We’ve taking a little tour through Europe lately, and you know what that means: grab your rentboy and sing along.
Keep on chatting. Long strokes, please.
(Current tally: 10,212 entries with 992,807 comments.)
Pharyngula
Evolution, development, and random biological ejaculations from a godless liberal
Do we have enough “completely heterosexual” songs to fill a CD yet?
I saw a flock of flying pigs yesterday.
At least, it was as rare as flying pigs.
It does appear the more some fundie decries teh ghey the further in the closet they are.
Hmm, a little extrapolation indicates that PZ’s millionth comment will probably occur in about 7-10 days. Better mark my calendar to make some extra batches of grog for then, and make sure enough bacon is on hand…
Flying pigs yield a lighter, fluffier bacon.
And maybe Laura Bush should run!
Rentboys are okay, but I’d really prefer some kind of long-term mortgage arrangement.
And Bacon LiteTM has only half the calories of regular bacon!
Fake science posters. Love.
I think someone DMC Takedown’d that video.
Fly some today!
It’s the Other Other White Meat!
I’ve proposed on the Ravelry Pharyngula group that people who knit should make the squid menstrual cup holder from AntiCraft for OM winners (it also doubles as a cellphone holder or, with a bit of stuffing, as a spiffy charm for one’s rear view mirror). Obviously there should be a squid for the millionth poster as well – perhaps I should actually start knitting.
Ideas on squid colors? Interested knitters? It basically takes rudimentary sock knitting skills and an ability to do i-cord. Seems like the pattern should take a couple hours at most – I’ll make it a standard project for my godless knitter group on Tuesday night.
Just to be clear, the blog I’ve linked to is not mine, but it’s the best picture I’ve found of the spiffy knitted squid.
Givesgoodemail,
I had no idea Laura Bush had a soul! I wonder how she really feels about Sarah Palin.
*sigh*
What’s a gal gotta do around here to get a moldy turnip thrown at her?
‘Night, all.
*slowly and sadly trudging bedward*
Mr. Mattir just found that Andrew Jackson threatened to veto a bill proposing a National Day of Prayer in response to a cholera epidemic, He said on the floor of the House of Representatives that the President should
Gotta love that man (men, actually, Mr. Mattir and Andrew Jackson).
So I have a question for some of the more experienced heathens at Pharyngula.
Today, I was waiting to talk to a lawyer, and I was talking to his secretary to pass the time. It was a long wait, and eventually, she told me I should go to church (I told her I don’t spend much time around people, and so don’t make a lot of friends. Church was a way she thought I could go and socialize).
So my question to you fine folks is: how do I deal with that kinda thing? I dodged by saying I went to a Catholic elementary school and my knees still hurt, and I didn’t wanna go to another Catholic service just yet, and then changed the subject. I try not to be closeted, but I’m incredibly timid, and have an awful habit of doing my best to not ruffle feathers, ever.
No, Mattir, I don’t. (Jackson, that is)
You’re lucky that’s all that hurt.
Is it cheaper in the long term to rent a boy or buy a man?
Clearly, that depends on how often you find yourself in need a male. If it’s infrequently, then renting is the way to go. But if it gets to be more than once or twice week, you’re probably better off in the long run making a full purchase.
You might also want to look into one of those rent-to-own businesses (though I’ve heard that they’re mostly just overpriced scams).
Wow… been reading PZ for years now; this is the first time I’m spotting a spelling mistake!
@csreid
I’m not an experienced heathen either, so I’ve also wondered at what point it would be appropriate to mention that I don’t believe in God in any conversation about religion. Being a confirmed Roman Catholic and coming from a fairly religious family I’ve never once mentioned my atheism, except to my Dad, out of fear for what would happen. But to be honest I don’t think it would be a big deal to bring up your lack of religious faith in every day conversation, especially with strangers. The average person would probably just be a bit surprised and respond with something to the effect of “Oh, I didn’t realize.” I think it would be the equivalent of someone taking for granted that you were American until you pointed out that you were in fact from Canada. People just make assumptions.
In general, human beings treat ideas (see atheism, homosexuality) with much greater vitriol than they do to actual people, especially when there’s some kind of interpersonal interaction involved. Even the most virulently anti-gay fundamentalist would probably treat a random gay man amiably if there wasn’t anyone else around. Hell, he might even ask for a friendly massage.
Pygmy Loris:
Word. Haven’t seen you much, still busy with census work? I’ve heard the census person has been in Almont, I’ll have to track her down so I can get all that done.
After a long torture session with my neurologist and long, boring waits at the hospital, then running one errand after another in town, I’m wiped out. Oh, Up arrived via netflix tonight, so we finally watched it. Yes, it was good, thanks to all who gave the recommend. So I’m off to bed, G’night all!
Cicely:
Pfft, you deserve much better. I bought some blackberry vines today, when they fruit, I’ll gently toss some fresh berries your way. ;)
You know, I wouldn’t care if Rekers was gay, straight, Bi or whatever, if he wasn’t such a damn hypocrite about it.
Rekers is one of those gifts that keeps on giving.
Great. Another video blocked in Germany, and once again using a proxy site doesn’t work. I’ll have to unpack some extra IP-Fu.
Apparently YOuTube blocks the video as soon as I hit the Play button. How do I get the video to start automatically, that should work?
Nope, adding the autoplay command to the URL doesn’t work either.
Hotspot Shield is installed on my Mac. I use it to get around a lot of content “not available in Germany”. It works for me.
Enjoy.
Too bad gaydars don’t work. Here’s something from the pope: Gay Marriage Is ‘Insidious And Dangerous’
@22:
… or European until you pointed out you were in fact from France? People just make assumptions.
I don’t know about anyone else but a lot of Americans, upon hearing me speak, make a remark about my Canadian accent…to which I reply: “I don’t know what the hell you’re talking aboot, eh!”
#29,
actually I have HS installed but usually not active. It works! Thanks for reminding me of one of the dozens of little softwares that I forget about after two weeks of disuse. :)
Oh, Japan …
via Ben Goldacre.
What’s likely to get the Arizona racial profiling law off the books?
The protesters? No.
The outrage from the rest of the country calling them idiot racists? Nope.
Take away the All Start Basketball game because of their bullshit? Highly fucking probable because all the fuck wit republicans care about is making money and their stupidity just lost us a whole shit load of revenue.
I just heard it on ESPN. Un-fucking-believable. I would place money that this is the best way to get them to change the law. again. Of course, it doesn’t help our economy here but I’m willing to lose that to protect other’s rights. I’m screwed anyways lol.
You forgot about forcing their religious teachings on everyone else – haven’t you been following Alabama’s gubernatorial race lately? I’m a hell of a lot more worried about that one to be honest.
*grumpy b/o night shift day-night-rhythm upset*
The hell is it with the religious bigots in the US wrt homosexuality, the amount of cognitive dissonance required to keep the homophobia going for these people must be requiring enough energy by now to fuel a middle-sized country.
Ol’Greg from the last incarnation :
.
I’m awful with presies.Tokens of appreciation, not quite so bad, and I guess passable in finding out what partner-at-the-time considers romantic, as tastes vary…:-)
David M @ 714 last,
Hedonism
Ol’Greg @ 699,
It’s not still euphemism week, is it ? If not, I love playing chess..:P
(There is a handy app for playing chess on one of the online servers in Linux btw, for the interested, it’s called Jin )
I posted this in the climate post, but had to share this. The latest climate denialist bullshit meme is that Venus, which has a surface temperature over 450 degrees C, is hot not because a nearly 100% CO2 atmosphere with a pressure of 92 bars causes a super-greenhouse effect…no, rather it’s because gasses get hot when you apply pressure to them. Yup! That’s what they are saying over on Anthony Micro-Watt’s blog, where the debate is generating some stupidity so dense it comes with it’s own graviational field! String Theorist Lubos Motl–whose blog says he does “conservative physics”–has even been suckered, and the denizens of the denialosphere are proclaiming a new “revolution” in physics. Before you ask, yes, these guys really are that stupid. They don’t even realize that their little contraption is a perpetual motion machine! DUMBER THAN OWLSHIT!
*cough*
Deutsche Physik
*cough*
This really needed to be said.
On a similar note, I noticed early on that all this talk of “vanquish your inner laziness” is bullshit. It’s not some evil part of me that wants to procrastinate, or some demonic whisperer. I am the one who wants to procrastinate. I really want to.
:-D :-D :-D
X-D X-D X-D
(Literally playing chess with oneself is an awesome ability.)
X-D X-D X-D
TSIB.
Oops. Forgot a set of nested blockquotes.
But in my case, my procrastination has reached epic proportions. I simply can’t work for more than ten minutes straight without doing something else. This is why everything takes me such a long time. (And it isn’t great considering that, in each exam, I have to concentrate and write for three hours solid.)
That said, I am feeling much better and less tired today. I didn’t set an alarm, but instead allowed myself to wake up naturally so as not to interrupt my sleep cycle. I still woke up just as early, but felt much healthier.
Have you got the lyrics written down somewhere? I find them very difficult to understand. The singer simply doesn’t seem to care. What’s the part that sometimes follows after “just because you feel good” (or rather “goo-eeeeeeh”) – is it “doesn’t mean you’re right”? I hope not!!!
Told you so. I bet you’re finding it easier to work today.
ADHD Walton. I have it and you can medicate for it.
And for most people it helps.
I was waiting for that song. Love it! He’d obviously not had the lyrics down long… :-)
Hah. If that were what he has, he’d never have got all the way to university!
I definitely don’t have ADHD. I never used to have any problem concentrating; in my teens, I could study for five hours straight without a break. It’s just that I’ve grown so accustomed to wasting half my life on the Internet that I no longer have the attention span I used to have. It’s entirely my own fault, not a medical problem.
Compulsive behavior Walton?
I, do have ADD, but you seem a little more OCD but then again IANAD.
Moar acronyms pleez?
By the way some one with ADD isn’t really that unlikely to get through school. Especially if they know at least one trick really well. I sailed through on my moderate talents much to the detriment of anything I might have learned.
Walton, have you noticed that the BBC is now actively lying to the public about the new coalition and the 55% dissolution rule? They have an article up at http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk_politics/election_2010/8678222.stm
which is so wrong it makes me want to cry. I’ve actually sent them a formal complaint. What the hell is going on when the nation’s main broadcaster can’t tell the difference between a dissolution of parliament and a vote of no confidence in the government? The newspapers are doing no better. Do you think you could drop them a complaint as well? I’d like to feel that there was somebody else out there who understood.
We’re in bizarro world at the moment. A Tory-Liberal coalition is dropping ID cards, stopping the third runway at Heathrow, and being smeared by the press over an attempt to make parliament more democratic.
Wibble.
I did
IANADA but I think you can “get” ADHD as you grow older.
AFAIK i think we covered it
Holy shit this is funny.
At least I think so
Walton,
I’m the same way. I’ve noticed over the last year that my concentration has dwindled down to almost nothing because I’m so used to task-switching constantly. I’m trying to address it, but it requires herculean effort when jobs require using the internet (like telling an alcoholic not to drink too much while forcing them to drink in the first place). One trick I’ve used, trees be damned, is to print out the things I’d normally deal with digitally if they involve reading/studying/editing. Allows me to literally get in a different room from the computer altogether, and even if I do race back now and then just to “check on things” I can force certain time limits and slowly increase them.
Doesn’t make it right.
Easier to understand in non-live recordings.
Never had that problem.Nothing relaxes me as much as sitting down with a book for 3 hours.
Caine,
Yep, I’m pretty busy with the census, and I’m trying to finish some stuff for school before I leave. I’m keeping up with the Thread for the most part, but I just don’t have the energy to post much.
David,
The REv. beat me to it, but it deserves repeating. Even untreated ADHD is not necessarily a bar to reaching or completing a university education. I know several people who made it through school before they were diagnosed. They just worked much harder than other people did.
And I notice that merely typing his name brought on a typo. That should be the Rev. not the REv. :)
Yes, I have always suffered from OCD (though it’s not as bad as it used to be) and have an obsessive personality generally. But I’m also certain that I don’t have ADHD.
woogie boogie
*spooky fingers
My spell is working
Speaking of typos
hyperactive kid
s…concentrate better and study more efficiently.
Stephen: Yeah, that article was confused and showed a distinct misunderstanding of constitutional concepts.
I’m mostly pleased with the coalition so far. They’re scrapping ID cards, ending the detention of child refugees, and have come to a reasonable compromise on nuclear power. The only thing that’s pissing me off is this absurd “cap on non-EU immigration”: it just seems like pandering to irrational Daily Mail xenophobia. If anything, we would benefit from more immigration, not less.
I have diagnosed myself with ASS*. I tend to foucs intently on a task, and have a tremendous amount of difficulty shifting my attention around. This makes me the worst multitasker on the planet.
*Attention Surplus Syndrome
I have an idea.
We ask all the members of the coalition parties at Westminster who have an immigrant ancestor in the last 4 generations to prove that whoever it was arrived here in a totally legal fashion.
It will be like Obama’s birth certificate but far more diverse and entertaining. If it catches on we could sell the idea to the citizens of Arizona.
While I’m definetely an ASS a lot of the time, I do not suffer from A.S.S.
I can multi-task like a mad man.
As I tell people frequently
I’m good at a large number of things, but not exceptional at many.
I am the one who wants to procrastinate. I really want to. – David M.
…but I just can’t get round to it!
It is. I knew it already, but not the second comment, which is:
I so need to steal that :-)
Autism spectrum. I have it, too.
:-D
No, I have enough willpower to get round to it whenever I feel like it. Sometimes it’s a bit scary.
I’ll now direct my ASS (pun intended) back to work…
Speaking as a non-EU immigrant married to another non-EU immigrant, I hope Theresa May falls in the thames (she can swim, right?), but last I heard they don’t know that the “cap” is going to be- so hopefully something that pacifies the Daily Heil without making any actual difference- and I’m sure I heard her say “unskilled” on PM the other day, so it should be entirely meaningless.
But the 55% confusion makes me want to scream.
The actual coalition deal strikes me as an excellent compromise allowing both parties to jettison their sillier policies while making largely cosmetic concessions- you can have a referendum on something that will not happen, and you get to make the cuts which had to happen anyway.
I guess neither of us got the MP we wanted but hey, look how the government turned out :)
I have ADD, sort of. I just have no real attention span. I’m always doing about eight things at the same time.
Big surprise. It’s been almost 24 hours and my comment on my uncle’s blog post (where he shreds the First Amendment and complains about some mysterious new law prohibiting prayer, and basically says that I don’t deserve to live in the country that was stolen from my ancestors) has not been posted. He’s an arrogant ass like most of my family. He’s been “de-friended.” Heh.
Accepting friend requests from family is a mistake anyway. Unless they are close enough that you really consider them friends. I just have a hard time saying no. Does anybody else have that problem? Do you have a hard time saying no to a friend request from somebody you know (even barely know)?
Stephen Wells@50,
I agree the BBC article is misleading (they do better here, but this is far from an attempt to make things more democratic – it’s a cynical stitch-up: neither coalition partner can precipitate a new election on their own, but crucially, both together can do so – hence the threshold of 55%. If it were really an attempt to make things more democratic, then the condition for a new election would be something like: the government loses a confidence vote, and no alternative that can win one is formed within a month.
So the conversation is about ADD and related conditions. I’ve never been diagnosed with anything like that. I’m just scatterbrained. It’s really causing me problems at work, though. I have so many things to do I can’t keep track of them all. Something slips through the cracks and then I get a lecture. I need to learn a way to keep organized. I think I’m going to try the Tasks app on my iPod. It’s portable and easier to organize than paper is. Papers just get lost on my desk. Any other suggestions are welcome though.
@Knockgoats: since all we’ve seen so far is the one line in the agreement, I wouldn’t fret about things like the time-limit- that should be in the bill, let’s see when it’s drafted – or the exact percent. Scottish parliament has a 66% threshold or one month with no government formed.
Since a vote for an early election would need the coalition to vote unanimously, and that would be tough to whip, I don’t really think it’s crucial.
I don’t see how taking a Crown Prerogative, which makes dissolution the privilege of the PM alone, and making it a supermajority measure for Parliament, can possible be “far from an attempt to make things more democratic.” There’s no point in reflexive opposition or making the perfect the enemy of the good.
On British immigration and limiting “Non-EU immigration” – isn’t this just setting a cap on immigration? I was under the impression that any citizen of an EU country can move freely around the EU, therefore it wouldnt be feasible (without renegotiating treaties etc) to cap EU immigration – are caps on immigration, which are non-specific regarding country of origin, race, religion etc necessarily a bad thing? (Assuming some provision is made for people whose immigration is due to extreme situations such as war, persecution, etc etc?) My feel on this is that there should be some sort of control over the whole situation, but that the focus shouldn’t be on particular groups.
I look forward to reading why I am wrong on this. (as I haven’t thought about it too much, and given that the 2 year period I spent waiting and paying to get over to the US my position probably shouldn’t be what it is…)
(SC OM – I’ll get round to a response, attempted a post last night from home but PZ closed the thread on me and I lost it, I even copied out the statement you wanted and everything (its tl;dr material also))
@73: because of free movement in the EU, you can’t cap total immigration because a number of EU migrants in excess of the cap could enter in any given year.
Holytape @ #19:
I have no idea, but given that George Rekers is both a politician AND a frequenter of male prostitutes, he should know the answer! :)
KOPD: Have you considered buying a Trapper Keeper™?
#74 – I understand you can’t cap number of EU citizens coming in, but isn’t the “non-EU immigration cap” just the only other logical, non-discriminatory cap that you can have (I guess either I worded my post poorly, or am misunderstanding your response) – perhaps my ‘cap on immigration’ is the confused bit here – for the sake of arguement lets assume that immigration from within the EU isn’t being counted as immigration in this case (which, in my mind, it shouldn’t be if the EU is working as intended, particularly as the weather in the south of france is so much nicer)
ie – you’re in a situation where essentially you can’t stop anyone from the EU coming in, but you want some control, the obvious control is to prevent (or at least limit) non-EU immigration – I think in this case you’d have to just ignore the immigration from EU countries and not apply it towards a cap. Is this necessarily a bad thing, and why?
It is unhelpful.
However, the introduction of a 55% threshold for dissolution of parliament coupled to a five year fixed term is bound to be confusing and seemingly sinister. It looks very much like gerrymandering, and will help to protect any sort of Conservative government (for the next five years) much more than it helps to protect the current coalition with the Liberal Democrats.
This also sets a dangerous precedent for future governments to exploit, and the potential for legislatively hamstrung minority administrations (with greater than 45% of the seats) to cling to power until the end of a fixed term.
A party with 36.1% of the vote, holding 47% of the seats, but requiring that 16 of its own must vote against it in order to force a general election? I can see no reason for it not to be a requirement that a simple majority can dissolve parliament, if that same majority is able to win a vote of no confidence. That scenario would seem to be rather undemocratic?
damn
grade school blast from the past funniness
To those referring to OCD — it should be CDO (that way it is alphabetical order in).
Other than the really good debating-muscles work-out, the only good thing about the “poke the creationist” thread was the upside-down pizza recipe @#56.
Is 3ity in the dungeon, yet?
Who got the April Molly?
Stephen Wells,
Nonsense: there should be no provision that allows the governing parties to hold an election at their convenience. The fact that Labour put one in in Scotland is no excuse.
I’m just sitting here kind of gobsmacked that Laura Bush didn’t say anything.
I’m not sure what to do with my respect for her – make it go up or down.
KOPD, regarding Facebook and family, just say you have boundaries and friending family on Facebook crosses them.
Hmmm. I’ve always been inclined towards the idea of fixed-term Parliaments, and I certainly think it’s wrong for the sitting Prime Minister to be able to dissolve Parliament whenever he or she wishes, as has traditionally been the case. But at the same time, I do think some provision is necessary for calling an election in the event that it simply becomes impossible to form a working government. What else could have been done in 1974, for instance?
Even so, a five year fixed term is relatively long, and in practice is not altogether very different to a five year maximum term.
Why? I’m not sure that there is any reason to think that this power has caused problems.
Quite. But why would a working government be considered a simple majority at inception, whereas the loss of that simple majority would not deliver recourse to consult the electorate? Why would a simple majority be deemed to reflect the will of the people in one situation, but not in another?
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Trapper_Keeper_%28South_Park%29
No. I was gonna post the link to Wiki about the Trail of Tears, but I see that Pygmy Loris has already got it covered. Still, it bears repeating; A.J., great guy for whites, non-whites…not so much.
Caine, I love blackberries, and will be delighted to receive fire! ;)
Interesting thing about ADD—by my observation, and keeping in mind the nature of my sample (which is all the males in my family), ADD/ADHD means Welcome to Limited Attention-Span Theater, while somehow not preventing hyper-focusing on something for hours at a time—provided that it is something you are interested in. My youngest brother, who is ADHD (ADD and ADHD run 50/50 among the guys in my family, straight down my father’s side), once described it to me as a situation where everything outside his head was going ‘way too slow, much slower than what was going on inside his head; far too slow, in fact, for him to match “speeds” with everybody else in the classroom. My son, who is ADD, was prescribed Ritalin, and later Adderall; he hated it because it made him feel “slow and stupid”. It made a huge difference in his school work; he passed into 2nd grade solely on the sharp improvement in his work during the last two weeks of 1st grade, when he started on the meds. Our only problem, as he went through school, was to keep his dosage and his growth more-or-less synced-up. Now that he’s an adult, he chooses not to take anything, and he’s doing just fine. Luckily, his keenest interest, which he hyper-focuses on, is computer programming; without having finished his degree, he’s in IT for a local bank. (And I’m very pleased to say, has enrolled to finish his degree this summer/fall! Wheeeee!!!)
We think that it’s the ADD that makes him incredibly good at pretty much any videogame; not such a marketable skill, but impresses the hell out of his peers.
@Pygmy Loris & Caine
My views on Andrew Jackson have become significantly more complex over the last few weeks as Mr. Mattir has embarked on a study of Jackson’s life and presidency as part of a larger project he’s considering. All I knew about Jackson prior to this was the Trail of Tears, and I was pretty appalled that Jackson got to be on the $20 bill given that. Jackson was really a lot more complex though, and an astonishing person and leader in many ways.
(I fully admit that “love” is too strong and unambiguous a word for my attitude towards Andrew Jackson – perhaps appreciate? Admire parts of? Fascinated by?)
In some ways Jackson reminds me of Richard Nixon. It’s easy to remember and loathe Nixon for his wildly grating personality, his pursuit of the Vietnam War, and his paranoid Watergate behavior. It’s harder to remember that Nixon established diplomatic relations with China, signed the Clean Air Act and the National Environmental Policy Act, established the Occupational Safety & Health Administration, the Environmental Protection Agency, and the Consumer Products Safety Commission, and tried to implement a universal health care system.
That’s so funny! I was just thinking the other day about Trapper Keepers!
***
http://www.counselling.cam.ac.uk/concen.html
***
Ewan, here’s the sentence:
What is clear from a large proportion of existing laboratory, mesocosm, and in situ experiments, and has been noted by several of the above investogators, is that glyphosate formulations containing the POEA surfactant and Roundup Original Max (which contains an undivulged surfactant) have the same potential to cause substantial amphibian mortality at environmentally expected concentrations. (my bold)
That’s the key point. That.
I have to wonder if you even read all of the 2005 articles…
Good.
Why is that important to recognize? We’re talking about a specific product used for specific purposes.
These are different products with different uses. But this is still a ridiculous fallacy. Even if you were talking about other herbicides containing POEA this would still have no relevance to the evidence concerning Roundup. None whatsoever. Nor would whether I personally am criticizing the use of these products. The evidence remains the same for Roundup.
But again, this doesn’t make you look good. You work there and had to know that POEA was involved, with its expected toxicity. Yet you said nothing about that here, and even wrote (I linked to it earlier “Roundup (glyphosate)” as though none of the other additives were relevant. And this is while defending a company with a record of lying and scheming concerning the alleged safety of its products.
I should hope not.
This sentence has nothing to do with anything preceding it. It’s simply bizarre. But decisions about its use have to be based on on the evidence of its effects. That evidence should be honestly gathered before it’s sold or used, and whenever evidence emerges it needs to be addressed.
Individuals can’t be considered guilty for using a product when the proper vetting of that product hasn’t been done by the people responsible for doing it.
Bugger all? So you wouldn’t be concerned with dropping non-herbicidal chemicals lethal to a large number of organisms over these ecosystems?
No, the opposite end of the usage spectrum from Plan Colombia would be not to spray the stuff at all.
I’m thinking you haven’t really read the articles.
Stop being so fucking disingenuous. The argument isn’t that if the use in Plan Colombia has serious effects domestic use will, too. It’s the reverse. Since the research deals with the effects of domestic use, the reasonable inference is that spraying from high altitudes, using high concentrations, including other chemicals is going to be utterly disastrous. But this is precisely what the Plan Colombia people are denying in their congessional testimony. And in this they appear to be fully supported by the corporation you work for.
I read that and thought, damn, that’s me. And my son. We both have very limited attention spans (my son studies for college exams surrounded by legos (and he is currently building a 2-8-4+4-8-2 Beyer-Garret out of the bricks), alternating between legos and studying (and it works)) for most things but, if it is something that interests us, we glom onto it and don’t want to let go. At work, wading through emails is torture (and I tend to very quickly enter what (((Wife))) calls National ADHD Minute mode), but give me a graphics or historical writing project and you damn near have to pry me loose.
Our school kept trying to put (((Boy))) into their ADHD program but our psychiatrist diagnosed him with what was then known as Asperger’s Syndrome. The attention problems were just a minor part of a larger set of difficulties (which, in retrospect, is exactly what I went through in the 70s). He never recieved medication for the attention disorder, but was successfully treated using an anti-depressant (he said it slowed him down so that he could be who he thought he was (if that makes sense)) and an anti-tic medication.
The good news is he’s now doing well in school, but his study habits (and note-taking habits) are strange. He takes notes with two pieces of paper — on one, he takes the notes; on the other, he draws. Should work. He’s double-majoring in history and fine art and design, so his study/class habits fit right in. Or overlap right in.
@ Knockgoats, Stepen Wells, Walton, and anyone else discussing the new UK “coalition” government –
I actually think we now have the worst of all governments possible, given the election results.
As far as I can see, all it means is that the Lib Dems can’t vote against any Tory policies. Eg, nuclear power, to which they were totally opposed, and got many votes because they opposed it. Now we will definitely get new nuclear power stations, whereas any proposals might have been defeated. (Forget the bollocks about “only with no public subsidies”. They’ll just hide the subsidies).
The “coalition” hasn’t “tempered the extremes” at all. The Tories didn’t have the numbers to get their crazier policies through parliament anyway. Now, with the LibDems agreeing to abstain from voting against the Tories, they can pass legislation with a minority of MPs (and election votes).
Nor do I understand why Clegg agreed so swiftly to a referendum on AV. It’s probably the least democratic alternative to FPTP. In fact, as the Electoral Reform Society says,
It just favours the established parties and will mean that no minor parties will ever get MPs, unless they actually get over 50% of the vote in a constituency. The 10% reduction in constituency numbers makes it even worse. I thought the LibDems were going for AV+, at least. Labour would have backed it, having devised it originally. I will certainly not be voting for plain AV. I don’t want to give even my millionth preference to the fucking Tories, nor will I ever give a vote to the LibDems now, so basically I’ll still just be casting one vote, which means it’s just like FPTP. Maybe there will be a “spoil your vote if you want real PR” campaign.
* Of course I do understand why they rolled over so easily. They want power and are prepared to ditch any long held principles to get it. Quelle surprise! Oh well, this will destroy the LibDem vote at the next election. They have just blown the best, and probably only, chance we will ever have for real Proportional Representation, and they won’t be forgiven by the majority of ther supporters, or anyone else who wanted proper PR and voted tactically for them this time. (Not me, but many people I know).
Oh, and I’m just so pleased that a bunch of multi-millionaires have voted for a 5% pay cut so they can “share” the pain of the rest of the country when they savagely cut public services.
We’ve been screwed again.
csreid @ #16 wrote:
“Well I’m not really a believer…but thanks for the invitation..”
I’ve had ADHD for my whole life and am now dealing with (((Son))) and his inheritance of ADHD from my side of the family. The interesting thing about ADHD is that it seems to be a flaw in
the ability to tune out extraneous stimuli (both internal and external) under normal arousal conditions. So while sitting and reading a textbook, I am simultaneously aware of the funny noise from the fridge, the weird tingling in my eft foot, the fly buzzing, the reflection of the light of the pages of the book, the smell of laundry soap in my clothes… Tuning out the noise is astonishingly difficult. When I get interested enough in something, though, I can tune out just about anything – the ability to hyperfocus is also associated with ADHD.
I learned in grad school is that women tend to be of the inattentive variety (daydreaming, staring off into space), while men tend to be hyperactive. (I think both women and men are impulsive.) I was told by a supervisor once that for an elementary school aged girl to get referred for an ADHD evaluation she was likely to be far more disturbed than the average boy referred, because the spacy symptoms likely to be exhibited by girls don’t tend to attract teacher notice.
One of the best results from medication is that I’ve learned what paying attention actually feels like and can do it to some extent even if I haven’t taken meds that day. So now when the traffic report comes on the radio, I can actually maintain focus on it until the part about my particular road comes on.
WRT AD(H)D:
Yeah, I used to think that my ability to hyper-focus on books or speed through tests (which, as a kid, I took no small amount of pride in) ruled out my having some version of AD(H)D… it wasn’t until last year (age 24) that I learned it was actually a primary symptom, heh.
In the words of a buddy of mine, whose whole famlity has AD(H)D: “Wow, [Falyne], yes. I figured you already knew.”
I’m also non-neurotypical in that I have weird compulsion and anxiety things. Like, when I was a kid, I couldn’t get past the fear that my perception was fooling me. I couldn’t stand to be naked, because I would be afraid that, say, my shower would suddenly change into a public place, and everyone would be shocked by the inappropriate crazy naked person.
The lack of privacy in boarding school got me to give up the shower-in-a-swimsuit thing, and I’m lazy enough to be practically a nudist at home now, but I’m still sometimes compelled to, say, stop watching pr0n because I’m afraid people are actually in the room. I don’t know if this falls under OCD, or what.
Oh, and I still sometimes have panic attacks over ‘supernatural’ things like scary dark shapes in my room (much less now that I intellectually reject their sources, heh) and a spasmy tic. My brainmeats haz a weird.
oh I can’t not tell you how familiar that is
I’d say, I’m looking for the kind of male friend who likes to drink beer and tell dirty jokes; I’m looking for the kind of female friend who’s lusty and passionate and wants to have fun in bed. Why would I go looking for people like that in a place that not only frowns on such activities in their institution, but is full of obnoxious killjoys who don’t want other people to do any of that anywhere? If I were looking for someone to talk poetry and literature, after all, I wouldn’t be going to monster truck rallies. (Not that you couldn’t find poets at such places, but they’d be a bit thin on the ground.)
I had a coping skill at school for my undiagnosed ADD. I would take notes. Verbatim. The whole lecture.
I write at lightspeed but it’s illegible. Doesn’t matter, I never looked back at them anyway. The act of writing forced me to keep hearing the words and I’d usually end up memorizing the whole thing.
As a result I was popular in study groups :P
Ha! The fake science posters site I put up yesterday now has a new one devoted to fucking magnets and how they work.
I had that problem as well. I solved it in one fell swoop by deleting one account and making a new one. That wasn’t the reason for doing so (it was to delete four years of history that I had under the assumption that facebook wasn’t entirely evil), but it was a nice side effect. I figure if the person’s posts always make me annoyed enough to hide them, and I’ve already put them on a “no status” list from me, there’s really no point for that connection to be there. Then again, my own dad hasn’t responded to my friend request from my new account, so I guess it’s cutting both ways. ;)
I use sticky notes attached to my monitor, and then went to the stickies application. Works as long as I’m at my monitor. I have a new ipod with the notes app thing, so I might try that too. But then I have to remember to carry around the ipod. I work with a guy who just carries around a stack of 3x5s and a pencil in his pocket at all times – I’m getting pretty close to that. I have a little teensy notebook, and a calendar with note pages, etc. I adore the idea and accouterments of being organized, but the long term proper use thereof has still escaped me.
iambilly – my son is diagnosed with Asperger, too. Do you find yourself constantly noticing something weird you do and going “oh, so that’s where he gets it”? I swear, I do that all the time now. :D
In retrospect, it’s obvious that I’ve got ADD as well. Lucky for me, I tended to hyper-focus on books, so I inadvertently got an education while completely ignoring such outside-my-head trivia as what the teachers were saying. I never noticed any time-out-of-synch problems, myself, but there was nothing going on outside my head that was anywhere near as interesting as what was going on inside it, which included the written-word input. The only thing that gave me trouble was math, which I never once read (and accidentally absorbed) for pleasure.
Downside—I never learned how to study properly, which became a problem in college. Which is why I never finished a degree. Which makes me feel just a little under-endowed in this crowd, but oh, well.
Building more nuclear power stations is a sensible idea. Like it or not, we simply cannot meet our current energy needs from renewable sources. The only way to realistically reduce our carbon emissions, and our dependence on fossil fuels, is to expand the use of nuclear power.
I disagree. They have already agreed in principle to end the detention of child refugees; this is an important step in the right direction. As I’ve mentioned in some detail above, I also think the compromise tax policy is an important improvement.
Hold your horses. You haven’t given this government a chance yet! You are pre-judging them based on bizarre preconceptions about the Conservatives.
This government will not be perfect. But I expect it will be markedly better for civil liberties and individual freedom than the previous Labour government was. I could, of course, be wrong – and will say so if I am proved wrong. (I’ve already outlined the issues I care about, and will be criticising the government loudly if it goes the wrong way on those issues.) But unlike you, I am not condemning this government before it’s had a chance to do anything.
As to AV, I’m undecided as to how I will vote on it. As you say, it doesn’t seem to make a huge difference to the existing FPTP system, and is not “proportional” in any sense. Given the choice, I’d rather have the Additional Member system as used in Scotland and Wales; but I just don’t see it as that much of an important issue.
Trapper Keepers. What a flashback! :-)
Add tinnitus to that and it fits. Maybe that’s got something to do with why I suck at reading books. It’s difficult when your attention is fractured into a dozen subprocesses. Hence I end up re-reading the same paragraph 3 times before it gets digested. I never finish a library book before it’s due.
I say. “I’m not really into the church scene” and laugh. It may be a bit rude to some, but it’s honest. I’m really not.
Or some times I might say something ambiguous like “Ugh, when did church become a sinlges club?”
I love sticky-notes.
All my books are full of sticky-notes.
I also learned to read fast and so it wouldn’t be unusual to read 4 or 500 pages in one night, jotting down truly random fragments until I saw some kind of shape or key line of information in the data input.
I have to read fast, if I don’t force myself to the max I won’t be able to read more than a few paragraphs before I start thinking about any and everything else, or obsessing over whether my foot itches, or how my contacts feel on my eyes, or who has or hasn’t called, or… or… or…
On my computer, in Accessories there’s “Windows Sidebar,” where sticky notes are one of the gadget options.
Word on The Street has it that Adderall is now the most ab/used drug on local college campuses.
How many of ya’ll were the first to finish a test (or one of the first)? I (and my son) either finish a test really, really fast and get a good grade, or fail if the test takes a while? Going into the Army, I finished every test in 1/3 the allotted time (there was one math test which tested speed — they told me that no one finishes all the problems. I did.) with good scores. I also read really fast (and read three or four books at a time).
Nice to know I’m not the only weirdo out there. Here. On earth. Wherever.
http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2010/04/22/60minutes/main6422159.shtml
Knitting has been my biggest attention-focusing tool – if I’m doing something with my hands, I can listen to people, focus on books, etc. It’s saved my life in staff meetings through the years. In law school, I propped my casebooks up in a recipe book holder and knitted a lot of sweaters. Got me through quite well.
I’ve started listening to books on tape more than I actually read, since the reader is slower and I can do something with my hands that requires more visual attention than knitting does (i.e. spinning or carding wool). The knitted squids will probably require actual visual attention as well – oh well…
I have a button on my purse that says “I knit so I do not kill people.” That’s another side benefit.
Almost always was one of the first to finish. If I wasn’t that meant I was in trouble. Thankfully that was rare, but the few times it did happen I thought my head was going to go into core meltdown.
If I knew the info I could blow through tests fast and score high.
I totally believe that.
Hell it’s not just college campuses. I know people my age who abuse it.
Add me to the “Test Fast or Last” club.
I’m getting a little curious as to whether there really is a disproportionate number of ‘differently-wired’ folks hanging out here, or whether it just seems that way.
Walton
We disagree.
It will just mean that there will be even less money available for the development and implementation of renewable resources, and a public peception that it’s needed. We ahardly manfacture anything in this country anymore, we could have become world leaders in the new technologies.
They’ll just stop people getting into the country to claim asylum in the first place. (“Border police” etc).
I don’t.
That’s the silliest of all your comments. I’m thrice your age, and have seen a lot of Conservative governments and politicians. I don’t have any “bizarre preconceptions” about them, I have experience of what they have done, and they haven’t changed, nor will they ever. Do you somehow think I don’t know what they campaigned on, and what they said thay will do?
You may not, but the LibDems claimed to, and campaigned on it. It was one of their central policies (probably their main policy). Many people voted for them precisely because of that.
Cicely:
I’m noticing the same thing. Whenever someone brings up a personal quirk, there seem to be lots of ‘me too’s’.
I’ve always been a fast test-taker. My record, though, was my Organismic Biology final. There were 1000 points in that class and the final was 100 of it. I needed 7 for a B and 107 for an A. With an A being an impossibility, and the test being multiple choice, I was pretty much guaranteed a B. I just read the questions and if I immediately knew the answer I’d circle it, and if I didn’t know the answer I’d circle A, never stopping to think. Out of 110 minutes it took me 20 and I was the first or second out the door.
It worked.
Evidence for the common ancestry of all known life.
:-o
How strongly I can focus on something depends strongly on how interesting it is and how tired I am, and I tolerate lower levels of ambient noise than other people. I have a fair amount of trouble learning stuff I’m not interested in, while I remember most of what I am interested in from just hearing or reading it once.
Math simply isn’t pleasure. That’s why I quit studying chemistry.
But for how long? Breeder reactors still don’t work; uranium will run out in a few decades at the current rate of consumption; where do you store the waste for the next thirty thousand years?
I suggest wind, the tides, and sea waves.
Me too. Oh wait…
Quick survey: All those who are normal, raise your hand.
David Marjanović Author Profile Page
Especially as the UK is just about the windiest mass populated place on earth (couldn’t believe how windy it was when I first came to the UK) AND has some of the highest tides anywhere. If not here, where?
Why should any developing nation listen to us telling them what do about about emissions and using renewable energy if we don’t do it?
Why should anyone listen to us telling them not go nuclear?
@iambilly – There are no hands raised.
Building more nuclear power stations is a sensible idea. Like it or not, we simply cannot meet our current energy needs from renewable sources. – Walton
Walton, how do you think you know this? Have you studied the question? I suspect I know a good deal more about it than you do, and I don’t know. A lot depends on how fast technologies for storing energy advance – and that depends in large part on how much is invested in them.
The only way to realistically reduce our carbon emissions, and our dependence on fossil fuels, is to expand the use of nuclear power.
I do know this is nonsense, though: we can certainly reduce both quite considerably through use of renewables alone. Whether we can do so enough is, in my view, an open question. What is certain is that new nuclear build will do very little in the next decade. The plans, IIRC, call for the first new nuclear capacity to come on line in 2018 – and that’s making the assumption, contrary to all historical experience of nuclear plant construction, that the programme will run to time (take a look at the history of the Oikiluoto plant being constructed in Finland if you doubt me: this was supposed to be the demonstration that nuclear is the future). Short-term, investment in insulating houses, switching to more efficient boilers, and improving public transport will do far more per £ than anything else.
Most renewable forms of electricity generation have a much higher cost per kilowatt-hour than fossil-fuel-generated electricity. If we rely exclusively on renewable power sources, this will mean both a massive capital investment cost (which is going to come from where, given that we urgently need to cut public spending?) and much higher costs of electricity production. Which will mean pensioners unable to afford to heat their homes, and so on.
The last time there was a Conservative government was 1997. Apart from Ken Clarke and (off the top of my head) Sir George Young, no one in the new Cabinet has served in any previous Conservative government. It’s a different generation with different ideas and values – just as the Thatcher generation was very different from earlier forms of Conservative politics. I just don’t think we can judge this government until they actually have a chance to do stuff.
Manifesto promises are usually bullshit. I supported the Conservatives in the hope and expectation that most of the sillier right-wing policies in the manifesto would not actualy be implemented. Thus far, it looks like I was right.
Mattir: I didn’t see any either.
How about the Bay of Fundy for tidal power?
iambilly
raises hand
Really surprised at the number of people here with all these nerological problems. I only know two people with mild Aspergers, and no one with anythng else.
@Ring Tailed Lemurian
You do know that things like depression, anxiety, autism symptoms and ADHD are distributed on a bell curve and that there’s no such thing as “normal,” right? Given the prevalence of depression and ADHD, I would say that you just don’t know everyone’s diagnostic status.
Yes, they keep moving further to the right, pursued by Labour and the LibDems.
Sack up and say ‘I’m not religious, so that’s not really an option’.
Mattir
It wasn’t me who used the word “normal”. I said “problems”.
Ring Tailed:
My ‘problem’ has allowed me to be creative, both on an artistic and academic level. I know that my brain processes information differently than a majority of adults. My coping mechanisms helped me to become a better student and, possibly, be better in my job. Abnormal doesn’t mean problem any more than disability means inability.
Tl;dr post coming up. Apologies again. I have no capacity to break complex matters like this down into awesome soundbites.
Sure, the statement you are referring to is
“What is clear from a large proportion of existing laboratory, mesocosm, and in situ experiments, and has been noted by several of the above investigators, is that glyphosate formulations containing the POEA surfactant and Roundup OriginalMax (which contains an undivulged surfactant) have the same potential to cause substantial amphibian mortality at environmentally expected concentrations.”
However there is no citation given for environmentally expected concentrations, other than the Canadian study, which is well below the LD50(96h) (and actually is below the LD10(96h) values stated for all but one species – which then makes perfect sense of why the Canadian study saw a non-significant (p=0.13) effect of roundup – around where you’d expect considering mortality difference between control and treated was ~10% (in absolute terms)) concentrations stated in the article – although not below NEOAL, in an area of wetland directly aerially sprayed with Roundup.
First my accusation that you were considering things in a vacuum stands – you fail to take into account the differential impact of RR systems compared to conventional, and you fail to take into account the body of peer-reviewed literature around roundup’s environmental and health safety OTHER than the Relyea studies.
Let me restate the zero inputs as zero herbicidal inputs, for the sake of argument. You still require a wholesale change in how agriculture works for this to happen. The evidence still suggests strongly that roundup, while not non-toxic, is less toxic than the commonly used herbicidal regimes – although as I think I stated earlier, glufosinate useage in conjunction with glufosinate resistant plants does appear to offer, based on the literature, a less environmentally impactful solution than even the RR system. I agree that decisions about our tools and techniques have to be based on an honest evaluation of the evidence concerning them. I contend that you are not even remotely interested in an honest evaluation of the evidence however. You appear to be tied up completely in a subset of the data which supports your prior assumptions, while ignoring all the other data. For instance:-
Safety Evaluation and Risk Assessment of the Herbicide Roundup1 and Its Active Ingredient, Glyphosate, for Humans – Gary M. Williams,Robert Kroes, and Ian C. Munro Regulatory Toxicology and Pharmacology 31, 117–165 (2000)
Which covers various mammalian studies (rats, mouse, dog, human, rabbit conducted from between the 1970’s and 1990’s, acute and chronic exposure studies, toxic and sub-toxic studies) giving conclusions on NEOAL levels for glyphosate, AMPA, and POEA for mammals. Also included are genotoxicity studies, specific organ/system effect studies, human exposure studies.
Or for a broader view on environmental impacts:-
The Current Status and Environmental Impacts of Glyphosate-Resistant Crops: A Review
Antonio L. Cerdeira and Stephen O. Duke – J. Environ. Qual. 35:1633–1658 (2006).
Which, amongst various points made suggests that adoption of roundup ready crops (and therefore use of roundup) has resulted in benefits in terms of fossil fuel useage (reduced manufacturing, reduced no. of sprayings. Also covers effects on soil microbes (minimal), soil loss and compaction (positive benefit due to useage in no-till ag), air quality (variable – roundup non-volatile at 25C so reduced problems, however proximity to fields sprayed with roundup causes issues for non-GM crops as drift of roundup will kill em), effects on water (positive, even when taking into account Relyea’s studies), effects on non-target organisms (plant and animal) – my own personal take home from the conclusion, with respect to the environment – “In the contextof the replaced herbicides and agronomic practices, theapparent health and environmental benefits of the glyphosate/GRC combination are significant. Glyphosate is more environmentally and toxicologically benign thanmany of the herbicides that it replaces. In most cases, theeffects on soil, air, and water contamination and on non-target organisms appear to be relatively small”
I’d also suggest looking through the literature at EIQ comparisons between conventional and RR utilizing regimes – Brookes & Barfoot are a good start point for delving into the literature here (although as a partisan source obviously not the definitive study – as their data is predominantly sourced from the peer reviewed literature however it does at least have some value)
Which I think also covers :-
I’ll stop making claims about Roundup toxicity until there is a comprehensive review. Luckily there’s already been a comprehensive review, as detailed above. (working on the assumption that decades of peer reviewed literature satisfies the requirement for comprehensive review). The fact there has been decades of work on the effects of roundup also make a bit of a mockery of the claim that Monsanto has fought this, if they have then they’ve done a pretty shitty job given the wealth of information available. I’m glad however we both agree that Relyea’s work is only a small (albeit important and interesting) part of the whole picture.
I’m not even remotely attempting to make things out as unclear, that apparently is your intention – muddying the waters with a handful of studies showing harm to amphibians and implying that this makes roundup completely awful. Suggesting that there is not comprehensive knowledge around the environmental consequences of roundup useage (at least in terms of achievable comprehensive knowledge), refusal to acknowledge that compared to other systems in use roundup is less environmentally damaging – the literature categorically is not unclear in this regard – the issue is complex, and open to vast misinterpretation, particularly if you focus solely on one authors investigation into one of the few areas where a ‘gap’ in the knowledge was identified.
Next bit stems from SCOMs post on this thread…. Hence explaining any repetition or disjoin between sections….
Because you can’t just consider roundup blindly in a vacuum. If roundup causes x amount of environmental damage, or toxicity, it is categorically important to consider this on the scale of other things which cause environmental damage when making any sort of subjective judgement about it. If x is less than the damage caused by other practices then surely utilization of roundup is preferential rather than a continuation of the status quo?
and does fall within the sort of aquatic toxicities one would expect to see from detergents
Sure, the evidence remains the same. However what you do with that evidence is vastly different. If it turns out that roundup is comparible, or better than other products in terms of toxicity (which articles cited above suggests is the case) then utilization would appear to be the best course of action, if roundup is worse in terms of toxicity, then the best course of action would be non-utilization (which based on the scientific evidence is why the user instructions for roundup formulations containing POEA expressly state not to use it below the water line, in aquatic situations etc)
Actually, until this conversation I wasn’t all that aware of POEA at all, hadn’t read Relyea (or at least don’t remember doing so, my guess is I skimmed references to his work in the various reviews on roundup safety and discounted them because they were a minor negative in a sea of positive data) – I work here on a project completely unrelated to POEA or indeed roundup in any of its incarnations – I work on the Nitrogen team in the yield and stress project (or whatever level of hierarchical shindiggery yield and stress is) whereas herbicide resistance is dealt with by completely different folk. Not sure why somebody not knowing all the inner workings of all their companies products would necessarily make them look bad, particularly when their work is not directly involved in that product (as far as I know roundup itself is in a completely different division to the oneI work in)
Indeed. Which is why decisions about roundup useage are based on the evidence of its effects. Which is why roundup containing POEA has express statements concerning useage around water.
I don’t believe anyone suggested they should be.
That’s a rather hyperbolic assumption no? I’m far more concerned about the effects of the glyphosate in terms of plan columbia than on effects of POEA on amphibians. Destruction of crops, destruction of surrounding ecosystems by drift – these are what concerns me, the toxicological evidence for non-target species suggests that this is far and away a smaller issue than the toxicological evidence for target species.
Sure if you’re going to be completely pedantic about it. However home use, and wide non-consensual useage of airdropped herbicide still satisfy my definition of being on opposite ends of the spectrum. Perhaps I shouldn’t have used the qualifier ‘complete’ as that appears to have caused some confusion there.
I’m thinking you’ve only read the articles, and none of the rest of the literature.
Apparently we’re discussing at cross purposes here. I think Plan Colombia is immoral because destroying farms and vegetation by aerial spray on the suspicion that someone is growing something you don’t like is wrong – I’m not convinced that the other ecological impacts of roundup make it any more or less wrong, and on the balance of evidence would rather that roundup was used than other herbicides (assuming something is going to be used)
wow
I don’t know by heart how highly nuclear energy is subsidised… but I’ve read it’s rather insane.
1. Such an accumulation of nerds, and you seriously expected a bunch of neurotypicals!?!
2. I actually like it that way.
Most renewable forms of electricity generation have a much higher cost per kilowatt-hour than fossil-fuel-generated electricity.
Well, only if you don’t take into account the environmental damage. In any case, renewable costs are falling rapidly; fossil fuel costs are not.
If we rely exclusively on renewable power sources, this will mean both a massive capital investment cost (which is going to come from where, given that we urgently need to cut public spending?)
Given that most of our generating capacity needs to be replaced over the next few decades anyway, this argument is otiose. And we get the money from the rich, by taxing them properly.
and much higher costs of electricity production. Which will mean pensioners unable to afford to heat their homes, and so on..
See above, and my comment on insulation and boilers.
Yes.
I didn’t think this was a “nerd” site, I thought it attracted people who are a) atheists, b) interested in science.
Are you saying I should expect science-interested athiests to have neurological problems?
Really? The fundies will love that.
@David M.:
Nerds aren’t neurotypical? Hah, that’s crazy. Of course we’re neurotypical. The other day I went for a drive down the road into Old Town and there was a store there with some really nice antiques. I’m pretty sure they were from India. I’ve never been that far overseas, though I kinda want to go to Japan one day. I really like the stuff that comes out of Japan, anime and manga and video games and stuff like that. I’ve been learning Japanese, but it’s kind of a hard language to figure out because there’s the formal and informal as well as the male and female forms on the language. I wrote my own kind of language for some books I’m writing, it’s based a lot around…
Wait, what were we talking about again?
hahahahahaha
I dunno; Oklahoma City is pretty populous, and awefully darned windy. (Fairly) recently, a wind farm has gone up west of OKC; a lot of people I know, wonder what took them so long.
—
Pharyngula—Atheist Sanctuary and Neuroatypical Support Group. :)
A_ray_in_Dilbert_space @ 38
Wait, what? I have a hard time believing this.
Surely no physicist would believe something like this (unless perhaps they had a severe mental illness). If he espouses such a belief, he’s surely the one doing the suckering, not being suckered. But then, I’d expect a lying physicist to come up with something less transparently retarded.
I prefer to think of non-standard mental wiring as not so much neurological problems, as evidence of the presence of selectable variants; i.e., the species not putting all of it’s cognitive eggs in one basket. Metaphorically speaking.
Mad Videogaming Skillz might turn out to be important.
No, really.
I’m not kidding.
My son finds that his ADD is very helpful in driving, when bundled with fast reflexes. Very useful in not getting killed in a car wreck before passing on those genes, given the rather large (and increasing, I think) number of complete idiots on the roads today.
Don’t look at me like that….
When did Ken Ham become an astronaut?
You know, cicely I find myself hyper aware of my surroundings when I compare them to many people I know.
This can be a good and bad thing.
For example, driving, when I used to play video games, being aware of my surroundings in unfamiliar situations etc.. it works in my favor.
But I’m also hyper-critical and hyper-sensitive of people around me who seem to be completely unaware of the others near them or their environment.
Not holding the door for people, stepping in front of people, stopping in the middle of a walkway or isle thereby blocking it and totally ignoring what that does to people around them, people with headphones on that don’t see the old lady they about ran over etc.. And not just things involving common courtesy. It can be the slightest move from someone that even very minorly inconveniences someone else in my eyes. Most people wouldn’t even notice it but I do.
My wife gets on my ass a lot about letting it go, and I typically don’t let it bother me, but occasionally it grabs me.
Through the years I’ve attributed at least some of this to my ADD and being unable to tune out a lot of environmental stimuli. Now some of it is my upbringing and having some sense of courtesy being driven into me.
Or maybe I’m just a grumpy old fucker and I’m trying to pass it off as something else.
Small update from Derek Lowe: How not to do it.
Now with added video. Sorta like Mythbusters on speed.
Fuck you too, David.
Malawi gay couple who ‘married’ face harsh prison sentences
Meanwhile, on UK TV tonight we have a report on the use of child labour (3 year olds!) in the Malawi tobacco industry. Good to see they have their priorities right.
You probably know more, only they haven’t said anything. There’s much stigma attached to it. Mark Chu-Carroll wrote a good piece about it.
I’m sure there’s a a lot of overlap between b) and “nerds”.
Being that interested in science isn’t normal, sadly.
Why do you say “problems”? My autistic ability to do repetitive work, and that fast (once I get around to starting it; my supervisor is astounded at my speed every time again), comes in handy at times, for example in… all my publications, actually, and even more so in some half-baked manuscripts we’ll have to get back to later. SIWOTI syndrome, autistic pedantry, has got me two papers, and I’m working on two more. My selective learning ability (I remember most of what I find interesting immediately) has helped a lot for the same manuscripts, and so on…
I’m working to get paid for having these “problems”! :-)
<mad-scientist cackling>
Several recent papers have found that videogaming trains some important thinking skills. I forgot which ones exactly, though.
Yeah. Like Parisians not getting the ideas of 1) letting people get out of the métro train before getting in themselves; 2) standing up, let alone working their way through the crowd to the door, before the train stops. Grrrmpf. <snarl>
Or Viennese thinking “dogs only with muzzle and leash” only applies to other people, if anyone. In the park/nature reserve today, I encountered maybe 10 dogs, not one of them with a muzzle or a leash. One immediately ran towards me… not reacting and just keeping walking worked; the owners, only an arm’s length away, only called the dog back after it could have been too late.
And the folk here have i) thought quite a lot about the people that they are; ii) are comfortable with that and iii) don’t give a damn if someone else doesn’t like it. Not everybody is so lucky.
Memory?
iambilly:
*raises hand* ;) I was one of those obnoxious kids. I was also reading at college level at 10. I learned to keep that bit of info to myself and figured out I’d get along a little better if I took my time over tests.
Mattir:
A while back, a friend in London sent me a set of tapes, Harry Potter and The Philospher’s Stone, read by Stephen Fry. I didn’t have a tape player though, so they just sat. Bought a nice boombox in town yesterday and started listening last night. It’s absolutely delightful. I think I’m going to have to start doing more audiobooks.
Rev. BDC:
This
“Normal” – in this case neurotypical – is a dreadful concept. Stultifying, paranoia-inducing, useful only to enforce social control.
If I ever stopped knitting – hi! Mattir – I could do a great tome on How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love My Brain (the way it is.)
Because some of the people here with these conditions said they caused them problems.
I’m not disputing, as people have said, that there are compensations. If fact, having a nephew with Aspergers, I know it to be true. The lad learns languages (on his own, from books) at amazing speed, got a very good degree at Oxford, and is brilliant at mental arithmetic, amongst other things. He’s now very happy as a librarian.
He did used to be terrified by the normal sort of in-family affectionate teasing, not being able to read the “affection” bit. (That was before the diagnosis, of course. No one teases him any more).
David M,
do you have the full text of that Nature article by any chance ? 32USD is a bit steep….
Btw, the high number of bearers of neurological conditions of the attention ** spectrum here just tells me that the diagnosis is made too often and indiscriminate, not that atheists who like science all have neurological disorders.
I’m finding this neuroatypical/typical discussion facinating.
As a kid I was the great daydreamer who got lousy grades in most classes because I never paid any attention. Yet I was well above average in anything that actually interested me.
I still daydream, but also am getting a shorter and shorter attention span, even with things I do like. I’m often up and down like a yo-yo when reading a book or watching TV because my mind keeps wandering. Yet other times I get so into it that hours will pass before I move. There’s no pattern to it.
Lately I’ve really started to annoy myself – I’m not sure if my behaviour has changed or I’m just noticing it more. I’ve always been fairly tidy, but in some things I’ve become irritatingly obsessive about certain things.
For example, I’ll be watching TV/a DVD and I’ll glance at the DVD shelves and I’ll notice one pile is slightly out of alignment. That will start to bother me to the point I can’t enjoy my viewing until I get up and straighten the pile. Ditto with noticing something not in the right spot on one of the bookcases. It bugs the shit out of me that I can’t just let it be.
I can’t leave drawers slightly open or have any tiny scrap of fabric poking out of the sliding closet doors. Knick knacks need to be lined up a certain way and must be fixed if the get out of their spots.
Yet, at the same time, I can leave a sink of dirty dishes for a day, chuck my coat/sweater on a chair in the lounge room and not hang it up for days, not make the bed until the sheets need changing. None of that bugs me at all. And it’s not because they are not in my line of sight, because when I do notice they are untidy, it doesn’t matter to me.
Chalk me up as another weirdo.
Ah never mind, I see PZ has it covered…:-)
I don’t know how your courses are constructed, but aside from a general math course that all scientists at my university were required to take, I barely saw another piece of calculus.
Then again, I chose the Org. Chem. pathway. If you took Phys. Chem., you were up to your ears in Fourier transforms, matrices, and partial differential equations. And beyond. NTTAWWT.
I decided not to go into chemistry because there just wasn’t enough math for me.
The subject of neurolgical conditions/problems/gifts/whatfuckingever :) reminds me of P.K. Dick’s Clans of the Alphane Moon where the population of an isolated space colony have separated themselves in to seven “clans” :-
the Paranoids,
the Maniacs,
the Schizoprenics,
the Polymorphic Schizoprenics,
the Hebephreniacs,
the OCDs,
and the Clinically Depressed.
“write about what you know” :)
I am of the opinion that there’s people who have Asperger’s and autism and then there’s people like me who are simply nerdy as anything, intelligent, extremely introverted, rather misanthropic, and while aware of social norms and reasonably socially adept somewhat dismissive of the more absurd rules, and get told by their mother-who-has-a-Google-U-psychology-degree that they have either one of those things when they most verifiably do not.
Not that there is not significant overlap between the two categories, but. It’s a bit like a Venn diagram.
that’s me… though you have to add depression to the 1st paragraph, resulting in skipping class more and more because it was boring as fuck, required me to get up at unnatural hours, and involved contact with too many people, which back then I hadn’t yet learned to deal with effectively. (oh, and eventually, resentment from said people for “not doing my part” and pretty much only showing up to exams, and still getting decent grades in them)
Generally, the only way I can really concentrate and learn information is if it’s interesting, and either if I can read it, or learn it via discussion (ideally, both at once. Yay Pharyngula!). Lectures make me fall asleep, and videos need to be under 5 minutes, or else I lose interest (with the exception of a handful of TED talks). Recently I’ve also started having problems with my mind wandering when I was reading, but I solved that by starting a blog and dumping all the mind-wandering on there. It works: once I’ve thrown it up on there, it usually goes away and I can finish reading in peace.
Also, math is awesome!
Sideways. Crosswise even. With triple ring integrals, differential equations of untold order and degree, div, grad, rot, advanced juggling of matrices…
I’ve told the story a couple of times. The first part of Mathematics for Chemists was all of highschool maths crammed into one semester,
taughtproclaimed by a professor who didn’t use or need a microphone, first thing in the morning – I fell asleep for a second or two, again and again; the voice was loud, but monotonous. I passed the exam at the second attempt. The second part was the stuff I mentioned above, and then some, taught under the same conditions; I didn’t bother taking the exam and quit. I’m told it’s needed in electrochemistry somewhere.I bet he was incessantly teased in school and didn’t want to be reminded of it. I’ve had experiences like that.
No, unfortunately. Till about a year ago or so, the university gave its institutional access to all students at home via a proxy server, but the proxy server itself has been discontinued. :-(
I definitely suffer from OCD. I’m also pretty certain I have dyspraxia, though I’ve never been diagnosed with it; from early childhood, I had relatively poor motor skills and co-ordination and found it very hard to learn to do physical things. Hence why I’ve never been any good at sports.
I also have a very, very strong general fear reflex. It isn’t a specific phobia, though I do have several of those too. But I’ve always been ultra-nervous of potential physical dangers, and simply unable to do anything that my subconscious mind perceives as physically dangerous. I can’t jump down even from a relatively low height, for example, and I have strong fear-reflexes even walking around the streets (I keep irrationally thinking cyclists are going to cycle into me, for instance). I also hate riding a bike and avoid it wherever possible, as I find the whole experience absolutely terrifying; I keep feeling like I’m going to overbalance ad fall off. And I’m nervous around animals, even relatively harmless ones. I don’t know if this is a “condition” of any kind, or if it’s just old-fashioned physical cowardice. It’s certainly one of the main reasons for my self-hatred.
Rev. BDC:
Snap that.
However I am completely the opposite to you and some of the others here when it comes to exams. For the first third of an exam…I used to just stare at the paper. Then something would switch on, and I would begin to make my way through it. Something to do with the idea, I think, that I didn’t want to commit anything to paper until I had the whole answer in my head, and it could flow out effortlessly. The disadvantage was it would typically take me right down to the wire: I used to be one of those mad scribblers still writing as the proctor was tugging the paper out of my hand.
csreid #16
Heh, I’ve just come across this article about how to answer unwanted invitations.
So do those show-offs riding down the street, hands-free, impress you or freak you out?
I’ve successfully gotten my bike around a corner like that, too.
No, he was diagnosed before he ever went to school (family of doctors and neurosurgeons).
We are all special snowflakes; no doubt about that.
Not just a special snowflake. I’m a special special dumpling of awesome. :-)
Sven: Snowflakes, or flakes?
(I don’t know about the rest of ya’ll, but I know where I stand. Er, sit.)
People who aren’t aware of what’s around them bug the crap outta me, too.
Part of that’s due to having spent the past two years living in NYC, though. The city doesn’t run at all unless people freaking MOVE, so people-who-get-in-your-way is the City’s Universal Pet Peeve. If you don’t develop situational awareness, you’ll be jostled and yelled at, and then people who *haven’t* developed it (ie, everyone here in southern CA) just. drive. you. crazy. when they stop in front of you.
I’m usually just amused by the fact that people I’m with haven’t noticed, say, the small sign way over there that tells us which way to go next. Or going with a grad student of ornithology I know to the aviaries at the SD Zoo, and how we made a good team; I’d spot a bird first, and then she’d identify it and take a picture.
“Oooh, pretty!”
“Oh, that’s a Red-Breasted Wharrgarbler!” *click*
“Oh, that’s pretty too, but I actually meant the snuggling pair nesting a foot in front of your elbows!” (THIS HAPPENED, as she leaned in to take the picture!)
“Verifiably”? You do sound like you have some (though most likely not all!) symptoms of what used to be called Asperger’s Syndrome.
Ah. That sounds more like my over-anxious brother and my over-anxious aunt.
They must have been huge! Oh wait, I get it.
One more example: baby cries, parents don’t react. ARRRRRGH!
“round a corner”? Pfff! You big girl’s blouse!
When I was young if you couldn’t ride hands-free the entire way to school you wouldn’t have any friends. Everyone could do it. Even those in blouses. Meant you never went anywhere near crossings or traffic lights. You just picked you moment and rode across 4 lanes of 2-way traffic. Most of the journey wasn’t even tarred/asphalted, and a lot of what was tarred was “strips”. (Two 18 inch wide strips of tar an axle length apart. With up to a foot drop each side due to erosion).
I’ll shut up now, quite enough from me. Must have undiagnosed Obsessive Posting Compulsion Disorder.
And you wonder why people like me, who physically can’t do stuff like that, are miserable and have low self-esteem? :-(
Damn. I hate society.
Ring Tailed Lemurian:
That’s nothing. When I lived in Arizona (northern Arizona (7200 feet attitude)), we rode to school on surface streets and a long sort of paved trail through the woods. During the winter, the snow piled up so deep on either side that it was an ice canyon. And we still rode without using the handlebars. While carrying a trumpet case. And there was a really steep hill with a turn at the bottom. Which sucked if your bike had hand brakes. Mine didn’t. I still ate ice on that damn turn.
Now I leave the floor open to the next individual who wishes to top that one.
I never properly learned it, because the bikes I had weren’t stable enough. They were too easy to steer. The one I have now is stable enough, but I don’t bother trying… I only use it once a month or so anyway…
I’m glad to hear this because I might have a…
…oh look, shiny.
Single-handed biking is really easy, in contrast.
That’s already a step up from “there’s no such thing as society” ;-)
Wish people woudn’t reply to me while I’m posting how I’m about to shut up. :)
I hate to keep correcting you, but if you mean that you think my nephew doesn’t really have Aspegers, and it’s just over anxious parents, you’re wrong (although I’d agree that lots of the Attention whatever diagnoses are the result of inadequate parenting and have no neurological basis). He definitely has Aspergers. Amongst other things, he had great difficulty grasping the concepts of “play”, games, and “let’s pretend”.
Fortunately, he’s now found his perfect niche as a librarian (and is doing a postgrad in it) and thinks the Dewey system is mankind’s greatest achievement. He’s even catalogued every one of the thousands of books in his parent’s house, and woe betide them if they ever put one back in the wrong place).
Yeah, but I didn’t add that when I round that corner, I was also doing it backwards. Whilst fending off Nazis. And making love to a beautiful woman.
Let me guess: when you got home, your dad would slice you in two wit’ breadknife.
[/appropriately enough, props to Walton for reminding of that sketch some weeks ago.]
Shaker’s Law knows no exceptions: if you say you’re leaving, you’ll come back.
No. It’s your nephew, not you, that sounds like them.
Uphill.
Both ways.
Walton, it is dumpling not dumping? :^}
Was always a fast reader, taught myself apparently before I went to school. Do not really understand that, but seemed always able to read. I do not remember learning it. Also finished tests fast and except for math, scored high. At least once a year I would be accused of cheating and have to retest.
My memory is not quite eidetic, but I can visualize pages I have read if they interested me and essentially reread them later. I always thought that was normal and that other people were just not trying. I did learn better.
I am very good at synthesizing large clumps of fragmentary data into coherent items. Again, I though pattern recognition was something everyone could do. In my professional life that meant I was usually the one to do briefings on fast breaking events or write the event reports for disasters, etc.
Oddly enough, I have a blank spot for higher math. I just do not see the patterns and thus have no interest. I can count and do everyday math, but was never able to do algebra or other things well.
My blood line children picked up my mental skills in similar, but not exact ways. Unfortunately, they also seem to have picked up my tendency to depression.
I do not know, not sure what normal is. I am sure it is overrated anyway.
One thing I like about this place is that intelligence is not seen as peculiar or weird. I first retired to a beautiful mountainside in east Tenn, but one of the reasons I left was because I got tired of either pretending not to be smart or covering it up. Also could not get a decent bagel and smear there, but that is another story.
That was the minimum requirement for social acceptability. Amongst other things, I regularily rode my bike hand-free and one leggged (the other was broken* and in a cast) the 20 miles of dirt roads (and back) to the local lake whilst carrying my crutches, fishing tackle and a tent. (Or sometimes with my little sister on the crossbar).
*Not from a bicycle accident, I hasten to add. We children climbed trees in the good old days. (And sometimes found snakes in them, and got down the fatsest way we could think of).
Walton – of course you could, if you lived on your bike as we did (no public transport). And maybe you’ll get the opportunity under this government. :)
Now I’m definitely going to shut up, (at least for a while) someone’s just given me a big fat bag of weed, and I need to walk a mile to an all-night shop for some Rizlas. (Hate the fact the blue warning sheet now says “there’s only 10 leaves left”. Grrrr. Do they think all we dope fiends are grammarless morons?).
After weeks of rain and cloudy weather, finally, a Spring day. Saw Cowbirds, Goldfinches and Black-headed Grosbeaks today and got some nice shots too. Little bees were busy gathering pollen and the tulips have blossomed. A good day.
Yeah… I don’t think I want to name myself in honour a satisfying bowel movement. Despite the fact that you seemed to think it was a compliment. :-D
I don’t think the prevalence of psychiatric or neuropsychological diagnoses on the Endless Thread says anything at all about over or under diagnosis. This is a very non-random sample (people who post regularly on a random-topics thread) from a somewhat atypical and widely scattered population (people who read combative atheistic science blogs). There is actually published research about personality traits associated with online time – next time I am at an academic library I’ll see if I can find it (I let my psychlit database subscription lapse).
And I would repeat my earlier statement – all of the various traits being discussed exist in the general population and are probably normally distributed. None of them are necessarily problems unless they make a bad fit with the particular environment that a person happens to be placed in. I would not trade my widely varying interests and ability to be distracted by and learn new things for an ability to pay attention in staff meetings, but my scatter-brainedness was definitely a problem when I had to fit into a world of staff meetings.
One of the thing that drives me crazy about the disease model for a variety of behavioral or cognitive issues is that every single person on the planet has a distinct profile of strengths and weaknesses and it would behoove us to teach people how to work with their particular set. I’m reminded of when my gifted son was diagnosed as dyslexic and ADHD – suddenly his private school began saying things like “We can’t provide services for learning disabled kids because all of our special services are focused on giftedness,” as if there was some clear dividing line between LD and giftedness or as if a focus on individual strengths and weaknesses wouldn’t benefit all kids as opposed to just the officially diagnosed ones.
In the a) rain, or b) three feet of snow and a headwind.
Walton – “Yeah… I don’t think I want to name myself in honour a satisfying bowel movement. Despite the fact that you seemed to think it was a compliment. :-D”
Just a mild jape at your expense, will try not to do it again…for a while.
(evil grin while chair dancing, just popped up Celia Cruz doing Guatanamera on Winamp)
Here’s a poll to pharyngulate:
Even without the Pharyngula influence the results are at 85% Yes, but why stop there?
I remember figuring it out (though I don’t remember many details… I do remember pretty exactly where I was, though). I was not quite 5 years old. I read all books the kindergarten had to offer because I was bored… (Still liked kindergarten a lot more than school.)
I have that when it comes to hearing instead of seeing: I can hear someone say something, remember the pure sound, and decipher it up to a minute or so later. Comes in handy for things like French numbers (99: quatre-vingt-dix-neuf, spoken at insane speed) or when I was simply focusing on something else.
My mother is capable of not hearing people speak when she doesn’t expect them to. It’s incredible.
JeffreyD:
I did the same, but I remember it. I wanted to be taught how to read, my mother refused. I got my alphabet books and figured it out.
We’re not perfect, but we’re pretty awesome. (The proportion of yeses would likely be even higher were it not for my moron province. Scratch that; redneck Albertans don’t read, watch, or listen to the CBC. The literate ones are fapping away to anything Ezra Levant or the Fraser Institute shits out, while the illiterate ones—which would include most of the Legislature—are too busy blowing oil execs to worry about trivialities like words on pages.)
I never learned to ride a bike. I was uncoordinated as a child, and couldn’t keep up in sports. I got tired of being screamed at all the time for it so I stopped going to gym which resulted in detention, but I figured they could shove it.
I still can’t ride a bike.
Damn Walton, we could not-ride-a-bike down the street together. lol!
By the way… Walton you just sound plain ol’ phobic to me. As a person who learned to swim in her teens (and still can’t stand to have her head underwater) I do understand.
Some of us just… don’t…ease…. up the way others seem to. I’ve learned to force a lot behaviorally as they say.
Which AFAIK is the psychological version of swallowing your own puke.
Caine, Ma Chère fleur du mal – I truly do not remember. I quizzed my mom and older siblings about it once and they confirmed that I suddenly just seemed to know how to read. One early problem I had is that I did not always decipher words properly. I pronounced island as “is land” in my head and did not associate it with the word island for quite some time. To this day, I will sometimes see it that way. (smile)
Best time I had was when my father broke my hand when I was about five and I had to stay home for about a week. I just read and read. Still love to be sick and bed ridden if I can have books scattered all around me.
Bonne nuit floraison
This is perhaps a little too graphic… I didn’t really want a mental image of Ralph Klein engaging in any of the above activities. I now need some brain-bleach.
Ol’Greg – Re “Which AFAIK is the psychological version of swallowing your own puke.”
Cogent and beautiful in its own way. I do believe this will enter the memory banks for further use.
Argh. Why did I write that silly self-pitying post at #166?
I have got a lot better when it comes to the fear reflex: I even managed to do some fairly dangerous stuff (such as rock-climbing and hillwalking) with the OTC. So I don’t think I’m too much of an abject physical coward; I can get over my fears when I need to. But I just seem to have a stronger fear-instinct than most people.
Coupled with the fact that I’m naturally a fast runner (at my best I could cover a mile in under six minutes, though I’ve lost fitness over the last few months), I just seem to have been born with all the “flight” and none of the “fight”, as far as human instincts go.
Wow JeffD. Same here. My mom says I learned to read by magic. I just started calling out words I would see, and by kindergarten I was fully literate.
But I also misunderstood words. To this day I see alias and I think ah-lye-ass. I try very hard not to say that because I already have to work against the auditory stench of a lifetime spent in the asshole of the US.
Mah twang. At least being from the city it’s actually not so pronounced.
Walton, you sound “normal” to me. Always been an abject coward myself.
And bonne nuit to you all.
JeffreyD:
I know a couple of other people who figured it out and don’t remember doing so. I think I remember because I was very angry over the refusal.
I loved reading when I was a kid, still do. My grandmother used to complain about “my always having my nose in a book” when she was trying to get me outside and just basically out of the house during summertime. I often went and climbed up my favourite tree. With a book.
Bonne nuit, m’dear.
I’ve always been like that. As a child, I acquired a wide vocabulary from reading, but had never heard how some words were pronounced, so when I attempted to use them in conversation I often got it wrong. My family still occasionally remind me of the times I pronounced “khaki” as “cake-y”, “noble” as “nobble”, and “domestic” as “dome-stick”, for instance. :-)
At the time, I had encountered these words in books, and knew what they meant, but had never heard anyone say them. I suspect this happens to a lot of children whose reading ability is ahead of their peers’.
I dunno. Why did you?
lol
Yeah, I’m not afraid of everything. For instance traveling and spending time alone in a foreign city where I hardly speak the language… no problem.
Rock climbing, heights, flying, no biggy.
Dance… great.
Driving… fablulous.
Getting on a sailboat? Fuck no.
It’s sorta like that.
Ol’Greg, you are the first person I have come across with the same issue about mispronouncing words. Guess PZ’s Playhouse is THE place.
My accent is pretty flat as we moved all over the South. Many people ask if I am Canadian on first meeting. Of course, one of the common accents in Nawlin’s sounds like Brooklyn. Also have a lot of Cajun French in the mix along with 2-3 other language bits, Yiddish, Latin, Hebrew, Gaelic. Then I added Mandarin on top of it. My Southern only comes out when very tired. Most linguists wonder from where I learned my speech patterns. Couple that with a taste for archaic usage and my spoken and written language can get pretty weird. My eldest daughter and I often speak Chinese and Chinglish with each other and eldest daughter in law and I jabber away in French and Franglish. She is from Quebec.
Good night Ol’Greg.
Monsieur ZigZag sneers at you.
G’night JeffD.
My language roots are all over the place too. Having family members from all over, learning speech from TV and music just as much as from a variety of speakers even including those for whom English wasn’t a first language.
People ask me where I’m from… everywhere. Even at home.
The truth is I don’t feel like I’m from anywhere.
When I was a kid I always felt “homesick” except I never could figure out where the hell home was supposed to be :/
yup, me too. I space out other people talking, and then they get pissed at me because I don’t realize that at some point they started talking to me instead of each other. I guess I’m supposed to be eavesdropping?
also, sometimes I’m so deep in thought that I literally don’t notice when someone starts speaking. Sometimes I finally register that someone was saying something, and that it might have been directed at me a few moments later. sometimes it doesn’t register at all.
Oh, by the way… I’m flying home tomorrow morning :(
:(
:(((((((((((((((((((((((((((((((((((((
I suspect nowadays I would have some diagnosis too. I’ve always had tunnel vision while working on things or reading. With math and science, I was usually the person who finished the fastest and got a high grade. Of course, in the slide rule days a person who was fast with algebra had a distinct advantage. My tunnel vision/hearing drives the Redhead to distraction at times, and she accuses me of having poor hearing (I have the hearing tests to refute her, showing my hearing is age normal), but when I do cease what I was doing, I do give her full attention, she doesn’t complain. Needless to say, I don’t multitask very well.
Knockgoats,
I remain unconvinced by this idea. We need to continue to attract international investment to the UK. High tax rates on the wealthy and on businesses will discourage such investment. This is a purely pragmatic issue, nothing to do with the morality or otherwise of capitalism.
My mother and younger brother both suffer from sea sickness. My brother has been sailing once in his life and did not enjoy the experience. My mother has never been sailing. On the other hand I have been known to go sailing every so once in a while.
I can’t not listen to people when they’re in earshot. I’m told it’s creepy. It also gets me in trouble sometimes when people think I’m not paying attention, just because I’m not looking at them. But then, I get in trouble when I do look at people as I’m a rather focused person and I’m told I’m staring and it’s creepy.
Socializing is weird.
Well, I hope you had a good time in Paris. (The pictures posted on your blog have continued to be consistently awesome.)
I don’t remember learning to read, either. Though apparently it happened from memorizing the meaning of signs (hotel and store names), and then learning to associate the shapes with the sounds. I memorized the names because my mom used to take me with her into town on the lightrail when I was 3 and 4 years old, and my favorite game was “what does that say”. Eventually I had them all memorized.
I remember reading Anne of Green Gables when I was 5.
This. Some times I get so into pretending not to hear people so they won’t think I’m weird that I actually don’t respond when they start talking to me.
I can’t actually *not* pay attention at all. If anything I’m hyper-aware.
I hope you had a fun trip
Argh. Once again I have not done enough work today.
I should go to bed, in keeping with my newfound commitment to get a sensible amount of sleep. I will, however, have to get up ludicrously early tomorrow and carry on reading Dworkin. (Ronald, not Andrea.)
Thanks. They’re probably pretty sentimental.
I still have a bunch more I’d like to post but I won’t have time until I get back to the States. Packing, flying, sleeping… I should eat.
I *love* traveling, but I never love going back to Texas.
But can I be blamed? It’s fucking Texas.
that’s actually a surprisingly common feeling. I had it myself for years, and apparently a lot of fundies get it, too (they explain it as being homesick for heaven)
Awww. I’m sure Texas isn’t that bad. It is one of the places I want to visit some day. :-)
But I do sympathise with the general feeling. The worst thing about travelling to Europe from these parts (on budget airlines) is having to return afterwards to Luton Airport – a grim concrete excrescence, in one of the least scenic parts of southern England, full of giant screens broadcasting irritating animations at you. And it’s always cold. And raining. :-(
:-}
That’s not something about you, it’s something about the English so-called spelling system.
I did that sometimes, when my grandparents still had a suitable tree.
The linguistics blogosphere is chock full of such stories.
Of course, it doesn’t happen in languages with a halfway sane spelling system!
Not the same thing – she doesn’t hear anyone is talking at all.
That’s more like it, but she’s doing something (sometimes, maybe often, several things at once) rather than sitting there and thinking.
My sympathies.
That’s more like me, unless I’m too focused, or unless I’m trying hard (and often failing) to understand what one of them (often the TV) says and deliberately spacing the others (most commonly my brother) out. Yes, that does mean that sometimes I enter the conversations of random strangers (though I usually manage to restrain myself).
Absolutely.
Interesting. I’m told I did it the other way around: having learned “all” car brand symbols and all traffic signs with the usual autistic perfectionist drive for completeness, I learned all letters, and what I remember is figuring out how they work together. Sounds like you learned words as units, like Chinese characters, and then successfully reverse-engineered the letters out of them… that’s fascinating.
May I ask when it stopped?
Hi, everyone! This thread hasn’t had any delicious babies yet.
Remember, Americans, the Liberal Democrats in the U.K. are closer to the Tories than Labour is, so it’s not such an odd coalition.
Ol’ Greg,
did you ever get my post about going to Patisserie Jean Millet?
Some of the best croissants in Paris…
Where do you get the idea that I’m only “sitting there and thinking”? The thinking happens constantly, even when I’m doing things (sometimes even when I’m multitasking, but that’s rarer); but it’s the thinking that makes me unaware of my environment, not the doing.
pretty much when I learned to deal with my depression by telling the world to go fuck itself.
@ Carlie #8
:D
That sounds more like me. :-) Sometimes I take something to read with me and then don’t take it out of the bag because I’m already thinking in overdrive. I either think or sleep (or both – dreaming). I’m told I always fell asleep while being suckled, because that simply wasn’t enough of an occupation, and to this day I hate the rare occasions when I can’t read (or have an interesting conversation, or watch something seriously attention-grabbing on TV) during eating.
Ah. I think I understand.
I’m tired enough that my thermoregulation is off. So I’ll peel myself off my autistic work (looking at pretty pictures and deciding whether to write 0 or 1 into the next cell of a matrix with 294 columns) and go to bed… :-)
Erm, at any particular time in general. Not just when sitting in public transport or a back seat of a car, the context of the preceding sentence.
that’s because the things you eat are boring :-p
I usually eat at the computer, but I’m actually fully willing and capable to focus on a good meal itself, as a sensual experience; one of the few instances when I’m not actively thinking (and actually, I get frustrated when I realize I ate something without noticing, because I started thinking again. what a waste of perfectly good food, especially on a limited daily calorie budget!)
No one in a developed country should have to be worrying about being able to afford enough calories. :-(
I still can’t get this personal story you told out of my head, months later. Along with other people – such as JustALurker – talking about their experience with poverty and deprivation, it’s really been playing on my mind recently.
Meh. My worldview has been becoming steadily more incoherent. I’ve come to really hate our competition-driven, harsh society, and I’ve also come to have a much keener sense of how the poor and marginalised are oppressed by government. Yet I’m still ostensibly a “conservative”, in some very attenuated sense; still support a broadly capitalist economic system; and am still optimistic for the Tory-Lib Dem coalition, in a hopelessly-naive sort of way. I’m just not sure whether the different aspects of my outlook are actually compatible or even make any sense.
Sorry for #235. It’s gone 1am and I’m not thinking straight.
Bedtime for the Special Dumpling of Awesome. :-)
limited in the other direction. if I ate everything I wanted to eat (because ATM I can afford to), I wouldn’t fit through the doorframe.
Oh, OK. Note to self: read for comprehension. (I suppose I misread you because of some of the stuff you’ve posted in the past on this topic.) My apologies. In my defence, my brain seems to be melting in a puddle of law at the moment. :-(
I am an idiot. Frequently.
Jadehawk:
Opposite problem here. I got a stern talking to from my neurologist, again, for not eating enough. I really have a hard time eating more than once a day.
Ringtailed Lemurian:
Hey, I think I know your nephew. Or was that Cambridge? Astronomy of some kind, and a Geology library…?
David M:
As a parent, sometimes an overt reaction really isn’t required. It depends on the cry and the context; protecting the child from harm includes letting it deal with some stuff for itself. But there are worthless-piece-of-shit parents as well, of course, just like there are worthless-piece-of-shit drivers who drive at half the speed limit as long as there’s no passing lane, who brake before indicating, or back onto a highway without checking for oncoming road trains (articulated trucks we have out here, pulling three or four trailers of ore or live cattle).
For those who haven’t had enough of Father Barron’s complaints about the New Atheists, here’s one about how the New Atheists and the Intelligent Design advocates share the same misunderstanding about who god is. I’m actually a bit more sympathetic to this talk, but only a bit…
As to his ending statement that “amid all the rancor of the religion-science debate, there really is a creative way forward?” Uh, no, actually.
Mattir @89,
Yes, of course Jackson was a complex character, and had many good points as president. However, genocide really counters almost all of the good points.
Honestly, Walton, there’s no such thing as cost-effective for electricity. Electricity is a necessity, in particular for food preservation and climate control (deaths from hypo and hyperthermia would be much higher without it). The only thing that matters is whether it’s energy efficient. Regardless of its cost in dollars, corn ethanol is not energy-efficient. Cost is a made up thing, there’s really no reason to say a necessity isn’t cost-efficient to deliver, only whether its energy and resource-efficient. You focus on money too much. Money is made up. Really. Those British pounds in your bank account aren’t actually worth anything unless other people agree that they are. Food, OTOH, has intrinsic value because people will die without it.
I could read before I was four. There was one particular book I really liked, so my mom made me a book on tape of her reading it. I listened to it until I had it memorized and then I figured out which sets of letters were which words. After that, reading other books on my own was easy. The reason I know this was before I was four is that my parents bought me books for my fourth birthday, and I can remember sitting down and reading one to my mom that day.
Learning to speak German (from reading a word in our book) was actually challenging because of this. I had a hard time understanding that the pronunciation rules really are rules.
Keeping in line with the general discussion today, I’m not at all surprised that many pharyngulites are not neurotypical. Most people do not enjoy talking about atheism and science. These are “fringe” interests, and the people who are going to be attracted to (and spend a lot of time at) a blog discussion this stuff are not going to be a representative sample of the larger population, whereas your acquaintances are probably a better (though not necessarily good) sample. Too, many people don’t feel comfortable discussing their diagnoses with many people. If I used my real name on this blog, I probably wouldn’t say some of the more personal things I mention here. For example:
Personally, I don’t have any diagnosed disorders other than a moderate anxiety disorder that becomes severe* when I perceive my financial situation to be perilous (add in real economic crisis and I really have problems). One great thing about the census job is the paycheck. Even though it’s a temporary thing, it extends the amount of time before I will be unable to continue to pay my bills, thus relieving some of the anxiety.
*By severe I mean I can’t eat actual food (for one whole month (when the anxiety was at its absolute worst) all of the calories I consumed were nutrition drinks like Slim Fast (I prefer the taste of it to ensure), smoothies and soda because you can just swallow them without chewing; I was only getting about 1000 cal/day and that was pushing it) or sleep more than the bare minimum (maybe 4 or 5 hours total per day split between 2 or more sessions of complete exhaustion). This means that the rest of my life suffers because my brain doesn’t function right. Starvation and sleep deprivation are forms of torture for a reason. On that note, I would like to thank everyone here who has said supportive things to me over the last few months. My personal life has been shit and I really do appreciate y’all giving me the space to talk about things that I don’t really feel comfortable talking to many people about.
What are friends for but to whine at?
To paraphrase Frasier Crane, Nerd, “we’re listening…”
Mattir, when my youngest brother was diagnosed with ADHD (and an incredibly easy diagnosis that was; no sarcasm of any sort involved), his teacher wanted to put him in the disabled class. Oh, yeah, good fit. He’s well more than average smart; just has the worst distractability problem I’ve ever seen.
There have been some wonderful recommendations for books recently and now Tim Minchin has one. Have I mentioned that I LOVE Tim Minchin.
Oh mah gaaaaah. . . .I cannot keep up with Teh Thread!
Hi and howdy y’all.
I’ll not join in with the Comparative Mental Maladies Club since you’ve all got it covered so well, and I’m sure it’s perfectly obvious to any regular that I’m “special.” Suffice it to say I find myself in the same DSM IV entries as many of you.:)
@SC, OM – Email for you. . sorry I’ve been so tardy checking my inbox.
My mom used to send me to my room, to sit on my bed, as punishment. Silly woman! A second’s thought would have shown her how foolish this was! My bookshelf was built into my headboard.
SIWIRL Syndrome. I could hardly ever restrain myself from correcting overheard errors at zoos and museums. At bus-stops it may be positively welcomed. In pubs toward closing time, not so much.
Oh, tell me, girl. There’s nothing finer than nesting in your bed with books, especially if its’ snowing, rainy, or some other stay-in-bed day. Heaven.
@Pygmy Loris
The problem with Jackson is that it does not appear that he thought he was committing genocide. There was almost-war between settlers and native tribes in a lot of places, and he was urged to simply move some tribes (not all) further west but not necessarily across the Mississippi. He insisted on relocating tribes across the Mississippi in order to minimize the chance of war. In the case of the Cherokee relocation, the war was virtually civil war, as the Cherokee were fairly assimilated with the European settlers. Another interesting Jackson fact – he had two adopted sons, one of whom was an infant from the Creek tribe found by Jackson after a battle. He died of TB when he was 16, just before Jackson became president.
Between 5 and 6 million people died in the Vietnam War, so I think the comparison of Jackson to Nixon is pretty appropriate.
Walton, rapidly switching your attention is probably just a habit, so you can work on re-training yourself by not surfing the web while you study. AND get enough sleep.
E-mail at work disrupts concentration for most people. I turn usually off notification and just check it when I reach a good stopping point.
Hyperconcentration on what’s interesting definitely goes along with ADD. I tend to use some nice but non-dramatic music to keep the wandering half of my brain occupied, e.g. some Bach to quiet distractions. I wonder if the reported “Baroque music improves IQ” anecdotes were detecting simply improved concentration. Colouring is good, too. Taking notes is excellent because it forces me to pay attention.
Picking the right thing to concentrate on is hard. Listing all my books on LibraryThing is a lot more compelling than sorting tax receipts. It’s even possible to overdo concentrating at work.
I can make lists of things to do but remembering to look at them is another story. Sticky notes can help. You can keep moving them towards the top left as they get more urgent. Notes might help, period. I have a tendency to leave things out so I won’t forget to deal with them but I need an uncluttered space for concentrating, and the two work against each other.
I think I need a watch that beeps every 20 minutes so I can check whether I’m using my time wisely or reading / daydreaming / sorting buttons by weight.
Some people swear by morning and evening checklists, writing yourself a progress report/things to do next every night, having a buddy system, daily/weekly/etc to-do file cards (Side-tracked home executives method), FLYlady web site. Weekly charts. Logging your time for a week and seeing where it went. Success teams, where you tell each other what you’re going to do by next meeting. Timers. Outlook tasks.
ADD Hyperactive gets attention but ADD Inattentive gets overlooked. Like a lot of people, I realized I was ADD when I started researching what was affecting my child. I’m still working on it. If you don’t like Ritalin, ask about Strattera.
Michael Jackson – Off The Wall.
cicely,
My mom used to do the same thing until she wised up to the non-punishment nature of being sent to my room. After that I got time out in a dining room chair facing the wall with the lights off. I think that’s where my imaginary life came from. :)
Mattir,
Still, I just hate Jackson. FTR, I’m not a big Nixon fan even though he actually did a lot of good things. Ford’s pardon of Nixon was unforgivable and IMHO one of the biggest reasons modern presidents *cough*GWB*cough* feel no compulsion to follow the law.
Tis and Nerd, you’re such sweet guys :)
In honor of Patricia and Marvin:
Nerd, I looooooooooooooooovvvveeeeeeee Karen Carpenter’s voice. You should not have unleashed this.
Dang, there goes my
streetblog cred.Ah, a little evil, after studying at the feet of the master, PZ, to regain it…
I promise not to post any more comments about Andrew Jackson. I’m sure I can find other things to pontificate about – I just wanted it clear that Jackson was of somewhat more ambiguous character than Stalin or Pol Pot.
Now I’m going to go cast on the first squid, abandon the spawn to watch tv, and hide in my room listen to books on my ipod. What an exciting life I lead.
Cicely:
You know, that could definitely be true– this is a pretty safe place for people to express themselves openly.
That being said, I don’t have ADD/ADHD.
the correct term is SIWIMS. there’s nothing more real about meatspace ;-)
Oh yes, yes, he should have.
I still run into words I’ve never heard anyone use in a sentence before.
Nooo! Walton, don’t do it! Texas is ugly. If “concrete excrescences” distress you, I doubt that flat, red dirt, as far as the eye can see and then some, will have any appeal. All of this, plus, in summer, the opportunity to drown in your own sweat. Ick!
As long as we’re discussing our mental malfunctions, does anyone else here sometimes have trouble getting to sleep, even when completely knackered, because they just…can’t…get…their…brain…to…slow…down? If so, what do you use for it? Wine can help, a bit, but I’m not supposed to do very much alcohol any more.
cicely,
I was in Dallas and Austin a couple of years ago, and the humidity was nothing. What part of Texas has flat red dirt and high humidity? I want to make sure I avoid it on any future visits :)
Having thought about the last endless thread’s theme, I have realized that some of my favorite songs have strong religious connotations. I have no idea why this would be the case, except that I’m attracted to the morbid, and that fits in with christianity quite well.
That being said, here’s Johnny Cash’s* The Mercy Seat.
* Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds did the original. And as much as I love me some Nick Cave, his version sucks. Hard.
yup; which is why it usually takes me hours to fall asleep. I’ve not found a remedy to that (other than boring lectures, anyway)
@Pygmy Loris
The republican part?
Cicely:
Oh yes, happens to me all the time. I don’t do anything for it, just stay up and work.
I’ve found that rereading the same episodic series books to be effective sleep inducing agents. If you know the plot, you quickly get board, and start to fall asleep. But, maybe once every couple of weeks, instead of 1-5 pages, 30-50 pages is required.
Every part of it I’ve ever driven through. I know that’s not much help…. And much of Oklahoma, especially the western parts, is much the same.
Dang, board = bored. *shakes fist at Rev. BDC, who is faintly chortling in the background*
If I workout during the day it’s usually enough to get me to sleep later that night.
@Caine:
Don’t tell me you’re another one. . . I don’t care how sugar pop it is, I just fuckin’ melt for Karen Carpenter’s contralto. Listen to the melody.
Rrrrrrreee-lease the
KrakkenKaren!@cicely and Jadehawk:
Yes. Too frequently. I decide at 3 a.m. that I must solve all potential and imagined problems with bills/house/career/family, and I must solve them now, in bed, when I can do nothing about them.
Mild tranquilizers such as Xanax can help in a really bad insomniac moment (and I recommend them), but that’s not something one can do more than once in a great while. Won’t someone please invent the Brain-Off™ switch?
Josh:
I am. I love her voice. I well remember when more than one song made the top of the charts and was heard all the time on the radio. They make me happy.
@ Caine:
Aaaah. And that makes me very, very happy. She’s underrated, because the Carpenters were the epitome of safe easy listening. Well, sure they were, and they didn’t claim to be anything else. But Richard’s arrangements were fantastic – in the pop genre – and her voice was singular. I miss it.
I just thought that particular song was very appropriate for our affianced Princess of Pullets and her Prince Charming. For those who got worked up over my selection, take five…
Night all…
Josh, yes, they were underrated and I miss her too. She had a wonderful talent. Her voice could hold a world of emotion.
Hell yes I do. My brain never stops. Apparently some people can sit and think about nothing, or perhaps just focus on one thing. My brain is constantly processing. Either it’s processing things around me, or processing something stored away earlier (a conversation that day, something on my to-do list, etc). And then it starts making connections between things. My train of thought is such a bizarre thing. In about 3 seconds from when something is said I’ve already done 6 degrees of Bacon on it and am thinking about something so unrelated to the original that I have to explain to my wife why I’m even bringing it up. Or I keep it to myself to avoid the confusion.
That what I like about my bike. When I’m riding my bike on a nature trail seems to be the only time my brain shuts up. That and when I’m playing my guitar.
cicely et al. about the not being able to stop thinking so that you can sleep. This is a problem for me too, and I was wondering, can you do the whole clearing your mind thing for meditation?
Pygmy,
The closest I can come to clearing my mind when I (very rarely) attempt to meditate is to picture myself in a vacant movie theater staring at a blank screen.
KOPD,
That’s an interesting technique. Maybe I’ll try it sometime.
There’s something that’s been bugging me for awhile now, and I have to ask a question. President Obama has talked about our budget deficits and getting them under control, blah, blah, blah. He always seems to mention Social Security and Medicare as part of the budget problem. Here’s what bugs me: FICA taxes completely cover the cost of Social Security and Medicare. There isn’t a deficit right now wrt these two programs. The budget deficit is entirely a product of other government spending. Why do people keep mentioning Social Security and Medicare as part of the current budget problem? They’re not part of the problem because of the already earmarked FICA taxes!
Possibly relevant: I remember reading, years and years ago, from what source I do not know (so take it with as large a block of salt as seems advisable), that at that time, the Social Security fund was the go-to piggy bank to “borrow” money from for other parts of the budget that were coming up short.
And I’ve never had any success at clearing my mind, once it gets spinning properly.
I went to a Catholic elementary school and my knees still hurt
Some years back, a few friends and I found that we all had problems—different problems—with our left knees. We joked about “Left Knee Disease.” I had a lightbulb moment and quizzed the few I hadn’t known about, and it turned out we were all recovering Catholics.
The thing about genuflecting is that, while you land on your right knee, it’s the left knee that does the work. Hmmm.
… how do I deal with that kinda thing?
“Sorry; I’m allergic to holy water.”
Walton, you’re sounding better toward the end of this thread. The stuff you’ve complained about maps very closely to the effects of sleep deprivation.
You want a tale of missed diagnosis? Here: When I was a gradeschool kid in the 1950s, nobody had heard of ADD or ADHD or the autism spectrum. However, as the order of nuns that staffed my school were a nursing order (The Daughters of Charity of St. Vincent dePaul) and some of then were in fact trained as nurses but redirected to teaching, I’m still grouchy about this.
I’ve had nasty asthma about since I was born. Some of those gradeschool years, I was pretty damned sick a lot of the time. If this had happened in the last few decades I’d’ve been hospitalized. As it was, the best available drug then was epinephrine. I ingested a lot of it, mostly from a handheld (delicate glass) nebulizer, powered by a squeeze-bulb. I usually had it with me and toked on it when I felt I needed to, PRN and ad lib.
This had a couple of effects. I developed a killer grip in my right hand, and sometimes I didn’t sleep much. I remember some nights lying at the wrong end of my bed looking out the window and watching the moon traverse the sky till dawn; hearing the funny whine of the milkman’s truck at 4:45 every morning.
No surprise, my attention wandered and I got sleepy in class. Also, I’d solve maybe the first two arithmetic problems and then get bored/tired/inattentive/baffled. In third grade, I used to have to stay after school to finish the rotework I hadn’t done in class—and when my beloved first-grade teacher spotted me doing that, she came in and scolded me.
These people SAW me snorting that drug in class, and they knew what it was, and they still thought the thing to do was shame me for its side-effects. If there were an afterlife, I’d spend most of it slapping faces.
of P.K. Dick’s Clans of the Alphane Moon
I read that, some years back. Funny in a way, even though he was kinda naive about classifications. When I was hanging out (writing an expose’ or something) in Harrisburg State Hospital, one of the funny things I discovered was that there was a social hierarchy among the patients based on their diagnoses. A paranoid schizophrenic ranked higher than an undifferentiated schizophrenic, e.g. My friends who were patients were quite straightforward about this when I asked.
pretty much when I learned to deal with my depression by telling the world to go fuck itself.
I’m working on that myself.
How many of ya’ll were the first to finish a test (or one of the first)?
(bashful wave) And I learned to read by the time I was three, but I don’t remember learning. I think learning to breathe was harder.
There’s a word for that pronunciation problem: misled, pronounced “MY-zl’d.” Seems fairly common among ‘net early adopters. I remember pronouncing “pterodactyl” to sorta rhyme with “periodical.”
cicely,
You’re right. The Trust Fund is invested in T-bills, so a large part of our debt is actually owed to Social Security. I believe that’s part of the “intergovernmental holdings” part of the public debt. OTOH, as far as I know, Social Security and Medicare outlays have not exceeded revenues from FICA in my lifetime, so the actual cost of running the programs is not contributing to the rise in the debt.
For those of you that can’t sleep:
FWIW, my mom has insomnia problems (she’s unable to shut her brain off at night) and she’s had luck with taking a mild anti-anxiety med. If you’re looking into a chemical fix, it might be worth considering.
Does anybody know if chamomile tea really works?
Cicely:
I honestly think it’s the process more than anything that’s actually in the chamomile tea. You know: taking the time to make the tea, taking a few minutes to force yourself to relax while you drink it, etc. etc.
I could totally be wrong on this though.
Anyway, goodnight, Thread and Threadlings.
At least tomorrow’s Saturday, and once I get to sleep, I can stay that way.
cicely has it right. Social Security and Medicare are solvent and would remain so for years except that Congress keeps borrowing money from the trust funds. The greatest holder of Treasury Bills (T-Bills) is Social Security. Much of the debt the gummint owes is owed to itself.
well, it works well to calm me down, but does precisely nothing to keep my mind from churning on :-p
Ron:
Three was when I taught myself to read, after having my mother refuse to teach me. That would have been in 1960. When I asked my mother about her refusal when I was an adult, she told me it wasn’t the done thing then, that the thought in those days was that it was a bad thing to teach children before they entered school. I have no idea why that was thought to be the case. (Or if that’s actually true.)
Shiny new topic:
So I was in downtown LA yesterday, and I noticed that the LA County Superior Courthouse had three stone figures affixed, each holding a different document, as if to proclaim that this was a major source of the Law as laid down within. Quite grand, quite impressive.
Except that the three figures personified “Mosaic Law”, “The Magna Carta”, and “The Declaration of Independence”.
So, uhhhhh, one out of three, really. Thanks for playing. I facepalmed.
It’s called GHB. The date rape drug. Non habit forming. I was on it for a while,just long enough to experience all its bizarre side effects. The odd thing about GHB is how fast it clears from the body, about 3 hours. This means that if you are using it to effect deep sleep, you have to set an alarm to wake you up after 3 hours so you can take a second dose.
Stick to trazodone; also non addictive and effective.
BS
Brain off; good night.
BS
Yeah, in spades. And I’m perfectly capable of posing myself some trivial question of fact, so that I have to get up and google, after which come the requisite surfing and blog commenting and eventual playing of teh solitaire until my effing brain gives up. I would much prefer drugs or drink, but I’m averse to those pesky side-effects, such as addiction and hangovers.
For the moment. The post WWII baby boom will be retiring soon. That will really up set the apple cart, and the programs are projected to be in the red, IIRC, by the middle of this decade.
Josh and Caine – I’m always sad that Christmas is the only time she ever gets airplay on the radio.
:-D :-D
Andy Hamilton, BBC Radio 4, The News Quiz
I have Aspergers, I just got diagnosed last year ut my school counsellor suspected in Year 7 and didn’t tell me. Several lives got runied (due to lack of social skills and concentration) while my mum dithered and dalied over whether i should be told. My academic and social skiils have improved immensely in the 6 months after the diagnosis. The only other possible Aspergians i know are my father and this girl from school. They are both annoying prats.
THIS. I had the vocabulary of a 2nd year uni student by the time i was 11 but i could never pronounce the more difficult words. Pronouncing it the “obvious” way does make it easier to learn how to spell it. In my primary school years i’m pretty sure i could have won a spelling bee. With the exception of my Year 5 teacher, i was the best speller in the school. It was a pretty bad school though.
Got my first Ma*us comment on my blog. On a post about music. What a loon.
So, in case anyone still cares about my silly circumcision argument with Mr. ODS:
I brought it up last night. We actually had a pretty productive discussion, without resorting to angry yelling or getting upset. His main argument was that circumcision would be a physical link to his family’s past and a way to share history. I politely called “bullshit” on that and told him that I have no problem learning more about Jewish culture and would love to teach our children about their roots, but that doesn’t necessitate cutting a piece of our boys off.
One thing that did not occur to Mr. ODS was that he was solely focusing on his family and not mine. I told him that I was hurt & offended that he didn’t even consider that I might like to incorporate my family’s traditions into our child-rearing as well– he assumed that because my family isn’t Jewish that there wasn’t as much of a connection to the past. I’m happy to say that he was embarrassed by his behavior.
Anyway, to make a long story short, he wants some time to do some research and think about this before we talk about it again. Which means he’s actually considering my point of view, which makes me pretty happy right now.
OurDeadSelves:
Yay! This is grand news and I’m very happy for you.
We need to continue to attract international investment to the UK. High tax rates on the wealthy and on businesses will discourage such investment. – Walton
On businesses, perhaps – international agreements may be needed. On the wealthy – why? Why should, say, an American or Chinese firm care whether we tax earnings over £50,000 at 40% or 60%? Make it 100% over – say – £250,000 a year and it will be saving them money on top salaries because there will be no point anyone asking for more than that!
“does anyone else here sometimes have trouble getting to sleep, even when completely knackered, because they just can’t get their brain to slow down?”
Frequently. Like someone else mentioned above, sorry I cannot remember, I usually take a well worn and old favourite of a novel and let that lull me. Sometimes I get up and walk around and have a smoke, maybe pull on a pair of shorts and sit on the porch for a bit. Because I wear a full face CPAP mask, it is often just a matter of washing my face, rubbing it hard, and then resettling the mask. The soft whoosh of the CPAP is an excellent white noise generator, by the way.
Ah, there goes the buzzer, time to hang laundry.
As long as we’re discussing our mental malfunctions, does anyone else here sometimes have trouble getting to sleep, even when completely knackered, because they just…can’t…get…their…brain…to…slow…down? If so, what do you use for it? Wine can help, a bit, but I’m not supposed to do very much alcohol any more. – cecily
I use the same method as Nerd of Redhead@268 – rereading part of a book I already know well, usually middlebrow fiction. Armistead Maupin’s Tales of the City series is one standby, another is a novel called Spencer’s List by a friend of mine, Lissa Evans (highly recommended). Similar emotional tone to Maupin, but rather more realist. Has to be narrative anyway, although sometimes I go for a series of historical atlases I have. Fortunately, we have a spare room, so if either Mrs. KG or I can’t sleep, we can move to it and not disturb the other.
Because a 50% stake in 3 billion base pairs is never enough =(
Good news on actually making him think – always the first step on the road to rejecting religious/traditional nonsense.
Caffeine still kicking in… previous post shouLd either have read “of 6 billion”, or just omitted the 50%
does anyone else here sometimes have trouble getting to sleep, even when completely knackered, because they just can’t get their brain to slow down?
Usually I sleep like a log, but occasionally I get too excited to sleep for one reason or another. Then I take out my old biostats book and read a page or two. Never had to go to three.
It’s called GHB. The date rape drug. Non habit forming. I was on it for a while,just long enough to experience all its bizarre side effects. The odd thing about GHB is how fast it clears from the body, about 3 hours. – Blind Squirrel FCD
I’d seriously advise against this. A friend of mine did himself serious damage with GBL, which is converted into GHB in the body, and which was legal at the time in the UK. Twice he just dropped in his tracks after taking it, smashing his ankle on one occasion and his nose on the other. The third time he passed out leaving a pan on the stove. His flat caught fire, and he ended up in hospital with smoke inhalation. This finally persuaded him to stop. (Oh and BTW, there’s no such thing as a non-habit-forming drug! He found it pretty hard to come off it.)
Nerd,
We could fix much of the Baby Boomer problem by removing the cap on income that is taxed for Social Security.
ODS,
Yay! I’m glad you were able to make him think without it devolving into yelling. That’s a good start.
Knockgoats,
I think the argument is that if executives can’t make exorbitant salaries then the business won’t be able to attract quality execs and it will fail. Fucking ridiculous.
does anyone else here sometimes have trouble getting to sleep, even when completely knackered, because they just can’t get their brain to slow down?
Usually I sleep like a log, but occasionally I get too excited to sleep for one reason or another. Then I take out my old biostats book and read a page or two. Never had to go to three.
Dang. Sorry about double posting. At least it’ll add to the post total and get us nearer to 1mil sooner.
Indeed.
I recall a while ago the BBC reported on a study done on the FTSE 100 companies. There was no correlation between how well a company did and the remuneration of the chief executive.
On sleeping, I found a comfy pair of cheapo ipod headphones and put on a book that I’ve read and listened to a gazillion times. I turn the ipod on when I’m ready to sleep, and if I wake up during the night, I am automatically drawn into the story instead of into the rumination of the day. It’s probably partly a conditioned reflex – the very sound of some books puts me into a sleepy relaxed mood. The odd thing is that the books are usually the ones that I really love and don’t find boring at all. Perhaps it’s a message of safety and familiarity telling the cortisol anxiety-making hormones that get produced in the middle of the night to just back off.
Knockgoats @309
Oh, it an be a dangerous drug alright. You will go to sleep wherever you are, if you take enough. 4.5 grams is the max dose.
The weird thing is that while the LD50/50 is 400gms (that is not a typo), this falls to a few 10s of grams with etoh. (no controlled studies on this) It also causes depression. I experienced the paradoxical effect. It wired me! And this at the max dose. I am glad it’s out there for those who need it, but I came to refer to it as “devil devil juice”.
Yes, you can develop a psychological addition to anything. I believe my doc was referring to clinical addiction, ever increasing dose, that sort of thing.
BS
Mattir: are we sisters? must be… @314 is how I get to sleep too… I love audiobooks. I set my iPod on timer to shut off after a certain length of time (how long depends on how wakeful I am), so I can fall asleep to the story and not have to back up much to find where I left off when I wake again.
KOPD, I take it you liked Going Postal in audio: did you have problems following the story?
I highly recommend the Dresden Files books in audio: they’re brilliantly read by James Marsters.
@ Becca – I leave my ipod on all night, but it’s always with a book that I’ve read so many times that I can jump in literally anywhere and not have to worry about knowing where I am. Sort of like reading oneself into a book in a Thursday Next book. Speaking of which, I should probably get a couple of those for the device.
Also, Richard Dawkins has a wonderfully soothing voice, especially for one so widely accused of combativeness. Haven’t tried The God Delusion for getting to sleep yet, but I’m sure it’d work fine. I’m pretty sure I wouldn’t try Christopher Hitchens, though, unless I wanted to wake up with more psychiatric disorders than I had when I went to sleep.
If I cannot sleep I tend to listen to the BBC World Service. It has some good news reporting.
The Iranian cleric who inspired Boobquake is off again
Caine: Three was when I taught myself to read, after having my mother refuse to teach me. That would have been in 1960. When I asked my mother about her refusal when I was an adult, she told me it wasn’t the done thing then, that the thought in those days was that it was a bad thing to teach children before they entered school. I have no idea why that was thought to be the case. (Or if that’s actually true.)
I can’t map it to the years exactly, but I do know there was a theory … well, I won’t dignify it with the name “theory”—it was more a wild-assed guess that got ossified—that kids had a certain point when they could learn certain tasks and it would be futile to expect them to learn them before that. This got carved in stone, and you know how subtleties get lost: The result was people thinking that it was somehow harmful to teach kids to read “before they were ready.”
I’d bet TW Mary would have a point or two to make about this.
Seems obvious to me that “You can’t expect a child to learn to read before X age because blablabla perception coordination fine nerve endings” is NOT THE SAME as “A child who tries to learn to read before X age will ruin her vision/go cross-eyed/hate the sight of paper forever.” So your mother wasn’t kidding about what was the current advice then; I can guess she’d been told directly that that would be like giving you a beer with dinner.
I’m sure there’s a generalization to be made here about institutional ossification in general, and advice/orders about childraising in particular. There are a couple of books out there about the history of such advice, and they’re a kick to read.
I was born in 1949. I learned to read early because I was the first kid, we didn’t have a TV, and Mom used to read to me while I sat in her lap. It just happened, no effort on my part that I can recall.
Hey, you want a Top This about childraising notions though? I was breast-fed (the only one of us six kids who was) on a strict q-4-hours schedule.
It’s a wonder we all survived, it is.
@Becca
Yes, I enjoyed it very much. I had no trouble following it once I figured out that my iPod had skipped some chapters and straightened that out. It was a pretty good self-contained story.
Weird thing about the iPod. If I had shuffle on the last time I listened to music, then it would shuffle the files of the audiobook. But when you’re listening to an audiobook you can’t turn off shuffle. You have to go back to music and turn it off there. Really silly. I figured it out and then listened to the chapters I missed, then the chapters I’d heard already made more sense.
Next I’m going to see about starting at the beginning of the series. I should probably do that sooner rather than later, as I’ll be spending some time in the hospital soon (wife is 39 weeks pregnant). A nice book would be welcome when she’s resting.
For getting to sleep nowadays, I like Ambien (or its generic). Often I split a tab, which, hilariously, keeps me out for almost exactly four hours. I skip it a lot so I can remember what I dream; sometimes I give myself useful advice or just frame (sorry) something that’s been bugging me so that it gets easier to solve.
We sleep kind of wrapped up tightly around each other, so I’m sure Joe would tell me if I took to getting up and fixing the plumbing or driving across town in my sleep.
A friend of mine had a psychotic episode after taking Ambien in combination with other prescription drugs and ended up chasing imaginary prowlers around the property with a loaded shotgun. I could have killed myself twice that I know of on my sleep eating episode when I took Sonata.
BS
Bill Maher had faithist S.E. Cupp, author of Losing Our Religion: The Liberal Media’s Attack on Christianity on his show last night (yes, she says she is an atheist).
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7KTeOMrOm0o
(The notes that appear on the video are annoying, but I can’t find any other video of the entire discussion.)
[Spoiler alert]
Her examples were very weak. Most were just liberal Christians attacking conservative Christians and that was somehow an “Attack on Christianity”. I also don’t agree with Bill Maher when he said that religion caused “most wars”, although they do cause many of them or make them worse. Oh, and predictably, Maher gets called “judgmental” and gets compared to fundamentalists by Cory Booker for questioning religion.
The Stupidest States Final Eight made me spit out me my coffee. My bet is on Texas! I also liked it when Maher said religion “cockblocks science and progress”.
Re Thomas Kinkade
Daughter Spawn will need to wash her eyes with bleach after googling the Bad Art Man. When her brother asked her what that was, she said “It’s a landscape showing clouds that don’t obey the laws of nature and which doesn’t adhere to the rules of perspective. And a cross.” Then “Oh, look, a bald eagle getting electrocuted.” Now we’re on to dramatic readings of the description of “Nature’s Paradise,” with frequent introjections of “ew,” “look at all the turkeys,” and Son Spawn announcing “Oh, look, there’s a Man,” “this guy’s an idiot,” “Wow, a church in Rivendell,” and “the trees have ray guns!”
They’re acting pretty gleeful and showing no signs of stopping. Perhaps I should direct them to the bat porn.
Apropos of nothing whatsoever:
I just checked my hotmail and found that a random user on YouTube had sent me a video by way of self-promotion. To my surprise, it turned out to be a really rather good-looking Spanish guy singing an original song of his own composition. It’s actually quite good.
(Kevin, was it you who mentioned swooning over guys with Spanish accents? You should enjoy this…)
Though it also reminded me how depressingly bad my Spanish language skills have become since I haven’t been speaking it over the last couple of years. Brushing up my foreign-language ability has got to be my next project after finals are over.
Ron:
That’s interesting and good to know. I had thought it might have something to do with socialization, but your explanation works as to explaining the prevailing stupidity of the day.
Heh, I was bottle-fed. I was told that also was the prevailing wisdom of the day but I forget what the ‘reasoning’ was as to why breastfeeding was “bad” – possibly something to do with weaning.
Sorry when I hear that name or read it, I black out
What were you saying again?
My ability to sleep at will, while simultaneously needing very little sleep is almost a superpower. Seriously. I can sleep wherever and whenever regardless of my physical position, surroundings, etc. It rarely takes me more than five minutes to become oblivious. On top of that, I require only 3-4 hours of sleep per day. I cannot count the number of situations in which this particular ability has come in handy. I have never had insomnia, but if I were to stay awake at night worrying (which I don’t), it would be about that.
Otherwise, I am quite un-extraordinary.
Feynmaniac,
I watched this clip of it:
http://videos.mediaite.com/embed/player/V3CX293H8MYL3GBR
Cory Booker kept demagoguing it. Bill Maher got him good though, “Well that’s the religion you pick out. I’m reading the whole book.” But what is Bill Maher doing (smoking) thinking he can challenge others with the lie that they cannot know what happens after death? It’s not that they cannot know, it is that they are hopelessly wrong.
Maher also took S. E. Cupp to task, calling her “deluded” because she wouldn’t admit that believers are deluded. Among the other things she said were, “I don’t believe in God, but I’m not like mad at Him”, (she must subscribe to the Karen Armstrong type of god) and, “If you read the Bible correctly, it actually supports gay marriage”, to which Maher replied, “Lady, you’re picking out one little raisin in a giant piece of bread.” Strange. Does anyone know more about this little raisin that supports same-sex marriage in the Bible?
Another good one from Maher, “[Obama] sounds like a super Christy guy to me.”
Now that’s one hell of a sentence. She [S. E. Cupp] should be locked in a room until she figures out just what’s wrong there.
TY.
Pot. A lot of it. He’s made many references to it. I think it’s partially responsible for some of his silly views (e.g, “alternative medicine”).
If you’re an atheist and you’re mad at God you’re doing it wrong. I think many people confuse being mad at theists, their fiction and their actions with being “mad at God”.
Well the Bible does contradict itself so from the principle of explosion you can derive anything (and its opposite). I doubt that’s what she meant though.
I learned reading very late – after starting school. I vaguely recall mygrandmother showing me an old reading book, but I don’t know if she tried teaching me or not. I do recall sitting in her kitchen and trying to explain ‘New Maths’ to her at a later date.
What knocked me over the edge and made me learn reading was supposedly me mother’s refusal to read any more Mortadelo y Filemón for me, because she thought the we’re too stupid.
I have — facetiously — said in the past that John 13:34 (“A new command I give you: Love one another. As I have loved you, so you must love one another”), and similar verses proclaiming the importance of love, support homosexuality. By extension, same-sex marriage would be supported as well (for what is marriage if not an expression of mutual love?).
However, even I would not call this reading the Bible correctly, but rather in a deliberately selective and strained manner.
Come to think of it, I brought that interpretation up while arguing with Pilt, mostly for the purpose of tweaking him.
Owlmirror,
Trinity has questioned your Biblical knowledge here.
Rest. Hell ya, I could use some. As I believe I have mentioned before I have Idiopathic insomnia. I don’t enter deep (read restorative) sleep. Not any, not ever, probably not for the last 5 years. Nothing helps. It’s completely debilitating. I just had my disability appeal hearing yesterday. On the bright side, were I healthy, I would not have the pleasure of interacting with you fine folks because I wouldn’t be sitting here slumped in front of a Dog damned crt! /personal problems.
And I made the mistake, born of boredom,of visiting GL’s blog. Mr. Laden must be bored too, because he has another of his passive-aggressive posts up and is taking cheap shots at SC. Again.
http://scienceblogs.com/gregladen/2010/05/the_evolution_of_asshatitude_o.php?utm_source=readerspicks&utm_medium=link
BS
In Austria, both the conservative party and the head of the industry lobby want a tax on financial transactions. The Tobin Tax basically.
Will wonders never cease.
Awwwww. :o(
Well, my food tends not to talk to me :-þ
I wonder if your synesthesia is showing.
<poke>
Interesting. I can’t eat (or drink) without noticing both the taste and the texture, no matter what I’m thinking about. That’s the only kind of multitasking I’m good at and indeed can’t help doing.
Well, at the dig you’ll have ample opportunity to watch me eating (Copenhagen could be a more constrained environment). I’m always the slowest to finish, and the food there is so good that sometimes I get a second or even third helping… :-9
Then maybe you should try eating once a day – all day long?
<headdesk>
The funny thing is, the few exceptions are chaotic. The German spelling system is pretty strict in degree (once you figure out how convoluted some of the rules are), but in kind it’s more like English than even French is.
A man after mine own heart.
:-S
Horror.
That’s why so many technical terms, including scientific names, have two or more accepted pronunciations in English. Even data I’ve heard pronounced with the first a as in jade and with the same a as in apple, both by Americans.
Texas Red Beds… with fossils in them… :-9
(Disclaimer: never been there, and the fossils are said to be few and far between. Can’t be that few, though, given how well represented Eryops appears to be in museum collections.)
(Hm… there are a few things in that article that really need to be fixed. The part about the ears is probably wrong, for instance.)
I just sleep through it. Sometimes my sleep begins with a dream that simply carries on what I was thinking while falling asleep.
:-S :-S :-S
Lenin’s Collected Works. You lie on your back, right? Somehow mount one of the books above your head, start reading on a random page, and pass out.
My sister once had trouble falling asleep. Guess what I read to her. It worked, quickly.
…Yeah, OK. You’re not going to find them in book form in ND. But everything any communist ever wrote seems to be online (IIRC, marxists.org is a good place to start); take a dead tree or two, print something out, and you should have no more trouble falling asleep for the next year or two.
If you can sleep next to a running laptop, it should be even easier, if you can mount the laptop above your head.
I decide at 3 a.m. that, actually, I ought to have solved all those problems earlier today. I think “I’m too tired, and that trumps everything else, so fuck it”; I go to bed and fall asleep without problems.
It’s the power of denial. :-)
Over here it’s rare for Catholics to genuflect that way. Most do it symmetrically, landing on both knees.
Seconded!
:-D :-D :-D :-D :-D
Oh man.
<headdesk>
Caine, Fleur du mal,
Heehee. Yeah. I felt that S. E. Cupp was only saying that to distinguish herself from all those militant atheists who are “mad at God”. What a saint of an atheist she is.
—
Feynmaniac,
QFT – A real possibility.
—
Owlmirror,
I see. That has to be the most overused verse in that book.
This morning I had a staring contest with my oatmeal. It won.
Today when I was out sailing my baseball cap blew off of my head. Now I have a sunburned bald spot. I hope His SpokesGayness reads this because he was down on ball caps. They do have a use.
Not if you ate it. :D
OFFS:
Or, other bloggers just don’t like him because he’s an ass.
Argh. Some of the discussions on various threads today have made me realise how much I hate human society, and how much I dread actually having to get a job.
I hate, hate, hate the whole basic concept of the employment market. I hate the idea of having to compete against other people for jobs, and having to jump through arbitrary hoops and follow other people’s rules all day long, and network and impress people in order to get ahead. I hate the whole soul-crushing system already, and I haven’t even properly embarked on it yet. I don’t really have any enthusiasm for becoming a lawyer, or an academic, or pretty much any other professional career I can think of: they all involve competition, following other people’s rules, and jumping through hoops.
If I were talented enough, I’d love to be a bestselling novelist. I’d go and live in a nice secluded rural location with nothing but my computer for company, write my books, and tell society and its rules and conventions to fuck right off.
Blind Squirrel, I saw Laden’s latest last night, it was linked on the Now on Scienceblogs at the top of the page – I did not bother to click the link. I already know it’s more of the same old shit. It’s sad, really, that it’s the only way he can garner much attention anymore.
David:
No, that doesn’t work, I’ve tried to eat small amounts throughout the day. It doesn’t take much to fill me up. My doc will be happy enough if I up my meat intake for the next little while.
Gee, I wonder how long it took for that amazing revelation to sink in. *near fatal eyeroll*
welcome to the last 10 years of my life :-p
Walton #343
Unfortunately, Walton, you have an expensive habit known as eating. The way our society is set up you have to get a job so you can support this habit.
I’m not being facetious (well, not too much). I’m lucky, I have a job I enjoy doing. But I know most people don’t like their jobs.
A gentleman with the appropriate name of Johnny Paycheck has a song about it:
This is what we mean we say that private power can be just as tyrannical as government power.
I know. Coincidentally, I was ranting about competition and the job market to a friend irl yesterday, who said it seemed rather incoherent to support capitalism and fiscal-conservatism and yet hate competition. But I guess my personal philosophy is fairly incoherent these days. :-/
Walton,
The answer is compete well for 20 years and then people start coming to you with jobs.
Walton:
Most people aren’t enamored with the idea. I wasn’t, which is why I’m self employed. That’s a hard, long road though, and you don’t necessarily eat all too well for a good number of years.
The best you can do is to do something you enjoy, even if that something wasn’t what you had planned.
ODS: His main argument was that circumcision would be a physical link to his family’s past and a way to share history.
Oh for cripes’ sake. Have the kid grow payesses or something.
Over here it’s rare for Catholics to genuflect that way. Most do it symmetrically, landing on both knees.
Oh now that’s just nuts.
‘Tis: Today when I was out sailing my baseball cap blew off of my head. Now I have a sunburned bald spot
Can you get one with a suction cup inside?
And This morning I had a staring contest with my oatmeal. It won.
You sure that wasn’t tapioca?
DM, way up there: to this day I hate the rare occasions when I can’t read … during eating.
Reading glasses are part of the usual table settings here. Once we discovered we shared that vice, the solution was easy. My complaint is publications that won’t lie flat and stay that way.
Caine: Heh, I was bottle-fed. I was told that also was the prevailing wisdom of the day but I forget what the ‘reasoning’ was as to why breastfeeding was “bad” – possibly something to do with weaning.
Or nutrition. Or something, as in “It’s always something.” I remember helping when Mom was making formula—involved um canned? cows’ milk and Karo syrup and maybe something else—and sterilizing the bottled and nipples and caps. They got stored with the nipples facing in and the caps over them, all held down by a ring that needed tightening when they’d cooled.
Then you had to warm up the refrigerated bottle and test the temp by squirting a little on the inside of your wrist before feeding. And THEN it was OK to use a bottle holder, a sort of cushion with a cloth ring to steady the bottle, and let the baby suckle hands-free.
Every generation or so, what is acceptable gets completely switched around. Kinda like hemlines.
Ron:
Oh, yum. Eeesh. Now that I think on it, I imagine the companies making formula were probably advertising massively and really pushing the product in ’58. I’m sure “complete nutrition” played a large part.
Why would I want a suction cup inside my sunburn? ;-þ
Head hickey! :D
Ouch. I have memories of previous such pains in your honor, and you have my sympathies.
Putting a couple of threads together, watching Bob Ross always calms me down – I’ve never tried listening to him to get to sleep, but now I sense it as a definite possibility. Wonder if his show is available as downloads?
I know that some of my relatives who are in their fifties, sixties, and seventies now were fed on a schedule so that they pooped on a schedule. Apparently, having to hand wash diapers full of poo is a good motivator to maintain such a schedule. Mom says there were accidents and such, but when pooping time came around, the mother would hold the baby over old newspapers until he or she was done. Then the newspaper-poo combo went into the burn pile.
I never wear baseball caps, because I’d still get sunburnt on my ears even if the nose is adequately protected!
And now I’ll visit the bat sex thread, which has been keeping me up way too long, one last time and finally go to bed. It’s almost 4 am over here. And I got almost no work done today.
Mine is publications that won’t stand stably! I don’t like it at all when some lines are farther away from my eyes than others and when the whole thing is distorted in perspective.
(Spaceballs: “If you can read this, you don’t need glasses.)
Now that must have stunk!
Dare I say that the bat sex thread has turned into a surreal drawing room comedy written by David Mamet and complete with fellating fruit bats hanging from the sets?
David,
I have no idea. By the time I was around, none of my relatives who still burned trash had children in diapers! Do burning feces smell strongly? When mixed with other household garbage?
My father always leaves a TV on when he goes to sleep. He wakes up if you turn it off. Even if it just static and bubbly gray screen. Some folks may need some sort “white noise” to help them sleep. Whatever noise works for them.
The whole burn your trash movement stopped back in the ’60’s in Battle Creek. Not good for the laundry on the clothes lines if your neighbor was burning his trash…
Nerd,
My grandmother was still burning her trash in the 90s in the rural South. The guy up the road from my boyfriend’s house burns his trash too. The message that it’s bad for the environment to burn plastic doesn’t seem to have reached everyone, and law enforcement on such things ’round here is very lax. :(
Wow, this thread fills fast!
@Darkmatter, #93:
Pretty much perfect, thank you. What does it say about me that I couldn’t think of that on my own?? *facepalm*
@PZ, #97:
No matter what I say, that’s what what I will mean! Unfortunately, that is probably a little too confrontational for shy ol’ me (unfortunately).
@Ring Tailed Lemurian, #168:
x
(From the quoted bit:)
… because I will instantly burst into flame (right? Surely god is pissed about all these blasphemous thoughts. If you knew someone thought you were imaginary, or at least a real asshole, you would sooner set them ablaze than let them in your house, right? … right?
Nerd:
I can’t stand any noise when I’m trying to fall asleep. Unfortunately, that’s not going to help tonight – the idiot neighbours have their godsdamned-never-ever-shutthefuckup dogs out, so I’ll be hearing fucking barking all night.
*repeats to self: stay away from the shotgun, stay away from the shotgun, leave the bows in their case, leave the bows in their case…*
Walton:
Well, you certainly have the skill to be a writer, so why not try some short story exercises and see where it leads? You don’t have to be stuck in the work-a-day world forever.
Ron Sullivan:
I actually LOLed. Awesome.
me
I can fall right the hell to sleep with the TV on but if I have to turn it off, I’m immediately awake for hours.
My wife can sleep though a nuclear war
Sounds like me a few years ago. We don’t have AC, so the windows are open in the summer. We had a dove that started cooing at 4:30-5:00 am most mornings, waking me up. I normally get up at 6:00 am. Fortunately for both me and the dove, I had lent my shotgun to my BIL thirty five years ago.
Nerd, a dove? I don’t mind the doves. I have a young Bluejay who screams me awake every morning, but he’s not so rude as to start at such an hour. He waits until 10 am or so. I can tune the birds out, I’m so used to hearing them. Dogs, that’s another thing altogether. Especially when it’s three of them all barking their asses off.
Rev. BDC,
I have the same problem with the TV. My eyes won’t stay open while it’s on, but when I get up to turn it off, I’m immediately wide awake!
Caine,
That sucks. Have you suggested to the neighbors that it might be a good idea to invest in shock collars for the dogs? They work by delivering a small shock when the dog barks (it really is a small shock. I tried it on myself because I was worried it was cruel) We had one for our large outside dog. After awhile of wearing it at night (of course we took it off during the day) we didn’t even have to charge it. She knew she had it on and wouldn’t bark. OTOH, they could keep their dogs inside at night, since they’re a nuisance to others.
Our city has an effective noise ordinance. If your dogs keep barking outdoors all night, you keep finding yourself with some hefty fines if your neighbors complain. Using doggyludes or bringing them inside for the night becomes very appealing.
We have three 50′ maples in our small yard, one of which is just outside the second floor master bedroom. I swear that dove was using an amplifier from that tree. It would coo three times, then wait a spell before another round. That was usually when I was just beginning to doze off again. I would occasionally see the dove strutting around the driveway, but could never get close enough for a three-iron swing. After three or four years, the noise stopped, so I presume that dove either died, or found/made a better nest.
oh, I need that anyway, because I have tinnitus, and if there’s no other noise to drown out the ringing, I just cannot fall asleep at all; however, it cannot be what is usually referred to as “white noise”; persistent monotone humming doesn’t work, it has to be a varied sound (wind and rain work best)
also, minor blogwhoring, but I used SC as an example in my last post, and therefore I think I should tell her so she can have the chance to chew me out if I misrepresented her somehow
On Greg Laden’s latest asshattery:
I’ve had my disagreements with SC (as many of you know, if you’re reading the “bat sex is not protected by academic freedom” thread), but I have a great deal of respect for her intellect, and my occasional disagreements with her come honestly.
Greg Laden is another story. He’s astoundingly mean-spirited and disingenuous. Harping on SC after he so brazenly misrepresented her (when he should have apologized). . I just can’t understand it.
I won’t go into all the details, but here’s a primer on Greg’s very bad, non-collegial, dishonest, and shitty behavior:
1. Laden turned an honest debate into a referendum on whether SC was . . .wait for it. .an anti-semite.
2. Laden outed the real name and email of a commenter (also a Pharyngulite) in retaliation for that commenter calling him up short on unfair and provocative argumentation.
3. Laden altered a comment I made on his blog in such a way to make it appear that I had said something I didn’t. He inserted words in my comment with no indication of editorial interference. He left it to stand so that it appeared I said something I did not say.
4. When called out him on it, he basically said, “I can do what I want if you aggravate me, so piss off.”
I have never seen a blogger act in such bad faith as Greg Laden.
And, because I originated the meme “I’ve seen him write lucidly on the Congo before,” for good measure: I retract my qualified praise. He’s a shitty prose stylist; his posts are full of grammatical errors, spelling mistakes, missing words, and awkward/opaque constructions. He has little sense of narrative flow. . .it’s like reading the undigested stream of consciousness no one with good sense would ever commit to the page without an editor.
*post night shift blues alert*
*giggle*
Josh @ 374,
Fixed at no cost ! :P
Are there still countries where the TV reverts to showing cosmic radiation at night ?
Me neither, drives me insane.Unless back in med school Uni apartment days listening to people screw across the paperthin walls, that was exciting, which led to relaxation, which led to sleep :D
@Rorschach:
I know I shouldn’t, but I’m tired, grumpy, and this is just so childishly annoying.
When is it appropriate to be a dick, pray tell Josh? What constitutes “being a dick” ? Is “being a dick” as defined by Josh different from “being a dick” as defined by someone else ?
I’m going to killfile you I think, if I want content-free emotion, I can watch Hannah Montana.
On a nicer note, it’s Etha Williams’s birthday today…:-)
I saw this the other day on RD.net and thought it was so bizarre they must have made it up, but I guess they didn’t :
The goat that ate islamic science
Rorschach:
I’m tired and grumpy too, so here goes.
Being a dick is taking a snipe at whatever comment I make, whether warranted or not. That’s what it seems like to me.
But, since I know I’m an ornery bastard myself, I propose a truce: I’ll lay down my arms if you will. We’ve sniped at each other many times over, sometimes over genuine disagreements, and (I think), sometimes because our personalities clash and we get on each other’s nerves.
I’d rather not have that fight, especially with someone whose comments and insights I respect, even if I don’t agree with them always.
Shake?
<sigh>
One would imagine internecine bickering would usually be about something substantive, but it so rarely is. We’re stupid, us humans.
@John, #380
I’m a dumb human, admittedly, but I am trying:)
The truth value of arguments is not decided by sympathies.
Something Josh needs to learn.I’m not prepared to have every discussion dragged onto a personal stage just because he can’t tell arguments from persons.It gets tiring.Fuck that shit.
*Harmonica theme*
what does that have to do with you making a snide comment about his disagreements with SC? *confused*
I don’t know, but maybe we could ask this Rorschach fellow?
Of course it’s not. I don’t concede your proposition that every argument we have is about dragging personalities into the issues debated, though it’s clear personalities have colored those arguments.
I would, though, like to wipe the slate clean and be on at least cordial terms with you. Can we agree to give each other a fair shake, even if we end up arguing on opposite sides of an issue?
Rorschach and Josh, please stop sniping at each other. It makes me unhappy. :-(
I like both of you. And you’re both better than this.
====
I don’t have enough life experience yet to write good stories. By my mid-twenties I hope for this to have changed, though.
If a fair shake means looking at the argument not the person making it, sure, I’ve been doing that.
Well nothing, who said it had anything to do with it ?
Walton, you lack subtlety, but have a surfeit of earnestness. ;)
PS You might find these of interest (from published writers):
Common Misconceptions About Publishing (current).
How to get my job (a tad dated).
You base your happiness in part on the bickering of regulars on here? Damn, that’s messed up Walton.
Sorry. It’s like hearing one’s parents have a fight.
Are you saying I’m old ??
:P
@Rorschach:
Addressing the arguments on their merits would be a start.
Try it sometime !
Oh back home, and up in the middle of the night. Stupid fluid time.
Oh I see we talked a bit about Texas. It’s only flat and red in a bit of the upper West. I’ve never been there. Even when I’ve gone to Oklahoma I’ve gone across Lake Texoma so it’s not that way. Cedar prairie land there.
I live in Dallas, used to live in Austin. Dallas is pretty green where there are trees still. I live just south of the Trinity. I gots pictures of the locality some where (flikr, facebook, something like that?) but I’ll probably take more because after spending so much time photographing Paris I think photographing Dallas could be… funny (ironic?)
As some one who’s just almost lost her 20’s forever I’m going to ask you outright what you intend to do to make that happen?
I’m just hoping I manage to do something worthwhile before I die, because the way the last 10 years have gone by I realize I’m a.) already an “older” woman and b.) going to blink and open my eyes on my last day in what seems like a minute or two.
Damned life.
Oooh… but I’ll warn you. Having a life that’s *interesting* isn’t what you need Walton. Just write what you know.
You won’t find time to write if your life is very interesting. Trust me on this one!
Looking back I’ve done more in 10 years than some people fit in a life time. It’s frustrating to have so little to show for it, and I think some times it would be interesting to write about and then I think… why? It’s one thing in this world that’s mine.
right now, you’re not making any arguments, you’re just being a snarky ass. what else is there to respond to?
there are just so many smartass comments about this that could be made. If there’s something I’m good at, it’s making life more “interesting” than necessary :-p
Damn. Rorschach and Josh. No love lost there… weird. I must have missed the actual argument.
Meh.
I bitch about Texas, but I love it when people come here from other countries though, to see their opinion of it.
However there are some perks to Texas and Dallas is a decent enough city as cities in the south-southwest go.
I facepalm.
Thanks for going easy on me.
There is none, as far as I can tell….
GOOD!
I was kind of half-kidding. Sorry that this wasn’t clear (it’s an inherent peril of the internet that comments can come over as more serious than they were intended to be). No, I don’t base my happiness on conversations on the internet. :-)
But I do think they should stop bickering.
Thread needs jump-start.
Walton:
You don’t need great or thrilling life experiences, just an imagination, some skill, and the time to sit and write a little each day. (If you don’t have that kind of time right now, I fully understand. It seems like you’ve got a full plate.)
Like anything else, writing takes practice. I’m trying to improve my own skillz just by writing little silly stories several times a week– these stories will never see the light of day, but I can see my own style improving little by little.
My own writing ability suffered after I left college. I didn’t have the time or the drive to indulge in anything that wasn’t work or sleep related. So, keep your skills sharp. It may pay off in the long run. :)
/unwarranted advice
Good news – at least for me, and I hope for some others here – looks like I will be able to go to Copenhagen, although I haven’t booked yet. I’ve been able to clear it with wife, son, dog, colleagues and department head (in order of priority ;-). Specifically, I’ll leave on 17th, but my wife will be away at a charity trustees’ meeting until the 18th, so my son will be in the house on his own overnight for the first time (he’s 15), and the dog will have to cross her legs until he gets in from school; I’ll be going on from Copenhagen first to visit a friend in Italy, then to Hungary for a meeting, so I’ll have to leave some preparations for the meeting with colleagues – and there’s an important deadline at the end of June, so I needed to make sure my department head could do without me.
Unlike most people, I won’t be dependent on the goodwill of Eyjafjallajökull to arrive as I don’t fly unless absolutely essential – although I will have to depend on Eurostar. So, hope to see lots of you there!
I just found out who Klaus Numi was.
Strange.
G’morning, everyone *stumbles in with hot tea* I did end up sleeping very well (for a change) and my neighbour actually put his dogs inside a little after midnight! I’m tempted to declare a miracle.
Pygmy Loris, shock collars? Here? No, they wouldn’t do it. This is life in the rural lane, I’m lucky they keep their dogs fenced in. Nerd, we don’t even have cops here, let alone any sort of you do that, you’re getting fined! system. I’m glad your dove left and you achieved quiet. I love the sound Mourning Doves make, which is what I have inhabiting the trees on my property. For sheer noise value, nothing beats a tree full of screaming Bluejays. Or Grackles.
Poopyhead (and friend) in Lego.
You could at least put him on his favourite form of ransportation. That would make him happy.
And we exist to make him happy, right?
Or have I, once again, confused god(s) and Professor Myers?
cicely #262 said
Clearly you haven’t seen much of Texas. It’s really big, if you didn’t know and encompasses a number of biomes, geological regions, etc. Big Bend is breathtaking. The hill country is also beautiful (Pedernales Falls State Park is freaking sweet). I live in the big thicket (Texas Chainsaw Massacre country) which is composed of a diverse mix of eastern and western flora, in one of the most observable ecotones I have traversed.
Antiochus:
I knew a ranger (name escapes me (they say that as you get older, memory is the second thing to go)) who spent three years at Big Thicket National Preserve. He said that you learned quickly to not turn your porch light on (shitloads of insects) and to spray everything with bleach (he told me PVC pipes got moldy and mildewy). But he enjoyed it there. Added lots of birds to his life list.
Blarg, I am hyper nervous.
Just finished my presentation more or less for my thesis defense tomorrow. I’m not entirely happy with it, I’m starting to develop those constant shakes and the back of my head is going “AIEE”, but I’m pretty sure that’s just my brain freaking out at how tomorrow I have to defend my thesis.
Going to print out my presentation notes and my paper and read them over a few thousand times.
2 years hinging on a day, of course I can do this…hopefully.
Oh man. Good luck, Cerberus!
*hugs! for support*
Of course you can do it, Cerberus. Keep breathing, and have a glass of wine (or whatever will relax you a bit.)
Just to be clear: Lego Zed is not by me. I merely found it (via Bad Astronomy).
Cerberus, frankly you’d be fine either way.
So just keep breathing and get through it.
It’s much more likely that everything will turn out well anyway!
Congrats in advance!
(see how confident I am?)
Good luck, Cerberus. (I empathise, as I’m facing finals in a few weeks myself.)
====
OurDeadSelves,
Yeah, you’re probably right. I intend to get back into writing stories once finals are over. (I’ve written a few parts of stories in the past – usually in a vaguely space-opera genre – but have since looked back at them and realised how awful they were. But I’m hoping my style will become more sophisticated with practice.)
sweet
You and most others who have been through it. It is frightening, but you usually don’t get this far if your adviser is doing their job. It means they think you are ready. Now, show their confidence in you.
I suggest 1) BREATHE. 2) Speak normally, and paraphrase your written notes into more conversational language (well rehearsed before hand), except for crucial passages. 3) BREATHE. 4) Speak for your allotted time looking at the clock occasionally (don’t stare), speeding up or slowing down as necessary based on rehearsals. 5) BREATHE. 6) Don’t pull a Redhead, and try to play the piccolo part of the last stanza of Sousa’s Stars and Stripes Forever in triple time since you are so nervous.
Do well. Make yourself and your adviser proud (also those of us at Pharyngula rooting for you.)
Cerberus –
You’ll do great. And while I believe that some institutions or departments have a tradition of flunking people at thesis defense, these are very very rare and generally well known by graduate students ahead of time. So if no one’s ever been flunked at thesis orals, you’re going to do fine.
So breathe and enjoy the champagne afterwards.
Oh crap, presentation run-through was fine, but a bit short, so need to go back and flesh it out a little.
Blarg. Thanks everyone for the encouragements.
Cerberus –
Short is fine. When you add stuff, put it in a different type or highlight it or something so that you can skip it if you need to. My experience was that it took way longer during the defense that it did during my run-through. They passed me anyway, even if they did request that I skip a bunch of my presentation…
Some of you please come over to the Sunday Sacrilege thread, where I’m getting accused of being an apologist for misogynistic religious teachings. So much for yesterday, when I was chastised on the bat-sex thread for saying that I often avoided discussions on the relevance of evolutionary biology to human behavior because it was too easy to get characterized as an apologist for [insert undesirable behavior here]. It seems that the problem of distinguishing “is” from “ideal” exists everywhere.
Daughter Spawn is reading the exchange and is mightily amused.
Grrr.
In the Torygoon, http://www.telegraph.co.uk/science/space/7722455/Aliens-hijack-Nasas-Voyager-2-spacecraft-claims-expert.html
My hypothesis is an alien has invaded Mr Hausdunkuf’s mind and is causing him to spout gibberish. This is because he otherwise seems to be a functional human being.
We’re good at cheering. Who was the last one? Hmm. Used a state in his moniker. Now working in bumfuck nowhere in the upper midwest (I know, almost sounds a lot like dah UP, but we had SNOW). Knows PZ personally. MAJeff? Yep. That was a party.
I’ll start the grog tonight. Celebrate with your local colleagues for a couple of days, then come by in three days and give me your car keys, free grog and bacon sandwiches for the night, or as long as you remain upright…Patricia will see you have a room upstairs with the Lilac Beret Pullet Squad™ outside your door…They are even respected by the Kninja Knitters…
Cerberus, as others have said, short’s Ok. A concise well-argued presentation is better than a long, dull, meandering/wandering, or bombastic one.
Cerberus – stand firm. You know your shit, and your committee wants to see you succeed. You will be awesome.
Oh,those wacky aliens, they just can’t manage to be straightforward, can they?
Especially since if they are more advanced than us, why is the poor little satellite still on track, beeping it’s little heart out…
A few minutes with Generalissimo Google™ suggests this Hartwig
HausdorfHausdunkuf is a von Däniken-style nutter with rather odd “theories” about burial mounds in China (sometimes called Chinese Pyramids).:-S :-S :-S
Can’t something be done about this? I mean, in a country where you have health insurance?
Wind and rain are great for sleeping even without tinnitus. Even mild thunderstorms are nice. :-)
What I can’t stand is less predictable noise. For instance, it gets on my nerves when the fridge is in the same room (as it was in Paris – the apartment was only one room) and gets to work when I’m trying to fall asleep. It doesn’t wake me up when I’m already asleep, though.
And there’s a loudly ticking alarm clock that is nothing short of torture. I can fall asleep next to it, but it takes very long indeed. My brother can stand it, apparently.
No. It’s his somewhat annoying sense of humor, and I think he was trying to praise SC more than to pick on you. He’s not going to change, so just ignore it. :-|
ROTFL! Now that’s how to write an insult! :-D
:-)
Will she ever come back to Pharyngula? I mean, she came, grabbed her OM, and left… :-þ
Bookmarked.
The law schools act a bit like denominations; everyone belongs to one, on a mostly geographical basis.
Is your memory photographic, or how did you find this? :-o
“There is a curse.
They say:
May you live in interesting times”
:-) :-) :-)
Stranger than Klaus Kinski?
(I’ve watched a few movies starring that guy. Horribly convincing. No need to watch them more than once.)
Nice.
:-o
Congratulations in advance! Just make sure you get enough sleep. Remember you’re the world’s top expert on your topic, and you explain it to the audience; it’s not a performance of a theater play.
Not even remotely comparable to a thesis defense, I’m afraid.
Never look at the clock, because you already know how long your presentation takes. After all, you’ve spent the last few days or weeks shortening it, haven’t you. Just talk.
And do you really need written notes?
WTF? Is it time to break out “America is a scary place” again? ;-) I’ve never heard of anyone failing a thesis defense; if you could fail, you wouldn’t have got that far.
Cerberus:
Stay on the short side. If they want to know more, they can ask. If you don’t give them something sensible to ask about, they’ll ask about off-the-wall stuff instead.
And you’ll be fine. I was a little worried about my student who passed his defense on Wednesday, but he did fine. You will too, then it will be over.
You need to? Really??? Is that in all seriousness required??? ~:-|
Surprises me. All talks I’ve ever given took less time than the rehearsals, because I’m alone in the rehearsals and put in a lot of false starts that I don’t do in the real presentation.
Maybe prepare extra slides for the question session to anticipate likely questions.
Anyway, I’m going to bed, 4 hours earlier than yesterday. It’s midnight. :-)
I’m quite proud of myself: I’ve recently been learning to cook. I can now make vegetarian “chilli con carne” (technically chilli sin carne, I suppose) using Quorn mince, and have also cooked a few pasta dishes for myself and a couple of friends, all of which have turned out well. Gone are the days when I had to subsist on ready-meals. :-)
Walton:
Good for you. Cooking is a skill which will always stand you in good stead.
Also a skill which many women find irresistible. FWIW.
like what? to my knowledge, tinnitus is neither curable nor treatable.
A good example of Poe’s law:
oooohhh yeeessss
And men, you know, just in case.
I must be a real Pharyngulite – I’ve gotten into an actual pissing match on a thread (the Daughters of Eve one) and seem unable to step away from the computer. I did manage to take 10 minutes to put a chicken in the oven, though (how domestic of me), and I’ve actually had a lovely and thought-provoking day.
Even if, after a while, it is just going the local family restaurant. It is the lack of cooking and clean-up for one night that is greatly appreciated. And a smart spouse provides…
Good for you sir! It’s actually not so hard once you practice a bit, eh? One of those things (like math for me) that gets much easier the more you actually do it.
All talks I’ve ever given took less time than the rehearsals, because I’m alone in the rehearsals and put in a lot of false starts that I don’t do in the real presentation.
ditto.
When I was a grad student, I would commonly find my rehearsal talks would go for 2 hours, and become inclusive of way too much (I tended to overthink everything). the actual presentations rarely lasted more than 40 mins.
now the debates AFTER the presentations…
I recall one “discussion” that went on, rather acrimoniously, for over 1.5 hours after I presented an aspect of my thesis work.
Yeesh, brings back tender memories.
:P
Re the aesthetic qualities of the Texas landscape, I have been chastened, and am contrite. Will try not to repeat offense. Insist on retaining right to dis Oklahoma, however.
I *heart* Lewis Black
Really? Oh man, no not me. But I’m a big extemporaneous speaker though. It seems like as I start talking I think more and faster so much so I have to record myself talking some times to generate get more into the detail I want to. Things I thought seemed sketchy will suddenly glue themselves together while I’m talking and I find myself thinking “Damn, so that’s what I meant.”
I have to make sure I really did get it all in while practicing or else I’m one of those talkers who will always go over-limit.
Remember, all you Texas promoters, that I’m making lists of cool places to include in the upcoming Dr. Mattir’s high-school-on-the-road program…
Could use Oklahoma places as well, if there’s anything outside of the climate stuff in Norman…
A rant.
Background first, I am a teacher and have a lot of sympathy for a teacher using their strengths to be better teachers, including minimally incorporating their hobbies and interests into the curriculum.
I have spent the last year gritting my teeth as my son’s health teacher has used his class as a platform for his views. He is a conservative, republican morman. I haven’t made a formal, or informal, complaint because as a teacher in this very conservative town, I know that if I had complained it would likely have made my son’s experience that much worse. Instead I have tried to talk him throughout the course about how to handle the whole situation nonconfrontationally and given him more scientific and reasoned examples and information.
During the last year the teacher has openly mocked democrats (in health yet, with powerpoints showing how good and healthy our country was when republicans were in office). He has stressed how unhealthy nonmarital sex is. How criminal it is to expose others to STD’s and how the morman religion is really the “healthiest” and most natural fit for marriage. He added a “spiritual” goal to their health goals that they had to develop. He talked about the mixed message of teaching birth control to teens. (Trust me my son already knows about birth control, not that he will need it for awhile, poor kid is as nerdy as mom.) The latest and cause of this rant are the following journal questions that he (my son) is supposed to submit answers to.
A. When does life begin? Explain your answer.
B. Will this affect your stand on the abortion issue?
C. Debate the pros and cons of whether the school’s health clinic (nurse) or health teachers should be permitted to distribute condoms to sexually active students.
D. What is Mr. Stubbs’ view about the issue of school’s health clinic (nurse) or health teachers should be permitted to distribute condoms to sexually active students?
10 more days and he is out of the class. I can hold on, I can hold on.
Sorry, just had to tell someone.
Jadehawk
Many years ago I remember my dad doing some research with tinnitus patients regarding zinc loading. I seem to recall there was some positive outcomes but can’t remember what sort of dosages or what degree of noise abatement we’re talking about. He’s not in the country at the moment to ask but if you give me a few weeks I’ll get some more info on the research he was doing and what the outcomes were. He suffers from it himself so I think he had some serious vested interest in finding relief!!
FWIW there is also things called tinnitus maskers available but like a hearing aid they can be a little cumbersome to wear but I remmeber some patients wore them at night only to aid in sleep.
oh yeah, I was gonna ask you for the timeframe on that, i.e. when you’re starting this high-school-on-the-road thing.
cicely: Actually, there are parts of OK that are beautiful too. Didn’t mean to sound shrill about Texas…its just that when you live in a place that seems* at times to be populated with idiots, you have to find something to like. I am grateful each morning for the smell of pine trees…while I miss my hometown, (Columbus, OH), I don’t miss the smell of the place, which was reminiscent of a turd-factory that had caught on fire. So I’m grateful for the pine-trees. And I guess I have gotten right with mold.
*seems is the operative word…lots of cool people here that don’t get the airtime.
@Jadehawk –
As soon as Mr. M lands a new job (high stress in the M household) – so probably late summer/early fall. ND will definitely be on the list, as my father grew up on a homestead in Montana and then in Fargo, and my grandmother grew up in Courtenay, about as far away from anywhere as is possible. I think the school-on-the-road will be a great thing for all involved.
I admit, there are a few nice places in OK. Red Rock Canyon can be amazing, and looks so totally out of character wrt the surrounding area; and there are attractive bits in the NE part of the state. I’ve heard, but cannot confirm, that the mountains in the SE aren’t bad. But OK is, IMO, on the whole, a total loss with no insurance. Putting some of the most bigotted, self-righteous people I’ve ever met on it, doesn’t help.
How can he get away with this? Damn.
I’m glad your son isn’t like me. I couldn’t have resisted answering… very honestly.
well, if the timing is right, I’d suggest trying to catch the restored version of Metropolis at the Fargo Movie Theater. Nothing like watching an Art Deco movie in an Art Deco theater ;-)
@Patricia
You have better self-control than I do – I would have blown a freaking gasket. This is why it’s good that I’m a homeschooler – the debris from the repeated gasket-blowing would greatly hinder my ability to improve the public education system. As it is, I can barely control my gaskets around scouts, public library internet filter policies, and the myriad other sources of miscellaneous education-related stupidity.
Mattir: I’m not done yet reading the Sunday Sacrilege thread, but it seems to me (downtrodden creature of The Patriarchy that I am) that you’re being perfectly reasonable, and people are reading into your writing something that I’m not seeing.
for what ever that’s worth.
@Mattir
Gaskets were blown but only in private. I want to confront the teacher AFTER my son has left the class, biggest fear is that this is a conservative enough town and small enough community that he will still be labeled if it becomes clear that I complained. He is socially awkward as it is, I don’t want to make it worse.
Just steams me that he feels so free to share so much of his personal world view with them. I teach science and NONE of my students has ever known that I am an atheist or democrat. I teach the facts and don’t entertain the “but what about” questions. I respond with, “In science we talk about the evidence, this is the evidence. I might enthusiastically talk about how science has replaced “magic” with understanding (teaching about stars for example). I might talk about places I’ve been, experiences I’ve had. But I am very careful to keep my political and social views out of the curriculum. When students want to know for instance “who did you vote for” I respond that if they see me off campus when they are no longer my student I will be happy to tell them.
Irony here is that I teach at the Junior High his kids went to. Never had his kids but I want to ask him how he would feel if they had been in my class and I had talked about how stupid I think people who believe in a magic man in the sky are.
on a completely different note: I have a theory about a scene in Iron Man II, but no one cares about it because no one here knows WTF I’m talking about.
My theory is that Michael Schumacher dies in that movie.
I’m going to guess no one here cares either, but now I’ve gotten that off my chest :-p
Theories need evidences and those evidences need to be validated, Jadehawk.
I’d validate them myself, but I’m waiting for the DVD.
Walton:
Oh for shit’s sake, Quorn?? *shudder*
Kudos for cooking, however. To quote Robert Rodriguez: “Not knowing how to cook is like not knowing how to fuck. You’re gonna eat the rest of your life, so you might as well know how.”
Jadehawk:
I think I know what you’re talking about (just saw Iron Man 2 for the second time last night), but I’m not sure why you’re convinced Michael Shumacher dies– granted they don’t really dwell on the other drivers that were attacked. And I wouldn’t recognize his car in the field, anyway.
the very first one that gets sliced up: fastest in the field, red, shell logo, “pirelli” written on it. and after it gets sliced up, nothing in or around it moves.
Jadehawk:
On the second time I watched IM2, I noticed a bunch of little details that I missed the first time*, like the self tanner that Hammer had smeared all over his hands and stuff like that. If nothing else, John Favreau has an eye for detail.
It could have been entirely intentional that Michael Shumacher’s car was the first to be attacked. He’s probably the most recognizable Formula One driver today.
*Granted, killing off a famous Formula One driver is hardly a “little detail”…
Actually, Jadehawk, I’d have thought that at the time the film was shot Schumacher would have still been in retirement – so if it is them taking a shot at a Ferrari driver, it’d be someone else (Alonso or Massa, or maybe even Räikkönen, who was still with Ferrari in ’09) they’d be killing off.
Then again, it’s been a while longer than that that Ferrari’s had a car that’s fastest in the field…
Damn I really want to watch it now.
Is Schumacher actually characterized in the movie or are you just talking about a guy driving a red car? Because after three years of retirement he’s driving a silver car now and afik he’s never been sponsored by Pirelli. Movies, meh.
@Patricia08, 459
it would seem to me that you have not said anything of your own beliefs to your students because you are living in a conservative community and your job, let alone your public standing, would suffer for it.
I dare say if you lived in a liberal community the shoe would be well and truly on the other foot. Your students would know much more about your own beliefs and your son’s teacher would be much less open about his own.
I am making no criticism, just an observation. The questions though, seemed to me to be relatively benign. They are open questions on how your son and his fellow students have interpreted the subject matter. I suspect your concern, and I think rightly so, is how your son will be marked if he answers with a more liberal worldview. As long as his answers show a reasoned thought process to derive the answers he should score well. If the teacher then marks him down for being “wrong” then you would have reason to confront the teacher about teaching religion in schools. Of course it’s ultimately your call on what to do.
well, I figured since this is happening in the Marvel universe, and since they turned BMW into Stark Enterprises, that they’d be tweaking reality and it would be Schumacher even thought that didn’t quite correspond with the contemporary situation, precisely because Ferrari stopped being consistently first when he quit. If it weren’t relevant, they could have slashed up any other kind of car first. but no, it was the red Ferrari, not a Renault, not a McLaren, not the Jaguar or one of the yellow ones (Jordan?).
no, it’s just the car that’s visible; but my theory is that it’s Schumacher’s Ferrari, because it’s such an iconic car.
Fair enough, of course it could be Kimi Raikonen, Ruebens Barricello, Filipe Massa, Fernando Alonso, Eddie Irvin, Martin Brundle – just to name those who have driven a Ferrari since MS has been driving them. MS sounds good to me though.
yeah, but how many of those guys have been good enough consistently enough to be the leading car in the race? especially in the Monaco Grand Prix, which Schumacher won 5 times? (only Senna won the thing more often)
Walton,
As someone who does a lot of writing for my job and have had fiction published, I’ll tell you the secret of being a good writer. Write. Then write some more. The more practice you have the better you’ll be.
You have the advantage you’re a clear, thoughtful writer already. I don’t see any reason why you shouldn’t be able to become a published author if you set your mind to it.
Cobolt:
I think you’re dead wrong here. Patricia stated that she doesn’t think that sort of thing belongs in class and she’s right, it doesn’t. She’s a good teacher who teaches the subject, not use the classroom as a platform to pontificate.
Firstly, my apologies, Brundle never drove a Ferrari – He was MS’ team mate at Benetton.
For the record I have never been a fan of MS, just to be clear.
Raikonen won the championship in 2007 in a Ferrari. Massa won it in 2008 for about 20 secs until Hamilton crossed the line in 5th in Brazil.
Infact all of the named drivers above have won in a Ferrari. Schumacher’s success came from building a team around him to give him the best possible car (no grudge there), insisting on number one status in the team and some dubious tactics on the race track (Thus my not being a fan). Yes, if anyone says Schumacher everyone thinks red Ferrari and yes he was the number 1 driver at what was, on balance, the best team for 13 years.
Still could have been anyone else though. :P
@Cobalt, 466 and @Caine, 472
I am always aware that my views would be frowned on by most of the people in my community. Given that, I am probably more cautious in how I talk about some issues in the classroom (global warming for instance). I try to gently influence more rational thinking by talking about evidence and scientific progression. (I hate talking about the scientific method since too many kids have been taught that this is a set of steps.) I try to always stay true to the science and rational thought. If my views were more widely known even this would probably bother some parents.
But my frustration is that I don’t think the world view and personal beliefs of the teacher have any place in a public elementary or secondary classroom. BTW I feel VERY differently about college level courses. I have had students approach me after they have left my classroom, while not on campus and ask questions. These I answer honestly and bluntly. I also haven’t ever hidden my views from my (generally) disapproving colleagues. I figure I can speak my mind in the staff lounge.
And yes most of the people in the community would have no problem with what he does in the classroom. They would probably have more issues with me, since I don’t answer questions for instance about the world being 6,000 years old with any discussion of differing views. I simply talk about how in science we look at evidence.
And yes I am most concerned with my son’s experience. For that reason I have tried to hide much of my anger and frustration while still validating his discomfort and frustration. And therein lies my need to rant. So I have to thank you all for your patience with me.
You may be right, but then neither of us know Patricia. The point I was trying to make though is that when we are “in sync” with a community we tend to feel more comfortable about sharing our own thoughts where-as if our thoughts/beliefs differ from those around us we tend to keep our heads down – generally speaking of course. I won’t argue that Patricia isn’t doing the right thing or that the other teacher isn’t doing the wrong thing but if the tables were turned I would suspect a role reversal.
Cobalt, 475
The particular questions with the exception of the last aren’t that bad. I don’t think a discussion of how the teacher feels is at all appropriate. I would also argue that asking if your views on when life began (which I would answer 3.5 billion years ago) would affect your view of abortion is at least a prejudiced question. However within a week of being in his class my son knew he was morman (picture of his wedding in Utah in a powerpoint), republican (snide comments about the president), and conservative (again comments about current events). He seems to feel it is important that they know who he is. And he has used selective data to prove how good his world view is. My reaction to the questions would have been much milder if this hadn’t been a going on since last August. (10 more days, 10 more days)
Now I do think that getting to know the students and letting them get to know you is important. I relate things to myself and my life frequently. I love to teach them something that wasn’t known when I was their age and tell them they are now smarter than I was at their age since this has only recently been figured out. I talk about traveling, going to school and growing up. But I try very hard to let them get to know me without trying to impose my liberal ideas on them. I want to teach them to think for themselves, not to teach them to think like me.
Awesome !
Say what ?? Moi, annoying ? :P
Someone noted !
*hungover, out for walk on the beach*
Re: Reading and breastfeeding, upthread:
In the early 50s, as part of the post-war boom, bottle-feeding, and the accoutrements that accompanied it, were hyped as upper-class because they were fairly costly. Breastfeeding became what those who could not afford to buy, buy, buy did. When my brother was born, the ladies of the church got together and bought my mother a steriliser, bottles, nipples, brushes and all – and were horrified that she preferred to breastfeed.
Reading: I was temporarily misdiagnosed as having “violent tendencies” when I was three. I was a participant in an early childhood study at Yale and identified several Rorschach blots as “a ‘splode!”
No, says my mum – she’s been reading about atomic bomb tests in the newspaper.
She tells me they asked when she taught me to read; she had to tell them that she hadn’t, I’d just picked it up from being read to.
It runs in the family, even if not in the genes: My son, at 18 months, was blurting out words on signs and in magazines – tho’ he did once identify McDonnell-Douglas as McDonalds. I’ve known too many people who started reading pre-kindergarten to think it particularly odd. I suspect it’s largely a function of being read to consistently and having the same books reread. [And, perhaps, Sesame Street.]
WELL DONE, WALTON!
(I believe I’m allowed to shout in this case.)
Walton, you are cooking now – excellent. There are many simple cookbooks available at used bookstores and the library. Buy a decent rack of spices and experiment. Spices can cover a multitude of errors. Growing herbs on the window sill is also pretty easy and they taste much better fresh. Also brightens up the place a bit.
I am still amazed at how many people cannot cook or do other simple things. I made sure that before they left the nest that all of the kids could: cook at least simple dishes; change a tire and check oil; do laundry; shop for groceries reasonably; use a checking account and have some idea of how to do a budget; do simple sewing repairs like hems and buttons; and a few other similar and simple items. People need survival skills and most of them are pretty simple.
I am not a great cook, except at the grill, but I can feed myself and others. From years of living alone and poor, most of my meals are not pretty as I still try to get everything done in one pot. However, they taste better than they look. I am an excellent sous chef and have everything chopped, sliced, diced, measured and standing by when spousal unit (great cook) starts in. I also have never minded doing dishes. (Walton – offering to do dishes will usually impress the hell of out of your hosts. Not talking about at a dinner party, but a friend’s get together.)
I can cook several dishes, do laundry, shop for groceries and deal with my finances without difficulty. However, I have no idea how to change a tire or check oil (as I don’t have a full driving licence yet), and have never repaired any clothes. But I’m sure I will learn these things in time.
Increasingly, I quite enjoy cooking and look forward to it. Some friends and I are planning to attempt a lentil-and-chickpea vegetarian curry this week. (Since I have one friend who doesn’t like onions, it isn’t possible to buy a ready-made curry sauce so we will have to make one from scratch. Any advice on spices etc would be welcome.)
I’m having a good week overall. I’m beginning to terms with aspects of my real identity. More on this later, perhaps.
I’m not a massive fan of Quorn in general, but Quorn mince is okay if adequately seasoned, and is the best available substitute for meat in chilli or pasta dishes. (I’m not vegetarian, but some of my friends are.)
:-D :-D :-D
Should of course read “…come to terms with…” That’s what comes of posting before my second cup of coffee.
@Walton: yay for cooking! We spend a LOT of time in the kitchen. Try to get hold of a good Le Creauset heavy casserole dish: they’re pricy when new but last for ever so you can often pick one up very cheap at a second-hand sale; one of our Le Creusets we bought for £2 when passing a car boot sale in Dorset; the owner had been using it for forty years. Try the Sunday morning car boot sale at Kassam Stadium.
The great thing about Le Creusets is that practically anything becomes a delicious meal if put in a casserole dish with a little stock and allowed to cook for three hours in a medium oven. That’s why we don’t get any more Jehovah’s Witnesses in our neighbourhood.*
Also, if you can get up to Stanton St John, Rectory Farm is the best place to get fresh veggies. Excellent value for money (as in, potatoes at 40p per kilo). And it’s pick-your-own asparagus season now. Yum.
*For legal purposes: kidding as far as you know.
Has anyone heard of this movie ? Sounds very interesting :
How Weed won the West
Walton – @ #481
Glad to here you are reasonably self-sufficient, my estimation of you continues to rise. (Yeah, I know you just could not live without my approbation – grin) Tires and oil checks are, of course, of less importance for the UK as you are far less a car society than North America. Clothes repair is easy, just buy one of those small sewing kits at Tesco or someplace. Useful to tack on a loose button or fix a simple tear. Staplers are good emergency tools for loose hems and the like.
Glad you are not automatically using onions in all you cook. I like them, but they are not fond of me. I find the mark of a good host is to check what his guests can/will eat and then adapt. Ask your friends about spices, that will give you both hints and allow you to tailor your meals.
Coming to terms with you real identity? Sounds good, let me know how that is going. Still waiting to grow up myself. (smile)
Take care, still owe you a drink.
Pffft. I told you guys, didn’t I?
lol
Cardamom, cloves, cinnamon, cumin, coriander…
maybe fennel and a touch of fenugreek?
Pepper of course to taste.
These are the key spices in a lot of Indian curry. With lentils probably a little garlic and tumeric too?
Good luck! :D:D
Your bout of Conservatism seems to be passing fast, Walton. Or should I call you Neil? *dun-dun-dunnnnn*
Yes you did, Ol’Greg, I bow to you. (smile)
Alas, time to write some. Ciao till later.
Let’s go back to the endless thread tradition of posting instructive lectures :
Dawkins–Boeing 747 argument
Sean Carroll–From butterflies to humans
Dan Dennett–The evolution of confusion
I vaguely recall a maths professor telling about someone at Oxbridge whose Ph.D. was deemed inferior and he was only awarded an M.Sc. Something he already had.
My impression is that one’s advisor is there to stop one from submitting insufficient work. UK unis seem to have some sorta thesis committee thingy as well – prolly to help iron out student/advisor differences as well.
Nomi? Awesome is a weird way, yes.
Sili! HAHA XD
Walton, your bedroom’s on fire.
Good morning, Pharyngulites.
I just got back from a weekend at my parents’ house – my brother, sister-in-law, and nephew were there, too. Only got awkward a few times, when super-Christian aunt started being all preachy, and again my father making me grow very impatient with him because of his off-color jokes about homosexuality.
More awkward because I am bisexual…
Oh, hi guys! I decided to stop being idiotic about ‘I’m attracted to guys, but not attracted to them in that way’ and embrace the fact that I’m not hetero. I like guys, I like girls, and that’s that. Silly Christianity, forcing me to be someone I’m not.
Who has two thumbs and just got her Master’s Degree in Biology?
This girl.
Just finished up my thesis defense and I fucking aced it. I smashed the presentation out of the park. I was knowledgeable and on top of all of their discussions on the topic. I even asked them afterwards for specific things I could improve for future papers and presentations and they didn’t really have much advice.
I wasn’t even all that nervous and was able to keep my cadence normal and walk through parts that had been awkward and stilted in my run-throughs. It was even perfectly on time, taking up a little over 40 minutes of the 45.
In short I’m a golden god(dess).
Wonder when I get my first Igor?
Wonderful to hear that, Cerberus! Congratulations!
I could be your Igor, but I’m neither hunch-backed nor limping… and I have next-to-no knowledge of biology… and I get squicked out by organs…
I should, of course, have looked up the Wikipedia article earlier… however, it does provide a long list of causes, methods of prevention, and treatments.
Most interestingly, tinnitus can be connected to low serotonine levels, which means it could be a side effect of depression; and both caffeine and its withdrawal can cause tinnitus.
Yeah. I’ve found chemistry to be a good preparation :-þ
(Seriously. I made tin iodide and alum several years before I steamed potatoes for the first time, and it was only a few months ago that I bought raw meat and fried it [with onion] all on my own. That meat & onion, BTW, turned out very good with steamed potatoes. The alum, in contrast, only worked at the 2nd or 3rd try.)
Who doesn’t!
I laughed for half a minute at Beck‘s comparison of the Peace Corps to the SS.
I get that with writing sometimes.
*grip*
That’s it. This violates the First Amendment.
<envy>
Any chance you’ll pass Pittsburgh in mid-October? I’ll be there at a conference, Oct. 10th to 13th.
Except for the remarkably few places with fossils. Richards Spur (formerly Fort Sill)… :-9
So I looked it up… sounds interesting, is a good idea in principle (assuming there’s a sustainable way to make ammonia), and might even taste good. Or not.
Well, maybe it’s just the stereotypic Formula 1 car, and not any particular driver… few people are as well informed as you about such things, you know…
(For crying out loud, comment 470! I barely knew the name Ayrton Senna!)
:-)
Absolutely. That’s more important than the cookbook – you don’t currently have time to use a serious cookbook much anyway.
Absolutely – though I never did it, because the invention of the window sill hasn’t reached France yet. I kid you not. If the wall is thicker than the window, the entire sill is on the outside; the inner surface of the window is level with the inner surface of the wall.
I was taught how to sew buttons to cloth in elementary school. Along with fairly advanced purling and (later) elementary knitting.
All I can say is that there are enormous differences between different kinds of curry powder (some very hot, some not at all; some mostly turmeric, some more greenish than yellow), but I bet you know that better than I…
Oho!
LOL!
ROTFL!
YouTube is excruciatingly slow right now. Looks interesting, however.
Related video: “American Drug War: The Last White Hope: Pre[-]Release Cut” – now that sounds interesting, but where could I steal 2 hours…
Yep. France has that, for the explicit purpose of preventing the student from embarking on projects that would take too long or are otherwise not feasible.
~:-|
Surely I shouldn’t drag my mind into the gutter again?
Walton – on cooking – some good advice already (pratcially anything slowcooked is awesome, spices are the win, particularly in curry) however haven’t seen mention yet of possibly the most important piece of cooking advice I ever learned – salt is king, it can be the difference between a dish tasting awesome, and completely bland – if you learn to salt things right you’ve won more than 50% of the fight in terms of cooking (which explains why prepacked and junk food is so salt heavy for one thing…)
Of the seemingly vast sum spent on my wifes culinary edumacation this is the one easily transferable (to the lazy cook that I am) skill which makes a difference.
As another aside – your friend who “doesn’t like onions” – is this tested fully or just a silly prejudice against onions based on a couple of bad experiences? My guess is that your friends, and yourself, are right on the cusp of giving up a lot of childhood food phobias is given the right push – took me until I was in my mid to late 20’s to truly appreciate how silly a lot of my food dislikes were (not saying all cases are silly, but in my personal experience, given the massive numbers of food types I shunned based essentially on my parent’s cooking ability, or lack thereof) – onions strikes me as particularly weird (despite having an aversion to any visible onion until age 25) because they are so ubiquitous in awesome cuisine, and so versatile awell – being 1/3 of the ingredients of a mirepoix which is practically the basis of all French cooking.
And to avoid this becoming quite the length of a Roundup post…. I’ll finish by saying that when cooking, another key component to making it all go smoothly (and thus increasing the chances of it actually working….) is preparation in advance (or misenplace) – if you have everything pre cut, pre measured, and sorted before you get anything remotely warm (or mixed) life becomes a lot easier (no “oh shit the recipe calls for 2 fine diced peppers to be added within the next 20 seconds and I don’t even have a clean knife” moments)
Re: Cooking –
I got a book recently called “Gourmet Meals in Crappy Little Kitchens.” It’s still coming here, but I think it will be invaluable when I get it, because I’ve got a really, really tiny kitchen.
I don’t spend much time following recipes but knowing a few basic patterns (Meat With Onions; Stir-Fried Whatever You’ve Got; Omelette With Something In It) gives you scope to embroider with seasonings. Meat With Onions sometimes starts out as pasta sauce and becomes curry as it goes along.
Nigella Express is a good cookbook because it’s short simple recipes that are orgasmically delicious. There’s this one where you lightly grill a huge steak and then you let it marinade for a few minutes in lemon juice and olive oil with some herbs and then you slice it finely oh god yes. Sorry. Need a minute here.