I won't be hanging around to comment. good night, everybody, and don't blow up the economy while I'm asleep.
I was a 'dutiful daughter'. If a brother will do little or nothing (and mine certainly did; I know some men do a massive amount, and of course some are sole carers) then 'fighting the gender wars' while also bearing a heavy burden of care is probably less helpful for the carer than simply putting up with the situation; but that will vary from person to person and situation to situation and advice can't be given in abstraction from that.
What does worry me is the CBT-therapy style "Expectations are what create stress"; in fact, what I lost by becoming a carer (there were gains, too) created and creates stress and though I do 'CBT' myself into muting it, I also resent having to do that.
Ultimately, the 'expectations create stress' line can sell feminism out totally. Feminism is in part actually about creating new expectations. Of course.
It's a brutal problem, because when you're in it, you're playing chicken with the welfare of the person who needs to be cared for. If there's a societal expectation that women will do more caring than men (which there is) a woman who's trying to arrange a 50-50 split of duties with her brother can't just do half and assume he'll step up promptly; there's a good chance the brother won't (not out of malice, but out of ingrained expectations about what his role in caring should be), and the person who needs the caring will suffer.
This same "playing chicken" dynamic comes into play anytime you have work that really does have to be done, and a strong pre-existing expectation of who's going to do it.
This is harsh, but alameida's comment about how her mom seems more competent reminds me of something I've seen dozens of times, and that's men, unconsciously or consciously, stressing their incompetence on certain tasks that they deem "someone else"'s job.
It's that they purposely do a shitty job, or complain before the fact that they aren't good at the thing in question. And after a while of that, whichever woman happens to be around will just go "oh, I'll do it." Or just do it to avoid having to deal with the requisite bellyaching.
It fucking drives me up the wall.
The behavior described in 4 is hardly gender-specific.
To be fair, that's not a male-only tactic. It just works better when you're trying to dodge work that you've got some societal backup for presenting as not-your-problem, so men tend to pull it on domestic work, and women tend to pull it on more male-identified stuff. I drive our car with the expectation that it's going to work -- Buck takes it to the mechanic; he doesn't seem to mind, but 'the car' is firmly his problem. That's partially city/country upbringing; I never owned a car as a single person. But some of it's gender roles that I'm using as an excuse for dodging a responsibility.
women tend to pull it on more male-identified stuff
My wife, who has no trouble camping in the desert for a week at a time, is "afraid" to use the weed trimmer.
Of course, the fact that the tactic is gender-neutral doesn't make the outcomes gender-neutral; male-identified tasks like yard-work or getting the car fixed tend to be a lot more amenable to playing chicken with than taking care of children or elders.
I saw the gender stuff in play this weekend at a family wedding. My (paternal) gradmother needed help getting ready for the ceremony and my aunts were busy tending to the bride so my mother was asked to do it. I helped her out as she brushed my grandmother's teeth, combed her hair, etc. When I left to go get ready, I found my father in the lobby reading a book, relaxing, when my mother had just spent over an hour helping *his* mother get dressed.
Maybe your mom's just better at that sort of thing?
[covers head, runs away in a zig-zag pattern]
I think a lot about how hard even baby steps are when you're learning new stuff. This likely applies to any chore that is new to you as an adult, which a non-traditional-for-your-gender task is likely to be.
I can put together a story about being afraid to use the weed-trimmer. It is heavier for me, so my control over it is less. I don't entirely understand the cutting mechanism; is that string going to fly lose and strap my ankle? Is there going to be a rock that makes the whole thing bounce back at me? Could I break it, and then I'm in trouble for breaking it? Fifteen minutes of handling the weedtrimmer would probably cure me of all that, but there is an initial low barrier. And, you know, if someone else is willing to do it...
That's been my huge lesson from having a personal trainer this year. I have been shocked at how much more I can do than I thought. But the key has been a limitless supply of coddling, breaking down the tasks into tiny baby steps and lavishly praising each tiny accomplishment. I think that is a model that works, but someone would need an awful lot of motivation (like the money I pay her) to gently train someone else that way. In the short term, it is likely as much work as the chore.
Besides that, I don't know how people take on roles. Childhood habituation. Absolute necessity. Community-wide role modeling.
****
There's the flipside of #4, where some women assume the role of the knowledgable parent and she and the husband sorta agree that it is up to her to approve or denigrate the father's parenting. I saw some of that recently and didn't think it was doing anyone any favors.
10: You've foolishly left your cock exposed, apo.
My wife, who has no trouble camping in the desert for a week at a time, is "afraid" to use the weed trimmer.
When I lived with other women, I always ended up being the one to kill giant moths and centipedes, or to lay out the mousetraps and deal with mouse corpses. Now that I have a live-in boyfriend, I get to indulge my squeamies!
in Japan the oldest sibling takes care of the parents, in return he inherits the house and their family tomb o'haka which is very expensive iirc
in my country traditionally the youngest one stays with parents inheriting their house
it's regarding sons
daughters are supposed to follow their husbands and take care of the parents on the both sides nowadays the traditions are becoming not that strict and all of course depends on who lives the closest to their parents
not taking good care of one's parents is considered to be great shame in the society, so for one it's better to be a good son or daughter than to face ostracism i suppose
There's the flipside of #4, where some women assume the role of the knowledgable parent and she and the husband sorta agree that it is up to her to approve or denigrate the father's parenting.
Yep -- the flipside of "playing chicken" is gate-keeping; if someone else is carrying the load, you don't get to complain that it's not done to your precise specifications. And if you do, it's not surprising if they abdicate the task to you.
Oh god, please nobody mention l_fe ins_r_nce.
We didn't have this pattern with my father's illness. But then it was so sudden and extreme that we were all needed to go flat out as much as we could, just to have him out of hospital part of the time and to keep him company the rest of the time. In fact, I think he would have found it preferable for my brothers to do certain personal care things rather than me, but it wasn't possible to divide things up like that.
I could see my mother if/when she gets to a similar stage being more comfortable discussing bodily functions with me, because her relationship with me is a little bit different than with her sons. But my brothers will do whatever needs to be done when the time comes.
Carol Bly (ex-wife of the drum circle dude) wrote a hilarious story about a girl who screamed when she saw a big when boys were around, but tore off their legs and wings one by one if she was around girls.
4 makes me mildly annoyed.
Women have historically taken by far the greatest share of the housework and continue to take by far the greatest share of childcare and care of the elderly and the mild rant that follows is not failing to acknowledge that.
This is harsh, but alameida's comment about how her mom seems more competent reminds me of something I've seen dozens of times, and that's men, unconsciously or consciously, stressing their incompetence on certain tasks that they deem "someone else"'s job.
This cut's both ways.
There's a societal realisation that 'women's work' is really both sexes work and expectation that, even if men don't step up and take on their fair share of domestic tasks, that they ought to, and their failure to do so is blameworthy. It doesn't hold however vice versa.
The number of female friends and acquaintances that I hear trotting out these lines about male 'learned incompetence' and men's failure to do this and that but are equally happy to make the same incompetency argument when the boot is on the other foot. They, frankly, can fuck off.
Of course the heroic caring for my father was primarily carried out by my mother, who practically lived in the hospital. She has told us all several times that she doesn't expect us to do anything similar for her, as we all have jobs, lives etc.
I think my father would have done exactly the same for her. I don't know if he would have coped as well as she has.
My mother is the eldest daughter (of five) and always made a point of being available for her parents. She lives about two blocks away from my grandma, who really appreciates her and my dad's attention, now that my grandad's dead. My uncles really haven't slacked off, though. One of them comes by at least once a month to work in her yard, do gutters, change lightbulbs etc., and the other, who lives further away, helps with finances and takes her on nice vacations.
My parents seem to have WANTED to be primary caregivers to my grandma (though it's not at that point yet), and I suspect that a lot of it has to do with the fact that my dad is enjoying being able to help his mother-in-law when his now-deceased parents were so goddamn resistant to being helped. My grandma has been really good at aging, which is a strange thing to say but it's the only way I can think to say it.
During one family crisis, I tried the old "you're so much better at this than me" routine with my younger sister. She looked at me with gimlet eye and said "You don't have to do it well. Just do it." I did it.
when his now-deceased parents were so goddamn resistant to being helped.
I think that's what my family would be like. Previous generations have a habit of dying before any sort of outsider care is necessary...
I really don't know if I could handle any of the stuff that some people say they do for their parents. This is kind of worrisome, since I love them and all, but the thought of either needing a caretaker just seems so utterly alien to me. Hopefully it never comes up, since I don't even have a sibling to play chicken with.
My grandfather cared for my grandmother, who had Alzheimers, for as much as a decade before she died at age 90 or so. He adored her and only outlived her by about a year. When we visited during that time he seemed quite happy. It's a beautiful story, but an odd one too. My mother said sort of offhandedly that he spoiled her so much all her life that the kids lost out a little. Ten years with an Alzheimer's patient wife also seems like a sort of Southern Gothic novel, and ten happy years that way is hard even to imagine.
23: Oh, man. Really trying not to think about this one until it becomes necessary; the logistical/emotional dynamics seem absolutely impossible.
You've foolishly left your cock exposed, apo.
I'm not running backwards, M/tch. And I'm holding it up so I don't trip.
26: And I'm holding it up so I don't trip.
Wow, such short little legs!
The better to, ummm, something or other you with, my dear.
re: 23
I'm with you, I think. I'm not sure how well I'd handle some of that stuff, either. I have worked in jobs connected with care, so I have a realistic sense of what's involved.
Luckily, both my parents are young and healthy so I don't have to find out how selfish or weak I really am, yet.
||
I just got laid off! Couldn't be happier, really--the severance package was pretty good, and I have the next gig 90% lined up for a January start, so it looks like I'll be around a bit more for the next few months (not that I expect that I was that missed, but it'll be good to reconnect with folks a bit before I dive into the next job, which also looks to be pretty intense).
I'll be asking for the Chopper Effect to be in full force early December to finish off the remaining 10%, though, so keep a little mojo in reserve, won't you?
|>
Both of my parents seem to be living with the expectation that they will remain hale and hearty until the instant they drop dead. I keep reminding them that they are not doing that well, health-wise, but they point to the fact that they never go to doctors, so they must be well. (This is what a Republican looks like, y'all. If you're sick, it's because you visit doctors and find out.) My mother has already claimed that if she gets cancer, she's just going to die and not get any kind of treatment. Because that will be fun to watch and really emotionally healthy for everyone involved.
I want to be somewhat nearer to them when I get a stable job, whether that means them moving or me moving, but they think that time is maybe thirty years away. Both of my parents are unwell; they just lie to themselves and call it health. And, of course, if my parents get sick, my brother will do dick about it. As a childless, partnerless woman, I'd say the likelihood of me being the one to wipe my dad's ass for the last five years of his life is pretty goddamn high.
So the fall will be devoted to producing artisanal pork products?
And woohoo! for being laid off and happy about it.
a girl who screamed when she saw a big when boys were around,
I get that response a lot when I let them see my big.
Of course, both my parents live in Scotland, which has universal free care for the elderly. So, I can probably shirk it.
Previous generations have a habit of dying before any sort of outsider care is necessary...
Don't count on it. My grandma on that side managed to avoid outsider care (by committing suicide), but my grandad had a long, slow, maddening decline. It was really awful. He had periods of dementia, during which he would misplace things and then accuse his family of stealing them, and periods of stubborn lucidity, during which he thought he could transact business like before. He actually took a flight to another city to see his lawyer, who properly refused to do as asked, and then got mugged, before anyone realised he had left home. He should have been declared mentally incompetant, but everyone was afraid that he'd never forgive them. Eventually he checked himself into a hospital to die. He weighed 90 pounds at that point. It was horrible for everybody around him. It was such an emotionally repressed family that there were all kinds of long-standing resentments and mistrusts that prevented decisive, unified, compassionate action. Oh, God, and then there was the divvying up of the estate. I'm so glad I was on another continent at the time.
Damn, chopper, that's some pretty solid equanimity.
A couple of years ago I managed to convince my parents to sell their house and buy a small place that was better suited to any physical ailments they may have to deal with. There house was really not set up well for anyone having trouble with stairs, for example. Although they were managing with the old place, they both have some medical issues that may become much less tenable at any time, and it seemed to make a lot of sense to move while they were in reasonable health and hand the energy for the move (and settling in).
I don't think I would have managed it if I hadn't been able to recall a conversation my father and I had about how much better it would have been if both of their mothers had moved somewhere better suited before it became absolutely necessary.
Still, related to heebie's thread the other day, it marked a strange turning point: Although they've long since stopped giving unsolicited life advice to me, here I was giving them some, and they've acted on it.
I just got laid off! Couldn't be happier, really
Wow, the latter makes the former much better to hear. Good luck with the last 10% on that new position!
So the fall will be devoted to producing artisanal pork products?
What do you think the new gig is?
My mother has already claimed that if she gets cancer, she's just going to die and not get any kind of treatment. Because that will be fun to watch and really emotionally healthy for everyone involved.
If the treatment will only prolong life by months, I am pretty strongly in favor of this option. Both grandparents who chose treatment explicitly regretted it. This depends, of course, on how much longer you could expect to live if the treatment worked. But you've mentioned that your mom does a lot of sitting-in with sick people from her church. She may know what she's talking about here.
****
Congrats, Chopper!
You've foolishly left your cock exposed, apo.
But at least I didn't create an international incident.
Even a small estate with basically nice heirs can lead to unpleasantness. There are still lingering hard feelings in our family about a $3,000 per person disagreement.
re: 42
Yeah, there's never been an estate in my family as such. My grandmother left some money, but all to my mother and uncle, and everyone agreed [and the sum was small anyway].
But I remember a serious long term disagreement in the family about a ring, which two or perhaps three different people thought had been promised to them. It wasn't worth much at all, they just all wanted it as a keepsake.
Even a small estate with basically nice heirs can lead to unpleasantness.
You can say that again. It only takes one person to create hard feelings. My grandad had a lot of random old one-of-a-kind crap, some of it valuable, some of it trash, and most of it unpriceable. That's the sort of thing relatives fight over, and it can't be monetised.
My mother just spent a huge chunk of change to buy herself a new piano. She has needed a new piano for years, and my honey helped her pick out a great one, but the primary reason she did it was to prevent my grandmother from willing her the Steinway With Sentimental Value For Everyone In The Family. My grandma just wants to show her gratitude for my mom's help, but my mom needs that kind of bequest like a hole in the head.
41: Well, of course he was British.
I think Jackmormon and I share the same paternal grandparents.
Stubborn independence really only works for the elderly if they pass on before the worst problems set in, and can be a total and complete disaster otherwise. My grandmother drew down on her checkbook and fled to New York City, where she was picked up wandering around by the police.
35: Ugh... That would be horrendous.
The one thing that makes me feel pretty confident about it, though, is that everyone in the family seems to really want to die rather than physically or mentally ail to the point where they need more intimate assistance or close supervision. Once that first big loss happens, whether it's the eyesight or the hearing or the ability to get up and out of the house, the family gets called everyone together, the ailing relative says they're ready, then they die within a few weeks. It's been a pretty strong pattern thus far (Except for the great grandmother who got hit by a truck).
*crosses fingers and knocks on wood*
Oops: "the family gets called everyone together"
And good luck, Chopper! Glad to have you back in the meantime.
41 - I'm fascinated by the double pronged sticks, which I'm assuming are for restraining crazy naked guys. In the USA they'd just taze the him.
Minnesota is almost a welfare state. Various sorts of home care and home medical care are provided by the state and/or county. Things like hospice care, and someone to come and help people bathe, and partners to help with things like groceries and transportation. It's impossible to exaggerate how helpful that is.
The 82-year-old woman next door ended up moving in with her county partner, who was only 73.
I keep trying to tell people that great grandmothers are not to be trusted around trucks.
In the USA they'd just taze the him.
`the him', and probably a few bystanders for good measure.
I keep trying to tell people that great grandmothers are not to be trusted around trucks.
Oh Christ, that reminds me that my grandad kept driving that behemoth of a truck until just before he died. No power steering, no power brakes, and my grandad barrelling that fucker at over 80 mph down the Alaska Highway. God only knows how he didn't kill anyone.
God only knows how he didn't kill anyone.
This sort of thing can be very difficult. One elderly family member had spent his entire life involved with cars, and basically had to be forced into giving his up. There is no good solution.
My grandmother actually got arrested for driving without a license after they'd taken hers away for repeated accidents (thank heavens all small, low speed, no injury accidents -- hitting other cars in parking lots and such.) It's a mercy she never killed anyone (well, with the car, anyway).
19: ttaM, can you give some specific examples? I mean, I think of Mr. Fix-it type stuff as a possible area of "men's work" where women might pull the "learned incompetence" thing, but as often as not these days that seems to be an area where men can pull the same thing -- and everyone's okay with hiring a plumber or mechanic or whatever. I can't think of a similar area of traditional "women's work" where people don't frown, at least a little, on hiring it out.
I can't think of a similar area of traditional "women's work" where people don't frown, at least a little, on hiring it out.
Really? Cleaning services, nanny services, and daycares are huge here.
57: I'd say it still shows up in the `Mr. Fix-it' stuff for simpler tasks, but you're right that there is less expectation that any random guy knows how to fix most things. Perhaps yard work, things like changing tires.
58: Sure, but using any of them is an issue (not a prohibitive one, but an issue) in a way that hiring a yard service or having a garage fix your car rather than doing it yourself isn't.
56: Yeah, he was pretty much forced (by family) to sell the car, not give up his license per se.
using any of them is an issue
A daycare?
There's a shallowly buried part of me that wishes my honey would do the wiring and painting and whatnot around the apartment. It's stupid, seeing as we're renters and he's a musician and this ain't the Yukon, but there it is.
As a childless, partnerless woman, I'd say the likelihood of me being the one to wipe my dad's ass for the last five years of his life is pretty goddamn high.
Sort of related to 57, I recognize that the expectation is that such an important task should and must be performed by family. But really, hire it out.
Oh, come on, apo, you've never heard anyone say "People whose kids are in daycare 40 hours a week, I don't know why they have them, if someone else is going to bring them up." I'm not saying it's universally condemned, it isn't, and no one gave me any personal shit for hiring a nanny -- I'm not personally martyred here. But there are plenty of people who view the use of daycare negatively.
But really, hire it out.
Easier said than done. A lot of the hire-out solutions aren't that good. If you can afford near full time in-home help, maybe.
62: You may not know this, Apo, but there are still people who will sigh and think, "if you must, but it would be so much better if the kids had 'a parent' who stayed home with them."
It only takes one person to create hard feelings.
And back to the sisters-in-law thread we go.... (My parents only have one item whose long-term disposition I really care about, and in my generation I would kind of prefer that it go to my brother...but I am NOT OK with letting it go on to his kids and thence into his wife's family.)
I keep trying to tell people that great grandmothers are not to be trusted around trucks.
The great thing is that apparently she was trying to help an(other) old lady across the street when it happened. I figure it was the local boy scouts troop enforcing their merit badge racket.
64, 66: Yeah, the problem there is the money. Paying someone to do inhome care costs a heck of a lot, and nursing homes are ghastly at anything but the top end (and even at the top end are pretty innately awful), and also cost.
65: But don't the same sort of people tend to look down their noses at guys who don't change the oil in the family SUV?
65/62 there are class connotations to some of this stuff too, not just gender.
Pwned by LB. I will add that I did, personally, get shit for putting Rory in daycare. Mostly from her father, mind you, so maybe it doesn't count the same. But a few of Rory's friends and their (at-home moms) have made subtle comments about how much harder it must be for her to have to be in daycare all the time.
But there are plenty of people who view the use of daycare negatively.
Yeah, it's definitely an issue in the 'mommy wars,' and the culture wars more broadly. And it's the subject of social-scientific inquiry, and every now and then the results of the latest daycare study will be front-page news.
71: Not as much, no. For one thing, it's not nearly as visible.
But there are plenty of people who view the use of daycare negatively.
True. And they can go fuck themselves sideways. Even "back on the veldt" you can damn sure bet there were only two or three people staying home with all the village rugrats because the other moms needed to work.
It's not like kids would rather spend all day with their parent instead of doing kids stuff with other sprats their age anyway.
You may not know this, Apo, but there are still people who will sigh and think
I know they exist, but practically everybody I know who has kids is in a two-earner family, aside from the odd couple here or there who has one person making six figures (and they have cleaning services).
71: I do not know a single man who changes his own oil.
I do not know a single man who changes his own oil.
Yeah, all the good ones are married.
Thanks, all.
Not a lot of pork products coming this fall, unfortunately, I'm not going to invest in the necessary quantities of pork to do a major project, because even though I got a nice big check, it still needs to last me until January, unless I pick up some consulting work on the side (which I don't want to do too much, as I have some other priorities--getting in shape, working on the novel, volunteering for Obama, household projects that have been on hold, and so on). I'm going to be really pleased to have a 3 month vacation, I can tell you that much. :-) ). Maybe I'll make some cheese, though--that doesn't cost much more than the price of milk.
Sorry about the emoticon, I don't know what came over me. Off to drop off my signed separation agreement and GTFO.
and everyone's okay with hiring a plumber or mechanic or whatever
Don't I remember conversations here where (some) men confesses that they felt shame at not knowing how to do to home fix-it tasks that they're hiring out? Maybe it bugs others more than you realize.
I really bothers me that I'm not handy, and I am getting better, but I really wish that I could go back thirty years and start the childhood habituation route. IBack then I just read all the time, and what has all that literacy gotten me, I ask you? Not a finished chicken coop.
75: Mebbe so, and we probably don't need to go down this road, but I'd put both in the category of "people who get worked up about this shit are few enough--or culturally remote enough--and dumb enough that I really don't need to care what they think." OTOH, the class of people whose opinions I don't give a shit about gets larger every year, so I may well be underestimating the significance of the tut-tutting to youngish moms.
Not a lot of pork products coming this fall
Fucking McCain. And where's Emerson?
82: My brother, not naturally handy, took enormous pride in the state-of-the-art chicken coop he made himself.
Especially after he corrected the small error that let the murderous raccoon in.
what has all that literacy gotten me, I ask you?
A while back I found my dad's copy of How To Wire Your Home For Electricity or whatever it was called. Sure made me feel better. I've learned a fair number of practical sort of things from books.
82: I was inordinately pleased with myself when I installed my new garbage disposal. Did I remember to brag about that here?
Oh we are designing the coop to keep out raccoons (which doesn't mean that the implementation will reflect that). I hate raccooons. I'll surely put up pictures of the finished coop.
I've learned a fair number of practical sort of things from books.
Crazytalk.
87: Yay! A lot of this stuff isn't very difficult, once you get past the "how can I possibly do that?" stage.
There are only a few household things that average homeowners are best advised to stay away from, really.
Chicken coop science takes raccoons very seriously.
There are only a few household things that average homeowners are best advised to stay away from, really.
Yes, but after I hooked the oven I found abandoned on the street up to the gas line and sealed the connection with duct tape, it worked much better than I had feared.
and everyone's okay with hiring a plumber or mechanic or whatever
If they can afford it. But I certainly know quite a few people who expect that they'll be able to clear a blocked drain, repair a toilet, replace the car's spark plugs/oil filter or clean its battery terminals, paint the house, replace a broken window pane, and so on. (I don't know how to do these things properly, and admit that I've always either let the guy do it, or asked for help.)
Not to mention building a chicken coop, of course!
83: Eh, if you've got it coming at you from within your family, and plenty of people do, childcare is a big emotional deal.
80: Solely because you didn't mention it -- you are remembering to apply for unemployment insurance? You paid in, you should be collecting.
Actually, for me, learning construction out of books is close to crazytalk. I find the diagrams almost impossible to read. This is consistent with never intuitively understanding plans and being unable to do those tests where you fold the box and tell what mark is on top. Or memorizing math instead of understanding the spaces. IKEA diagrams, or the knitting books bring me to tears. I just cannot project into three dimensions or do the rotation.
I figure this is the price I pay for remembering nearly anything I hear, and whatever. I'm fine with it. But it means that books about how to make things aren't very rewarding for me. Being shown and told are better, but who has time to coach me?
Heh, the posting of 93 was delayed, and so pwned.
Meanwhile, yeah, I've gathered an assortment of how-to-do-things books over the years, and feel funny that people will see them: how ... charming of you, dear.
I tested it by standing across the room with a lit match. Then I gradually got closer.
96: I find that it's a matter of faith. If I can literally obey the directions in something like that (crochet patterns, furniture assembly directions) despite the fact that they make no sense, halfway through the epiphany hits me and I understand the diagram. But I have to go in blindly obedient.
I would not recommend that other people do this. Looking back, I can hardly believe I did it myself. It seemed like a good idea at the time.
I hate raccooons
How did the abbreviation for this animal become a racial epithet? Does not seem related.
It's funny, I've just posted to Standpipe's blog twice in a few minutes.
As a person who wasted (or used) most of my free last summer 'souping up' my scooter the biggest problem with home repairs is that they are so varied and one does them so infrequently that one seems to always be early in the learning curve.
So many times I've noted that the second time would have been a LOT easier based on what I learned the first time, but once one has installed the garbage disposal (good on ya Di!) the chance to do it again won't come up again for a long time.
Around work I've noted it usually takes three goes to get really good - the first time is learning, the second time is okay, and the third time I am really good.
Unfortunately many of my current work tasks are similar to home repair, I'm always stuck in the first or second go and never get to the third. Things change too quickly.
Being shown and told are better, but who has time to coach me?
Next time someone says they're going to build an x this weekend, ask if you can come over and 'help'. Sometimes people agree to this. But a lot of people don't like you standing over their shoulder going "So wait, you're measuring that like that, and you've put the joints like so and the supports like that because ..."
I swear to god, tutoring has for some strange reason been subcontracted out of our society.
103: Very true. I like doing fixy stuff, and feel very satisfied when I do, but it just doesn't come up often enough for me to get good at it (or really, for it to make sense to even try when something comes up, rather than hiring it out).
re: 57
The hiring out thing I probably agree with you.
I am more thinking of young women in childless couples of my acquaintance who are quite happy to employ the rhetoric of domestic disparity when it suits them, and not when it doesn't. Certain duties -- household maintenance stuff, looking after the car, gardening, etc. -- are the duties of their male partner. Even if he does hire it out, it's still his job to deal with.
Furthermore, it's rhetoric that they haven't 'earned'. These aren't people who spend their lives cooking and cleaning and looking after children and generally shouldering the vast burden of domestic and family chores [something still true of lots of women, it's not like we live in some post-sexist paradise of equal roles]. These are professionals who spend about as much time as their partner doing domestic work, i.e. not very much at all.
I've talked about this before and struggled to articulate the annoyance. It's about the adoption of a posture that we associate with genuine disparities in domestic labour without the reality of the disparity underlying it, then combined with the employment of precisely the same posture of incompetence that gets so loudly decried when it suits them.
There's a town in MN called "Coon Rapids", pop. 60,000+. No one thinks twice about it, except Doonesbury awhile back.
It's sort of like the way the "Mexican" became a slur. I had to explain to someone awhile back that actual citizens of Mexico are willing to be called Mexicans and might even insist on it.
101: Wikipedia says: Possibly from Portuguese barraco, a building constructed to hold slaves for sale (1837),or from the c. 1830 American folk song "Zip Coon".
106: What I thought I saw was the summation of all the issues women have with men into one unit, and then making every element of that unit equivalent to the whole mass, so that failing to put the toilet seat down became a form of rape.
86 - My favorite type of book is older how-to books, the older the better. I have some awesome homesteading type books from the 1950s, and a very cool book on building scientific instruments from the same period. My dad had a very cool book on homesteading from the 1920s, but I'm not sure what has happened to it.
104 - I love tutoring people on building stuff. It's deeply rewarding to make something concrete and doubly so to share that pleasure with others.
re: 106
What I am talking about is just a way that certain people can be assholes. There's no big thesis attached. One of the ways that certain people can be assholes is to use a particular language of grievance that has its power because the language is grounded in a genuine dispartity but where this use of this language isn't grounded in that same grievance.
I can think of parallel examples from men of my acquaintance, btw.
Further to 106,
Combined with a level of hypocrisy.
Fairness is a good goal, but it is difficult to achieve because the tasks involved are so varied.
For example, early on, I was delegated the role of bug-catcher dead-mouse retriever and similar tasks. I don't mind too much, and have actually gotten a little proud of losing my fear of spiders and now catching them with my hands. I try to let them go outside alive, cause spiders are spooky but useful.
But apparently I had the stronger stomach from the start so I'm also the vomit, snot, and diarrhea cleaner. Same with any animal excrement. I'll tell you, some dog vomit or excrement can reek so bad, and is so slimy, even I partially gag from it.
So, out of fairness, how does one compare an incident of slimy vomit cleanup against, I dunno, say making the bed?
Seriously. It is a hard comparison to make.
Oh, and both my wife and mother-in-law ask me to help my demented father-in-law use the toilet, which involves aiming his hoser with my hand.
Wow. That was tough in so many ways, including knowing some day I myself might need such assistance.
111: I have some awesome homesteading type books from the 1950s
Yes! Those are great. Some of them are gender-divided (I have one called Country Women, dated 1976, though) -- which I just find a historical curiosity -- but many are just fantastic stuff about how to build a stone wall without it falling over, etc. I, um, read these for fun; I like the tone.
As for teaching other people things, it may be my imagination, but it seems more and more often I hear people say things like "Oh, this skill? I took a little mini-class once. You should do that!" Whereas I want to say, "Or you could show me."
110: It was an event involving me and another person where the whole million years of oppression of women was loaded on one medium-to-small infraction of mine. I'm not saying that this is the official doctrine of the whole feminist movement. It's something that can happen, and similar to what ttaM mentioned.
LB - 105,
Yeah, and if you add in the problem of the task requiring some expensive specialized tool, well, it can be very daunting to try it oneself.
114: You're right, getting to perfectly, or even pretty close to, fair is impossible, because you can't net out dissimilar tasks against each other. All you can do is negotiate until everyone's happy.
114: Same with any animal excrement.
What's up with that? I have an elderly cat on the premises who's losing control of her bowels on occasion, and it must be cleaned up; my (male, as it happens) roommate throws a hissy-fit each time.
117: Got it. What puzzled me is that your first comment didn't actually reference anything specific, which did make it look like a commentary on gender relations generally.
What's up with that? I have an elderly cat on the premises who's losing control of her bowels on occasion, and it must be cleaned up; my (male, as it happens) roommate throws a hissy-fit each time.
because unlike a human being, there's no moral or practical reason to put up with a cat, so disgusting explosions of shit and puke are all downside. Joint living situations between pet and non-pet people are dependent on the capacity to ignore the pet.
This presumes that your roommate is, like me, a non-pet person.
I had to explain to someone awhile back that actual citizens of Mexico are willing to be called Mexicans and might even insist on it.
When I was a freshman in college, one goy classmate referred to a Jewish classmate as "Jewish,"* which prompted a second goy classmate to 'correct' her for using such a term. Much amusement ensued. The second guy was legitimately a tool, although he had some non-toolish tendencies that would presumably blossom with the help of a good woman.
* Or, possibly, as "a Jew," which granted has a slightly harsher sound somehow.
My grandmother has a big speech about how much she loves The Gays and she did her part since the civil rights movement to help try to secure rights for The Gays and how The Gays love her back.
123: Using a racial or ethnic term as noun to refer to a person is always worse than using it as an adjective modifying a more generic noun. For example, saying "A Black" is worse than saying "a Black person." The reason is simple: using the noun implies that you are reducing their identity to the ethnicity, whereas the adjective implies that the ethnicity is only one characteristic they have.
Strangely, this effect has also happened with the term "a gay" but it has not happened with "a lesbian."
I also once heard a well-educated woman from an elite family, married to an even better-educated man from an even mre elite family, say that she had spent her junior year abroad in Spain and had studied some of their ethnic poets, though she couldn't remember their names.
125: It's because everyone loves lesbians.
122: This presumes that your roommate is, like me, a non-pet person.
This assumption would be wrong.
125: Strangely, this effect has also happened with the term "a gay" but it has not happened with "a lesbian."
Hm -- being a (male) gay person is more accepted than being a lesbian? It's not hard to construct an explanation for this.
He's just not a feces-friendly person. Don't judge him; not everyone has an appreciation for feces.
129: I think you got me backwards. There was a great episode of the Larry Sanders show where Larry's bigoted sidekick says "Elton John is a gay" that sounds totally awkward and weird (perhaps like HBGB's grandmother.) But a similar comment about "a lesbian" would not be weird. So:
*Elton John is a gay.
Melissa Etheridge is a lesbian.
Walt's right, its because everyone loves lesbians.
not everyone has an appreciation for feces.
No shit.
130: We won't sign him up for child care or elder care, then. He can change the oil on the car and muck out the clogged drains. Problem solved!
123; "Jew" is particularly weird in that context. I'm about as familiar and comfortable as a goy can be with Judaism, and I still can't use "Jew" in a sentence where a Jew would; I use "Jewish" pretty much exclusively. While the word "Jew" isn't a slur, a gentile using it in a sentence has a very hard time not sounding like an anti-Semite.
not everyone has an appreciation for feces.
I brought home a bag of shit by accident today.
131: Oh, I thought Walt got it backwards.
That is, "a gay" is odd in the same way that "a black" is odd, both for reducing said person to his/her attribute. While "a lesbian" is still not considered odd, suggesting that reducing said woman to her sexual preference is okay.
Well, that's how I read it.
I brought home a bag of shit by accident today.
That's nothing: I routinely bring home containers of vegetable matter from the bookshop.
I think I'll just leave it at that.
The difference is so highly marked that "a lesbian person" also sounds wrong, but "a gay person" does not.
The gay bar was full of gay people
*The lesbian bar was full of lesbian people.
135: You'll be able to use it eventually, I'm sure.
*The lesbian bar was full of lesbian people.
That's because women aren't people?
It's because "gay" is a state of being, while "lesbian" is more of a job description. You wouldn't fell bad calling someone a "plumber" either, and "plumber person" sounds weird.
For example, saying "A Black" is worse than saying "a Black person."
I almost used this exact example. As I say, 18 years later, I don't recall which term was used.
Oh! But I just remembered that I got the roles reversed: the toolish guy was the one who said "Jew" or "Jewish," and the corrector was a well-meaning but sheltered Catholic from Cleveland. Realizing that, her assumption that the tool was using an offensive term was justified, but in reality almost certainly incorrect.
I'm pretty sure it was "Jewish." At the moment, I can clearly hear her saying, "Nick!" but I can't quite conjure up the antecedent.
Oh well.
And yeah, lesbian is tricky because the word-form* is an adjective, but it's also a noun, whereas gay and black are noun word-forms that can double as adjectives.
It mirrors the Democrat/Democratic thing, where Jew is like Democrat and lesbian is like Republican. The "Jew bar" is offensive just as "Democrat Party" is, whereas "lesbian bar" is no more offensive than "Republican Party."
* there must be a term for this
"lesbians and gay men" gets 410,000 hits on google.
"Lesbian women and gays" gets 4
Getting scattershot here, is it better to refer to "my gays" instead of "the gays?'
Also, anyone else notice the dem canditate ticket is OB and the publican ticket is MP? Babies versus cops - coincidence? I don't think so.
And I'll tell you what, if you ever wondered who has the power in a relationship, wait for the stinky dog vomit. When you are cleaning it up, look over, cause that other person has the power. No question.
And yeah, lesbian is tricky because the word-form* is an adjective, but it's also a noun, whereas gay and black are noun word-forms that can double as adjectives.
What?
||
So apparently "The Secret Life of Bees" is all about women, and largely about African-American women? I had no idea. But I see a blurb about it that lists 6 actors, all women and at least 3 A-A. I wonder what it's about.
* Ah, 4. Sophie Okonedo is also A-A**. Had to look it up.
** On further investigation, Nigerian-Ashkenazi Jewish. Interesting.
|>
146: "Lesbian" and "republican" end in "ian", an adjectival suffix, so it seems natural to use them as adjectives "Republican Pary" "Lesbian Bar"
But this actually goes against my original observation, because "Lesbian woman" (326,00 google hits) sounds weird in a way "gay man" (8,490,000) does not.
"Lesbian" and "republican" end in "ian"
Ahem.
if you ever wondered who has the power in a relationship, wait for the stinky dog vomit. baby poop.
149: oops. They end with adjectival suffixes?
if you ever wondered who has the power in a relationship, wait for the stinky dog vomit. When you are cleaning it up, look over, cause that other person has the power. No question.
Ha! I usually do most bodily fluids here, because I don't care (I've cleaned up other, non-family, people's vomit voluntarily and happily), but when the dog ate a mouse and puked it up skinless, with a little pelt next to it, I took that as my cue to yell for Chris.
It's "lesbians and gay men" because there's ambiguity as to whether women are "gay", which the phrase dodges.
149: The "ian" ending is Armenian, see, like most Armenian names.
What?
What I mean is that lesbian means (originally) "from Lesbos," whereas gay and black aren't derived from some other noun. So our brains resist "lesbian person" just as they resist "Italian person." Italian can mean "of/from/pertaining to Italy" or it can mean "person from Italy." Although gay can be used as a noun or adjective, it never refers to another, related word in the way that Italian or lesbian do.
Lesbian, obviously, no longer has any relation to Lesbos, but I'm talking about observed usage*, not nec. optimal usage.
* is this de re or something?
152: See, Asilon is a girl after all.
Some nasty things are male, and others are female. There's no sense to it.
I don't think that the dominance thing is the main thing. Different people have different disgust thresholds. I can see that certain types of highly dominant partners would never clean up nasties, but there's lots of things they won't do.
152: One nice thing about infant care is that you get immune to grossout. I went out one night when Sally was an infant to play cards with some friends, and ended up cleaning a stranger's tub in which a friend of mine had puked up about a quart of sangria with a lot of fruit in it, including unclogging the drain by pulling half-chewed bits of orange out of it with my fingers. Didn't mind much, given that my daily life included a fair amount of vomit and poop.
115: But "a Chinese person" sounds much better than "A Chinese." Is there a race/origin issue here?
So our brains resist "lesbian person" just as they resist "Italian person."
I think our brains resist "lesbian person" more in the way they resist "pregnant person".
The preferred terms are "a Chinee" and "some Chinese", rob.
my daily life included a fair amount of vomit and poop
"But enough about my acting career. Is there any sangria left?"
98
I tested it by standing across the room with a lit match. Then I gradually got closer. to the taped gas duct...
A professor of mine told me that he had met the dude who came up with the idea of adding odor to gas to make it detectable. According to my professor, the range where the smell from the gas would be absolutely intolerable comes well before the point where the gas would explode.
I find that comforting, so I believe it.
***
The other problem with getting taught to be handy is that for any project that needs doing, I'm more useful hauling or digging shit than standing and watching carefully. The skilled person is all "hey, how 'bout you fetch those sacks of concrete while I stare at this?" and then I never learn what all the staring was about.
Options:
Do projects when they aren't necessary.
Do projects alone.
Pay someone to teach me.
Go back in time and learn as a child.
Decide that stuff is stupid and I didn't want to know it anyway.
I find that comforting, so I believe it.
The guy the gas company sent out to my house one holiday weekend to deal with a gas leak told me that in general the house really has to be "reeking" before it's in real danger of exploding. Of course, I've always lived in places with old electrical wiring, including knob and tube, so I'm a bit less sanguine about the whole thing than I might otherwise be.
155: What I mean is that lesbian means (originally) "from Lesbos," whereas gay and black aren't derived from some other noun. So our brains resist "lesbian person" just as they resist "Italian person." Italian can mean "of/from/pertaining to Italy" or it can mean "person from Italy." Although gay can be used as a noun or adjective, it never refers to another, related word in the way that Italian or lesbian do.
This just seems confused to me. Since "lesbian" originally derived from Lesbos, "lesbian" is a primarily adjectival form. As are "gay" and "black." We might not think "lesbian person" sounds right, but if we were referring to a Lesbos-born person, then "lesbian poet," say, would make perfect sense (though it wouldn't mean that the poet in question was a gay woman). And indeed we might well now say "lesbian poet" meaning that she's a gay woman poet.
We should by rights use "lesbian" in the same way as "gay" or "black." We don't: we accept a noun form. As we have also accepted, at various times in the past, noun forms of "gay" and "black." The mystery isn't, I don't think, grammatically based.
Thinking about this stuff makes me believe everyone should just committ suicide at 75 or so. It's what I plan to do. Watching what happened to my father was pretty terrifying -- his wife nursed him, thank god. It was amazing to see how little external/government support there was in these situations.
157: I would have had to wear a gas mask for this to prevent filling the tub myself.
I would have had to wear a gas mask for this to prevent filling the tub myself.
On the plus side, you're already right there.
Solely because you didn't mention it -- you are remembering to apply for unemployment insurance? You paid in, you should be collecting.
Part of me is just too stinking proud, but I think I'm technically employed until the end of my severance period anyway. I'll look into it.
It was amazing to see how little external/government support there was in these situations.
Where did he live? Around here I was amazed at how much there is.
I would have had to wear a gas mask for this to prevent filling the tub myself.
Seriously, having a kid or two is like working hospice in terms of getting accustomed to the sundry ejecta of the human body.
adding odor to gas to make it detectable.
A few years back, there was a leak of the odor (mercaptan) around here, which ended up being big news because hundreds of people were reporting gas leaks, so the press had to cover it to let everyone know, but still to be careful, &c. Funny.
The stuff added to gas is Methyl Mercaptan, one of the stinkiest substances known. It and close relatives were considered as rocket fuels. There are some very funny stories told by John Clark (Isaac Asimov's PhD advisor) in his book Ignition! about experiments involving these substances. The chemists who worked with them were extremely unpopular due to their stinkiness. Incidentally, that book is hard to find and if you do locate a copy at a reasonable you should definitely buy it because sooner or later you'll be able to give it as a gift to some geek who will absolutely love it. There are places where it's laugh-out-loud funny.
IME, caregiving tensions can arise from issues like:
1. Who's going to pay for it.
2. Who's going to do it.
3. What "it" needs to be done.
People who have had little firsthand experience of caregiving and who haven't been socialized into or bothered to develop a personal awareness of the issues, IME often have a grossly underestimated sense of #3.
Everything from pooh-poohing getting LTC insurance "before it's time" to not wanting to urge one's parents to move to a mobility-friendly home, to denying that isolated Aunt X might actually have some moral claim upon your time and goodwill.
Getting better at recognizing the smaller #3s means heading off bigger problems down the road. If you call Grandpa weekly or daily to check in, you're going to notice when his speech is oddly slurring or if he sounds weak and out of touch. If you ask your mother about her doctor visits, you might hear when she's been put on a new medication and can catch that when she's peculiarly tired, that might be a reason. (And then you find out she's mistakenly been told to take the beta blocker at 30 mg 2x day instead of 20 mg 1x day.*)
*Which, yes, actually happened to someone I know. It's a miracle the person didn't die -- and the worst is that the hospital didn't catch the mistake, and offered a very tepid apology when the spouse did figure out what was going on, 10 days and some panicky moments later.
169: his wife may have been reluctant to call in sufficient external aid. Near the end, when the hospice people came in, she called them Nazis.
Togolosh wasn't shitting you. $978 used, per Bookfinder.com.
Seriously, having a kid or two is like working hospice in terms of getting accustomed to the sundry ejecta of the human body.
Cue that study of a few years ago showing that every household with small children (in the study, anyway) was positively covered with a minutely thin layer of the stuff.
Getting better at recognizing the smaller #3s means heading off bigger problems down the road.
This terrifies me. I'm busy, and slack, and both of my parents live alone. I can go quite awhile without more contact with them than a phone call every week or so, and three weeks wouldn't be anything like unprecedented. While they're still both healthy, if some health issue came up that needed an outside eye to spot, I could miss it for ages.
Gotta get Dr. Oops on the ball, LB. She lives farther away! Make her do the regular phone check-ins!
(Seriously, I hear you. I am abidingly grateful that a) my grandfather's wife is as wonderful as she is in taking care of him, and b) I have siblings. Because it's almost never easy. The only question is whether it's quick and difficult, or long and difficult.)
We should by rights use "lesbian" in the same way as "gay" or "black." We don't: we accept a noun form. As we have also accepted, at various times in the past, noun forms of "gay" and "black." The mystery isn't, I don't think, grammatically based.
I would buy the argument except for the fact that it's simply not an accurate description of the words. "Lesbian" has an ending. The other two don't. And just as "Jewish person" is an unusual* formation, so is "lesbian woman." They're not quite parallel ("He's Jewish," "She's a lesbian"), but that suffix, to me, makes it work differently. You suggest that "accept[ing] a noun form" is problematic. Is it problematic to say "He's an Italian" or "She's a German"? Absolutely not. "They're Dutch. He's a Dutchman. She's a Dutch." The last one is jarring only because there's an alternate word for someone who is a native of Holland. But there's no other word for someone who's a native of Germany, so "She's a German" doesn't sound odd, and certainly not offensive. Despite its particulars, "lesbian" is formed exactly as "German" is. I have trouble seeing a cultural conspiracy in the fact that the two words are used identically in syntax.
* Not unheard of, but somewhat awkward, or even ironic
157, 171: I guess having kids is also a pretty good way to break a nail-biting habit.
177: small houses with infants have a subtle but ubiquitous fecal smell.
My kid never vomited once while he was staying with me (usually 3 days a week). He almost never had a runny nose, either. Fact. God has blessed the wicked House of Emerson with amazingly good health.
Perhaps it's compensation for Cotton Mather's treating poor Aunt Elizabeth so mean. Being hanged is bad enough, but being hanged after a year of one-on-one Mather counseling would be make you wish for hell.
The arrangement around here is that my wife is responsible for taking care of family problems (hers, that is; I help/support/keep her sane) and her dad is responsible for telling her everything she should be doing differently, preferably via late-night phone calls when she's already exhausted. It gets tiresome.
I have noticed that native Chinese speakers refer to "Chinese people" where Americans would say "Chinese". The world lost a perfectly good word in "Chinaman". Usage matters, I suppose. A good ole boy acquaintance of mine refers to going to the local deli as "gettin' some Jew food".
A potential data point for the issue here that fascinates me (the lesbian issue):
There was a debate in the early 70s among newly out Lesbians about how much they should make a common cause with gay men. Do they present one unified front of Gay, or should lesbians distinguish themselves. Because Lesbian identity was closely tied to radical feminism at the time, many were reluctant to form an alliance with men, especially men who could act in such a hyper-male manner. As a result the phrase "gay men and lesbians" became standard, to indicate that lesbians had a different set of issues than gay men. This was the root of the ever expanding GLBT acronym.
I don't remember where I heard this, exactly. It was a gender studies textbook, with primary source readings.
According to my professor, the range where the smell from the gas would be absolutely intolerable comes well before the point where the gas would explode.
I used to work for a chemical plant that made the smelly stuff they add to gas.
http://www.take-a-view.co.uk/images/2007winners/AY_0001265.jpg
They had a leak once.
Imagine a whole town smelling like a gigantic gas leak, it wasn't nice.
I don't remember where I heard this, exactly. It was a gender studies textbook, with primary source readings.
Celia Kitzinger's 'Social Construction of Lesbianism' has some stuff on this, iirc.
She was strongly anti- the whole idea of gay men and lesbian women being lumped together.
the issue here that fascinates me (the lesbian issue)
YES, LESBIANS FASCINATE ME TOO! ESPECIALLY THE ONES IN THE VIDEOS!
ESPECIALLY THE ONES IN THE VIDEOS!
Two naked chicks are better than one. What?
In Portland OR there was quite an extended feud between the lesbian community and the M2F transsexual community, which as far as I know was mostly a response to the public M2F leader's personality. It became very bitter and rose to the state level.
190: Not true! I do quite like lesbians, but mostly for the same reason I like gay men: because they've got pretty decent taste in the aggregate (except for folk singers. ugh). They're the urban symbol for a neighborhood of fine eats and good coffeeshops. If only Andersonville wasn't so damn far north...
except for folk singers
That aside, Mrs. Lincoln, how was the play?
Perhaps this is naive, but isn't this all explained by the fact that when we talk about a resident of an area/country, they almost always end in -n or -an? So lesbian can masquerade as one of these. Thus, German, Minnesotan, Nigerian, and lesbian all sound normal. Whereas, gay person, Chinese person, black person, Sudanese person are the norm.
193: And expensive. We used to live there, but I think we'd be priced out of it now.
195: I think we can explain it in those terms, yes.
So everyone would say "He's a German"? It sounds odd (not wrong, in the way "He's a Chinese" would, but odd) to me. "He is German" is what I would say.
On the other hand: I know a lot of Germans. Hmm. That one doesn't sound odd to me.
"Andersonville" means something other than the Confederate prison? I guess there were some gay guys there, but no coffeehouses and possibly not a single lesbian.
"New Mexican" doesn't sound right, especially if you're talking about an old, broken-down person.
German is an adjective. The people are Germians or Germanians.
"New Mexican" describes food, just like "Chinese". "Let's go get some Chinese." "Have you tried that New Mexican place?"
Also against the notion that only things ending in -n or -an can be formulated as "he's a x-an": He's a New Yorker. One can multiply these things forever; there will be tons of exceptions in both directions. The fact that "lesbian" originally meant "from Lesbos" throws a wrench into things, and may or may not be a red herring. We wouldn't want to forget that "black" was once, and is still sometimes, used as a noun.
"Negro" is a noun, but "Negroid" is a verb. And "Negress" is a verb.
But I negress.....
Er, that is to say, meaning is use, people, meaning is use!
(I'm only talking about this to avoid challenging Po-Mo's diss on folk singers.)
Meanwhile (OT): I have some small bright yellow hot peppers from the farm that were called "chinese lantern" peppers. Googling to determine their hotness level gives me basically nothing. I think I'll just have to try one.
I theorize that the more a folk singer uses the word "we", the worse her/his songs are.
205: "Negro" is a noun (now), but "black" isn't (now). Huh. Confusing.
The actual population of Lesbos is not at all amused. Lesbophobes!
If you are a repentant white misceganator, does consulting a divorce lawyer constitute "seeking means of Negress?"
New Jerseyian sounds wrong, but apparently it isn't.
My guess is that even Lesbos's few indigenous lesbians are tired of the joke by now.
What about the Symbionese? Why not Symbions?
Probably them above all, come to think of it.
Also: A Swede.
Oh, and a word that always seems odd to me but is normal in some academic contexts is "Jewry" - as in "East European Jewry," for example.
Lesbian tourists sometimes visit Lesbos, to the annoyance of the very conservative inhabitants.
I do quite like lesbians, but mostly for the same reason I like gay men: because they've got pretty decent taste in the aggregate
No, gay men have good taste, lesbians have bad taste. Get it straight. Which would you rather eat at, a restaurant owned and patronized by gay men, or a restaurant owned and patronized by lesbians? Who would you rather dress like?
209: There was reprinted in Harper's (I think) a while back an open letter to the world from representatives of Lesbos calling for a cease and desist, forthwith, of use of the word "lesbian" to refer to anyone other than an inhabitant of Lesbos. Oh, well.
I've heard that people from Lesbos are properly called Lesbosians?
Andersonville, on the north side of Chicago, has many excellent restaurants owned and patronized by lesbians.
If Ani DiFranco counts as a the kind of folksinger lesbians favor, then you cannot complete write off lesbians folksingers. Also, lesbian homocore rules. Also, Le Tigre.
Where is the obligatory debate thread? For once I have a sufficient supply of alcohol at the ready.
I feel peculiar about any name for a person that ends with "o". Although the only non-ethnic ones I can think of are albino and lesbino. People like Michael Chiklis's parents are Lesbonians.
Also, PGD doesn't know many lesbians.
No, PGD needs to differentiate "taste" from "style".
221: I'm hoping one of them challenges the other one to a duel.
There are some Greek men in my neighbourhood who don't like this Lesbos/lesbian thing at all.
PGD doesn't know many lesbians.
IYKWIM.
At last! A thread that combines the gendered division of labor with pet poop and vomit! My husband and I have a novel solution that is fair and equitable. He is responsible for the everything that comes out of the front end of the dog (vomit, etc,) and the back end of the cat, and I am responsible for the back of the dog (poop) and the front of the cat (hairballs). This often leads us to looking at some mess on the floor to decide "whose end it is." When my dog eats her own poop and barfs it up, however, he cleans up the barf.
I ended up cleaning up more baby poop just because I was around more, but he certainly did his share of diapers. My kid also barfs so much that there is plenty of cleaning to go around. Usuallly, this also gets divided up, as in--you take the barfing kid and put her in the shower, while I change the sheets or clean the floor or whatever. Or the reverse.
I have noticed that native Chinese speakers refer to "Chinese people" where Americans would say "Chinese".
What, like they say "This is terrible Chinese people food" and "native Chinese people speakers"? There are very very few circumstances in which I would use "Chinese" by itself as a noun phrase denoting "Chinese people".
Oh, hello, I was more behind than I thought.
I'd like to throw out the idea that sometimes the people (friends, family members) needing this kind of dehumanizing degredating horrible oppressive help may not only be your elders and betters. Sometimes it's your siblings and friends and neighbors, who are your age and equally appalled at the situation.
I quit my job and took care of my mother for 7 years, for just room and board, till she died at age 95. Lost getting anything in my Social Security (I'm 62 now) for that time. Also had my cantankerous younger MR sister in the household. I have 3 brothers who did very little (their wives neither); brothers "couldn't stand to see Mom that way." One older sister helped Mom & Sis for decades, mostly by herself. Now we're getting ready to sell the farm, and guess what: The proceeds will be equally divided. For my sacrifice, I get a poke in the eye w/a sharp stick. It's just expected of women. So beware if you go into such a situation. Get something in writing beforehand. Ask for help-- demand it. I found that if one person was doing the caregiving, that gave the others license to step back and do nothing. It's unfair but it's reality. Total sexism.
Yow, that's awful. You're absolutely right about getting any financial deals in writing beforehand, even with family -- you just can't count on working anything out in a way that feels equitable after the fact.
Yow, that's awful. You're absolutely right about getting any financial deals in writing beforehand, even with family -- you just can't count on working anything out in a way that feels equitable after the fact.
LB is absolutely correct.
What seems equitable after the fact is so different from before the fact.
How much is it worth for you not to take care of mom? If I am going to do it, then we need to approach this in a fair and business-like manner.
Unmarried couples are the same way. They start buying stuff together. Then when they break up, they have horrible fights over who gets the house proceeds. Good for me. Bad for them.
Partnership agreements people! Gays, brothers and sisters, heteros!
JudyLou,
Thank you for putting this in perspective. I had similar feelings when I sacrificed for years at work and then had my pension yanked away.
BUT a bunch of us fought it and got at least something. Is the 'equally divided' thing for sure? Even without a legal remedy (and I am not a lawyer) can you talk reasonably with your family and get a more fair settlement between you? Yeah, I know these things can tear families apart but on the other hand many families do the right thing if you ask for it. Can you speak up about it?
My mom just seems more competent, somehow? Or she steps up to the plate and everyone lets her do it?
Funny how that works.
(That said, I doubt I'll be a dutiful daughter when the time comes, as my parents--in particular my mother, actually--were so heavily anti-dutiful that they really do seem to have reaped what they tried to sow. Which was foolish of them, in retrospect.)
