Seriously, you go to Dudley Square and Hyde Park? Admittedly, I don't go to Hyde Park that often.
Still with the commuting -- is there a leg of your commute you could turn into a long walk? Again, ideally you could shortcut public transportation somehow to save time, so you could, say, get in a brisk forty minute walk to and from work without making your commute longer, but you'd have to work that out on a map.
Walking's real exercise, particularly if you're doing a lot of it.
We had a dancer at our gym who thinks that dancers desperately need to lift, so their backs don't go out in their twenties and thirties.
[whimper]
I get nervous walking around Field's corner.
381: ah, no. I was mostly thinking the Arlington/downtown axis. Dudley is pretty nice because you can take the southeast corridor bikeway but I'm not sure what the hubway situation out there is.
OK, notionally a foodie-friendly or at least foodie-curious group of people that reads too much, I think. Both stool and the brain are organs that consume calories, yet neither has been discussed here.
Relentless chess problems or memory exercises for static calorie consumption. I have no idea how to increase the metabolic intensity of stool though. Probably fiber (basically in all plant cell walls) and fresh bacteria, so Kimchi.
Solution: become the character on the bus who smells funny and reads incomprehensible books.
They have a Zumba class for our clients.
Relentless chess problems or memory exercises for static calorie consumption.
It's really hard to boost the brain's overall metabolic rate with specific tasks.
I go from Arljngron to JP and spend time in Sourh Boston, Dorchester and Roxbury.
Dsquared claimed somewhere in the archives to have lost a bunch of weight while overeating horrifically due to the mental strain of losing millions of other people's money over the course of a couple of months of intense trading. I've probably garbled the story a bit and slandered him in the process, but something along those lines.
Is there a CrossFit type thing you can do once a week that might motivate me to pick up the pace while walking with an enormous backpack.
Relentless chess problems or memory exercises for static calorie consumption.
Ah, so that's why the online gamer types are all ripped.
There are hubway stations right now in mission hill and south boston. None in JP or cambridge yet, but they appear to be working on it.
390: Sure, or BG could hire a personal trainer, and have a weekly maid service, which would free up some time.
The only time I've put on any significant weight was during my first time on the job market while finishing my dissertation. Then I submitted it, and started tae kwon do, and dropped it all before graduation without trying really. Post dissertation baby weight. Stress is weird.
Looking at the map, you could pick up a bike at the harvard coliseum, ride along the river to brookline, then ride through brookline to roxbury crossing and take the T from there.
Wait, you're suggesting it'd be impractical for her to get a high pressure job in the financial industry as a method of weight loss? I don't know why you're so closed minded about these things. Think big, parse! The only limitations on you are the ones imposed by the failures of your own spirit.
It takes an equal monomania about eating.
This is so depressing. I really like food! Especially junk food! But then, I have had the experience of cutting out snacking almost entirely (invisalign made eating between meals a giant pain in the ass) and losing almost 10 lbs in 10 months, with no other meaningful changes in my life. Once my teeth were straight the snacking returned and so did the weight.
I'm not really looking for dramatic changes in the size or shape of my body, though--in college I was in pretty good shape at just about my current weight, but with somewhat different fat/muscle ratio. So maybe I can hold onto the delusion that I can achieve the fitness results I want (which I envision, vaguely, as losing those 10 lbs of fat again and replacing them with strategically placed muscle) by finding time for regular exercise. Sigh.
398: If you can work a bike commute, I can't say enough good about it. Not weight loss, but man, am I springier and more Tigger-esque (when not hacking up phlegm). Throw in some pushups, maybe some pullups, and what else do you need?
Well, monomania about eating doesn't have to mean portion control or eating less. But if you aren't going to do portion control, you should do some shifting between types of food (away from carbs! to protein!) which also takes focus.
Still, if you like eating, you can eat and change your body composition with paleo-similar diets and lifting.
Once I get my parents sorted I want to get back to looking for work, though I'm always open to leads from the unfoggextariat. I'd live to cut my commute and have an insight gym. My goal now is stress relief and not letting my physical health fall apart.
Solution for not gaining weight (no fitness required). Don't snack, smoke a lot, skip breakfast, eat one large meal and one small one per day mostly made up of cream, butter, cheese, carbs, and a good amount of meat, don't eat much in the way of veggies or fruit except when they're in season at the greenmarket, walk a lot, inherit the right metabolism.
Do they have helmets at the hi way stations?
402.1 is the key and if you're anything like me will lead to either weight loss or weight gain on its own. Now is not the time for you to be taking on anything that feels like a burden if you don't have to.
Repeating myself, but for your situation, I think walking's the thing. Get a comfortable backpack, and speed will come as you do it more. It gets you outdoors in the sun and around people, it doesn't hurt, it's free, you know how to do it already. Low stress, good for bone density, completely paleo.
404: they don't; they suggest places to buy cheap ($8) ones.
400: Actually, at my new job I'm walking to work, and it's pretty damn sweet. I occasionally think about getting a bike so it would take me let's say 8 minutes instead of 18, but the hassle factor of biking in a suit (another thing about the new job) seems high enough. Or at least high enough that it's not worth it for that small amount of time and what would really not be a meaningful amount of exercise.
I really ought to be able to find time in my day for exercise, though (and University employees can join the gyms, one of which also within a mile of my house of course, for $24/year!), and eat more protein and less carbs. All of this is absolutely attainable, which just makes even clearer that the only thing stopping me from doing it is my own lack of willpower.
Solution for not gaining weight (no fitness required). Don't snack, smoke a lot, skip breakfast, eat one large meal and one small one per day mostly made up of cream, butter, cheese, carbs, and a good amount of meat, don't eat much in the way of veggies or fruit except when they're in season at the greenmarket, walk a lot, inherit the right metabolism.
Not much else matters, unless you're happy to let your exercise regime take over your life.
unless you're happy to let your exercise regime take over your life.
There are nice things about that lifestyle, if anyone is tempted.
BG, if you're just looking for stress relief and health and something you can do, iTunes has a lot of yoga podcasts that I've found to be useful. All different lengths and types of yoga workouts. At least it will help you with a little bit of strength and balance after a day of work.
My other advice is not practical: find a new commute. That's horrid.
392, those cheeto-munching weaklings should study these dudes.
Seriously about the gut, though-- more lignin and fresh bacteria, so kimchi or home-fermented yogurt.
It seems like we've had a bunch of wholesome exercise-more-and-eat healthy conversations, so I'd like to second tkm's nicotine suggestion. The new smokeless glycerine-based delivery devices make this not just slimming, but also fashionable.
403 is working pretty well for me, but I think I ought to start walking home on days that I don't have my son, especially since about 75% of the trip is in Central Park.
My other advice is not practical: find a new commute. That's horrid.
But possibly, if your lease is up anytime soon, it might be worth it to move.
408
I occasionally think about getting a bike so it would take me let's say 8 minutes instead of 18, but the hassle factor of biking in a suit (another thing about the new job) seems high enough.
I see a lot of people biking in suits.
I leave leather shoes at work and wear sneakers while commuting. These days I put shorts and a t-shirt in a bag in the morning and wear my work clothes during my morning commute, and I have no problems doing that. If it's warm enough in the afternoon that I'll work up a real sweat, then I change into the shorts and t-shirt to go home so that my nice clothes don't get so messed up. Later in the summer it'll get so hot even in the morning that I'd be unpresentable if I followed that routine, but I'll cross that bridge when I come to it.
That should all be less of a problem for you, if you're talking about only eight minutes. If you want even more exercise, you could always take a less direct route.
Or just don't worry about it, because walking to work is pretty good right there. Something you can stick to is the most important thing, IMHO.
398: Similar to your invisalign inspired weight loss, I developed horrible heartburn that was causing all the tissue in my esophogus to become inflamed. The doctor promised that it will go away if I lose weight so I started getting serious about caloric restriction, decreasing the bread consumption and exercising at night. It's finally working and I've lost about five pounds. I really miss bread, but seeing as I'm allergic to sunflower seeds, which is in all the multi-grain bread, I'm probably better off.
Something you can stick to is the most important thing, IMHO.
Bus seats meet that criteria.
I bring two changes of clothes and a towel in a bag when driving to the office on Monday in the summer, allows two days of bike commuting no matter how hot. I am lucky to have two grimy battered shower stalls in my building, though.
I really feel for the people who have clean, new shower stalls in the building.
I leave leather shoes at work and wear sneakers while commuting.
I don't know what your work clothes consist of, but I can't possibly condone, let alone wear, the sneaker/suit combo. I'll have to open an account with the resoler.
Perhaps you could pack sport-sandals rather than sneakers? There's nothing like the combination of tweed and visible bare feet.
I have slipped a little further toward total barbarism - a couple of times this spring I've left for work late enough that I didn't have time to stop at the gym to shower, just changed in the bathroom at work. This really won't work once it gets hot.
I don't know what your work clothes consist of, but I can't possibly condone, let alone wear, the sneaker/suit combo.
Wear a propeller beanie hat to distract everybody from your stupid footwear.
Ive heard that having your own war owl helps you lose weight.
420: I only wear the sneaker/suit* combo while biking and slip on the more formal shoes when I get to work. Of people who see me when I'm biking, about 10 percent are other bikers and probably understand, and another 10 percent are pedestrians. The other 80 percent are in cars, and I'm more worried about them killing me (or, worse, slowing me down) than whether they approve of my fashion sense.
* What I wear to work: slacks of some kind and dress shirt. Tie included about half the time, depending on meetings scheduled or just what goes well with the shirt. So it's more casual than some suits, but still formal enough to clash with sneakers, I admit.
423: Show me a bike helmet with a beanie propeller on it and I'd seriously consider it.
This really won't work once it gets hot.
Yup, those clothes can get really sticky then. You'll just have to wander around in a garish sweat soaked bike jersey and padded lycra shorts.
424 Any predator really. The larger, the faster the weight comes off.
427: Please. Like I spend the money on frivolities like garish bike jerseys. I'd be wandering around in a sweat-soaked Kerry-Edwards t-shirt from '04 mostly.
No showers at my office - I just bike in a t-shirt and comfortable shoes and change to dress shirt and shoes when I get in.
Based on advice here, I sprang for a waffle-textured bike jersey; much cooler than cotton when you generate your own wind, worth the $25 or whatever.
My work shoes already live at the office, with the walking commute. I wear hiking shoes to and from that are brown/black, so I kid myself that it's less egregious than actual running shoes.
Isn't the solution for the to-work outfit to wear cute little sneakers, like old-school adidas?
Might work for the ladies, but I'm pretty sure if I wore Adidas with a suit I'd look like I was trying to be a hipster.
Hell, if I wore Adidas (I assume you mean the old-school Sambas, not just random running shoes that happen to be made by that brand) at all I'd run that risk.
And yes, I assume it because you said it. I'm very clever that way.
I don't understand 433. You're a dude, right? Is there something about men's dress shoes that makes them unsuitable for walking? I can see women switching out if they're wearing heels, but otherwise, I don't get it.
411: It's a compromise. My BF drives 25 minutes to his office complex. It wouldn't be so long driving, but card cost money, and then they would expect me to drive people around.
438: It might be that I wear cheap dress shoes, but while the problem doesn't come close to what it'd be if I had to wear heels, walking a good mile each way in my work shoes wouldn't be that comfortable. They'd start to pinch a little at the toes and chafe blisters into my heels. Plus then they'd wear out faster.
Jobs in the medical area would be awesome.
438 If he wears full blown dress shoes, complete with stiffness, pinching, and leather soles, there are good reasons not to wear them on a long walk. Leather soles in particular are good only for the suicidal when it's wet.
Yes, they're "full blown" dress shoes with stiff leather uppers and leather soles. I call them cheap because the leather isn't full grain (is that the right word?) and I bought them at DSW or an outlet mall or something for like $50.
429: Oooh, I want one (though I think I can talk myself out it).
Is there a good guide to bikeways in the boston area?
A vaguely on-topic bleg:
A very bright, competent, lovely physics/math former student has dropped out of grad school (with serious props for quickly realizing it was making her miserable) and is looking for a job in Texas.
Just wants to support herself financially and not be in grad school anymore. Anybody have any long-shot connections I could follow up on?
(heebie dot geebie at gmail)
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I see the Colombia scandal broke because US security agents are cheap.
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I have some really comfortable leather soled shoes that I'd happily wear for a long walk. They have softer suede uppers, though. And yeah, not great in the rain.
Losing weight is bastard hard. In my case it was like a switch got flipped from skinny and can eat anything to fat and can't. When I did some fairly rigorous calorie counting I was surprised how little I had to eat before I lost weight. Probably need to get my thyroid overclocked.* But sedentary desk life is definitely a big contributory factor.
* I only have part of it, and have long been suspicious I'm under dosed.
447: The current administration really is too fiscally conservative.
When I worked a shitty retail job, I was on my feet all day and super light. I'd like to lose 30 to 15, but 5 would be okay to keep my current clothes.
Mostly it's my doctor telling me I need to exercise more.
When I worked a shitty retail job, I was on my feet all day and super light. I'd like to lose 30 to 15, but 5 would be okay to keep my current clothes.
Mostly it's my doctor telling me I need to exercise more.
Yeah, I have a couple of pairs of leather soled shoes as well, one of them just like men's oxfords, that are fine for walking. Stiff shoes that pinch just suck.
I don't think that I need to lose 30 pounds. I meant to write 10.
I have leather-soled shoes that are great for walking also. Problem is that the leather only lasts a couple of months or so.
452: If it will fit into your commute you can get some exercise with those stretchy "therapy" (really just rubber tubing) bands and some squeezy things. They're light, don't take up room, and IMX are good when stuck in traffic, boring meetings, lines at stupidmarkets, and so on. The tubing can be cut, doubled up, knotted, etc. to suit.
Alas, sometimes people see you without your clothes and the gig is up
AKA, launching the jolly boat.
446: US Air Force. She cld become an astronaut... Oh wait
A very bright, competent, lovely physics/math former student has dropped out of grad school
Not for everyone, but there's always shortages of math and science teachers. My wife's enjoying it more than the lab she was in and it has better benefits. Texas has an Alternative Cert. Program. Retirement's not too bad in TX, 2.3 percent of your salary per year of service. And there's a few districts like Austin that also pay into SS. Austin has half a dozen openings in the high schools alone. Salary schedule here.
My dress-ish work shoes were generally fine for walking as long as I wore the right socks until I got plantar fasciitis. Then they became almost unbearable after a few hours.
Actually, one shoe was fine, but I don't have the status to mismatch shoes. Fortunately, I wasn't doing work that really required dressy shoes.
Wow, at every level of teachingexperience, you get exactly $820 more per year if you have a graduate degree. That number must have been calculated by some behavioral economist somewhere.
At my first job out of college, the college degree was worth exactly $1/hr extra beyond no college degree for a starting employee. MA and PhD were also $1/hr more than the lower level.
|| This new Etan Patz stuff is kinda nuts if you grew up with it being the most covered story ever. |>
465.--I saw that earlier today and reread the article multiple times before realizing that there was, in fact, no indication about why the investigation had been reopened at this point.
465/466: Seriously, now. They're going to bring in a corpse-sniffing dog that can (according to the news report I read) detect a spot where a corpse once lay for 24 hours, decades after the fact? Sounds to me like they have a suspect they're trying to spook with mumbo-jumbo about new CSI-worthy forensic techniques, hoping he'll do something or say something to incriminate himself.
I wonder how common it is to have dozens of people on that kind of scene. Depending on how much space they need to cover, it seems like too many people could be an issue (but not a problem if knecht's theory is right, then it could be that they're trying to make someone think they're serious about finding new evidence).
I think they've had the same suspect forever -- he's in jail for molesting or killing or molesting and killing some other kids.
467: I doubt they're going to find anything, but I don't think that's what's going on.
"In the past few months, the official said, investigators had received information that Etan's remains might be buried in the basement. Then, within the past few weeks, an FBI dog indicated the possible presence of human remains in the space, prompting the decision to dig."
Oh -- that was from here. Huh, and that also says they don't think Ramos did it anymore. Well, who the fuck knows. But the school pic of that little boy kills me.
456: I've heard of resistance bands, but they involved hooks for doors and handles. Is that the same thing? I'm trying to figure out what these things are that I could use during meetings or on the bus.
http://stretchwell.myshopify.com/products/fit-loops
Like above, or the plain tubing you can make any sized loops you desire of any resistance. All you need for that is how to tie a "Hunter's Bend" knot. I bet you can liberate 10 feet of the stuff from a rehab place you know with no trouble.
I hook a loop over my knee, or use both hands, or wrap a loop over the neck of the idiot with 16 items in the express lane, etc.
The device you seek is at the end of this clip.
310
Does anybody besides the media and a few lefty peaceniks even care about US atrocities in Afghanistan anymore? ...
No.
I think the bigger outrage is we are spending billions and getting our people killed for no good reason just because our leaders don't have the courage to cut our losses. But it's hard to push for a more sensible policy because it would cause too many top people in both parties to lose face.
I've lost about 55-60 lbs since leaving the stock brokerage. 30 lbs since September of last year. My secret is not eating fast food/restaurant food for every meal and not drinking 20 or more alcoholic drinks per week. Sounds easy when you put it like that.
Also I've been walking to-and-from work for a big chunk of that time.
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If someone died in the state that's shaped like a mitten, and their will named one of their children as the beneficiary, but their spouse is still alive, is there a likelihood that the child would prevail in getting the assets (including the decedent & spouse's principle residence)? Also, if there were insurance policies with the child as the beneficiary, how likely would it be that the husband could get those monies?
We're talking about ||>
Sorry "less than sign" $500,000 amounts of money, possibly considerably less.
I am not a trusts and estates lawyer, nor am I a mitten-state lawyer, nor am I giving useful legal advice. But the issue here is that married couples own a lot of stuff jointly, and when one dies, the jointly owned stuff isn't part of the estate, it just keeps on belonging to the other like it did all along. Only stuff that was owned separately by the decedent can be bequeathed, and there's a perfectly good shot that there's not much of that.
An insurance policy is different, though -- it should go to the named beneficiary, AFAIK.
Allegedly the deed to the house was in the decedent's sole name, although I question whether that would make a difference, and I gather that's the kind of detail where what state you are in is critically important.
I'm going to drop the phrase "tenancy by the entirety" and move on.
Yeah, they need local lawyer advice. My off the cuff guess is that I think you'd need a weird set of circumstances for one spouse to be able to bequeath the couple's primary residence away from the other, but that's really off the cuff.
Anyway, under the assumption that this is contentious, all my sympathy to whichever of the parties is your friend. It sounds like a mess.
482: I love that phrase. I keep on meaning to check whether I am a tenant by the entirety -- I'm always a little shaky about how real estate law applies to co-ops.
The only reason I know that phrase is because somebody mentioned it when we bought a house.
Also, the mortgage-office lady had a really weird way of signing her name that filled the whole area with extraneous, but very deliberate, flourishes. She said this was an anti-forgery measure. Until the robo-signing scandal broke, I assumed she was just paranoid, but now I see her as a visionary.
480
But the issue here is that married couples own a lot of stuff jointly, and when one dies, the jointly owned stuff isn't part of the estate, it just keeps on belonging to the other like it did all along. Only stuff that was owned separately by the decedent can be bequeathed, and there's a perfectly good shot that there's not much of that.
Really? IANAL, of course, but that sounds weird. I see why that would be the default in the absence of documentation, and I wouldn't expect full ownership to transfer if one part-owner dies but the other is still alive, but given that there's a will saying that the decedent wants to transfer their interest in something jointly held to someone else, why can't they? I thought you could will whatever was legally yours to whoever you want, barring taxes and eccentric millionaire scenarios.
The question is mostly academic, though. If relations between spouse and beneficiary are good, this wouldn't matter. If they aren't, it actually should be harder to transfer property away from spouse than not. This is just lazy Friday curiosity.
For a variety of reasons that I'm going to assume have to do with mistresses, spite, affairs, and incentives to murder, it is usually hard to disinherit a spouse without divorcing them.
There are different ways to own things together. Tenants in common each own part of whatever the thing is, and can bequeath that interest. Joint tenants with right of survivorship, OTOH, each own the whole thing, and when one of them dies the other continues to own the whole thing (and tenancy by the entirety, which is a special status for real estate owned together by married couples in most states, works the same way). Here's a wiki article.
I understand owning real estate in common better than I understand personal property (although not well) -- I don't actually know how you figure out what a decedent owns separately from their spouse. Joint accounts would go to the spouse entirely, but physical objects or non-joint accounts, I really don't know.
488: Yeah, in NY there's a statutory minimum of how much of your estate must go to an undivorced spouse. I can't remember what the rule is, but it's always on the bar exam because it requires people to do arithmetic, which is hard for lawyers.
Yeah, my connection is to the child/beneficiary. I told the interested party not to count their chickens before they hatched when in came to the issue of the house and any bank accounts or other property, but that hopefully, barring weird mitten-state statutes, the insurance money was probably safe.
If there is less than perfect trust among all the parties, which it sounds as if there isn't, your friend should be paying attention to who the executor of the will is, and how that process is occurring. I don't have specific advice, but having lots of stuff be jointly owned by the spouse is a very normal state of affairs, and so if the spouse is the executor, it would probably be fairly easy for them to claim joint ownership of everything valuable if no one was checking up on them.
Probably need to get my thyroid over clocked.*
AB recently noted that her recent weight gain can probably be in some portion ascribed to going off her thyroid meds last fall (thanks, American system of medical insurance!). We joked about getting a kicked-up dosage to make up for lost time.
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Past the second gatekeeper interview. Now on to the first real one later this morning.
I live in wine country. In California. Why am I thinking about Ann Arbor? In Michigan? Just outside Detroit?
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494: Planning some skullduggery with your will perhaps?
Weird. I actually edited the word 'skullduggery' out of 492.
492: Apparently, what is making this fun is that the spouse is NOT the executor, but may be in the process of trying to squirrel away assets or hide the will or some such nonsense. This is all coming to me 4th-hand, so I'm not 100% sure about the details, but it definitely sounds like the kind of thing that this family will be going around and around on for years, even after the estate is settled. (Also, did I mention the spouse has significant debts, and part of the concern is to keep the assets away from creditors if at all possible? It just keeps getting better.)
I live in wine country. In California. Why am I thinking about Ann Arbor? In Michigan? Just outside Detroit?
Because you want to sink into a sad, gray depression? Because you want heavy gray skies for six months of sky, with very little snow, so that your entire visible color palette is limited to the brown-gray spectrum? Because the Henry Ford museum is cool?
I know a couple who are both on second marriages, well third for him, because one of his other wives died. They both have kids from other marriages. They sold the house that they owned together and are now living in a house he inherited in Maine. She has a life estate in it before it passes to his kids.
My poor, elderly neighbor's wife died rather suddenly and he had to move so that her kids could sell it to somebody who I told to fuck-off before I knew it was my neighbor.
That's a nice way to handle it.
498: Was this your only time living in the north, heebie? Also, you didn't get a lot of snow?
501 to 499, although I suppose to 500 as well.
502: Yes and yes. I found it really unbearable.
Came for the brownness, stayed for the street names.
"Very little snow" in Ann Arbor is quite the unrepresentative sample.
506: Thanks for the back-up!
That someone coming from Florida would have a hard time adjusting to the cold & relative darkness of Michigan doesn't suprise me at all, but the part about little snow is perplexing.
More than you would ever want to know about snow in Ann Arbor. Averages somewhere around 57 inches. I'm surprised how much more than Detroit, which is in the low 40s. There is a pretty big east-to-west gradient across lower Michigan due to lake effects in the west, but should not kick in that quickly ( for instance Ann Arbor inches more than Lansing does not seem likely).
498. I gotta say, TX as I've seen it seems to me like an arid hellscape crawling with police and people imitating badly-drawn cartoon characters. Parts of SA seemed OK, but that was about it.
Parts west, AZ or NM, equally arid but seem to me nicer.
My gut reaction to 497, Natilo, is to tell your friend to cut their losses, because except for the life insurance this sounds like a hell of a lot of time and effort and money to maybe get some of what they're entitled to. (And what they're entitled to might or might not be too much at all, the way you've phrased it!) Unless your friend is in dire need, or finds that the uncertain part actually is worth a lot, or there's strong sentimental value attached to something, I'd say it's not worth the high blood pressure.
But I tend to fear paperwork probably more than is rational in general and definitely more than usual these days.
That someone coming from Florida would have a hard time adjusting to the cold & relative darkness of Michigan doesn't suprise me at all, but the part about little snow is perplexing.
I could only find Detroit snow by year, and 1999 looks like it had a huge snowfall, while 1997 barely had any. I was there from Sept 1995 to Dec '99. Not sure why my overall impression was of not much snow.
My sister lasted one semester at University of Michigan before deciding it was bullshit and not fun. She switched to Berkeley for spring semester.
492: Yeah, executors need to be watched and so do estate lawyers. From the DE's rantings and ravings I gathered there are a fair number of incompetent (not exclusive) or dishonest ones out there.
Over the next few years after undergrad, I sometimes wondered if I should have transferred. The math program was a great fit in some ways, but a terrible fit in other ways. The weather made me woefully despondent. I had a tight group of friends, and we're still close in some ways, and not in others.
512: The problem with places like Ann Arbor is that there does not tend to be enough snow (or snow followed by cold) to really *use* it. For instance from my link in 508 only 25 days out of the year is there 5-inches or more on the ground. So a pain in the ass, but not reliable for x-country etc.
For ... 8 straight years, I believe, I visited Ann Arbor around Super Bowl weekend. There was ALWAYS more snow there than in Pittsburgh, and usually flurries in the air as well. It became a running joke that we might end up spending an entire year of our lives in Ann Arbor and not have any experience of the place other than 10 degrees Fahrenheit and skidding all over the snow-covered roads.
516: So you're saying I won't have to shovel because it will all melt?
There is a pretty big east-to-west gradient across lower Michigan due to lake effects in the west, but should not kick in that quickly
Shouldn't there also be lake effects on the east side?
Anyway, I've never been to Michigan so I don't have any useful input. I hear the trees are just the right size.
I was working/drinking with some Norwegians last week, and they were telling me when they left for the meeting, they had 1 metre or more of snow, still. They were also telling me the skiing gets good in early summer as it gets slushy -- so less chance of avalanches when telemark skiing up [and then back down] a fuck-off-big mountain. Mad.
520: I don't think so. The wind patterns aren't symmetric east-west. So the east side of Lake Huron will experience the lake effect, but not the west side. Or something.
522 -- I've mentioned before skiing (and then drinking) with a couple of Norwegians in Dubai last summer. Very impressive stories, sounds like plenty of fun.
I'd certainly travel to Dubai to ski if I was a Norwegian and also a total asshole.
Ann Arbor is, I think, among the most overrated college towns in the country. Its weather is abysmal (grey, cold, sleety, or hot and quite humid), the cost of living is incredibly high (especially factoring in its craptacular location), and it isn't located on an isthmus like Madison (in fact, it's not really blessed with any especially lovely natural features, though the river isn't bad and Lake Erie isn't too terribly far away). Why its reputation so far outstrips its reality is beyond me, though I suppose it has something to do with the fact that the university is truly great.
My sister lasted one semester at University of Michigan before deciding it was bullshit and not fun. She switched to Berkeley for spring semester.
I have always liked the cut of your sister's jib.
Yes, westerlies are the norm especially in the winter. Lake effect enhancements are also found SE (not just E) of some of the lakes as they often come from cold northwesterly 'wrap-around" flows that occur after storm systems (lows with counter-clockwise flow) pass to the east. This map (1971-2000 normals) illustrates the pattern (showing Ontario would be better, however).
Detroit is fucking amazing. I love it. Never been to Ann Arbor.
526: Maybe they were in Dubai for other reasons, got homesick, and decided to ski to get a bit of home away from home.
455: What part wears out first? I found I could add a few months to my shoes' life by having hard rubber plates attached to the bottom of the toe, and the back of the heel.
It cost a lot less than having them resoled/reheeled.
Am now disappointed by reality, after temporarily thinking Benquo was getting his shoes rewheeled.
Said Mother, "It just goes to show yer532 astonishes me. This trick is a couple of hundred years old; where have you been hiding if you've only just found it?
That the future is never revealed;
If I'd thowt we was goin' to lose `im,
I'd `ave not `ad `is boots soled and `eeled."
536: I never liked those rubber extra-soles be because they didn't last and made the shoe feel weirdly thick.
536:
Some people don't even know that you can get shoes cheaply resoled/reheeled.
I knew that (though I was getting massively overcharged for shoddy workpersonship for a while), but didn't know about the plates until a year ago. Did everyone else here already know about those?
I don't think it's terribly unusual not to know about (or at least not to think about) what things one can get mended, in this age of disposable clothing.
How long do shoes generally last? I don't think I've ever had to replace dress shoes due to wear. (I've only had the kind of job that requires them for four years or so.) As for boots and sneakers, the soles only seem to wear out a little bit quicker than the linings and sides and everything else.
538: Don't worry, I didn't know. (Not sure whether you want me on your side about fashion, though.) The idea sounds vaguely familiar, but I've never done it and wouldn't know where to buy either new soles or these plate things you're talking about. Do shoe stores have them and I've just never noticed?
It takes me about four to six months to wear through the sole of a casual shoe (i.e. with a rubber sole, but not an athletic shoe). It depends on the shoe, the season, and how picky I decide to be about having a hole in my shoe.
Sandals last me about two years before the sole is gone. They get thrown out. Cheap casual shoes last about a year and they also get thrown out. Nice ones about two, and get resoled, same for winter boots. Dress shoes last forever.
Do you only walk on Fluffernutter-paved streets?
They're all more or less seasonal so we're talking three to four months of use per pair each year.
535: I meant to add that I think you'll like it a lot.
[W]here have you been hiding if you've only just found it?
In a consumer culture militating toward pan-disposability, like the rest of us?
545: No, I've kept pans for years, and I've continued using them until they were so dented the lid wouldn't fit on them or they wouldn't stay still on the stove or something.
544 should be read as "I meant to add that I think you'll like it a lot." Since VW is not just a dick, but a tenured dick.
I can't picture a shoe repair place outside of NYC -- I know what they look like here, but I don't know if I've ever seen one in a shopping center. Where do people go to get shoes fixed if there's not a hole-in-the-wall with a grumpy man who tells you your shoes will be done Wednesday?
There was such a place near my former apartment building in the DC suburbs. Much like you describe, but I'd guess a bit more square footage.
The shoe repair place I use has a youngish guy, maybe 45.
548: There's at least one like that in Beverly Hills. Fixes bags and such too. Grumpy gets around.
They're harder to find outside of big cities but much the same: hole-in-the-wall, filing system from 1930s, pick up boots in a week, etc.
The shoe repair place I use has a friendly guy in his forties who is always very excited to see the vintage shoes I bring him from goodwill. He says, "Ah, a Bostonian, from before they were crap."
"Ah, a Bostonian, from before they were crap."
Before the Irish showed up, presumably.
Not sure I care for the implications of 526.
That makes sense. When Cyrus was confused, I thought maybe they were a local thing, and in the rest of the country there was something different, like there was a shoe-repair counter in garden supply stores or something.
The LA versions are identical, except with signed celebrity photos in them. Here's mine.
I wonder how this will work.
re: 540
Wow. It takes me literally years to wear through shoes with rubber soles. Even soft leather soles are a lot more than months.
I've seen shoe repair places but I figured repairing any of my shoes would cost approximately 100% the price of a replacement pair, plus the non-sole region would still look old and beaten up.
Not sure quite what 563 was going for, but it doesn't look very successful.
FAIL. I'll leave it to the young master.
561: For expensive shoes, this is not the case. I have a $150 pair of flats that I've walked through the soles of twice -- got another year or so out of them for maybe $20? $30? And got a general refurbishing that made them look not new, but not scuffed up. So a real profit over buying new shoes.
Men's dress shoes are usually going to be sturdier -- I bet a good pair you could resole quite a number of times before they looked bad.
Why its reputation so far outstrips its reality is beyond me, though I suppose it has something to do with the fact that the university is truly great pot has been decriminalized since the '70s.
I have four pairs of reasonably expensive boots that I've had resoled periodically. Three of them have leather soles (average half-sole, about $15; heels, $8), the other solid rubber. I appear to be unusually rough on shoes, but I've had all of these boots about six or seven years now.
558 et al. seem to "work" in Firefox and Safari but not in Chrome or IE.
570: You might want to see if you'll survive, like that seitan guy.
571: That's because Chrome and IE are teh suxxors. (Actually, I think they'd do it if there's a simple way to change the character encoding.)
I just ate a bagel.
WHERE'S YOUR GOD NOW, CAVEMAN?
I figured repairing any of my shoes would cost approximately 100% the price of a replacement pair
It also depends on what kind of shoes you're buying to start with. From what I understand, most shoes with non-leather soles can't be resoled, unless they're from a company that specifically sells those replacement parts. (Ones I know off the top of my head that do are Frye, Birkenstock, and Fluevog. I'm pretty sure some kinds of work boots do as well.)
I have the most perfect shoes ever in the world but they have rubber soles which are starting to wear through. I am very sad.
Hmm. Changing to unicode on Chrome didn't do anything except reveal that Chome's menus have once again changed: now it's "under the bonnet." I wish they weren't taking over the browser market.
And now I think I'm hallucinating, because the menu says "under the hood" again.
510, 511: My friend is actually the stepchild of the child/beneficiary. So not a direct interest per se, but having money accrue to their part of the family would definitely be positive.
I actually pointed out the applicability of the central theme of Bleak House to this situation in correspondence with my friend. Indeed, cutting losses would seem to make the most sense all around, but these are stubborn, bad-tempered people who don't know shit about anything and hate anyone that does.
Continuing this exciting browser commenting subthread, turns out Chrome uses different terms depending on if you have the UK or US setting. (This computer was set for UK until I changed it.)
Anyway, still getting blocks where I should be seeing other characters.
I opened Firefox just to look at that. What a disappointment.
Here's the place the DE used for shoe repair.
http://www.arturosshoefixx.com/
From what I understand, most shoes with non-leather soles can't be resoled, unless they're from a company that specifically sells those replacement parts
Sure they can. The cobbler sands down what's left of the leather sole, takes a new leather sole, shapes it to fit the shoe base, and attaches it to the shoe. The guy I currently use seems to only use Vibram soles when resoling rubber soled shoes and it works fine.
575: I know that's not true of heels, because I have to replace the heels on my Frye's yearly. My old shoe guy said they could do the soles -- I doubt they'd be exactly the same, but probably close enough.
548: We have one like that in DC, but without the grumpiness.
I know, that makes it substandard, but the grumpy place overcharged and did shoddy work, so I am willing to accept pleasantness as the price for good quality.
Much the same situation for tailoring around here; unfortunately, the good tailor is also quite pleasant.
Also the grumpy shoe repair place closed, which is the real reason I stopped bringing my shoes there and sought another recobbler.
553: Shit. That probably means that when my Bostonians wear out, I won't be able to buy proper replacements.
When did they become crap according to your source? (If more than 15 years ago, then I am happy with "crap" Bostonians. If not, then probably not.)
570: Does that mean you can now tell me where to find the good bagels in LA?
Sure they can. The cobbler sands down what's left of the leather sole, takes a new leather sole
That doesn't sound a bit like what one would do with a non-leather sole.
Oops, meant to say rubber sole. And it is what they do.
I truly did not grasp until just now which part of all that was not intended to read "leather".
In my experience the grumpy cobblers have sucked, the polite ones have been good. However, stay clear of native speakers of whatever language is the official one where you are.
575, 576: My girlfriend was sad that the rubber soles on her beloved $60 pair of shoes were worn out. Then I insisted on taking them to the shoe repair place, where they were able to replace the soles for about $30. Well worth it, I think.
They were nice enough to tell me that even if they replaced the soles on my Eccos, the shoes would fall apart. Reminder to self: don't buy Eccos.
But I did grasp it before reading 592. Go team!
594 does not establish a sufficient condition for good workpersonship. I haven't ever had shoes repaired by a native American English speaker, so I can't comment on whether it's a necessary condition.
I survived! I was really worried I would puke because that's what I'd heard would happen. And I accidentally scheduled a big dinner for an hour after the workout.
It was >50% women. Everyone was supportive. The instructor was nice. I deadlifted 30 lbs, did fake-pushups, and jumped onto a shorter box than most everyone else did, and I did a fuckload of that for 30 minutes. The fake pushups (slanted against a box) became the hardest part for me and I skipped a couple rounds of them, but didn't quit them entirely.
By the end I was pretty flushed and limp and could barely move my equipment back to the wall and barely take a shower. "That's how you know you did it right!" I felt a little close to puking. But I showered and went to dinner and was fine except I can't raise my arms too well. I feel good and worn out now but am a little worried about what the morning will bring.
(More datapointitude: I am a moderately active person who has never lifted weights. From time to time I do wimpy cardio; occasionally moderate hiking.)
Hooray!! It's really been a great experience for me so far.
Also I have to restrain myself from talking about it all the time because I'm so fucking proud of myself, so it's like double plus extra good when someone else brings it up.
not reliable for x-country etc.
Sorry I missed the active A^2 discussion. I think this gets it exactly.
I was in Ann Arbor from 97-02, moved there from Carolina. Hated it for the first year, but slowly came to lovelike it (Stockholm Syndrome?). But the winters are the worst of all possible worlds. Any large snowstorm is inevitably followed by freezing drizzle within a week, so the skiing sucked and was never reliable. The sun really does come out less than in pacific NW from November - May. We had relatives with a lakehouse near AA that we got to visit a lot during Spring and Summer, though, which colors my recollections. "The lakes! And not just the big ones but the inland lakes, too!" (Mitt said it)
Huh, it seems there's a Crossfit just a few blocks away from me.
I'm starting to think that Crossfit is sort of like Fight Club made safe. Is Mr. Halford building an army?
It's all part of his long-term plan to eradicate agriculture.
The first rule of CrossFit is you talk about CrossFit!
Perhaps that's been said before. Man, I can't sleep for shit. But I feel good!
Apropos of the OP: dating is weird and scary.
dating is weird and scary.
As any archaeologist will tell you.
589: He didn't say, and I have no idea how old mine are, as I bought them at goodwill.
You idiots made me dream about Crossfit last night. Knock it off.
OK, I was an idiot and failed to buy nonstop tickets from PIT=>LAX/SFO=>PIT for $500. Now they're $540.
Am I just screwed? Should I bite the bullet and buy them now, before they go up again? Or will they drop after the weekend? I've heard that different days you get different prices from online flight sources.
Oh, except that won't work for Pittsburgh.
66: If you are at all flexible on travel dates (mid-week best) you should be able to get that flight for $500 or less this far out. I have also not found Cleveland to generally be any cheaper over the last few years.
||
208: I'm wondering if the "pineapples have no sleeves" section was on same the test as the Dikembe Mutombo? Fuck a bunch of standardized tests, but Daniel Pinkwater!
Also how did we all pass on the "Know him? I've ___ed him?" response.
|>
590: Brooklyn Bagel Bakery. I'm tempted to try crossfit, but not to give up post-Neolithic cuisine.
Brooklyn Bagel Bakery
I knew they'd moved the Dodgers to LA; I didn't realise they taken the whole borough.
Fun fact: Once upon a time, Sunset Boulevard turned into Brooklyn Avenue as it headed east out of downtown Los Angeles. About twenty years ago, the city renamed it Cesar Chavez Avenue. East L.A. had a longtime Jewish history, and Brooklyn Avenue was a main drag.
The bagel place is not that close to the old Brooklyn Avenue, however. It's just a straight-up nod to the old country.
There's a good case to be made (OK, this is a case that I make all the time, without much knowledge) that the New York ashkenazi Jewish food in LA, which was originally designed as nostalgic food for transplants, now surpasses what you can get in NY.
I am so psyched about Ursyne. You know, I only started CF because of encouragement from Megan to lift heavier weights. And Urple was the original OG Unfogged CFer, doing workouts on his own from the main site. But he stopped and then couldn't run away from an attack of living dinosaurs.
But he stopped and then couldn't run away from an attack of living dinosaurs.
Urple was gobbled by turkeys? I thought he'd been a bit quiet lately...
That said, a good bagel is easy to come by in New York, and an adequate one difficult in L.A.
That's awesome, Ursyne. I hope Crossfit keeps feeling good for you. That's Heebie, Biohazard and Ursyne in this go-round, right? It is super impressive that you guys motivated to try something out.
Thanks for the encouragement, guys! I think I will go again next week. Yeah, when I finally slept last night I was definitely dreaming about fighting off dinosaurs.
Today I am pretty sore/reduced mobility, but it doesn't exactly hurt. I could do this again for sure.
couldn't run away from an attack of living dinosaurs.
Which are so much faster than zombie dinosaurs. (Plus they fly.)
When will the bears come for Ted Nugent?
Flyers goalie Ilya Bryzgalov when asked about the biggest threat the Penguins have before there series. "I'm not afraid of anything. I'm only afraid of bear. Bear in the forest."
Actually, he's pretty much played for shit, but the Pens and Fleury were even worse for most of the first three games.
Some friends visiting Charlottesville for a wedding were heading to Ann Arbor next for a visit. (They're from San Francisco.) They were all excited about all the great restaurants there, which they'd frequented when she did her residency at U of M hospital.
