“The first thing you should know about sex is that it’s a word,” writes Cory Silverberg, Toronto sex educator and author of Sex is a Funny Word. This educational kids’ book, in bookstores this month, stars four children of different genders, races and abilities. It tackles the usual—changing bodies, fuzzy hair, extra nipples—before it dares go where few other kids’ books have gone. “Having a penis isn’t what makes you a boy,” it reads. “The truth is much more interesting than that!”
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I sure did like this thing Haley Mlotek wrote:
My sister works a very challenging, very demanding job. She has often pointed out that being called a saint or angel for her work is not really the compliment people seem to think it is; it’s often accompanied by a shake of their head and a sincere “I could never do what you do.” Her job is really hard, it’s true, and it does require a very particular personality, and sometimes she tells me stories and I can’t say anything, I can only put my tiny hand on her even tinier hand and wait for her to continue, but she is right that a saint is not a compliment so much as a judgement. She thinks they’re saying that she’s ascended to some higher plane of humanity, that her goodness transcends a normal level of decency, that she’s removed from the rest of the population by virtue of her virtue. But for her this is just the only job she ever wanted to do and the job that she excels at. The idea that her job—working with people who have special needs—is suited only for an angel, she says, takes the responsibility away from the other humans.
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Jaya on the history of energy drinks:
There came a point, sometime between the mid-19th century and the 1960s, when the “energy” started to come before the “drink.” But we’ve been chasing legal highs since long before that. Energy drinks are the fun of speed without the stress of finding it, a way to get the most energy possible without sliding into “taboo” territory. Another way to define the category is to think of the drinks that seem, even if briefly, one step ahead of regulation and legitimate medical worry—whether fears of mixing cocaine and wine, or worries over the long term effects of taurine. And as governments and regulatory agencies clutch their pearls over ingredient lists, making energy drinks label themselves up and down with safety warnings, or ban them outright, energy drinks have even winked at their status, taking pride in being just on the side of legal. Hell, there is an energy drink straight up called Cocaine.
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Jess Zimmerman is on FIRE right now:
There was nothing really wrong with my relationship, on the face of it. My ex-husband was—is—a good man. He was probably the only good man I’d been with to that point, the only one who didn’t try to manipulate or control or belittle me. I was already 25 when we met, 28 when we got married, but in many ways it was my first adult relationship. This turned out to be part of the problem: I wasn’t ready to be an adult. I hadn’t finished making mistakes yet, and so many of my mistakes had been made in someone else’s name.
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Sousaphone Man is an honorary Friend of The Toast.
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Okay, I’m going to start watching UnREAL.
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Hipaa is not what people often think it is:
Hipaa applies only to health care providers, health insurers, clearinghouses that manage and store health data, and their business associates. Yet when I last wrote about this topic, a California reader commented that she’d heard a minister explain that the names of ailing parishioners could no longer appear in the church bulletin because of Hipaa.
Wrong. Neither a church nor a distraught spouse is a “covered entity” under the law.
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life is a rich tapestry (I read the whole thing with my mouth like 00000000):
“An airplane is my bedroom,” he says, stretching to reach his complimentary slippers. “It’s my office, and it’s my playroom.” The privilege of reclining in this personal suite costs around $15,000. Schlappig typically makes this trip when he’s bored on the weekend. He pays for it like he pays for everything: with a sliver of his gargantuan cache of frequent-flyer miles that grows only bigger by the day. Hong Kong, he says, is his favorite hub, and “the only city I could ever live in.” The 16-hour trip has become so routine that it’s begun to feel like a pajama-clad blur of champagne and caviar — or, in Schlappig’s terminology, a “two-hangover flight.”
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While I was reading that piece with my mouth all 000000000000, Rolling Stone coughed up their old 1976 profile of Linda “Nicole’s Style and Aspirational Beauty Icon But It Does Bum Nicole Out That She Played South Africa’s Sun City During Apartheid But There Were People Who Disagreed That a Cultural Boycott Was a Good Idea I Guess” Rondstadt:
Linda’s fantasy began in Tucson, Arizona, where, at age 14, she began singing in a folkie group with her older sister and brother. In 1964, at age 18, she left for Hollywood with $30 in her pocket and joined a folk-rock group that became the Stone Poneys. After three frustrating years they broke up, just before “Different Drum” became a hit. As a solo, Ronstadt fronted numerous transient musicians, among them Glenn Frey and Don Henley, who went on to form the Eagles. Linda was unable to communicate with them on musical terms, she says, and she had difficulty bossing men around. “When I got to L.A.,” she says, “I was so intimidated by the quality of everybody’s musicianship that instead of trying to get better, I chickened out and wouldn’t work.” She also had problems with her first solo albums — “I didn’t know what I was doing,” she says. Her producers — among them John Boylan and J.D. Souther — would also be managing her or living with her, so that she was at once a singer, a lover, a daughter-figure and a puppet.
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Speaking of boycotts, this is one of the most depressing things I have ever read:
But in the past 25 years, the apparel industry, the entire global economy, has undergone a complete transformation. The way our clothes are made and distributed and thrown away is barely recognizable compared to the way it was done in the ’90s. And yet our playbook for improving it remains exactly the same.
This year, I spoke with more than 30 company reps, factory auditors and researchers and read dozens of studies describing what has happened in those sweatshops since they became a cultural fixation three decades ago. All these sources led me to the same conclusion: Boycotts have failed. Our clothes are being made in ways that advocacy campaigns can’t affect and in places they can’t reach. So how are we going to stop sweatshops now?
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Comment deleted for being too male:
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Just a video of a Russian man shouting at his ducks until they form an orderly clump and march into his barn, no big:
Tags: feminism, i’m using the tomato pic bc i just like it so dang much, link roundup, the internet
The story behind “Morris Mickelwhite and the Tangerine Dress” in the Cory Silverberg link made me cry, straight up. My four year-old proudly showed off his Frozen tattoos when we met some cousins this past weekend. His older cousin (by 5 months) witheringly informed him that Frozen was for GIRLS. So we had a quick 1-minute conversation about how all tattoos can be worn by anyone, anytime. No one is going to tell my son that he cannot wear tutus and nail polish because he has a penis, godfuckingdammit.
Somewhat recently a facebookfriend of mine posted about how her ~6yo son got made fun of for having his nails painted, and how she had to have a similar conversation with her son. Some dude ended up being the one not-nice person, and a bunch of us responded— including my cismale partner who posted a picture of his toes, painted Tiffany blue.
(it’s adorbs, whenever anyone asks him about his toes, clearly trying to make some sort of point about how he’s a MAN and nail polish is Not For Men, he just starts telling them about how it’s Tiffany Blue, you know, the color of the Tiffany boxes, but the actual nail polish is “For Audrey” after Breakfast at Tiffany’s, because of copyright reasons……………… If pressed, he will continue into discussion of copyright law, or the Deep Blue Something song, or Antiques Roadshow’s segments on Tiffany Lamps. If the person tries to turn the conversation into a discussion of masculinity or sexuality, he just sort of gives them a confused look, and goes back to discussing one of the other topics. i <3 my troll)
OMG. I would *love* to have that conversation about copyright, including the segue into Deep Blue Something AND the Antiques Roadshow. Relevant to many of my interests!
One of my dear friends from school has a picture of his feel on the Book of Faces with his toes painted almost this very shade.
I still have very fond memories of an extremely cute boy with blue fingernails I met at a forensics meet in high school, swoon. I always paint my nails blue these days.
Strangely, it’s always men who comment on it, mostly to say how much they like it.
…. forensics meet?
Yup!
Oh man, they changed the organization name? I always enjoyed chirpily informing people I was “in the NFL” back in high school, with no further explanation.
Agreed! Very sad. Still though, we’ll always have Saturdays, dressed up boys from other schools, and the very first girl I ever had a crush on. Ahhhh memories.
My husband and I paint each other’s toenails and I’ve been shocked at how many really good conversations it’s started, actually–we totally blew the mind of my 6 year old cousin, for example
Princesses are for Everyone!
<a href=”http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9RnRKeK0u7Y” target=”_blank”>www.youtube.com/watch?v=9RnRKeK0u7Y
I need to start a list of awesome books I need to get for when my daughter gets a little older.
me TOO with the tears. My husband had actually just checked out “Morris” from the library last week and I liked it, but now having the backstory my heartstrings are TUGGED. Excited to get Sex is a Funny Word!
I’m having a really hard time not crying. Thinking about this little boy and his realization that people think he’s wrong, that there’s something wrong with him, with his joy … It cuts me up. Why are we so cruel?
Sad for both boys–the little boy who likes Frozen, and the cousin who has already absorbed the message that he shouldn’t like things for girls.
That is a very good story and I don’t want to call you parenting choices into question but IN MY OPINION four years old a is a little young to get tattoos.
Honestly, by the time you get to be four, the best tattooing time is ALREADY PASSED. I am firmly of the belief that ALL tattoos should be done, by a pediatrician, within the first 10 days of life.
Well, you’ve convinced me. I better get this sleeve design finished.
Shows what you know. All the cool kids in Pre-K are getting tatted up these days. Extra points if it’s cultural appropriation done ironically. Or the Pabst Blue Ribbon logo.
Perhaps I am getting old, but the idea of a two-hangover ANYTHING (day, week, month, year) is profoundly unappealing. Hard pass on that one, plane guy.
It all just sounds so exhausting!
Also, judging from my own plane experience (which must, therefore, be everyone else’s) his skin must be SO DRY.
and, like, how does he avoid getting SARSdeathplague upper respiratory infections CONSTANTLY?
ahhhh he probably has an immune system of steel and just carries them from place to place for the rest of us poor suckers to catch :O
They don’t have those diseases in first class.
Also irradiated by being in that high of altitude all the time.
He travels in a very large bubble of Male Airplane Space, and nobody can get close enough to him to share their germs.
That airline story is bananas. What a world we live in. I love to read stories about people whose lives stories are so manifestly different from my own–it takes all kind of people to make a world, I suppose.
I mean you do you but…
This would screw up my workout habits so hard.
Who calls their hobby “the Hobby”?
MTE on the workout thing, but maybe there’s weights and treadmills in first class/airport lounges. I will never know.
As someone who hates flying, I was both fascinated and more than a little horrified by the idea that that dude has been flying more or less constantly for a YEAR. Just, how? I can’t even imagine loving flying THAT much, regardless of how fancy it is. And it sounds like SO MUCH WORK to game the system. Persistence, man.
The Limited Too is coming back and please tell me I was not the only one who had a pair of those pastel satin PJs that were exclusively to be worn at sleepovers.
I deffff had some of those pajamas. Cotton top, mint green satin pants. They were glittery and had white cartoon tigers all over them.
Wow I miss those pajamas.
Oh my god, the horror. I had all that sparkly body lotion/hair spray/chaptstick crap.
I thought it didn’t really go anywhere, just morphed into Justice?
They carried Monster High dolls for a while, even had some exclusives, so I’d go in and look and see what they had every so often, but I haven’t seen them carry anything new since this time last year. It is still a neon glitter wonderland and half of their stock I wish they made in adult sizes. :'(
Does anyone remember when Limited Too was the preppy little sister to The Limited? That was my jam: I still remember the striped turtlenecks with matching scrunchies I had.
I remember but I was already too old for Limited Too when it started. God I’m old.
Do you remember the shiny pants? They were just, like, weirdly shiny?
I had one of those inflatable chairs!
When I was in middle school I had a lime green shirt from Limited Too with a rectangle of velcro on the front, and it came with a pack of velcro letters so you could put any message you wanted on the shirt. I’m not sure why but at the time I thought this was fantastic.
I had a shirt like this that I got from Alloy or Delia’s or one of those catalogues! I always made mine say AD SPACE $5. I loved it.
My mom had very strict rules for me about Limited Too: She wouldn’t buy the clothes for me because they were too expensive + usually too sexy for a 10-year-old, but I could buy them myself with my allowance/birthday money, but I couldn’t wear them out of the house unless she gave me the OK. I still remember my favorite Limited Too outfit that I could only wear in my house: a tight white one-shouldered tank top covered in sequins with blue booty shorts that said LTD TOO in sparkly white letters on the butt. FASHION.
OT-not-OT: Someone just registered for the race I’m directing on Saturday as Magic Mike, shirt size XL, I am DYING
okay but what if it turns out it was channing and he registered as “magic mike xl” because he thought it would be hilarious and he shows up to registration and is like “did you get the joke?” and just smiles at you goofily until you smile back and laugh
no don’t say this DON’T SAY THIS
now I will be able to think of nothing else all day
i’m so sorry
can’t decide if I love you a lot or like A LOT rn
I’ve been awake for an hour and it’s a shitty morning already so MORE CHANNING GIFS FOR EVERYONE BECAUSE IMMA TURN THIS DAY AROUND
you are a true treasure and we are lucky to have you.
too precious for this world
These gifs are pretty much the only thing keeping me from losing my shit right now, so thank you a lot <3
<3 this is my favorite thing to do and i’m glad i’m using my powers for good rn <3
I can’t tear my eyes away
Starting to feel crappy again, MUST POST NEW GIF
PHEW that feels better
Ooooh look at how he kind of glides through that and then GIGGLES
Ugggh he does that all through the Pony sequence at the beginning of MMXXL, he’s like ::leaps up and slides gracefully onto a dangerous worktable:: haha I’m so silly
::continues +1-ing every gif and comment on this thread::
WHY isn’t it out on DVD yet?
It’s available for pre-order!
That won’t make it get to me any faster though. I did look it up and there was an estimated date of November, which means it will hopefully be just in time for my birthday.
It is a cold comfort, to be sure. I’m probably going to pre-order it and then try to forget about it (which won’t take much trying, actually), so when it’s cold and rainy and dark, I’ll come home from work one day and SURPRISE BEEFCAKE!
GENIUS.
He makes me happy. As do you today!
here cat
cat here is a food that I feed you
That cat’s like Nah brah I can see that you are a golden retriever disguised as a human
I just laughed so hard I had to explain myself to my mother.
Clearly the puppies recognize him as one of their own and cats know better.
BUT HE’S STILL GONNA TRY AND FEED THEM
CAT COTCHED
you guys this whole thread, i am weeping
I keep coming back hoping there are more Charming Tater gifs AND THERE ARE EVERY TIME, it’s like magic
THANKS FOR CHECKING IN
*flailarms*
This has been the most fun I’ve had in a long time and I have found SO MANY WONDERFUL CHANNING GIFS
truly they are the gifs that keep on giving
truly the most under-rated teen comedy!
I’m jsut going to sit and look at that through my half-hour phone meeting that starts in 4 minutes.
right???
It’s actually a semi-important meeting and all I am hearing is bla bla bla fishcakes as I gaze at his chest.
I always feel like I’m the only one still using blah blah fishcakes and nobody ever gets it I love The Toast the end.
Nobody ever gets it when I say it either.
I do I do!
I bow to you.
::gleefully clicks +1 on every comment in this thread::
okay okay OKAAAAYYYY
The other day I was having a discussion of who might actually be described unironically as a “beefcake.” I suggested Channing Tatum. All these gifs support my hypothesis.
Are you directing the Fishtown race? I JUST registered for it this morning.
Unfortunately, I did not consider a clever registration name.
That’s me yes!!! Did you email me last night?
No. I actually just found out the run was going on this morning and registered for it about half an hour ago, before I even saw your comment.
I’m super-excited about finding out about it. We’re going to be up there for the weekend and Fishtown is one of my very favorite places.
I will definitely find you while I’m up there! (that sounded creepier than I meant it to…)
About as creepy as the fact that I just checked through today’s registrations, so I think we’re even. 🙂
I’ll be easy to find: gray race tshirt, blue FPS cap, orange shorts, located either: behind the walk-up registration table OR headless-chickening around Fishtown OR screaming at interns OR leaning against tall lanky Englishman and quietly weeping while he strokes my hair.
So glad you’re coming!! yay!!!
Is it bad that I hope to find you screaming at interns?
No, that’s legit, also because A Man Intern is going to be on registration with MrChouffe and me, the odds of screaming-at-intern as a played-out scenario that day are pretty good.
Excellent. I’m very much looking forward to being told what to do and where to go by the Mantern. I will be sure to ask many questions to which I already know the answer so as to increase his sense of self-importance.
Don’t worry…the event will be amazing, the weather glorious, and everyone will be thrilled to be there.
oh my god WEATHER NOOOOOOOO it’s thinking about storming fuck fuck fuck
*hyperventilates*
eta: I think this is why a bottle of gin just appeared on my desk with a note: “Race Director Lunch,” thanks boss you are A-OK
NICE. I need more boss like that.
It will only storm in the afternoon when I go to the beach. You’re perfectly safe.
you could always join us at HopLot instead
just saying
I’ve not been there! Sutton’s Bay? Tell me more…
We’re going to be jumping from place to place Saturday and my only required stop is Mawby…and maybe Tandem.
Yup, SB. We’re meeting some friends there 2-3ish. Great space, beautiful outdoor seating, beer isn’t half bad.
You know that MrChouffe and I moonlight at Mawby on Saturdays, right? We won’t be there this weekend, for obvious reasons. 😉
I did know that! It is my absolute favorite place up there and I always require a stop to pick up a bottle of something, even if we don’t taste.
We’ll definitely look at HopLot. Sounds fun!
Meanwhile, I got an email from Swiss saying I could bid on an upgrade to business class for my upcoming flight to Zurich, but it turns out the minimum bid is 420 CHF per person on the booking, so that’s not happening. If anyone needs me I’ll be down in Economy feeling like a baller because my credit card gives me bonus Shoppers Optimum points.
I have enough points to to fly economy to Australia in December but want to upgrade, and even as a science nerd with a decent grasp of math and statistics the whole airline-booking-points thing still makes my cerebral cortex shut down and possibly emit smoke. I dumped the whole problem in my travel agent’s lap and am willing to pay cash to have the problem solved, which I guess makes me the Anti-That-Hobby-Guy.
I just moved and now am much closer to a Rexall and I’m sad because there was a Shoppers in my old apartment building that had a food section so I used it as a convenience store AND drugstore and was accumulating Optimum points like a boss, and now I haven’t been to one in like two months.
I brought this upon myself. What would my professor say?
Professor Legge probably would have said, “Satire. Sarcasm. Pastiche. GO HOME.” As she did when we ran out of time on the two-part module on postmodernism.
Further thoughts on Magic Mike (sorry pals, I’m still processing):
1. Elizabeth Banks + Jada Pinkett Smith = WHERE IS MY SEQUEL
2. I now want a pack of bros in tank tops to follow me around and shout “WOOOO” supportively when I accomplish basic tasks
3. Lesbians Who Want to Sit on Channing Tatum’s face —> it me
4. Every dickhead that has pulled the “hey baby, smile” at me in the street has never performed a sexy dance for my delight. Joe Mangathing entertains me; they do not.
5. There must be DVD commentary. There must.
please do continue to process, these thoughts are solid gold.
4. YES. You want me to smile, random dude, you need to make it worth my while.
My smiles are glorious rays of sunshine, and if you want one, you had better fucking EARN it.
Pretty much.
Yasssss number 4! If you want me to smile, asshole, do something smile-worthy! Earn it! This shit ain’t free! Though admittedly Joe Manganiello has now set the bar rather high for mortal men.
I didn’t even think about #4 before! From now on the standard response to that line should be “do me a Joe Manganiello dance, bitch.” Not looking up the spelling of the name, cause you all know who I mean.
Joe Mangawhatsit is the new, beefcakier Bandicoot Cabbagepatch.
Thank you! I’m going to giggle all day now, and possibly into next week!
I just saw this movie and it is my everything. Between Mad Max and this, 2015 is killing it in movies. My girlfriend and I clutched each other throughout, and stayed up later than we should have after… Now I want Joe Mangielloelloello to come to our wedding and do that whole wedding routine… Especially the last half.
I just finished reading Nothing is True and Everything is Possible: The Surreal Heart of the New Russia by Peter Pomerantsev (which is bananas) so I feel like the ducks video is super relevant. How in the world?
I read that last December & it is such an amazing write-up of modern Russia! It has definitely made me react to all the “Look at this CRAZY Russian thing!!” videos with a nod & thinking, “Yup…that’s completely normal.”
I’m enjoying UnREAL. I’ve never watched any Bachelor/Bachelorette type shows but I think they’ve been around long enough that I’m familiar enough with the tropes to get that part of it. Though I hope I’m not alone in thinking that Rachel and the ‘love of her life’ ex-boyfriend whose name I can’t even remember have no chemistry together and I want him to leave for New York or somewhere at the end of this season with his fiancee whose name I also can’t remember.
I am really into Unreal (haven’t watched this last episode yet). And OBVIOUSLY Rachel and Bachelor are being set up — and they’re interesting together, though they aren’t at all the most interesting interactions.
It’s a show with a lot more depth than the premise suggests and I have been suggesting it to everyone I interact with.
I’m so glad other people are watching this show! I’m recommending it to everyone but none of my friends are biting. (They balk when I say it’s on Lifetime.) I think it’s so smart and dark and interesting + all of the DRAMZ that I require from my shows. +1 on kicking off the boring ex-bf; I saw an AMA w/ Shiri that seemed to suggest she won’t end up w/ either of the two male leads, thank goodness.
I’ve gotten totally into it, too.
Also, someone should be writing ALL THE PILOTS/SCRIPTS for Breeda Wool (Faith) now.
I’ve been slowly getting into what those guys call the “points and miles game” and I need to keep like an entire salt box next to me when I read their blogs. They are obsessed with gaming the system to fly in first class and they do that through various routes–blog affiliates are a major part of that. I had no idea Krug champagne was such a big deal, but it is mentioned constantly by these guys (and it’s mostly men, of course).
There are a few blogs out there that aren’t industry shills, but not many. It’s one of those things that you innocently Google one day and then fall into a world you had no idea existed. It can certainly be very rewarding, but guys like Ben Schlappig are not working towards the same goals as your average Toast commenter who just wants to travel despite being broke.
My husband got into the periphery of this when he was traveling frequently for work. Like you say, a lot of it is pretty asinine, but man I enjoy the free trips. We’ve done Portugal, Hawaii, and are planning South America as well. The two of us went to Hawaii for 60$. If you have the time and inclination, it can be a cool hobby. Not often mentioned though, is that the cheapest points-based flights often suuuuuuck, if you value your time at anything above free (we don’t). While Hawaii was sixty dollars, we took four flights to get there from Seattle; I see that as an adventure, but judging from people’s reactions, I’m in the minority there. Also, it’s a hard sell for Canadians, if you can’t pick up flights across the border. Points-based flights on Canadian carriers (and some Euro ones I think?) charge huge fuel surcharges, turning your “free trip” into several hundred bucks. Ha, I’m a nerd about this too, apparently.
My stepdad has become obsessed with these blogs! It’s all he talks about and he keeps telling me I need to look into getting a credit card(s)!
I’m really surprised the article didn’t mention what happens to your credit score when you are constantly opening and closing cards, or if you have 40 (!) of them. I can’t imagine it’s anything good!
Welllll… my mother’s best friend recently had to build up his credit so he could buy a new car. He didn’t have bad credit, he just had been in the habit of paying cash for everything for years, so he had no credit history. He apparently just started applying for credit cards last year and now has a ridiculous number of them (mostly unused). It’s only just helped his credit score, apparently, probably because he doesn’t use more than two of them and pays the balances off each month regardless.
But I expect most people won’t have his particular situation. I certainly wouldn’t go around opening loads of credit accounts myself, even with bonuses like airline miles.
Yeah, I got to the point in the article that mentioned it being based on having dozens of credit cards and went, “nope”. The possibility of unpleasant things happening just seems to be way too high.
Opening credit cards can be good for your credit, but these guys are closing a bunch too. It was my (admittedly very limited) understanding that the closing part is what can hurt your credit? Something about reducing the pool of your available credit line looks bad. I dunno.
I want to say that having too much available credit can hurt you too? Credit scores start to seem like strange arcane magic after a certain point, honestly.
It is an entirely confusing system.
Credit card churning! If you have a fine credit score, and no need for an excellent one, it doesn’t really matter what happens. We’ve looked into it, but the deals in Canada aren’t good enough to warrant the hassle. If I was American, I would certainly have 40 credit cards in a giant block of ice in my freezer.
Part of the premise for this approach is that the main thing that drags your credit score down is how much credit you have versus how much credit you are using. It’s better to have $4,000 spent across five cards with limits totaling $20,000 than to have the same amount spent on one card with a limit of $5,000. Also, you must be able to pay off balances every month. Paying interest cancels out the rewards garnered from using the cards and carrying balances can also bring down your credit score. Having tons of cards doesn’t really affect it negatively, unless you are using them irresponsibly.
Having a ton of cards doesn’t hurt your score, as far as I know. And having lots of unused credit helps your score. But yeah, when he said he cancels card I internally screamed “WHY?” I’m under the impression that canceling cards is only bad, because it means your credit history is constantly “young.”
That’s why my old cards go in a safe, dark place and are never touched, but I don’t cancel them.
The answer is: it affects your score very, very mildly (less than 20 points in the 7 years I’ve been doing this. I apply for 1-2 cards a month). If you pay it off each month and keep your credit ratio high (i.e., keep your balance around a 1:5 debt-to-credit, so if you have a $5000 limit, keep the balance each month around $1000), you’re golden. I’ve not paid for a hotel room since I started doing this and have at least three and as many as twenty first class international flights per annum. Not bad for a 30 minute a month hobby.
Oh man, I had a coworker who did this stuff, and it worked for him, but also “worked for him” = “flying from Chicago to Vienna for 2 days/1 night and then flying back.” He loved it and jolly good for him, but it’s not my idea of travel.
Yeah, there’s a lot of personal value weighing that happens with what is required to do some of the things these guys do. Mileage runs and futzing with moving hotels every other day is not what I’m looking for in my life. Rich tapestry indeed.
Yeah, though I will say he had it down to a science. Sleep on plane, explore city without sleep for two days (I think sometimes he wouldn’t even book a hotel), sleep on plane on way back.
Okay, okay, okay, though.*puts on lawyer hat.* A lot of providers do misunderstand and misinterpret what HIPAA does and does not allow in terms of disclosures, and it is true that since (despite the fact that it’s been on the books for a long time) the implementing regulations have only been finalized in the last few years, most of the penalties have been against either large entities for substantial breaches or for individuals for intentional breaches (e.g., peeking at the Kardashian birth records).
But it’s a total misstatement–actually and completely wrong–to say that it’s not designed to keep your doctor from discussing Aunt Nelly’s CT with you. If you’re in the room with Aunt Nelly when the doctor comes in, then sure–that’s implied consent and the doc can talk unless Aunt Nelly asks you to leave the room first. But if you call up and say “tell me about Aunt Nelly!” then the doc has to have Aunt Nelly’s consent before she goes blabbing on about Aunt Nelly’s gallbladder. Because maybe Aunt Nelly doesn’t want you to know! To say that they do it because they don’t want to have complex conversations with patients’ families is disingenuous BS. (Not to claim that docs are good at that–they aren’t! But it’s not because of HIPAA. It’s because of patriarchy.)
*removes lawyer hat. bows head. shuffles out of room apologetically.*
THANK you, this shit was the bane of my existence working in a health insurance company call center. “No, I can’t tell you what your 21-year-old daughter’s doctor’s appointment was for, even though she’s on your insurance…. Yes, that’s because of HIPAA, and also because she’s a grown adult…. Please don’t use that language, ma’am. I’ll have to ask you to calm down or I’ll need to end the call… Yes, I’m sure that last time we told you absolutely everything… ASK HER THEN IF IT’S SO DAMN IMPORTANT TO YOU.”
Oh. God, I worked for a health insurance call center in the early 90’s and I’m still traumatized by stuff like what you describe. Also the one call–I’m sure there was more than one, but this was the one that made me cry–from this horrible woman whose teenage daughter was having a baby, and though the daughter’s hospital bills would be covered by insurance, the baby’s wouldn’t (otherwise, health care plans would apply in perpetuity). She was so verbally abusive that she was a major factor in my taking a pay cut to have a non-phone job not long after. I still don’t like to answer the phone.
oh god :((((
I remember asking my union rep if we could get 45 minutes a week of counseling into our union contracts for phone reps, because we just took on so. much. pain. The woman with trigeminal neuralgia whose pain meds were getting denied and she was literally screaming in agony on the phone, the wife who wanted to know if there was any way she could avoid getting an explanation of benefits sent to her house for an abortion she didn’t want her husband to know about. It was awful and we didn’t have any healthy way to deal with any of it.
YES. For us, it was limited dosing on Imitrex, which must have been new then. I think our members were limited to something like two or three doses per month, so I took a lot of calls from people, almost all women, who suffered from migraines and needed access to more doses. We also wouldn’t pay for Wellbutrin, which I think also was still under patent, because it was being prescribed for smoking cessation by some doctors, which left in the lurch people taking it for depression. And there were the people in small group plans where birth control wasn’t covered (it was a plan option then, and cost a few dollars more per premium) who needed it for non-contraceptive reasons…needless to say, I did not leave that job thinking much about the morals of insurance companies. Whenever people now think government is the real evil in health insurance, I just don’t understand them. A for-profit company has actual financial motivation to leave you sick or dead if it would cost more than keeping you alive. Nobody in their right mind wants that.
It’s so far beyond fucked up. I was there when the “countdown to the Marketplace opening” was about a year out and leadership had been so brainwashed into thinking that the ACA was going to end! insurance!! as!!! we!!!! know it!!!!! (dear god I wish it WOULD) that all our training and discussions about plan changes and eligibility etc were basically just anti-Obama screaming matches. When I started, MrChouffe and I had been together about six months and I hadn’t had insurance for I don’t know, eight years or something, and I remember telling my training class that my health insurance consisted of a plane ticket to England and a marriage license and they were just floored (sidebar: my class came in as temps, so we didn’t get health coverage for six months after we started. Irony!). Nothing’s convinced me more of the need for single-payer than a year and a half with BCBS.
Oh wow, my mom was probably one of those women! She took Imitrex for migraines when I was a kid and I remember her needing it a LOT, and it being very expensive.
This is just as much fun when you work at a college/school, and have to comply with FERPA regulations, and parents don’t understand that you can’t tell them their kids grades, or anything related to their record. Also fun: “No, sir, I can’t tell you where on the student site to login so you can register for courses for your daughter. Yes, even though you’re her father and you pay her bills, I’m sorry, but the student must register themselves.” I also cannot tell you how many times I’ve told someone that, and then had them go “well okay, WHEN my daughter does this, where on the student site will she go?” and then, when I reluctantly tell them the basic instructions they hit me with “oh that worked, I added the course, thanks!” UUUGH. (Helicopter parents, oy vey.)
HIPAA is amazing and terrible all at the same time.
Like, there was the time I’d sent my lawyer partner to pick up some medical records for me. I’d talked to them ahead of time on the phone letting them know he was going to be there picking up records for me, and they said I just needed to send a letter with him saying that it was okay for him to pick the records up. I sent him with that, as well as a form from their website, as well as the notarized POA. They released the discs of images to him. On those discs was a written report. They would not release the written report to him, Because Hipaa. He briefly tried arguing with them— they’d given him the report already, it just wasn’t printed. He had every possible piece of relevant paperwork showing he was approve to pick up my stuff, and I’d called in to let them know ahead of time he’d been coming. Nope. Hipaa.
I mean, I’m glad my parents can’t get my info, but, seriously. At least say “Our records policy”.
Yeah, that’s more the kind of issue you’re likely to see–there’s no HIPAA reason why your partner couldn’t pick that stuff up with the proper authorization, and likely the doc’s policy allowed it too. But it’s hard to strike the right balance–on the one hand, if you don’t put the fear of g-d in people then they’ll think it’s a policy they can wink-wink-nudge-nudge their way around when people get worked up. But on the other, perfectly reasonable requests get denied because the rule of the road is “when in doubt, say no.”
Agreed. And in other circumstances, I’ve been a front-line person with no workplace-based training asked to look at a POA and determine if it’s worth sending it to legal to be reviewed, trying to explain to someone who will explain to someone else how a POA needs to be signed. Not just by anyone, but the person granting the POA. So expecting everyone involved to be able to figure out what sorts of documents do and don’t allow people to get info for others is sort of absurd. But so is having each healthcare provider have their own form (sometimes multiple forms, sometimes different forms for different situations/departments/etc).
Wouldn’t it make sense if Hipaa had a standard release form? That covered entities could have additional forms if they wanted to have more restrictive policies, but that the standard Hipaa form could work for the Hippa part of the policy? *sigh*.
That sousaphone guy is a delight. I don’t fully understand which side the lady speaking about “stupid is as stupid does” is on, but I don’t really care.
BONUS SOUSAPHONE STORY:
I was on the bus the other day, and a guy with a huge sousaphone (or tuba??) got on. The bus driver said a few words to him that I couldn’t hear, and then as we pulled out into traffic, the dude stood at the front of the bus and played a few bars of “Wheels on the Bus!” It absolutely brightened my day.
The sousaphone is the one that wraps around your body. Basically, a marching tuba, since the weight is more evenly distributed and easier to carry and play for a long time.
But they will still destroy your left shoulder. Even if they are fiberglass. Ask me how I know!
I’m told they are also effective sails and, at least in the case of the brass ones, heat sinks.
My day is brighter knowing there are people like that in the world.
The only thing I know about sousaphones – they wrap around you, while tubas you just hold with your arms. That is why sousaphones are what you see in marching band. Just my hot brass identification tip of the day, ha!
But also, that would have made my day.
My brother marched with a concert tuba up on his shoulder. Our school didn’t have sousaphones
i didn’t expect as much pure delight as i ended up getting from sousaphone guy.
Former brass player here. Did not play tuba or sousaphone, but dated people who did. There’s no way that was a sousaphone on the bus. *If* the bell fit through the doors without removing it from the rest of the instrument, there would not be enough head room for the player to stand with the bell overhead in playing position. Definitely a tuba or euphonium (looks like a smaller tuba, with forward facing bell).
Damn, I’m pedantic. Anyway, I am delighted by the ear worm you gave me. I chose to hear The Wheels on the Bus in a lovely euphonium timbre. Thank you for that.
I also have the earworm now, ahhhhhhh.
As a former LGMB member, I’m pretty sure I’ve seen a sousaphone player on a bus. Most buses have pretty high ceilings in the front bit, and the doors aren’t that narrow. I don’t think old streetcars were that much trouble either. We never *played* on the bus, so you might be right about playing position, but I’m not convinced of that either.
It may have helped that our sousaphone player wasn’t particularly tall, and also when it came to maneuvering instruments the bass drum probably distracted me from any other bnad [sic] members who might have been having trouble. And admittedly we didn’t take buses that often, the subway was usually sufficient.
There is a rare sousaphone that has shorter bell, but I concur with Absotively there is likely plenty of room on certain buses to be able to fit a sousaphone into without removing the bell.
I just love that he heard, “The KKK are gathering for a rally!” and his immediate response was “LET ME GET MY SOUSAPHONE.”
“I am going to play Ride of the Valkyrie, only composed entirely of fart noises.”
Can I just point out that Morris Mickelwhite and the Tangerine Dress appears to be named after Michael Caine, whose birth name really, actually is “Maurice Joseph Micklewhite”?
The DA in Texas said that Sandra Bland was not a “model person that was stopped”. In the first place, this is a completely grotesque thing to say, even if all you mean to do is hedge your bets in the face of a future investigation — i.e., “we don’t know all the facts, let’s refrain from judgment until the facts are in” and so forth — personally, if it were me, a DA who talks about “model” subjects of a traffic shop, I would fire that DA and insist that they never work in law enforcement again. It is absolutely unacceptable under any circumstances to suggest that there are different classes of person who merit different levels of justice.
BUT SECONDLY, actually I think we need to redefine what the “model” is; the DA, presumably for the sake of police organizations, thinks that the model in this case is someone who is absolutely polite and complies with all of the officer’s orders without question. But it seems to me that this is very wrong — our model should be a person who cooperates with the officer’s demands only when they are strictly merited by law, and who firmly refuses to comply with any instructions that are not legal requirements.
In a civil society in which citizens have basic freedom, the actual model should be what Sandra Bland did, which is to cooperate only to the strict limits of requirement.
I know this is basically moot at this point, and I also know that there are more important things to worry about than maybe specifically this one particular statement, but also I think it’s worth pointing out how the rhetoric of police agencies stresses cooperation and submission far beyond the extent of the law, and this is a recipe for oppression.
Model people don’t die and inconvenience me dammit >:(
“A model victim would be someone that didn’t disrupt my carefully-crafted illusion of police righteousness.”
it’s like all them Guantanamo inmates what’s committing asymmetrical warfare against the United States by killing themselves, but even more devious cause she tricked our honest upstanding public servants into incompetently framing her! Do the terrorists know no limit
I agree with the principal motivating spirit here, but I got to admit that I am not real comfortable making jokes about this at this point.
Yeah, but I don’t know what else can be done. Analyzing “mistakes happen when it’s cops but this girl was not a model person [and therefore I as DA have judged her worthy of death]” seriously seems to give it far too much credit both morally and intellectually, it’s cartoon evil. The cops murder people over traffic stops and in response Texas Torquemada gets up on his pulpit and declares “LET ALL WHO BEAR THE TAINT OF SIN BE DESTROYED” and the press dutifully nods their heads and passes the word along, I mean really, what else is there.
I agree, but nevertheless.
Model victims say “please sir, may I have another?” And when I say yes, they say THANK YOU! And then they go home and tell everyone how great their experiences with me were!
In a civil society in which citizens have basic freedom, the actual model should be what Sandra Bland did, which is to cooperate only to the strict limits of requirement.
This, this, this, +100000.
Yeah, this makes me want to tear my hair out. Besides being MORALLY DISGUSTING, it’s just…unsound reasoning. Because if you take the idea of “model citizens” to its logical conclusion, you are essentially saying “if you do not show an acceptable level of deference when stopped by a traffic cop, you deserve to be physically assaulted and have your head slammed into the ground.”
It’s the same as the people who go “well, Eric Garner WAS breaking the law by selling cigarettes, so–” So what? Finish that sentence. So the appropriate consequence of minor rule-breaking is death? Because that is what that argument boils down to.
Yeah, ESPECIALLY because there doesn’t seem to be any limit to the deference you’re supposed to show to police. When, exactly, ARE you allowed to be uncooperative? When they’re rude? When they tell you to do something that you don’t have to do? When they threaten you?
The argument that police make always demands that we assume the police are correct, and proceeds from there to FULL COMPLIANCE, and I’m sorry, but it is just statistically impossible that all police are good.
Yup. Case in point: this ongoing lawsuit brought by a woman who was hit on by–and politely rejected–a NYPD officer, upon which he immediately made up a bullshit reason to arrest her.
His full statement opened with “it was not a model traffic stop but…” Police are allowed to make mistakes, for everyone else mistakes merit swift and fatal punishment. In what other field of work are professionals so consistently held to a lower standard than the average schmo, and why would anyone expect the results of that to be any different than they are?
A family member was upset because they love me and because I drive through Waller County, Texas, all the time. They said, “But Rose, you never use your turn signals. This could have been you, dead in jail!” They were relieved but I was very sad when I reminded them that white people are seldom asked to get out of the car, much less arrested, when pulled over for failure to signal. That I have never been pulled over for such an infraction, though I do largely ignore my turn signal when my car’s position makes my intentions clear. (OK, I’m lazy, but I do signal when necessary. Starting to think I should examine myself for lurking entitlement.)
TLDR: No worries. Because this is Texas and I’m white. ::sigh::
oh yeah, do signal. You might run into somebody like me who probably has different assumptions about what’s clear and what’s not (I drive in a part of the country with tons of rotaries and one-way streets and 5-way unmarked intersections and lefthand parallel parking and all sorts of weird shit that seems totally normal to me, but get very confused by suburban and mall-style road traffic in other parts of the country — which other people think is clear but I find very odd and confusing). Signaling is good!
And I do wish you the very best luck when you are in Waller County which seems like a scary place.
p.s. I have always been told to refuse to get out of the police car when alone but offer to drive behind the police to the nearest station, and to ask to see a police officer’s badge first… does that still apply in the US, or is that now “non-compliance”?
Seconding hellebore_, please do start signaling. The habit is essential, because so much of driving because automatic, you aren’t really thinking about your everyday route, and you never know when that signal is going to save someone’s life.
Signalling of course is good, but a really gross part of all this is that in this case the cop had pulled up close behind Bland without flashing his lights, and she’d moved over to let him pass.
Oh yeah, my comment had nothing to do with what happened to Sandra Bland!
Like, we had a violent revolution to ensure that everybody gets the same justice. We overthrew our government for the right to say “what seems to be the problem here, officer,” and receive an answer to that question. We’ve obviously never managed it, but we could at least pretend we’re trying to uphold the standards of our founding rhetoric.
I actually had someone on my Facebook say (not in reference to Sandra Bland, but I think in reference to Eric Garner or Ferguson) that the police won’t give you a dangerous order, so you should always just do what they say.
I pointed out that the police frequently give illegal orders (e.g. all the times they tell people that they aren’t allowed to film law enforcement) and that the police are also perfectly capable of giving an order that is unsafe for the person on the receiving end, even if that isn’t their intention (e.g. someone has an allergy or invisible disability that makes complying with police orders dangerous).
The police are supposed to protect and serve the citizens of their communities, there is no reason that we should have to comply with unlawful orders.
Might one propose a rule that any comment that begins with the word “actually” should be deleted on principle?
just wordfilter actually to ‘my mommy says’
man i love when my (all-male) coworkers are like, voluntarily incompetent at their jobs so they can push work back onto me. i love that. it’s the best feeling. *banshee scream, rictus grin, death*
You made me look up “rictus grin,” Sausage, and my day is 500% weirder now.
I am so, so sorry about that.
Never be sorry about educating me! Even when it’s SUPER CREEPY and I’ll have to sleep with the lights on forever.
Hence the name of Immortan Joe’s son, Rictus Erectus.
man I read the airline article and then I read this about eating delicious things in Turkey and then I read this about women’s travel writing and now I want to travel everywhere and eat all the food and read all the books.
I’m hung up on the “$100 designer cookies” line in the beginning of the air travel piece, though. What would make a cookie worth $100? The best cookie I can imagine, my desire to eat it would probably top out around $20. There are some designer things that make me think, sure, they cost that much because the materials are the best quality and the designers are talented, makes sense, and this is…not one.
What would make a cookie worth $100?
Chris Evans warming the cookie up for me by letting it rest on his incandescent pecs, and then feeding it to me slowly and kissing away the crumbs at the corner of my mout–
Whew, I got carried away for a second there.
Are they pot cookies and does Rihanna deliver them?
It’s probably a cookie with, like, edible gold leaf on it, which would be gloriously, terrifically decadent but also probably not very tasty?
I think this might be worth $100. Made by this gal: <a href=”http://butterwinks.tumblr.com/” target=”_blank”>http://butterwinks.tumblr.com/
Wow, I would pay a hundred dollars for that cookie. In fact, that cookie makes me want to be a billionaire patron of cookies. Look at those folds in the shawls! The color of those flowers! The delicate beading!
If I were rich as dirt, I’d comission a me-as-Madame-X cookie portrait from her in a heartbeat, plus pay whatever artist residence stipend would be necessary to complete said portrait and maybe a grant in perpetuity for excellence in frosting.
She’s amazing and does custom cookies too, and she loves to do comic book cookies
i do cookies too, but not like these. Mallory has a talent I can only dream of
!!!!
I would be unable to bring myself to eat that cookie.
Content note: the airline story contains a brief reference to a nonconsensual sexual encounter. (Second paragraph after second video.)
I wish I’d seen this before reading, that was upsetting. Especially how blithely it was mentioned, without a single comment on the fact that he was sexually assaulted.
yeah….I feel like that merits either zero mention because, ugh, poor guy, or some actual investigation, like is this something explicitly or implicitly required of flight attendants? which is complicated because you get the impression she’s a victim here too.
Yeah I read that and was pretty upset by all that was left unsaid. Good grief.
I got no impression that the flight attendant was anything other than a perpetrator, actually. And there’s nothing to say that the flight attendant was female here.
Definitely should be investigated.
What really bothered me was the first part of that paragraph, saying “He’s treated equally well by flight attendants, who are among his rowdiest fans.” That is not being treated well!
d’oh, good call on the gender thing, didn’t even notice I did that. Might be reading too much into the brief paragraph, but that “treated well” language was what made me think it was something that high-class passengers have a pattern of expecting, vs. something this individual decided independently to do. Nothing good going on there either way.
I was about to comment about that – the throwaway treatment of it is really scary. It’s sexual assault!
I get a lot of the “saint” and “I could never!” talk from people about caregiving for my husband, and it’s maximally irritating. I’ve taken to just looking them in the eye and saying, “So if your husband suffered a debilitating brain injury, you’re saying you’d walk? Leave the kids, leave him, leave your marriage, and go? Accept what everyone would say about you for doing it, what it would really mean about you if you did it, maybe lose your friends and family in the bargain?” And generally they’re all, “Oh, no, I could never do that!” Well, then… They don’t really know how complicated it is, unless you’re some kind of monster, to give up and leave, and believe me, I’ve been tempted. There are times when it’s just fucking awful, but that’s not what these people want you to say about the experience. They want to think you’re a saint and then not be friends with you. Don’t fool yourself into thinking people you knew as your friends won’t flee if something like this happens. They will. They’re satisfied with canonizing you and then they want to get away as far as possible because it might be contagious.
Ugh, that all sounds awful, please know you can always vent here with no judgement.
Aw, thank you. It’s been three years, so most of it I can just accept as the new normal, but some parts of it are difficult in ways that it’s really hard for people to understand. Like, he has issues with depression (mostly just sleeping all the time) and self-expression (mostly laughing and prosody), and I get really lonely for the kinds of conversations we had when we were dating and first married, the kind of thing most couples think will sustain them in the long run. We’re young (41) so sometimes the long road ahead without much open affection or sex as we’d (I’d) like seems pretty daunting. But it’s not like I can date or something.
Take care of yourself, that all sounds incredibly hard. Caregiver burnout is for sure A Thing, and I hope you find a way to keep going. Maybe there are other Toasties in similar situations who can commiserate. In the meantime, here is a gif of a kitten being scared by a lizard in case you need it:
But it’s not like I can date or something.
I mean, that’s not strictly true. The really heavy commitments you already have might make it more challenging than it’s worth. Your husband might not be okay with that, or might not be capable of consenting to it in a way you would want before moving forward with it. It might not be something you don’t really have an interest in (now, or ever). And even if every other problem was magically solved, and you were getting more open affection and/or sex, it still wouldn’t be the same as getting those things from your husband, which would likely still be something to grieve.
But you could date. I don’t point this out to say that you SHOULD date, or to suggest that it would be easy (it wouldn’t be). More, that if you’re in a situation where it’s not a feasible option, that is one more thing that you are giving up and should get “credit” for.
I’ve thought about it. You can’t unsee what you see when window-shopping on Craigslist. But so far, it’s like a odds good-goods odd situation. Married men looking for married women for companionship because of this kind of situation come off pretty sleazy, and I can’t fool myself that I’d look much better if I came right out and said “seeking friendship because of complicated marital situation.” What men can see as a practical solution for themselves, they tend to regard as unforgivably slutty and faithless in a woman. I don’t want any relationship with anyone who would think that of me. I’m open to the possibility that someday I’ll meet someone in person, though, who gets the situation and wants to go with it because of who I am, not because of what they need. But it’s the kind of thing best kept on the QT.
If it’s a thing you’ve considered, and you have so far rejected the idea because you don’t like the way your options look (and I don’t blame you), I’d suggest looking at the polyamory world. Books like Tristan Taromino’s Opening Up, or More Than Two by Franklin Veaux and Eve Rickert might help you figure out if it’s the sort of option you’d actually feel comfortable with, and people in poly relationships are, on average, better on the “behaving ethically” and “avoiding double standards” than it sounds like the people you’ve peered at, and sound like they might be a better fit for you.
Again, very much not trying to paint any of this as easy, not trying to suggest that there are right or wrong answers here. But one of the things that helps my lifepartner and I stay sane, when both of us have chronic health challenges, is that we don’t need to try to be everything to each other, and we can (and do) reach out to others for love/comfort/support/etc. As a Random Internet Person, there isn’t much I can do to make your life easier (other than bear witness to the fact that this sort of shit REALLY BLOWS), but I hope that you can actually have all of your options available to you as you piece together loves and joys and moments and least-shitty-options.
I actually never even realized that was a thing. Poly, yes, but not specific to these circumstances. I appreciate what you’ve said. Thank you.
I loved that Haley’s sister pointed out, “The idea that her job—working with people who have special needs—is suited only for an angel, she says, takes the responsibility away from the other humans.” That really struck me.
Nicole, I am so excited that you’re watching UnREAL. It’s my favorite thing right now.
On that note… next week looks INSANE.
Seconded! Nicole, you are going to love it. I’ve been having trouble getting people to watch it, because after you say, “It’s on Lifetime” people roll their eyes, laugh, and stop listening. But it’s so good! It keeps flooring me because it’s so rare on television to see a human woman with a complicated life and complicated feelings who actually reacts to those things the way an actual human woman might.
Toasties sorry this has nothing to do with any of the above, but I just found out that the person who got a job that I was runner-up for got a better counter-offer, and they want to know if I’m still interested in the job!!! So I am Kermit-flailing all over the place (internally, anyway) and I needed to tell SOMEONE. So I am telling you.
Hurrah!
Congratulations!
I used to work in medical publishing, and I can’t tell you how many times doctors sent us images to use in our articles that featured operating rooms or labs or posed staff standing in front of computers that clearly displayed private patient information. Names, DOB, social security numbers, whatever. My editor and I would PORE over every photo, and then I would touch out anything questionable in Photoshop. People are clueless.
Oh my God, this past week I got an email for someone with my name and probably a similar email address — but it was from her doctor’s office and had lab test results for her bloodwork and stool sample (!), right there in the body of the email! Also in an attachment! And it had her DOB, so I could look up the person online and figure out where she lives and the clinic (they’re in the region) and confirm the mix-up.
I wrote back a short note advising them to confirm the right email address before sending private medical info, because yeah, they had the wrong person. Haven’t head back, which isn’t surprising, I’d be too embarrassed too. Hope the other woman gets her medical info, though.
Wow that mid-life crisis article pretty much describes my life from 24-29 holy shit
I always felt like something was wrong with me for not knowing what I wanted — like I wasn’t interesting enough, or something was broken and I’m a robot. How can’t you know your own *desire*? It’s supposed to be an emotion that just happens and exists inside you. You don’t get stopped from wanting things — you only get stopped from getting them.
Now that I know there might be a lot of complicated reasons why I don’t know, it’s been easier to start exploring that and being freer.
“We are not in midlife yet—we’re in our mid-30s, mostly, some even younger—but we are, in a sense, in crisis: we are opening our eyes and asking, “How did I get here, and is this where I wanted to be?””
Yeah, I shivered a little when I read this part.
Dead on for me. At least job-wise–I mean, I’ll keep the spouse. Putting the moves on him was the best decision I’ve made in the last decade, and he’s trying to figure out what he wants to do when he grows up, too, and we can be real with each other.
But as far as a career goes? I have a doctorate and I kind of just want to become a bus driver. I spent my twenties chasing an ambition that turned to dust and ashes in my mouth. Now I just want a steady paycheck and benefits doing something societally useful. And the transit authority is hiring…
Not sure if it helps at all, but I basically have the steady paycheck, benefits, and relatively socially good job, and I keep wondering if I should go back for the continued post-secondary. I’m trying to figure out if the latest thinking of “keep the acceptable job that pays for you to do your hobbies that you love” is good being an adult or just the sound of settling.
“Is this good being an adult or am I settling”
YES THIS IS FAMILIAR. God it’s the worst. And people are like ‘you’ll know’ NO YOU WON’T KNOW. The thing with good being an adult is that sometimes it feels like settling. The only difference is that sometimes it doesn’t. But probably settling feels good too sometimes, so how even do you know? How do you know what you’ll want in ten years if you don’t even know what you want now??
Also the article made me feel really glad about my late 20s when I made some semi-questionable decisions, and wanted a relationship so bad but couldn’t seem to manage one even when it looked like it might happen. I needed those years, so badly, to do all those things, to be dumb and make mistakes and do things like eat out of the pan while standing naked in my own kitchen and just be gross and irresponsible and not care about anyone but myself.
I never want to take for granted what a luxury that was.
I read it through once but haven’t even been able to think about what it means for me yet. :\
That article is me right this very instant. After I finished grad school I didn’t know what I wanted to do or who I wanted to be beyond some intangible “I want to be a writer!” and had no way of translating that into the real world. I knew I didn’t want to do what I’d done prior to grad school but didn’t know how to figure anything else out. So I ran away to New Zealand. And basically on the plane I was like, “Oh, this is what I’m doing. This is why I’m doing it. Let me figure my shit out.” And now I know I’m heading home in December with a rough plan and I’m so excited for parts the life I was desperate to leave I can hardly breathe. But it took coming here to figure out what I liked and what I didn’t and why and who I want to be and how to start making that happen and it’s this massive fucking gift and I’m super happy I was able to figure this out while being 29 and single. (Actually, the single part is part of why I did this – I realised every move/decision I’d made was for/based on a dude and I just couldn’t handle that anymore. It felt gross.)
Oh geez, I spent a while doing constituent services for an elected official, and I got a number of calls that went like this:
CONSTITUENT: I/ my daughter/ my mother is stuck in a medical bureaucracy nightmare! We’ve called this agency and filled out that form and nothing is happening!
Me: That’s because you actually need to call a different department and fill out a separate form. I will make some calls and see how we can expedite your case.
CONSTITUENT, TWO DAYS LATER. IRATE: I just got a call from the agency and they said you discussed my situation with them! That’s a HIPAA violation! How dare you! HIPAAAA!
Me: holy shit why did you call me in the first place
I still don’t 100% understand how HIPAA works but that article is confirming my suspicions that 75% of people who call their representatives’ offices are in one of those “problem exists between keyboard and chair” situations.
This article about Lindy West’s wedding is lovely and perfect and made me tear up: http://www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/2015/jul/…
I love her body acceptance awesomeness, BUT ALSO everyone is so beautiful and happy! And I’ve read her for so long I feel vaguely like I know her, so it’s like YAY MY FRIEND I’VE NEVER MET OR SPOKEN TO GOT MARRIED. Basically, I am full of squish about it.
The above, plus: her dress!
Yes, the dress! Also, her LIPSTICK.
Thanks for sharing that – what a fabulous essay!
That HIPAA article made me think of all the funny moments when people are like “how dare you tell me that I shouldn’t say that! you’re violating my constitutional right to free speech!”
And I’m like I’m not the government, I can’t violate your constitutional right to anything and also SHUT UP.
I bet those deleted commenters would like to invoke the constitution against Mallory, for real.
Isn’t them telling you not to tell them something violating YOUR free speech?? HUH????
I always like it when people here in Australia talk about free speech (we do not have a protected right to it) because invariably some idiot invokes the First Amendment and I get to tell him (always him) that our first amendment is about seating order for state representatives in federal parliament.
Tangentially related (to bullying and gender presentation), has anyone else seen Hjørdis? I watched it on Netflix, and I highly recommend it. Here’s the trailer: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oGU7EVyBjBA
Did you watch Rita? It’s been in my queue for a while, but I haven’t started it yet.
No I haven’t yet, but I certainly will now! Is it also on Netflix?
Whenever I’ve seen Hjørdis, I’ve seen Rita on Netflix. However, I use a proxy thing for Chrome to get the different Netflix country accesses and I can never remember off the top of my head which countries have it. Idk where you are based, but I would check it out. I thought Hjørdis was a sequel/companion to Rita, that’s why I ask.
Hmm, I may have to look into setting up a proxy thing for my Chrome. I didn’t realize that Hjørdis had a sequel/companion since I stumbled on it out of the blue, but now I can check my recommendations when I get home. I’d love to see more from that actress.
Just don’t get Hola (as a proxy) (even though I like it better than the one I use… it has a back door that is unsafe… unless they fixed it, but if they had, I would assume that I would have heard). But yeah, that’s how I watch most of my shows now b/c there’s so much more variety outside of the US.
Thanks for the tip! I’m not particularly computer savvy, so it helps to have a few pointers about what to watch out for.
I’m a social worker and being told that I’m a saint for doing my job makes me enraged. Totally agree that people say that to excuse themselves for working outside their comfort zones,
That's the thing.
I had a meltdown the other day in KMart where we were buying socks and I scream-whispered to my partner 'this was absolutely 100% garunteed picked by slave labour and made into socks by children'.
But then, are the socks that are five times the price any different? I have zero way to know. But then, as I said about the socks, if the market will only bear $5 for a pack of 5 socks, then even if people wanted to pay their workers more and provide good conditions, they couldn't afford to.
I may be fooling myself. But gosh, I have to fool myself SOMEHOW because it's all so awful.
And then I went home and darned some socks.
Thank you for this. Can't wait to share it with Miss 4 who is stuck in a that's for girls rut
I just saw this movie and it is my everything. Between Mad Max and this, 2015 is killing it in movies. My girlfriend and I clutched each other throughout, and stayed up later than we should have after… Now I want Joe Mangielloelloello to come to our wedding and do that whole wedding routine… Especially the last half.
I actually never even realized that was a thing. Poly, yes, but not specific to these circumstances. I appreciate what you've said. Thank you.