I recommend changing your name entirely, to something that will just throw people for a loop. Something like this.
You don't think "Immunogenetics and Cancer Genetics" would be a confusing name?
I think it's going to be the next "Madison".
That's Immuno and Cancer Genetics to your friends.
1 is in the right track. You should make it clear that you are IN Texas but not OF Texas.
"Heebuschka Geebowicz"
At conferences, I get asked now if I'm Mormon. The last conference I was at, however, was a blast, and was very child-friendly. The Calabat had a great time.
I was going to post something saying that Bonjour Tristesse is a bad movie and Jean Seberg's performance in it is bad, but then it just seemed like a mean-spirited thing to do. And I am not a mean-spirited fellow.
Hey I sent that thing about Kanye's statement on prenups. He told the world that they are tacky.
My next step: www.celebritynetworth.com says he's worth $100m.
The site further informs its readers:
Some celebrities can safely be updated just once a year, some people are re-visited every quarter, others are tracked monthly. We literally have a spreadsheet that lists everyone in their priority category. Then there's Lindsay Lohan.
The conferences I go to ban children under some age (14 I think?) from the premises.
I was struck by the epic awfulness of this advice column in n+1, which is trying to out-write or out-intellectual Dear Sugar or something, but ends up being Dear Isn't Fifty Cupcakes A Bit Much. The letter-writer is talented!
11: I didn't know porn conferences were so teen-friendly.
Huh. Checking the link in 10, apparently Judge Judy is only worth $150 million. You would think someone with a salary of $45 million a year would have saved more than that.
Teens are the best repeat customers. They're not allowed on the judging panels, though, not discerning enough.
Hey I sent that thing about Kanye's statement on prenups. He told the world that they are tacky.
Oh right! I knew there was actually something else in the queue! I checked the list on my phone, but forgot to check the list in my email. Dang.
The national math meetings provide childcare.
I guess they're good at keeping track of how many kids they have.
You would think someone with a salary of $45 million a year
For real? Judge Reinhold really is missing a trick by not following through on that Arrested Development joke.
I guess they're good at keeping track of how many kids they have.
They're mathematicians, not arithmeticians.
20 - Yeah, apparently starring in your own personality-driven syndicated daytime show is a recipe for printing money.
Hey bay-bee let's perform a bilinear operation.
Oh wow, 12 must be parody.
I have researched this in various ways, as mentioned above, and I have reread Nietzsche, and read the copy on the back cover of M. Scott Peck's People of the Lie: The Hope for Healing Human Evil, neither of which helped very much.
...
[showing the letter to a friend] Also, he thought you sounded hot. He wanted me to ask you: What do you look like? Do you like beards?
Actually, almost every sentence there
20 - Yeah, apparently starring in your own personality-driven syndicated daytime show is a recipe for printing money.
I guess it never struck me as all that personality driven. I mean, obviously she has a schtick that works, but I'd be surprised if the ratings dropped all that much if they kept the same format and changed the judge. And besides, $45m is crazy money. I don't think any TV "talent" in the UK would come within an order of magnitude of that.
PS. I just checked, and they don't. The highest paid TV stars in the UK get paid less than £3m, it seems.
PPS. Just looked at the US figures and was surprised (and pleased) to learn that Neil Patrick Harris makes a boatload of money.
Hey bay-bee let's perform a bilinear operation.
Usually people go for the smooth operator joke, but our nosflow does it biliously.
James May is worth 13 M to Benedict Cumberbatch's $4M. Is Simon Cowell famous in Britain? He is wealthy.
26: I think her schtick is a huge part of the appeal of that show (not that it appeals to me whatsoever). There have been tons of other court shows that have come and gone in the days since Wapner, and none have had the widespread impact that Judge Judy has.
On the other hand, maybe its just a court show thing. Judge Joe Brown was making $20 million a year before his show got cancelled in a salary dispute.
That's just a stupid amount of money. If I was Sandra Day O'Connor, I'd totally get a court show and start raking it in.
Is Simon Cowell famous in Britain?
Very, and I'm sure he's very well paid when he's on the British talent shows. But I think most of his money comes from the record and TV production deals, rather than from being paid to be in front of camera.
Maybe the BBC helps keep market rates down?
That celebrity net worth site is notoriously unreliable.
Also that headline salary of $45 million isn't a real number that you really should think of as her salary, though she's still super rich. She probably takes home no more than $20 mil pretax per year.
32: Fuck yeah. 200 million. Are they kidding? We pay our assistant nanny that much.
2 I recommend changing your name entirely, to something that will just throw people for a loop.
I am super-confused by a guy I know who I think is French Canadian and has a name with hyphenation in both the first and last names, where the things making up the hyphenated parts look to me like French-Chinese French-French. And yet I'm pretty sure the guy's ancestry is completely European. I thought about asking "uh, what's with that first name?" but I couldn't decide if it was rude and now it seems too late.
32. It's OK, you are wealthy in the esteem of your peers. No man is poor who has friends, wasn't that the motto of "It's a Wonderful life"
She probably takes home no more than $20 mil pretax per year.
So whats the other $25 million?
Neil Patrick Harris makes a boatload of money.
And his husband is gorgeous and professional chef.
I'd resent his success, if he weren't so damned talented.
Maybe the BBC helps keep market rates down?
Oh, I'm sure it does. Every few years there's a tabloid furore over how much the BBC is paying its biggest stars. And they're the only broadcaster other than ITV who are going to be paying top whack (other than for people like newscasters or sports commentators). And of course a large part of it is not having such a large syndicated audience, though having said that I'm always surprised at how low US (non-sports, non-NCIS) TV show audiences are, scaled for population. 10m seems to be considered a decent hit for prime-time on a network. That's about as much as X Factor or Strictly Come Dancing gets in the UK, while a typical hit drama will get around 3m to 5m. Downton gets 8m or so. I realise cable means audiences are more fragmented, but we have Sky and Freeview and indeed cable over here too.
38. Agent, broker, and attorney fees. Which add value.
That says she makes $123,000 a day, but I think it means $123,000 per episode. What I understand is that she only actually works about 3 days a month, and records 8 or so half-hour episodes each of those days.
Nice work if you can get it.
38 -- the $45 million is an advance against whichcertain production and distribution costs are taken out. Figuring out exactly how that works and is structured is the name of the game in these matters and impossible to know without looking at the contract, but the headline number isn't a real number.
And of course 41 is true as well, though 43 is where the real cut is and negotiation action is, since agent/broker/manager fees are pretty standardized.
That explains what I saw about Judge Joe Brown's salary in Wikipedia. CBS was claiming they paid him $20 million a year, he said he was only getting $5 million.
I don't get why production and distribution costs come out of talent salary, though.
I'm disappointed that celebritynetworth.com doesn't tell me how much money my senior colleague has.
I get the broker fee for the judge Elbee youtube channel that will come out of this thread. Ask the mineshafters provide the material. To preserve anonymity, a Guy Fawkes mask and rave gear for the judge, with all plaintiffs or supplicants or whatever the little people are called to wear a three howling wolves t-shirt. Uggs for male supplicants, rhinestone flip-flops for the ladies.
I do like supplicants. Unfortunately I'm miserable on camera. The mask would hide my face, but that still leaves body language and voice to deal with.
45 -- part of it is that this is just how basically all talent deals are structured, but note that both Judge Judy and CBS have incentives for providing massively inflated public estimates for her salary. Her for obvious reasons, CBS because they are selling the show in syndication and otherwise and want buyers (who may be suckers) to have an exaggerated estimate of the cost of the show. I hate to ruin anyone's innocence, but all Hollywood accounting, on both the talent and studio side, s designed to produce misleading numbers and be deliberately opaque to non-initiates.
In regards to Mr. West's distate for prenups -- I suspect he doesn't have too much to worry about when you consider that his wife-to-be has an ascribed net worth of 40 million.
the $45 million is an advance against whichcertain production and distribution costs are taken out. Figuring out exactly how that works and is structured is the name of the game in these matters and impossible to know without looking at the contract, but the headline number isn't a real number.
Which screws over everyone who can't afford the lawyers and/or accountants to prevent shenanigans in the calculations, right?
I hate to ruin anyone's innocence, but all Hollywood accounting, on both the talent and studio side, s designed to produce misleading numbers and be deliberately opaque to non-initiates.
That explains my cable bill.
Since it's "Net worth", not "Money in the bank", I assume this includes grossly inflated estimates for what someone's "image rights" and "potential for endorsement deals" are, based on Q score or whatever, in addition to adding up a lifetime of residuals and royalties which will continue to come in at the same rate that they do now.
49: Are you familiar with Edward Jay Epstein's book on this topic? He says that too. When he writes about national security stuff he seems like a conspiracy nut, but I don't have any idea whether to believe his stuff about Hollywood.
Usually people go for the smooth operator joke
Applied mathematicians do it with a real model.
51 -- of course it does. Have I mentioned that I have a pretty nice car?
Crack cocaine and a Hollywood lawyer
Nothing in this world will make you go broke quicker.
54 -- I've never actually read his book, just seen some online snippets of his writing, but he seemed generally reliable about things I know about.
To 50, KW was a talented kid from a promising background who has developed an ego problem as a consequence of becoming successful. KK's trajectory is not as auspicious. Last time I brought up the reason for her becoming famous I thought that the tape was particularly degrading, but apparently not, so there is a lower bound on her behavior. (I haven't seen it, not that there'd be anything wrong with that).
But these are emphatically not two reasonable people, and KK in particular seems unstable, dim, and greedy. I tell myself that it's not schadenfreude, don't feel antipathy, it just seems like a public partnership somehow fitting for these stupid times. It also seems clearly set to end badly.
It's like Canada in that the bad things don't affect real people. It's hard to believe that KW or KK or Toronto exist so when they have a hugely messy divorce or a mayor smoking cracking, you can laugh freely and without guilt.
My impression of Kanye and Kim is that they're both far out of mainstream and they found each other out of a small pool of peers. Good luck to them!
This renders all other vows columns superfluous.
small pool
No, that wasn't in the video that she sold, it's just an allegation that the video's owner has made.
64 is amazing. I can't even pick which line to excerpt, because I'm busy flying to, like, Bahrain to visit someone.
The starling had been the favorite bird of the groom's father, the late Christopher R. Sibson, who was a banker in England and Luxembourg. His photograph was set near the couple as Dorothy Toth Beasley, a former senior judge on Georgia's Court of Appeals, led the couple in their vows, which included lyrics from a song by the Smiths.
"There is a Light That Never Goes Out", I assume.
I don't know why, but I thought this paragraph was best:
Wishing to be as close to nature as they could, the couple spent their wedding night in a tent lined with Indian saris in a bamboo grove on the Koch property. The morning after the wedding, the couple took their respective clans to that Southern icon, the Waffle House.
It just fills one with an overwhelming desire to see someone drag the couple into the woods, saying, "Oh, you can get much closer to nature than that..."
Overheard: "well, you could take your sabbatical over summer 1 and still teach summer 2." Maybe it's supposed to be a short sabbatical but it sounds like someone is getting totally robbed.
"There is a Light That Never Goes Out", I assume.
"I Know It's Over".
Have I mentioned the acquaintance who played, innocently, "I still haven't found what I'm looking for" at his (first) wedding?
Have I mentioned the acquaintance who played, innocently, "I still haven't found what I'm looking for" at his (first) wedding?
Megan! I was just thinking about you. I just noticed that big water bond proposal you wrote about in the past is going to be on the November 2014 ballot - will you write about it closer to then for us CAians?
Yes heebie, you have, recently.
"Heaven Knows I'm Miserable Now"
We're nearing the abbreviation singularity, Sifu, so try to keep up.
Water policy is very important to Californaiads.
"I still haven't found what I'm looking for"
"Heaven Knows I'm Miserable Now"
I'm certain we can put together an entire wedding playlist that is actually a plea for help.
I still can't get over 64. No one excerpt does it justice:
Ms. Koch, who was born in Atlanta but spent her childhood in Germany, the Netherlands and Britain, spoke four languages and unabashedly expressed love for unicorns, flying saucers and all things related to outer space.
"She was listening to Bjork before anyone else was," Mr. Sibson said.
. . .
By this time, she was dividing her time between Paris and New York, swirling through the fashion world creating art and designing sets. He had been doing difficult work in Liberia, Bosnia and Herzegovina with the United Nations Refugee Agency.
. . .
They slept four hours and then, by bus, ferry and car, made their way to Dubrovnik and then Italy. They rented a stone hut called a trullo amid olive groves and the foxes.
. . .
Her mother, Disja Koch-ter Kuile, who gives art lessons
. . .
Ms. Koch's dog, Sir William Sugarplum, helped walk her down the aisle. Ms. Koch's sister, who is a milliner in Beijing
Maybe? I miss the water blogging, but I haven't had the heart in a long time.
I'll be interested to see what that bond will be like. My work is near-desperate to get it passed. I'm hearing that it'll be much smaller, and possibly phased, with subsequent authorizations only coming if the economy is growing.
I kinda think it is a patchjob. That infrastructure maintenance should be paid for by a public goods fee (surcharge/acrefoot). That the true need is so big that if it went out as a bond to vote for, people would choke and sputter and vote no.
What should you vote? I'm neutral. It'd shore up my workplace. Some of it might turn into nice wetlands or collaboration groups (which I don't think are always useless). It is too small to be a real downpayment for built infrastructure repair and maintenance. We shouldn't be limping from bond to bond, and debt service on bonds is something like $300 per household-year, with $27 of that going to old water bonds.
I'll likely go into the ballot box unsure what to vote. I do know that there is no way it will appear before the public if our executive officers aren't 90% sure it will pass. They will absolutely not risk breaking the perfect streak of passed water bonds.
Kanye West's Gold Digger
Sting's Every Breath You Take
the European School of Luxembourg
As much as she liked him, she disliked the school more. So she moved to a new one in the Netherlands.
There was no ring, but the stars and the moon were out. So were the animals and the dragonflies.
The word "starling" holds multiple meanings for the couple, who believe they are creatures from the stars.
"Our lives will be our honeymoon."
They cut it with a saber that belonged to the bride's father.
My favorite bit is at the very end:
and for something blue, a single earring that looks like a blue eye that a woman recently gave her on a whim
Makes it sound as if these folks like to give each other body parts, just for the hell of it.
He had been doing difficult work in Liberia, Bosnia and Herzegovina with the United Nations Refugee Agency.
This is just wrong, and wouldn't have happened if the Times's style called for the serial comma.
Oh man. I think I've been reading too many YA books with an element of romance, because I rather loved the Vows column. Perfection.
That column really is beyond everything.
Has anyone googled these people? I have to use a separate browser for the New York Times because no matter how I handle cookies, it's not good enough for the Times, and so fuck them, and so I didn't click through-- but based on excerpts, if any of this is falsifiable, it oughta be tested.
That vows column was so over the top it was almost cute, or maybe it's just that I went to school with enough people like that.
Right, I bear these people absolutely no animus, just amazement.
There was no ring, but the stars and the moon were out. So were the animals and the dragonflies.
This is just such poor writing. Dragonflies aren't animals? Presumably larger warm-blooded animals, but couldn't she be more specific? Rats? Bunnies? Lions? Rainbow-colored unicorns?
Insects do not belong to the folk understanding of animals.
(This is all about me and I really just need to vent and not to be perked up, but I'm waiting for the wraparound services person to come and tell me what they'll be doing for us and how we'll schedule that all since I go back to work next week and Lee is extra irritable since she's making the supreme sacrifice of occasionally helping around the house while sighing about it and I'm super bitter and don't want to have a whole meeting about how we can work so hard to be a family and just want to say fuck it. I know this isn't helpful and I am grateful for what she's doing and for what an effort it is for her, but everything is just one more set of things I have to emotionally manage for everyone else. I know, because I'm a mom. And sorry I'm complaining again; there are complaints here on the homefront that I complain too much and should get medicated to stop, but I don't have the time or inclination for that either. Plus this is my last day of antibiotics and I'm clearly better but still not healthy, which is frustrating since I was supposed to feel so great I would be tempted to stop taking the pills, though of course I never actually am. Whine, whine, whine! Even a stupid hanging daybed probably wouldn't be enough for me!)
That sounds super-frustrating, and very much worth whining about.
95: If you can't whine to your imaginary internet friends, who can you whine too.
Calming Manatee says you have a right to expect help from Lee, and she shouldn't grumble.
(Or if she must, she should grumble to her own internet friends and/or large, algae-covered mammals.)
95: Thorn, I'll be my usual diplomatic self and ask you WTF are you getting out of the relationship with Lee? I don't think I've seen anything positive in several years. And do feel quite free to tell me to fuck off, I can handle that.
It might be helpful to discuss how much each of you feels like you're contributing to chores and unpleasant tasks. Our division of labor is I do daily things and she does weekly things and it can feel to each of us like we're getting a raw deal (me: I have to do the dishes and make lunches EVERY DAY; her: I have to clean the bathroom and vacuum for HOURS every week!) Even if you're actually carrying more weight, she might feel like she is and having you tell her she's not doing enough just makes her perception worse so it would be good to know if she thinks she's actually the one doing more.
98.last also applies to this and all future comments.
88: Has anyone googled these people?
She was "Parisian the month" on some website/nmagazine recently. During the interview one of she said one of her 3 desert island items would be The Fountainhead.
You're sure it wasn't a fountainhead? Because drinking water would be very important on a desert island.
Here's a picture of her with some crazy ass thing on her head. Seriously, this is a rare case where even an Ayn Rand reference can't make me hate. Just go forth and do your thing.
From the same piece:
For example, her sister, Elisabeth Koch, who is a milliner, designed a dolphin headpiece for Anne to wear to a Japanese benefit to raise awareness of the horrible dolphin killings, brought to light by the documentary The Cove. The ocean in general is a huge passion of Anne's, which she manifests through her jewelry line which include shrimp pins, calamari rings (cleverly called "calamarings"), and sterling silver oyster vessels and lobster claws.
Calamarings!
I think they shouldn't be allowed to be so rich, both because I am a communist and because I resent it when other people have a lot of fun.
If I want to put a blue alligator on my head, I'm going to put a blue alligator on my head.
The quotation in 104 contains an interesting use of "cleverly".
101: Dammit, LB.
I was trying to think up a bidet reference. Cleverly.
98: There hasn't been much positive for me in the last few years, though there are certainly periods of tolerable. Things were pretty good in a lot of ways pre-Mara and it's been grading on a severe curve since. What I get out of it is that it's easier in some ways to run a household with two bodies, cars, and incomes. And I've contributed to the dynamic by adding more kids and so on because it seemed best for Mara and for me. Lee can be nice to be around at times, but there really isn't a relationship in the normal sense of the word and I'm in one of the periods where I don't have a whole lot of hope there ever will be.
She feels that nothing she does is ever enough or ever good enough, and I have been very careful not to say or suggest it in at least a month, probably more, but she still feels that way and it's pretty much mutual. I also think by normal-people standards what she does ISN'T good enough or sufficient, but that doesn't really matter.
She was "Parisian the month" on some website/nmagazine recently.
This reminded me of the time my roommate was The Onion's Drunk of the Week, but I can't seem to find it in the Google.
Really, all I'm asking from her is that she stop the theatrical sighs and passive-aggressive comments about the state of the house and her life, though she claims they'd only count as passive-aggressive if she were saying them TO me and not just around me and I'm trying to not say that she's not good enough at understanding what being passive-aggressive actually means. And if that is too much to ask but she is willing to work more on having a relationship with Nia and doing the counseling we'll be getting and so on, then I'm fine with that because I'm not looking for much, just wish I were.
And she's a perfectly lovely person and all that, just extremely selfish and way way worse about that these last few years. People who aren't her partner and aren't paying attention to how often she leaves me with the kids love hanging out with her, and I do enjoy her company when I'm not too annoyed.
. . . adding more kids and so on because it seemed best for Mara and for me
I presume you've seen the research showing a "U" shape to reported happiness within a marriage, over time, and the theory that child-raising causes a significant decrease in happiness for several years until the child(ren) mature. , , ,
Which is just to suggest that, in addition to whatever issues may be specific to your individual relationship your frustration may also be reflective of the very common stresses of dealing with young children (I say as someone without much experience dealing with young children).
Thorn, I hope it gets better. I'm sorry Lee can't or won't do her part for you and the girls. Also, 111.1 is totally a thing my mother does. It's crazy-making.
112 is a large part of the reason I haven't bolted. I do still have some hope things will improve, but some days I'm more bitter and lonely than others. I also think I could get better in time. I know the girls can do better as they mature and already they're so much more independent, which is great.
I have the weirdest message on my work voicemail. It goes something like "Hi [my first name], this is [common first name] from the University of [midwestern state]. I'm calling to see if you can make my fundraiser for running for office on Tuesday in [city kind of near place where I live]. I'm giving a talk at [garbled, but sounds kind of like "the U"] beforehand. Hope to see you there!"
I can't think of anyone I know at that university with that first name. No last name was mentioned, nor was what office this person is running for, nor why a fundraiser would be happening in my state which is far from his state. I'm so confused.
I do still have some hope things will improve, but some days I'm more bitter and lonely than others
You have my sympathy. My general personality tends towards, "wait it out, and hope for improvement" but part of what can be very difficult about that approach is the sense that if it does fall apart, and things don't improve, it can feel like you've wasted all that time -- there's always the possibility of second guessing, "why didn't I see the writing on the wall ages ago."
I do hope things get better, and they often do, but it's a rough situation.
"I like the fact that it resembled blood," she said.
'That's where Anne is, and she seems nothing like those big-haired women.'
She feels that nothing she does is ever enough or ever good enough, and I have been very careful not to say or suggest it in at least a month, probably more, but she still feels that way and it's pretty much mutual. I also think by normal-people standards what she does ISN'T good enough or sufficient, but that doesn't really matter.
I bet she's clear on this entire paragraph. That whether or not you express it is moot, because she clearly sees that she's not actually doing enough. So she consequently feels that nothing she does is ever enough, because she genuinely doesn't want to do much and would rather feel bad about not doing more than actually do more.
On a much less destructive scale, I do something similar. I've maxed out how much I'm willing to do, but Jammies definitely does more and I sometimes feel bad about that.
My brother's dog is so elderly, and his wife so devoted to the dog, that the dog regularly shits their bed, while they're all sleeping in it. My brother says "You can't even hear him do it. He just lifts his tail. And it somehow doesn't smell at first. You just wake up in the middle of the night and there's shit in your bed."
So for anyone who's struggling, at least your dog isn't shitting up your bed, each night.
I know you're right, heebie, and I also know that I've maxed out on what I'm wiling to do in certain arenas and I do feel guilty and sad about that, so I understand that too. I know I'm a disappointment to her but also know that she wouldn't be able to function without me, and both of those things make me feel bad at various times. It's really not awful, or rather it's awful because we're in crisis right now and once the crisis is over, many things will be better. But I am not going to apologize for still having some Target bags out when the crisis coordinator arrived because she's the fucking crisis coordinator and presumably was not expecting a spotless living room to complement our fucked-up lives.
109+: That doesn't sound like much fun. About all I can do is wish you luck with the hoped-for changes to come. My only suggestion is to put a time limit on being a martyr to "two bodies, cars, and incomes". Sometimes (he says from experience) it's better to dynamite one's whole past and walk away from the rubble.
124: No, it's really not fun, but she claims not to be having fun either, or at least not when she's at home, and at least I enjoy much of that part. We've only had Mara three years, but I'll need to see improvement to make it through another three. We've both promised to take our nuclear weapons (disrupting Nia's placement for her, breeakup and dual households for me) off the table while we deal with this crisis service thing and take our parenting classes and all that, so that's maybe six months where it's not even up for discussion. And I really need to get the adoptions done to have the freedom to do anything, so come summer I might be at an ultimatum point but I really can't effectively be before then unless she crosses the line again. These kinds of calculations are so romantic! But at least the dog isn't pooping in our bed, in which case I would absolutely be sleeping in my own room in the attic.
she stop the theatrical sighs and passive-aggressive comments about the state of the house and her life, though she claims they'd only count as passive-aggressive if she were saying them TO me and not just around me
Uh...
and I'm trying to not say that she's not good enough at understanding what being passive-aggressive actually means.
I've heard of being passive-aggressive, but I have to say this is the first time I've ever heard of someone being passive-aggressive about being passive-aggressive. If it helps, feel free to give her my contact info and I'll gladly give her a third-party point of view on just how passive-aggressive she's being!
122: I generally think my love of animals, and dogs in particular, is deep to the point of maybe being a bit weird or even off-putting. And so take what follows in the spirt in which it's being offered: it's time to buy a gunny sack, a couple of cinder blocks, some zip ties, and take the dog down to the river.
About to meet up emdash, as I'm conferencing in his town.
We decided on drinks at the Eddy, for those following the conversation at the other place.
I hope things get better Thorn. My longstanding opinion is that it's utterly impossible to understand other people's relationships, and that certainly seems to be true in this case. That said, the first three years after the older boy was born were hardly the high-water mark for my marriage, and things have really improved a lot since then. So again, I hope things get better for you as well.
Further to 127: if there is no river nearby, the local DVM should know what to do.
That was basically my advice. But the wife would never. Plus, the dog keeps on sleeping in their bed because of "we don't know how much longer we'll get to have him, so we have to savor every night" kind of thinking. So maybe he could shit their bed for years.
127: The "pink juice" is less complicated and if you can get enough for the Alzheimer's or colon cancer Dx also, it's a win-win.
Seriously, this calls for a dog hitman. Where do they live? I can get you a dog hitman.
A few years ago, I got an email with like 100+ recipients, from the sister-in-law, on and on about what a good dog he was. It was weird, but you grant people these things when they're leading up to the fact that their beloved pet has died.
It went on for paragraphs and paragraphs, all these doggy details. Finally, at the bottom, she concludes: that he's just sick. But alive. He has cancer and they're going to fight this thing through.
So they paid for doggy chemo. (Maybe he's still on it?) Anyway, it's been years. One of the follow-up mass emails included the line "Fortunately dogs don't feel pain when they get chemo". Maybe that's true, but maybe it's a really tidy thing to believe.
Ok, now I'm going to go change things to be anonymous because I think I crossed a line.
My veterinarian relatives say people tend to wait too long. From the vet's perspective, it's often obvious the critter is suffering more than the owner/guardian is willing to acknowledge.
Dogs don't feel pain when they get chemo? Amending 132: it's possible that their DVM will NOT know what to do in the event that there's no river handy. It's possible that their DVM has a boat to buy and knows an easy mark when one walks in the waiting room. That said, I'm sure your sister-in-law is lovely. Or at least I'm sure she's lovely when her legs and feet aren't covered in her dog's shit.
Feel free to delete any of my comments that you deem incriminating, LBJ.
That said, I'm sure your sister-in-law is lovely.
This is the brother that I use the Petraeus-shared-email account trick with. For the record, we did it first.
140: I think the fact that I openly said I was going to go change the names overrides anything incriminating you might have said. I'm mostly concerned about these comments turning up in a search, if my pseud was discovered.
141: Do you think maybe he had an affair with Petraeus and that's how P and GF got the idea? Or that you did? Obviously the dog story is interesting enough without international sexual intrigue, but I might as well ask.
Is this the same sister in law who was a psychopath about a certain kid's one year old birthday? Because I don't want to say anything negative about her, but she may be Hitler.
DogBreath was shitting in the apartment pretty regularly the last six months or so -- never on the bed because she couldn't get up there anymore. For the last six months of her life, it was tolerable.
Shitting in the house is completely reasonable -- time-honored, even -- behavior for an elderly dog who has earned respect. By contrast, shitting the bed, especially frequently, is a very different thing. Not even a the dog that pulls the entire family from a burning building and then picks the correct Powerball number earns the right to shit the bed more than once.
144: Yep, although to be fair, both SILs were crazy that time.
143: I'm open to the possibility. Maybe he is broadwell!
Not thirty second ago, I received an e-mail from the Provost's assistant saying that the Provost's tickets to the S/alzburg M/arionette T/heatre were up for grabs. Just now, I received another e-mail saying that the tickets had been claimed. A) The S/alzburg M/arionette T/heatre sound creepy as hell. B) Different strokes, I guess. C) There's not a lot to do around here on a Friday night.
At least if you know there is a dog shitting in the bed every night, you don't have to wonder if your brother and his wife still have a sex life.
Look, take the dog shit, Salzburg Marionette Theater, and brother's sex life back to Kink.com where they belong.
"I never thought this could happen to me, but I laid down in bed to get some rest before seeing the Salzburg Marionette Theater...."
111: Really, all I'm asking from her is that she stop the theatrical sighs and passive-aggressive comments
Up to here, I thought the comment was about the vows lady.
154: Ha, no! And to Lee's credit, we've had five kids in three years, which isn't a ton by fostering standards but she's also not particularly comfortable being a foster parent. (Hell, we've had four additions in just the last two years, which is also a lot, since we were just a few weeks shy of one year with Mara alone before Val and Alex came into the picture and sent Lee into a total tailspin.) She wanted and wants to be a parent, but she's inclined to do so in sort of demanding and authoritarian ways that don't always work so well, and if she's able to work through that I think she'll be happier and so will the kids. And I know she has plenty of complaints she could make about me, key among them that I'm not supportive enough of her or her efforts, and she's clearly right about that.
Vee haff zome standing room space if you are up for it. Drinks on zee house.
Emotional support. Lots of people seem to want it. The secret for me is to never try to be supportive when sober. It's probably different for people with acting ability or empathy.
123: You're a disappointment to her because you're messy? I thought the rule was always that the partner that has a lower threshold for mess is supposed to do more cleaning.
Shit, I missed 95 et seq. I'm sorry to hear it, Thorn. Best of luck. Contemplate words of wisdom from Kenny Rogers:
You've got to know when to hold 'em,
Know when to fold 'em,
Know when to walk away,
Know when to run.
You never count your money,
When you're sittin' at the table,
There'll be time enough for countin',
When the dealin's done.
Obviously I really don't know what the fuck I'm doing being a parent or in a relationship or anything, but it's what I've got to work with now. Tonight turned awful and I'm stuck in the middle as usual, but eventually all the kids will be asleep and I can do something. Probably not sleep myself since the party we went to pre-ugliness was beer or Diet Coke only and so now I've had caffeine. But tomorrow I get to read for a high school quizbowl tournament at Lee's old community college, and that should make me happy enough to counterbalance the elaborate birthday party for a four-year-old in the afternoon. And I get to leave the baby with Lee for at least the first part of the day.
Oh, and I just read the new Pynchon book and really enjoyed it and would love to talk to anyone about it.
My sympathies. I know Sifu had lots of thoughts about that book. Where's Sifu?
161: I started it on my trip but haven't gotten too far into it. Turns out reading about the dot-com crash still brings up uncomfortable memories.
Thorn
Yeah, I'm sorry to hear that things aren't really better. I agree with everyone else that it doesn't sound like you're getting much out of your relationship with Lee, though I suppose it's hard to know the full story from blog comments. 6 months sounds like a reasonable time to take actively leaving off the table, but to be preparing to leave if necessary if things aren't improved by then. Do you feel like, if you didn't have three kids to deal with, and your relationship with Lee were at the same place, you would stay?
165.last: Absolutely not. But we do have three kids, so there's that. And I have a dispensation from our couples counselor to have my priorities be self -> children -> relationship -> work, etc. (or probably I could swap those last two) rather than self -> relationship -> children/work/whatnot the way it's supposed to be in a healthy relationship. Obviously I fail a whole lot at the self-first part, but it's a hard balance.
Also, while I'm talking to you, you were asking ages ago about makeup and the Cover Girl giant crayon lip gloss/balm stuff is good and easy to apply. Other people make them too and the Queen Latifah line I never see in stores also features them, but I totally just bought some because I wanted to support advertising them with Janelle Monae. Anyway, buying lip balm periodically counts as self-care, I'm sure.
And Josh, I thought about that a lot while reading. I was still in college for the crash and then got a job in the not-tech side of a dot-com that eventually got bought out to the stable place I'm in now, so I never dealt with more than temporary uncertainty. And there are a whole lot of surprisingly unscathed dot-com veterans in the book in a way that seemed weirdly glib, as if it would be uncomfortable to get into the reality of unemployment misery when instead we could just talk about numbing ourselves with pop culture while waiting for the next big thing that's always out there somewhere.
I wanted to support advertising them with Janelle Monae
That reminds me, I got to see her last week and Ho. Ly. Crap. What a great show. And the crowd was more diverse (in all dimensions) than any other I've ever been to.
I haven't started it yet, but I took it on a trip to Spokane last month, and have had it on the side table for a month since then. I suppose it might be time to crack it open.
By which I mean maybe tomorrow.
Thorn,
Thanks for the advice. I will try out the Cover Girl lip balm/crayon stuff. Right now my tinted lip balm is Burt's Bees, but it's in a color that's not quite right and wears off after about 5 seconds. If you have any eye liner recommendations let me know. I have Revlon color stay, which I remember working well at some point, but now I feel like after I put it on I end up with more smeared on the underside of my eye than on top. Also, any mascara that isn't lengthening or thickening but just kind of subtle, and comes in brown instead of black. Preferably, one that doesn't clump much, but maybe that only comes in a higher price range? I don't wear mascara on any regular basis so I don't like spending much money on it, since you're supposed to throw it out after 6 months (though I use mine for about 2-3 years, since I only wear mascara once every several months).
162: I did. I thought it was swell.
168: She's so awesome. The only time I saw her perform was opening for Of Montreal and she totally stole the show. I wish I could have made it to one of the shows on this fall's tour.
Yeah, Monae was here on Oct 22nd, but I missed it. Next time she comes through town I am definitely going.
161: I read it as well, and enjoyed it, but I had problems with some of Maxine's sexual adventures; I kept wondering, why is this here? Also, I'm fairly sure I missed some bits by not being very familiar with either finance or the computer industry (though I know the rough outlines of the latter better than the former).
175: I thought a lot of the casual-to-the-point-of-barely-noteworthy-to-her sex stuff was so off that it almost had to be a metaphor or something.
(Back to being sad about my life, I just packed a bag because it sounds like my little girl is being admitted to an inpatient psych program after tonight's meltdown and subsequent ER visit because of another breach of the safety plan. I remember being on the other end of the process at 15 and I know it can be a positive and necessary step, but fuck is this not what I wanted for someone half that age, for someone I love and want to care for. But it's going to be a few weeks before all the extra services are in place and functioning, and I'm trying not to feel too guilty that I couldn't hold everything together until then. I'm just so sad.)
My sympathies, that sounds rough and very emotionally trying.
177: Good luck and best wishes. All I can say is I admire the hell out of your determination and courage.
179 speaks for me as well, Thorn. Do speak up if people can help from afar.
Oh, aaargh. Poor girl, and I'm so sorry. Not for specifically being admitted, but just that there's so much on her plate. And yours.
Thorn, there is this long review of Bleeding Edge if you're stuck with a smartphone and a bunch of downtime waiting for things to happen.
I hope they can help, and second all the comments of support.
184: Thanks. The wait is over and I had an excellent book for the three hours I spent alone in a waiting room (Eleanor Catton's debut, The Rehearsal, which is recommended for other reading situations too) because the anbulances were all in use for real emergencies, but she's in and safe and has the bag I brought plus all the lollipops the EMTs gave her.
To heebie's penultimate point, I probably under-respond to what would get other kids sent to therapy because for both big girls, feeling hurt and outraged and sad seem like very reasonable responses to what they've dealt with. Both need to learn better coping skills, and I'm saying this to remind myself I need to develop and model some myself. Just because I no longer starve myself to feel satisfaction or take apart scraps of cloth strand-by-strand to soothe myself or feel in control doesn't mean I've replaced it with a life that's healthier.
Glad to hear things are somewhat more chill. Empathize with all the coping skills stuff. Sitting outside while 250 people are blown away by an amazing event that wouldn't have happened without me, I wondered tonight about how much I hated being so estranged from people in my early life. Did I really hate it? Why do I seem to seek it out so much now? I guess we all just have to forge ahead and do whatever gets us through the night. One doesn't have to go full-on SPK to recognize that 80% of medicalization is bullshit and what we really need to do is burn shit down. I hope things get better for all the little ones.
I thought a lot of the casual-to-the-point-of-barely-noteworthy-to-her sex stuff was so off that it almost had to be a metaphor or something.
Agreed. But I still don't know what for!
I just packed a bag because it sounds like my little girl is being admitted to an inpatient psych program
Sympathies. I hope it leads to good things, but I can't imagine how hard it will be.
Oh shit. Let me countersign 179 too. So sorry.
And one more for 179, as well as my strongest hopes that having you in her corner means that the two of them will be able to recover from the injuries they've already received.
And thanks, all. The kiddo is doing okay, per her nurse, and the rest of us will go over and visit when the baby's afternoon nap is over. I think this will be a wakeup call that daily rages and attempts to beat me up are not a successful coping strategy, and I'd be okay with that changing for sure. I think this was the right choice, just a hard one, and we've got good supports in place for her in a lot of ways.
I do think both girls (all three girls?) are better off for having been placed in a home where we/I have a therapeutic focus and we really talk about things and work on how to help them function better and integrate their pasts. Their caseworkers seem to think this is basically unique, especially in a home that also meets their racial identity needs, so that's a good thing and I think it will be a good thing long-term. And I'm going to have involved professionals helping me learn how to be a better parent, too, and I hope that will help them. I think they're all going to grow up to do great, and stand by any brags I've ever made about how they stack up against any of the Unfoggedspawn when it comes to smarts, beauty, or all-around awesomeness. I feel sure they're going to grow up to be amazing people, but they have more challenges (including having me as an annoying white atheist adoptive/foster mom) along the way than some others might.
I think this will be a wakeup call that daily rages and attempts to beat me up are not a successful coping strategy, and I'd be okay with that changing for sure.
Yay!
I think they're all going to grow up to do great, and stand by any brags I've ever made
Yay!
Now get some sleep . . . not this instant, of course, but just hopefully you can get out of crisis mode at some point.
Hang in there, Thorn. I'm thinking of you all.
re: Bleeding Edge-- is this Pynchon's normal style? It wasn't quite what I was expecting. Also, Daikatana came out in 2000 (though I had to look that up to check).
193: yes and no; his style is always heavy with contemporaneous references and so on, but it tends to bend to shift the milieu, so Vineland has a little bit of a California hippie prose style and Gravity's Rainbow is sort of dense and mid-century and British, and Mason & Dixon is oddly capitalized colonial-ish English.
Also, his use of turn-of-the-millenium tech signifiers isn't perfect (he doesn't quite understand what Back Orifice does, for instance) but it's not at all clangingly off, which I had feared given that he's, you know, a 74 year old novelist.
His rendering of female characters is, as ever, perhaps best described as "well-meaning".
Nthing 179, and the short time we spent with the older girls makes me think you're totally justified in standing by your brags.
Thanks, all. Nick wins, as I just got the baby to sleep and realized I'm in a lot of pain (residual stress stuff, mostly, I'm sure) and about to keel over. Luckily Lee's willing to do the other bedtime and I can just get some sleep. I took the other two girls for a nice visit at the facility and I'll probably go by myself tomorrow night, and then Medicaid will only pay through Tuesday or Wednesday and so we're probably about done anyway.
(Lee didn't go to the visit because she was out getting a passive-aggressive haircut because she doesn't want me to have to spend time retwisting her locs, which I don't because she's never willing to sit still for me, only to complain daily about it not being done. It turns out from other conversations today that she probably doesn't actually know what "passive-aggressive" means. I'm having a hard time thinking of a way to explain it that isn't.)
197: Thanks to Teapot Zucchini for making me see how sweet they can be with a baby and respond the way I did to the email looking for an adoptive home for Selah. Despite all the other things that are going on, they adore her and are hilariously cute with her.
The last sentence of 198 is making me laugh.
(including having me as an annoying white atheist adoptive/foster mom)
This is total bullshit, Thorn. Also, 179 is totally right.