Excellent. Always reassuring to know that sports are more important than education.
Maybe they would if Vegas would print lines on the future success of random fourth graders.
Er maybe they would care about education.
Anyhow, misplaced priorities at the root or not, why not take it?
I announced to my lab-mates that I was boycotting the NFL until the real refs were back and they were troubled and disbelieving.
1: Take the OP with a much bigger grain of salt, then.
I think this is actually fairly wonderful; this is probably the one union where the members 1. seem pretty blue collar but are 2. basically immune to attacks from republican politicians.
5: Just to be clear, I'm not grumping at you, right?
The loudest voices on my facebook feed blame the locked out refs for being greedy. Also, the folks most outraged at the replacement refs were extremely outraged at the real refs for bad calls last season, and will resume that outrage as soon as the lockout ends.
7: Oh, no I didn't think that. What I mean is that these are all Unfogged people saying these things in my facebook stream.
Or nearly all. But people who were already pro-union, seizing the opportunity to point out the illustration.
1. If heebie's facebook feed is any indication of the pulse of the country, people are really taking the NFL ref situation as a referendum on union-busting and the value of well-trained and compensated workers.
2. People are not really taking the NFL ref situation as a referendum on union-busting and the value of well-trained and compensated workers. (Are you kidding?)
3. Therefore, heebie's facebook feed is not a good indication of the pulse of the country. (Which is what I would have guessed anyway.)
I'm not a sports person, but the leftish spectrum of persons has of course been pointing out that this NFL referee business is one of the very rare cases in which conservatives are, in outraged fashion, defending union rights. (I mean, as far as I can tell, that's the position adopted by the outraged.)
I'm not sure it amounts to much more than: look! hypocrisy! I have no idea whether otherwise anti-union types will notice that.
I doubt it. And I hate to say it, but Shearer has occasionally said here that he supports sports-related unions because. Whereas other types of unions are a different matter. Shrug.
The Bobcats are 4-0, and will safely get to 6-0, I think, after visiting Davis 10 days hence. What are you people talking about? People still care about the NFL?
I heard some sports-talk bloviator going on about how unions are ruining everything. These replacement refs are terrible, and if only there wasn't a union the regular refs wouldn't have walked out!
But I'm actually surprised at how rare that sentiment is. The overwhelming majority of sports radio people, as far as I can tell, get that (a) the owners are being greedy and ridiculous. (b) the refs don't make that much money in a super profitable league, and their demands for more are fair , and (c) that however much you hate the regular season refs, the scabs are way worse. People who aren't super ideologically blinded seem pretty uniformly willing to blame the owners.
I don't think that means that sports fans (who weren't otherwise inclined) are going to start singing "solidarity forever" but it's a decent indication most people don't hate unions per se.
The quotes from sports fans I've seen (there were a ton of emails posted by Halford's favorite sportswriter) have been almost universally supportive of the (union) refs and down on the league.
Apparently there is some clause in the players' CBA that prevents them from taking any organized action to support the refs?
most people don't hate unions per se
Probably not: it's just unions for me, and not for thee.
Oh, then I'm grumping inappropriately at le tout unfogged. Comment 1 withdrawn!
most people don't hate unions per se
Most people I know hate unions. I think most people, if pressed, would say there shouldn't even *be* a referree's union, so that strikes like this don't happen. (More or less exactly the same tack they take with teachers.)
That said, everyone does seem to recognize that the league is very profitable, and so the owners are the ones with power to immediately end the strike. And more important than breaking the union is immediately ending the strike. That's the sports radio angle I keep hearing: yes, both sides are being greedy, yes, they're both at fault, but the owners are the ones who CAN end it and so THEY MUST, NOW, because we can't possibly suffer through any more of this.
16: A friend of mine posted the following on FB: "While the Collective Bargaining Agreement contains a no-strike/no-lockout clause that prevents a work stoppage during the 10-year term of the deal, the CBA doesn't expressly prohibit a sympathy strike, in which the players would respect the game officials' picket line. The players could, in theory, boycott games under that principle."
I don't get it. A sympathy boycott isn't a work stoppage?
The professional sports world is a world apart: the monetary stakes are very high, and the number of people who might possibly find themselves in a position to work in it is small.
Some portion of general anti-union sentiment -- in, say, the building trades -- has to do with pushback against the fact that you can't work a lot of jobs unless you're a union member. People find it difficult to become union members.
20: There is no picket line, so there 's nothing for the players to refuse to cross. There is no picket line because there is no strike. This is a lockout. The refs are being locked out because they want (roughly) the same pension package they've had for many years, and that's unacceptable to management.
And more important than breaking the union is immediately ending the strike.
As you probably realize, there is no strike. Nobody is striking. I wish there was a way to make that point so that it sinks in with people.
The refs are willing to come to work, but the owners insist on reneging on past commitments.
23 reads like it's from Sideways Stories From Wayside School.
Unimaginative gets it, and gets it first!
I feel like this is an instance where having six separate sports talk radio stations pre-programmed in the car radio is finally paying off.
Apologies for my repeated uses of the word "strike" in 19. I stand corrected.
Right now Jim Rome, who is not exactly a member of the Green Party, is going off about how awful and greedy the owners are.
And he just smacked down one of the "clones" by saying that the regular refs arent perfect but still should be able to get cash from the greedy owners. I'll have to turn off the radio now and stop this real-time reporting/commenting while driving.
Whoever Jim Rome is, he's probably only concerned that the game must go on. Obviously that's really important.
I'm with halford here. My oldest brother is a liberal Democrat, but (and?) somewhat susceptible to "conventional wisdom" type crap. He also listens to a shit ton of sports radio. He called me up last night ranting first about what greedy fucks the owners are and second about how pathetic it is to hear "douchebag hypocrites" Scott Walker and Paul Ryan whine about the scab refs. A little later however he segued into some nonsense about how the refs need to give a little too since they make "a whole lotta money for a part-time job" and "pensions are out of control." I then did some ranting of my own, and he conceded basically instantly, but maybe that was just to shut me up. He also thinks "real" owners like the Maras are going to put an end to the shitshow sooner rather than later.
TL;DR: "While there is still some generic animosity against mostly well-compensated 'strikers,' it's very much outweighed by loathing of the scab refs and the NFL owners."
they make "a whole lotta money for a part-time job" and "pensions are out of control."
The money at question is probably less than what the NFL charges for a couple of Super Bowl ads.
33: Heh. Yeah, he knows that. I'm guessing he was repeating bullshit some NY sports radio doofus felt he had to tack on so as not to feel too pro-labor.
A little later however he segued into some nonsense about how the refs need to give a little too since they make "a whole lotta money for a part-time job" and "pensions are out of control."
These kind of people are from another planet to me. I don't know how someone looks at America right now and concludes that anyone working for a living* is over compensated.
*excluding outliers like CEOs, etc
Last season rookies made more than $75,000. The most senior refs just under $200,000.
Hmm. I wouldn't object to them making twice that, or even more.
The refs aren't that much more part time than the players during the season, are they? Also, if they focused on football only during the season, wouldn't it be likely that they'd make fewer mistakes?
Which is to suggest that they should be paid more and paid to do a bit more (although that's up to their negotiations - I have no say on it).
Thanks. They're close to the 1%, but that has nothing to do with whether they should continue to have union protection.
39: It's a bad idea to adjudicate how much a person's job is worth. I mean, I'd do that. But it would come out like this: NFL refs should make, oh, the median wage. Teachers should make at least twice that. Sanitation workers should make twice what they make. Waitpersons should make the median wage.
Fights would ensue, because our current arrangements don't remotely compensate people according to the true value of their work.
Can someone knowledgeable explain why the NFL isn' t using expereinced Division I college refs, who ae accustomed to working in large stadiums, with top athletes and televison coverage? Or if they are, why are they so much worse in the pros than in the college game? Aren't those guys basically doing the basically same job as the professional refs?
I don't claim to be knowledgeable, but I think I read something about it being against their contracts. Also, the rules are different.
What's the true value of this person's labor?
42: NFL makes a shitload of money, and refs are integral to that. I don't see why they shouldn't make a shitload of money, then.
44: Right. Aren't they in their own union? Plus, I think, anyone with any desire ever to be a pro ref pretty much can't take scab work.
Its also important to note that these refs starting at $75,000 are those who have reached the top of their profession. They've already put in a lot of low-paying years in rec-league, high-school, and college football, before they make it to the NFL.
43: From a Sports Illustrated article from last summer:
When officials went on strike for one game in 2001, major-college refs filled in. That won't happen this time. NFL refs now serve as supervisors of officials for five major conferences--the Big East, Big 12, Pac-12, Big Ten and Conference USA--and they won't allow officials from those conferences to work NFL games. The source said that, in solidarity with the NFL zebras, supervisors in other FBS conferences won't allow their officials to work NFL games either. That means the replacements will come from high schools or lower levels of college, or be retired and/or dismissed college refs.
via Quora. I guess I should look at that site more often.
For comparison, MLB umpire salaries range from approximately $84,000 to $300,000 per year.
I was going to say what 49 does. I would assume that the refs who make it to the NFL are extremely experienced and have highly developed skills.
If the NFL lockout helps create more support for unions, will it also create support for better a better regulator state?
(crickets)
That's right, a double better regulatory state.
My friend's dad was a college ref, and then later a pro ref, and he had a separate career as a corporate lawyer making beaucoup bucks. So calling refs "part-time" is more meaningful than calling players "part-time". It's not just that the season only lasts four months - they can hold another job during the week.
49: Okay, but I think $300k (per 39) is a bit much.
thanks for the explanations to 43!
Basically, I don't see the broader societal value in major league sports, so while I understand why players, and referees and coaches and whatnot, are paid why they are, having advanced to the top of their professions, it's never going to make sense to me morally. Not in a "He/she deserves more than that" sense.
None of this is to say that I don't completely support the NFL refs union.
It's not just that the season only lasts four months - they can hold another job during the week.
That's kind of why I was asking, should they? If the owners believe in a market for labor and want referees focusing entirely on the game, how much would they have to pay people to referee full-time during the season? And why don't they?
As I understand it, the issue isn't really salary. It's the league/owners deep-sixing the officials' pension plans and moving them to 401k plans.
how much would they have to pay people to referee full-time during the season
It isn't a matter of pay; it's the schedule. Most weeks, there are only games on Sunday (all in different cities), with one more game on Monday.
60: That's what I heard.
Since they have the public's eyeballs, they should take the opportunity to point out to the public that a shift from a defined benefit to a defined contribution plan is a problem.
61: But using my n of 1, he was often scheduled for local games. He lived in metro Detroit.
I'm not exactly arguing against anything, since this guy was fantastically wealthy, and it's easy to imagine that the wheels of being a ref turn more smoothly for you when you're independently wealthy.
I do know what makes it possible to hold another job while refereeing NFL games. Thinking through this, I guess there's nothing you can do to stop people from working another job, but I wonder if more prep time/practice between games could actually help the level of refereeing that leads people to complain a lot about the regular refs. Probably nothing, since everyone always complains about refs.
Huh. Apparently "a deal is at hand." We shall see!
401(K)s are evil. They are sold as empowering workers in their retirement, but "embowering" is basically a code word for "shifting risk to".
63: Right, I'm just saying that it isn't possible to referee "full-time" in the way that basketball or baseball officials do because the sport is (for the most part) only played on one day a week.
Also, "embowering" is a code word for "empowering"
If we were to set salaries from an a priori moral worth standpoint, per parsimon's idea, we wouldn't have any of these problems with lockouts or unions!
Basically, I don't see the broader societal value in major league sports
I have to side with Robert Nozik on this one (thinking of his famous Wilt Chamberlain example). If millions of people are willing to spend money on sporting events (and more chose to watch them on TV) then they are clearly providing value.
Most of that value is just entertainment, but think about this way:
1) If actors are putting on a play that people pay to attend is it fair for them to get paid out of the ticket money? (yes)
2) If actors are putting on a play that people pay to watch on TV is it fair for them to get paid out of that TV money? (I don't see why not)
3) If actors are putting on a play and advertisers are willing to pay to broadcast that play, should they get paid out of that money? (again, I don't see why not)
So why is the calculation any different for pro sports? The money involved is absurd, but that's a matter of market size, I'm not sure how to make a moral distinction that would let me oppose having people in pro sports leagues make huge amounts of money.
I think the response to the refs lockout is pretty amazing, actually. The workers in this case are all wealthy men who don't need the money. They're almost all white Republicans. They could theoretically demand whatever they want since they mostly have other jobs and are not suffering in the least from not being paid right now. They don't even have the various sob stories that athletes have, coming from poor backgrounds, having careers that end before age 40, being exploited instead of educated, etc. And still, everyone who supports labor rights mostly people who would hate them personally, supports them.
And so do a lot of people who don't support labor rights, because it is IMMEDIATELY OBVIOUS that they aren't replaceable. This will be a useful example in any number of labor struggles in the coming years. "Remember when they tried to bring in a bunch of schmoes to replace the well-trained, well-respected referees? Well, this is like that, but with waiters / housekeepers / whatever. You don't spend a lot of time watching what these people do, but you can be assured that they are better at it than replacement workers would be. And pinching pennies on labor will make your life inconvenient because the workers all of a sudden will not know what the hell they're doing."
Contrarian article proposal: why don't we create a "Ref for America" initiative to bring in young, inspired referees on a two-year basis?
72: Really all this proves is that football is important to Americans in a way that nothing else is.
But we knew that already, right?
I'm just not sure that booksellers really deserve a living wage. After all, they're just undermining our public library systems, which is the real unvarnished good. People get accustomed to having books in their own home and then support for the public system erodes. It's like people who sell books are just serving the agenda of corporate interests who want to undermine the welfare state. Not very deserving of a good salary, if you ask me.
76: I wrote something replying to 75, and erased it when I saw this. My answer to your question would be "yes".
74: I actually don't know that it does. The nature of pro sports is such that the exclusivity of the athletes is part of the attraction. People wouldn't be that interested in watching the best 10% of athletes; they want to watch the best 0.01%. So the potential labour supply has an inherent cap on it, and those few who find themselves within that supply can command huge salaries. Then you have the mass media aspect of it, that allows you to expand your customer base beyond any particular city to hundreds of millions.
If there were only, say, a thousand teachers in the country, and most people learned most things from them, on the television, they'd probably get paid very high salaries, too.
IT'S A PRETTY SWEET DEAL, REALLY.
And 78b, incidentally and hilariously, is what futurologists of the 40s and 50s thought would be the primary use of television.
76: I wrote something replying to 75, and erased it when I saw this. My answer to your question would be "yes".
Don't worry, though, essear! My answer to your question would be—scratch that, is—"no".
Not that you should necessarily be more assholish.
80: they didn't anticipate the resistance that would bring from the teachers' unions?
77: I think the important difference with sports is that, unlike, say, novels, sports have the ability to elevate as well as entertain. That should be reward enough.
I think one of the things it shows is that people are more likely to be responsive to demands of workers for more pay when you can show that the bosses are bringing it in but not sharing it. I think an intuitive problem people have with public sector unions is a sense that the state is "broke" and can't afford to pay anything. That's so obviously not the case with the NFL.
77: I think the important difference with sports is that, unlike, say, novels, sports have the ability to elevate as well as entertain. That should be reward enough.
Indeed. Sepp Gumbrecht has written movingly on the beauty of sports, but has, contrariwise, never written movingly on the beauty of novels. I think that says everything one needs to know.
sports have the ability to elevate
I miss Slamball.
There was a guy who used and maybe still wrote for yahoo sports or had content syndicated there who advocated making an sports equivalent of a performing arts degree.
People wouldn't be that interested in watching the best 10% of athletes; they want to watch the best 0.01%.
The remarkable popularity of high school/college sports (in the US anyway) would seem to argue against that.
elevate
Start at 3:00, go back to the begining if there;s interest.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=98yRuBkUBGQ
There's a new Graeber post at CT! We should have a long thread about it.
89: High school football is a community rather than commercial affair. College football is minor league NFL. Anyway, the point I was driving at was that in most industries you can meet increasing demand by hiring more people and building more facilities, but in pro sport you can't do that without hurting the quality of the product.
College football is minor league NFL.
Wrong wrong wrong wrong.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EHj-yuMrskE
92: Allow me to be the first to make 500/5000 jokes about the title.
I mean, really. Go repeat that to anyone at all in Lincoln, Nebraska. Or State College Pa, for that matter.
97: I know those shitbirds love their school and their team, and think it's the center of the universe, but that doesn't mean they're right.
Full disclosure: I was interviewed for a post-doc at Penn State a few years ago, which I didn't get, but would not have accepted anyway, because jesus christ, State College...
I really think the importance of quality players is overrated. It's mostly about the competition. That's why reality TV competitions are so popular, even when nobody competing actually has much talent.
State College may or may not suck (I've never been) but Lincoln is great.
And most kids playing college ball know going in they have no shot at the NFL (Or NBA, for that matter). You have to stop thinking that the world of the 1% is the same as the world of the 99%.
I'm really confused by this whole lockout, as it seems to me that the amount of money involved is really really small relative to the NFL's revenue and other expenses. Is the point just cultural solidarity where the owners want to stand firm with their brethren in the "job creator" community by irrationally fucking over their workers whenever possible? Or is it some long game where they want to shift *player* pensions over to 401Ks?
State College may or may not suck
It does.
Lincoln is great.
I certainly thought this as a kid. I wonder what I'd make of it as an adult.
It's getting new storm sewers so I assume that would be sufficient improvement.
[quote]High school football is a community rather than commercial affair.[/quote]
Yeah, that's my point. It's not necessarily about watching the best of the best.
Anyway, the point I was driving at was that in most industries you can meet increasing demand by hiring more people and building more facilities, but in pro sport you can't do that without hurting the quality of the product.
But you can "hurt the quality of the product" and still have people turn up. There are 92 teams in the English football league, and the ones at the bottom really aren't very good. Thousands of people still turn out every week to watch them. Hell, thousands of people turn out to watch the 92 teams below them.
I don't know what you're getting at, precisely, carp. Doesn't college football function basically as an NFL farm league? Regardless of how many make the transition.
106: I wasn't precise enough, sorry. Clearly people will watch even children and terrible athletes play sport from time to time. Replace "watch" in my original comment with "patronise to an extent that profits can be made from them watching".
107: College football seems to be basically university self-promotion and student/alumni bonding mechanism.
107 and 109 not mutually exclusive.
I was interviewed for a post-doc at Penn State a few years ago, which I didn't get, but would not have accepted anyway, because jesus christ, State College...
Small world: the person who did get that postdoc is a dear friend of mine. According to friend, it's even worse than you think in State College.
111: Wait, how do you know? I don't know if it's known in this forum what area I study?
You use your real name and don't make a secret of where you live? The google tells all.
it's even worse than you think in State College.
SRSLY. It's very pretty though!
How many people named ffeJ can there be, after all?
ITYM "Soothly we live in mighty days".
||
I really loved our wedding photographers, and I look in on their blog semi-regularly. It appears that at a wedding they recently photographed, the best man iced the groombro during the toast. UGH.
>
If they're not drinking rectally, they barely mean it. Where's the conviction?
107: 109 is more right. I think college football is not unlike high school football in this regard. It's not just that few players are going to have professional careers. Nearly all of them know it as college freshmen. They aren't playing for a chance to get to the NFL, but because they like it, the college pays (some of them), and it has shorter term social benefits.
The census says 80,000 people live in my city. The Griz' 25,000 plus stadium sells out every game. And fan interest is way more intense than any Redskins game I've been to or seen on TV.
Now its true that the pros draw their players from this pool. But that's really a 1% kind of thing, and when you say that the purpose -- functional or intentional -- of the big pool is to serve the little pool, you're really missing the point that (a) players play; (b) fans watch; and (c) universities sponsor.
108 -- Town gown relations are always an issue, but all spring as our rape thing was unfolding, you couldn't throw a rock without hitting someone worried about the economic fallout for town if the U football program was tainted enough that attendance fell significantly.
Lots of money is being made on college athletics, and none of it is coming from the NFL.
We have, in marked contrast, an actual farm team for the Arizona Diamondbacks. Broke the attendance record this year, and went to the playoffs. But everyone understands what a farm team actually is, who calls what shots, and how these things work. And no, while I see someone in maroon every day, I don't see Osprey gear outside the stadium, and way more maroon in the stadium.
51
For comparison, MLB umpire salaries range from approximately $84,000 to $300,000 per year.
For many more games (140+).
122
... Nearly all of them know it as college freshmen. ...
Maybe they should know it but I am not convinced they do. Anyway the number who think they have a shot at the pros must far exceed the number who actually make it.
6
I think this is actually fairly wonderful; this is probably the one union where the members 1. seem pretty blue collar ...
Is that true? I was under the impression that being a pro football referee was basically a rich man's hobby.
121 is correct. Non-butt-chugging icing is no icing at all.
12
... And I hate to say it, but Shearer has occasionally said here that he supports sports-related unions because.
I have said I support the baseball players association because otherwise the owners would use their totally unjustified exemption from antitrust rules to pay below market wages. Is that so hard to understand?
Why is everybody so shocked or whatever about the butt-chugging thing? Kids been doin' that since ever.
119 is worthless without links.
Here ya go. About 2/3 of the way down. (It won't let me link to individual photos.)
OK, so Tweety has butt-chugged. Who else?
131: Holy moly. Brotastic. Brotrocious? (I like the beige linen suit + white bucs + light blue bow tie, though. Shoot me.)
I haven't personally! It's super dangerous. But come on, how many times do I have to say it?
75 is somewhat bewildering. Obviously I'm aware that the market sets incomes, and the market's measure of value is divorced from other measures of value.
I like the last wedding shot. We're now in the angry drunk phase!
Otherwise it looked pretty much like a wedding, maybe with more floor dancing that the usual.
133. I like the suits too.
The next wedding at the blog almost makes me want to get married. I spent many, many hours as a kid in McKim, Mead & White's Boston Public Library. Now I find that you can have a party there?!
I have super stupid sibling drama that I want to share, but it's too long to type on the iPad, and I'm laying in bed and so very lazy about dragging myself back out of bed.
If you drink with you butt, doesn't the ice cause problems?
138: I will die if you don't tell us. OK, fine. I can wait. But I am very nosy.
136: Do people normally get iced at weddings you attend? I don't claim it's of particular interest outside that.
I had to get out of bed to help Jammies who is fixing the dishwater. Ok, I'll write the STUPID STUPID drama up!
I liked the one at the beach, with the people* ignoring bride and groom. Had a little of the end of Graduate vibe.
But as a rule, I have always tried to steer clear of the kind of people in the photographs. Big healthy whitebread professional alky jock or lawyer types. Not my crew.
No offense.
*the people on the beach were my kind, and I know the contrast was supposed to be to their disadvantage
141 -- I'd like to say yes, but sadly the answer is no.
I've said before I think the world would be a happier place with more, not less, icing.
Brother C's wife is finally pregnant with their second child, after years of infertility. (I'm really happy for them.) I've known for a few months they're pregnant.
We don't speak super often. I called to wish him a happy birthday this weekend. Later in the phone call I told him that I'm pregnant. (Haven't mentioned that here yet but seems reasonable to.)
I speak to my other brother often. Today he told me that Brother C said it was weird/rude of me to announce that I'm pregnant on his birthday phone call.
To be honest, if they were still trying to conceive, I would have made a separate phone call, because that would seem inconsiderate. But once you're pregnant, shouldn't it just be "wheee, happy for all!"?
Finally Brother C also said "This is the second time she did this! When she called to tell us she was pregnant with Hokey Pokey, she called on Mother's Day!"
Uh, I believe them, because it probably barely registered with me that it was Mother's Day...Also, they're extremely private about their infertility, and the only reason I know about it is that my parents can't keep a secret. So I certainly wouldn't have had any idea three years ago.
Finally - I'd be happy to apologize, I mean who cares, right? Except I'm not supposed to know, because my previously sane brothers now engage in stupid triangular whisper campaigns instead of talking directly.
Too long to read it all but congratulations and best wishes to you and jammies.
And this is their second kid, so I'm sure I would have said "Happy Mother's Day!" on that occasion.
When she called to tell us she was pregnant with Hokey Pokey, she called on Mother's Day!
But... neither of them is your mother. But you're still required to honor mother's day for them somehow? I don't get it.
Also, fuck that: if you were calling to tell them that you were going to be a mother (again), then it was just as much THEIR responsibility to say happy mother's day to YOU. Geez.
I mean, I don't want to do jerky things that hurt people's feelings. But...I'm also not being talked to directly and told that their feelings are hurt. So all I can do is shrug and say "They sure as fuck don't try to give me the benefit of the doubt, do they."
Heebie just makes all holidays about her. What's next, you'll call on Arbor Day? Laylat al-Qadr? During Black History Month? Not cool, Heebert.
Come on, Blume, it's not so crazy—if you assume (apparently contrary to fact) that heebie knew they'd be trying to conceive, then it's reasonable to think that mother's day might be a sore day for them generally and in particular a sore day for them to hear that someone else is preggers.
Heebie just makes all holidays about her. What's next, you'll call on Arbor Day? Laylat al-Qadr? During Black History Month? Not cool, Heebert.
She even announced her pregnancy on Yom Kippur!
I know the contrast was supposed to be to their disadvantage
I found that photo a little off, too. Also, looking at wedding photos semi-regularly makes me think that people often look pretty weird in wedding photos. I don't know these people, but I imagine they don't necessarily look like that usually.
then it's reasonable to think that mother's day might be a sore day for them generally and in particular a sore day for them to hear that someone else is preggers.
Would you be sore on Mother's day when you already have a kid? Don't you just take the time to relish the pampering and whatever else?
it's not so crazy
Eh, if you assume it's not crazy to hold things people couldn't have known against them.
158: well, to be fair, we don't always wear those tiny furry hats.
That's totally nuts, but I'd just call the brother in question and apologize, and also reveal you know about their trying to conceive. Just say fuck it and do it.
I mean, sure, you can feel sore about whatever you want. But that would have been right exactly when they started trying, not when they would have known they'd have trouble.
(Maybe they had trouble conceiving the first kid. They're very private.)
but I'd just call the brother in question and apologize, and also reveal you know about their trying to conceive.
Humorously, I've actually sent two follow-up texts to the birthday conversations already of ways I thought I might have offended them - an inadvertent first trimester comparison and then a follow up imagined misstep. In hindsight, I guess both of these were off the mark. Or perhaps the fallout could have been worse.
The whole "she got pregnant and was happy about it when we were very excited about a pregnancy! ours should have stood alone and supreme!" bit is no good.
Are these the same people who were like you can't have your kid's birthday party because it's the day before our anniversary, or something like that? Or was that someone else entirely? I don't know where I am most days.
166: Sort of - both siblings and spouses were involved in that craziness.
I would never completely wash my hands of them, mostly on my parents' behalf and because there will always be family functions. But at what point do you decide to withdraw your emotional attachment to someone? There seems to be very little payoff to this relationship besides me inadvertently insulting them and simultaneously getting my feelings hurt.
Not "simultaneously" - I get my feelings hurt on different occasions.
Fortunately I enjoy dishing about them behind their backs on the interwebs.
She even announced her pregnancy on Yom Kippur!
Sandy Koufax would have had the courtesy to wait a day.
I wanted everyone to know why I wasn't fasting.
That must be why this bar is not very full.
175: I think the holiday's already over where you are, actually.
Maybe it's just because Wednesday.
Too drunk?
You can't get drunk while you're fasting, silly. Unless you do it rectally, I guess.
Maybe it's just because Wednesday.
Prince Spaghetti Day?
Great, heebie. Ruin that too.
The next time it's someone's birthday let's all tell them how pregnant I am.
That's probably tomorrow. There are lots of bodies.
I think during the holidays heebie should send out blue-and-silver or red-and-green (as appropriate) cards that say I AM STILL PREGNANT!!!!
This bartender always gives me a glass of water when I order a rusty nail. Also, always puts in a lemon twist and never looks up the recipe.
I'm happy to do that for the next several decades, regardless of whether or not I'm packing fet.
186: oh. I thought it was what day.
188: he doesn't look up the rusty nail recipe? I... should hope not?
Congratulations!
Have you picked out a pseud?
194: I'm sure it's somebody's buh day.
195: yes, I'm sticking with Sifu.
199: I never understood that pseud until I saw Kung Fu Panda.
191: None of the under thirty bartenders seem to know it and everywhere but this place seems to think it is an old man drink.
202: why not kick back and get them off your lawn with a tall glass of me tonight.
I'm thinking of ordering a Donald Sutherland to see if anybody but wikipedia used the term. Except then I'd have to drink Canadian whiskey.
Why not get off my lawn and let me kick your glass goddamned ass tonight?
Heebie, hooray! (Your brother is being a dick.)
188: That sounds disappointing. How do you get drunk on that?
The Pirates finished the year without being eliminated from payoff contention if you use the Jewish calendar.
The congratulations are for the deal, I assume.
Seconding the 'fuck Heebie's brothers' comments, and the 'Congratulations, Heebie (and Jammies)' ones.
re: 158
Yes. I look at a lot of photo blogs, including a couple of wedding ones, and it's really hard to make some people look both natural and good, I think, and some photographers have it (that skill) in a way that others don't. Someone like J /onathan C /anlas is way better than most, but I still look at some and think, 'Jeez.'
Someone like J /onathan C /anlas
Huh, he's that widely known? My sister is married to his younger brother.
re: 214
He's quite big in the 'people who still use film' community because he promotes a lot of workshops and sells his (over-priced) e-book. So I probably came across him via some film-photography blog. I've no idea if he's super well-known but his blog is widely linked, and a fair number of people attend his workshops. I quite like what he does [as a wedding/event photographer] although like anyone after a while you spot the repeating tropes and tricks that he uses.
Have you picked out a pseud?
Hinky Punk? Hippy Puncher? Hanky Panky?
PS Your brother is a dick.
Yay, babies! Boo, weird siblings!
Unfortunately, I've exhausted the names of my childhood guinea pigs. I'll move onto other childhood pets, but they won't be HP-themed.
Aside from common sense, there's no reason you can't buy another guinea pig today and give it an HP-themed name.
It's either that or re-use the existing pseuds.
I guess you could buy a guinea pig, name it, and then give it away to somebody willing to deliberately keep a rodent in their house.
Aside from common sense, there's no reason you can't buy another guinea pig today and give it an HP-themed name.
Brown Sauce would be an odd name for a guinea pig.
221: Done and done! Keep your eye out for a package arriving in the mail with air holes.
For security reasons, I put all my mail in the swimming pool for a week prior to opening.
I don't think that should affect its name.
Maybe not, but it's probably good that pool-using weather is past.
Boy: Huge Penis
Girl: Hebrew Princess
Or vice versa.
Or vice versa.
Huge Princess or Hebrew Penis?
Or vice versa.
Huge Princess and Hebrew Penis?
Pwned and nameless. Not a good start to the day for me.
I don't know who you are, but stop stealing urple's comments.
Pwned on mocking for pwnery. Oh well.
Stop trying to steal my comments, urple.
Henny Penny
Hewlett Packard
Harry Pollitt
they won't be HP-themed
I don't want this to sound judgmental, but I've always heard the rule of thumb that if you have too many children to give them all HP-themed pseudonyms, you have too many children.
Heir Psupply (the P is silent as in Psmith and ptarmigan).
Heavenly Princess and Hegemonic Patriarchy.
Uncle: He bit me.
HG: The Patriarchy hurts men to.
Heavenly Princess and Hegemonic Patriarchy.
Sounds too much like a band.
Huffington Post. (Stolen from the last time (LB?) we had a string of these jokes. But still funny.)
This morning, my radio guys' take on the NFL strike was "the refs wanted way more money for a part time job and bullied the owners into getting their way." They're jerks though.
"and bullied the owners" - by getting locked out. Yes, that makes sense.
271: By being too competent to be easily replaced.
274: I tried that strategy but it was a fuck-ton of work.
Heaven's Prisoners.
Or just name your kids after characters in Heaven's Prisoners. Dave Robichaux, Minos Dautrieve, Claudette Rocque.
||
For those following the saga, my wallet was returned to my apartment building around 10am this morning -- a guy gave it to the super. No money or metrocards, but apparently it looks like everything else is in there.
I am now convinced that it wasn't stolen, I dropped it somehow, but of course I'm being silly, because the return doesn't change the odds of anything; it's just as likely to have been returned after a thief emptied and dropped it as it is after I dropped it. Obviously, I still might have, but I'll never know either way.
Yay for the good Samaritan who brought it back, though.
|>
May the good Samaritan not be the one who rots in hell!
296: Hooray! Still a pain in the ass, but at least you've got the cruft back. I get quite attached to my cruft.
(297: Sorry, old habit. I make that correction about 10-20 times per month in my job.)
Were the credit cards still there? Had you already cancelled everything?
If somebody stole your credit cards, you need to cancel them even if you get them back.
It's great about the pictures getting back though.
I hadn't actually looked at the photos in my wallet in years. It's nice having them back.
If somebody stole your credit cards, you need to cancel them even if you get them back.
But with a lightness in your step and song in your heart that wouldn't have been there otherwise.
304, 305: Oh, yesterday was devoted to cancelling everything, closing my checking account and opening a new one (checkbook wallet) and so on. Perhaps the most annoying bit of this is going to be having a new credit card number; I had the old one memorized, which was handy for online shopping.
Really? As long as they held it long enough to write down the numbers, your heart should be about the same as if they kept the physical card.
You don't love your cards?
Of course you love your cards. That's Moby's point--it hurts to have to look them in the eyes while you cut them into tiny pieces. It's almost easier just to have them lost and never seen again.
If it helps, put the little pieces in your child's bed the night you fake out the baby-sitter.
I guess getting the cards back is a comfort in that it means that your wallet wasn't stolen by somebody who gets sexually aroused by looking at your name embossed in plastic.
Or at least they feel too guilty to indulge their passion.
Maybe they'll sublimate it into some great work of art.
First, they destroyed the world economy. Now, the banksters are trying to destroy NFL football. . Where will it end?
At the end of the day this past Tuesday, I changed into bike gear and couldn't find my helmet anywhere. I decided I must have absentmindedly left it with the bike on the rack, and let it get stolen at some point during the day. I hated the idea of biking for any distance without a helmet, and felt compelled to pick up a new one on the way home (it fits better, happily).
Yesterday, I noticed the old helmet at home.
My bag is too small to lose a helmet in, so the only explanation I see remaining is that I rode all the way to work on Tuesday without noticing I was bare-headed, even though I never ever do that. WTF?
the only explanation I see remaining is that I rode all the way to work on Tuesday without noticing I was bare-headed, even though I never ever do that
Once this past summer I noticed I was helmetless about 8.5 miles into a 20-mile loop. Oops. I was secretly excited, though I probably went slower on the downhills than I usually do.
Last weekend Tweety and I tried out Boston's bikeshare bikes, also helmetless. So liberating.
closing my checking account and opening a new one (checkbook wallet)
Huh? Can't you just cancel the cheque book?
I always notice when I'm riding helmetless because it feels so delightful. Then I turn around and get my helmet.
I miss the days when I didn't give a damn about wearing a helmet.
323: I would have thought so, but the nice woman at the bank who handled cancelling my debit card said that anyone with the full checking account number on the checks would be able to use it to take money out of the account, so the account number had to change.
I am always puzzled by the security aspect of this kind of thing. Literally hundreds of random low-paid people have access to my credit card number every month or two, given that I give it out every time I buy something, and I don't worry about it. But once a known thief has touched the physical card, it's presumptively a problem.
People are people so why should it be,
just this one guy wants to steal from thee.
I choose not to wear a helmet, although I personally know two people who are alive because of their helmets. But I ride everyday, and the pleasure of being helmetless adds up. Also, I'm on short trips on flat, well-marked roads.
When I have kids and have to set a good example, I'll wear a helmet. But not until then.
(No one needs to tell me that's dangerous. I know the risk and I'm taking it.)
Also, I'm so glad that most of your wallet came back to you, LB. Now it is truly yours forever.
Yeah, it always strikes me that the level of security that banks impose on a lost/stolen card is out of synch with the way I treat my card the rest of the time (which is to use it for purchases with staff who see the number).
the nice woman at the bank who handled cancelling my debit card said that anyone with the full checking account number on the checks would be able to use it to take money out of the account, so the account number had to change.
This is an insane way to handle security. Essentially every time you give someone a cheque, you are giving them the full checking account number - and therefore the power to take as much money as they like out of your account?
As opposed to each time you hand someone your credit card?
I'm not sure that she's wrong about what you can do with the full number, though. I've certainly set up online payments without anything more than my checking account number (and wondered why that was okay). This makes paying for anything by check unsettling, of course.
330: It does basically work that way for on-line payments you make with checks. However, paying your electric bill with someone else's checking account isn't exactly a hard crime to solve. I think that's why they worry so much about a stolen card. A thief likely knows of a way to get money out without using his own name while the dude at the store who took your payment for groceries probably doesn't.
333 is just me thinking it, not like any actual knowledge. I'm not really sure how to launder money.
334: well it's a linen cotton blend, so.
As opposed to each time you hand someone your credit card?
Well, then you see the charges on the statement at the end of the month and complain (and refuse to pay them). So it's safer.
When I have kids and have to set a good example, I'll wear a helmet. But not until then.
I suppose setting a bad example for other people's children doesn't phase you.
I promised a friend once to always wear my helmet. She still had her jaw wired together, and was holding her cracked helmet, and the crash wasn't her fault, so it seemed very reasonable at the time. And now I've promised.
I always wear a helmet because I'd feel like even more of a dumbass than most people would if I got a closed-head injury. They sure are overrated as a Magic Safety Totem, though.
I always wear a helmet and make those around me, too, because I've got a quite a phobia about cars.
And I'm talking about sitting around the dinner table.
We don't let cars sit at the dinner table.
Guess who's coming to dinner?
Given the trees and hills, if it's at my table, it won't be a car unless somebody put in some time with a chainsaw first.
||
There is a heartwarming story of life in the town called Gorges in the NYT.
Google 'because incessant documenting' and keep an eye on the corrections.
|>
shiv told me once he didn't really need to wear a helmet, but he would to humor me (and also because I told him it was that or I'd hide his front wheel). And then he flipped his bike down a mountainside and landed on his head. The helmet had a flat spot the size of my hand on the top and six cracks all the way through. We're pretty sure he would have been dead or paralyzed without it. I know they're not magic, but I think of them as mandatory.
350: I was talking about general city/town biking. Mountain biking or road racing are a different story.
I suppose setting a bad example for other people's children doesn't [faze] you.
Fleur and I were apprehended by the police in Germany for crossing the street against the light. The Polizist used exactly that argument. He let us off with a warning, after I pretended not to understand him.
I suppose setting a bad example for other people's children doesn't [faze] you.
I particularly love riding my bike through the foyer of my work in the morning. Ride in through the automatic doors, turn left to get to a door that needs a swipe from my pass to open (twenty feet). On the right is a daycare, and the kids eyes open wide at the proof that one can indeed ride one's bicycle inside.
354: I suppose you've decided that since you can't set a good example, you might as well serve as a horrible warning.
Every now and then, put your arm in a sling and put black-eye make up on. For the children.
And a tight, thin shirt. For the adults.
A horrible warning of the freedom you'll have when you're an adult and can ride your bike wherever the guards don't stop you? I should also warn them that they can have pancakes and ice cream for dinner when they're grown up.
Maybe I should start wearing mine again.
Maybe I should start wearing mine again.
Your smile? Your tight, thin shirt? Your helmet?
Putting a tight, thin shirt on the fireman.
326: the nice woman at the bank who handled cancelling my debit card said that anyone with the full checking account number on the checks would be able to use it to take money out of the account
I'm pretty sure this is hogwash.
Here's the truth, y'all: Megan doesn't wear a helmet because her hair is curly, and her vanity exceeds her sense of self-preservation.
That is, people can use the full account number to put money *in* to the account, but when was the last time you could just declare that money should be taken out of the following account number: blah blah blah xxxyy and it would be done? No. Having the actual checkbook is a different matter, sure; then a signature can be forged.
(This comes up from time to time at the bookshop, when European customers want to do a direct bank transfer by way of payment, and ask for our bank account number. My partner frets, "Can't they then take money from the account??!" No.)
I can only assume Megan is naked as she does this.
Close. My sense of pleasure exceeds my sense of self-preservation. Remember that I put a large value on my immediate lived experience and a helmet causes a small but non-trivial frequent loss of pleasure.
(Also, I don't think the risk is high for my rides. The penalty is high, but I don't think the likelihood is high.)
Heh. I've proposed to the City that they have a clothing-optional lap swim hour (not all of them, but one available). Sadly, it went nowhere.
The check has the ABA routing number too. That's crucial.
I have had a debt collector (library fine!) "create" a debit over the phone with just the info I could read out from my checkbook. .
369.2: I stand corrected, then. Do we all have to stop using checks altogether, if anyone with the routing number + account number can take money using that information?
370: Yes!
Use cash only and keep your money underneath your mattress, and don't tell anybody where the mattress is.
Fleur and I were apprehended by the police in Germany for crossing the street against the light. The Polizist used exactly that argument. He let us off with a warning, after I pretended not to understand him.
Once, in Berlin, I crossed the street against a red light while a child and his mother were on the other side of the street waiting to cross. The kid pointed at me as if astonished and told his mother all about how I was crossing the street but the light was red!@!!
I recommend either having the clothing-optional lap swim hour, or allowing adults to eat pancakes and ice cream for dinner, but not both.
I've never had the cops stop me when jaywalking in Germany, but I did get both plaintive and angry versions of 'Aber die Kinder!'.
Remember how Giuliani tried to get rid of jaywalking in NYC, complete with ticket quotas for the cops? It didn't last long, but I did once see a cop in midtown very apologetically ticketing someone for it in Midtown.
You see, Midtown is a part of midtown.
121: If they're not drinking rectally, they barely mean it.
This is not actually a safe thing to do.
Authorities think Ale/ander P. Brou/hton, 20, of Memphis, who had a blood-alcohol level thought to be "well over" 0.40 percent, ingested the alcohol by a method known as "butt chugging," in which wine was inserted directly by a tube into his rectum for quick and potent absorption.
How can one swim with a child on one's lap?
370: Seems to work fine in Europe.
This isn't directed specifically at Blume, but:
I hear claims to this effect all the time: no one uses [typical American method of payment] in Europe, because everyone uses [credit cards with chips, or perhaps something more exotic]. And IME it's not true at all. Most of the Rheinland and Vorarlberg seem to run primarily on cash; credit card acceptance is random at best; and I've certainly seen checks used. So what's the deal? Is this just an unevenly-distributed future thing, or what?
381: My experience in Europe is that everyone uses smart cards with chips everywhere. I've met people who didn't know what a check was. I don't think they were German, though.
In enlightened crotchless Europe, they no longer use checks.
In Germany, everyone seems to use bank transfers in exactly the way I would use checks (phone bill, rent, etc.).
382: That's just so odd. We never succeed at buying my FIL dinner because it seems like every damn restaurant is cash-only, and we don't carry 200 Euros most of the time.
I don't think most (younger) Americans use many checks anymore either - I write 1 or 2 a month at most, except when paying workmen or whatever.
Actually, personal checks (as opposed to business) are even rarer.
I haven't seen checks in Switzerland or France in a long, long time. The ones they used to have were either Postal checks which IIRC could only be used to pay existing bills (e.g. electric or phone) through the postal service and 'Eurochecks' which were some weird thing that combined aspects of check, certified check, and debit card. Their advantage was that they weren't denominated so you could pay in any currency and were more widely accepted than credit cards so my parents always kept a few around when travelling.
I've routinely used credit cards for restaurants in Europe. Perhaps we're communicating from parallell universes? The wormhole is probably located right inside nosflow's brain.
I looked through my checkbook recently and pretty much everything in it was a co-pay or a hospital bill.
I pay the mortgage with checks -- there's some size over which automatic payments make me unhappy. Anything over a grand or so, I want to take positive action each time the money leaves my account. Other than that, the only time checks come up really is for kid-related organizational things. Soccer leagues and such tend not to be set up for credit cards.
Are you guys counting electronic checks sent directly from your computers, or just the paper kind. If it's the former, which AFAIK turn into paper checks on the way to the payee, I use a bunch, mainly for rent. I virtually never use paper checks, maybe once or twice a year. For years I was using my bank's proprietary dial-up network that predated the Web.
For years I was using my bank's proprietary dial-up network that predated the Web.
I pay my bills exclusively by Minitel.
388: Astonishing. I want to say that, literally, 75% of the restaurants* on the Rhein and Mosel (below Remagen, above Trier/Bingen) don't take cards, including in more urban places. And, again, same deal in Vorarlberg. I've never lived there, but I've spent a couple months cumulatively. This isn't based on the one night when I couldn't find a restaurant that would take my Visa.
PS - as a small businessman, I've gotten offers to help me take credit cards and electronic payments. Checks are fine by me.
* disregarding chains or whatever, but including small shops selling wurst usw.
They didn't take Visa or the didn't take your obsolete chipless Visa? I haven't run into many cases of the former in Europe, but a ton of the latter. Back when I lived in Koblenz a dozen years ago, before the EUropean card tech upgrade, I don't remember it ever being a problem.
I pay my bills exclusively by Minitel
AKA text only web with banking, social network stuff, and messageries roses.
So, but what do people make of md 20/400's tale in 369.2 that I have had a debt collector (library fine!) "create" a debit over the phone with just the info I could read out from my checkbook?
It was indeed my understanding that in Europe, direct bank transfers -- which require the payee's account number -- are fairly common. I totally don't get how someone can take money *out* of the account with just the account number (plus, I guess, your name and perhaps address). I'd probably throw a hissy fit if my bank allowed that to happen. Obviously everyone you've ever written a check to has the requisite information.
Also: I've never received payment via online bill pay -- which is how I pay a lot of my bills. Do you receive a paper check generated by the bank that shows your account number? Just kind of curious about what those billpay checks look like.
If a debt collector calls looking for your ex-husband's new wife, is it right or wrong to give them her cell number?
Also: I've never received payment via online bill pay -- which is how I pay a lot of my bills. Do you receive a paper check generated by the bank that shows your account number?
Yeah, I get child support this way. It just shows up in my mailbox like any other corporate check and I guess he arranges it online.
I want to say that, literally, 75% of the restaurants* on the Rhein and Mosel (below Remagen, above Trier/Bingen) don't take cards, including in more urban places.
Yeah, I would bet that a lot of them (ones expensive enough to want not to pay cash, certainly) you can pay by EC-Karte. I've never spent much time in the Rhineland, but it's been the case everywhere else I've spent serious time. (Göttingen / Hamburg / Dresden / Berlin.)
399: Does it have *his* bank account number on it?
This isn't really important, but I'm curious, since we run across enough bookshop customers who are so incredibly paranoid about identity theft and such, presumably because they've been told a million times that they should trust no one, that they render themselves nearly incapacitated.
401: I'm not sure, to be honest. I mostly just pay attention to the amount and pay-to-the-order-of. I don't think so, though.
In 2001, I paid for a night at a hostel in Narvik, Norway by credit card and they did an imprint. I had to pay as soon as arrived so they'd have time to process the payment before I left the next day.