I have eaten a butter tart every day this week! (No raisins, raisins are garbage.)
What have you chosen to do with your one wild and precious life?
Tags: cocktail hour, open thread
I have eaten a butter tart every day this week! (No raisins, raisins are garbage.)
What have you chosen to do with your one wild and precious life?
Tags: cocktail hour, open thread
Toasties, I need some advice.
I have a friend (let’s call her Cassie) in my distant homestate whom has confided in me that she is cheating on her partner (let’s call him Dustin). Naturally, she doesn’t word it that way, opting for more flowery language. She and Dustin have two children together and while I don’t believe they are married, they live together, financially support each other, and all of that stereotypical married stuff just without the legal marriage. They have been together for 10 years.
It’s so classic, but she is sleeping with his best friend (let’s call him Nate). She is sure that this other man is the love of her life. I am sure that her body is pumped up on the chemicals you get when you are experiencing new crushes and loves, which tend to endure longer when you are sneaking around and not actually having a forward relationship.
Nate travels around occasionally, sleeps with a variety of people along the way, and returns. Cassie is fine with this, romantically saying that he always comes back to her. But naturally Dustin has no idea that he is at risk for STD’s when he sleeps with his supposedly faithful partner. This is my biggest concern aside from the fact that I think it is grievously disrespectful to cheat on a significant other.
The way I see it, someone is being taken advantage of and I feel obligated to not just be a bystander. The last time we spoke, I tried to gently talk to Cassie about the negativity and unfairness of what she was doing without using judgment words like “wrong”. I’m not sure if any of it will get through eventually, but I must say I have never in my life heard such wild and reaching rationalizations from a person.
She thinks that she should continue to keep this a secret, and that over time she will convince her partner that they should start a poly relationship with the best friend. Naturally, this is a bad idea, as the relationship would be founded on lies and deception. And it’s also clear in talking to her that she doesn’t actually want her current partner. She spreaks disrespectfully of his feelings, needs, and personality, and expresses a like for her current lifestyle where she only has to work part-time (guess who works more than part-time?). The poly idea is just her imagining a way to have her cake and eat it too.
She is horrified about the prospect of actually telling Dustin about this, as she thinks this would be betraying a secret that Nate has trusted her with (yes, I’m rolling my eyes, too). So she thinks that if she tells, she will lose everything: her partner, her lover, and her children. I acknowledge the sadness of this fear, but I don’t think it’s worth the continued deception of her partner.
Sadly, I don’t know Dustin’s full name and they don’t use the internet, so I’m having a lot of trouble tracking him down. I have a lot of questions, and I want to encourage my fellow Toasties to engage with me about any of them you want to.
1. How do you think I can best convince her that what she is doing is wrong and that she needs to make a change?
2. If she can’t be convinced, any advice on locating her partner’s contact info?
3. If I find that contact info, what is the best way to tell the partner this soul-crushing news?
Naturally, if you want to talk about any other aspects of this, please feel free. Thanks everyone!
4. Distance yourself from this. Let her know you don’t agree and can’t be her confidant. Do not be the one to tell her partner, but don’t allow yourself to continue being sucked in either.
Agreed, hard.
Concur with this.
Agreed. I don’t think you can be the whistleblower here. It would be one thing if you and Dustin were friends, but you don’t know him. Taking it upon yourself to tell him will put him in the position of deciding whether to believe his spouse or a perfect stranger, which is actually not going to help, and it inserts yourself in this drama, which Cassie may like but you and Dustin probably will not.
What you can do is not feed this troll. It may actually wake her up if her friend refuses to validate the inarguably bad decision she is rationalizing. Or it may not, but it’s not your responsibility to fix that.
Agreed. Consider telling her it’s wrong and you don’t want to hear about it. If you don’t want to do that, don’t lecture but when she talks about it ask her a lot of questions. “Are you worried about the STD risk to Dustin? Are you using condoms with Nate?” “How do you see this ending?” “Do you have any reason to think Dustin would be interested in poly?” “It sounds like you don’t even want to be with Dustin, do you still love him like that?”
Don’t try to contact her partner- it’s not your news to tell and it will come out on it’s own soon.
Agreed.
I say this as someone who has NOT been faithful as well as someone who has been cheated on. It’s not your place to be the one to tell anyone anything right now. You’re perfectly within your rights to tell her that you don’t want to be her confidante in this, that you disagree, and distance yourself, but don’t contact her partner.
Agreed, also hard. Do not contact Dustin. This is not your battle, not your relationship, and just not your business. Repeat. This is not your business. I’ve been there. I’ve been the inadvertent other woman. I wrote into Ask a Lady on the Hairpin about it. The consensus was: stay out of it. Just stay out of it. And they were right.
We all like to think that someone, anyone, would tell us if our partner were cheating on us. But the reality is much more complicated.
If you want to do something, do what alicia says: tell her that you don’t want any part of it, and don’t want to hear about it any more. Cut her off, if need be.
Thanks to everyone whom has weighed in on this. I’ll admit that part of me still feels like I have to tattle, but if the soulmass that is the Toast populace unanimously feels that backing off is the best option, the logical part of me knows that the truth is being spoken.
I’ll put effort into not thinking about this any further, and the next time she calls I’ll tell her straight up how strongly I disagree with what she’s doing, and that I don’t feel comfortable talking to her while it’s going on.
Thanks again, everyone. Toasties are the best! ๐
i love all this unanimously great advice!
think of it as you doing the part you can: you are shutting down audience to this fantastical story. she is getting a lot out of the mere recounting of it to you. by refusing to listen, you’ll be doing yourself the favor of not having to fret over it anymore, and taking a significant amount of hot air out of her sails in not allowing her to indulge the self-satisfaction of regaling you with it. sure, she might find a willing ear somewhere else, but that is both-of-their problems.
Yes, you don’t live near her. Don’t become involved in her drama. Cut her from your life if it comes to that, but do not engage with her on this subject any more.
If you absolutely must, tell her why you cannot engage with her, or why you have cut her from your life, but I doubt she will understand, if she is as self-involved as this makes her sound.
I don’t think you can convince her, alas. People are very good at self-deception and self-justification, and she’s deep in that mire.
As for the rest, I have no advice, but I direct you to Captain Awkward, who has given great advice on similar situations before, and may help you work your way through this.
Seconding the rec for Captain Awkward.
I am a big fan of option 4., posted above, but I would also add CUT THIS POISON OUT OF YOUR LIFE. Like, IMMEDIATELY. If she thinks so little of the feelings and needs of her partner WITH WHOM SHE HAS PRODUCED CHILDREN, what does she think of your feelings and needs? This is not a good person to have as a friend. Or even an acquaintance. I think I’m gonna go so far as to say this is not a good person, period.
I’m going to go against the grain here, as someone who’s been cheated on and REALLY WISHED someone had told me. Those six months waiting for the second HIV/Hep-C tests were agony (fortunately, they were negative, but that was pure luck). If I’d known sooner, I might have been able to stop sleeping with the boyfriend who was putting me at risk, before he put me at risk. The same may apply here even though she is already sleeping with both, since the third party is constantly bringing new people into the mix.
So I do think you should tell him, for the health reasons alone – although I have no idea how to go about contacting the man, sorry. Should you manage it, just be up-front and brief. He may not believe you, and/or he may irrationally blame you, so be prepared for that. It’s up to him what he does with this crucial information, but I believe he needs to have it.
AND cut her out of your life. Not that you’ll probably have to, after this, if you do opt to do it.
It is completely dead at work today. Nothing is happening. Half the staff is gone and the other half hasn’t booked any meetings. The phone has rung ten times.
I’m reading Not Always Right and have been waiting for the open thread – even Twitter is quiet today. Any suggestions of other things to read? (I’m caught up on longform.org, Pajiba, Go Fug Yourself, The Royal Order of Sartorial Splendour and all my other usuals).
Check out The Bad Advisor for hilariously awful takes on people who write in to advice columns!
That sounds great! Thanks!
Is Fashion It So a usual for you? If not, please enjoy acres of analysis of Star Trek: The Next Generation costuming.
Oh my goodness. Fantastic. Thanks!
I recently followed thefrenemy on tumblr and I really like her. Makeup tips, suggestions about life, and general awesomeness.
I’ll check it out, thanks!
Do you like Tom and Lorenzo? If you haven’t heard of them, basically just scrolling through their entire archive is great.
I’ve read a couple of their Mad Men posts despite not watching the show but I’ll have to try some of their other stuff!
If you like Not Always Right, you might also enjoy How May We Hate You.
I just recently got turned on to Geo Guessr. It gives you a random Google Map image and you have to guess where in the world it is. Fun time waster!
My one precious, wild life? My (horrible, racist, idiotic) boss has taken the monstrously illegal step of refusing to pay us our new legally-mandated minimum wage, so I guess I’m taking him to the Labour Board and then looking for a new job! So, you know, my week has not been the absolute best ever.
Ugh, I’m sooo sorry to hear that. That’s awful. I hope you get what you need from the Labour Board and without too much hassle.
Wow. I am confident you will find yourself in a better situation soon, but that is beyond awful.
Boo to your terrible, terrible boss, but yay to you for not putting up with him!
Haha wow that is incredibly stupid levels of illegal and I’m kind of impressed with the sheer jawdropping audacity of that.
WAY TO GO ARAVIS you take that MAN to the LABOUR BOARD and you tell ’em
indeed I 2nd! Here Here!
I also commiserate because that kind of stuff can be frustrating and long and slow, but FK THE PATRIARCHY make him know your WRATH
WOW. That’s some bullshit, right there.
GAME OF THRONES talk. Queen Sansa 4eva.
Also, I won’t be here next week for the Open Thread because I’ll be in Portland, Maine! I am SO EXCITED for a vacation.
SANSA!!!
Read the books and refuse to watch the show because DEATH CONSTANT DEATH, buuuuut I love Sansa and everything about Sansa QUEEN SANSA FOR LIFE
Oh my gosh I’m excited for your vacation! I hope you will come back and tell us all about it because I am fascinated by Portland, Maine (I live in the other more moustached Portland)
robot_dinosaur, I long for you to visit and I will take you on a moustache tour of Maine*.
*That sounded less filthy in my head.
oh my GOD that sounds filthy hot damn
Also: I would totally love to see Maine because I have recently become FASCINATED with New England. It’s like a different country out there!
Also: do they only put mustaches on their faces out there because in Portland they put mustaches on everything >_>
oh gawd
moustaches everywhere
(Now I’m seized with the desire to sneak into a tourist lobster bake, affix little steam-proof moustaches to all the lobsters before they’re served, and spirit away again.)
Do you know what would be even cuter than lobsters with mustaches???
DUNGENESS CRABS WITH MUSTACHES
Now I want to run around some tidepools with a zillion microscopic moustaches and a bottle of epoxy BUT I WON’T
Can I ask you what fascinates you about New England? I grew up there so I am very interested in seeing what interests you about it from an outside perspective!
Mostly it is that every time I go to Boston I am FASCINATED by people saying “wicked” and “rad” all the time and everything is slightly like another country and everyone jaywalks at the drop of a hat and it is fabulous and I have a good time and everything is a million years older
the way she looked at Petyr over the old lady’s shoulder!! She’s like “that’s right you better stay sitting down.”
Yesss I will talk about Sansa forever, because I do not want to talk or think about That Other Thing.
AND I will also be in Portland next weekend! It will only be for a three-day weekend, but I am pretty excited!
OH MY GOSH IS THAT THIS COMING WEEK ARE WE DOING A THING?
Ahem. I mean, how wonderful and restful! I hope you enjoy the visit! If you expect to have free time while you’re here, we should plan a Toast meet-up. A reply to this comment will go straight to my inbox (but only directly to this comment; a reply to subsequent replies will not), so if I’m online, I’ll get it.
YES I WOULD LIKE TO DO A THING IF POSSIBLE.
My Hairpin/Toast/whatever internet e-mail is iammeetapossum at gmail. Send me a note so we can plan a potential meetup!
Done!
I am excited/terrified for how her story line in the show might differ from the books. From all previous experiences in this universe, everything will go to hell in a handbasket, but I so wish for Sansa to rise from the smoldering ashes of Westeros and be their Dark Queen.
She’s like Lili in Legend.
portland ME is one of my favorite places! enjoy!
Sansa’s so great! I love how she’s all “oh, I get get this now, you’re darkly manipulative and powerful and wrapped around my little finger. BABY.” That dress is so awesome! But why is she wearing a belt from Fashion Bug around her neck?
Teenager. Belts as necklaces are their thing.
Good point. Teens: get off my lawn, I am old.
YES Queen Sansa. That testimony scene was the best. I have been *waiting* and *waiting* for her to start employing the people-wrangling skills I know she’s been absorbing in King’s Landing. That was a pretty satisfying payoff, and I really hope they let her go bigger with it.
(I bring up the Sansa/Brienne femslash basically every time I talk about her with friends. But you guys already know about it so no need.)
Butter tarts! Livin’ the good life.
I am going through withdrawal today because my brain medication prescription ran out yesterday. I need to make an appointment with my psychiatrist to get it refilled, but a) PHONE and b) I’m embarrassed that I haven’t made an appointment with her in so long. I have to do it, though, because my withdrawal symptoms suck. And it’s the responsible adult thing to do. And the medication is important, I guess. Uggggggggghhhhhhhhhh.
Also this haircut I got yesterday is too short HA HA I am a mess.
Head-meds withdrawal is the woooorst. I hope you’re feeling okayish. And of course when you’re in withdrawal it makes it that much harder to do things like PHONE.
Oh honey! Being out of brain-chemical whack is so unpleasant, and so difficult to drag yourself out of because the Responsible Adulting is the thing that gets broken in the first place. Waves of empathy and strength!
PLEASE go make that appointment now. It will not get easier as time goes on to make the call. *hugs* I hate hate hate the withdrawal (head zaps!) but it’s also not healthy for you to cold-turkey stop if you can help it. See if she’ll advance you a half-script to carry you through to the appointment.
*MOAR HUGS*
UGH I dread haircuts more than anything, including my own messed-up brain chemicals (which is probably a direct result of the messed-up brain chemicals, of course, those tricky devils). I’m sorry, that stinks, but I bet it looks fab to everyone but you, because no one but you knows what you expected it to look like.
Any reasonable doctor understands the cycle of delay and embarrassment you’re describing. Those feelings are perfectly understandable and common, but they’re just feelings; they aren’t a fact about who you are, and (like the haircut) it’s likely that no one else is thinking them or feeling them about you.
Oh, your psychiatrist has seen way worse behaviour than not making an appointment in way too long. You have nothing to be embarrassed about! Go make that appointment! You can do it! Go get a butter tart after you make the phone call, that’s the ticket.
Aw, you guys are the best. Thanks for pushing me; it was just what I needed to make the call. Except I got her voicemail. But I did leave a message and will try back later if she doesn’t call me first. UPDATE: She called back and I have an appointment for next week!
Just three more hours and I can go home and take a nap!
You can also call your pharmacy and ask if they will front you two weeks or so of your meds. Last time this happened to me I called shoppers and got some stopgap antidepressants. Then the psychiatrist’s office called to issue a refill. I then booked an appointment for later on that month. This kind of thing happens all the time and everyone was remarkably no-nonsense about the whole thing. My only caveat is that I live in Toronto so I’m not sure how this might play out in other places but honestly the worst that can happen is that they say no.
I have had identical experiences in Washington State. The pharmacists were very dedicated to ensuring that I not have a gap in medication. Thanks, pharmacists!
Thanks, both of you! The pharmacy hooked me up, so I got to take my medication today after all! I feel better already. Toast Open Thread: Success.
Wow, good work, logicbutton!
Friday Cat Thread!
As I revealed on wednesday, Bonny is a vicious murderer, who brought a bird in, that was still alive and proceeded to bleed all over my kitchen before I could capture it and get it to the vets. Where, sadly, they could do nothing for it.
My old cat, Olive, was an outdoor cat in the countryside with a 3 mile territory, and there was a dead thing in our house about every two days, so two dead birds and a few moths in 2 years isn’t that bad.
Here are the killers in question, enjoying a sunbeam.
Can you believe people can’t tell them apart?
What monstrous things have your animals done?
I watched one of my dogs eat a lizard this morning. I cheered him on. Only problem with this dog eating backyard creatures is that he’s really fat. He’s already on a diet but…
My monstrous cats are just generally monstrous.
This picture is basically the essence of one of them. She desperately needs wet food, attention, and belly rubs, and she greets you by meowing and yowling LOUDLY at all times. But she’s lazy so she’ll just lie there and cry for….something, whatever it is. Also she’s dumb enough to wander into other rooms and then cry because she is lonely.
“Also she’s dumb enough to wander into other rooms and then cry because she is lonely. ”
Bonny does that. She goes into another room, and then realises we aren’t in it, so she cries until you shout ‘I’m here, dumbass’ back at her.
Kuno does that too!!!
hahahaha that is AMAZING.
Oh my god I LOVE HER. She sounds JUST LIKE ME.
Oskar went behind a quilt that was tacked to the wall (next to the couch that I was sitting on two feet away) and did the same thing because he couldn’t see us anymore. And it’s always such a mournful wail too.
Only slightly unrelated, I misread your username as “everyspacebassethound” and thought of the mournful howl a basset hound sets up and was pleased by the symmetry.
Kismet chews on photos and leather goods (oh the shoes I lost before investing those plastic boxes from the Container Store and putting all my good heels on a high shelf…)
She’s an excellent killer of bugs. And once she killed a lizard in the house (a biggish one) which made me sad but she was so proud of it I had to give her treats.
Oh my god, I wish my cats would kill our bugs! They found a spider the other day and just poked at it and looked at me like “what the fuck is this, human?” Then I killed it and stepped away to get a Kleenex to clean it up with, and in those 3.5 seconds, one cat ate it. Idiots.
Hmmmm. I think the worst thing my Monstrous Heathen has done (this is Kuno, the black cat) is pee on my bed while I was in it, and therefore also on me. Then had the gall to yowl every night after that when she was locked into another room so she could not do this again.
We have these little salamander or lizard type guys around the concrete outside of our house (so in the back patio and front stoop). I used to think that about one got in a year. In the past week, we have found 3 live ones that the cat was playing with and one that was already dead. THANKS CAT.
My computer is in the main kitten room and the other day I went in to turn it on–the monitor and internet were unplugged and all wires had teeny tiny teeth marks on them. Not even sure how to correct that behavior as I’ve never witnessed it. Just cross my fingers and hope they grow out of it before one gets electocuted? Cover the wires in hot sauce?
They have this stuff called Bitter Apple at pet stores–it works to keep my cats off electrical cords, it tastes awful. Also you can try lemon juice, since cats apparently hate citrus?
Lurker comes out of lurking to say: Soap. Soap works like a charm for keeping little cat teeth off of wires and cords.
Take a bar of soap, get it damp, and rub it over the cords that need tooth protection. Repeat every couple of months or so. It’s nontoxic, easy, and extremely unpalatable to the little bastards — it kept the cat I have that incessantly tries to chew EVERYTHING from chewing through my cords.
It may not help you to know that my cat (Siamese) has never grown out of this behavior. She looooves wires. We have to hide wires or put them in tubes to protect them.
It may reassure you, though, that no matter how many wires she’s bitten clean through, while plugged in, she has never gotten electrocuted. Or even apparently zapped enough to curtail her behavior.
The bitter spray did nothing to deter her but constantly got in our own mouths.
Like m98widow I use cord proctors (I have Critter Cord http://www.crittercord.com/ ). The cords themselves taste bitter (and they smell weird) which puts off chewing.
My cat has a very discerning cord-appetite–she only likes thin cords (earbuds and cell phone chargers; never touches thick TV cords or my lap top charger).
We have indoor only cats, but they love to faux-murder all their toys. We sometimes get them dog toys so they have more stuffed animal to murder on. They like to hold on to the unfortunate victim with their front paws and bring up their back paws to kick it to death, all while biting whatever they can reach. They have ripped a hole in their hedgehog’s head this way. It looks like he was shot between the eyes and his stuffing keeps falling out. I fear for the bird population if they ever get out.
We went to the vet last weekend, and one of our cats is officially 25 pounds! I’d say he’s only 4-5 pounds overweight, though, he’s a big boy.
We’re going to have him lion-cut this summer. When we do I will learn how to embed photos because everyone will want to see this.
Oh and my cats have done nothing more monstrous than chase each other around lately, but the neighbourhood cat killed a mouse in our yard yesterday and was proud as punch, and happy to torture our cats through the window with her freedom.
My husband & I had to live in my parents’ basement for a while after we moved, and the first week our kitty Brains managed to destroy an airplane model my dad had put countless hours into. OMG THE DAD FURY. (He did forgive her eventually, but she was NOT ALLOWED in that room for the rest of our stay.
Also, can someone tell me a good way to post pictures here? MY CATS ARE SO CUTE YOU WON’T BELIEVE IT.
http://hooniverse.com/2010/08/03/how-to-embed-ima…
You’re the best! OK, here goes–Miss Brains not knowing what to make of my newly arrived Lil BUB plush.
And Benny, biggest, sweetest kitty in the world, who makes an excellent drawing desk.
See how helpful they are?
eeeee!!!
This is what MT looks like when he’s had a rough day.
Oh, yesterday he ate a bug, which I guess is kind of monstrous?
He has caught a couple of mice in our apartment, but only one died. To be fair, I tried to catch the mouse before I left for work one morning and I WARNED IT that Monster Truck would not be kind, but alas, the mouse did not listen.
Brought a half-live mouse in and, as we chased her around the house, she dropped it in every nearby shoe for a few seconds.
We got a new cat this week who is a big friendly happy orange cat with double paws. Naturally, my cat haaaaaates him. We are trying to make the transition as smooth as possible but I sort of just want to be like “YOU ARE ACTING RIDICULOUS” to my cat even though I know that there are serious cat feelings at work here.
Also I feel like there is a language barrier between the two of them? My cat is a Siamese and vocalizes her displeasure SO MUCH but I think it sounds more serious than she really means it to the non-Siamese new guy? She yells and yells and yells at him and when he finally breaks down and yells back she flips her shit.
I now have anthropomorphized your cats in my head as Archer and Lana.
“Lana. Lana! Lana! LANA!”
“WHAT?!”
“Danger Zoooone.“
CODE NAME VERITY UPDATE I HATE ALL OF YOU
OMG OMG OMG OMG I WAS JUST GOING TO START THIS THREAD BECAUSE I AM READING ROSE UNDER FIRE RIGHT NOW AND COUNTING THE MINUTES UNTIL I CAN GO HOME AND CONTINUE READING IT OMG OMG OMG
which is to say, I have feelings, they are many
I just finished Rose Under Fire today! (Well, yesterday at this point, since I’m reading Open Thread hours late). It’s goood (although maybe not quite as good as Code Name Verity). Elizabeth Wein also has a bunch of additional information/background material at her website (about the Rabbits, about taran flying, etc), just fyi.
Oh my GODDDD I just finished it last night. HOW AWFUL. HOW AWFUL. That book is like a nightmare come to life, omg. Good god.
I have the book in my house. I haven’t started yet. I am afraid.
I warned you! I warned all of you! But would you listen? Nooooo…
Did you finish it!??
YEAH I DID
D:
I thought I knew what was going to happen but I was so wrong and it was SO MUCH WORSE THAN I IMAGINED
My dad and I made a deal that he would read CNV and I would read one of his Lee Child books.
We were both hooked. I’m hoping that means he’ll buy Rose Under Fire and we can both read it.
I bullied my boss (who loves WWII fiction) into buying it after he complained about not having anything to read for an upcoming work trip, so hopefully he’s crying alone in his hotel room in Canada right now.
Oh! Oh! You gotta read Anthony Doerr’s All the Light we Cannot See or he’s gotta then he lends it to you or something. I’m only 1/3 through it but it’s such great WWII fiction.
Two main characters are a blind French girl whose dad was key-keeper at the Natural History Museum in Paris & they evacuated to this tiny coastal island where his mostly crazy uncle lives (sent by museum b/c of keeping treasures safe reasons), and a German orphan boy mechanical genius who joins the Hitler youth b/c otherwise like every other boy in town at 15 he’d go into the mines where his parents died, and orphan boy is a radio operator & he ends up on the same tiny island and I don’t know what’s going to happen to bring them together but I love them both & I’m excited to find out. Dad/blind daughter scenes have already brought me to tears.
I. KNOW. IT WAS LIKE TEN THOUSAND TIMES WORSE.
OK so wait, is this a thing I am supposed to read, or a thing I am not supposed to read??
That depends on whether you like having your heart BROKEN and STOMPED ON (yeah, you should read it)
DEPENDS how much do you like badass WWII lady pilots and also crying forever?
OK OK It’s on the list.
And also a book where ladies’ friendship is front and center (in a YA book even) and romance a distant second place.
Going into it, the only two things I knew were: all of my friends loved it, and all of them told me to keep a box of tissues handy.
THEY WERE RIGHT. THEY WERE ALL RIGHT. oh fuck I was a MESS for the whole weekend
Kiss me, Hardy!
Why
And when Julie pulls her hair back into a bun with one hand with one hand, stands up as tall she as can (being a tiny girl to begin with, and now tortured and starved), and turns on her ice queen side to say: “Fuck yeah, I am exactly who you think I am.” to von Linden. auuuuuggggggh
This morning I had the Toast-aided realization that no one gets to tell me I’m not bi enough to be bi, and probably the person who did isn’t the greatest possible friend. Husband asked how I was feeling today, I said, “Bi,” he said, “Great!” and it feels REALLY REALLY NICE.
Good for you, fellow bisexual!
Thank you! I am surprised by how suddenly comfortable it is. Gonna go swoon at pics of tall ladies in tuxes now.
I’m not sure if this exactly counts, but you sure can’t get taller. <img src="&rdquo ;http://www.motherjones.com/files/griner-web_0.jpgโ title=โโ width=380 /”/>
Niiiiice. The funny thing is that my lady type is basically my mom: tall and curvy and hella competent. The kinda gal who’ll chop me down a tree and then carve me a bed out of it.
In fact, this whole realization might be credited to Captain Janeway dressed up like Marlene Dietrich in a Voyager episode I watched yesterday:
That is the sort of picture that leads to ALL KINDS OF REALISATIONS thank you.
Bisexual high-fives all around!
More like bi-fives! Heyo!
ayyyyy!
You go be as bi as you wanna be. As for ladies in tuxes, here you go:
MERCY.
I’ll never let up. Best part: look at those photos, let your brain do what it wants, then go jump on your husband. EVERYONE WINS.
EXACTLY. He treasures my relationship with Dean/Cas slash fiction for this very reason.
Oh, oh, oh my. Wow.
I find that I just kind of stare, slack-jawed. like….uh……oh my, indeed
Congrats! Enjoy your well-deserved bi-ness! ๐
Has anyone yet coined the phrase “bi impostor syndrome”? Or something else meaning the same thing? I feel like it’s a pretty common thing (I certainly have it!) Anyway, bi-five!
I’ve ALWAYS thought of myself as “mostly straight”; I remember saying constantly in high school that “you’re attracted to people, not genders.” But I’ve never had a relationship with a woman, just a few college makeouts–in retrospect I was utterly in love with one of my freshman roommates, but didn’t realize it at the time. (She broke my heart anyway.) And I’m happily, monogamously married to a man, so sometimes I think “Why does it matter? It wouldn’t change anything.”
And the person who told me “No, you’re straight” when I tried to explain on Tumblr that I’m often attracted to women without necessarily wanting Naked Time with them is genderqueer and pansexual, so I felt like ze must know better than me, right? Ze said I’m just socialized to think of women’s bodies as sexual objects. So my calling myself bi is probably un-feminist to boot…anyway, fuck that.
All of this, yes, but especially the monogamously married to a man, “why does it matter?” part. But it does.
I’m non-monogamously married to a man, and I have two boyfriends and no girlfriends, and every time I say I’m bi I imagine people are thinking, “Pshh, if you liked girls so much surely ONE out of your three partners would be one!” But if they did say that, that would be a really jerky and ignorant thing to say, like I have to fill some sort of dating quota to prove my bi cred. Which is what I tell myself every time I catch myself thinking it.
And man, what the “no, you’re straight” person said is straight-up bullshit. I didn’t entirely want Naked Time with dudes OR ladies until I’d actually had some (and been doing it for a while, actually). I just felt this general sense of attraction, and Naked Time was fun and satisfying, but it didn’t all coalesce into that “Yes, you are hot and I think it’d be fun to see/touch your bits” feeling for quite a while. I think our culture puts a stupidly narrow interpretation on what “attraction” has to mean and feel like, when it’s actually very complicated and variable.
Sometimes, I think, even people trying to expand definitions of gender or sexuality just end up creating multiple rigid boxes, instead of acknowledging that there are really as many sexualities and genders as there are people in the world.
Yes, it is so frustrating. I get ‘crushes’ on people but that does not necessarily mean I want to go to bed with them. Or that I *don’t* want to! It’s just what it is and words are not enough and I get so tired of people going ‘oh well you think she’s cute you must want to sleep with her’ or whatever.
Go you!
I came out as bi to one of my coworkers a few weeks ago so she’d quit trying to give me Queer 101 lessons (she’s a very out and proud lesbian in our rather conservative town, so I think it’s just reflex) and I think it was the first time I’d ever actually said it out loud before. It is pretty nice, saying it. Own it!
Thanks for this. I am dating literally the best human being I know and feeling a little like “Hmmmmm maybe I like other kinds of humans…but I want to keep this one…” its been a confusing time. So thanks.
Yeah, my husband is a goddamn jewel and I have zero complaints about our life together. But also I wanna go to roller derby bouts together and ogle the lady booty without feeling like I’m “pretending to be cool.”
Raisins are completely horrible.
OMG, solo travel tomorrow! Getting on a plane at 7:30AM to fly to Las Vegas for a day, because my cousin and his amazing wife are throwing a huge party at a resort. Open bar is worth the plane ticket and hotel costs, and I have a 30% coupon for the room from them anyway.
If solo travel goes well, I think I’ll look into doing that of a weekend: pick a random city and go there for a day and a night by my lonesome. I’m thinking Portland, Oregon or Seattle next month for a break from summer in the high desert.
That sounds great! Have fun!
COME TO PORTLAND Portland is very nice.
I’ve been to Portland a billion times (Mostly for Powell’s and OMSI, and a great-aunt too, I suppose), and Seattle once. I love both of them! I CAN’T DECIDE!
DID YOU KNOW: right now OMSI has a dinosaur exhibit???
AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAND, decision made.
I did a solo vacation in Portland a few years ago and it was lovely! If you like gardens hit up the Japanese Gardens and the Botanical Gardens/ Rose place.
Yay solo travel!! I’m going to a conference in San Diego this weekend with some coworkers, so it’s technically not “solo travel”, except that I’m not taking the same flight as everyone else, and I’m staying in MY OWN HOTEL ROOM WITH TWO QUEEN BEDS and I might just skip the conference and watch whatever I want on TV.
A much better plan.
Game niiiiiiiiight! My wife and I are hosting a small game night for some of our friends tomorrow, so totally breaking out the Cards Against Humanity and We Didn’t Playtest This At All, along with, of course, booze and pizza. Toasties, what are some of your favorite game-nighty games?
Also, we are now LESS THAN TWO MONTHS from the premiere of Guardians of the Galaxy! And LESS THAN 6 WEEKS from our vacation. This whole summer business is looking like it’s going well.
My brother, the most sarcastic, black-humored human being on the planet who also spends all day on the internet with nerdy people, DID NOT KNOW about Cards Against Humanity when I mentioned it last weekend. My jaw dropped. I am sending them to him immediately of course, this cannot stand.
It’s great, because my wife always gets the most effed up, morbid and creepy responses, and it’s hilarious.
“a bigger, blacker dick” is pretty much the winning card for us
I think the last expansion has “the biggest, blackest dick”?
I did not know that, THAT’S SUPER(LATIVE)!
In my group it’s almost always the card that references semen that wins, no matter what. Not sure what that says about us.
In our group of friends it’s “soup that is too hot.”
strip scrabble
Yeah, i’m gonna need a ruleset for that.
It’s a pretty simple set of modifications. On each player’s turn, the player must play a word scoring higher than the previously-played word or remove an article of clothing. Along those lines, if a player plays a lower-scoring word or exchanges tiles (and consequently removes an article of clothing), then the scoring threshold is reset (to zero in the case of a tile exchange). For challenges over words, removing an article of clothing is added to skipping a turn as the consequence of losing a challenge.
Have fun!
Well, this probably won’t happen, as a) we don’t have scrabble and b) i doubt our guests or us would be into it, but it is definitely interesting to know! Thanks!
Well, you could use “Words With Friends,” but then you’d have to go about your day in a state of partial undress waiting for the other player to take a turn.
OH MY GOD let me tell you about board games (99% of my birthday gifts this year were board games)
I am LOVING Pandemic with a fierce fierce passion that is uncontainable, although it’s only 2-4 players, which depending on how small your small game night is, may not be good enough. We played Small World last night and enjoyed it but the rules are FAR too terribly written for a game night with booze and pizza. Dominion is excellent and can be taught quickly, and is replayable. And of course, Betrayal at the House on the Hill is FABULOUS and creepy and ridiculous and very replayable for a story based game!
Betrayal at the House on the Hill! I have been trying to think of the name of that game for so long. Thanks for mentioning it!
We are very much playing that tonight at our game night. We have one every Friday night and it’s oodles of fun.
The On The Brink expansion for Pandemic lets you have five players.
IT DOES and that expansion is great (we played with the Virulent Strain rules last night and I want to try the bioterrorist next.) The In The Lab expansion adds some new crazy ruleset thing where you can play as teams?? With up to six players but I don’t know how that works.
I liked Betrayal a lot (but my ex got it in the divorce) BUT SO MANY PIECES OMG.
This is sad for SO MANY REASONS but if you don’t like the number of pieces you should stay away from Small World oh my god so many tokens.
Yeah, billions of tokens always annoys me unless they’re, like, all the same token. Betrayal has a couple dozen varieties to sort through and it always lulls the game.
Dominion is one of my absolute faves. So easy to learn and endless re-playability. One of my preferred types of games – which Dominion does well – is where you mostly have to worry about your own shit, and not as much what other people are doing. What other people are doing is important, yes, but you can mostly focus on yourself and not have to attack/defend as much as in a lot of other games.
BETRAYAL FOREVER.
THANK YOU I am doing board games at my wedding and need something that isn’t CAH. Bookmarking this.
oh man this seems like a pretty good wedding
Another + for Betrayal At House on the Hill.
I like Love Letter, although I think it maxes out at 4 players, so you’d want to have other games going at the same time. It’s fun, fast to learn, fast to play, has a pretty good balance of strategy vs. luck-of-the-draw, and costs like $10 max.
I also enjoy love letter for these reasons. There is a part two coming out soon I believe.
7 Wonders! 7 Wonders is the BEST. Tons of fun, good ratio of skill to chance, great for 3-7 players. (There are rules set up so you can play with just two people, but it seems… unadvisable.)
The rules for two people are actually pretty fun! When I visit my boyfriend’s family, he and his godmother will play rounds of two-player 7 Wonders for *hours* after his other godmother and I have fallen asleep.
Then I stand corrected! I’ve never actually tried it out (just looked warily at the extra rules) because the four people I know who own it are couples, so there’s always been at least 3 people when I’ve played.
Munchkin! Especially if you have a roundy/competitive group. Not advisable for people who hold grudges.
Munchkin!! I miss playing Munchkin! Oh, I want a group of Toasties to come to my house for booze, Cards Against Humanity and Munchkin.
Munchkin is a wonderful game! I love screwing over my friends, it is the best
King of Tokyo – easy to learn dice game and you get to murder your friends!
House update! So, they accepted our offer and we’re on our way! We’ve had an inspection done and we’re in the process of getting some estimates on how much it will cost to fix a few things. So, exciting!
But holy crap, this process has been stressful. My girlfriend and I are constantly on edge and it’s sometimes boiled over into snapping at one another. I’m fundamentally a give-someone-the-benefit-of-the-doubt type of person, and she’s fundamentally a fear-the-worst kind of person. She’s lost trust in our realtor, and I still think he’s mostly doing a good job, and so we’ve be arguing about whether or not he’s untrustworthy and actually on our side in the buying and negotiating process. It’s challenging. I can’t wait for this to be done.
Congratulations! I’m sorry it’s so stressful, but so many of life’s big steps are. So excited for you to get into your NEW HOUSE!
All the commiseration to your girlfriend. I’ve completely lost faith in my realtor and she sucks. I’m trying not to let my rage toward my realtor turn into rage for the house but it’s tooouugh. Did you go to the inspection? Was it the most depressing thing ever or just slightly saddening?
Ugh, I am both so excited for you and so sorry for you. House-buying is so incredibly stressful.
My boyfriend and I (and, for the time being, his roommate and his roommate’s boyfriend) are moving into the house he bought in a few weeks, and I am looking forward to being in it because it’s beautiful and etc., but I’m also looking forward to it just all being done.
Help, I keep getting a song stuck in my head that I find lyrically appalling (because PATRIARCHY) but soooooo catchy.
(Rude, by MAGIC!)
(Would probably be 8 billion times better if covered by a female vocalist and therefore about lesbians.)
(Don’t listen to it; it will be stuck in your head FOREVER.)
Ugh, I hate that song. Why is the song’s protagonist such a whiny asshole? I can’t get over the idea that the reason the father won’t give his blessing is because he knows his daughter will be marrying a squirrely, pollyannaish loser.
WHY indeed? For starters, it isn’t rude to deny you something you want. Secondly…..gross.
Thirdly, stop being such a whiny asshole.
SERIOUSLY. Or maybe he’s saying no because he doesn’t want his daughter to marry the kind of patriarchy-upholding asshole who asks the dad for permission in the first place.?
Is the band’s name really “MAGIC!”?
YES!
Thank you for introducing me to my new favorite hypothetical song, Lesbian Rude. Seriously, that’s all I want to hear now.
Possibly I just need to write THAT song.
Do you ever hear a song on the radio, and once you hear the lyrics you can’t tell if it’s being meta or not because it seems so backwards or regressive?
“Cooler than Me” by Mike Posner and “Young and Beautiful” by Lana Del Ray are like that for me. They are both really catchy, and the first-person lyrics are so bad that I can’t imagine that anyone would take them seriously…and yet I know that people can, and will. I’m just not sure about the artists themselves…
I’m not sure it matters what the artist intended, just what is actually being communicated and understood by the audience.
And for contrast, a song that is OBVIOUSLY meta: Title of the Song.
THAT SONG HAS BEEN STUCK IN MY HEAD ALL WEEK TOO!!! IT IS TERRIBLE AND I HATE IT!
I’ve been waiting all morning for this open thread so I could tell you guys about my RIDICULOUS week. It didn’t get ridiculous till Wednesday, when a friend needed her tickets to Cabaret taken off her hands. My husband and I went and it was unexpectedly amazing. Then yesterday I MET CLARK GREGG AT THE APPLE STORE IN SOHO.
He did a Q&A for this movie he wrote and directed and stars in, and he was genial and funny and MAGNIFICENT.
And my parents are visiting this weekend, so, yeah. Everything’s coming up Christy, I suppose.
I learned TODAY that he’s married to Jennifer Grey, which fills me with a vast and inexplicable joy.
Oh wow REALLY? That is just delightful.
Someone asked how she was and he was VERY enthusiastic in responding. He also talked about how much he loves embarrassing their daughter (she’s 12). And he literally teared up when an adorably precocious child asked him if he ever imagined he’d be one of the most legendary characters in film history.
BEST
!!!!!
I am very jealous. Clark Gregg is awesome. I am very jealous. I may have said that already.
WHAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA
*dies in a fit of jealousy*
*is posting this from beyond the grave*
MADDEST OF JELLIES
HE IS SO CUTE HOLY BLAAAHHH
OK, he was wearing a freaking leather jacket during the Q&A. My husband was like, “You should’ve told him to put it back on for the picture.”
But… then you couldn’t see his forearms, and his forearms are a thing of beauty.
CAN WE DISCUSS CLARK GREGG’S SHOES PLEASE
That is literally the thing I most want to discuss right now. My husband commented on them after saying the shot’s angled kind of weirdly and you can really, REALLY see his shoes. I like that he clearly wears them frequently, so scuffed up and faded. Guy’s a snappy dresser.
Meanwhile, my shoes are FANCY ELF SHOES, and you can’t see them, but I promise they’re great, see? http://www.modcloth.com/shop/shoes-flats/dancer-s…
(I went straight from work to the Apple store, so I’m very business casual.)
Dad shoes.
SO JEALOUS!
Raisins are delicious.
They’re nature’s candy!
You stole the delicious word-raisins right out of my mouth.
So good.
Agreed!
Counterpoint: Raisins are evil. They are chocolate-chip impersonators and can go straight to hell.
I don’t think they actually look that much like chocolate chips, but I have occasionally found them where I expected chocolate chips and been disappointed. So that’s understandable.
But I think I’d also be disappointed to find chocolate chips where I expected raisins. For instance, chocolate chip butter tarts would be weird and too sweet, but butter tarts with raisins are delicious.
You know, if we were friends in meatspace, I’d give you my raisins. I think we could work together to form a Raisin Alliance, and I could be your ally. I might not love raisins, but I’ll be damned if anyone tries to take them from people like yourself.
Thank you! I appreciate your hypothetical raisins.
there is no food that is garbage. if someone doesn’t like raisins, please regift them to me.
Raisins ARE delicious…as raisins. The soft and slimy goo they turn into when baked, though, is NOT.
Nope, still delicious.
Also, butter tarts are filled with goo regardless of whether they have raisins.
Yes! Especially when soaked in rum. Or brandy.
Also, Toasties: I got a new knife set for my wedding and it is DIVINE. However, it’s so sharp I live in fear of slicing myself open. Also I burned myself cooking bacon this week and felt ridiculous.
Please share with me your worst kitchen disaster and cooking injuries! I’LL START. I tried to make pancakes using some horrifyingly expired or otherwise “off” baking powder. They tasted so strongly of baking powder and chemicals that my human garbage disposal husband could not eat them. They tasted like a chemical spill. It was awful.
I once decided to get fancy and broil some fish.
Yeah, when you coat an entire fish in butter and stick it under a broiler, you’re gonna get some open flame.
Once I was making a vodka sauce and accidentally slopped the vodka over the edge of the pan, into the open flame of my mother’s gas stove. Little fire. My dad wandered in, put down his drink, clapped the lid on the pan, and said “That’s how you do it.” Then left.
Dads.
I set a pan of butter on fire when I was planning to make french toast. Luckily my brother was a quick thinker even at age eleven and immediately clapped a lid over the pan. He now works as a cook; I fear open flames and hate my gas stove.
I cut my finger so deeply that I severed a nerve or two and to this day it randomly goes numb or prickly on occasion.
*fistbump*
Me, too.
I was so pissed off that I actually THREW AWAY THE KNIFE when I got home from the hospital.
I didn’t even go to the hospital, I just stuck a plaster on it and two days later when I realised how deep I’d gone, I took it into the walk-in clinic, who stuck it together with glue.
Wait, aren’t you British? Doesn’t the Queen make you say “go to hospital”?
Yes, but I would have had to go on a BUS, and I don’t like waiting in A+E for 5 hours so they can glue together my cut finger instead of treating, say, a small child with a hole in their stomach, when the walk-in-centre can do the same.
Because of the NHS, we actually have a wide selection of free or low-cost medical providers, and hospital is for ‘I’m dying, like, now’
I would also like to extract this emotion and put it in darts.
Mine wasn’t quite that deep, but apparently I ever-so-slightly nicked the tendon sheath, so my finger “clicks” a little bit when I bend it all the way. I’m super paranoid about cutting anything with that knife now!
Ha, yesterday I tried to make falafel for the first time, and the beautiful patties dissolved into the oil, creating a panful of falafel-flavored sludge. I was having a good day, so it was funny at least, and cheap.
Also this week: burned myself on pasta sauce, cut myself chopping a red pepper, spilled tahini down my leg. I’m like the “cute girl who’s clumsy to make her relatable,” except for all my other flaws!
oh gosh are we the same person??? I’m looking at my hands right now and I see at least three relatively new marks, one of which is from the box grater (THANKS A LOT POTATOES) which always happens when I grate potatoes. One of them is from when we were cleaning the apartment and I managed to nick my finger with the fingernail of my other hand and just scrape the top layer of skin off and it did not heal super nicely. Anyway, clumsy, that is what I am.
I cook all the time, and injure myself on a regular basis. Also I walk into furniture regularly, even though I KNOW IT’S THERE. Oh! And the one time I ever mowed a lawn for money (covering my cousin’s business while he was out of town), I misjudged which end of the gas trimmer was the end that actually trimmed, held it upside down, and whipped the shit out of my upper arm before I noticed. Goodness, that customer was confused.
a few weeks ago I let my roommate’s computer case that had just been delivered fall on my leg.
It was like a thirty pound box.
THE BRUISING MY GOD MY GOD
My grandfather lost a toe to a lawnmower. Maybe you shouldn’t cover that cousin often.
It was 15 years ago (my Summer With a Shaved Head), so I’m safe. He’s in med school now.
Alternately, get steel-toed boots. I had to wear them for a summer job that involved lawnmowing, and they were annoyingly heavy, but probably a good idea.
Also earplugs. Mowers and trimmers are noisy.
Fingernails are *evil*. I managed to put a nice cut in my cheek a few weeks ago with my thumbnail, easy as you please, when I caught a bundle of post-its too close to my face.
It’s like they know it’ll sound a bit ridiculous when you go ‘yeah, that cut is from my fingernail’.
I have definitely done this with falafel. “Hey, it still tastes good.”
I once got my fingers stuck in a mixer and my skin got roughed up a bit. My friends kept talking about my “domestic incident”, which I found hilarious.
Like an idiot, I didn’t use the thumb guard on the mandoline. Guess who has a new scar on her thumb?
My parents somehow don’t have a thumb guard for my mandolin so I usually stay away from it. One night I thought i’d be helpful and cut the potatoes. My dad walks in, sees me using the mandolin and reminds my to be very very careful with it. I roll my eyes at him because dads. Three slices later and I sliced into my thumb.
mandolins are SO SHARP. Mine is by far the sharpest thing I own, and I own a lot of sharp things (in a craft way, not a serial-killer way)
Someone very beautiful and wise wrote an excellent article on mandolines as instruments of war.
http://thehairpin.com/2012/11/the-history-of-the-…
I recommend kevlar kitchen gloves for mandolines. Otherwise, yeah you are gonna have sliced hands (the stupid handle holder thing does nothing). Of course I still love to tempt fate…
I was thinking that too! I’ll see if I can pick up a pair this weekend.
With some vegetables, you can just impale them with a fork and do most of it that way. With zucchini, I just hold the stem end.
Sharp knives are better though! I cut my finger open last month because I had let my knife get dull and it slipped off the top of an onion into my hand.
I once accidentally made a cake with buckwheat flour. It was at the beginning of my stay with a French host family, and I didn’t know the difference until too late.
Oh noooo, what was it like?
It was extremely grainy. Luckily my French family included a 15 year old boy who was willing to eat it.
The first time I made pancakes for my mother (with the help of a friend), I knew there was buckwheat flour in my mom’s recipe; I just didn’t know that she used half buckwheat and half white flour. They were extremely dense, slightly chewy pancakes.
Making tea in my underpants I accidentally splashed my thighs with scalding water and had horrible burns (no scars, thank goodness). Lesson learned: wear pants when doing kitchen-y things.
Also a shirt, as I learned while frying in sports bra and yoga pants. The scars took YEARS to fade.
Also shoes, says the girl who burned her foot making hardboiled eggs.
Do you know why you’re supposed to unplug the stick blender before you try to dislodge recalcitrant pesto from behind the blades?
Well. Let me tell you. It’s so that you don’t accidentally press the button and cause said blades to lodge themselves right into your fingernail. Ow.
I’ve done that, except on the un-fingernailed side. Blood EVERYWHERE, like sprayed all over the kitchen.
I think I finished the dumb cake, and it wasn’t that good. Maybe because it was full of blood.
BTW, there’s a whole NYT piece on these accidents, if you want to feel less alone.
A friend who worked at Cutco gave me a knife set when I moved to a new city, and the very first thing I did on my first night alone in that new city was slice off the tip of my thumb. The whole tip, with a bit of the nailbed. Totally not the knife’s fault–I was slicing chicken and looked over my shoulder at the television. So, don’t do that.
My thumbtop grew back–finger print and all!–with just a small lump of scar tissue and a second thumbnail that starts growing under the first about where the slice happened. But I keep my nails short, so no harm no foul.
SECOND THUMBNAIL
I also have a second thumbnail! Mine’s not knife-related, though — it was because I slammed my thumb into a car door while going to see The Two Towers.
I blame Peter Jackson.
Oh, that’s another task I should take care of this weekend: getting my knives sharpened, because FUCK dull knives.
Other than a few marshmallow fires and small knife accidents, most of my kitchen disasters involve me being gigantic doofus. I just make the dumbest mistakes. Like not closing the yogurt container all the way before putting it away and then spilling yogurt all over my bare feet. Or overfilling a cake pan and baking cake all over the bottom of the oven. Or just general spilling of sugar and flour containers all over the kitchen.
My funniest food related disaster was when I put my leftover birthday cake in my underwear drawer in my dorm room. I didn’t want to share with my roommates, but I ended up with ants in all of my pants. And my dresser was under my bed, so I had nightmares for weeks that ants were just constantly crawling all over me. Greed is bad.
I…. cut myself on a bagel.
When I cut it in half it has a piece sticking out kind of, and when it toasted that piece turned RAZOR SHARP and I gave myself the stupidest cut in the world. Lasting damage to my body: 0. Lasting damage to my soul: 100
Been there. Gluten-free bread fresh from the freezer. Those suckers do NOT want to go gently into that good toaster.
I’ve done this to the roof of my mouth many times.
I was in a cooking class in middle school and I managed to burn myself pretty badly on the arm taking chocolate chip cookies out of the oven. Chocolate chip cookies. The first recipe of the semester. The easiest one we made. It caused untold damage to my cooking skills confidence which I am only recently recovering.
The issue here was not the cookies, but the oven! Tricksy beasts.
I was cutting an onion and the knife slipped and cut my left middle finger so deep that it didn’t really stop bleeding for like three days, and then about three months later I was cutting an onion and the knife slipped and cut my left middle finger pretty deep but it didn’t bleed as much because it mostly hit scar tissue from the first time.
Also I let so much crud build up in the drip pan below one of my burners that it caught fire, which wasn’t serious but was embarrassing (hi landlord I promise I’m taking good care of my apartment)
TIE between the time I splintered a wooden spoon in the mixer when making pound cake and continued the baking process after picking out the largest pieces (I threw it out before anyone could eat it) and the time I sliced off the tip of my finger while chopping garlic (and then I threw up). One of these things was a decade ago and the other was last summer. I will let you all be the judge of what happened when.
So, I got up one morning and put on the stove-top kettle to make tea.
And then when it hadn’t made any noise after a while, I checked and found that I had turned on the wrong burner, and the burner I had turned on had a Corelle plate on it. So I grabbed the plate with the sleeve of my housecoat and moved it, and then I turned that burner off and turned the right burner on, and was glad to have avoided some disaster where the plate exploded or something. The housecoat was polar fleece, so it did melt on the plate, which was unfortunate, but the housecoat had a big folded cuff and only one layer melted through so that was ok.
The kettle boiled. I made tea. I sat down with my tea for a few minutes. I smelled smoke.
When my roommates and I had moved into the apartment, the previous tenants had left a potholder sitting on top of the sticky-up part at the back of the stove, which seemed to us like a great place to keep a potholder, so we did. The potholder had fallen onto the burner. I had turned the burner off, but it was still hot enough to ignite the potholder.
The good news is it was a small, self-contained fire on a non-flammable surface, and it stayed that way while I figured out how to put it out. It was too big for my first attempt, which was dumping baking soda on it. Then I grabbed a metal cookie tin my roommate was keeping and used the lid to scoop the potholder into the tin. The lid went on, the fire went out, and I used more baking soda on the tiny bits of melted potholder stuck to the burner. Success!
And then the whole apartment smelled like burnt polyester, so while it aired out I went and bought a little fire extinguisher.
Boiling water to the chest. My boyfriend at the time had a cat that only randomly showed up in the house. So, fixing pasta one day, I picked up the large pot of boiling water and pasta to pour into the colander. Cat gets under my feet, boiling water all over the chest. Pulled my shirt and bra off…skin came with it. Took 6 months heal (still a bit of a scar).
This happened twice.
twice! what. Was one time soon after the other, or like after you had healed so you spent two 6-month periods healing?
2nd incident shortly after the first. I got in the shower to cool down before removing the shirt, but it still peeled away skin. Seriously, like a 2″ x 2″ patch on the top/tips. It was awful. Compounded by a shit job in a Japanese restaurant that made us wear a pseudo-kimono and obi (in polyester) that rubbed exactly the wrong way whenever you moved, and cause sweat to pool RIGHT ON RAW SKIN. It was a nightmare.
omg. no.
I’m simultaneously loving this thread and reading it with a look of horror that I can’t quite remove from my face.
I dropped an open jar of chili garlic sauce on the floor. But because the jar was plastic it BOUNCED a couple of times, spraying the entire kitchen and me with red, red, red hot sauce. I had to get a ladder to clean it off of the tops of the cupboards.
A lot of my kitchen disasters involve me or the food displaying more exuberance than dignity.
I was roasting chickpeas for a dinner party in an oven-safe saucepan. I took the saucepan out, put it on top of the stove, took the oven mitts off to put a cooling rack out, then went back and grabbed the pot to put it on the cooling rack. I was halfway across the (very small) kitchen before I realized I was holding the 450 degree pan with my bare hand. I insisted on not cancelling the dinner party, and got shit from the doctor when I finally got around to going to go see her three days later. She said I was no longer allowed to use the phrase “If it was serious it would hurt more” since I keep abusing it. The broken finger I never got medical treatment for says I did not follow her orders.
I’ve done similar before… though not that severe a burn. I now put pan handles I take out of the oven facing away from me or s far away as possible so I don’t try to grab them out of habit.
My left thumb has a spectacular scar on it from grabbing a jagged soup can lid in an unwise fashion. It was super sensitive to any kind of pressure for a good year, but now that it’s all healed, it just looks kinda cool and has left me afraid of can lids. The proliferation of cans with pull tabs is a godsend, lemme tell you.
Also I cut my hand once by pushing too hard on the handle of a butter knife while cutting a block of cheddar (because I was too lazy to wash an actual sharp knife for it). Apparently the shape of that particular silverware set’s handles becomes sharp if you clutch it too hard. Who knew?
My beloved does all the cooking. (Why do you think I married him? He wasn’t pregnant!)
One evening he was in the kitchen, at the mixer, making a cake. The power went out. We scrambled about in the dark for a few hours. We got ourselves to bed with the aid of candles. A few minutes after saying goodnight, the lights came on and … so did the mixer.
We spent the rest of the night cleaning batter off the cabinets, floor, and *ceiling*. There was a stepladder and hydrogen peroxide involved because the ceiling was ivory and the batter was *chocolate*.
One of the people here burns what he is cooking /every single time/ no matter what. All of our lovely fancy aluminum pans now have scorch marks on them.
If they aren’t non-stick, steel wool scouring pads and a little elbow grease will almost certainly take off the scorch marks. It might not be worth that much scrubbing effort every time he cooks, though. And eventually I suppose one might manage to remove a significant quantity of aluminum.
If they are non-stick, then I’m impressed by the stuckness of the scorched food.
Thank you, that is good advice! I will point him at it and let him loose with the steel wool. They are not non-stick; after the 3rd aluminum pan we said ‘Use the non-stick’ and so then he switched to just burning the food. ๐ Fortunately it is a rare event as I think he has mostly decided he does not like cooking enough to pay the attention it requires and there is not a shortage of people who do.
I have a new standard for horrifying kitchen mayhem: a shattered nearly full liter bottle of fish sauce.
It’s sticky, and very runny, and shattered glass everywhere, but most of all fish sauce is pungent. Nauseatingly so. My apartment overlooks the back garden. It does not overlook the street. But you could smell the giant fermented fish and stale sex smell on the street.
That was Sunday. On Wednesday, I was home sick, and my boyfriend called to check on me. I was washing the floor on my hands and knees again, because despite all of Jolie’s wisdom, I could still smell it.
I have hands covered with knife and burn scars. Last year I had a fire in my oven because of a forgotten lid. The fish sauce is worse.
What an appropriate question, I am choosing to quit my job! Today is my last day! (Which is why I’m all over the Toast today, I am really running the clock out at this point.)
Yay, congratulations on job quitting and may your FUNemployement be glorious and last just as long as you want, and no longer.
Thank you!! I’m freelancing, which I swore I’d never do again, but whatever! We’ll see how it goes. I’m just lucky I have the financial leeway to not be stuck in Burnoutville.
WOOO WELCOME TO THE LEAGUE OF EXTRAORDINARY JOB-QUITTERS. HERE IS YOUR DECODER RING.
They’re great! I just got mine in the mail!
YAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAY
and so on
This is a throwaway because I’m wildly embarrassed, but y’all know me.
Anyway: have any of you ever been on metronidazole? It’s an antibiotic for BV, which you take, in pill form, for a week. I’ve been taking it in conjunction with my birth control, which is the only contraception I use; I’ve taken the antibiotic once before, and my doctor, knowing about the BC, said I had nothing to worry about re: decreased effectiveness of the pill. I do not believe that I have missed a pill this pack, though I was taking a pill while walking and was worried for a second that I had dropped the pill and didn’t realize, but just brushed it off due to paranoia.
But today, a week before my period, I woke up mildly crampy and with some spotting. Am SURE it’s nothing (and I called my doc to find out; still waiting to hear back), but, please, humor me, and tell me it’s nothing?
It’s probably nothing! Even if you did miss that one pill, which you likely didn’t, it would take missing more than one pill to screw up your BC so much that you’d be at risk of pregnancy. Have you been skipping your placebo week at all? I will occasionally go 2-3 months straight on the pill without pausing for the fake period week, and I find I can’t go any longer than that because I’ll start spotting and even cramping occasionally earlier than my fake period would be due (if that makes sense). But if you’re concerned, spend the few bucks on a pregnancy test, maybe, just to put your mind at ease?
It’s nothing. I have an IUD and haven’t gotten a period in four years- except for spotting one day earlier this year while I was on antibiotics. But a period is the opposite of a symptom of pregnancy, and period variations do not necessarily mean the pregnancy-prevention effectiveness is reduced. Especially not if your doctor said it wouldn’t be.
It’s probably nothing.
I was on metranidazole recently, myself, and I had stomach cramps with it: I think the cramps, at least, are a side-effect of it.
The cramps are very likely a side effect of the antibiotics. They’re hard on your system! But yes, it’s probably nothing, and good on you for calling your doctor with your worries. They are around to answer questions like this! Also, remember you can always ask your pharmacist when you pick up pills to answer questions too.
All good points! The last time I had to take antibiotics, my stomach was upset and crampy the entire time. It is probably nothing. You’re good.
I have done that, it sounds pretty okaynormal to me though I also take probiotics on the regular now bc with gayladybabesex= everpresent potential.
Ack! That is so hard! I’m always really worried about those kinds of things. I got an IUD about a month ago and since have had foot surgery and am on pain killers and antibiotics and I know in my brain that everything is fine. But the type of spotting that was happening changed and I was like “SOMETHING CHANGED = I’m pregnant!” But of course I’m not. And if your doctor said it was going to be ok it is!
From how much camping stuff I have, you would think I would go camping a lot. But I don’t, actually. I haven’t put up the tent in almost 2 years. But I am going to Warren Dunes this weekend and I am going to sleep in that tent!
Woop woop! We went camping last weekend up in Idyllwild, VA and it was super fun. One night there were some coyotes not too far off and they were yodeling away loudly and frequently, probably because they’d just scored a kill. And it absolutely terrified our poor little dog. But, good times!
“Yeah, well, maybe we should cheer him up then”
“What do you uh..suppose we should do?”
“Well does he like butter tarts?”
Song number one on every summer playlist/mixtape I’ve made since 1999.
I still listen to it regularly. Best summer song ever?
Yes.
I WAS LYING ON THE GRASS OF SUNDAY MORNING OF LAST WEEK
INDULGING IN MY SELF-DEFEAT
L a T e r that week!
On my way home from Philly, where I’ve been since Tuesday night. I’ve been juggling client meetings with client reporting writing, staying up late to get the latter done after full days of the former. Not whining, because my work is really interesting, but just tired! And missing the fam. Occasionally I panic that I’m wasting my one wild and precious life too focused on work, but I carve out regular personal time so that’s good. And I’m going to Ontario and PEI for 2 FAB WEEKS in August, so I’ve got that goin’ for me.
And Nicole is right, raisins are garbage, except maybe in Raisin Bran where they break up the fiber monotony.
Have a great weekend, Toasties!
P.S. Got my Hamlet t-shirt the other day, looking forward to wearing it proudly.
My Ronbledore t-shirt is already covered in cat hair, as befits a Toast shirt.
My sister-in-law informed me that my Hamlet shirt is at my in-laws’ house. (We’re moving and didn’t want it to get lost with the change of address and everything.) I can’t wait for them to come visit me so I can wear it.
Last night and today, I am watching lots of The Addams Family FOR VERY IMPORTANT PROFESSIONAL REASONS, and tonight I have made a date with 5-6 other women for the First Friday Art Walk. The city will be closing a few blocks of downtown, making a pedestrian fair, and I just got word that a small circus troupe will be appearing in the city square. I will wear pink pants and eat street food and laugh until I feel sick.
What have you chosen to do with your one wild and precious life?
Um, read a lot of gay porn and become waaaaaay too emotionally involved with fictional characters.
DITTO DITTO DITTO. Plus writing gay porn and becoming irritated with pronouns.
YES IT’S SO HARD TO WRITE SLASH BECAUSE “HE” “HIS” “HIM”
I think I do all right in the end, but sentence structure is SO IMPORTANT. As is keeping track of the anatomical possibility of some positions. Occasionally I ask my husband to help. ๐
Yep.
That’s basically it, yeah.
Prompted by the ad for Sankya that I keep seeing on the Toast, does anyone have any recommendations for novels set in modern Russia? I’m really interested in learning more about that part of the world, and I’ve already got some great non-fiction resources. Thanks!
.
I found Petropolis by Anya Ulinich funny and dark. I _think_ it might be set in the 90s, though.
Ludmilla Petrushevskaya’s short stories are bizarre and wonderful, and Alina Bronsky’s The Hottest Dishes of the Tartar Cuisine is one of my favorite “first-person narrator oblivious to the fact that they’re a HORRIBLE PERSON” novels ever.
I successfully made it through TWO day-long meetings, and there’s only one more hour long meeting of planning to go today. The Toasties on Twitter, etc were a great boon to me during that time. In other news, I still can’t talk about job stuff but it’s VERY POSITIVE so yay! Hopefully next week I will be able to tell you all for sure. If not then, the week after. *sits on news*
Can’t wait to hear the news. Fingers crossed.
I moved successfully! Cheers for putting up stuff on walls and alphabetizing books. New apartment is big and quiet and shady and we already made friends with a stray cat (I have named him Miles).
Work is stressful as the students work on finals, copiers break down, weird admissions/testing stuff lands on me, and two of my favorite student workers are graduating (you guys, I am super-sad about this. I neeeeed them in my life. I’m trying to be happy for them and their bright shiny futures though).
Meanwhile we have donuts and it’s Friday. And OITNB is waiting for me at home.
Also the Tonys are on Sunday!
Congratulations on moving! When you alphabetize your books, do you just go whole hog and alphabetize them all together regardless of physical type or genre, or do you separate them first and THEN alphabetize them?
Separate and then alphabetize.
When on the shelves they’re sorted by genre and within that alphabetical by last name, chronological by original publishing date. Except for certain areas of lit crit which has weird subsections according to chronology and/or literary movement.
Also, I just tentatively planned with my sister and niece to have commemorative BLTs on Father’s Day, because that is how the mourning looks in this family.
I think your link is broken? But commemorative BLTs sound very sweet, and mourning with food is the best way to mourn, because at least there is food.
So it is! The commemorative BLTs were in memory of my father, and now are also in memory of my sister’s husband/niece’s father.
That’s a beautiful story. I hope you have the best BLT on Sunday.
It’s my birthday this weekend! I’m going to eat EVERYTHING.
Happy birthday to you, almost-birthday twin! What sorts of things are you going to eat? I haven’t decided what my birthday-takeout will be, but I’ve got great brunch plans for Sunday and have been promised an amazing homemade dessert by a friend.
I also have brunch plans on sunday! Today is takeout, tomorrow is to be decided, possibly Favourite Sandwich Day. Monday is cake-o-clock. All foooooooood ๐
Happy birthday! I eagerly await news of which is the Favourite Sandwich.
HELL YEAH! happy birthday!
BEST BIRTHDAY STRATEGY, HAPPY BIRTHDAY
Dude and I are going whitewater rafting this weekend! I am super pumped because RAFTING but also a little apprehensive because we’re going with some casual friends from the intramural sports team we play on together and a bunch of THEIR friends who we don’t know at all. We are camping for two night with all these people, and there’s been a group facebook thread going about stuff to bring and coordinating schedules and whatever, and the whole thing has devolved into two of the dudes have a dick-waving contest about whose REALLY BIG FULL-SIZE PROPANE GRILL to bring. Then a third guy announced that he was bringing his HATCHET, which we will definitely need at this family campground that includes bathroom and shower facilities (and grills, ha).
Too many bros all up in my business
Let me just say that on our last camping trip, I for sure brought my hatchet and split THE FUCK out of some firewood for kindling, and it was awesome.
I’m pretty strongly pro-hatchet, and am considering whether to buy one for the (completely tame, one-night) camping trip I’m taking in a couple weeks. I think yes, because (a) I might go on less-tame camping trips in the future and (b) what if there’s a giant storm and I have to rush to the aid of someone trapped under a tree branch and all I have is my growing collection of handsaws? What then?
Yes, get one! I have the Fiskars X7, and I like it. But I’ve also heard really good things about the Estwings! And those are purdier.
Why would you not bring a hatchet? Bring a hatchet to work, bring a hatchet to the daycare. O, reason not the need! Our basest beggars are in the poorest thing superfluous. Allow not nature more than nature needs, man’s life’s as cheap as beast’s!
Oh lord. I hope you have a very large time and can avoid the dudes and their grills and their superfluous hatchets as much or as little as you like. RAFTING!!!
“I brought a hatchet” is our #1 city person marker. That and “Why does the outhouse smell so bad?”
A full-size grill for two nights? Ugh, I know exactly who these dudes are.
I took a personal day yesterday! It was not as productive as I had hoped (I spent close to two hours at Sprint trying to upgrade my phone), but it was glorious because I found the PERFECT pair of high waisted jeans at the Gap.
Should I read Beloved or White Teeth?
Both! Maybe Beloved first?
I’d say White Teeth. Beloved was not my favorite Morrison. That prize goes to Song of Solomon.
Good to know. I’ve actually not read any Morrison yet.
I also loved Jazz and Sula, a lot! All Morrison novels are pretty intense, but Beloved is REALLY intense.
Second Sula as a really good one. I’ve also read Home and Bluest Eye and I liked Sula the best.
So intense! So haunting! I still occasionally will remember pieces of Song of Solomon and get chills.
Beloved and then On Beauty
Beloved is actually the only Morrison novel I’ve read (…something I should rectify soon…), and I love it more each time I read it. Admittedly, the first time I read it I wasn’t wild about it (it is VERY intense), but now it’s one of my favorite books.
(I haven’t read White Teeth, so can’t weigh in on that one.)
Today during my lunch break I sat outside and drank coffee and ate one of the tiny scones from Starbucks and there was a brass band playing and ahhh, life feels good right now.
Side note, last week I was in total misery for no reason. The only difference between then & now is I had my period in between. I really should change my birth control again because this shit is getting out of hand.
I was in an AWFUL mood last weekend for (almost) no apparent reason, and then happened to open my period tracker app and…yep, period due in 1 day. I hate knowing that you’re artificially in a bad mood, but not being able to really do anything about it because HORMONES. I can’t wait for men’s BC.
BOY DO I KNOW THAT FEEL.
Last winter, I had two miserable desk-bound jobs and the weather was awful, so I got out of shape. I gained weight, too, but I guess I didn’t realize how much. (I’m really tall, so I can gain about 15 pounds without it being obvious.) I assumed that my boobs were just growing and bought a bunch of new bras to contain them. Well, thanks to unemployment and it finally being sunny and warm out, I’ve been exercising a ton. And now those bras no longer fit, while the bras I bought a year ago do. So I guess I have to choose between my boobs and my abs. Goodbye, beautiful winter rack.
Much like birds, your boobs had to fly north for the summer.
Guys! Hey guuuuuuuuuys today is my birthday! I am {mumbletymumble} years old! I had to come into work, which is a shame, but I plan on consoling myself with ice cream at lunch and tonight I’m going to drink wine and eat take out and watch a dumb comic book movie and on Sunday I’m going to the park with friends to play croquet and eat snacks and drink wine ๐
YAY HAPPY BIRTHDAY!!!! That sounds like a delightful birthday plan.
Happy birthday! That sounds delightful, except for the working part!
Even the working party’s not too bad – I’ve been lucky enough to be able to take my bday off for years, so it’s only fair that I have to suck it up once in a while. It’s fairly quiet here today, and I’ve got access to good snacks, so I’ll call it a win.
Happy birthday again, Jinx! Have a wonderful day and weekend!
Thanks! I feel a little greedy, demanding birthday accolades here AND on Twitter but…eh, fuck it. It’s my birthday!
DEMAND BIRTHDAY ACCOLADES EVERYWHERE. IT IS YOUR… BIRTHRIGHT!
(Happy birthday, again! ๐ )
happy happy birthday!
JINXIE. I would send you a bottle of wine if the fucking man and his postal regulations weren’t dumb. Enjoy the hell out of your birthday and the weekend!
Happy birthday!!!
Happy birthday! I highly recommend wearing white and drinking Pimm’s Cup while playing croquet and cursing loudly and drunkenly.
A+ WOULD PIMMS AGAIN
PIMM’S
I forget every winter and then am gleefully reminded every spring. It’s one of the best moments of spring, remembering that Pimm’s Cup exists.
Happy birthday! That sounds just perfect, and you deserve it!
JINXIE! Happy birthday!! (all_ephemera on Twitter. I know it’s confusing that I have different names in different places.)
happy birthday almost birthday twin! ๐
Happy Birthday!
BIRTHDAY TWINS! I hope you have a fabulous, amazing day and year. Ice cream and croquet and wine and comic book movies? A++
OMG is it also your birthday????
Happy birthday!!
<3
CROQUET IN THE PARK! That sounds perfect.
Happy birthday!!
happy birthday!!! Hope you found your donuts!!!
I did not, but I went and got a milkshake instead, so I’m feeling pretty ok.
I should’ve done the same, I never found mine =(. I wrote a missed connections post, hoping to hear back by tonight *fingers crossed*
“You: Deep chocolate glaze, moist and luscious crumb, just enough sprinkles to be intriguing, but not off-putting. Me: tired, hungry, desperately clutching a cup of hot coffee, looking for the One who can complete my meal. Is it you? I think it’s you – I can’t get you out of my mind. I will dunk you gently, lovingly, into my cup, and then eat up every morsel. Contact me – we can make this work.”
I like your can-do attitude. Like that dude from star trek always said “Do or donut – there is no try”
Toasties! Happy Friday! I had a great dream last night in which I became Doctor Strange (the Marvel character in charge of flinging around magic & being mysterious). I wore an incredible dramatic red cloak with a high collar and threw various magics at rampaging demons like a boss. It was pretty bad-ass.
Have you had any noteworthy dreams lately? Is there a particularly good dream you’ve had that you remember? Do you believe that if you tell someone your dreams, they won’t come true? (This last one is particularly great if you have a terrible dream, because sharing means it won’t happen.)
This week I had a nightmare where someone had poisoned the neighborhood squirrels (whom I over-feed shamelessly, to the point where I can identify most of them by individual features or character traits) and I had to watch them die, slowly and in pain. I woke up nearly crying. It was horrible.
AGH NO. D: But you told it to me, so now it won’t come true! Your squirrely buddies are going to be OK. (And I love that you have squirrel friends!)
Here is one of them from spring, peering in accusingly through our kitchen window because I have not yet put out breakfast.
Edit: JFC look at how fat he is. I seriously overfeed these little monsters but HOW COULD I NOT? I mean THAT FACE.
Oh my goodness. Hello, you wonderful little fatty squirrel!!!! I will give you /all the nuts/.
The other night I dreamt that the grocery store across the street from my home was large and modern and clean and in the basement of a skyscraper (it is none of these things). I couldn’t find anything I needed, I lost my husband somewhere in the produce section, and the whole store was cold and blue-lit and empty. I’m 100% certain this was an anxiety dream about moving to New York.
The other night I dreamed that my Dad made me wonton soup and then packed up the leftovers in my lunch bag. Except he just put the soup in an open bowl and then put that bowl inside a giant bowl of tinfoil and then filled the tinfoil with hot water and strawberries. I woke up right as I was about to yell at him about how impractical that was to take to work. Also, my Dad has never in his life packed me a lunch.
I had a dream I was taking a tour of a castle that was also a dorm, and the tour guide opened an otherwise unremarkable door off the hallway to reveal the “cuddle room”, the walls of which were lined with adorable animals, and there was a large area in the middle with cushions and toys. The bunnies had a little sign by them that said “Caution: Scamper”.
Then my alarm went off and I was so mad, you guys.
I had a dream involving characters from Avatar: The Last Airbender, which was baffling because 1) it’s been several years since I finished watching it, why would I have a dream about it now, and also 2) they were acting entirely out of character.
I have fairly amazing dreams every single night. Last night I dreamed that I was sipping colorful drinks at a table in the desert with Pharrell, who was also my camel. We talked about our relationship and friendly love for one another, and then desert bandits came so I rode away on his back after taking the secret credit card that unlocked the ruins with me.
I also had some sort of dream about discovering that dwarves (the fantasy kind) are all actually robots. I freaking love my dreams.
Wow. I love your dreams.
Earlier this week I went to bed an hour early because I could not keep my eyes open and was asleep so long that I traveled into the Vivid as Fuck Dreams portion of my sleep cycle.
I got pregnant, gave birth, took terrible care of my baby, and then my baby time warped to being a dirtbag teenager. I woke up just so confused about how any of that had come into existence.
I had a REALLY terrible, random everyone-dies-at-the-end dream the other morning (when I ought to have been getting ready for work and was having trouble getting out of bed) that I was part of/watching this Puritan/Amish family that was getting slowly taken in by this sea-demon creature. Like, it was slowly working on each of their minds to try and take them over. And then the little boy succumbed and had a pistol and killed every one (god, it was such a terrible dream). Needless to say, I found it much easier to get out of bed when I woke up (“WELP, NOT GOING BACK TO SLEEP NOW”), and very glad that I didn’t have to work with children or farms that day.
Okay, here goes: camping last week in Maple Ridge, BC. Dream one, I was witnessing two, large buildings burning to the ground in a large, open field. Horses were inside but were already dead and I was sadly commiserating while being simultaneously horrified. The next morning, I overheard my camping buddy telling a fellow camper a barn burned down in a nearby township (Langley), killing a number of horses.
Dream two: the next night, I dreamed my dog (Moe) was drowning in a small, man-made pond but was saved by a scuba diver in the nick of time. When we got back from camping, my dog sitting in-laws casually mentioned their dog (Kizzy) accidentally fell into the pool at 3:00am when they let Moe out for a pee. If they hadn’t heard Moe barking, Kizzy would have drowned.
DA DUM! True story, honest.
I took all of my books out of the bookshelves in preparation for packing and moving and there are SO MANY BOOKS
Luckily I’ve heard there are no shortage of books where you’re moving, so I’m sure you’ll be able to restock in no time.
Thinking about moving scares me because I have a lot of books but I actually have so many books that most of them are still in boxes because I don’t really have bookshelves.
Clever planning on your part!
One of my favorite aunts long ago told her husband that they must buy a bookcase every year on their anniversary. They go shopping together and it’s their gift to each other.
That is actually a great idea. That’s about how many books accrue over a year. What happens when you run out of house for all the bookshelves though?
Yeah, they had to stop at some point. They’re past their 50th anniversary now. Here’s what happened.
About 10 years ago, Auntie got upset at Uncle. He had retired and moved all his office crap into their house and totally overran the place. She couldn’t even get through some of the rooms. And Uncle suddenly expected Auntie to cater to him the way his staff always had. She tried various avenues of communication, but to no good effect. Finally, she took the money that proceeded from the sale of his medical practice and bought *herself* a house a few miles away and moved into it.
Shocked the hell out of him. That’s when he *began* listening to her. He was properly chastened and asked her out on formal dates, never expecting to be invited into her house. After a few “dates” she invited him in, but he left at bedtime.
Later he was invited to stay the night, but only once a week. He carried in his toiletry kit and carried out everything in the morning. Eventually Auntie invited Uncle to move into *her* house. She got his agreement that she has the final word on the house. She tried teaching him to share. He was obedient but never “got” it.
Uncle was an indulged only child of extremely unpleasant parents with no social skills to teach him. As a tall white man he always got a pass.
Auntie and Uncle converted the garage of *her* house to be *his* space, since he wasn’t really sharing. He’s still obedient about her sharing rules in the main house, but still doesn’t get it.
After Uncle moved into Auntie’s house, they sold the first house. They had to sell most of those books and bookcases, too. They no longer accumulate furniture or books as her house is small and full.
I’m sorry for the long post and I hope you’re not too sorry you asked. I find these two fascinating, but do not expect others will. Thanks for your indulgence.
I am fascinated and your Auntie is awesome!
Thank you. I love it when people assume I’m her daughter. I do look just like her. Trying to grow up to *be* like her.
I love this story.
omg, about to do this, and I’m dreading the moment when I take them out and can’t wait for the moment when I put them back into the bookshelves in the new place. Best part of moving.
THEY BREED. I swear they do. You leave them alone on the bookcases for too long and suddenly there’s twice as many. Probably when you unpack them, there’ll be twice as many again because they haven’t anything else to do while cooped up in boxes.
It seems that what I am doing with my life, mostly, is procrastinating. I break it up sometimes with attempts to not procrastinate stuff.
Check.
I have chosen to volunteer as an EMT in my community, and recently passed the skills test for the national registry. I’ve scheduled the written test, but have already done some ride along work, and you guys, I’m cutting people’s clothes off in the back of an ambulance already!
Cutting people’s clothes off in a non-sexual setting is still really fun!
Neat! You get to cut clothes and help people!
Congratulations and thank you for doing this!
I love the use of the word “still”. ๐
WINK WINK WINK
This was the plot for a very uplifting “Go Women, Go!” Lifetime movie! I’m so into this story rt now, go you!
Anyone else have conflicting feelings about the World Cup? I love watching World Cup games, but there is just SO much shittiness that has gone on/is going on in Brazil due to the preparations for the Cup, a lot of which is to appease FIFA, an organization which is supposedly insanely corrupt & awful. I am very against megaevents in general because they cost their hosts soooo much money that could have gone to other things. If no one bid for the Olympics, and they ceased to exist, I would be perfectly happy with that. (Actually, a ton of cities have dropped their bids for the 20?? Winter Games, and now it’s down to either Beijing or (I think) Almaty.) Another thing I don’t like about the Olympics is the fact that NBC pays like $3 mil to have exclusive coverage or whatever.
But I just can’t get as mad at the World Cup.
Speaking of the Rio Olympics, this is an interesting article about how Rio could host an “austerity Games,” i.e. use existing facilities: http://www.theguardian.com/cities/2014/apr/23/wor…
Oh gosh did you read the matchfixing articles in the NYT? I found them SUPER interesting.
I think maybe? I read something that said that Dilma would have a lot to gain if Brazil won, so… [wink, wink]. I had never thought about fixing before & found it interesting as well.
I think the World Cup brings enough happiness into the world that it outweighs the FIFA/financial crap. That said, these giant events could easily be broken up in regional events that don’t concentrate all the expense/corruption in one place.
I am hating on it not because of FIFA, but because of how the event has impacted the indigenous population. Brazil is not usually great about respecting tribal land normally, but now that they have the Cup to justify it they’re going a little kookoo. Survival International has some great information: http://www.survivalinternational.org/worldcup
Definitely. There are lots of reason to hate on it. FIFA isn’t even my #1.
FIFA is and always will be the fucking worst. Don’t get me started on the Qatar tomfuckery.
TBH, I think I’m less conflicted about World Cup than I am Olympics, which is probably going to be far worse for the city/country in the long run. I know quite a few people who did research/analysis on the planning issues with the infrastructure of Rio (look into how the transit is going to be just.. well, won’t work, actually). But as someone who was so relieved/happy my city did not get the Olympics back in the day for so many reasons, I am going to go with that is where I will put my conflicting feelings? So sounds like I’m with you? Because goddamn am I excited for the World Cup!
ARGENTINAAAAAAA.
I was going to edit to say the exact same thing about Qatar.
I love the Olympics (I only recently got into soccer so this will be the first World Cup I pay attention to), and hate that the past few have been so costly. I have a few friends in Brazil who were incredibly excited a few years ago for both events; it’s been depressing to watch that enthusiasm transform into anger during the past year.
That being said, if Rio is a failure, it, plus the clusterfuck that is Qatar, might force these orgs to start backing countries/cities that have more sustainable World Cup/Olympic plans. LA is fighting really hard to get either the 2024 or 2028 Summer Games, and unlike other candidates there’s broad political and community support for it here. We’d follow the same idea as 1984 — use as many pre-existing venues as possible, and focus our spending on infrastructure projects, primarily ones that are already going forward, such as our current subway/light rail expansion, and the revitalization of the LA River. Getting the Olympics might actually force those projects to get done sooner, and would be a great rallying point for increased funding.
Gathering Toasties to me on Twitter is basically my life now.
Dumb question to which there probably isn’t even an answer, how much do tattoos even cost? I want to get a pretty big one, maybe about 6×4 inches?. At this stage not envisioning it being in color, just black & white.
A lot depends on where you are, I think it varies! I have a full color one on my ribs, about 4″ diameter, and I believe it cost me about $250-$300 (it was a few years ago). Don’t go for the lowest bidder, you get what you pay for!
It varies greatly, depending on location, reputation, and how labor-intensive it is. Probably at least a couple hundred dollars, though.
I can’t speak for all people, but I for one never mind being asked by strangers where I had my tattoos done. I mind being asked what they mean–that’s personal!–but many folks are pretty happy to recommend an artist whose work they were happy with. I used to keep my last artist’s business cards and hand them out to people who asked, I was so thrilled with her work. So, perhaps ask around and see where that leads you?
Depends on the artist! Cheapest is not usually best. The price also depends on your area. In Norwich, where I live, they most charge a minimum of ยฃ25 for something smaller and more simple.
My back tattoo cost about ยฃ400, my leg tattoo (done in one day) cost about ยฃ300, my shoulder tattoo, which was tiny, about ยฃ40.
The best thing to do would be to describe/design your tattoo as best you can and take it round various artists to price check.
While you do this, check their portfolios and their reviews. Make sure they are fully compliant with any and all rules your area has for tattoo parlours.
Edit: If there are any tattoo conventions in your area, why not get a ticket? Go along, check out your local artists, see other people’s tattoos, get an idea of what you want.
They vary wildly in cost, honestly. My phoenix on my lower back (yes I have a tramp stamp SHUT UP) was upwards of $500, but it’s about the size of my hand and has about 6 colors in it. I highly advise saving up for the best artist in your area.
The place I go charges around $100 an hour, which is on the high end but absolutely worth it. I have a tattoo of lilacs on my shoulder that’s about 6″ in diameter, which took 4-5 hours, so with tip around $600, and a partial sleeve with lots of detail in full color that took about 9 hours, so like $1200 with tip.
My squid Tobias is about 6×4, and he cost me about $250, but like everyone else says, it varies wildly. Definitely go around to visit some shops — even if you’re too shy to talk to the artists at first, you can look at their portfolios and get some idea of whether their art style matches. And talk to people about their art if you can. I keep business cards from every artist I’ve gotten work from, so I can rec them.
Black and grey can be just as pricey as color, since a good artist will shade just as carefully as with color. It also depends on how many sessions, which depends on your pain tolerance, intricacy/detail work, and how much you bleed. 1 session, $250-400, 2 sessions $400-600.
For the record, I can’t take a lot of a pain, and get shocky/shaky fast, and bleed like crazy. Some of it’s because I’m constantly in pain of other sorts, so there isn’t much energy left over to suppress more stimuli. BUT, I’ve gotten over feeling bad about something I can’t control. However, it does mean that tattoos will always cost more for me, since I can’t do more than 2-3 hours at one time. The Beau can endure infinite pain, and finds this baffling.
http://www.bme.com is an excellent resource for designs, advice and stories. With the pictures, people usually link the tattooist info.
They even have a directory of artists http://411.bme.com/ – depending on where you are, they might not have many, but worth a look.
What have you chosen to do with your one wild and precious life?
WRITE EVEN THOUGH IT’LL NEVER GET ME ANY MONEY
COSIGN
DESPERATE SOBBING
you are still living your best life and being Your Dream You! Sometimes that doesn’t come w ALL THE $$$$ but #Passion and all that. You’re doing great!
My dream me apparently spent most of this week staring at a blank page and screaming silently
well you could be doing that anyway but at a shitty desk job under the burden of the Patriarchy, and now you’re doing it ON YOUR OWN TERMS!
Sometimes I like to imagine that one day I will quit my job and run away to open an ice cream shop. I make very good homemade ice cream, but like a quart every month, maybe. So in actuality, if I ever did quit my job and try to make a living from making ice cream it would feel just as much like work as work does now. I would just get to eat a lot more ice cream. All in all, not bad, but not really a “dream job.” Plus, no more weekends and evenings, because people don’t just eat ice cream 9-5.
So Toasties, what’s your fantasy job? Not necessarily something you think you can achieve, but your escapist “I want to run away and join the circus” kinda job.,
Goat farm!
I knew some hipsters in Houston who really did this. (Knew=”bought goat cheese from”). They were like, touring musicians or something, and then settled down and bought a goat farm. Her hair was pink. They were wonderful. Their cheese was even wonderfuler.
Replace goats with sheep and that is my fantasy life.
Goats are the cutest! And such yummy cheese!
A farmer!!! That may just be the cooped up feeling from living in apartments too long, but I have begun searching for old farmhouses with acreage with the dream of renovating and becoming a self sustainable bubble!!!
Or or!! Being a member of a commune. Similar idea of the self sustaining farmer but I still get some human interactions!!
I have friends who’ve already selected the breed of goats they’ll raise on their fantasy goat farms.
I want someone to pay me to read (good) fanfic.
WHY DID I NOT ANSWER WITH THIS ANSWER?
SECONDED
Yes, this is a good life
I want to work for either NASA doing something… spacey… or Marvel Comics. Doing something… Marvelous. A ha. Sorry.
I know a lot of people at NASA. It’s a complete bureaucratic shitshow, top to bottom.
Yes, but at the NASA in my fantasy job, they are all awesome people who are all contributing to awesome space things and also budgets are not an issue
I want to work at (not even necessarily own?) a bookstore. The kind that serves tea and has a cat that doses on the books in the sunlight.
Yesss this too.
I hope my imaginary ice cream shop is next to your bookstore. When it’s slow I will come over and pet the kitty.
Yessss, and on really lovely day we can do sidewalk sales of ice cream and books!
I am so on board with this! I’m actually getting sad that this is all imaginary…
I kind of am, as well!
A carpenter! I think I’d be good at it/love it.
Or a baker, but I wouldn’t have to get up at 4 am, and the ovens would magically not make the kitchen really hot, etc. etc.
I want to get paid to sit in an inner tube and read in the pool all day.
During winter months, substitute with cozy chair/warm fireplace.
I want to be a food/cooking blogger – the kind where you get a tv show and cookbook deal out of it and make piles of money.
Horse astronaut.
best
Indiana Jones-style paleontologist, raiding the Lost Raptor Temples of Utah.
Less fictional, I wanna be a professional perfumer.
Ooooh that just seems so glamorous.
Translating Latin poetry. Writing comics, except all the comics are about the lady characters and how rad they are and how they’re all friends.
I dream of my husband and I opening a yarn store/coffee shop together. He is so not on board with this dream.
How rude! Yarn/coffee is a match made in heaven! I would totally shop there!
Possibly even better: Yarn/cafe that serves coffee and snacks and maybe adult beverages in the evenings? With lots of comfy seating areas! And a fireplace (for some reason).
Actress, always. Now that I come to think of it, there’s a severe shortage of chubby northern girls in Hollywood movies. Clearly they’re crying out for me to go there ;).
imaginary bookstore/bakery that serves tea, but not in a pretentious way. I’d make ridiculous things in photoshop on the side, and pet cute dogs.
I want a place that serves looseleaf tea in a nonpretentious way, because I can think of like TWO places and that’s it, and really, looseleaf tea is sooooooo good.
My kitchen is one such place – I loooove looseleaf tea, and I’m not pretentious about it. I have my IngenuiTea (because that thing ROCKS) and then I just plop tea and hot water in it and gooooo.
This sounds perfect! I should have incorporated more cute animals into my fantasy job.
Successful and innovative bohemian artist who has brilliant ideas and is accessible, not pretentious. This actually doesn’t exist.
Dogwalker. Or alpaca farmer.
Distillery. My brother almost bought be a little still for Christmas, but we decided that I had no where to put it that wouldn’t risk burning the house down and couldn’t be seen by the cops at the cop station next door.
That, or a perfume store.
A sci-fi, fantasy and horror specialist bookshop.
Bookshops barely make their owners ANY money, so why I think I could do this I DON’T KNOW.
Maybe you could found a bookstore that works like those antique marts do, where everyone gets their own booth and there’s sort of central staffing or what not. So you could have a specialty sci-fi booth, round up someone to do romance, a few specialty history sections, a new-agey self help booth…
Basically, like a normal (really big) bookstore but every section is intensely personally curated.
I want to play video games for a living.
And not in a sweatshop QA type setting, I want to do something like write about games or work for Rooster Teeth/Achievement Hunter.
I really just want to be paid to play video games. Like, here’s $25/hr to play Assassin’s Creed for the hell of it.
My castle-in-the-sky idea is to buy a massive old house in the country and run it as a bed and breakfast sort of stay themed on Jane Austen-esque house parties: everyone who is there is either family or guest and stays for a while, putting on impromptu scenes and going for strolls and having balls and eating great food and generally socializing. I like to place people I know in my “family”, so my actual sister can come and be the resident artist and do portraits or lessons or just give the place a certain je ne sais quoi, and I’ll make the meals and my friend can be the director for the little theatrical scenes, and the other can be the costumer… etc etc. It’s wonderful to revisit and revise, and house hunt.
I want to go to there!
But seriously, I would stay there. Especially if it was run by a Toastie!
I would TOTALLY go stay in your Austen mansion.
I had a dream of doing this but 1930’s between- the-wars Agatha Christie-esque.
Maybe including MURDER!!!
Infamous reclusive space witch. No? How about neighborhood eccentric? Okay, not a job either.
Some sort of culture/artsy event host. Sometimes book readings, art shows and small plays, or open discussions about anything really, or interactive events where you come and try something you haven’t done before. I want to talk about stories and art forever. (I do not have the extrovert levels needed to do this.)
I would love to be paid to take college classes for the rest of my life. The good ones.
I have been going back to school recently, and I wish I had the time and money to take so much everything! Women and gender studies classes, psychology, physics, sociology, biology, chemistry, omigod there is so much that I would love to just immerse myself in for a quarter at a time!
Before I got burnt out by grad school this was my answer. Learning is so much fun!
Samantha Hess-style professional cuddler of cute queer folks.
Running a theatre (which of course would stage amazing shows and readings and whatnot that extremely famous/talented people would inexplicably be a part of). And I’d be all fancy and hang out at the theatre bar at intermission and have legendary dinner parties at my house. The theatre would have a cat and a ghost.
Running an adventure B&B with scuba diving and horse backing riding and those terrifying-amazing flying squirrel suits (but in dream life, they’re completely safe)/anything fun in the outdoors. It teleports to different parts of the world every oh, year or so, and it doesn’t cost any money to come stay but all guests have to be able to tell a good story and not be an asshole.
Either the owner of a yarn-dyeing/knitting-pattern-designing studio (with classes! and lots of travel to sheep and wool festivals!), or the director of a literary walking tour agency that specializes in taking groups of people up mountains in the English Lake District and then having seminars on Wordsworth and Coleridge in the evenings.
Hi all – I wrote in here last week about my very sick kitty. After observing him and having several heart to hearts (not just with each other, with the cat, too), my fiance and I decided to take him in on Sunday to be put to sleep. He was ready – he was so weak and sad, hiding in closets, etc.
It was the hardest thing I’ve ever done, but I am so, so glad he’s not in pain anymore. He went quietly and gently, just like he was falling asleep, and the vet who administered the procedure was so kind and compassionate. We got to spend some time alone with the kitty before and after, and it was so valuable, to be able to say goodbye on our own terms.
I miss him big time, and his little kitty sister is still occasionally looking for him, but we’re doing okay.
I am so incredibly sorry for your loss. All the sympathy in the world.
You are a good pet owner and you have just done one of the bravest and best things you may ever do, even if it was very hard. You have served your kitty well. Much love to you.
Oh, I’m so sorry. You acted with great compassion to your beloved cat, and I hope that’s a comfort to you.
I dread the day I have to put a cat to sleep, but it sounds like you did the right thing for him. I hope snuggling his sister helps.
I’m so sorry about your cat.
I’m so, so sorry. ๐ Lots of love & hugs.
Hugshugshugs. Worst thing to go through.
I’m so sorry! Major hugs! Putting a beloved pet to sleep is the wooooorst.
Oh I’m so sorry for your loss. Big hugs.
I am so sorry for your loss. Your cat was lucky to have parents who loved & cared about him enough to do what was best for him, and I hope the little one provides some comfort while you grieve. <3
I’m so sorry, that’s the hardest thing about pets. If only they lived forever.
You did right by your kitty. I’m sorry for your loss, but it’s so good that you were able to take the best care possible of him. My condolences.
I’m so sorry. It’s so hard, isn’t it? I’m glad you were able to be with him. Hugs and skritches behind the ears (or is it under the chin for cats maybe?) to all.
I’m so sorry for your loss. It sounds like you made the best decision you could, but it’s still so, so hard to do.
I am really sorry for your loss. Take good care of yourself!
I’m so, so sorry.
(1) HBOs adoption of MaddAdam I am cautiously optimistic about because I thought the first two were great, but hated the third with a passion that actually lead to me creating a commenter account on the Toast to vocalize my massive disappointment. There’s a chance, however, that the adaption will fix all the BLAH GOD WHERES AMANDA WHAT IS THE END GOAL HERE kind of like the movie version of Atonement or some of the muddled plot threads in Game of Thrones? On the other hand, there’s a LOT of rape/misogyny in the books, which HBO might direct like a 13 yr old and turn into a rape carnival rather than thought provoking critique?
(2) HBO the Leftovers could be great? I loved the book when I read it and thought it was written very cinematically, so it could be exciting! From the trailer, however, it could also be a bunch of white people being depressed which in this case I suppose would meanโฆall the minorities were better people and thus no longer around? I am just OVER depicting entire universes / cities where ONLY white people exist; no neighbors, no barristas, no teachers, NO ONE LITERALLY IN YOUR TOWN.
โฆand this has been “thoughts for Sr. Mngt of HBO by plspassthePinot”
I didn’t hate the last book (though did like the first two better), but I share your fear of the HBO rape carnival. Just not sure that network quiiiite gets it. Anyway, we read the same books, because I am also intrigued by The Leftovers! I haven’t seen the trailer, though. hmm.
We do! I went through a phase were I read about 5 dystopian series until my worldview got a bit bleak (oh God then I read War and Peace. Hmm.) Have you read the “Wool” series by Hugh Howey? Strong female protagonist + great from start to finish + really cheap on Kindle (i think its one of those self-published ebooks?) You’d prob enjoy it!
I’ve chosen to play it safe and sensibly rather than wildly and unpredictably. If I try to do things any other way, I stress myself out to the point where I’m completely unable to do anything. I don’t want to do that anymore.
Yup, that’s my game plan for life too and so far, so good.
Knowing what works for you is a huge step to a happy life. Good job figuring that out.
In other news, thanks for all the support last wk ladies! I have thrown myself headlong into interior design, painted my nails bright pink bc I don’t have to look “professional” at work for no man rt now, and made a strawberry tart yesterday so life is OK!
Strawberry tart recipe please
Techinically a “crisp”, I used this recipe: http://www.saveur.com/article/Recipes/Blueberry-C…
I used strawberries bc thats what I had around and sprinkled them in Splenda + lemon juice; and added sliced almonds to the topping for extra crunch (you could prob also use oatmeal or granola?); I served w greek yogurt sweetened w a bit of honey and lemon zest instead of ice cream. I baked it in a cast iron skillet bc thats the 1st thing I grabbed and it came out looking rustic and artisanal! The crowds are into it! Let me know if you bake one ๐
It’s my birthday, Toasties! I bought fancy nail polish and an Atwood book and am wearing spiky weapony earrings. Tonight my friends and I go to a taproom and drink beer floats. It is a beautiful day AND National Donut Day!
happy birthday!
Happy birthdaaaaaaaaaaay!
Happy birthday! Your plans sound so swell!
Happy Birthday!
HAPPY BIRTHDAY SWEET EPW, you are one of my favorite internet peoples and I love seeing you around. <333
<333
Happy Birthday! I had never considered a beer float before and now its so obvious! have a great wkd!
Happy Birthday!
Happy birthday! Beer floats and donuts sound like an ideal birthday to me. ๐
Have a magnificent birthday!
Happy happy birthday, birthday twin! Gosh, June 6 sure was a good day for Toasties! It sounds like you’re having a fantastic bday so far and I hope it continues to be awesome! <3
HAPPY BIRTHDAY!!
*sabers a champagne bottle*
Weapony earrings? Do tell.
They’re these little dangly white brass (I think–something heavy) six-sided spikes. They’re delightfully pointy and I have no doubt they could inflict damage if need be. I loff them.
YESSS! They sound great. It is good to be weaponized as one welcomes another year of life.
Happy birthday! And spiky weapony earrings sound awesome, btw.
Happy birthday!
Happy, happy birthday!!! ๐
Happy burthday! (also I somehow read taproom as tampon the first time)
That would be…somewhat less tasty. ๐
Happy birthday!! Those sound like just the right things to do on a birthday.
Woo hoo happy birthday! Please tell me about your fancy nailpolish!
It’s the Formula X kit at Sephora–I was super hesitant about it (four-step process? $10.50 nail polish? SKEPTICAL) but a friend of mine got it and was very, very complimentary about it, so I picked up a set–I wanted to do something with my nails, and this was cheaper than a pedicure, so! Pretty pleased with it so far, we’ll see how it wears.
Oh, so, what am I doing with my one wild and precious life? Planning on moving to the East Coast to a city where I know a handful of internet people, because I’m shrinking here in Portland, and the worst that could happen is that I fail and come back and really, if a coin flip had gone differently I’d be moving from Boston, OR to Boston, MA, so really, they are the same city and nothing about this concept is scary at all.
That. Is. Awesome.
In 1995, I passed up my chance to move to a strange city where I knew nobody. I can’t say I *regret* it, because my life is pretty fantastic now and I wouldn’t be living it if I’d moved, but… yeah, my life there might have been fantastic, and it would have been fantastic in a state other than fucking Kansas.
So. Yeah. Scary? Definitely. But WOW I am really excited for you!
I grew up in Kansas, and I cannot not go back soon enough.
but the handful of internet people are Toasties! who are waiting with open arms. And cats. Like, all of us have cats.
oh my god you guys have so many cats and I haven’t even met all of them yet
BOSTON WELCOMES YOU. Seriously, a number of my friends have been migrating to Boston and mostly because of knowing internet people, and to a one we are all generally thriving. (You know, on the average with life’s ups and downs.) Good luck. <333
There is a person who wears a bear costume and plays the keytar outside of Boston’s South Station sometimes. Let that thought buoy your spirits as you get ready to move!
So I did it! I took my first solo and first international trip to Montreal, where I slept and walked and ate and watched TV BY MYSELF for five days. I also met Rookie! I came back to New York so stinkin’ well-rested, it was insane. It was a godsend, really; and REALLY cheap. $500 TOTAL: travel, lodging, food, fun, etc. I’m really proud of myself.
But now I’ve returned back to my busy, busy life: I’ve played hostess to mine and my boyfriend’s friends for two nights this week, and will tonight for a third; leaving bright-n-early tomorrow morning to attend my best friend’s brother’s wedding (!!), and coming back late on Sunday to try to catch the last few minutes of the Tonys. DO YOU NOTICE THE “NO TIME FOR OITNB” IN ALL THAT?!?!??!!!!
Toronto Toasties! We’re doing a meetup this Saturday at Tequila Bookworm (512 Queen St West) at 8:00 PM. Come if you’re free!
oh man, I almost forgot!
Oh no I DIDN’T KNOW. ๐ (Because I don’t usually come in here, so my fault.) Do you have an FB or a Google Group or something??
Yes, there is! It’s “Toast of Toronto” on Facebook — you’re welcome to join.
We manage meetups about every two months or so.
TEXAS TOAST MEETUP TOMORROW! Join us, Austin-and-region Toasties! We will be meeting in Austin, at the Tavern on 12th and Lamar, at 3:30 pm.
Folks who will be there — how will we recognize each other? Does anyone have a distinctive item they plan to bring/wear to identify our table? (How to recognize Elsajeni: I have short blonde hair and glasses and I will be wearing a blue Captain America t-shirt.)
I was wondering the same exact thing just now. I’m coming in from Houston and just realized other than this comment thread I have zero way of knowing who is who at the Tavern. (Me: tall, red hair, and have no idea what I’ll be wearing yet.)
I’mma be there though now I feel a bit self conscious because all my comments got deleted and I can’t prove I’m an occasional but relatively well received poster.
I’ll probably be wearing a bright yellow shirt but regardless I’ll be the surly looking half bald dude with shoulder length blond hair.
I will be wearing my Ronbledore’s Army shirt!!!! You can see what I look like in my profile picture. : )
When you go into the restaurant there is a section to the left just inside the door that is cut off by a low wall. To get to it you need to go around the bottom of the stairs. It is usually free, so lets plan to meet there.
I agree with turanga_leela. Let’s meet by that low wall to the left inside the door. I am white, middle-aged, apple-shaped, with short hennaed hair. And I can’t wait to meet all you very fine Texas Toast folk.
I can’t make it but I hope ya’ll have a great time!!
I will be there! I have medium length brown/ blond hair and glasses. I will probably be wearing pink. Or maybe purple.
If left to my own devices too much this evening I may even make mini Texas toast flags…
Nothing makes me realize how much the weather influences my mood than days like today: it’s sunny and breezy, and it’s perfect patio weather. As a result, I’m skipping and jumping around.
Weekend: picnics, patios, biking. I’m incredibly excited!
I downloaded blogTO’s patio app. Which means my phone can now instantly tell me where the closest patios are. It’s the best thing.
Ooh, I should get that. It would cut out the “huh, does that place have a patio” part of deliberations.
I have Feelings for someone and I haaaaaaate it.
It’s been so long since this has happened to me and I had forgotten how nervewracking and anxiety-inducing it is, especially since I have no idea where he stands. :/
I am in this right now and Feelings are the worst. Sometimes I think that I’ve lost the ability to read people and then I remember that I never had that ability in the first place (at least where Feelings are involved).
Oh man, do I feel you. If you find a way to make it less of a nerve-wracking, anxiety-inducing mess, please let me know!
So far I’ve tried:
-casually asking him to hang out this weekend and dying inside when he gives a very legitimate reason for not being able to
-getting drunk and belligerent while out with friends and he’s not there to see
-continuing to go on dates with other guys from okcupid to distract myself
None of these things has worked.
Oh god, the casually asking him to hang out is my life right now. I constantly am going through cycles of I am going to be super casual and ask him to hang out and then hate myself when he is busy with work or grad school. It is torture.
Speaking from experience: Ask him out on an actual date for a specific place and time, then have a backup if he’s busy at that time, so that you know for sure if he’s interested. You will either start a thing, or know for sure and getting over the crazy bad crush feelings will happen much faster.
Be brave! It is usually the not-knowing that makes you feel bad when crushing.
This situation is especially fraught because we found each other on OkCupid like, a year ago and then texted/chatted until LAST WEEK without ever having met up. I asked him to grab drinks, he said yes, and I think it went well. So I guess that was technically in the context of a “date,” but we had been talking for so long that we very well may have fallen into “friend” territory. It’s just become this whole weird grey area and I have no idea what to do about it.
Then the next time you ask him to do something, say “Would you be available for a date at X time in Y place?” Maybe have it be something more obviously date-y than drinks. When in doubt about how to communicate datey-ness, I usually go with looking at art, as I get drinks as friends with people all the time.
It’s a simple process but hard to do. I believe in you!
You are wise, Prawns. I think I’m going to give myself 1 more time of “hanging out” so I can maybe get a read on him without all those “first-time-meeting” nerves getting in the way, and then after that say something like what you’ve outlined above.
And really, I think we’re both mature enough that if he says he’s not feelin’ it the friendship will survive. I just don’t want to come on too strong and scare him off.
You’re not me, I get that. But me, when I was dating, I found value in scaring off men. I’d rather know sooner if he can’t handle the Full-Strength RoseCamelia.
RoseCamelia, I sincerely hope that I am as confident as you are one day. I mean that with 100% sincerity. I’m very much that way with men who I’m indifferent toward, or who I don’t feel very intensely for, but when I *really* like someone I become a self-conscious teenager again.
YES. I really loved being all high on the crush emotions at first, but then I decided to be BRAVE and FORWARD and ask him if he wanted to meet up for a beer and he hasn’t replied. Now I’m all deflated and bummed. But I could’ve sworn he was into me! How do you even know? Argh.
Those who jump at the chance to know you better are worth your attention. Anything short of shocked bliss at receiving a precious invitation from you is not worthy of your very fine self. Move on to other people. If this one wakes up and contacts you later, maaaaybe you’ll make time for him. Either way, not worthy of you. Just my 2 cents.
I appreciate those cents! You are right. I’m going to remember ‘precious invitation’, I likes the sounds of that.
As I stated on Twitter yesterday: Official robot stance: emotions are kind of dumb.
I feel you.
Oof, I hear you. Feelings are the worst.
I recently admitted to my crush that I had feelings for him. I knew he didn’t feel the same way already, but honestly it was such a relief to just say it.
Ahhg! Solidarity!
Do you (does anyone else) do that thing where they get feelings for someone. And then you try to talk yourself out of them for reasons? Or is just me?
I do the same thing. Mostly it’s the sudden influx of bubbly, giddy happiness that is such a change from my normal mellow / quasi-apathy. It throws me off balance and makes me suspicious and on edge waiting for something bad happening soon.
I posted on FB to see if anyone in my neck of the woods wanted to go see Maleficent at the movies tomorrow night, and the only people who have ‘liked’ the status are either otherwise busy (my boyfriend) or in another state.
I’m feeling more than a little unliked. Like, hey, I can be friends with people online but meet me in real life and hooooo boy, I suck.
I feel like this too. I can be witty and articulate online, but IRL half the time I end up with a migraine or my CFS wipes me out & I have to cancel plans. I worry I’m actually a bad friend.
I don’t think that being unwell makes someone a bad friend. I can completely understand (even if sometimes as a human I get annoyed) when a friend has to cancel due to illnesses. ๐
Yeah, I know nice people understand, but it still sucks to have your plans all set and get a last-minute text saying “UGH I DON’T FEEL GOOD SORRY.” I enjoy having a narcoleptic friend, because every time we make plans we know we’re gonna reschedule at least once, and probably twice.
I wonder if people are feeling the same kind of self-doubt you are, though, but from the other side? I know I see those types of posts on facebook and don’t reply because “I am forcing myself upon this person what if they don’t really like me enough to hang out outside of the internet and they’re going to go with me because they feel bad backing out but then have an awful time because I am awful!!!!”
It’s hard from both ends. Facebook can -seem- like an easy way to get people together when you just want to send out a generic all-hands “hey who’s up for this!” type of invite, but I always end up with too much anxiety around it – as the event host-er and as the potential tag-along-er. Please don’t feel badly that no one responded! I am sure no one thinks you suck in real life.
What polka_stripes said – I usually feel like those FB all-calls don’t include me, especially if they’re from a friend I would’ve expected would directly invite me.
Perhaps I’m being naive and excessively hopeful, but maybe it’s not that people don’t like you but that they don’t want to see that movie? Some people, like me, are really picky about that sort of thing.
I’m hoping it’s that. Because I don’t want you to be unliked and alone. ๐
I actually saw a lot of interest in the movie itself on my friends list, so I’m guessing I’m going to have to just ask specific people and deal with the results, but thank you for not wanting me to be unliked! *hug*
My wild and precious life has become all about my late-bandwagoning of ORPHAN BLACK. Holy shit you guys, what a great show!!! (except I am halfway through the episode where they show that club Neolution and I always laugh at TV clubs because they never, ever look like real clubs and always look vaguely the same, and all the “punks and goths” are like way too clean and fancy)
IT’S SOOOOOOOOOO GOOOOOOOOOOOOOOD.
Orphan Black! Yay! Allison and Felix are my favorites. That is all.
Orphan Black is the best show! I am continually amazed by the writing and the fact that all of the clones are played by the same actress – I can see the physical resemblance(s) but never feel like I’m just seeing the same person in different outfits. And yes to the love for Allison and Felix, I hope they will never be written out!
Toasties, anyone have any recommendations for where to get a pair of skinny trousers for work (thus not, like, SO skinny they’re basically leggings)? I have one pair from J.Crew Factory, but they get weirdly stretched out in the knees throughout the day, and since they’re dry clean only, I can’t pop them in the dryer to get their shape back. I wear straight sizes and, at 5’3″, petite sizes work for me sometimes but not always.
Gap slim cropped pants? I’m 5’4″ and the regular size/length hit very nicely around the ankle.
Am wearing these right now!
I just got a J.Crew pant called Andie, maybe not skinny enough though? They are on sale right now! And super comfortable.
Have you looked at Banana Republic? They have some nicely professional-looking skinny trousers, and my Banana Republic pants are absolute workhorses.
Ann Taylor petites have always served me well.
Second Ann Taylor, or even Loft if they can be a little more business-casual
Express has some good options for professional pants, including a basic skinny one that comes in all sorts of professional colors.
Thanks for the suggestions, all! I was originally hoping to narrow things down (ughhhh, pants shopping), but I am glad to hear that the usual suspects have good options.
New York & Co, too!
It’s Fridaaaay and I’m alone in the office! *Dance party ensues*
Yesterday I had to get up at 4am (boo) to get to DC, but it’s okay because it was to attend a breakfast where my office got a fancy pants *national* award and then afterwards I was taken to lunch and given a present (Coach clutch!) for all my hard work! I was beyond overwhelmed. I’ve never worked anywhere where I’ve felt so appreciated almost every week. It’s an amazing feeling.
Also, BSideBoston, I mailed your mix cd today! Now I’ll allow myself to open yours and listen to it this weekend!
yaaaaay! I’ll keep an eye on my mailbox.
I’ve spent about 100 hours in the last two weeks combined sorting through headshots, scheduling auditions, signing actors in at auditions, giving people callbacks, scheduling callbacks, rejecting people, emailing out audition sides, gently pushing the director to make some damn choices already etc etc etc. I. Am. Exhausted. I truly envy anyone who has not ever been involved in the audition process. And I still have another week of callbacks to go! Faaaaaack. #artsadmin4lyfe
Also, I had my first therapy session ever on Monday and I bawled like crazy. It was a huge relief and also weirdly exhausting. I’m very proud of me.
I also just started therapy and man it is great. I wish you luck on your journey!
I started therapy a couple months ago and it’s been the best thing ever. Good luck!
I’m proud of you, too. Not that you need this internet stranger’s approval, you efficient, tactful, resilient, admirable human.
Can we discuss the high school style romances happening in our lives?
I used to run into this sexy dude every week or two at the climbing gym. I finally decided to ask him out, but the next time I saw him he left right after I got there and I could only wave goodbye from my perch way up on the wall! Then of course immediately after, the weather became amazing and nobody is climbing at the gym anymore. I haven’t seen him in weeks and I’m so bummed about that missed opportunity.
Oh, I did find an online profile of his and sent him a message there, but he hasn’t replied. It’s possible that he just hasn’t seen it, but I’m worried that the more likely scenario is he saw it and said “Nah, bro”.
I was wondering what had happened with your search for climbing guy! Too bad it’s “has not responded to your message.”
Ah yes, I posted about that two weeks ago! I googled him and found out he has a profile for pretty much EVERY networking site in existence, so I figured it’s possible that in the flood of emails he must get from each of these sites, he could have missed the notification of my message and I also don’t think he goes on this particular site that often. So MAAAAAYBE he hasn’t seen it. And MAAAAYBE I’m really good at keeping my hopeless crush alive and being in denial. Maybe.
I made out with a guy friend who I really like (platonically) last night. Perfect summer night, quiet streets of midtown NYC, ahhh!
Oooh, that sounds perfect. No worry about feels, nice makeouts, scenic backdrop….I approve!
I’m staying in a cabin full of people for the week, so naturally I have to sequester myself in the guest room with my laptop looking at the Toast and watching Penny Dreadful/OITNB/Scandal/whatever the hell else I want. Part of me is worried that the rest of the people think I’m too antisocial, then the other part of me pipes up, ‘you ARE antisocial!’ It’s probably no reason to worry, I just worry for no reason, because, well, who knows. That being said, it IS lovely to be up in the mountains of Colorado, with fresh clear air. I just left the Dallas area where the air is mean and humid and gross. Still allergy-ridden, though, I just traded one set of allergens (mold) for another (trees).
I got my first CSA box this week! Tell me how I should use radishes, green garlic, and chive blossoms?
Radishes are amazing sliced up on top of buttered toast and sprinkled with salt. Trust.
Believe it or not, cooked radishes are delightful. Saute some sliced onions (I like mine in half-circles) in either butter or coconut oil until they’re golden but not caramelized. Add your radishes (which can be sliced into halves or quarters). Continue to saute, adding oil as necessary, until all are caramelized. Little over-done brown patches are (IMO) delicious and visually appealing. Top with a dash of salt and NOM.
Green garlic is amazing. If you can’t think what to do with it, just saute it lightly make a compound butter with it (i.e., mash it into a bunch of butter) and freeze it. A little bit on almost anything makes it more delicious, I especially like a smidge as a final touch on a bowl of soup.
My heart sped up reading this. Seriously. Oh my god that sounds amazing.
This is so helpful! I also got my first CSA box, and it also had radishes. Plus two huge bags of salad greens of various types, a bunch of beets, some sage, and some HOLY SHIT THESE ARE SO GOOD “teenage onions.”
All for $20…thanks North Carolina and just-starting-out CSAs!
I also got asparagus, mint, baby spinach, and freshly milled oats. For about $15 because I live in the midwest. But I paid so long ago it’s like getting free veggies!
I’ve been getting CSA boxes for the first time this summer! I’ve discovered that I love turnips.
This week I got a huge pile of dill, and I’m not sure what to do with that.
Make one of my favorite meals! Saute some zucchini with garlic in olive oil. Once those are getting soft throw in a big heap of raw whole almonds and a TON of fresh dill. When the almonds get toasty smelling, put the sauteed stuff on top of whole wheat pitas and pop them in the oven til the pitas get brownish. Cheese-eaters can put goat cheese crumbles on it, too, but it’s just as good without.
Green garlic pesto = everything. And those chive blossoms are awesome on a pizza with either some sheeps or goat cheese, very simple, cracked pepper. Actually, a little sliced red potato would be good too.
I can eat radishes like chips, but they taste really amazing in Smitten Kitchen’s black bean feta chopped salad.
Oh, yes, and THANK YOU to everyone who gave advice on my laundry situation last week! A spin dryer is en route to us and I’m actually a little excited to start washing more at home!!
Toasties. This has been a week. I graduated from college on Saturday, moved to North Carolina on Sunday, and started a new internship on Monday. The city is weird and empty and tiny and the internship is corporate and surreal. However, I live in a nice house with film students and a cat, so that’s a plus. Also I went on a date last night?? And had a really good time?? I have lots of things to talk about.
Congratulations! What a week!
Oh my goodness. SO many things to talk about! First of all, congratulations and I hope that you generally feel okay and not lost and terrified in this time, like I did at this time last year, but even if you do feel those things, it is okay.
Secondly, where do you live in North Carolina? I live in Durham, and it’s secretly an incredible place. (Of course, if you don’t feel comfortable saying, that is also perfectly fine.)
Thank you! It’s all very weird and surreal, but I’m glad I’ve got something keeping me busy right now. I’m in Winston-Salem, which is like an hour away from Durham, I think? I don’t know, this state is a mystery to me.
Oh hey, yes it is! Like an hour and fifteen minutes in traffic. Feel free to come visit any time. ๐
Winston-Salem IS really tiny and weird, but it is kind of great as well. Old Salem is pretty fun to wander through and there are some excellent bakeries.
So weird. Like I think this is probably where the zombie apocalypse will break out.
I’ll totally visit Durham, I’m here until August. And I think I’ve found a bakery or two – Camino is pretty great.
wow thats so many things! its likeโฆ ALL of the things! how exciting!
You know what? HIGH FIVE.
Hi Toasties!
I have been kind of depressed lately, despite having a lot to be happy for and only a couple things to be depressed about, but that’s how that works sooo
Anyway, I have all these books I -want- to read but am afraid to because I don’t want to feel any more feels than I have to right now. The Fault in Our Stars! Code Name Verity! Young Men and Fire (I started this one before The Depression but am now afraid to pick it back up), a Joan Didion book…so I am reading The Secret Garden because I know how it ends, thanks to endless playings of the 1993 movie as a kid (WHICH I JUST FOUND OUT MAGGIE SMITH WAS IN??? Brb, trying to find a copy)
What are you reading/what are you avoiding reading right now, Toastettes?
If you want to feel NOTHING at all, read the Jack Reacher book series. They are ultra-masculine summer fluff. They are not the most feminist thing? At all. But they are just so much fun. They’re like candy.
OHHH YES Alternative question: what should I read this summer to NOT feel the feels??
Thanks for getting us started safvn!
YES. Seriously, though — I’ve had a rough year, and have basically be re-reading these the whole time. And they aren’t un-feminist, I think? I mean, there are more super-competent female small-town cops than in anything else I’ve read? In most of them, I feel like the formula is, he needs someone to work with, and someone to sleep with, and making them the same person is easier?
I’m embarking upon Samuel R. Delany’s Dhalgren today, and it’s gonna be a challenge! But rewarding, I think.
Whenever I’m in The Depression, I read David Sedaris – light, funny, kind of give you the feels but not too much!
I’m reading The Fortune of War by Patrick O’Brian (the sixth Aubrey/Maturin book). It’s good fun so far, though I admit it’s probably not everyone cup of tea. but: espionage! naval warfare! terrible puns! wombats and cassowaries! excessively detailed nautical jargon! fraaaaandship. It’s my go-to series to look out for whenever I’m in a used bookstore.
I am reading A Tale For The Time Being by Ruth Ozeki and I LOVE IT so much. it has made me emotional at times but is also really sweet and I hear it has an uplifting ending. I love it because it focuses on a radical old Buddhist nun (which is roughly equivalent to what I aspire to be one day), through the eyes of a depressed teenager (which is roughly what I once was).
I’m listening to that on audiobook (read by Ozeki). It’s pretty awesome.
I have a ton of articles on the Santa Barbara tragedy as well as both of Ta-Nehisi Coates’s articles on reparations in my queue. I am a pretty slow reader, and these are intense reads, but I really want to get through them. I’ve also been taking this week off from reading “serious” things because I just got so burned out by reading too much about Santa Barbara last week.
So, basically I’ve just been reading The Toast. ๐
I just finished reading Constellation Games which was interesting and kind of funny but it was clearly a book by a guy who then went ‘wait there are not enough girls!’ and so made almost all the aliens female. Which was kind of cool in a way but also not. Also the humans in that book acted in ways I found very incomprehensible which is not BAD but now I want to sit down with the author and try to figure out how it is he understands other people because it just makes no sense to me.
Now there is great internal debate about what to read next! Probably Embassytown by China Mieville will win.
Just discovered Jhumpa Lahiri and read the Namesake this week (gave me FEELS), now embarking on a David Sedaris book which, as mentioned above, is funny and touching. Both have been good commuting-reads! (which is my prime leisure reading time)
I started reading The Book Thief over Christmas, but then started feeling depressed (for no good reason, of course). I didn’t finish it then, and now am sort of afraid to for the same reasons you’ve mentioned.
Currently, I am reading Gulp by Mary Roach and it is fantastic. I’m thinking Hitchiker’s Guide to the Galaxy may be due for a reread following that.
I am going to a Carmina Burana open sing on Tuesday and I’m SUPER EXCITED. We sang it in my college chorus and my best friend and I made tee shirts that said “WAFNA” on them and I’m sad mine has vanished.
Also I’m writing an enormous Regency romance novel AU for my otp and if I actually finish it I’m going to see about filing off the serial numbers and trying to get it published.
“Filing off the serial numbers” is a BRILLIANT euphemism (and a thing I have, myself, been plotting a bit).
It’s a classic phrase in fandom, I cannot at all take credit for it!
Oh, man, the choir I was in in high school sung the ragazzi parts for this huge production. I swear it was harder (and scarier) than the arias from fricking Gloria we did the year before. But that sounds like so much fun!
REGENCY ROMANCE AU YES. pleeeeeassseee tell us where we can read this delight, PLEASE.
CHOIR TSHIRTS YESSS. And Carmina Burana is SUCH FUN to sing ๐
OMG Carmina Burana! An open sing of that would be so much fun. I sang it with my choir about ten years ago and we had the best time- me and the other first sopranos would compete trying to hit the notes in Dulcissime (because first sopranos) and we all laughed a lot about all the sex jokes because we were teens.
Our conductor made CDs of him speaking all the lyrics in rhythm so that we would be able to pick up the pronunciation properly but we mostly laughed at him tripping lightly through In Tabernam.
I would definitely kill for a “WAFNA” t-shirt.
Everything about this is perfect, perfect. Would read. Would sing with you. etc. etc.
I am at my second science conference in a row this week, with the following fun points:
– I managed to convince my boss to order womens’ sizes for the conference shirt. (Woohoo minor feminist victory!)
– I sat next to my project’s former manager at a fancy dinner as he got more and more drunk. (He’s a sweetheart and it was awesome.)
– MISANDRY ALERT: I got to keep time for the presenters, to make sure that their talks didn’t go over! This meant that I sat up on a dais and watched as a bunch of prestigious old men stared at me in utter terror, sweating. It was really satisfying.
That last point sounds particularly amazing!
Apparently what I’ve chosen to do with my life is stay up until 4AM welding a sculpture out of some unidentifiable scrap that emits the foulest smell on Earth when melted, then sleep till 10 on a work day, where I start goofing around on blogs. I don’t give a damn about anything
That’s the good life, right there.
You are my hero, right here and now.
Can I get just a bit sex-gross for a minute?
Does anyone else really hate sex with male partners without condoms? I just don’t care for the feeling of having semen inside me, and just feel like it keeps oozing out for practically days afterward. Are we doing something wrong?
I love sex, just the easy-to-clean-up kind. Am I alone here?
Divacups aren’t great only for menstrual times. Just sayin’.
I’ve taken to wearing a pantyliner the next day, but it still feels terribly unfresh.
I’m with you. It’s just so messy if you need to get up and walk around with underwear after. It helps if you go pee right after and kind of push as much of it as possible out there.
Side note: always pee after any sex, regardless. Cuts down on UTI potential.
I wish I were more anonymous than I am but I will just say that this is as normal among women as the opposing desire is among men, condoms need some design improvements but are still the greatest invention ever, and nobody ever has to stop using them just because they are married or post-menopausal or whatever if they don’t want to.
No, you are definitely not alone. Pulling out may not work well as a contraceptive, but it makes cleaning up way way faster.
I support you 100% in this opinion. It’s so unfair that it’s not even our messy sperm but we have to deal with the cleanup for ages! I make all my partners wear condoms, even the long term ones. My last bf and I were together almost 3 years and we never had sex without a condom.
This is grosser: I actually miss that. My boyfriend loves condoms, and I don’t, and I really miss having come inside me. I also miss getting come on after sex.
EW ICK SORRY.
No, I was hoping to hear that it goes both ways! I find it heartening in some way that someone else may like the feeling although I do not.
I do not know how to explain.
It totally goes both ways. We really like the feeling, mostly. But I bet it takes some getting used to and why get used to it if you don’t want to?
“why get used to it if you don’t want to?”
THANK YOU. I stopped using condoms only for as long as it took to get pregnant, and I went right back to using them, because that’s what I’m comfortable with. And I’m a little tired of friends acting like this is some sort of insane thing instead of a personal preference.
I find peeing directly afterwards and some type of baby wipe product helps with this. But I know where you are coming from sometimes both of us are sort of like “ohhh we are going to pull apart and this is going to be gross”
This week, my one wild and precious life has involved apricot brioche, the live second-anniversary Welcome to Night Vale show (complete with Dessa, because shit was not epictastic enough already), hugs from a toddler who cued me to replay videos on my phone by staring into my eyes and saying, imploringly, “BEEP,” and being reminded why I’ve kept some friends despite time and distance. Midlife has its perks.
Dessa is so awesome. If you ever get the chance to see her live I highly recommend it, it is an amazing show.
I went to that show too! Were you at the first one or the second one? (I was at the first.) SO MANY NIGHT VALE FEELS.
My wonderful three part summer starts on Monday!
Part One: Vacation! I am getting on a plane on Monday to go with my two daughters to Croatia to see my in-laws, who live near Porec. It will be three weeks of lounging around and swimming in the sea for me!
Part Two: Honeymoon! I go home alone and the children stay with their grandparents for three weeks. It will just be me and Husband at home. We will go to restaurants and movies and do other adult activities to our hearts content.
Part Three: Solitary Witch! Husband goes to see his parents for three weeks leaving me all alone. I will watch all the Netflix, read all the fan fiction and sleep all the sleep.
That is what I am doing with my “one wild and precious life.”
That sounds like an excellent summer.
Has anyone on here ever been through chemo? My significant other’s dad started it yesterday (he didn’t have any terrible adverse reactions besides sleepiness and also had a clean scan beforehand, so as far as news that involves chemo goes, that’s all about as good as it can get!), and I want to send him something to either do during treatments or eat after or any of those things. Any suggestions?
Also – this sounds like something a bad television writer would make up, but S.O.’s parents both teach at the place where there was a shooting yesterday, and his dad wasn’t there because he had his first treatment. He is one of those unwavering optimists, and was like “Well, I guess this was a good day to start!”
S.O.’s mom went straight from the hospital to campus and proceeded to get locked down in her classroom shortly thereafter. I really hope she had a tall glass of scotch when she got home.
Chemo can be horrible, but there are so many different varieties and effective antiemetics now that it depends a lot what the regimen is. Although food is tricky, because chemo can mess with the tastebuds and nausea can ruin anything (never again, sour cream and onion potato chips), hard candies can help with dry mouth. If he’s on heavy steroids, he’s likely to develop overpowering and quite specific cravings–just don’t be hurt if the thing he can’t live without on Monday is revolting to him on Tuesday.
Chemobrain can make it harder to focus, so books are also a bit hit-or-miss, but good music and podcasts or audiobooks help pass hours spent dealing with fatigue or treatments. Good luck to you and to him!
Really appreciate your feedback and thoughts, ladies. It’s no fun for anybody but I’m hoping we can find some way to make it clear we’re thinking about him and trying to help him through it in some small way!
My mom went through chemo a couple of years ago. The place she went had a massage place across the hall. If the women from the massage place were not busy they would come over and give free foot massages to all the chemo patients. You might want to set something like that up for your dad. Being relaxed is always better for you.
It is different for everyone and dependent on how many rounds he’ll do and if his reactions worsen over time. For me, the first month wasn’t too bad, just sleepy and the steroids made me eat everything that wasn’t nailed down. The last two started with the nausea and weird symptoms like some kind of metallic taste in my mouth (hard candies helped) then mouth sores (ice cream!) and other not-fun things. Rereading books helped, especially one really long fantasy series and L. M. Montgomery. It didn’t matter if I feel asleep in the middle or couldn’t concentrate because I already knew the story by heart. You end up sitting for long stretches will they give you the drugs and having something to read that I didn’t have to pay too much attention to really helped.
A care package with suckers and a variety of snacks and maybe some crosswords or whatever he’s into would be very sweet. Even just making some casseroles to reheat for dinner. My dad took care of me during chemo and I know he really would have appreciated a healthy dinner he didn’t have to cook.
Good luck to your SO’s family. It sounds like a good prognosis and I hope the chemo isn’t too bad for him.
I’m late to the game, but everybody is right that chemo varies a lot depending on what the regimen is.
That said, soups are a great idea. You can spike the soup with protein packets that the hospital will give you (that are better than ones you would buy yourself because formulated for sick people). I got good reactions to a minted pea soup, and most of all to this apple, cabbage, and thyme soup which is full of vitamins in addition to being really gentle: http://www.epicurious.com/recipes/food/views/Cabb…
Mysteriously, frappucinos from Starbucks also worked great during chemo for the person I took care of. Maybe because they are cold, and cold dampens certain tastes? Your mileage may vary. But they have a million trillion calories, so that is also a really big point in their favor.
There are special Chinese healing recipes for food during chemo that you could google. Some people recommended that to me, but I didn’t have time to do it.
Good luck to all, the dad, your s.o., and you too — it can be draining for helpers as well as the sick.
Delurking (I love this site so much)! But it’s to get a sad and frustrating moment out of my head and into the wild.
Earlier this week, I asked my husband how my braid looked and he said, “It looks great! You’ll make every other girl on the street jealous.”
Deep breath. Even tone. No sarcasm. “I’m not looking to make another woman jealous. I just want to make sure this damn thing isn’t crooked. I don’t need this subliminal female aggression that’s not even real occupying my brain space.”
“It looks good.”
He’s also being trained (bad husband!) in not referring to any female over 18 as “girl”.
I kind of simultaneously want to say “Blarg.” and “High five!”. Blarg for ingrained sexist attitudes about competition! High fives for addressing them! It doesn’t sound like your husband is a jerk, it sounds like some of the things he says on automatic are flawed. Those are easy to learn to avoid, it just takes time.
Good for you for training him. The rest of us appreciate it. If he’s less than 30 he gets a pass. I consider men in their 20s as embryonic, still developing. Related: the best gift I ever gave myself was a promise never again to date anyone under 30.
He actually turned early-40s yesterday, but! grew up in a very Latino machismo household. He isn’t himself (ugh, I wouldn’t STAND IT), but the language is there.
I’m proud of myself for staying calm (I’m a sputter-er) and for him for getting it and not arguing/shrugging it off.
He actually turned early-40s yesterday, but grew up in a very Latino machismo household. He isn’t himself (ugh, I wouldn’t STAND IT), but the language is there. He’s a quick study. We’ll be okay.
However, he does manage 20 year olds and comes home with infuriating stories of this kid Nice Guying one of his female coworkers and I’m all like, “NO MOAR MENZ. PUT THEM IN A CAVE. BLOCK THE CAVE. PUT BEARS IN FRONT OF THE CAVE.”
I am training my SO to not respond to my complaints of street harrassment (experienced by myself or others) with “Well maybe you/she shouldn’t…” No, she shouldn’t stop talking the evening walks she otherwise enjoyed; men are the ones who should their inappropriate behavior!
Can’t live with them, can’t live without them.
While that isn’t something that bothers me personally (the braid or girl commentary, but that’s honestly just my own lax comfort levels), big high five to you for saying something about it!!
Ahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh I need to vent for one minute. I had a doctor’s appointment this morning, that I had arranged to take an hour off work for. It was the doctor’s second appointment of the day. I went, checked in, and sat down 15 minutes early. An HOUR later I finally ask what’s up, and the idiot receptionist hadn’t finalized my check in and there wasn’t room for another appointment for weeks.
AHHHHHHHH
I am an awful person but – you couldn’t demand the next appointment? Or did you have to go back to work? I’d be so upset.
Burn. It. Down.
Oh, man, the earful that entire front staff would’ve gotten from me.
And on a lighter note: Luther Season 3 AND OITNB Season 2 released on the SAME DAY? Netflix, my weekend cup runneth so far over.
My queue runneth over. ๐
Canadian NetFlix released Nashville Season 2 last week, and OINTB today, and my boyfriend is away for the weekend at a bachelor party, and I’m resenting all the fun weekend friend plans I have SO MUCH right now.
I know. I actually have lots of plans that involve being with friends in sunshine, but would kind of be cool staying on my couch and watching really dark dramas all weekend!
Canadian Netflix also has BOTH seasons of Hannibal already.
Has anybody seen this nonsense with Bezmozgis’s review of Rivka Galchen’s book? So ridiculously emblematic of the problems with how literature by women is received. If one character in a collection by a male 30-something Jewish New Yorker happened to be a male 30-something Jewish New Yorker, there’s no way it would have so overwhelmed his reading capabilities that it bled out into his memory and judgement of every other story. I’m willing to bet that reading female protagonists is a rare event for him.
(Unabashed meaningless vanity ahead.) We knew her in high school so I had to go read the review! Which yes was a very problematic one, but now I must go read her new book.
It’s Friday, but I have a ton of work to do because instead of working yesterday I was just frantically updating news on the Seattle Pacific University shooting and trying to get in touch with a couple of friends. Ugh.
Ugh, I’m sorry. I don’t think any of us were ready for that to happen so soon after Santa Barbara. I hope your friends are safe. ๐
I decided a week ago to grow out my pixie cut, and it hasn’t grown out yet. I am so confused and upset.
Welcome to the tribe. My hair finally reaches the part of my neck where it meets my shoulders, though. It is possible!! It took maybe a year and a few months to get here, though. Hats and bobby pins helped.
BROKEN SOBBING
I did this twice before and surely it didn’t take this long to grow out before?? Surely I… I………… auugghh
we who are about to enter that weird fluffy-mop like hair mullet stage salute you! It is frustrating, I recently gave up trying to grow mine out (for like, a year? what’s that about!) and put the pixie back in.
That’s how my diet and exercise changes go, too. I lifted weights every day this week. Where are my triceps, already? I ate green and orange veggies last night, where’s my improved complexion?
My husband was having lunch with his coworkers – one of them started to explain his not-great dating website startup idea. My husband and the other coworker looked at each other, and then looked at him.
“I don’t know man”, said the second coworker, “I haven’t dated in twenty years.”
“Yeah” said my husband, “I’ve never technically dated as an adult? But if you take me and coworkers as examples, you should just pre-screen ladies and select the ones named after waterfowl, and then abase yourself until one of them allows you to be her groom.”
(Like two of my husband’s coworkers have wives with my same *relatively uncommon* first name, but I like to envision a crowd of women named “Avocet” and “Heron”. Also lots of shorebirds have a pleasantly misandrist lifestyle.)
I am trying so hard to figure out what your name might be now. Egret? Egret could maybe be a person’s name, right?
Swan? Mallard?
Spoonbill.
Definitely Spoonbill.
I know two Birdies but one is 90 and the other is 3.
I’m going to need more details on your courtship post haste.
He made a loud, booming call and then we made a nest in the reeds together.
You guys! I have tonnes of important things to do but my computer is acting up and I am taking the decision to read a fun book (for work tho) in the park. Fuck yeah!
Please convince me I should not quit my job without something else lined up. I got a massive “fuck you” from my work yesterday when they decided not to give me a raise, even though a 1.5% annual raise is standard here and I am now about $15,000 underpaid compared to general market standards and am making $20,000 less than my coworker did at this point of her career for this company. If I quit now it will be super awkward for them, which I would like. I don’t have another job to go to, though. I just found out this morning that I narrowly missed a government job, but that the director really wants me to work for him and is going to see if he can get me on somehow, but that is not a job offer. I am shortlisted for another position, but the final round of interviews is not for two weeks. I should just wait to see if any of these things come through, but I really really just want to walk out.
Maybe set a date in the near future to make a decision, say July 1st. It sounds like by then you will know about other jobs possibilities. That way when you are frustrated you can say to yourself that the situation is temporary. It will also give you time to see what else is out there beside the two possibilities you mentioned.
Excellent advice!
Don’t do it. Yes, it would feel good. But it would end up hurting you more than it would hurt them. You deserve better. Both a better job and to job hunt with the advantage of current employment. Please don’t hurt yourself this way.
It sucks sucks sucks and I FEEL YOU on when your work is all FUCK YOU. But ohhhh it is not a terrific idea to quit without something lined up. For starters, it’s easier to get a job when you’re employed already. Secondly, money….it’s good to keep it coming in even when the job sucks. Thirdly, you can DO THIS! You have some other things coming through! You have other options for sure. You can wait! You can! YOU CAN DO THE THING.
I will give you the advice – almost verbatim – I was given in a similar situation back in 2010. Suck it up. Yes, this situation right now sucks, but you have a job, it pays you a living wage, though not what you deserve, and what you’re talking with right now is bruised ego, not common sense. Start looking for another job if you need to, but walking out does nothing at all to hurt them really, and everything to hurt you.
I’m sorry if that sounds unnecessarily harsh. I found that the harshness was what helped me. (I stuck with the company in 2010, and a year later was promoted with a raise to a management position. Not that this is necessarily what will happen with you, but just as an anecdote for sometimes it’s worth it to suffer a bit longer.)
Never, EVER shoot yourself in the foot job-wise to stick it to your employer. They are a company who counts on its people leaving. You are an individual that needs a paycheck.
It is so so so awful being in a gross toxic bad ugly workplace, but HANG IN THERE. Find something else that can tide you over, THEN give them the finger.
These are all very good points. I will stick to brooding and keep my job for now.
Oh God, but you could quit at the beginning of June! That would be so sweet. They’d be screwed!
(You’re a eco worker too, right? June, June, beautiful June, the month to make demands and work and sleep.)
i just want to chime in and say: i’ve always quit my jobs without the next one lined up.
usually it’s after months of looking, and realizing that i need to make my job search into my full-time job. i don’t do it in the heat of the moment, but i do eventually get fed up and decide on an exit strategy. so, i make a short-term plan, stop spending money, save up a couple months of cash to float the search, and give notice. and every time, despite the months of looking before, i have found work relatively quickly after quitting.
this isn’t to tell you what to do or not do, and i certainly don’t know your financial situation enough to advise that this is feasable for you… but, when i’ve made it my focus, and planned for it a bit, it has worked for me. i see you’ve decided to stay for now, but if you are feeling edgy, see if there are ways to amass some savings that could give you the freedom to make the move. just an idea.
I agree with everything everyone else has said, and will add: it never bothers the employer as much as you think it will that you left. Which SUCKS. Because we’d all like to think that they wouldn’t know WHAT to do without us. But the reality is that employers are very used to staff, even necessary, couldn’t-do-it-without-them staff, leaving. And they are surprised for a minute when we give our notice and then they adjust and move on and you’re the one stuck without a job. ๐ Good luck with the search though!
Only do it if you have at least 6 months of your monthly expenses saved up.
Any y’all have some tried-and-true tips for emotionally preparing yourself for Significant Other Fights? My (sort of) ex (who I’m still living with, whoops) and I have a Big Talk scheduled for this evening, and I just don’t want to. I’m convinced I’ve done nothing wrong by seeing other people, he’s convinced I have. I don’t want to fight, and I don’t want to apologize. Help me.
General tips for big conversations: *Take care of yourself before hand. Don’t be hungry, wear clothes you’re confidant in, etc. *Write out talking points. Even if you don’t get flustered and need to use them it will help you sort through things in your head. *Anticipate his talking points and figure out how you want to respond. Practice your responses with a friend/cat/mirror. Write them down if needed. *Make plans for when it’s over. Have a pint of ice cream in the fridge to reward yourself for getting through it. If you or the ex need space afterwords have a plan of where you’re going. If things go really badly have somewhere lined up you can stay the night.
This is great advice! God, fights are the worst. I think scheduled fights, while in some ways more manageable, are almost more difficult — there’s so much dread and anticipation.
(side note: may substitute one glass of really nice Scotch for ice cream. Or one glass of really nice Scotch in addition to ice cream.)
Seconding the Scotch. But only if it’s really good Scotch.
Oh, it’s GREAT Scotch. I have a Glenlivet 21 and a Talisker 18 waiting for me. ๐
I envy you the Scotch but not the fight so it probably comes out even.
If you’re like me, this will help. If you’re not like me, I have no idea if this will help. But you have my support either way.
Prepare a few statements in advance, e.g., I am not wrong to see other people. I don’t want to fight. I have nothing to apologize for.
Practice saying them out loud. This evening, wait for opportunities to make these statements. Try hard to say nothing else. Just refuse to engage on other topics. It avoids needless conflict and avoids diluting your message.
This feels awful, doesn’t it? I feel for you. Good luck. Toasties got your back.
Oh my god, that is the best advice I think I’ve ever heard. I am so not about getting diverted in arguments, but it always ends up happening. Goal of the evening: aforementioned statements (which I may or may not have just practiced on a work bathroom mirror, heh) and making concrete plans for the future.
Breaks are hard. What even are breaks?
Thanks for the advice!
I second the above advice. Specifically, I always prepare and practice my opening line out loud (this applies to all Big Conversations, not just with romantic partners.) For me, starting the conversation is the worst part because in general I would rather not have a conversation at all! If I’ve planned how to start it, I can just vomit the opening words out and the rest follows.
I only have communication tips, for what they’re worth.
I like the “each person gets a chance to talk until they are done, with no interruptions” method. Keep a pen and paper if you need to make notes. Discussion happens after this step is complete.
Really listening very hard before allowing myself to get defensive or think up ripostes has been helpful for me in the context of disputes. And then I reflect back what I think is really going on (what underlies what has been said, not what was actually said), with a chance to correct. e.g. “It sounds like me seeing other people while we are still connected and sort of working through our relationship has made you feel really hurt, and you wish I would XYZ instead, is that fair/right/accurate?”
The devilish part of this approach is that the person you are communicating with first feels really heard, which is helpful, but you are gathering lots of information to also have yourself heard and come to a resolution that meets your own needs. You can also achieve some of the value of an apology (ie that the other person feels heard) without actually apologising yourself. There is a toooonn of power in really listening. This ain’t no hippie dippy stuff. I use this stuff to push people around in my job as a lawyer.
I find that people generally really want to feel like their experience is understood and their feelings have been listened to. What happens after that is often much less important than they actually think. If you can listen closely, you both gain a lot of understanding and also often an outcome you like better.
Oh man, that is some sound (and specific!) communication advice. I can remember so many arguments where I’ve just felt like the other person didn’t get it, and they probably feel the same about me. Thank you.
Haha yeah, talking and listening are two totally different activities (it’s like sending vs. receiving), and if you’re trying to do both at the same time, you may muck up both.
Listening to someone doesn’t mean I’m agreeing with them, it means I’m trying to understand them. Understanding someone’s point of view doesn’t mean I agree with them. It just gives me much better information to work with about how to move forward. Withholding judgment (for a while) can be so powerful.
I’ve done a bunch of mediation training, which is where I developed this stuff. It’s surprisingly difficult learn, or is for me. It has also changed everything about how I interact with people, both and and out of disputes.
ETA: Good luck! That discussions sounds super stressful and hard, especially in anticipation. I wish you lots and lots of good self care.
“Listening to someone doesn’t mean I’m agreeing with them, it means I’m trying to understand them.”
God damn, that is a wonderful way to put it, and confronts a lot of the problems I’ve had in arguments before. I tend to get into a “but I don’t WANT to listen because you’re WRONG,” but that’s not very productive, and I’m all about productivity.
I am not interested in fighting for the sake of emotional venting almost ever. I’m solutions-oriented; this seems like a good way to get there.
But hey, if you decide at some point you’re done listening, that’s ok too. RoseCamelia had some advice that seemed like it really resonated with you about developing a message and sticking to it, which is a great thing to do after you’ve listened closely with a bunch of reflecting.
Like “ok, so now I think understand how you feel about this situation: [XYZ]. I’m not going to apologize for my behaviour. I need us to develop a situation where I can [ABC] without you feeling [XYZ], or, if you’re going to feel [XYZ], that’s not going to be my problem. How do you see that happening?”
Anyway, I’ll stop now. I find conflict super fascinating, but I’m pontificating, which is no good. Good luck! Let us know how it goes.
I’m not sure if this is good advice, but I’ll put it out there.
I’ve been reading a lot about Non-Violent Communication, and I really like it. One thing that NVC has made me realize is how much people (especially men) avoid talking about how they feel about things and instead state how things are.
For example:
“It’s wrong of you to see people while you live with me.” INSTEAD OF “When I see you with other people, it makes me uncomfortable/sad/angry/feelings.”
If he tries to just tell you you’ve done something wrong when you didn’t make any sort of agreement about it beforehand, that’s very arbitrary, and I hope that you find a way to point it out as such.
However, if he takes responsibility for his own feelings and wants to try to work out solutions with you (instead of just telling you what you can and can’t do), just understand that you are not responsible for his feelings. Hell, either way this is probably a good thing to understand.
My other advice is to supplement doing everything Cookie said about taking care of yourself with focusing on not getting angry. What you want to have is a conversation, not a fight. Some people like to get angry when they talk and don’t get their way, and the best thing you can do is not be dragged down to their level. When you are angry, you don’t think nearly as clearly, get sidetracked, say things you regret, etc.
If things get too heated, try to call a time out in some way that doesn’t sound like blame is being placed. Sometimes difficult conversations take multiple sessions, and while it’s painful because it draws the process out, that’s just the way things go.
Final advice: don’t let either of you get caught up in semantic details. It’s tempting to look for even the smallest holes in the other person’s argument so you can invalidate their claims and validate your own, but ultimately it just distracts from the central topic that you both want to discuss. A fruitful conversation isn’t a battle of attrition.
Final final advice: Remember that no matter how this conversation/fight goes, you will have another chance to make things better if it goes wrong. This doesn’t have to be the last word, and everything doesn’t hinge on it. You will get more chances.
Sorry for rambling, I just want to throw advice at you and hope that some of it helps. GOOD LUCK!
Not responsible for his feelings! That, that!
Planning ahead is great if you are feeling confused or conflicted about the topic at hand. Personally, if I plan it out too much, the conversation ends up going really sideways and weird, usually because I’m working through my talking points instead of listening to the other person.
Also, sounds like the topic isn’t really “you are seeing other people and that’s wrong because feelings,” but is more like, “we have a poorly defined living situation on top of an emotionally fragile personal relationship, and we either need to set some boundaries that work for both of us, or someone has to move out.”
But that wasn’t what you asked for, so I’ll stop being the tough love auntie now.
Oh lord, that was… awful. Just awful. I’m emotionally wrecked. Things were said that hurt me more than I think words have ever hurt me, in an “oh shit this is a serious character flaw of mine” kind of way.
And the relationship is still not defined.
And I accidentally lied by omission but I can’t go back on it.
The advice I give myself when I’m not with him is so different than when I’m with him.
Re: CD swap:
Kelly, if you made it this far down the open thread, please accept my apologies. A few weeks ago I had to return my computer graphics card, and then the replacement came back also broken, so my roommate/tech support decided to do a clean install of windows to see if it was a registry problem (and because it was a recent install anyways and he’s just like that). So now I’ve got an alternative graphics card going along just fine, but god knows what state my computer will be in when I get home this evening.
My music is all backed up, so you will probably be getting a mix tape in, like, November, the way things are going.
I HAVE NOT FORGOTTEN YOU.
The highlight of my week: I walked into the bathroom one morning to find a sexy, naked man scrubbing the bathtub. That man is my husband and he doesn’t usually do the indoor chores. Hot men doing my chores for me? Yes, please!
I can home one night to find my boyf cooking me dinner in only an apron. Slightly dangerous but A+. Would ogle again.
My SO does most of the household chores but he does them fully clothed and I am suddenly feeling like that is not enough.
(no but seriously, it is enough, because I practically don’t lift a finger and it is glorious and I take far too much advantage of it)
I just wanted to introduce myself tothe Toasties group here. I’ve been binge reading archived posts like it’s going out of style and linking almost every new post to different friends in Facebook. I never dreamed a place like this could exist, haha.
Hi, Lisa! I was you a few weeks ago ๐
Hi Lisa! Welcome to the toast! How do you feel about rocket cats?
…Earlier this week…
Boyfriend: Hey lady, I want to make sexy time with you.
Me (cramping, in sweats, and craving ice cream): Oh sweetheart, you do not want anything to do with that today. It’s a Superfund Site down there.
Boyfriend: …
————————-
Too gross? Not funny? All in the delivery?
My normally comedy-minded and not-at-all prudish boyfriend did not laugh. Dudes at band practice did not laugh when I recounted the story to them.
I’ve been waiting all week for Open Thread so you guys can tell me where I went wrong.
You didn’t go wrong. The menfolk did. That was beautiful.
Maybe they don’t know what Superfund sites are??? (I laughed)
I don’t know what a Superfund site is. I’m sure you’re hilarious, though. ๐
In my household you would have been scolded for negative self-talk. Maybe your boyfriend has turned into a radical queer feminist lesbian?!
+1000
During those messier times of the month, I respond to my lover’s invitation with “towel or tampon?” He knows what that means. So far, he has chosen towel every time. I think it helps that he’s a biologist and gets grossed out by nothing, ever. Well, he screams my name when encountering a spider, but otherwise he’s cool.
Given the topic of sex, I did not expect “he screams my name” to be followed by “when encountering a spider”.
“When encountering a spider” = code for “when encountering the sublime pleasure I produce with my nethers.”
Also, glad to hear I’m not the lone lady spider killer.
Me (muttering, holding spider-killing shoe): What’s the point in having a boyfriend if you don’t even kill the bugs?
Him (standing on a chair, shouting): I was raised by a single mom and I love to shop! We don’t need the patriarchy! This isn’t about traditional gender roles, this is about you go kill that thing right now!
Come to think of it, @samburgers might be right.
Maybe he didn’t know what a superfund site was? I don’t know what a superfund site is (and I’m afraid to google it at work now) but that’s probably the only reason I didn’t laugh because I normally love period/vagina based humor.
Superfund is perfectly safe to search for at work, unless descriptions of toxic waste problems so bad the government has a special name and funding mechanism for their clean up is not something you can handle during work times.
Well… I really don’t know, but I think if I said to someone ‘I want to have sexy fun times with you!’ and they said ‘No you do not because…’ I would immediately be kind of unhappy, because they are telling me what I feel/want. Even if they are doing it in a funny way, for me that is a big trigger, and bigger because it is pretty hard to tell someone I am interested in having sex with them. If it was me it would be much easier to hear, ‘No, I’m not interested, because <insert funny thing here>’ than being told that I really don’t want to after all.
But, you know, you could ASK him! Because he is the only one who knows!
Truth.
(He is sometimes very sensitive to my playful jests in this way, and it is a thing I practice. The getting better at it, not the insensitive joking part.)
Is it too late for a personal finance thread? How are we all doing? I haven’t really spent any money this week, so I threw an extra hundo in my mutual fund, which feels great. I find it easier to save in the summer – more park beers maybe?
It is never too late!
I am on automatic goal-meeting mode: We’re finally saving/investing $2,500 – $3k/month without thinking, even while we travel a little and BUY A PERFECT NEW DOG ($$$ but omg omg omg BABY). Summer is a HUGE help. We make sangria and walk to the park a lot? Cheap fun and very little temptation to kill time smelling all the fancy hand soap at Target.
I’m also not obsessed with finances for the first time since my getting my job nearly a year ago. WOO for moving on and feeling sorta-kinda stable!
Never too late! I find it way harder to save in the summer because I want to be drinking on patios and not cooking. This time of year also means lots of travel, pride*, and outdoor activities. Sure the outdoor movie is free, but I’m going to want snacks and possibly new sandals to wear to the movie. I just noticed a lot of annual expenses bill me in the summer including my rental insurance and Amazon Prime.
$65 bar tab last night crying to friend about my boss’ resignation.
*Pride week this week in DC has been a real budget buster. This weekend is going to be expensive I’m sure. I don’t really regret spending the money but clearly I need to budget for it next year. I’m performing Saturday and Sunday and plan to be out brunching, shopping, and drinking all day both days. I will probably go to She Rex tonight as well (any Toasties attending?) because I have a fear of missing out and I want to support the organizers.
I’m doing okay! This is my first month using my travel rewards cc for all my purchases, and I think it’s going well! I had to make a few deposits on upcoming travel accomdations and also invested in a new Deuter pack for $179, but I think other than that I’m staying on track.
Although, summer is harder for me to save because I want to be out at patios and in public/downtown socializing with other humans. Plus out of town friends come to stay, and I always go on vacation out of the country.
A women’s investment club I joined in college bought Apple stock in 2005 and it just split 7 ways this wk!
I just did Day 2 of my first week of Nicole’s workout for noobs. I have a tendency to get pukey migraines from overexertion, so I’m starting slow: instead of repeating the whole sequence three times right off the bat, I’m doing once through each day for the first week (repeating any that I can stand to but not pushing it too much), then twice through for the next week, then the full three times. At least, that was the plan, but I just surprised myself by doing everything twice, even the burpees (ugh).
I’m trying to get back into running, but for some reason I’m really daunted by going to get my feet measured at a Serious Running People store. So I have to do that, but I haven’t yet. So instead I downloaded a ridiculous industrial album I used to dance to in goth clubs 8,000,000 years ago and bought a jump rope.
I am not even remotely ready to start a new exercise program, I’m working on fixing some other issues around food allergies and general nutrition first. But today I successfully avoided eating any refined sugar or processed food so that’s a tiny step forward.
That’s not tiny at all! It’s awesome.
The food thing is a whole other monster for me, but increased exercise seems to be helping somewhat.
(sorry about the late reply; I thought I replied to this via email but apparently didn’t)
VNV Nation?
So totally VNV nation! (I thought I replied to this via email but must have messed it up)
Toasties I have had a week.
Tuesday: Get off probation at work. Stability! Love this job!
Wednesday: Use some of the money I’ve been hoarding to pay off small student loan. Only $45k more to go!
Thursday: Boss tells department he is resigning in August because of the high stress environment. Leave meeting and go to bathroom and cry.
This boss gave me my first internship many years ago and I finally circled back to working with him about two years ago. He is so awesome! I am where I am today because of him and I can’t imagine working in this field without him. My predictable work life has been turned upside down.
I refuse to lose him as a mentor, but I don’t know how to forge a relationship with a 50+ year old dude that isn’t about the institution he is choosing to leave under difficult circumstances. Any advice?
I cried at the bar to my friend about this last night. In PUBLIC. Crying in public is the worst.
Keep communications open with him. Ask him where he is going. Get his personal email address. Mark your calendar to email him once a quarter to ask what’s new and to keep him updated on your business successes.
Yes, this sucks. I don’t blame you for crying. I would, too.
I know it’s late in the game (*fist shake* PST!) but but BUT I got not one, not two, but THREE requests for interviews this week!
*CONFETTI*
I’ve been applying to stuff since January and had heard nary a word from any of the 23 places I had applied to and then POOF! 3 right in a row! I might be a real librarian yet!!
Unrelated: I never fail to appreciate the Toast’s firm stands on food. Raisins ARE garbage.
Congratulations!
I too suffer the PST, and today also the home-being children, so I am always late to the party. ๐
isn’t that how it always goes? CONGRAAAAATS! Take all the jobs (away from a man)!
Despite the fact that it is going to cost SO MUCH MONEY (in a first-world-problem way) my partner & I have decided to spring for a Montessori summer program for the two kids, which means 1) we no longer have to spend tons of time stressing out about our daughter’s preschool which is starting to seem kind of skeevy, and 2) the baby (who is 18 months old, but, you know, he is doomed to be the baby until we get a kitten in a few years and the kitten becomes the baby) can attend with his sister.
So! Starting on 17 June, she will be gone 5 days a week 8.30-3pm, and her little brother will be joining her 2 of those days. There will be getting up crazy early for us, there will be a long drive, there will be much effort, but then we will have something like 11 hours a week TOTALLY TO OURSELVES.
I can barely imagine this!
I am a lumbering tired animal, y’all. 32 weeks pregnant, and had a long day today. Tomorrow’s plan is to get up early and take the neurotic and snappish dog (pairs great with infants, right?) to the vaccine clinic at the animal shelter so I can get him his rabies and DHLPP vax without spending hundreds of dollars at the vet. I love my vet, and she’s hooked it up on some pet procedures before, but we had so many unexpected expenses this year, and so many more are coming. The clinic starts at 9:00, but people start lining up as early as 7:30, from what I’ve heard. I dread every aspect.
Then after that I have to go to work.
On the other hand, my block smells like honeysuckle this week.
I would like to petition that no one (and by no one I mostly mean guys) ever reference ‘you had a sexy phase?!’ when a lady mentions a previous girlfriend ever again. It’s really gross, dude.
Wow. That manages to be really gross in an impressive number of different ways at once.
Scott Pilgrim is just not the person to model your social skills on.
Butter tarts! Damn, now I’m jonesing really hard for butter tarts, and unless someone opens a Canadian bakery in NYC, I don’t think there’s anywhere nearby to get them.
What I’ve been doing with my wild and precious life this week: well, mostly, neurotically worrying about writing projects. But what I plan to do with it this weekend is better: a drag king performance workshop tomorrow, then a day at the Russian baths. Glamdrogyny and steam rooms and borscht and Russian tea await!
They’re not hard to make, if you buy the tart shells. The only problem is that then you have a dozen of them, and probably you are only looking for one.
Use the extra butter tarts to make some friends?
Hmm. I could make some and bring them in to work and share the Canada-love around!
Apparently no one gave peacocks the memo about being the official bird of May, not June, as one decided this week that my dad’s porch was now his territory and decided to lounge around sublimely not giving a fuck. Said bird:
Behold, the Zero Fucks Duck Peacock!
(This is the original Zero Fucks Duck.)
I have decided to venture into the world of making and selling geeky crafts, because I’m original!
I cross-stitch and while usually I do batshit insane projects like Klimt’s The Kiss, I’m changing tack and making things like “This Reminds Me Of A Puzzle!”
It’s so easy and fast compared to my ridiculous projects and I am currently optimistic about actually selling the things.
Good for you! I’m kinda trying to do the same thing, but equine/cowgirl themed. Here’s to budding creative-types starting out in the world!
Very late to the open thread party but just on the off-chance, what I’ve been doing with my wild and precious life is this: http://climateanxietycounseling.wordpress.com
Oh no I DIDN'T KNOW. ๐ (Because I don't usually come in here, so my fault.) Do you have an FB or a Google Group or something??
Canadian Netflix also has BOTH seasons of Hannibal already.
Only do it if you have at least 6 months of your monthly expenses saved up.
David Attenborough's autobiography? He has a lovely voice, and it's basically a series of anecdotes, so if you doze off and miss some it doesn't really matter. I enjoyed it a lot while I was listening but didn't feel super compelled to continue with it when I had taken a break, and it's long, so it took me a few months.
MC Beaton's Agatha Raisin series narrated by Penelope Keith are quite fun and I would say fairly gentle murder mysteries, so they might work too. I think most other audiobooks I'd recommend are a bit too narratively compelling for what you need.
Yes, there is! It's "Toast of Toronto" on Facebook — you're welcome to join.
We manage meetups about every two months or so.
Ooh, I should get that. It would cut out the "huh, does that place have a patio" part of deliberations.
I'm late to the game, but everybody is right that chemo varies a lot depending on what the regimen is.
That said, soups are a great idea. You can spike the soup with protein packets that the hospital will give you (that are better than ones you would buy yourself because formulated for sick people). I got good reactions to a minted pea soup, and most of all to this apple, cabbage, and thyme soup which is full of vitamins in addition to being really gentle: http://www.epicurious.com/recipes/food/views/Cabb…
Mysteriously, frappucinos from Starbucks also worked great during chemo for the person I took care of. Maybe because they are cold, and cold dampens certain tastes? Your mileage may vary. But they have a million trillion calories, so that is also a really big point in their favor.
There are special Chinese healing recipes for food during chemo that you could google. Some people recommended that to me, but I didn't have time to do it.
Good luck to all, the dad, your s.o., and you too — it can be draining for helpers as well as the sick.