[you]
You couldn't just clean it up silently, could you?
4) Do you clean up silently after 3) ?
(erm. I probably meant to italicize that differently.)
1) Do you have or want kids?
2) Are you actively religious?
3) Do you like trying new foods?
1) alright, love?
2) fancy a bit of how's yer father?
3) eh? eh? Know what I mean?
1. What is your name?
2. What is your quest?
3. What is the air speed velocity of an unladen sparrow?
Strictly speaking I suppose "eh?," "eh?," and "Know what I mean?" are three questions, but all's fair in love and war.
1. Do you like me more than you like anybody else you could be dating?
2. Are you put off by sarcasm, the aphoristic style, the etiolated religiosity of the early-twenty-first century New England Protestant or a modest but well-curated collection of Batman stuff?
3. Are you going to get all stabtastic if I disagree with you?
Are you blind?
Are you mute?
Do you have big tits?
5 is a good set.
1) Name one interest unrelated to either work or school?
2) Age?
3) How much free/uncommitted time do you have in a typical week?
Oh, come on. Low-hanging fruit.
A/S/L?
Are you going to get all stabtastic if I disagree with you? want to wear my Batman costume to bed?
Ogged has written about the unacceptability of double penetration before, but I can't find it.
what is the last book you read?
What is your intoxicant of choice?
Spit or swallow?
1) Can you impress me with your intelligence whilst not minding if I win every argument?
2) Do you have any objections to cunnilingus?
3) Will you dote on me without being a doormat?
Spit or swallow?
While riding the car of one of my clients today I had the pleasure of hearing a song that for a while went like this:
Shut up bitch, swallow
Shut up bitch, swallow
Shut up bitch, swallow
1. If you could only get terse answers to three questions, and none of the information could identify the person specifically, what would you want to know?
and then 2. and 3. at your option.
Are we assuming that there are some other broad constraints on the pool? Otherwise age, sex, etc. become important questions. I am assuming the questions are to winnow down on personality.
Otherwise age, sex, etc. become important questions
This is not universally true.
Ogged has written about the unacceptability of double penetration before, but I can't find it.
Here.
(Do you lot have Blind Date? Not with Cilla, I don't suppose.)
This is not universally true.
It would be true for me.
Their lot originated Blind Date, I think.
If I told you you had a great body, would you hold it against me?
If you woke up in a strange room with no memory of the previous evening, would you prosecute?
Can you buy the next round?
1. Do you like your sense of humor?
2. What is your preferred medium for resolving conflict (yelling, talking, writing, hitting)?
3. How often do you encounter ethical questions in the course of your daily activities?
Does anyone dislike h/h own sense of humor?
1. Do you have some kind of weird hangup about dating married people?
2. Well, do you?
3. Do you have any cute friends who feel otherwise?
1. Do you believe masculine/feminine behavior is natural or a result of socialization?
2. Over the course of your life, do you find yourself making decisions that more reliably result in increased happiness for yourself and those around you?
3. What is your primary motivation for wanting to date right now?
1. What is your definition of "too risky"?
2. How much money is enough?
3. How useful are general rules of thumb?
Does anyone dislike h/h own sense of humor?
Insecurity can cause people to dislike a great many things about themselves.
I thought that the questions were to anticipate a terse reply. I believe any answer to some of the above questions would be quite verbose in order to be meaningful.
I like how the guy who complained that blog posts don't just write themselves is now griping because said posts are eliciting multiple comments.
1. 1. What is your definition of "too risky"?
Skydiving.
2. How much money is enough?
More.
3. How useful are general rules of thumb?
Very.
Nope, I definitely don't want to date this person.
1) how dare you?
2) what's that supposed to mean?
3) my god, are you fucking serious?
put 'em on the defensive from the get-go, that's my motto
1. Early bird or night owl?
2. Regular or diet?
3. Neat freak or slob?
1. If I don't ask you about 'monster', would that make me more attractive?
2. Can we conduct this interview in my room?
3. Do you think I can provide you with more or less orgasms than a resolution to the genocide in Darfur is worth?
I like how the guy who complained that blog posts don't just write themselves is now griping because said posts are eliciting multiple comments.
But.
37. Well, certainly any question can be answered tersely. But I thought the game was to anticipate a terse but telling answer to the question.
1. To what degree do you expect a girlfriend to be the primary relationship in your life, and yourself to be the primary relationship in hers?
2. How much do you expect someone you date to make you feel better about yourself than you do when you're single?
3. Does sex in your relationships tend to get more interesting and satisfying over time, or less so?
I thought the game was to anticipate a terse but telling answer to the question.
Well, telling can be in the eye of the beholder.
Also, I think nonverbal reactions tell you at least as much as the actual answer to the question. I bet you could get better results watching a muted video of somebody responding to your questions than you could by actually hearing the answers.
(1) Willie Nelson or Johnny Cash?
(2) Keats or Shelley?
(3) Clinton or Obama?
Dude, 8 should just be ignored. No feeding!
My prediction is that the questions would reliably provide more useful information to the person being asked than their answers would provide about them.
8 is beautiful.
Because you shouldn't date people who know their IQ?
Ginger or Mary Anne?
Betty or Veronica?
Jeannie or Samantha?
I'll narrow this sucker down to one question:
1. If not now, when?
1) What was your geekiest moment?
2) What was your moment of greatest triumph?
3) Name a book or recording do you own that you no longer care for.
50: No, come on. If you were going to impersonate Shearer, you couldn't do a better job of indicting him.
1. Cats or dogs?
2. Favorite book and why?
3. Which is worse: vulgarity or condescension?
54: But you also need...
2. If not me, who?
If not like this, then how?
1) How much time in a typical week do you spend alone?
2) How different would you expect that answer to be if you were in a relationship?
3) How long has it been since you last had sex?
Are you now, or have you ever been a member of the Communist Party?
If not, why not?
Spit or swallow?
Do you like pina colada?
Gettin' caught in the rain?
Are you not into yoga?
Do you have half a brain?
Oh, darn, that's four.
1. Do you have a dollar?
2. Can I have a dollar?
3. What's your problem?
Also, I think nonverbal reactions tell you at least as much as the actual answer to the question. I bet you could get better results watching a muted video of somebody responding to your questions than you could by actually hearing the answers.
Polygraphs work on the same principal. It's not your physical responses when you answer the question, it's your response when you hear the question compared to when you hear a neutral question.
And, since polygraphs actually don't work, we infer that Knecht is saying that Witt's technique wouldn't work either.
I bet you could get better results watching a muted video of somebody responding to your questions than you could by actually hearing the answers.
Or you could just leave the camera rolling for that extra fifteen seconds, like 60 Minutes, just to watch them squirm.
1) Do you ever, like, just look at things and stuff and think like wow, you know?
2) I mean, I don't know, like philosophy and shit or like maybe some spiritual shit, you know?
3) You know what I mean?
1) How much do you need to "win" (at arguments, sports, cooking, boardgames, sex)?
2) What's the first image that the word "romance" brings to mind?
3) Bryant Gumble: Hot or Not?
1. If you find yourself in an unhappy relationship, are you more likely to (a) break up, (b) suffer in silence, (c) fight a lot, and/or (d) cheat?
2. With a partner who has her own intense interests, do you (a) pretend to adopt those interests, (b) share your own interests equally, (c) feel left out?
3. When you have unplanned downtime with your partner, would you most like to (rank the following) (a) fuck, (b) watch TV, (c) read, (d) nap while cuddling affectionately, (e) go home?
Bryant Gumble: Hot or Not?
And I thought you were black.
AWB, most of your questions seem to invite a lot of bullshitting.
Is multiple choice cheating on this question-writing thing? It feels like cheating.
Which is to say that they're good things to know about someone, but asking is not a good way to find them out.
The choices in 75 don't actually exhaust the possibility space.
77: I doubt it. I've asked most of these questions in relationships and gotten answers that were useful.
I think people would only be able to bullshit on them if they knew me well enough to guess what my preferred answer would be (assuming they, like, rabidly wanted to date me).
76: Bryant's street cred is sorely underestimated in these fallen times.
And, since polygraphs actually don't work, we infer that Knecht is saying that Witt's technique wouldn't work either.
Uh, no, they don't "work" in the sense that they have an error rate considered excessive to use them as evidence in a court of law, but they do detect lies at a statistically better rate than random chance. They can also be fooled by someone who knows how to do it (e.g. Robert Hansen). They're somewhat less accurate than weather forecasting, but somewhat more accurate than, say, ordeal by fire.
(1) Ogged or BitchPhD?
(2) Emerson or McManus?
(3) Now, what about that DP thing?
Does a party need a theme to be "fun"
Are you open to an "Emersonian" relationship?
Do you like pastry?
1. Do you find it difficult to maintain professional relationships with people who see you naked?
2. Do you swing?
3. Do you like T.G.I. Friday's?
My prediction is that the questions would reliably provide more useful information to the person being asked than their answers would provide about them.
Especially w/r/t expectations, if this thread is anything to go by. "Do you object to sarcasm/cunnilingus/my choice of cocktail" says "Are we going to have fun on this date, and maybe hook up," whereas "Are you interested in having kids/what's your housekeeping style" represents a rather more long-term view.
1. Can I pay you in small bills?
2. Can I keep my socks on?
3. Bareback?
sarcasm/cunnilingus/my choice of cocktail
Redundant.
1. Are you one of the most talented men or women in the world?
2. Do you associate plagiarism with fish-bladders?
3. How are questions 1 and 2 connected?
One would hope, Tweety, but some people are just freaks.
75: A bit leading. How likely is someone answer c) or d) to 1, a) or c) to 2, or e) to 3, even if those answers were true?
93: A bit. But most guys I've dated have admitted that they tend to stick with relationships they are unhappy in out of some sense that that's a good thing to do, with the possibility of cheating or jumping right into another relationship rather than facing being single again. I don't admire it, and it's a good thing to know ahead of time, but past relationship-behavior is not necessarily a deal-breaker.
Now this thread reminds me of the Steven Wright bit, where he goes to his job interview & before the interviewer can say anything, Wright asks, "If you were driving your car at the speed of light and then you turned on your headlights, would anything happen?"
Interviewer: "Uh ... I don't know."
Wright: "Forget it, then. I don't want to work for you."
88 - Jesus Jesus, I was being really serious about the cunnilingus! I'm definitely not going to stay with someone for 40 years who won't do it. I just thought of 3 things I like about C, and asked about them.
More questions:
Would you rather buy someone a meal, or be bought a meal?
Do you like your work colleagues? (Secret hidden meaning: do they like YOU?)
So, what about your father and mother .... ?
While riding the car of one of my clients today I had the pleasure of hearing a song that for a while went like this:
Shut up bitch, swallow
Shut up bitch, swallow
Shut up bitch, swallow
I recall both oudemia and AWB touting their love for singing these songs while driving.
Never underestimate the likelihood of irony! Is all I'm saying.
96: Oh, I can see the cunnilingus question revealing both short- and long-term expectations. If it were asked of me as one of three introductory questions, though, I might not think in the long term, and for that I blame testosterone.
97: Oh, you just assume it's irony. Oudemia and I get really mad when bitches won't swallow.
How would anyone answer the questions? I don't know that they'd tell anyone much about me that's distinctive from anyone else here. For ogged's I'd say
1.) unfogged, delong occasionally, Lawyers, Guns and Money, paperwight's fairshot. (I used to read others, but I've trimmed back. Mostly I read what gets linked to here.)
2.) Dick Cheney
3.) I can't believe you asked that question. That's none of your business.
I can't believe you asked that question. That's none of your business.
More efficient to just say "yes".
1) are you into recognizing patterns in your emotional behavior?
2) children in public places are largely irritating: yay or nay?
3) (secular) Easter: great holiday or the greatest holiday?
100.3: Way to keep him interested, BG.
1) Are you a pedant?
2) Do you love Brett Favre?
3) Will you please not try to talk to me over breakfast?
1) if you fought a shark, would you win?
2) if a shark fought a bear, who would win?
3) do you fight with yourself?
have admitted that they tend to stick with relationships they are unhappy in
Now see, I'd say that "unhappy" is the crux here. Considered, situational, definitely unreconcilable unhappiness is different than general malaise manifesting as unhappiness with a partner or a work situation. Being able to distinguish these flavors of discontent is not easy, especially if you're unhappy, are simultaneously vulgar and condescending, and have earnings outside of income.
1. Point taken. But are you gay or something?
2. Doesn't that make it hard to date?
3. Are you Merlin?
1) up or down?
2) left or right?
3) in through the screen or out through the screen?
Music Nerd edition:
1) Do you like, love or really love early Ike and Tina?
2) Hank Williams: Sr, Jr, or III?
3) Who does the better version of "I Heard It Through the Grapevine": Credence Clearwater Revival or The Slits?
1. All alike, or all different?
2. Bleen or grue?
3. The first critique, the second critique, or the third critique?
Trekkie edition:
1) Can you admit that Kahn was sexy in the Space Seed episode?
2) Spock's mom: hot or not?
3)Why didn't they stay on the spore planet, for real?
1. You are standing in a dark, densely-wooded forest and can hear wolves howling in the distance. To the east is a small hut. To the south is a lake. To the northwest are the forbidding peaks of snowy mountains.
2. You have been eaten by a grue. Play again? (Y/N)
3. You are standing in a dark, densely-wooded forest and can hear wolves howling in the distance. To the east is a small hut. To the south is a lake. To the northwest are the forbidding peaks of snowy mountains.
115 pwned my grue! I hate you, Ben.
Victorian fictional character edition:
1) So, do you think you end up with Estella or not?
2) What were you thinking when you brought Bertha to this climate, anyway?
3) What were you thinking when you married that old curmudgeon; could he really love you more than his unifying theory of myths?
I'm jonesing for a political thread, but I'm not supposed to threadjack this one. Still, I really want to know what the implication is of Casey's endorsement of Obama.
114: *SPOILER* It look good, girl.
German lit edition!
1. Goethe or Schiller?
2. Do you care that Brecht was a womanizer?
3. Favorite German-language playwright writing post-1985?
(Immediate sex for the person who answers 'Kleist' to #1.)
Always wondered about 120.2 myself.
121: Everybody says the same old shit and we keep on waiting.
How can I kill a tiger armed only with a biro?
If I crash land in a jungle will I be able to eat my own shoes?
Will there ever be a boy born who can swim faster than a shark?
1. Early or late?
2. Visual experience or thought?
3. Said or shown?
127.3 is pretty much the problem with most online dating forays.
German culture edition II:
1. If you're depressed, do you find that reading Trakl helps a lot, a little, or not too much?
2. Wagner: great artist, vaporing cornball, or big fat Nazi?
3. If Nietzsche had gotten laid now and then, would his writing have been better, worse, or about the same?
129.1 should be "really not very much at all".
We regret the error.
99: Oh hells yeah, sister.
Hellenists' version (basically from real life):
1. Plato or Aristotle?
2. Herodotos or Thucydides?
3. Pindar or Bacchylides?
No! That third one is a joke!
3. How would you cast the Iliad as a major motion picture?
123: Well, that's what I immediately thought.
116: I believe it's spelled "KHAAAAAAN!"
If I answer Aristotle and Thucydides, I'm out of oudemia's good graces, aren't I?
1. Vim or emacs?
2. Linux or *BSD?
3. Perl or Python?
133.3.3 Hey, I resemble that remark
1. "Mit toten Heldengestalten erfüllst du Mond die schweigenden Wälder." T or F?
1. Would you think I was a douchebag for trying to filter you out with three contrived questions?
The answer to 132.1 is pretty much a deal breaker for me.
(Immediate sex for the person who answers 'Kleist' to #1.)
What does great affection for the Agee translation of Penthesilea but no other familiarity with Kleist get, a delayed kiss?
Not only Kleist, but a Kleist play, and not only a Kleist play, but one with lots of teichoscopia? Oh, that's at least an immediate kiss.
Actually, I just like the stories. I was trying to fool Blume.
There are women out there who haven't been DP'ed? Clearly I got married too soon.
144: Wait. Disciplines are colliding. There isn't just one teichoscopia -- Helen and Priam in Iliad 3?
Is it a general trope now? Like ekphrasis?
1. What kind of monster would go forty years without cunnilingus?
2. Is there really someone on Earth who doesn't think Kahn in the original Space Seed was sexy, or is this one of those hypotheticals that analytic philosophy throws off, like is water on Earth 2 really wet?
3. If you understand all three of Ben's questions, does that mean you have to date him?
There's a Trivial Pursuit question in one of the older editions, possibly the original, which asks what D.P. stands for, but the answer it's meant to prompt isn't double penetration or double play, it's displaced person. People look at you strangely when you suggest some of the other possibilities.
What do I get for confusing Kleist with Klimt, and not knowing anything about him either except that he did that shiny poster students have in their dorm rooms, and only knowing about that because of that one Buffy episode where they made a joke about it?
152: Forty years of cunnilingus.
3. If you understand all three of Ben's questions, does that mean you have to date him?
Hopefully.
However, I have asked nine (three sets of three) questions.
1) Are you a Republican?
2) Do you have any friends that are Republicans?
3) Do your friends have any friends that are Republicans?
1. Dilettante or specialist?
2. Bath or shower?
3. Venter or brooder?
Actually, this is all fascinating. ogged's questions, or variations thereon, are good at getting to general orientation (withholding judgment on 3, though).
1. So, how 'bout those 'Canes?
2. Would you trade Dwyane Wade for Tyson Chandler right now, and complete the rebuilding project? What about from the Hornets' point of view, would that be worthwhile or would it screw up their chemistry?
3. Is Josh McCown the answer?
RE 152 -
That was a genius bit in that Buffy episode.
However, I have asked nine (three sets of three) questions.
Yeah; which questions?
Now that I think of it, these kinds of questions make me irrationally irritable.
Sorry you don't care about the 'Canes, Gonerill.
It's because I care that I get irritable.
144: Thanks random German lit class from undergrad!
145: I take it that's the idiomatic way to say "all or nothing"? I would've just gone with alles oder nicht. Actually, I didn't know that 'oder' was 'or', so I wouldn't have gone with anything
1. How is this night different from all other nights, laydeez?
2. Why on this night do we eat reclining, laydeez?
3. Why on this night do we dip our herbs twice, laydeez?
2. Why on this night do we eat reclining, laydeez?
Because it's a symposium, innit?
My prediction is that the questions would reliably provide more useful information to the person being asked than their answers would provide about them.
I could see that. That might be interesting, too: a site that in which you picked someone from their questions. I was really wondering how little information one would need to narrow the field down to an appropriate level: how to separate which information is wheat (age, perhaps) that really does give us useful information about people we might be interested in, and which chaff (last book read, perhaps) that we think tells us something important, but really doesn't.
Really, Shearer's #8 doesn't seem that off to me. Age seems useful, at least; income and IQ less so, though I'd suggested education, with which those two might correlate.
I just think it's very open-minded that nobody even wants to know whether the person is a man or a woman. Truly we're post-gender.
I thought of my two other questions!
2. Why is it seemingly impossible to get my phone to receive text messages, so that I can actually use the website that occasioned this post? (Going out only with people who have "confirmed" their phone is checked by default when you sign up; confirmation is only possible via text message.)
3. Why does the huge freaking Mac ad on the NY Times home page keep crashing my newly-upgraded browser, making me wonder if Firefox's golden age has in fact passed and it now sucks?
I newly upgraded my browser too! And maybe that's why I suddenly am seeing 5 times as many ads everywhere. I've spent almost an hour adding crap (pure crap!) to my adblocker. While I was at it, I deleted to my view that stupid perpetually waving flag you get on some of the right-wing sites---I was too ashamed to do so before!
165
"... income and IQ less so, though I'd suggested education, ..."
So you would prefer a dummy with a degree to a smart woman without one? Or is it that you don't think IQ has anything to do with being smart?
121: implication is of Casey's endorsement of Obama.
Don't want to threadjack either BG (maybe we should take it to the Power thread except that it is currently the site of the lamest conversation evah), but the endorsement is quite significant, basically because Casey is the most finger-in-the-wind piece of shit centrist stand for nothing Dem you could ever imagine whose only positive feature is the he is not Rick Santorum.
So you would prefer a dummy with a degree to a smart woman without one?
Smart is an ante, at best. Beyond a certain level, the excess is going to the specific field, not to every day life. Education, I suspect, speaks to a likely shared set of reference points.
So you would prefer a dummy with a degree to a smart woman without one?
If I were Andrew McCarthy, yes.
171
"Smart is an ante, at best. Beyond a certain level, the excess is going to the specific field, not to every day life. ..."
Don't agree. Talking to smarter people is more interesting.
Bryant Gumble: Hot or Not?
I take it you look like Bryant Gumble?
Other than that, Sibyl is obviously the most datable person here. I'm not sure about her Star Trek obsession, but hey: everyone has to have a flaw, and a Star Trek obsession is a lot less damaging than insisting your prospective partner has to have a preference about various dead white guys.
Talking to smarter people is more interesting
I'm beginning to see why some of you find James funny.
Aren't you clever, Ben? But Sibyl isn't insisting that you prefer GR to that whatever his name was D&D guy who died recently, now, is she?
No, but she is insisting that one have opinions about his works.
Also, remember when w/d asked me what grounds I had on which to cast aspersions about James's sex life? I present to you comment 8.
178: Indeed, and his works are still very much part of the popular culture vernacular, so in doing this she isn't being a little bitch.
As if the works of the immortal Kant aren't part of the cultural vernacular!
B isn't clever enough to come up with questions of her own. Sad.
The word "popular" was actually doing some work in that sentence, Ben.
As if the works of the immortal Kant aren't part of the popular cultural vernacular!
B. did come up with questions of her own, Ogged. Better luck next time.
1. Why do birds suddenly appear every time you are near?
2. Why do doves fall down from the sky every time you walk by?
3. Why do all the boys in town follow you all around?
I think you could make an argument for "categorical imperative" being part of the cultural vernacular. Sadly, not as popular as "deconstruct" (meaning to "take apart," or among the half-[as opposed to un-]educated, "analyze closely").
But not enough to actually *read your own thread*. Lazy bastard.
1. HARVARD OR YALE?
2. HEDGE FUND OR INVESTMENT BANKING?
3. NANTUCKET OR THE HAMPTONS?
189: You could, but only if you're not down with the gente, as I am.
[R]emember when w/d asked me what grounds I had on which to cast aspersions about James's sex life?
That sure sounds like something I'd say, but actually I don't.
Maybe it was someone else, and now I'm casting aspersions on you.
1. You know that thing I like to do?
2. Do you like to do it, too?
3. Final answer?
1. Who put the bop in the bop-she-bop-she-bop?
2. Who put the ram in the rama-lama-ding-dong?
3. Who was that man?
Okay, Mineshaft. You have 12-24 hours to remind me why it is a bad idea to sleep with a colleague.
200: Um...it is not a bad idea unless you have looked into the future and foreseen awkwardness.
I thought I left a comment saying "it could be awesome", but it looks as if I didn't.
It could be awesome, though.
Uh, exogamy has a long and noble history which you should respect?
202 to 199. Though I suppose it is sort of a modulation of 200.
Jesus, don't do it, man. Because it's very likely that the relationship won't last--regardless of whether it ends acrimoniously or not--but you'll still see each other every day and it will be awkward and your co-workers will pick up weird vibes. And if it does end acrimoniously, wow are you in for a world of hurt.
I thought I left a comment saying "I thought I left a comment saying "it could be awesome", but it looks as if I didn't.
It could be awesome, though", but it looks as if I didn't.
I thought I left a comment saying "it could be awesome", but it looks as if I didn't.
It could be awesome, though, though.
Do you know why Unfogged sucks now? Because Ogged's gone all earnest, and he doesn't even read his own comment threads any more.
Okay, Mineshaft. You have 12-24 hours to remind me why it is a bad idea to sleep with a colleague.
Because you shouldn't shit where you eat.
Jesus, don't do it, man.
Talk about your indiscretion errors.
something presidential wasn't asking for advice about what particular sexual practices to indulge in, gonerill, well-taken as yours would have been, had he or she been.
Well, 212 brings up an interesting topic. Why not engage in coprophagia with a colleague? After all, you don't have to actually see each other naked.
Because you shouldn't shit where you eat
s/b "Don't get your honey where you get your money."
ogged is probably the wisest. bitch the most compelling. Id. Superego. What to do?
ogged is probably the wisest. bitch the most compelling. Id. Superego. What to do?
I thought you could simplify the question by asking yourself "If I had asked ogged and B. to counsel me on all the important decisions of my life, and consistently followed the advice of one or the other, which would have turned out better for me?" But then I realized the answer is probably more ambiguous than I first suspected.
Would you rather look back on your life and say "I wish I'd been wiser" or "I wish I'd shtupped that hottie at work"? Keep in mind that you may be in a fatal car accident next week.
(In all honesty, I was being flippant. The wise course of action is to refrain. This depends, however, on if your job is a Career-type job or not. If not, then for fuck's sake, go for it. If so, then probably you shouldn't, although in all honesty, I've never done the wise thing in this kind of situation in my entire life, and yet, I am still alive. So.)
But then I realized the answer is probably more ambiguous than I first suspected.
Yea verily.
Would you rather look back on your life and say "I wish I'd been wiser" or "I wish I'd shtupped that hottie at work"? Keep in mind that you may be in a fatal car accident next week.
When the crazy bitch runs you over, you mean?
[I]t's very likely that the relationship won't last--regardless of whether it ends acrimoniously or not--but you'll still see each other every day and it will be awkward and your co-workers will pick up weird vibes. And if it does end acrimoniously, wow are you in for a world of hurt.
This sounds like good advice, but ogged fails to think outside the box. Sleep with her or him, then fire 'em.
Would you rather look back on your life and say "I wish I'd been wiser" or "I wish I'd shtupped that hottie at work"? Keep in mind that you may be in a fatal car accident next week.
It's really a matter of your level of risk tolerance, or more precisely, of loss aversion.
For large categories of purported "bad choices", the chances are still better than even that no bad will befall you: drinking and driving, cheating on your taxes, having unprotected sex with a stranger. But the downside, however small the probability, is unthinkably bad: killing someone, going to prison, contracting a fatal disease.
Now, the consequences of schtupping someone in your office are unlikely to be as bad as any of these, but the same principle applies. If you do it, chances are better than even that it will be just awesome and you'll suffer no consequences. But if you pick the unlucky card, you're going to feel really stupid.
What is your tolerance for that kind of risk?
ogged fails to think outside the box
So true. You should do it in the context of an orgy with the entire office, so that any awkwardness or other negative consequences will be shared by the whole workplace, and no one can suffer career impairment as a result.
199, listen to ogged in 207. Just having flirted* with and kissed a co-worker led to months of awkwardness and drama.
*Flirting with intent, not the fun, clearly unserious kind of flirting, which I wholeheartedly endorse.
This sounds like good advice, but ogged fails to think outside the box. Sleep with her or him, then fire 'em.
Alas, em is higher ranking than moi. Albeit not directly supervisory.
Also said colleague and I almost never work directly together. Almost never. I'm rationalizing.
Just do it. DO IT. You know you want to.
(Helpful anecdote: a friend of mine once told me that nothing is hotter than shtupping the head of w/men's studies over the desk in her office. He was but a lowly adjunct. They are now an item.)
Is the co-worker thing the only impediment? Like would anyone be cheating?
if you or em are married, don't
if not, what's the problem?
Office doors are glass, so no schtupping over the desk. Damnit.
a friend of mine once told me that nothing is hotter more awesomely patriarchal than shtupping the head of w/men's studies over the desk in her office.
No cheating, but a very gossipy workplace. I hate, hate, hate being the subject of gossip. Plus, what ogged said in 207.
Alas, em is higher ranking than moi. Albeit not directly supervisory.
Sleep with them, have them fire you, sue for sexual harassment, profit! Unless you really, really like your job.
And I was casting aspersions at B for making assumptions about JBS's sex life, but I don't see how 8 really adds any information. It's not like he said "Skill at fellatio, breast size, impulse control when drunk", although even then he very well might be getting laid regularly.
I hadn't noticed until this thread how often people call Sybil "Sibyl".
Sleep with them, have them fire you, sue for sexual harassment, profit! Unless you really, really like your job.
Who the hell really likes their job? So what do I need to transform this into a lawsuit. I mean, if it's not happily ever after and all...
Gah! Someone fix 235?
FWIW, the times I have contemplated fooling around with a colleague and resisted the temptation, I have always thought afterwards that I made the right choice. And the times I have gone ahead and done it, I have not regretted it afterwards. This could point to (1) my unmatched discernment and judgement; (2) my capacity for rationalization; or (3) the possibility that it doesn't make much difference one way or the other.
The one exception to the foregoing is the one time I slept with a colleague that I wasn't hot for at all, just because I was in the midst of a long drought and really wanted to get laid, and she was drunk and willing. This was regrettable and awkward, and would have knocked me down several status rungs in the organization if I hadn't already been as far down as you could go to begin with.
236: I so knew it was you! I'm going to revise my advice now in light of your identity and say don't do it. I think the risk is too high that your scenario resembles my 237.2.
Kntecht is right. Pity and/or desperation fucks are to be deprecated among coworkers.
238: You're right, you're right, I know you're right...
It's unfair to the Mineshaft that you didn't disclose the pity fuck aspect, "something presidential."
You should probably be focusing your efforts on fucking Knecht Ruprecht at this point -- always ruin the friendship, that's my rule of thumb.
Eh, I'd say that it's probably not worth doing if you have alternatives. Unlike 222, I feel that the chances of adverse consequences are a fair bit better than even, though the most likely result will just be minor awkwardness and gossip, etc.
Of course, very often there aren't any great alternatives. And I won't deny that, if given the chance to have sex with someone at work in my current state, my ass would be naked in the server closet in an instant.
237.2: Well, that's just a pretty good rule of thumb regardless of whether the person is a colleague or not. The two times I've had droughts longer than 3-4 months, I've broken them in fairly regrettable ways because I really just wanted to get it over with. One of the times it had pretty horrible social fallout, the other time it just caused some minor self-loathing but the friendship was maintained thanks to immediate healthy distance as she went back to school.
Yo president, sounds like you really want to do this. So I'd calculate out the potential adverse consequences -- the specific ones. Can you pull this off discreetly (assuming you are not married but still want to do this as a fling and are not imagining, say, that your kids would meet this person)? If you want to quit (or get fired) how hard will it be to get a new job at the same salary level in your field? If you're female, how reliable is your birth control and would you want to have this person's baby (or deal with an abortion) if you got pregnant unexpectedly?
My general advice would be "No," but as I said, it sounds like you want to do this. And it could be great, so who am I to assume that the common wisdom on sex with colleagues applies in this particular instance?
ERLÄUTERUNG: unerwartet nicht auf Widerstand stoßen
BEISPIELE: "Da rennt er bei mir offene Türen ein" ("Da habe ich überhaupt nichts dagegen")
Hätte dann Fleur nichts dagegen, oder hast du keine Rücksicht auf sie?
I hate, hate, hate being the subject of gossip.
Then don't.
Although my advice on *this* problem, not that you asked, is to get over it, because hating being gossiped about is like the surest way of never doing anything interesting.
(That said, if you're really not all that hot for this person and are just feeling indiscriminately horny, don't bother; go find some young hottie on CL or something.)
War nur ein Späßchen, Wolfi. Aber bitte 246-247 trotzdem vorsichtshalber redigieren.
I don't see how 8 really adds any information.
"Sex, IQ and income" doesn't sound like the most unlayable person, ever?
250 gets it entire wrong. "Sex, IQ and Income" would be a great name for a rapper.
something presidential, let me tell you a story.
Once upon a time, two people at a workplace slept together for a while. Then they had a nasty breakup. THEN, one half of the ex-couple hauled the other half into her (glass-walled, visible to half the floor) office for a four-hour screaming match. Every morning. For six months.
This story has become so legendary that I told it to someone I'd just met today who had only the most tenuous connection to the company in question, and she'd heard it. This happened over a decade ago. (And no, not to me - this happened before I started there.)
Do you want to be a part of a story like this?
It's just a cross between this and this.
go find some young hottie on CL or something.
Much, much harder than it sounds. I suppose things may be somewhat different for women, but I still remember my friend bitching as she scrolled through her email responses in Chicago, which is hardly North Dakota personals territory.
251 lies. It was a disaster as the name of my 2nd single.
254: Why not? You could dine out on a story like that for years.
256: Well, true, most guys are swine. But maybe you could find someone who was hot and tell them that the requirement for sexxoring you is that they keep their damn mouth shut the entire time.
Wenn du wirklich vorsichtig wäre, würden nichts redigiert müssen werden. Und kaum geht es um Vorsichtigkeit meinetwegens
.
Did it really take me ten minutes to write that? wtf.
You could dine out on a story like that for years.
That's scant consolation when you're getting yelled at for four hours.
My three questions:
1) Who pays?
2) Cats or dogs?
3) How do you like your steak?
That's the ONLY consolation when you're getting yelled at for four hours. Anyway, you have to take the long view.
Shorter 258: If life gives you pigs, make bacon?
And could anyone help us out on Ben and Knecht's little jokes? Blume?
As far as I can tell, 262 is a great explanation for why Knecht never wrote 246 in the first place.
266.2: That, or ben & Knecht should just go get a room already.
I just today discovered that gTranslate is a great Firefox add-on.
266: This site should help. (My German's decent enough that I could understand 249, at least, with no help, but the rest of it required some translation.)
If only there was some kind of service that would set "something presidential" up on a blind date....
I find a desire to not have a desire to fuck someone is not the same as wanting to fuck some random stranger.
Frex, right now I have a night class that includes like 5 or 6 hot 30-something-y-o guys who fawn on me. I am totally aware that this is a product of being a lit instructor, and teaching a lot of sexy material, and I've been a teacher long enough to know just how false that desire from their end is.
On the other hand, so cute! So (otherwise) datable! So ready to laugh at my jokes! So starting grad school in the fall! Still, however, an incredibly stupid idea that could ruin my life. Sigh.
It doesn't make me want to hook up with strangers from the internets.
274: They are not equivalent, but those desires can share a mutual origin: being generally horny and hard up for it (yet knowing some possibilities are just bad, bad ideas).
Does anyone know any great ways to get rid of nasty-as-hell sinus congestion? I had a horrendous cold a couple weeks ago, then spent the past week on a diving vacation with 4 flights altogether, so my head's been feeling like exploding for most of the past couple days. Seriously, I can't take this much longer, I was nigh worthless at work and couldn't go out as it worsened in the evening.
275: Most here will say neti pot. You can do basically the same thing with a cup of warm water in which you've dissolved a little salt and a spoon to apply it. At least it provides temporary relief.
I was introduced to the neti pot recently. It seemed like the sort of thing that people who refuse to vaccinate their children would queue up to buy.
It seemed like the sort of thing that people who refuse to vaccinate their children would queue up to buy.
And now you will be beset by hippie wrath.
275: Nyquil. Also, possibly it's a sinus infection, in which case you should see an actual real doctor.
As long as we're asking health questions, can anyone tell me how the HELL to tell if a kid has head lice or not? I've just spent an hour combing through PK's hair (let me tell you, it's not easy) and yeah, there's the odd little piece of what could be dirt. Not much. Are these fucking head lice? How the hell should I know?
You'll see nits, right? Like little tiny white eggs.
Does PK have symptoms, specifically itching?
Well, following the advice of teh internets (and the copy on the head lice shampoo box), I coated his entire head in about a quart of conditioner (it would be impossible to comb through his hair with a fine-tooth comb without that). So if there are little tiny white eggs in the SEA OF CONDITIONER I am unable to tell. All i can find is the odd tiny little black thing and may 2-3 teensy red smears that could be blood from nit bites, or they could be blood from me poking at the poor kid's head with the goddamn comb.
Or they could be paint flakes or leftover bits of fruit candy or whatever the hell, what with his being SEVEN.
He claims his head itches "some." Which could be a symptom, hypochondria, or maybe he needs a shower.
279: Wait two days and see if you start developing an itchy scalp. If yes: headlice.
Should I just wait and see if he starts scratching his head like a cat with fleas?
283: Well of *course* I have an itchy scalp *now*. It began the second he suggested he might have head lice. (We've had several scares through the school year and this is the first time he's confirmed itching at all, so.)
"I wish I'd shtupped that hottie at work"?
This is flippant, but as long as it doesn't lead to a lawsuit, 'tis better to ask forgiveness than permission. (Of your employers, that is. Obviously you should ask permission from the hottie.) I went to the hottie-at-work well only once, and it was one of those things that's equal parts shameful and delightful. As long as said hottie is not hierarchically obligated.
285: There you go then. Step two: shave off all his hair and demand that he cover his upper lip in public while crying "Unclean! Unclean!"
I don't quite see what the upper lip thing has to do with it, but if he does have lice--and if it takes more than one or two treatments to get rid of them--head shaving is *definitely* in order.
288: I don't quite see what the upper lip thing has to do with it
Biblical thing. Originally meant for leprosy, but headlice will do. The exact means of covering the upper lip is left unspecified; I take it as an Old Testament endorsement of nose glasses.
I figured it was a leprosy thing. Okay, it's from the bible. But *why*?
The same reason the Ark burns people alive for having uncovered genitals, I figure.
I'm familiar with a cultural prohibition on uncovered genitals. Uncovered upper lips, not so much.
Do you keep saying that he has "head" lice so that we won't think he has the other kind? Because if so, that's uncharacteristically demure of you.
My son does not have crabs, Ari. Jesus.
And yet the God who thought uncovered genitals were a capital crime demanded that his chosen people identify themselves by... circumcision. Yet more proof the Bible was written by committee.
Lices sucks. My younger daughter a couple years ago brought it home three or four times. We finally wised up to where she was catching it. "Sorry kiddo, can't play at the dirty friend's house anymore."
295: You can get them from toilet seats, you know. SRSLY.
300 to 295. Or, if not that, 300 to every other comment in every other thread on this and every other blog. Ever.
296 made me laugh. Which considering that PK MAY HAVE HEAD LICE is quite an accomplishment.
Gswift, you are so mean.
Presumably, PK does not yet have pubes on which for crabs to survive.
AWB, STOP THINKING ABOUT MY SON'S PUBES. Pervert.
301: Also made me laugh.
can't play at the dirty friend's house anymore
RACIST.
Also: Unfogged has had a circumcision thread, no? Because I just had a looong conversation with an old friend who's trying to decide what to do with the penis of his soon-to-be-born boy.
306: We have, yes. Tell your friend not to circumcise unless he feels strongly about religious tradition.
The friend may be dirty, but is s/he articulate?
And, of course, is Jewish or Muslim.
279: Damn, I hope not, a sinus infection would suck. As for PK, just wait it out. He'll either itch for sure or it's nothing. Lice won't kill him in the meantime.
Just make sure he doesn't sit on the good couch until you know for sure. Also, cover his bed in plastic. Kids love that.
I just had a looong conversation with an old friend who's trying to decide what to do with the penis of his soon-to-be-born boy.
Circumsize that fucker EARLY. Before he can remember it. Worked for me, and look! I'm perfectly well-adjusted. See how well I spend my Friday nights.
Head lice and pubic lice are not the same thing. That said, if PK does have head lice, he may have to surrender his hair.
Do they have plastic slipcovers for kids? I mean slipcovers to place over one's children. With breathing holes, of course. I wouldn't want to be cruel.
the good couch
I do not understand what you are saying here.
Tell your friend not to circumcise unless he feels strongly about religious tradition.
Says she whose son subsequently had to go to the doctor because of complications with his uncut dong.
CIRCUMCISE!
314: You know, the good, buttsex couch.
Yes, that may be over the line. I'm daring.
313: I suppose I could go *back* to fucking CVS and buy him a showercap. It's only midnight, after all.
if PK does have head lice, he may have to surrender his hair.
In all seriousness, it would have to be a major, major infestation for us to get to this point. Anything less and he'd probably kill me in my sleep.
Says she whose son subsequently had to go to the doctor because of complications with his uncut dong. the (ahem, Jewish) primary care physician was freaking out over nothing doesn't know about uncircumcised penises.
309: Neither Jewish nor Muslim. And yes, I suggested not mutilating his as-yet-unborn child's genitals. He agreed. But his significant other is, for some reason, leaning toward cutting. Hard to fathom, if you ask me. Even though I'm Jewish and entered into Abraham's* (right?) covenant when I was however many is the right number of days old.
* Isaac's? Oh, who cares.
319: His wife is completely insane, and he should totally pull the "I'm the person with a penis here and I say LEAVE THE PENIS ALONE" thing if he has to.
319: The foreskin is a breeding ground for evil infections and loose morals. It's one of those flotsam and jetsam of evolution, best chopped off before it can do any damage. I can't even tell if I'm serious about that or not.
"mutilating", Gah. Next up, trimming your cuticles is mutilation of the hand.
323: I'm in your camp, bro, but WORST. ANALOGY. EVAR.
317: If it's anything like a major infestation, you'd likely be hearing about it from parents of his classmates. But you might want to call your pediatrician, just to be safe.
317: If it's anything like a major infestation, you'd likely be hearing about it from parents of his classmates. But you might want to call your pediatrician, just to be safe.
Next up, trimming your cuticles is mutilation of the hand.
So awesome that I beg you not to tell me if you were serious.
WORST. ANALOGY. EVAR.
I'm working on my other monitor (kind of), and analogizing on the fly.
326 and 327: Oh, the note has come home from school several times. Many of the classmates have had it repeatedly; so far we've been lucky.
You know, it's kind of mean to make fun of gswift's numb cock like that.
332 is a single-source reference for why I'm a BitchPhd fan.
I do not understand what you are saying here.
At my age, any fabric couch you would not like to burn or throw off a roof counts as "the good couch".
it's kind of mean to make fun of gswift's numb cock like that.
Besides the awesome staying power, it's also a handy tool. Tenderizing meat, beating the neighborhood children...
334: Mmmmayybeee...
But I'd be thinking the same thing if I were sober. Promise.
Gswift beats the neighborhood children with his cock. Where's that number for the SLC police, now...
the requirement for sexxoring you is that they keep their damn mouth shut the entire time
That really invalidates "Do you have any objections to cunnilingus?"
I suggested not mutilating his as-yet-unborn child's genitals
You should always wait until they're born.
Although there's a case to be made for partial birth circumcision.
PK has a mane, right? Once you get an infestation in something like that, it can go on for years. Literally. Also, leave it for a week and then comb with a proper, fine nitcomb. If he has them, you will be quite clear about this then: like thirty or forty of the fuckers, some still wriggling, will appear. They look like little clots of dirt, unless they are huge, when you can distinguish the legs.
Don't worry, though. The cure is puberty, when the hair gets greasy and the nits slip off. And no one ever asks their mothers to comb them for the other lice.
Come to think of it, that's a question for the dating game...
re: 323
Dude, there's a pretty major difference.
320 is right.
Also, why would head-lice necessitate cutting hair? I don't see the parents of little girls with long hair having their hair chopped off. *I* had head-lice at least once as a kid, and I had long hair. It's not that hard to get rid of.
Dude, there's a pretty major difference.
Cuticles do grow back, I suppose.
Dude, there's a pretty major difference.
Meh. In my book, not in terms of "things worth getting riled up over".
What is a good analogy, anyways? For me it seems about as severe as...getting a tatoo? Maybe a run of the mill ear or nose piercing?
Shouldn't we have body mod people up at this hour? Tatoo is too different, and piercings are largely reversable and less severe. What about branding?
What about branding?
Yeah, I also sold the naming rights to my middle kid, Kinko's FedEx Noah.
re: 347
I'm generally against cutting bits off of people who are too young to consent and where there's no life-saving reason for doing so.
If I lived in a society where ear-trimming-to-fetching-point was the done thing [some sort of militant Trekkie community, or something] I'd object to that, too.
"Do you realize that the first sexual experience you ever had was also the worst trauma you've ever experienced? Maybe that went to the back of your mind and stayed there, just maybe."
It also numbed my soul? Damn.
What is a good analogy, anyways?
Maybe this? (Keeping a focus on the specific adornment. Totally SFW.)
353: Fuck that. Worst trauma I ever experienced was being mugged, and/or watching The Black Crowes trying to play their instruments.
353: "The men stick around, discussing foreskin-restoration gear the way some guys discuss fishing tackle."
Poor analogy choice, that one.
Well, yes. Excellent analogy choice, but unfortunate.
North Dakota State University officials are investigating after complaints about a skit in which a black-faced white student portrayed Barack Obama receiving a lap dance. Presidents of the NDSU Saddle and Sirloin Club and sorority Alpha Gamma Delta publicly apologized for the skit at an NDSU town hall meeting this week. The skit was performed March 18, for 500 people at the Mr. NDSU Pageant, which raises money for diabetes research.
People who attended said a pageant contestant from Saddle and Sirloin dressed as a woman from the Internet video "I Got a Crush on Obama" and performed for another student who was wearing dark makeup and an afro wig. In the background, two male students dressed as cowboys simulated anal sex while holding an Obama sign that one student ripped at the conclusion of the 30-second performance. [...]
"It wasn't malicious and it wasn't racist in any way," Danielson said. "They're very apologetic and they realize the mistake that they made."
239/241: Neither pity nor desperation. Just a bad idea that is probably just a little extra appealing because it's such a bad idea.
243: Thanks, Ben.
274: Precisely, AWB.
354: "Totally SFW"???? Where the hell do you work?
I am currently unemployed. Modify accordingly.
DS mostly does free lance body mod work.
I was let go for banging coworkers and browsing Modblog.
1. How do you feel about circumcision?
2. Ever had head lice?
3. Ever been double penetrated by coworkers?
366: "I'm here to apply for the job."
Also, the first page of this week's Smoking Gun mugshot roundup is just about the hottest mugshot ever.
I'd love to see somebody try on some new frontiers in forehead tattooing. Like a geek with Tengwar forehead tattoos that say "Curse. Thou."
368: I suspect not "just about." She looks like it was all part of a planned shoot.
Damn. I finally get to this thread and I'm pwned by 198.
Sleeping with the coworker who you don't actually work with much seems like a perfectly reasonable idea to me, assuming we're not including complications like either one of you being married. I would raise whatever standards you have for non-craziness in a partner because of the work thing; I wouldn't do it if they seem like the sort of person who's like to flip out in any dramatic fashion.
I* had head-lice at least once as a kid, and I had long hair. It's not that hard to get rid of.
Head lice went around my dorm in college; one of the girls went home over break, her elementary-school-aged brother had them, and it spread through one wing of the dorm. I wasn't affected, but no one had to shave her head.
I just had a looong conversation with an old friend who's trying to decide what to do with the penis of his soon-to-be-born boy.
Leave the damn thing alone, obviously. Tell him, in your capacity as a historian, that the Middle Ages are supposed to be over -- the continuing obsessions of backward religions notwithstanding.
My MIT coop got lice one term. There was a whole lot of nitpicking, but no haircuts I remember. I was very happy to have extremely short hair, though.
Nitpicking is a lot easier with dark hair than with blonde, too, for obvious reasons. ugh, lice.
Also, I think nonverbal reactions tell you at least as much as the actual answer to the question. I bet you could get better results watching a muted video of somebody responding to your questions than you could by actually hearing the answers.
Witt video tapes all of her dates.
Witt's questions were excellent.
My questions:
Are you patient? (my daughter related)
Are you curious? (me related)
Are you squeamish? (daughter related)
More than three:
Do you like to wake up early? (the kids and I like to wake up early)
Are you freaked out by abortion? (you will not be happy around us if that is the case.)
Do you like to be touched? (we are a touchy-feely family)
I just had a looong conversation with an old friend who's trying to decide what to do with the penis of his soon-to-be-born boy.
I vote for leaving it alone.
Ask your friend the following: Do you really want your son to grow up and join a 'Reclaiming Our Foreskins' support group?
I was introduced to the neti pot recently. It seemed like the sort of thing that people who refuse to vaccinate their children would queue up to buy.
Stuff White People Like: taking anything under the sun labelled 'natural' or 'yogi' or 'mystical' but being afraid of nsaids.
That said, nasal irrigation (I have a squeeze bottle, not a neti pot, but same principle) has really improved my allergies to the point where I'm no longer needing to take antihistamines. It's a little uncomfortable at first, because it's essentially water going up your nose, but it does seem to help. It can put pressure on your ears, however, so if you're prone to earaches, proceed carefully.
I actually got myself a neti pot a while back, and I'm having a little trouble with technique -- when my nose is stuffed up, the saline just doesn't flow anyplace. I should figure this out.
Yeah, I could see how it might be effective. Everything from the thing itself to the picture on the package to the copy on the box was SWPL to the peachy max, though.
I also can't think of many questions where I'd find terse answers all that helpful where the question isn't so leading as to be useless. There are things one wants to know about one's potential date (45.2 is a great question), but it's hard to get a straight answer about many of them (no one is going to answer 45.2 on a first date with anything that makes them look needy, so it's going to be useless as a sorter.)
There are things one wants to know about one's potential date (45.2 is a great question), but it's hard to get a straight answer about many of them
These kind of hypos all have their roots in the desire to spark conversation about this stuff with one's friends, rather than in any real desire to find, e.g., a set of questions that would actually be useful in practice.
Do you love yourself?
How often?
Tell me about your family?
Do you love yourself?
How often?
Tell me about your family.
1. Red wine or white wine?
2. Beach or mountains?
3. Ayn Rand or hernia surgery?
How 'bout that Fox News?
What do you think about Obama not wearing a flag pin?
Too little God in school?
I get that, Goneril. But I really think that most of these question either fall into 'answers are unimportant, given sufficient hotness' or 'are something people know to lie about.'
re: 379
Gives me the most amazing headaches.
'Oh my god, kill me now' level of headaches, which is a shame, because several people I trust swear by 'em.
Who needs a neti pot when you can just go swim at the pool?!?!?
Ayn Rand or hernia surgery
thanks, i'm fully awake now
now you people may be should answer each others questions
so that i could find out your compatibilities
AWB&WB, the next, Witt&AKorCNorP, two of them did not submit questions yet though
i wonder why there are so few younger single women around here, it hinders the whole process
389: Ugh, what a shame. Too much sinus pressure, or what?
re: 397
Could be. My mum has problems with her sinuses [she's had to have surgery on them in the past]. It's possible I share some of those problems [one of my sinuses is never completely clear] and that's why, more often than not, the netti pot gives me the headaches.
i wonder why there are so few younger single women around here
You should have been here three years ago. Read the archives.
i wonder why there are so few younger single women around here
The collective wisdom of the male commentariat here makes them dive headlong into matrimony.
Cala.
what qualifies as younger?
Arent there a significant number of under 35 single women here?
My friend tried a neti pot and found that she could get the saline in but it wouldn't come out again. Until some time later when she was walking down the street. Her doctor told her that people prone to sinus infections often have such problems.
Personally, I'm afraid of them.
Hey will, some enterprising lawyer who seems to work exclusively on immigration and divorce has arrived at a creative solution in his subway ads. Both ads picture a person up with worry in the middle of the night and say something like "Trapped!" or "No way out!" but the copy beneath each pic encourages one to seek either a divorce or to normalize one's immigration status.
I made the mistake of waking up in the middle of the night to read this thread and go back to bed again, and I ended up having a nightmare about it. I'm at a party, I meet a really handsome and friendly guy with a good sense of humor, we fool around a bit and exchange numbers. Then he calls me two days later and starts whining about how I hadn't called him yet, and he thought we had such a special connection, and how he's never felt anything so strong so soon with someone he's just met, but obviously, there's something there, and yadda yadda. And friends? I find myself placating him because he is cute, even as I try to explain that I'm not the right girl for his romantic excesses. I woke up disappointed in myself.
now you people may be should answer each others questions
Being over literal, and having time on my hands, I started this. To save time, I have only answered the first question from each set of three, and even then I was not able to make it all the way through the thread. But, surprisingly interesting. Someone else should answer the 2nd questions.
1) Which blogs do you read?
Unfogged, MY, Ezra Klein regularly and a dozen others irregularly.
1) Do you have or want kids?
No and probably not.
1) alright, love?
No.
1. What is your name?
NickS
Age
31
1. Do you like me more than you like anybody else you could be dating?
No
Are you blind?
No
what is the last book you read?
Embarassingly, Andy Roddick Beat My With a Frying Pan which I read while in the middle of Number: The Language of Science (good book, but I got bogged down).
1) Can you impress me with your intelligence whilst not minding if I win every argument?
I've had a long term relationship like this, so yes.
1. If you could only get terse answers to three questions, and none of the information could identify the person specifically, what would you want to know?
1. Do you like your sense of humor?
Yes, though I occasionally worry that it has atrophied.
1. Do you have some kind of weird hangup about dating married people?
Yes.
1. Do you believe masculine/feminine behavior is natural or a result of socialization?
Both/and not either/or, but primarily socialization.
1. What is your definition of "too risky"?
Almost anything that someone else would call "fun".
1) how dare you?
I didn't hurt anyone.
1. Early bird or night owl?
Poor sleeper. (Night owl, when I can, but my schedule does not allow).
31.1 is unanswerable tersely.
I was tempted to answer "no", but I thought I should give a reason.
1. To what degree do you expect a girlfriend to be the primary relationship in your life, and yourself to be the primary relationship in hers?
I think SO is a relationship that should have a plurality, but not a majority role.
(1) Willie Nelson or Johnny Cash?
Johnny Cash.
Ginger or Mary Anne?
No opinion.
1. Cats or dogs?
I don't want pets. I usually like other people's cats better than other people's dogs, but my favorite "pet of a friend" is a dog.
1) How much time in a typical week do you spend alone?
Lots.
1) How much do you need to "win" (at arguments, sports, cooking, boardgames, sex)?
Quite a bit, but not obsessively. I have willingly lost a game of one-on-one with a 12 year old.
1. If you find yourself in an unhappy relationship, are you more likely to (a) break up, (b) suffer in silence, (c) fight a lot, and/or (d) cheat?
(b)
1. Do you find it difficult to maintain professional relationships with people who see you naked?
I would very much prefer to not see my coworkers naked.
1. Are you one of the most talented men or women in the world?
No
Would you rather buy someone a meal, or be bought a meal?
I would rather split the check (or just buy alternating meals).
1) are you into recognizing patterns in your emotional behavior?
Yes, very much so.
1) Are you a pedant?
Occasionally, but I try to restrain myself.
1) if you fought a shark, would you win?
Only if I could pick the parameters of the fight. On the shark's turf, I'm betting on the shark.
1. Point taken. But are you gay or something?
New hovertext?
1) Do you like, love or really love early Ike and Tina?
Like
1. All alike, or all different?
All alike (I am embarrassed to say).
1) Can you admit that Kahn was sexy in the Space Seed episode?
I don't think I've seen that episode.
1. You are standing in a dark, densely-wooded forest and can hear wolves howling in the distance. To the east is a small hut. To the south is a lake. To the northwest are the forbidding peaks of snowy mountains.
Statement. One-love.
Hey will, some enterprising lawyer who seems to work exclusively on immigration and divorce has arrived at a creative solution in his subway ads. Both ads picture a person up with worry in the middle of the night and say something like "Trapped!" or "No way out!" but the copy beneath each pic encourages one to seek either a divorce or to normalize one's immigration status.
I like the idea, Oudemia. I would add something about emirating to escape one's spouse and/or your country's foreign policies.
OT:
We just went to the Southern Graphics Print Council's confernce where all of the printmakers are showing off their stuff.
Printmakers all have the same look. A gothy, tattooish, geeky look. Everyone seems obsessed with breasts and beheadings.
Okay, following Nick's lead, I answered number 2's:
2) If you had to kill one person, who would it be?
As if you don't know.
2) Are you actively religious?
Not if by "active" you mean "attend services" or anything like that.
2) fancy a bit of how's yer father?
Say what now?
2. What is your quest? Come again?
IQ
I'd tell you, but then you'd get all insecure and neither of us really needs that.
2. Are you put off by sarcasm, the aphoristic style, the etiolated religiosity of the early-twenty-first century New England Protestant or a modest but well-curated collection of Batman stuff?
Etiolated?
Are you mute?
[raises eyebrows meaningfully]
2) Age?
35
What is your intoxicant of choice?
Depends on my mood. Vodka, gin, scotch, wine, sometimes beer.
2) Do you have any objections to cunnilingus?
None at all, thanks!
If you woke up in a strange room with no memory of the previous evening, would you prosecute?
Are punitive damages available?
2. What is your preferred medium for resolving conflict (yelling, talking, writing, hitting)?
Writing
2. Well, do you?
Yes already.
2. Over the course of your life, do you find yourself making decisions that more reliably result in increased happiness for yourself and those around you?
Shows improvement.
2. How much money is enough?
Enough to not have to worry about losing my job.
2) what's that supposed to mean?
Don't try to play dumb with me, mister.
2. Regular or diet?
Regular.
2. Can we conduct this interview in my room?
No
2. How much do you expect someone you date to make you feel better about yourself than you do when you're single?
Not making me feel worse about myself will be good enough.
(2) Keats or Shelley?
No thanks.
2) What was your moment of greatest triumph?
My daughter's first stage performance.
2. Favorite book and why?
Fox in Socks. It's fun to read aloud!
2. If not me, who?
Well, there was that guy at the dance club the other night. And that little hottie I dated a few times who reportedly is really trying to sober up. That guy my friend wants to set me up with. And a whole slew of eligible bachelors on that Crazy Blind Date site....
2) How different would you expect that answer to be if you were in a relationship?
I would expect slightly less "alone" time, but would not give it up entirely.
[Following question about communist party membership]If not, why not?
Fear of commitment.
Gettin' caught in the rain?
Yes.
2. Can I have a dollar?
No.
2) I mean, I don't know, like philosophy and shit or like maybe some spiritual shit, you know?
No, not so much.
2) What's the first image that the word "romance" brings to mind?
Dinner with wine.
2. With a partner who has her own intense interests, do you (a) pretend to adopt those interests, (b) share your own interests equally, (c) feel left out?
None of the above. Pursue interests individually.
(2) Emerson or McManus?
Emerson.
Are you open to an "Emersonian" relationship?
Yes.
2. Do you swing?
Like, on the playground?
2. Can I keep my socks on?
No.
Do you like your work colleagues? (Secret hidden meaning: do they like YOU?)
Some more than others.
2) children in public places are largely irritating: yay or nay?
You know, I'm offended by the mere asking of this.
2) Do you love Brett Favre?
No.
2. Bleen or grue?
Bleen.
2. Do you care that Brecht was a womanizer?
No, but I would if I were reading Brecht.
2. Visual experience or thought?
thought
2) Do you have any friends that are Republicans?
Yes.
2. Bath or shower?
Together or alone?
2. Why on this night do we eat reclining, laydeez?
Because I am tired and hungry.
2. Do you like to do it, too?
I'll try anything once.
2) Cats or dogs?
Cats.
2. Ever had head lice?
Nope.
Are you curious? (me related)
Yes
2. Beach or mountains?
beach
What do you think about Obama not wearing a flag pin?
Not much.
You people are so adorably premodern, pretending you believe in the existence of questions that constrain, or even relate to, answers. Surely you know that asking questions among upper class white folks is just a way of signalling one's own status markers, such as education, cleverness and big vocabulary. Haven't you seen a press conference or political debate?
So here are some responses I'd like to hear. The questions don't matter.
A. I am that I am.
B. I must repectfully decline to answer on the ground that I might tend to incriminate myself.
C. It tolls for thee.
Refusing to answer questions is so upper class white.
2. Favorite book and why?
Fox in Socks. It's fun to read aloud!
2. Can I keep my socks on?
No.
So, Di, Fox in Socks, but no fucks in socks?
I just assumed that all Northerners kept their socks on during sex.
Cala and Di Kotimy are young single women? noted
NickS is 31, i thought you are more mature :), also noted, you two may note each other
though the answering ideally should be to the questions of one particular person you choose, otherwise how i'll know who is compatible with who
i'm not a computer :)
but may be it all will happen naturally, so more answers, please
AWB's comment is disappointing, that it's not her answers on the questions, but the dream itself is insightful for the other, i hope
oedemia i thought not single
i started to read some posts around 2003, and they were strange, there were either no comments or only 3-4 comments per post or posted by unknown to me people or were discussing Spears and Aquilera
so have no insights why there is shortage of single women around here
i just think why you all need to go shopping to the suspicious dating sites with potentially disappointing people when you can date your fellow commenter, so obviously nice people, so
In fact, I assumed that Northerners had sex like Hugh Person in Transparent Things. ie clothes discretely parted only so much as nature would require
i just think why you all need to go shopping to the suspicious dating sites with potentially disappointing people when you can date your fellow commenter, so obviously nice people, so
Because when it all goes horribly, horribly wrong, as these things inevitably do, you lose the opportunity to openly whine here about how horribly, horribly wrong it went if the person who was so horribly, horribly wrong is a fellow commenter.
(I'm an optimist, in case you couldn't tell!)
This is Wrongshore's Small World day at Unfogged (see Wright thread), but I also know the dude responsible for 26, a friend of a friend. We set him up with another friend of mine, but apparently I wasn't supposed to pass on the remark, "I don't know that she's gonna find true love with the creator of Blind Date." New rules around confidentiality were thereafter devised.
Fucks in socks, no!
Fox in socks? Oh!
Fucks of fox in socks, a go!
why you all need to go shopping to the suspicious dating sites with potentially disappointing people when you can date your fellow commenter
But aren't you married, read? And are you suggesting that Unfogged isn't one of those "suspicious dating sites with potentially disappointing people"?
Chicks with bricks come.
Chicks with blocks come.
Chicks with bricks and blocks and clocks come.
jesus, I missed the voting on the wine blog. sorry.
From now on, by commenting at Unfogged you implicitly agree to be set up on a blind date by read, who will draw up assignations based on her very thorough understanding of your status and geography.
If we lose by one vote, you're a dead man, will.
Okay, I'll do #3. Ogged's: no.
3) Do you like trying new foods?
Yes. I keep very long food to-do lists.
3) eh? eh? Know what I mean?
Yes, I believe I do.
3. What is the air speed velocity of an unladen sparrow?
Requires research. I will skip research-requiring questions that follow.
income
Under 15K.
3. Are you going to get all stabtastic if I disagree with you?
I might get stabtastic if you agree with me, mindlessly, all the time.
Do you have big tits?
Medium tits.
3) How much free/uncommitted time do you have in a typical week?
Lots of my time is uncommitted, but not much of it is free.
Spit or swallow?
I prefer to be unpredictable.
3) Will you dote on me without being a doormat?
Dote? I'm not good at doting, but I'm nice.
Can you buy the next round?
Sure.
3. Do you have any cute friends who feel otherwise?
Several, apparently.
3. What is your primary motivation for wanting to date right now?
Sex and getting to know people.
3. How useful are general rules of thumb?
If I made them up myself, they tend to be useful. Otherwise, no.
3) my god, are you fucking serious?
You better fucking believe it.
3. Neat freak or slob?
Leaning toward slob. I have a high-clutter tolerance.
3. Do you think I can provide you with more or less orgasms than a resolution to the genocide in Darfur is worth?
Probably not, but it's worth trying!
3. Does sex in your relationships tend to get more interesting and satisfying over time, or less so?
More interesting and satisfying, usually.
(3) Clinton or Obama?
Obama. (Weeding out only half of the US population seems less than productive.)
Jeannie or Samantha?
Jeannie
3) Name a book or recording do you own that you no longer care for.
3. Which is worse: vulgarity or condescension?
Condescension.
3) How long has it been since you last had sex?
It can be counted in months, which is too long.
Spit or swallow?
Pwned.
Are you not into yoga?
Correct.
3. What's your problem?
If I knew that, I probably wouldn't be an academic.
3) Bryant Gumble: Hot or Not?
Hot!
3. When you have unplanned downtime with your partner, would you most like to (rank the following) (a) fuck, (b) watch TV, (c) read, (d) nap while cuddling affectionately, (e) go home?
a, c, e, d, b
(3) Now, what about that DP thing?
I am not cool enough to know what this means.
Do you like pastry?
It's alright, but not ever my preferred comestible.
3. Do you like T.G.I. Friday's?
If it means I can shtup your hot driver afterwards, then yes.
3. Bareback?
Vasectomy? Clean VD screen? Then yes, please.
3. How are questions 1 and 2 connected?
No connection currently exists. If you would like me to make one, please deposit 50 cents.
So, what about your father and mother .... ?
They're perfectly nice people who struggle very hard to maintain emotional and mental health.
3) (secular) Easter: great holiday or the greatest holiday?
I prefer Thanksgiving.
3) Will you please not try to talk to me over breakfast?
I sort of like chatting, I'm sorry to say. But I will try.
3) do you fight with yourself?
More so than I fight with anyone else.
3. Are you Merlin?
Apparently not. I get older.
3) in through the screen or out through the screen?
Out through.
3. The first critique, the second critique, or the third critique?
Don't make me choose.
3. You are standing in a dark, densely-wooded forest and can hear wolves howling in the distance. To the east is a small hut. To the south is a lake. To the northwest are the forbidding peaks of snowy mountains.
NW
3) What were you thinking when you married that old curmudgeon; could he really love you more than his unifying theory of myths?
I'm willing to play second fiddle to insane academic research projects.
3. Favorite German-language playwright writing post-1985?
All my favorites died in the 80's.
Will there ever be a boy born who can swim faster than a shark?
If there is a very slow shark, perhaps.
3. Said or shown?
Shown.
3. If Nietzsche had gotten laid now and then, would his writing have been better, worse, or about the same?
Better.
3. How would you cast the Iliad as a major motion picture?
I'd choose through hand-to-hand nude combat.
3. If you understand all three of Ben's questions, does that mean you have to date him?
I think so. It's the law.
3) Do your friends have any friends that are Republicans?
Do libertarians count? Then yes.
3. Venter or brooder?
Venter.
3. Why on this night do we dip our herbs twice, laydeez?
To remind us of the bitter tears shed in Egypt, gentlemen.
3. Why do all the boys in town follow you all around?
Because they want me to call the police.
3) Do your friends have any friends that are Republicans?
Do libertarians count?
Do they ever.
Read, if it's any help to your project, Cala got married last summer.
3) Name a book or recording do you own that you no longer care for.
Oh, I didn't answer this. I guess something like Immortal Poems of the English Language, ed. Oscar Williams. I got it as a gift when I was 14 and marked it all up with love. Now I think anthologies like that are sorta dumb.
My three:
1) Racist or sexist?
2) d20 or White Wolf?
3) Louisville Slugger or board with a nail driven through it?
1. Bakunin or Marx?
2. Berkman or Most?
3. Chomsky or Bookchin?
1. Mary Read or Anne Bonney?
2. Voltairine De Cleyre or Lucy Parsons?
3. Starhawk or Silver RavenWolf?
Sorry, will! My previous answers were sent precipitously because my computer shut off while I was writing them and I was afraid of losing them again. Here's the Will edition:
Are you squeamish? (daughter related)
Not at all. I like and respect bodies and the stuff they do.
Do you like to be touched? (we are a touchy-feely family)
Honestly, I can't handle it all the time. I like hugs and sex and the occasional caress/backrub, but constant petting/cuddling makes me anxious.
Tell me about your family.
We have a lot of problems in my family. Most of my relatives are very smart, but undereducated, usually due to lack of proper diagnosis and treatment of emotional and mental disorders. Everyone in my parents' generation was badly physically and emotionally abused, and that has necessarily trickled down to my generation. Things get better for some of us, though.
Too little God in school?
In a sense, yes. By making religion an academic subject, we rob it of its romanticized ghettoization in churches and make it a matter for analysis and comparison.
Thank you Di and AWB for keeping me from looking silly.
though the answering ideally should be to the questions of one particular person you choose, otherwise how i'll know who is compatible with who
i'm not a computer :)
I was intentionally avoiding that.
NickS is 31, i thought you are more mature :)
just boring.
2) d20 or White Wolf?
Ugggh, isn't this like being asked whether you'd rather be eaten by badgers or weasels? Two systems that have absolutely nothing to recommend them qua systems, but happen to have large player bases.
. . . which means that she commented as a young single woman, and then stopped doing so. (IIRC, a couple of the fellas are also engaged, so the number of young single men will also decline.)
420 i'm not, but it's not about me coz i'm here alone
for another yr i suppose
i do not believe in international relationships or marriages, unfortunately
one must compromise one's pride or identity somewhere to make it work i think and i'm kinda too stubborn to try to compromise
about your next question, i'm just trying to be helpful, at least there are no serial killers around here
NickS, hope you noticed Di and vice versa
But those who are single will get even more intensely single.
If I weren't single, someone might be making chicken broth for poor sick me. Alas! I have to make it myself and sit on the couch reading Pale Fire and moaning pathetically.
Poor Ben. Many sympathetic tuts and pats.
Advice for the single: lie back and think of Zembla.
Etiolated?
Am I the only one who likes that word?
149: Wait. Disciplines are colliding. There isn't just one teichoscopia -- Helen and Priam in Iliad 3?
Is it a general trope now? Like ekphrasis?
Way late answer: It can also be used now to refer to a device in drama, any time there is a character on stage reporting on action s/he can see that the audience cannot.
I only like ekphrasis when it isn't all aspirational.
Pale Fire isn't that hard, Ben, you'll get through it OK
just hang in there
any time there is a character on stage reporting on action s/he can see that the audience cannot.
Cheaters! There doesn't even have to be a wall!
So far Pale Fire isn't even that gripping.
Maybe I should read Forever Amber instead.
Sorry babe, it's always aspirational. See Mitchell on the desire for the 'natural sign'.
(Not that FA has been on my list or anything, but I was just reminded of it by a line in PF: "Judging by the novels in Mrs. Goldsworth's boudoir, he intellectual interests were fully developed, going as they did from Amber to Zen." I feel I should clear this up.)
Natural signs are all around you, Blume: the footprints of a bird, the shadow of your body on the ground.
Cheaters! There doesn't even have to be a wall!
Oh ha! I was reading your comment at first as talking about the fourth wall. Genre collision!
I like Pale Fire a great deal. The poem is supposed to be rather bad, you know, with flashes of brilliance mixed into somewhat boring Frost-ish crap.
The poem is supposed to be rather bad, you know
This is the part I couldn't get past. Yawn. I get it, do I have to read it now?
Nick Cave's accent and r-inserting tendences make it sound as if he's talking about a "lower-abiding citizen" instead of a "law-abiding citizen" in his cover of Dylan's "Death is not the End".
It wouldn't fit if Kinbote were all up in arms over a poem that really was hot shit. What is failing to compel me: I was hoping for really creative and insane misreadings of the poem, and not random words being used to spur histories of Zembla, or (worse!) discarded drafts. Consider, eg, the note to line 691.
I enjoyed Pale Fire. One of my favorite college classes was a seminar on Nabokov.
I gave it to some Ivy League freshers to read once and, to a Prep, none of them had heard of it and all of them skipped the spoiler-filled introduction, so the book had its intended effect almost to perfection.
I picked it up as a teenager off a used-book table because I'd vaguely heard of Nabokov somewhere, and only figured out what was going on as it started to get weird.
250
""Sex, IQ and income" doesn't sound like the most unlayable person, ever?"
Actually it was "Age, IQ, income". And I interpreted the question as what you would want to know as an initial screening mechanism before agreeing to a date not what you would ask as an icebreaker once on a date.
307
"We have, yes. Tell your friend not to circumcise unless he feels strongly about religious tradition."
For once I agree with B.
Nabokov had such an amazing command of the English language. Very impressive for someone for whom it was a second language.
I would recommend Transparent Things if you like the odd and the quirky.
Did they read Kinbote's Foreword? It must surely be hard to read that and not have an inkling as to what's up.
To further cement my status as an odd ball. My dad both delivered and circumcised my son.
It was an interesting conversation explaining that one to my son. I told my son that he better behave around my dad or he might get that scalpel out again.
Assuming that your dad is properly trained and licensed, will, I don't see how that makes you so odd.
Did they read Kinbote's Foreword? It must surely be hard to read that and not have an inkling as to what's up.
I can't remember. They may have skipped that, too.
Peculiarly (or not), I have little to no memory of Pale Fire, or of many of the other books read in a college course on 'The Post-World War II Novel'. It was a race-course through, miscellaneously remembered, The Tin Drum, The Crying of Lot 49, Malloy/Malone Dies, The Invisible Man, The Bluest Eye, The White Hotel, The Magus, god knows what else. I remember very little of any of these; must have been absurdly distracted at the time. Weird, and unfortunate.
My grandfather baptized me; our father baptized my brother.
In unrelated news, on the work hottie question, I am of the party of go for it, bro. Fist pound!
As someone in the same position, I believe I remember thinking it was oddly chatty, but I didn't really get what was going on until I was in the footnotes.
(And thank you for you moment of one-off nostalgia.)
Ben, chicken soup and a novel sounds lovely, obviously. You have a warm fire to go with that, of course.
I have a non-functioning fireplace; does that count? And I'm not exactly making much progress on the novel (nor am I certain when the broth counts as done, though I did just taste it was delighted to discover that it actually tastes like chicken!).
472: Put candles in, on, or around it, and it does. The fireplace; count, that is. Can't help with the chicken broth. Done when it tastes done, I'd think. It should fill the house/apartment with a "done!" aroma, clearing the sinuses. Put a little hot pepper in it.
Right, well, I can't smell a thing, basically, so.
Too bad dsquared wasn't around yesterday to carry out his official duties. But it seems that Flippanter has recanted his earlier apathy and joined forces with him.
474: That's why you need a few red pepper flakes in there.
People, the "go for it" story works only if you're equally up for the aftermath. Sometimes you are, sometimes you aren't. Sometimes the promise at hand looks to be truly worth it, sometimes it clearly doesn't (this is not a measure of hotness, but a measure of connection, something like that). Geez. You ask yourself: if I don't do this, will I regret it for the rest of my life, or will it really not matter much?
Parsimon, adversity strengthens character. So what if a one-night stand ends up forcing you to reroute your whole work day for five years, right down to your choice of bathrooms? You'll be a better person for it.
John, such things one does when one is younger. And then no problem, do it!
Holy crap, though, 5 years? The kids today have to rearrange their bathroom breaks at an awfully young age. (I have no idea who the someone presidential person was.)
oh, so you discussed all this before
that explains why you all were not that enthusiastic
and i was to post the first compatibility report,
dropped
Nooo read totally do it. You were dead on about me and Blume.
To clarify, the idea wasn't "one-night stand." Thus the 12 to 24 hour "cooling off period." During which you were all supposed to be talking some sense into me. And I think you did. Probably. Though, as a rule, we don't use the same bathroom at the office anyway. Not that there'd be anything wrong with that.
Can I just say, sompres, how bummed I was to miss your lapse in pseudonymity.
Me too. What puzzled me most that when people found out who it was, they immediately claimed there was a pity-fuck going on, which either means that s.p. is famously unattractive and comfortable with that, or else famously attractive and surrounded by troglodytes.
I thought it was cheeky on people's parts, assuming the former, but I chose to assume the latter.
483: I didn't expect it was a one-night stand thing. John's engaging in hyperbole, indeed. Seriously? If you're seriously considering it still, talk to the person about it, about the ramifications. There's no way to know from what you've said whether that would just have to be in a teasing, testing way. As in: 'So, I'm thinking, I've been thinking, bad idea, what think you, this is a bad idea, right?' See whether you get a smile. Or, maybe it's not that kind of situation at all.
485: That was, in fact, rather insulting now that you mention it.
really? how nice! i was dead on about ogged and bpl too :)
so just briefly, coz i deleted the previous one
the first analysis of the compatibilty check:
the AWB&WB compatibility is based on the theory that opposites attract
she is a warm emotional experienced being, he is a more reserved one, both are nerds, they have similar tastes, sometimes opposite, the age and their sexuality peaks could be compatibly matching, i don't know the exact ages, but the differences like 4-5 yrs or up to 10-12 yrs are pretty auspicious
he would find younger girls dumb, she would find the same age partners somewhat weary, i'm not sure though, it's just supposed individual preferences, may be i'm wrong
it's very incomplete and may be not very convincing analysis, still, is there any truth in this?
i mean the important thing is to notice the possibility and what BPhD said
Isn't there a law against what Read is doing? Encouraging relationships? There damn well should be.
488: Conversation had, much along those lines. Mutually agreed it's kind of a bad idea. So, you know, we'll think about it some more.
My god, I'm so earnest.
So, to 482: read predicted Sifu and Blume? Her match-ups upthread were rather impenetrable.
may be saying nerd was impolite, may be should have said geeks? sorry
though i don't see any difference between the words
may be there are house psychologists around, it all may sound laughable, but if it'll help people to find each other i don't mind
Geek is sometimes impolite. We're all nerd here.
494: I'm not coming up with anything other than w-lfs-n, Ben. But I don't know that that's what read was thinking. Read?
Ah. Read has long had a thing for me and w-lfs-n.
why, sure the sick man with chicken broth and candles of course
i saw their pictures from DCcon, and their faces are so revealing compatibility, now you two may deny it however you like :)
Was it AWB who introduced w-lfs-n to Forever Amber?
Does anyone actually have amber coloured eyes? Does that mean light brownish, or what?
499: But if it doesn't work out, will you have to reroute your entire blog-surfing for 5 years? Right down to your choice of threads to comment on?
501: High-school english teacher, junior year, if I'm not mistaken.
Right! So my love-affair with w-lfs-n must, tragically, be postponed until Internet Armaggedon turns the world of Unfogged to a mighty stranger.
504: Oh Jesus, don't do it!
read's project is unsure, based on unclear information on her part, but absorbing or entertaining in the same way that I find interesting some astrology sites matching the birthdates of relevant parties for their likely personal relations on various levels. Which is to say, not bad at all, in massive, massive retrospect.
Along the lines of 469 and will's family foreskin, I met a guy whose father performed his brother-in-law's vasectomy reversal.
Let's just act as though the BW / AWB match is a done deal. They can protest, but there's only two of them against a lot of us.
You'll cross your own ethical boundaries to make read happy, won't you, John?
Has anyone else noticed that John's "relationship-free" position began to soften at almost exactly the same time that read started commenting here? I'm thinking double date with AWB/BW.
Some relationships are made in Heaven, AWB. There such a thing as Destiny. Fight it, and you end up married to [insert your worst marriage phobia here].
I only noticed it softening up strikingly when Emerson counselled ogged to remove posts about the bpl.
510 exactly
i like this transliteration AWB/WB, it's like a mirror image
i have other suspicious couples in mind too, but not sure by now,
if only i had people's birthdays or photos it would be so much easier, but that's ok, i'm not those sites to ask personal information
Perhaps I've gone over to the dark side. Perhaps I'll be campaigning for McCain soon too.
Well, maybe, but I don't see what mildly humorous innuendo you can get out of that.
510: Oh, as funny as that is in the moment, it seems a bit odd, this matchmaking thing.
You've seen photos of many of us, read!
I am CN? You matched me up with Witt?
No offense to Witt, but I do not have any image in my head at all of what she is like.
But love conquers all, of course.
519: just wait 'til she matches you with B, sanctimon.
522: Are you not in the flickr group? Witt's famously a hottie of the first order.
You people are going to force me to get a flickr account. Some day.
the other photos looked just friendly, not romantic
and i don't know most people's marital status
and i'm not suggesting to marry you two like instantly, just you may give it a thought something
Witt&CN's report will require some more confirmation
well, one thing at a time
523. Sanctimon?
You gotta admit, it's funny.
of the first order.
Of the first water.
Actually, I suppose that if there are pictures of me in the flickr group - and I'm pretty sure there aren't - I should sign up.
I haven't seen any, eb, but maybe in the wayback machine.
Read is just working around to setting herself up with me, her part-mongol soultmate. Dick Cheney style, you might say.
Um, guys?
Witt's famously private, and started commenting here with a gender-neutral pseud because she doesn't actually love having her attractiveness discussed.
(Despite how kind AWB and will are to give me such effusive compliments.)
Sorry about that; I thought it had come up before. Non-gendered Witt is presumed to be a middlingly attractive something-or-other of indeterminate sexual desires or lack thereof!
You gotta admit, it's funny.
It's funny. It's so wrong. And the matchup with B., well, it's obvious.
For the flickr group pics from unfoggedCon2, not everyone was pictured, so no worries.
B--Tea tree oil shampoo is supposed to prevent lice infestations. Desert Essence makes one with tea tree oil and blue cypress. You can dump in pure tea tree oil too.
Oh good, I remain a mystery (to some people).
i'm not suggesting to marry you two like instantly
24 hour cooling off period, and then in!
Witt is a famously private internet dog of indeterminate gender. Even his or her doctor is puzzled.
Non-gendered Witt is presumed to be a middlingly attractive something-or-other of indeterminate sexual desires or lack thereof!
A striking resemblance to Standpipe Bridgeplate, in fact.
Someone just came to the site via a search for does barack obama have the qualifications to be the antichrist.
540: I keep warning you: his lack of experience is going to hurt his chances.
Witt is happy to be acknowledged as female, just as long as you remember she's also 47 and balding.
Now let's talk about something else.
Someone just came to the site via a search for does barack obama have the qualifications to be the antichrist.
See, he's black so he can't even be the regular antichrist, he's got to be the fucking Affirmative Action Antichrist!
fucking Affirmative Action
They've got affirmative action for everything these days.
Blacula
Jefferson Twilight for President!
If he weren't black, you know he wouldn't have achieved the right to be accused of being the Antichrist. That's a white man's job, and you know it.
Witt is not Standpipe Bridgeplate. If it is so, I too renounce my gender something; though what will that lose me?
545: It's necessary to help overcome the effects of stereotype threat, LB.
The antichrist is defined per the Omen series: a white, empowered, capitalist, nepotistic family. On the other hand: magic!
Obama may not qualify under those criteria, but white, empowered, nepotistic, capitalist people love him.
551 reminds me of that all-important blind date question, 'Starbucks or Dunkin' Donuts?'
Speaking of black people, are we going to hear from drunken apo if UNC loses this one?
Starbucks for coffee; Dunking Donuts for dessert.
'Starbucks or Dunkin' Donuts?'
Intelligentsia. Unless you're talking donuts. 2 am Dunkin' is the greatest.
And Starbucks' coffee is really bitter and four times the price.
I used to walk home from the train at midnight or 1 a.m. past a place where you could smell the donuts baking. Mmmmmmmmsigh.
If you're a latte swiller like me, Starbucks can be a godsend. A lot of those little local owned coffee shops are terrible at making espresso drinks.
And Starbucks' coffee is really bitter and four times the price.
And the chichi baked goods at Starbucks are vastly overpriced, and every bit as fat- and calorie-laden as the more downmarket doughnut.
On the contrary, just this morning on NPR I heard a quote from Alton Brown (some food channel guy) singing the praises of smashing up several KripsyKreme donuts in a bread-smasher apparatus until the goo smushed out and fried, then serving the end product drizzled with maple syrup.
Okay, that may not be baking, but it's surely something.
And the chichi baked goods at Starbucks are vastly overpriced, and every bit as fat- and calorie-laden as the more downmarket doughnut.
Plus, they don't usually taste good.* Whereas DD donuts are reliably scrumptious. Huh, I wonder how far away from me the closest good donut is right now. Probably not close enough. That's sad.
* Except the lemon cake with the lemon frosting. Yum.
Come on, donuts don't bake.
Gah, you're right. I blame my kitchen background. If something is delicious and dessert-y, I think of it as a baked good. Not a lot of fried sweets in my household.
And MC is so right about the relative merits of S/DD sweets. I have been known to eat at Starbucks, but not usually voluntarily. Whereas DD....a colleague brought in a couple of dozen donuts in last week and it was sheer busyness that kept me from devouring more than four of them.
I wonder how far away from me the closest good donut is right now. Probably not close enough.
One thing I never noticed about my home and native land until I moved to the US: in Canada, doughnut shops are everywhere. And they're supposedly "baked fresh daily," so who the hell is eating all those doughnuts? One day my sister and I were driving down Bloor St and we decided to count them, and we came up with 1 doughnut place per 1.5 city block.
I remember from the NPR blurb that his show is called "Asphalt" something, but I don't remember what. I remember snickering about it, because, you know, asphalt ... food ....
Does he host the show about the making of candies and other mass-produced foods? I mean, I know his name.
OT: Heads up to Elinor Lipman fans: The film adaptation of Then She Found Me is finally being released. Festival screenings now, wider distribution hopefully soon. It's Helen Hunt's directorial debut, and also stars Colin Firth.
569: We have no truck with the doughnut shops in these here United States any more. Fat, you know, lard. Those up there in Canadicia will soon follow our wisdom.
570: No, that's Marc Summers. *shudder*
Alton Brown hosts Good Eats, but he's done a few specials called "Feasting on Asphalt."
Last weekend I wanted something sweet and went to a Dunkin Donuts for an ok donut. Then I realized I was near Chinatown and checked out the bakeries there; I'll take dan ta over donuts any day.
571: That sounds interesting. Though (and I know it's wrong of me) I can't help thinking of Colin Firth as Fitzwilliam Darcy.
Also OT (but food-related, and after all, possibly a crazy blind date question): Jamie Oliver is a). a delightfully inventive chef with a charmingly insouciant attitude; or b). a sanctimonious prig with an annoyingly affected mockney accent?
573: Oh, I'm so sorry. I don't see the shows often enough to be clear on them.
in Canada, doughnut shops are everywhere
From an old NYT article:
At 8:15 one recent Friday morning, the Starbucks on Yonge Street in midtown Toronto was almost deserted, with just a handful of customers in armchairs nursing grande lattes and reading the morning papers. Yet next door at Tim Hortons, patrons in straight-backed chairs sat with their coffees, iced cappuccinos and pastries, which were selling as fast as servers behind three cash registers and a sandwich bar could process the orders.
That dan ta looks good. It reminds me of some custard things we used to buy from the Amish and Mennonite stands at the farmer's market.
I can't speak to Jamie Oliver as a human being, but his recipes for simple chocolate tart and chocolate hazelnut twister bread are beloved favorites in my household.
I'm a huge Jamie Oliver fan, but that doesn't rule out him being a sanctimonious prig.
Oh, and:
I can't help thinking of Colin Firth as Fitzwilliam Darcy.
He was definitive. How could you not?
575.2:
This is a vexed question among some. a)
He was definitive.
Indeed. It is a truth universally acknowledged, and etc.
I think he had to use hair dye to make himself look more moodily and broodily tall, dark, and handsome.
I should go to chinatown and eat food in chinatown more often (or, you know, ever, or, I guess, the richmond).
Oliver's done a lot of good, possibly in penance for being one of those obnoxiously successful TV chefs. But I like the way he cooks, and his projects have been worthy ones.
Alton Brown is just totally awesome. Love him.
Oh fantastic, thank god! Jamie Oliver is both a sanctimonious prig and a delightfully charmingly insouciant inventful etc. I was worried -- these things aren't mutually exclusive.
1) Is there something you'd like to try?
2) Is there something you'd like to try?
3) Ask me I won't say, "no", how could I?
I'm not sure why Oliver's come in for so much extra loathing. Is it because he's young and his TV shows have annoyingly fixated on his "I drive a Vespa around town and play in a bad rock band" thing? Seems unfair. At least he is a good cook. I'm a little biased toward him because he cooks the way I do ("Take a handful of basil, chop it up a bit, whack it in the pan," etc.). He's not truly loathe-worthy, like many Food TV stars (SANDRA LEE).
Dan ta seem to have become mainstream - that's probably not the right word, but I could find them in any bakery anywhere in Chinatown, usually alongside a mixture of goods that looked specifically Chinese/east Asian and cakes that seemed like they could have come from a european-american bakery - but I had a lot of trouble finding this kind of rice cake. It's possible the other bakeries had simply sold out by the time I got there, but I wonder if the problem was that their clientele wasn't Chinese enough; I finally found a place that had them when I got to a part of Chinatown where people were crowding the sidewalks buying fish (some of which were live) and produce. I bought the last three they had.
There's a dim sum place in the Richmond that a friend of mine found through her grandmother that was really pretty good the time I went there, but I can't remember what it was called or where it was located.
I'm too cheap for lattes.
I'm too cheap/ppor for regular latte cosumption, in no small part because of my wife's latte addiction.
Hey, how many can there be in the Richmond, right?
587: I'm not sure either. I haven't seen his show for quite a while, but there are a couple of his cookbooks around the bookshop. He cooks variants on traditional dishes, it seems, so that may contribute to scorn. A friend who follows these things recently said Oliver's noticeably aging but not changing his youthful style (like I care, but some do, quite a bit).
His cooking style is like mine as well, one reason I like him, as you say. Perhaps he appears to people to be more of a dinner party host than a cook.
588: I've never seen that kind of rice cake. It looks radically different from the dry, air-puffed nothingness that you can get at the supermarket. Is it served hot or cold? Is it moist? How is it flavored?
I've had a Vietnamese rice patty (?) that was extremely good, served warm, with shredded coconut, but I have no idea what it was called nor even where to get it again (it was a gift).
I don't loathe Jamie Oliver, I too generally like the way he cooks, but I don't like how he's marketed himself (or been marketed). Too much focus on him personally as opposed to what he's cooking and how and why. I find a lot of his pronouncements in his cookbooks to be overbroad/underconsidered or at least underexplained.
Is it served hot or cold? Is it moist? How is it flavored?
Yes?
596: I agree. Those are terrible questions to ask a potential date.
There's a dim sum place in the Richmond that a friend of mine found through her grandmother that was really pretty good the time I went there, but I can't remember what it was called or where it was located.
A recommendation worthy of the old (or "classic") listserv Chowhound, which, alas and alack, has since gone all slick and bloggy.
Jamie Oliver also seems to be terribly terribly pleased with himself at all times, which I also find offputting.
This sounds likes something that you'd get out of the Prior Art-o-Matic, though mostly, I admit, because of the phrasing.
I like it best at room temperature, but it's fine warm or right out of the refrigerator if it's not set too cold. Probably not good hot, since that would mess with the texture. It's mildly sweet, but beyond that I'm not sure how to describe it. I wish I knew the mandarin name for it; I've always known them as "rice cakes" - the dry kind I learned about much later - and they're pretty much my favorite Chinese sweet ever. I'm disappointed I never got any in Taiwan, although I did have the best dan ta I've ever had there.
I find a lot of cooking shows' "party atmosphere" to be really dumb. The unwatchable parts of all these shows involve having to sit through a real, talented chef have fakey conversations about food with their (apparently) real friends. Jamie Oliver's friends all blab about how scrumptious and awesome the food is, Ina Garten's guests act sort of awkward like they don't know what they're supposed to say, Giada makes desperate-seeming lunches to "surprise" her boyfriend at work, and even the people at the counter on Molto Mario struggled to make conversation. (Ina Garten is kind of a special case because her luscious confidentials about how she hopes her friends enjoy her food make one imagine she's trying to get them into bed. Hott!)
One of the things I loved about Alton Brown's Good Eats show was the complete absence of these awkward friend-visits. It was about food! And science! And food!
I find a lot of cooking shows' "party atmosphere" to be really dumb.
Yummo!
(But I'm sure I haven't the slightest idea what you're talking about).
As it was meant to be. Just wander around your city's Chinatown for a while and go to all the bakeries.
(I seem to be doing my best to confirm the "inscrutable" stereotype. Although I, personally, am partly scrutable, IYKWIM.)
Ha! I just noticed 577. Well, nobody ever said Canada was classy. Or even klassy, for that matter. (Except for Renfrew Co., Ontario, of course.)
Tim Horton's makes a damn good egg salad sandwich.
I like Jamie Oliver and I hope Sandra Lee chokes on a semi-homemade frosted cupcake while matching her table daycor to her cocktail to her eyeliner.
And I find Emeril oddly appealing, but I can't figure out why anyone ever thought he'd make a good TV host. What makes a producer think this lumbering guy who seems kind of like a high school varsity football coach would be a hit?
Alas, the sweets are not so much for me. As for party atmosphere cooking shows, I can't stand them much, unless tempered by actual cooking information. It's one reason I rarely watch the cooking channel any more. I hear there are still some good shows on there, but I haven't a clue what they are.
The last time I was in Vancouver (fall '07), I enjoyed a delicious late-night donut from Tim Hortons. I believe it was, appropriately enough, maple frosted. I really do wish I had a donut right now.
During nearly every schoolday during high school I ate two donuts.
I have never liked donuts, and I feel guilty about this. Everyone in my family is into donuts. Every time I visit them, they force me to try donuts from some new place that's like so unbelievably divine that they get up at 5am to go get them when they're super-fresh, and, every time, I say it's very good, for a donut. No, I don't want another. No, I'm not on a diet.
I went to a Dunkin Donuts once in Shanghai. The woman there sold me the wrong kind, and I didn't care enough to ask for another.
If this link works, then the dim sum place in the inner Richmond I'm talking about was one of the two places you see side by side. Probably the one on the left. If google street view let me see inside, I could tell you which one. I remember going to the supermarket on the other side of the street afterwards. (Disclaimer about unreliability of memory, blah blah blah.)
The one on the left looks to be Good Luck Dim Sum ... where I've been!
613: Did you have zits? (cruel, I know)
I will say that for about a year during grad school, a friend had noted that sometime around 4 pm, the downstairs coffeebar gave away its end of the day doughnuts at closing time. We declared a break during 3-5 pm seminars, and some rushed down to grab free pastries.
617: You could try the one on the right and compare. From another angle, the one on the left looks different than what I remember. But then I don't remember two places next to each other, so what do I know?
613: This makes me very jealous. And not a little angry at my own donutlessness.
Vancouver must have good Chinese bakeries.
612: Jesus, Ari, you sound like you're in a bad way. I want to ask Jimmy Doyle, Jean-Guy Charlebois, and Budge McFarland* to send some doughnuts your way.
*Totally fictitious, but absolutely authentic, Canadian doughnut-eating hockey player names.
Tim Horton's coffee is like crack.
What's Tim Horton's crack like?
614: For god's sake, don't feel guilty. I feel guilty when I decline cookies and cake during the holidays.
Jimmy Doyle, Jean-Guy Charlebois, and Budge McFarland
I have all of their rookie cards.* And dad wept when Budge won the Lady Byng.
* But nary a donut.
623: Apo, shouldn't you be blind drunk and lighting a couch on fire on your front porch? Or turning over a car? Or burning a cross? Or whatever you crackers do on Tobacco Road to celebrate?
The distance most Americans would cheerfully drive to get a donut is not known with certainty, but is most likely much larger than the distance between Ari and the nearest donut for sale. I conclude that his revealed preference is that he does not want a donut all that much.
And dad wept when Budge won the Lady Byng.
Da always loved the boys from Napanee. Even more so than did Don Cherry.
628: Incorrect. First, I live in a tiny town in the middle of a very large valley in which donut shops seem to be relatively rare. Or, more accurately, donut shops are plentiful enough, but they seem to close earlier than one would expect. Second, on our best days, we have only one car. Today is not one of our best days. Our one car isn't working. And biking to Sacramento in order to get a donut is out of the question. Third, perhaps you're right after all.
On the subject of sweets, it is my goal to eat as much Pinkberry before I leave New York as humanly possible.
When life gives you notdonuts, make notdonutade.
629: What do you think Don Cherry's three questions are?
631: Okay, I'll bite: what's Pinkberry?
A substance that doesn't meet the legal requirements to be frozen yogurt.
Other than soft swirls of chilly bliss with a distinct pouty peak, I mean.
Frozen not-quite-yogurt. Actually Flurt is better than Pinkberry but Flurt was recently closed by the health department. (Boo.)
In our deregulated economy, there are no legal requirements to be frozen yogurt. Surely you know this, Ben.
Viz, the difference between philosophers and sociologists.
HOW do you all manage to eat something called Pinkberry yet still allegedly work out daily or at least several days weekly?? While still presumably working?
What do you think Don Cherry's three questions are?
Honest to God, I don't even want to think about it. The guy's a rageball, who owns a chain of sportsbars.
Hey, when's the last time you were at a pub where they had a picture of the Rocket on the wall? Okay, I'm homesick now. I want a doughnut.
I take it you are not referring to the musician.
It doesn't take 6 hours to eat a bowl of the stuff. The servings are of normal size.
Rhey rioted in the streets of montreal when they benched Rocket Richard. It's true.
646: The Rocket. Sheesh, w-lfs-n's a philistine.
622: While you're at it, d'you think you could get Paul Coffey to deliver me some...well, coffee...tomorrow morning?
Don Cherry was a jazz trumpeter.
Also: The Rocket. And: The Rocket. Now I'm homesick.
Forget the donuts, break out the Jane Sibbery.
647: Yeah, but you're, like, 23. or 30.
653: I get unapologetically all misty-eyed over Maurice. Love that guy for real. Yeah, I'm homesick now.
Siberry. I don't know what she has to do with the Rocket things, which I have not viewed. I see that Siberry, unbeknownst to me, is now, and has been for some time, Issa. Oh, my. I actually saw Jane Siberry perform many moons ago; she was great, or I found her so at the time. I haven't listened to the album I have from then (The Speckless Sky) in something like 10 years.
627: Apo, shouldn't you be blind drunk and lighting a couch on fire on your front porch? Or turning over a car? Or burning a cross? Or whatever you crackers do on Tobacco Road to celebrate?
Naw, Chapel Hill is the New South. They'll celebrate by giving tax breaks to some tech companies and building some more youth soccer fields. Faulkner wept.
1) What is your opinion of the instigator rule?
2) Do you, generally speaking, approve of Europe?
3) Is it possible for a suit to be too loud?
1) If some poof Swede got boarded by a good kid from Moosejaw, and the Swede got banged up a bit, like maybe he lost a couple of teeth and a bit of blood, would you celebrate with me?
2) What if the same thing happened to one of them girls from Russia, like that queer Bure kid? Or his brother? What about then?
3) You don't think it's is possible for a suit to be too loud, do you? Well, DO YOU?
Do you, generally speaking, approve of Europe?
Bunch o' feckin' gels and chicken Swedes. Body check their sorry arses. And starch my shirt collars while you're at it.
Today -- yesterday now, I guess -- I had the best chocolate chili brownie in the history of the universe.
1. Do you doubt it?
2. Would you nonetheless let me keep my delusions?
3. Want to try one?
569: That's mostly an Ontario thing, innit. Especially Hamilton.
In view of the brilliance of Mary Catherine's contributions to this thread (esp. 541), I now have to apologize for telling her to fuck off the other day. We Canadians may not be classy, but we're big like that.
chocolate chili brownie
Throw some hash into the mix and I do believe you have the Best Brownie Ever Made, period.
I was watching HNIC a couple weeks ago and Don Cherry was wearing an 8 button suit. I didn't even know they went that high.
Don Cherry has always been the king of loud suits. Also I incline to sympathy for the man, who's visibly been a shell of himself since the death of his wife.
We Canadians may not be classy, but we're big like that.
Touché, mon frère. One day my youngest sister was roller-blading in old Montréal when she almost lost her balance and a man came up from behind from her and set her to rights. "Careful there, young lady!" he said, and she looked up and saw that it was none other than Pierre Elliott Trudeau. We're so small! but also big like that.
So Don Cherry is an actual person. Somewhere upthread I saw that Mary Catherine was making up names of Canadian superheroes, and Don Cherry, when I checked back in to the thread, sounded like another such. But no.
I hope I haven't offended in my ignorance.
668: I wonder if you could tell stories like that about any American politicans. Probably not about actual heads of government. I do love our quaint country so.
669: My first reaction is all like, "What? You've never heard of Coach's Corner?!" But then it's like, well, of course you haven't. Why would you?
671.2: Er, thanks. A Canadian friend once lambasted me for never having heard of a famous poet laureate of Canada. I felt badly, but then I also wondered why it wasn't okay to ask.
Canadians have a poet laureate? Huh. I guess there's lots of time for poetry during the winter up there.
Un Canadien errant,
Banni de ses foyers,
Parcourait en pleurant
Des pays étrangers.
Oh hell, I couldn't name a Canadian poet laureate to save my own life. I used to sing "Un Canadien errant" for my Nana, though.
673: Gah. Can't remember. It's late. A woman, and not necessarily a poet laureate -- I'm not sure. A rather famous Canadian woman poet? (I'm sorry, tired.) But to the extent that when I saw several of her volumes on my friend's shelf and asked who this was, he looked at me horrified. You must know who I mean, though you may not think of the name either. Oh, and the friend I visited was in B.C. -- I don't know if that makes a difference with respect to his literary radar.
Last one I'm aware of was [Robert Southey], who's fun to drink with but otherwise an overrated shithead. If that's who it was, the friend was out of line.
676: Pat Lowther, who was brutally murdered by her own husband?
None of these, I'm afraid. I'm embarrassed that I can't remember. Forget the laureate part, just a famous woman poet, for god's sake. She had an elder (or older) sounding name, I seem to think. My partner at the bookstore had heard of her when I got back from that vacation trip.
This is a bit like asking Americans to come up with "Walt Whitman" when asked. Never mind.
And you know what would be great: to view webpages describing Canadian women poets that didn't show me pictures of half-naked chicks across the top banner.
Don't mean to prolong the torment, but I can't help but keep guessing... Susan Musgrave? Adeena Karasick? Jan Zwicky? Margaret Atwood?
Not that you're obligated to visit it, but there's a page full of Canadian poets here.
683: Honey, none of those. And Musgrave I've loved; some memories there, and I hadn't even thought of her stuff for a couple of years (slight ouch). But sorry. I'll look at that link before bed. Maybe I'll write my friend to find this out.
Well, if it's not [William Blake] or [Thomas Gray], then, I've run out of names that one could reasonably expect a non-Canadian to know.
(Grudgingly) There's also [Charlotte Brontë]. I hope that's not it.
(Also, screw Jane Siberry: real Canadians worship at the alter of Erica Ehm.)
that one could reasonably expect a non-Canadian to know
What? Oh, no. My friend is a bookdealer in the Vancouver area, I'm a bookseller from the US east coast; he may not be reasonably expecting a generic non-Canadian to know this woman. Fucking booksellers, they can be that way sometimes. Like academics.
My friend is a bookdealer in the Vancouver area, I'm a bookseller from the US east coast
Interesting. Ever been to CBA? (Or BEC, as it's now known?)
Darcey... Bussell? Also hott, despite (or perhaps because of) the whole walleyed thing.
690: No, as I don't know what those acronyms even stand for. Do tell. I only know ABAA, ABAC ILAB. Those are organizations, not conferences.
"BEC" is "BookExpo Canada." Like BEA, only less so.
No, not familiar with it. I'll look into it tomorrow. Sounds, off the top of my head, like a new and publishers' expo. I keep my eye on that sort of thing; it affects what I do. But, well. Are you involved in the book trade?
Yes, it's the big Canadian trade show.
Are you involved in the book trade?
In various ways. Aside from writing (I think this is the closest I've come to exposing my real ident on Unfogged), I used to work here.
Okay. Go to bed. I knew you wrote, but that was about it. Talk to you later.
Bed is for the weak.
...
I suppose I am weak. Later.
Re: Alton Brown upthread, I would marry the man in a heartbeat if her were single. And, well, interested. Good Eats is proof to me that I could live together with him happily. Living on Asphalt, I am convinced, was produced solely to highlight the fact that he rides a motorcycle. Which, you know, convinces me that I would swoon.
"If her were single" S/B "If he was single". The subjunctive is obsolete, and "her" in this context has not been attested since 1287.
BBC's Radio 4 is doing a Food Programme episode on the shortage of rice and the incredible jump in prices. There are export bans in some rice-growing countries. Maybe some of the bakeries are cutting back on rice-based goods.
i did not have any sinister plans fyi
dick cheney comparison is as objectionable as rosie o'donnel's :(
Among Canadian writers, I really like Farley Mowat, especially for his sophisticated and characteristically Canadian writing style. He was banned from the US, though I don't remember much outcry or uproar. Not artsy enough, I guess.
Are we guessing who DS is?
I guess: William Gibson! But black!
Blume guesses: Alice Munro! But black! And male!
One of the Trailer Park Boys. The black one.
Bryant Gumbel. But Canadian, and in a different medium.
Do tell. I only know ABAA, ABAC ILAB.
They have an ABAA now? For the people who were too hoity-toity for the regular ABA?
(Ah: antiquarian booksellers etc.)
Penguin Canada's new Extraordinary Canadians series.
DS had to quit after a year or two, when they ran out of Extraordinary Canadians.
This thread has made me envision a new version of Eharmony, with the questionnaires entirely written by AWB. I would definitely sign up.
This thread has made me envision a new version of Eharmony, with the questionnaires entirely written by AWB. I would definitely sign up.
That's not a bad idea. Hell, she could just do a question per week in blog post format and eligible singles could answer in comments until they find that special someone who gives all the right answers.
I can only think of one famous black Canadian writer, but he doesn't seem like the Unfogged type.
They have an ABAA now? For the people who were too hoity-toity for the regular ABA?
Yeah, it's funny, I see/hear ABA, I think: Oh, them.
683: Not that you're obligated to visit it, but there's a page full of Canadian poets here.
For closure purposes: Jeannette Armstrong.
Does William Gibson count as Canadian?
710: What about Charles Saunders, author of the Imaro stories and several (I believe) books about African-Canadians in the maritime provinces?
Remember, DS was raised by South Africans. Obviously, he's JM Coetzee, except black and Canadian.
WordFest takes place near BANFF! and he seems to know comics; maybe he's Nightcrawler?
Remember, DS was raised by South Africans. Obviously, he's JM Coetzee Dave Matthews, except black and Canadian.
Fixed that for you, ben.
Steve Nash is Canadian and was born in South Africa. However, ironically for an NBA player, he is not black.
578: Witt, those recipes sound delicious (esp. the choc-hazelnut bread) but don't appear to be on his site. Could you post them at some point?
719: Ooh, yeah! Can you put them on my food wiki, if you don't want to post them here? ybwwwe.pbwiki.com, password wmybsalb
Does William Gibson count as Canadian?
No. South Carolina claims Gibson. We need all the good press we can get.
1. How many times do you like to come during a single sexual encounter?
2. Do you think fellatio or cunnilingus is only worth it if it lasts at least 30 minutes?
3. Do you like to cook for a man?
Could you post them
Yup, happy to. It will take at least a few days, though, because although I brilliantly packed the cookbooks in an easy-to-reach box, I am not currently at that location.
Dunkin Donuts? Cripes. Krispy Kreme, people. Krispy Motherfucking Kreme.
DS is Robbie Robertson!!
Do we know that DS is a man? If so, he is Bob.
Oh hey, wow, could I maybe prevail on one of the bloggers to redact 677 and 686 for me? Those are really not cool. I curse thee, demon rum.
Better, Slack?
Next time you won't get off so easy!
Or did you mean "redact" as in "google proof"?
Thanks Ben, that's great. I was aiming for 686 as well. Cheers.
You are a gentleman and a scholar. I raise my glass to you, sir.
1. What's the difference between an orange and a bicycle seat?
2. Did you walk to work or bring a lunch?
3. WHA?!
For the record, co-worker apparently voted for Giuliani in the primary. Probably an even more important red flag than workplace issues.
