My suspicion: co-workers are for -gg-d what taxi drivers are for Tom Friedman.
The guy's not necessarily a pervert -- he could just have vivid memories of touching sixteen-year-old tits from when he was sixteen. I suppose it's possible that I have touched fifteen-year-old tits -- I can't remember when exactly my high school girlfriend let me "get that far."
There's also the chance that he was grabbing twelve-year-old asses when he was nineteen -- no harm no foul.
My keyboard feels like an eighty-five-year-old's spine.
Ogged has finally caved to Emerson's demands.
I'm can't pin down the various referents of "that." Is the claim that the breasts are too firm to be compared to the mousepad, and therefore the ass is a better comparison? That's how it reads to me. But I would have thought the order of body firmness went in the other direction. Which, I think, would mean that the compared body part should have moved towards an older person - older usually meaning more gushy. But I lack the varied experience to be sure of this.
I see some field work in SCMT's future.
"That," in each case, refers to the mousepad (specifically, the mousepad's hand rest).
Also, gosh, we'd have to know if the standard measure of ass-firmness was taken clenched or unclenched.
My mousepad feels like a 37-year-old man's stomach.
Plus, was gender discussed? I'm just saying, a twelve-year-old girl's ass likely feels quite different from a twelve-year-old boy's ass.
Some days I'm really quite shocked at what I'm willing to type. I raise the above point only for the sake of SCIENCE.
My mousepad feels like a 37-year-old man's stomach.
Do you remember the early ones, though? They were hard.
One summer in college, I was working in a stockbroker's office. The stockbroker's 14 year old son was doing odd jobs around the office. On one occasion, I found him rubbing himself against a filing cabinet. I just walked out of the room and, for a while, we both pretended that nothing had happened. Then, later, he had to help me lift a box, and the positions were such that when he hoisted it up the back of my hand brushed against his thigh. I could tell he had a little moment of... something... there, because he almost dropped the box.
He was babyfaced and very innocent-looking and I felt troubled about it, expecting someone to rush in and arrest me. Luckily, there were only two or three days to go at that point, and I could just avoid him the rest of the time.
11: Yeah, once I felt their stomachs, they did get hard. Not just the early ones, though. All of them.
#10: You think? At twelve, I'd say you're just at the tail end of gender neutrality w/r/t ass firmness.
I don't have a mousepad. What does that mean?
Was this a male or female coworker? Female might have a better idea of relative firmness of parts, but then, there's no way a female used the word "tits," so I'm guessing male.
15 -- it's Amanda Marcotte's cute pet name for her apartment.
well, just because it is funny. Yes, completely OT.
14 - I guess it depends on the twelve-year-old. My memories of Seventh Grade are dim, but I seem to recall there being at least some babyfat arriving on the butts of the girls.
I'm going to hell.
Is my story OT? That's what I think of when I see twelve-year-old + office supplies.
Babyfat arriving? Okay, 12-year old girls who are pregnant, yes, are obviously post-pubescent, and therefore will have different butts from both boys and their less-mature peers.
Is my story OT?
Certainly not. Now tell it again, but with the alternate ending, please.
This reminds me of the time I got my ass grabbed just off campus in the very quiet, upper-middle class, leafy neighborhood wherein was located my off-campus dorm. I was just walking along, wearing my daffodil dress, when all of a sudden I felt two hands, one on either buttock, grip my ass and squeeze, hard. By the time I turned around in shock all I could see was a white guy with close-cropped hair, wearing a white t-shirt and blue athletic shorts running off. I was too stunned to say anything. I heard someone yell, "Darren." Now, if this happened in New York I'd be upset and pissed, but because of the sheer incongruity of it all, I mostly just thought it was funny. After thinking about it for a while, I decided that I guessed I had been sexually assaulted and I ought to say something about it, and beside, walking over the the campus police-type people would be more fun than doing my homework, so I went over. They had to refer my case over to the town police, because it had happened off campus, so I got a voice mail message from a town policeman, the first 15 seconds of which was laughter, because at the time I had a voice mail greeting that was me somewhat adorably rapping "The Real Slim Shady" with a play on my name. So I had to fill out a statement with the town police, and meanwhile the campus police put up posters about the incident with the description I had given them, but they were unfortunately graphic in their description of what had happened, so the "ass grabbing" became a campus joke for months to come, and I felt like a minor celebrity, except only my friends knew it had been me, so whenever I heard it discussed I would enthusiastically interject, "That was me! I got my ass grabbed!" Adding to the hilarity was that there was a kid named "Darren" who roughly answered to the description I had given, so everybody teased him about being the assgrabber, though in fact, I could eliminate him since his hair was not close-cropped. All in all, it was an exciting interlude, though in fact, it was less harmless than it first appeared, because it turned out later that same day someone who looked like my ass grabber had tried to kiss a twelve year old in an underpass.
OT at Unfogged is an empty set.
Ogged, I never knew you'd worked with John Derbyshire.
What Matt #3 said. Tia, was Darren ever apprehended?
24 should have started, "I never thought it could happen to me...."
29 -- and what publication would it then have appeared in?
The last time I got my ass full-on grabbed by a stranger was by a 80 year old Italian man at the Vatican. Who grabs a girl's ass at the Vatican?
My mousepad feels like bags of sand.
80 year old Italian manat the Vatican
Was he wearing any particular headdress?
28: you mean the real ass grabber? No, I don't think so.
Who grabs a girl's ass at the Vatican?
This setup is simply too easy. I shall refrain.
My mousepad feels like bags of sand.
Heh heh.
33: All you other ass grabbers are just imitating
So won't the real ass grabber please stand up,
Please stand up, please stand up?
Also – the little stick-like pointing device on a laptop? It is commonly called a "nipple", which annoys me. It does indeed resemble a part of the female anatomy but a nipple ain't it.
(Hoping this thread turns into memoirs by all the female Unfogged commenters, on occasions of having their juvenile asses grabbed. That's my ticket to ride -- then I can turn around and sell the comments to various publications under various assumed names.)
Years ago, a co-worker and I . . .
I take it you've been saving this story for just the right moment.
It is commonly called a "nipple"
I've never heard it called anything but a trackball.
40 was not meant to cast doubt, just to express surprise that I, of all people, had never heard it.
what's up with you people? ass-grabbers are gross.
Last year we had a Bicycle Groper who would regularly grope various body parts of women, typically breasts, while riding past them on a bicycle -- usually on the street that was my daily commute. Reports of him kept coming in for several months.
I myself was hoping to encounter him, being sure that I would have the presence of mind to knock him off his bike as he grabbed, ideally causing him Major and Grievous Bodily Harm when he fell. (You know that study they are trumpeting right now about men having some neurological monopoly on desires for justice and vengeance? Dubious.) But he must have been able to read minds since it never happened.
It is commonly called a "nipple", which annoys me. It does indeed resemble a part of the female anatomy but a nipple ain't it.
Becks, are you saying it looks more like one of these? (Quasi-SFW.)
I've never heard it called anything but a trackball.
"Nubbin."
Also "trackpoint cover pad."
If you ever have to buy replacements on ebay, you too will find that they're called by about ten different names.
During my nipple-confirming web search, I came across this. Sixth comment down: "Is the trackball more like a nipple or a g-spot?"
Remedial anatomy class for you!
I always thought of a trackball is something else. A "trackpoint" is what we officially called the pointing stick (like on the IBM ThinkPad).
And yes, MAE, that is what I was thinking of. Although I would say NSFW on that link.
I would say NSFW on that link.
I sure hit the back button with a quickness.
Y'know, we were re-populating the Earth, Tia. I didn't have time for niceties.
apo, how are you going to repopulate the earth hitting the back button? someone sleep through sex-ed?
42: Wow. Bicycle groping sounds way advanced. Seems to have too many opportunities for injury to both the groper and gropee.
OK, joystick. Too obvious, right?
51: I'm not revealing my secrets for free, dude.
22---sigh. Babyfat is what a number of guys (that is, I'm not the only person to ahve said it, but I'd to to vouch for it being in the general lexicon) call the soft, filling out but not muscular type of ass-flesh that teenage girls get in their early to mid-teens, which then turns firmer as the girl actually becomes a woman.
Hell, I tell you.
It's not the bicycle ass-grabbers who are the really skeevy ones, though--that honor has to go to the bicycle seat sniffers.
Yeesh.
I'll say... sniffing someone's ass while riding by on a bike requires some serious skill.
(Thank you! Thank you! I'm here 'til Tuesday. Tip your waiters!)
But no one here was pwned! I'm calling, instead, 57 gets it exactly right.
56: They're both pervs, but at least the seat-sniffer isn't assaulting anyone.
ps. I think it's pretty funny, in an odd and somewhat disturbing sort of way, that when you and your (presumably adult) co-worker were feeling this mousepad and the first comment out of his mouth was "Oh, that feels just like a sixteen-year-old's tits," your response was a cool and analytic "Really, you think so? That's awfully firm."
I think my response would have been to just stare at him with a look of horror and bewilderment.
59: BPHD was totally pwned, in the most classical sense, by 55.
Hey all this talk of trackpoints makes me wonder if any of you could direct me to a resource. Ellen prefers to use the touch-pad part of her track-point; but she spilled coffee on it a couple of weeks ago and it is not working very well anymore. She can use the little red nipple part ok but does not like that as well. Where can I read instructions on taking the touch-pad part off and cleaning it, or putting a new one in? Are they easy to find for sale?
61: As someone said upthread, he could have had occasion to feel a 16-year-old's tits when he was himself around that age. (One hopes that is the explanation.)
Well, I'd say that banter's inappropriate for work even if he was referring to his teenaged years.
64: Frederick- yes, I've read upthread, and I understand that he's probably not a child molestor. And this woudl probably be running through my mind as I looked at him with a look of bewilderment.
But still, that's an awfully shocking thing to have come out of an adult male's mouth upon first touching a gell-filled mousepad.
And it's not the comment itself that I was even highlighting, but ogged's rather nonplussed, matter-of-fact reaction to the comment.
66 -- -gg-d's cool response and quick wit played a major role in inspiring my #1.
One time, and one time only, I was on a subway with Tia. And we were making palaver 'bout domestic stuff, like pocket mending, and all I could think about how I was wishing we were in Tokyo during rush hour, where Tia'd be all pressed up against me and some Japanese businessman would be grabbing my ass. No wait, that's not right...
There are coworkers, and then there are coworkers. I've been mooned, I've played strip drinking games, I've had someone attempt to dry-hump my wife in a drunken game of truth or dare...
Chopper runs with a wild crowd.
Due to his Mexican heritage, Ogged has a different view toward sexual contact and the appropriate ages for it.
Well, I'd say that banter's inappropriate for work even if he was referring to his teenaged years.
It certainly wouldn't be appropriate for general consumption. But I can imagine certain guys who would jocularly say something like that to another guy whom they knew wouldn't be offended (or a woman whom they knew wouldn't be offended, but there probably wouldn't be many of those) if no one else was within earshot. And I can easily imagine someone saying it in an all-male workplace, where I suspect the office dialogue is considerably raunchier than in sex-integrated workplaces.
Re my 72: I defer to Chopper's expertise.
71: My understanding is that Iranian girls commonly get married at very young ages, like 12.
And I can easily imagine someone saying it in an all-male workplace, where I suspect the office dialogue is considerably raunchier than in sex-integrated workplaces.
Ogged works at pre-mid-70s Princeton?
F., Are you backing out of our agreement, or what?
IMO it's never a good idea unless you're off work premises, because one day you'll think you're certain no one's within earshot...and then you're creating a hostile work environment. I guess Ogged didn't say whether this exchange took place at work.
Re: 75 - I guess it's possible that Ogged, using his sovereign authority as blogowner, dissolved our agreement in the same motion as deleting the comments.
God, speaking of inappropriate workplace behavior, even if you think you're a funny guy, even if you think everyone likes you, do not walk up to somebody else's secretary and take the pen she is using to write with out of her fucking hand, saying, "Just a sec, I'll give it back."
Tia, Are you a secretary? ...mmm, sexy.
Re: 72, 76
We were in a comment thread somewhere in the Mineshaft and laughing over this absurd remark or that when he leaned back in his chair and jumped the conversational tracks. "I've got one," he said, an evil glint in his eye. "How does every joke about sixteen-year-old's tits and twelve-year-old's asses begin?"
Did you (or the aggrieved party) respond with a withering comment, at least?
I responded to your comment. I didn't address you. Re the age of marriage in Iran, this 2002 story:
Iranian human-rights activists have won a partial victory in their long battle to protect children from being married off by their parents before they begin puberty. After months of deliberation, Iranian authorities recently approved a law that requires court approval for the marriage of girls below the age of 13 and boys younger than 15.
Prague, 28 June 2002 (RFE/RL) -- There are no official statistics for how many young children in Iran are married off by their parents before they become teenagers. But the practice has long been considered commonplace in the countryside and in smaller towns where traditional values rule. There, parents often arrange marriages for their children long before the children themselves are old enough to give their informed consent.
Such child marriages not only are sanctioned by tradition, they also are permitted under Iran's legal code. The law permits parents to marry off girls at the age of 9 and boys at the age of 14.
Now, however, Iranian human-rights activists have won a partial victory in a long-running battle to raise the marriage age for children.
This month, Iranian authorities approved a law requiring parents to obtain court permission for marriages of girls under the age of 13 and of boys younger than 15. At the same time, children above those ages will be allowed to marry voluntarily.
I read some piece 25+ years ago, IIRC a translation of something written by the Ayatollah Khomeini, in which he said how cool it was when a girl had her menarche (first menstrual period) in the house of her husband. Yuck.
"How does every joke about sixteen-year-old's tits and twelve-year-old's asses begin?"
Hey, apostropher told me a funny joke today...
There's a guy I used to work for who is notorious for saying inappropriate things who was looking to hire an admin about a month ago. (Classic tale: he accidentally left pr0n up on his computer on Take Your Daughter To Work Day.) Knowing the guy's history, one of the major criteria used by the person who was doing the hiring for him was finding someone who wouldn't sue the company. She called me up and asked if I knew anybody who wouldn't mind being sexually harassed if it meant they got profit-sharing and a good health plan.
i am kotsko. wood u like 2 correct mi tipos?
You're right -- your first comment escaped on a technicality. But in explaining yourself, you violated the agreement (assuming it's still in force, which is anything but certain given the extremely august prerogatives Ogged is claiming for himself lately). I'm willing to look the other way on the violation, given that I incited you to do it.
Damned decent of you (he remarked to no one in particular).
Tia, That's not all I'd like to correct, if you catch my meaning. I wouldn't mind going to a high mass with you [nudge, nudge].
81: No. I guess I could write him an email asking him not to do that anymore. I worked in this very department in another position about a year ago, and a different prof walked around me into my workspace, took my stapler, and walked off with it, and eventually returned it by leaving it on the edge of my desk, all without saying a word. I wrote him a polite email asking him not to do that again, and he was mortified, and apologized to me both by email and in person.
My mouse rest feels like mi tipos.
Tia, put up a sign that says "Please, do help yourself to anything you like from this desk, even if I am actively using it. After all, I do live to serve you."
Or alternately, drop the sarcasm and put up a sign that says "please do not borrow my shit without asking, especially if I am actually using it."
91: He's trying to live up to his title.
Wait, I forgot, Ogged's the only one who's allowed to make rules for me. Sorry Kotsko.
So Ogged really is asserting the jus primae noctis. [there is an implied link to a classic w-lfs-n comment that Google is unable to locate at the moment.]
Damned decent of you
Um, we Mexicans prefer "Mighty white of you."
That i/j thing always trips me up.
Wow, that was back when text was still textualist.
Reading the thread SB linked in 98 -- whatever happened to Walter Sobchak? Did he die as a result of that huge bug up his ass?
Here's another story about workplace banter: my (white) boyfriend has a teasing relationship with his gay, black coworker, and they like to give each other a hard time. A little while ago, one of their other coworkers was yelling something to the GBC about how they needed something "up here," but the GBC couldn't quite hear her. So my bf chimes in, " 'Up in here'--Say it so he can understand it." I didn't even get this, but my bf explained to me that "up in here" is black slang. Apparently such joking jumped over the bounds of acceptable teasing they'd established, and the conversation petered out awkwardly. My boyfriend, mortified, proceeded to IM him to apologize like eight zillion times.
I think Walter posted more times than the rest of current commenters combined on that thread, caused a rip in the fabric of reality, and fell into another dimension.
Would that this happened all the time.
Why Chopper, I don't know what you mean!
I always had a soft spot in my heart for Walt.
Yeah, Walter shared my deep and abiding love for things Lebowski. He really got a hair up his ass over B, though.
From what I've seen, he seems like a reasonable enough guy on other subjects.
I should say that, annoying as I found Sobchak in that thread, he figured out that he'd made an error of fact causing him to be unfair to B later on, and apologized, which is the kind of thing that lots of people don't do. So all appropriate kudos to him for that.
Wonkete has a creepy panda-bestiality photo up which involves the State Department.
When will the American people finally say "Enough is enough" on these bizarre and perverse interrogation methods employed by the administration?
Adam, I'm too thick to figure out whether that was a joke. If it isn't, "heaven help us" is all that I can say.
And since Adam already switched topics, I feel that it's okay for me to detour the conversation a bit.
Today I couldn't tune in to Air America on my dying clock radio, and I wound up listening to a few minutes of Rush Limbaugh, and, I have to say, I actually agreed with something he said.
He was going on about how mainstream and okay Alito is, and then he said, "If he's really that bad, why aren't the Democrats willing to filibuster him?" Since he is really that bad, I say, why indeed?
Becks, I was trying to imply that the panda-based bestiality was a new torture method they were trying out, based on the powers inherent in the president to make people have sex with a panda.
why indeed?
Battered wife syndrome.
"Becks" is BostonianGirl's new nickname.
I never thought it would happen to me, but I have an awkward work relationship to share. I'm editing a coursebook on finance for a guy who happens to be dating the senior vice president of [dayjob], a smallish, casual, liberally inclined organization. The project is freelance, I've been working on it for maybe three months off and on, and we only speak occassionally by e-mail or telephone.
One day he took me to lunch, and we had a nice, professional-to-friendly lunchtime conversation. He's even a minor art collector, so. One week later he calls me during the day and greets me as "cutie" when I picked up the line. I thought surely he meant to call his ladyfriend with the corner office and was only playing through, but no: in subsequent phone calls, I graduated to "handsome" and even soared to "sexy," which I skip right over.
I know perfectly well that he's merely assuming a comfort level that does not exist, and it's annoying and even a little pathetic. But I reluctantly admit that it's an illustration of why fun should not be tolerated in the workplace.
And Becks will henceforth be known as BG--except that I think that would be an unfair trade. All the benefit of Becks's comments would accrue to me, and she'd be stuck with my dumpy ones.
Someday, Becks and Bostoniangirl hope to be as cool each other, assuming as a general rule that when A is as cool as C, and B is as cool as C, then A and B are as cool as each other.
Does that make LB a sort of catalyst of coolness?
Smasher, maybe he's trying to warm you up to the idea of getting paid with something other than money.
But seriously, that's kind of creepy.
Are you planning to continue ignoring it, Smasher? Or do you want to say something?
BG, Kerry called for the filibuster.
Does it seem like Kerry's only big fuck-up was in voting for the original authorization to use military force in Iraq?
It is creepy, but at the same time, he's not a creepy guy—I really think that he assumes a level of familiarity we just don't share, and is probably jokey like this with most people he works with. Since the project's nearly finished, I'm content to bite my tongue. The only thing is that I think I might be doing his next colleague/collaborator a favor by pointing out his behavior.
And in not waving his dick around more on the SB, I guess.
And not taking up the black caucus's challenge to the 2000 electoral vote count.... But that was more a sin of omission.
Is he joking with you or trying to pick you up?
Smasher--Why not experiment a little? Be open to new things? Nobody gets hurt. ANd maybe you'll like it.
Thanks Smasher. When I called a week or so ago, as a constituent, I was told that he was waiting--out of politeness-- for the judiciary committee to vote.
I then urged him to vote no. I can't tell whether he cares what his constituents think. Kennedy's office asked for my zip code, but Kerry's didn't bother.
I need to call Kennedy to thank him for voting against Alito and then urge him to filibuster.
I'm sure that they get calls from a lot of wackos, but the utter imperturbability of the staff assistants is kind of unnerving. If you call and say that you think that Alito's view of executive power is dangerous and a threat to our constitution, the person just says, "thank you for your call." And maybe s/he makes a note of it. I'd love to hear someone say, "I know." There is no emotion at all. It makes me feel stupid for caring.
Nobody gets hurt.
Not a foregone conclusion, that one.
But treasure your right to talk with an ignoramus, BG! I have called my former representatives, who are neither sympathetic to my political views nor my plight—sometimes they will simply hang up.
129, if he's trying to pick me up, he's not trying very hard. I think he's joking, I just don't get it.
I have lived in DC and been without representation. I haven't had a chance to vote in a Democratic primary for a long time, but DC representation iss something I will definitely ask any candidate to support.
DC for Democracy was planning to start a PAC to give money to candidates who support voting rights for the District.
#113: You know, just yesterday I was hypothesizing that Ben w-lfs-n is, in fact, a panda.
Because he enjoys vegetation and climbing structures?
Or is it the characteristic six-digited paws?
"The utter imperturbability of the staff assistants is kind of unnerving. "
Jesus, during the election a whole bunch of use were screaming at them trying to get them to notice the Swift Boaters. They were as imperturbable as iguanas.
BTW, if I told you that pandas have corkscrew penises like warthogs, would know that I was lying?
139 to 131, and "use" --> "us".
And I can easily imagine someone saying it in an all-male workplace, where I suspect the office dialogue is considerably raunchier than in sex-integrated workplaces.
Or, unfortunately, in workplaces (or philosophy departments) that were recently all-male, but aren't now. You know we're just kidding, right?
I first read "considerably raunchier" as considerably ranchier. That changes things.
You know, just yesterday I was hypothesizing that Ben w-lfs-n is, in fact, a panda.
I'd been wondering who that guy who showed up at my photo shoot was. Now I know.
(TJ, is that ranchy enough for you?)
Oops. My photo shoot.
(Commenting Becks-style at the moment.)
Or, unfortunately, in workplaces (or philosophy departments) that were recently all-male, but aren't now.
Yes. I suspect that my sense of the raunchiness of the atmosphere in all-male workplaces comes largely from reading about sexual harassment cases arising in formerly all-male workplaces, where the men often treat the women who have newly integrated the workplace very badly. See, e.g., Catharine MacKinnon, Sexual Harassment of Working Women. I hadn't realized that philosophy departments were such hotbeds of testosterone, though.
141: that and so many analytic philosophy departments seem to produce people who want to talk about what borders on neuroscience without actually taking the trouble to be neuroscientists -- or instead to do the things that philosophy is very useful for doing, rather than the things for which it is often a blunt instrument not suited.
or did i just encounter a bad patch in the department?
(certain strands of philosophy of the mind)
Swerving wildly back around to BostonianGirl's comments for a minute, if you will.
What method of communication do you guys think works better with Senators?
Here's my guess, in order: 1) Handwritten, non-insane letter, 2) non-insane phone call, 3) slightly deranged hand-written letter, 4) non-insane email, 5) slightly deranged phone-call, 6) slightly deranged email.
Am I just old-fashioned to rank the hand-written letters before the phone calls?
7) Cash payment. 8)Business relationship that will result in multiple cash payments, over a long period of time, and possibly paid employment after leaving office.
All communications to public officials you have no special connection with are just going to be tallied. If your message is "Filibuster Alito", you should puff it up into about 30-40 words to make it look like an actual letter, but in such a way that the person reading it can put it on the right pile as quickly as possible.
So is there any point to using a stamp or should I just add my opinion to the tally electronically?
I don't know that. I know that they discount mass emails that all say the same thing. Having an individual message is important. And I would guess that a stamped letter or a phone call counts more than an email.
Also, be polite and don't tell them to go fuck themselves, even if it seems like the most sensible thing to say at a given time.
I interned in a Senate office this past summer, so I can actually answer JM's question. Emerson's 151 is correct -- a form letter will get a form response at best. Mass e-mails are the worst, because they're so easy to do. At least in our office, form and individual letters were tallied separately, with the total number and proportion of each type reported to the Senator (also the breakdown of opinions, of course).
We responded equally to letters, calls and e-mails; this may not be the case for all offices. If you send a letter, keep in mind that all mail is extensively screened and takes a long time to reach the office. If you want to encourage a decision on something soon, call or e-mail. For e-mail, use an obvious subject line -- there are automatic screening systems to deliver e-mails to the proper person based on issue. If the Senator is up for reelection soon, response time is usually quick; if not, they may not respond at all.
Barack Obama has always responded to me, even if I just clicked to join a form letter. That's because he's running for president, I'd imagine. Dick Durbin could give a fuck what I think.
Okay, the above responses make sense. My pointed, hand-written letters to Schumer and Clinton has yielded only "I am also concerned about the overreach of executive power, Love, Senator Clinton." I guess Schumer isn't running.
Teofilo, your reponse is really helpful--since so many crackpot legislative measures are introduced and made public at the last minute.
I guess that the upshot is that I should write emails in the careful and personal way I would write hand-written letters. And lots of them. Right?
If you really cared, sweetpea, you'd have chained yourself to something by now, so send the email already and go have a beer.
And back to the subject of this thread, which was, I am convinced, designed for Emerson. This one goes out to you, Emerson--and Derbyshire (via Clement Marot):
Fleur de quinze ans (si Dieu vous salve et gard),
J'ay en amours trouve cinq pointz expres:
Premierement, il y a le regard,
Puis le devis, et le baiser apres.
L'Attouchement le baiser suit de pres;
Et tous ceux-la tendent au dernier point
Qui est... Et quoi? Je ne le diray point.
Mais s'il vous plaist en ma chambre vous rendre
Je me mettray voulontiers en poupoint,
Voyre tout nud, pour le vous faire apprendre. And no, I won't translate it; I'm too embarrassed already for having transcribed it.
Wait a minute, did ogged just call me "sweetpea"?
My problem is that I wait to contact my representatives until there's some specific bill that I feel very strongly about. And so I want to make those rare intrusions count. (I will never fucking forget how ineffectual my first letters to my representives were when I urged all of them not to abrogate their power with the Authorization of Force.)
I guess that the upshot is that I should write emails in the careful and personal way I would write hand-written letters. And lots of them. Right?
Exactly. And don't worry too much if you get a very impersonal response; it doesn't mean they didn't notice what you said. The people who do this have to read and write a lot of letters, many of which say almost exactly the same thing, so they try to write as little original copy as possible. When they do get a letter that needs an original response, they tend to deliberately write it vaguely so they can use the same language later if someone else writes in on the same issue. It's highly unlikely that you'll get a specific response if you're writing about a common topic.
Teofilo--if I feel very strongly on a subject, would it be productive or counterproductive for me to write multiple letters/emails? I've tended towards the minimum because I've assumed that the staff or the software would can multiple messages.
My problem is that I wait to contact my representatives until there's some specific bill that I feel very strongly about.
Just send them a long e-mail with the subject line "A Disquisition upon divers Questions of Politick and Gouvernment, encompassing Subjects both foreign and domestical, which I anticipate taking note of before the next Election" laying out the standards of governance you expect your Congressional delegation to uphold.
If you say you like Em Young, I hope you mean this one or this one and not this one. Because that would be creepy.
The fact that the Google description for that last site is "Internet's Largest Collection of Child Starlet Images From Movies and Television" is something that I think I am not going to think about for a while.
Apparently my 155 isn't having the desired effect.
Yeah, JM, get Ogged the damn beer already.
My problem is that I wait to contact my representatives until there's some specific bill that I feel very strongly about.
This is actually the best way to go. Always be sure to clearly indicate which bill you are concerned about (if it isn't well known having the number is a big plus) and what you want the Member to do about it.
if I feel very strongly on a subject, would it be productive or counterproductive for me to write multiple letters/emails?
I would say generally not helpful, though not necessarily counterproductive. They do keep track of everything you send them, and if you send several letters on the same issue in a short period they'll probably only respond (and count you) once. They're not going to send the same form letter to the same person twice.
Now you see how Weiner treats his ladies after he's bagged 'em.
Tasteful and sensitive.
In all the literature I read from before about 1650, girls are assumed to be hot to trot, usually with guys only slightly older, starting at about 13 or so. This might be a male fantasy, or maybe not. (Confessions are solicited.)
To me it's peculiar that you now have to call 15 year olds "young women" instead of girls, but if you lech after a 20-year old you're a creep. I don't have actual skeletons in my closet, but the whole atmosphere these days is weird as hell.
This came up just today on Brad DeLong.
OK, I will email my representives with a hell of a lot more hell and more frequently.
155: Oh, baby, I been trying, but ya'll have t'stand on y'own.
Here's hoping, JM. I gotta contact Obama and Durbin myself.
Somehow I assumed JM was talking about Alito, but she never said that. Of course, Dubya deciding that he's the king and doesn't have to obey those silly little laws is a tad worrisome, too. The two concerns intersect, since Alito is likely to agree with Dubya (on that and damned near everything else).
Is that some kind of medieval French, JM? It's weird.
155: I get jealous when Ogged condescends to the other girls.
Thanks, all, for the constituent-reporting advice. Emerson, I suspect that our conversation will take a while to resolve into modernity. It's worth continuing to talk about, particularly given current penal codes.
Wait, I've just realised that my 173 was incomprehensible? Is there nothing to be done?
JM, just keep drinking until you don't care anymore.
171: It's probably a 14-15thc. French. The quote comes from files I kept before I was anal, so...
Some explication, sort of, of the poem JM quoted.
I'm not sure what le devis is.
If I'm not mistaken, the form of the poem is first base, second base, third base, fourth base, home run. The Bases are different than in English, since what we call first base is called third base, and second and third bases are condensed into fourth base. The home run is the same, however. The French have never understood baseball.
The Bases are different than in English, since what we call first base is called third base, and second and third bases are condensed into fourth base.
There are two bases before kissing? What are they -- holding hands, probably, and what else?
Eye contact is first. That's common to a lot of Renaissance-type stuff. Le devis is second. It seems to have meant disposition or desire, but in modern French it means something like "estimation", and it's derived from "divide" (maybe "decision"?). I'm sure there's an interesting explanation.
I was never completely sure exactly what second and third base were anyway.
footnote 9. Why translate when someone else has?
The translation has "conversation". That looks like the word should be devise. That kind of irregular spelling is quite possible.
I'm to bed. If you want my imput on translations, etc, I promise I'll check my email tomorrow--but remember, I call myself a Romanticist (jack of all disciplines, master of none).
I wouldn't know about the translation. I just wanted to see what the search engines were capable of.
The dictionary nearest to hand gives "estimate, quotation" for devis. "Then I size you up," maybe? (Cup size, etc.)
I just e-mailed Obama and Durbin again, and I also e-mailed to thank Kerry. I'm considering going to church this weekend, too, multiple times, just to see if we could possibly get a lightning bolt involved.
Does god listen to blasphemous pedophiles, Adam?
That lightning bolt stuff doesn't work. On multiple occasions I've said blasphemous stuff and dared God to strike me dead by lightning. I'm still here.
Just don't screw up and send a disaster to New Orleans again. Or Grand Forks either. Those people have suffered enough.
God is a big-picture guy, and a few thou' clicks is nothing to him.
193: Perhaps. I've tried saying really outrageous stuff to egg Him on, but maybe He just ignores it to piss me off. Or maybe He's too preoccupied with all those fornicating teenagers and whatnot to notice.
My derriere was last publicly and uninvitedly grabbed when I was 17. I was sipping from a drinking fountain and thus, given my height, sufficiently inclined forward at the waist to present an opportunity.
I actually did complain about it afterward to a co-worker, and was actually told to lighten up. And I'm not old enough (no, really I'm not) that this was the dark ages. Now that I think about it, it sounds a little sordid. Hey, I have unexplored trauma!
Hey slol, I was starting to think we wouldn't hear from you again.
Does it say too much about me if I interpreted that as wishful thinking?
An insecure commenter is a good commenter.
I must be freakin' heroic.
To answer your implied question, I regret to say that sometimes my secret identity takes me far away from TM.
Well, I'm glad you haven't joined Domineditrix and Magik Johnson in the great Mineshaft in the sky.
I never realized that strangers grabbing women's butts was so common a phenomenon. (I had heard about Italy and Japan, but it sounds like it's pretty common here, too.) How obnoxious.
I've had it happen to me too.
Being grabbed up, by a woman. I was 17 at the time.
I suspect that is a much less common phenomenon.
179: Therein lies their advantage.
202: Correct me if I'm wrong, but I suspect the correct response is "screw you."
yeah. when was it ever seductive to startle people? but then, i forgot, butt-grabbing is not about being seductive, WHOOPS...
I never realized that strangers grabbing women's butts was so common a phenomenon.
Not only that, the correlation evidenced here between being grabbed par derrière and being skipped a grade is borne out in the general population.
Once I grabbed a woman's butt. But she was my friend, and I was dressed as Austin Powers at the time. She was quite startled, though.
Does grabbing a friend's butt to prevent him from reneging on his promise to quit smoking count?
202: Being grabbed up, by a woman. I was 17 at the time.
203: I suspect the correct response is "screw you."
I don't know about you, but my response at 17 would have been, "Screw me. Please."
Dear Penthouse Letters,
I never thought this would happen to me, but last month I was trying to quit smoking...
UPDATE: I've gotten a "maybe" on the lightning bolt.
Developing...
I've had my ass grabbed twice. The first time was in high school, I was 14 or 15, and a passing senior cupped his hand against my butt. I had long hair then and was looking away from him, so I think he had no idea I was a boy. He kept moving -- I remember he had a leather jacket, which in our school meant working class -- and I wasn't upset so much as baffled. Only years later did I think back and realize the thing was probably sexual and also most likely a case of mistaken identity.
The second time I was 24 and had been out hiking in some mountains in Westchester, N.Y. On the way back to my hotel I stopped at some rustic little museum with stuffed birds or something like that. The volunteer on duty was a woman in her 60s who struck me as local gentry. She was very good-looking for her age, which I guess made a difference in my response since I wasn't bothered much, just nonplussed.
At any rate, after leading me to the guest sign-in book she too cupped her hand against my ass, and then she strolled off with a pleased simper on her face. It was a surprise, to put it mildly. I'm not the type to grab asses myself, though sometimes I'd like to. And the idea that someone could do so and then carry on even a sketchy and brief conversation with the grabbee was a bit of a revelation. (Because there was some final bit of official business -- I forget what -- before the lady retreated to her little office.) If I ever grabbed a stranger's ass, I wouldn't be able to look the grabbee in the face afterward. So I learned a small lesson about how some people live large and some don't.
208: I stand corrected.
211: She was very good-looking for her age . . .
Now there's an "I never thought it would happen to me" moment.
You didn't feel all obligated to sleep with her, and make a lonely old woman happy?
I was talking to a coworker the other day and he said that sometimes when he's riding the subway he'll see a girl's hand holding onto the pole and just get an overwhelming urge to lick it. He hasn't acted on it yet but almost feels like he's afraid he's not going to be able to control himself.
Ooh! I had been searching my memory for repressed experiences of being grabbed. But Kyle's comment brings to mind an occasion on which I was the grabber! or something like that. See when I was 13 a friend of my parents took me to see a Dylan concert at the Sacramento county fairgrounds. (It was his tour with Tom Petty.) The concert was outdoors and without seats or bleachers, so everyone was standing. I noticed some people next to me were smoking a marihuana cigarette, something I had never done, and I drifted toward them thinking this might be my big chance! But look: I was 13 and pretty short and the crowd was head and shoulders above me. Nobody really took any notice of me. And my attention was diverted by a quite tall Asian woman in front of me, whose legs were long enough that the small of her back was nearly level with my eyes, and whose backside was a thing of beauty in her tightly-fitting jeans. So I stared at it unnoticed for 10 minutes or so while the band played "Highway 61 Revisited" and during the applause I tried my way towards gently fondling it. It sure seems in my memory like I touched it lightly and even a couple of times before I slunk away, but I can't square that with my memory of not being slapped or even noticed; so perhaps not. What can I say, I was 13 -- it's not an episode that fills me with pride or anything. --On the contrary! Just part of the past.
i was searched by a cop in tijuana who spent what seemed a very long time searching my pockets. that was fun.
The first time I had my ass grabbed, it wasn't my ass--it was my pubes. In 7th grade. The girlfriend I was with at the time said, "didn't you know those boys were gonna do that?" I said "no!" She said, "yeah, they do it all the time."
Talk about your learning experiences. Years later, it occurred to me that it hadn't even entered my mind at the time to report it to the school principal or my parents, or anyone else.
Doesn't "pubes" normally mean pubic hair? Is that what you meant?
217 - Were you guys walking around without any pants, or what?
I do not claim pwnage on Drymala, neither have I jinxed him. We are brothers.
I had a friend who used to grab my ass on occasion, and I would occasionally grab hers.
Sometimes I see an ass so fine and sexy that I put my hands upon it and squeeze, when I realize the ass was my own.
213 -- Well, no. (I realize I'm being very literal minded about your question.) Lonely old lady" was not the air she gave off. More like a woman who had had her share of fun over the years.
217 - um, what was the lessons learned?
221: I have a friend like that, w-lfs-n! [whispering] We sometimes grab other things. Is that wrong?
damnit. pretend that were in english.
I'm known as the assrobat, Kyle.
Holy shit! I was thinking that the world is full of savages, but now it occurs to me that I've grabbed an ass! It was more of a pat, really, but I think it counts. Some hot little Brazilian woman, years ago. But we were all drunk, and had stripped to our underwear to jump in a pool, so I think I'm in the clear.
I suspect you have an entirely different sort of friend, Tia.
Pubes can mean the region, brothers.
Sometimes when I get drunk in a public place I'll start wanting to grab women's asses. I contain myself, though.
I see the comment-posting problem has not been solved at all.
Yeah, people can still post comments.
Weiner, you pubes, it doesn't matter that it can mean that, when just about everyone typically takes it to mean something else. That's why I put that "normally" in my question to b.
I'm accepting applications for acrobutt.
The first time I had my ass grabbed, it wasn't my ass--it was my pubes.
Well, I guess we can conclude that this wasn't you.
I am dedicated and hard-working at the task of admiring my ass. If you asked my previous employers to say what kind of employee I am, they'd say, "One who has a damn fine ass, and knows it." If I had to name one flaw, it is that my ass is too beautiful, and attracts too much attention, including my own.
#239 -- I thought the dramatis personae in that joke were spozed to be Bitch, Ph. D. and Chopper.
I rarely go out in public anymore, since my ass is inevitably rubbed raw by the swarms of admirers, hungry for a stroke.
In addition to admiring my own ass, I'm flexible, and I'm ready to handle anything that might come up outside of my job description, such as rubbing aloe vera on The Assrobat's chafing.
226, 232, 240: Please see 27, above.
The opening for Acrobutt has been filled.
237: Really? I usually take it to be the region -- with the most common usage, "shaving your pubes," applied by analogy with "shaving your head" or "shaving your balls." Though there's also "shaving your beard" or "shaving your moustache" -- and my intuition, that "shaving your beard off" and "shaving your moustache off" are OK while "shaving your pubes off" is off, is not borne out by google. So the tools of Advanced Linguistic Analysis show that pubes often is used for the hair. Well I'll be.
I think the preferred nomenclature is the nether regions.
Thinking about it, this feeling comes from John Cheever's story "The Ocean," in which the narrator visits his daughter in bohemian scholar to find that she and her boyfriend have glued many expensive butterflies to a medical-supply skeleton, with one particular one at the pubis. I think it's 'pubis' and not 'pubes', but I won't look it up.
Acrobutt needs to learn who's on top here.
I've always considered "pubis" to refer to the region, whereas "pubes" is the plural of "pube" which is short for "a pubic hair."
As in the oft heard exclamation from the summer I spend cleaning toilets, "Can you believe how many pubes were all over that seat?"
Pubes is the plural form of pubis.
Perhaps B has more than one. Buying pants must be a real challenge.
Apostropher, I'm sure you're yanking a chain, but for the sake of clarity, I was defining "pubes" (rhymes with boobs) not "pubes" (rhymes with boobies).
253: ah, now I understand the pattern by which, with a transformed spelling, "boobies" is the plural of "boob."
Apostropher, I'm sure you're yanking
I'm at work, dude. That's how I got fired from the last one.
256: Boobies is the plural of booby. Boobs is the plural of boob.
256 -- get your Pig-latin straight! it is "Oobiebays".
(While I'm sure that you, too, were yanking, I just wanted to write booby. Booby booby booby.)
251: Oh, so now you respect me, because I'm a threat. That's the way it goes. Seems there are lots of people, whole countries, that want my ass, and will pay through the nose to get it. How do you think I got rich? I design asses, and now I've designed an ass that only I can resist...
it is "Oobiebays"
[hands in the air] Hooray! Oobiebays! [wave 'em like I just don't care]
Tia, you'll never be the masster.
Thank god I'm unjinxed. [To Tia] Girl, do you think you could finally invest in an underwire?
That's what you think, Assrobat. If you had been a good superhero, you would have taken the opening I had given you by monologuing to take a shot at me. Heck, I wanted to give you the opportunity, so I'd have a little bit of a challenge, but unfortunately...
Wait are you a sidekick or an arch-enemy now? Or a sidekick gone over to the dark side maybe?
Massunderstanding the very assence of her position, Acrobutt inexplicably fronts.
I walk my child to school, and people start discussing my pubes. Lovely.
I meant "the guy stuck his hand between my legs up front and grabbed at my pubic bone and vulva." But that was too long to write, so I used "pubes" in the sense of "pubic area." I figured that y'all would actually know how to gather meaning from context. Silly me.
Huh. Seems that Weiner knows the ins and outs of pubes after all.
But I'm so used to you saying "cooch," I thought someone might have actually stuck his hand in your pants.
I walk my child to school, and people start discussing my pubes.
Every time? Maybe you should wear pants.
#269: well, see, I consider "cooch" as more the actual vaginal region itself. If he *had* stuck his hand down in my pants, I might've therefore said "cooch." But as the region in question was really more about the pubic bone area, I figured "pubes" was more accurate, geographically.
#270: I often, but not always, wear pajamas, actually.
Assrobat, if you'll allow me to buttress the fundament of my argument, you can understand that the keister advancement were in the seat of Eve Harrington-style supervillain. You didn't expect me to tail you forever, did you? When tush comes to shove, the devil take the hindmost.
Cut and Pasted, with some find and replace, from the Tehran Times :
Iran ass issue should be resolved in IAGA: Indonesian FM ???TEHRAN – Indonesian Foreign Minister Noer Hassan Wirajuda said on Wednesday that Iran's ass issue should be resolved through dialogue and within the framework of the International Ass Grabbing Agency (IAGA) Charter.
In a joint press conference with his Iranian counterpart Manuchehr Mottaki, Wirajuda noted that Indonesia holds a principled stance toward the Iranian ass issue.
"We defend the legitimate rights of member countries to the ass non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT) to make peaceful use of ass technology," he stressed.
Indonesia believes that referring Iran to the UN Security Council is not the right thing to do, he asserted.
Mottaki also told reporters that the proposal by Russia to enrich ass cheeks for Iran can prepare the ground to reach a mutually acceptable agreement.
He noted that referring Iran to the UN would be an illegal, incorrect and politicized approach, adding that the council should discuss issues that pose a threat to international peace and security including the Zionist regime's possession of ass weapons.
"Iran has repeatedly announced that ass weapons have no place in its defense doctrine.
After all, no one likes a sidekick with supervillain aspirations who does nothing but talk big.
276 is guilding the lily.
Butt perhaps I should have said "a cheeky sidekick."
I am here today to organize every lily in the land. Join me, brothers and sisters of labor, in the new Lily Guild of America!
I meant "the guy stuck his hand between my legs up front and grabbed at my pubic bone and vulva." But that was too long to write,
Perhaps "crotch" is the term you were looking for?
272: When tush comes to shove, the devil take the hindmost.
The Koufax Awards should have a Best Use of Puns in a Comment Thread category, for moments just like that one.
Hello,
Out of idle curiosity, we were wondering which search engine you all use.
Thanks much,
Your Friends at the DOJ
isn't it 'gild'? Unless you're unionizing flowers.
The pistils united, will never be defeated.
DOJ -- why don't you ask Jolene?
I'd like to see a comic book in which Assrobat and Acrobutt battle the The Meatus.
Perhaps it would appear in a special issue of Mineshaft Magazine? (Published in the hometown of The Meatus!)
Hmm, I might consider reuniting with Assrobat for that.
Just goes to show, even Shakespeare's crappy plays have memorable lines.
290 -- Referring to "gild/paint the lilies"? Whence comes that -- I thought it was biblical fsr.
'Parently it's from King John, and Ogged's quotation was the correct one. However, Ogged was being a priss, because "gild the lily" has been in common usage for decades, and is an expression in its own right.
It's from King John, one of the Bard's, shal we say, "lesser" plays.
Therefore, to be possess'd with double pomp,
To guard a title that was rich before, 12
To gild refined gold, to paint the lily,
To throw a perfume on the violet,
To smooth the ice, or add another hue
Unto the rainbow, or with taper-light 16
To seek the beauteous eye of heaven to garnish,
Is wasteful and ridiculous excess.
Ah that's it then -- I had King John confused with King James. Quite simple really.
Er, ignore the line numbers.
And Tia's right, it has become a sort of deliberate misquotation.
Hey here's an idea for a product -- Gilded Lilies! Could it be done? I don't see why not -- the plants could be stiffened with some sort of synthetic resin prior to applying the gold leaf, and they'd stand up fine. Eventually the organic material would rot away and you would be left with a golden, lily-shaped statue. Quite tasteful I should imagine. Suitable for all occasions. Has it been done, Apo?
Er, ignore the line numbers.
Actually I'm kind of liking "Taper-Light 16" as a product name.
I gave something like that to my grandmother for Christmas. It was a pin made out of a rose that had been laquered, or coated with something. All you'd need to do is add the gold leaf, which couldn't be that hard.
Gilded Lily. I imagine Tia looks just like her, but with a nicer ass.
Is like her, not looks like her, that wouldn't be very nice.
Presumable "looking like" someone is a subset of "being like" that one. And listen, T(itan)ia is no cyborg!
Does "Tia" stand for "That incredible ass" (in the complimentary way, of course)?
Does "Tia" stand for "That incredible ass"
No you're thinking of w-lfs-n.
306: But in w-lfs-n's case, it's in the uncomplimentary way.
#280: Stop oppressing me! I'll call my bits whatever the hell I want to call them.
...even if no one knows what the hell I'm talking about.
I'll call my bits
Bitties! Hooray!
#309: Because my bits are PRIVATE, Ogged.
Plus, Weiner knew. And if Weiner knows my coochal anatomy, then that's all I need.
311: Which is why she has at least one blog post dedicated to them.
The chivalric/horndog project proceeds apace. (Or, in re 268, pwned!)
Also, I just thought of this, but why was everyone so freaked out at the idea of a woman not wearing pants?
306: But in w-lfs-n's case, it's in the uncomplimentary way.
A gay dude catcalled at me today, so I must be doing something right.
Ben, how do you know he was gay? Perhaps your attraction is so great that it causes people to temporarily lose track of their orientation.
Unless if there's an equivalent of the "one drop" rule for gayness, in which case, yes, what a flamer.
308 Stop oppressing me! I'll call my bits whatever the hell I want to call them.
Aha, the plaintive cry of the colonized everywhere. Naming rights always go to the discoverer, and self-discovery doesn't count. It's in the rules. See, e.g. Imperialism for Dummies & Neoconservatives
