Couch potatoes are important too! And from the looks of it she was a pro.
Mine should enjoy agility in theory - she’s super smart, easily bored, very nimble and needs a lot of exercise. I don’t know if she’s being considerate by trying not to expose her clumsy human to such situations or if she just thinks such simple challenges would be degrading to such a majestic animal as herself.
At least our slightly overweight french bulldog (of all things) is ultra-motivated as long as there’s a treat waiting behind every other obstacle.
Ugh. One of our ‘kids’ has been using various dating apps for a couple years, and all they did was make her depressed and me immensely grateful that I’ve never had to resort to any of them. They’re such a carnival of vanities, people killing themselves to outbid each other with unnatural selfies photoshopped to faux perfection (while simultaneously assuming that every other person is naturally beautiful without filters).
There should be a dating app or website with a strict ban on images that have been altered in any way.
Good for you to have scored a date though! Fingers crossed that there will be a second one.
I’ve never dabbled in poly myself (just open relationships, which have some similar mechanics but a fundamentally different mindset), so the following is limited second-hand knowledge/opinion, but seeing as nobody else has replied…
First of all I don’t think there’s a definite answer to your question, as ‘poly’ is an umbrella term for a lot of different constellations: does everybody date everybody or are people just allowed to have several unrelated partners, is everything fair game or are there things you’re only supposed to do with your main partner (if there is one), how are new partners introduced, who can have sex with whom, do the same rules even apply to everybody involved, etc. There’s no right or wrong, only “everybody involved is comfortable with this” or not.
I myself haven’t seen many poly constructs work out mid- to long-term, mainly for the same reason that many open relationships eventually fail: not everybody involved was equally enthusiastic about the open/poly part, and/or as mindful of their partner(s) ad the situation demands.
Those I’ve seen succeed all have two things in common: very, very good communication and unconditional trust.
One part of this is what some call “brutal honesty” - you talk about everything that might affect your feelings for each other - even, and especially, the things that may hurt your partner(s)'s feelings. This obviously demands a lot from everybody involved. You also need to accept the fact that your partner(s) will have feelings that may be hurtful to you but are still valid and good for them. For example you need to be genuinely happy for the person you love the most in the world when they fall in love with somebody new and/or have had better sex with them than with you. That’s tough on many levels. It also means that there needs to be enough trust to accept and overcome jealousy and fear of loss.
You also see how easily such a degree of trust can be abused. That abuse accounts for, hmm, probably 90% of all the failed poly and open situations I personally know of. It never works out when one partner just goes along with it in order not to (entirely) lose the other partner, which sadly happens alot and is not always obvious from the start.
Funnily enough, a monogamous relationship would profit just as much from that kind of communication, only a monogamous break-up is generally more of an obstacle than a shift in a poly constellation (both for personal reasons and because of what society expects), and so monogamous constructs can be of a much lower quality before they’re deemed unsustainable.
I’ve also asked a close friend with poly experience what they think is important and will add their response here once they’ve replied.
Aw man, that sucks both for its effects and for how much people underestimate the consequences. Did you stub it or cut it? Keep it snuggled up to the two toes next to it and make sure there’s a steady supply of chocolate.
Sounds like both a practical and fun car! Here’s to many adventures with it.
As for the name, I have no idea. For some reason, Pierre comes to mind. Maybe because Nissan is french nowadays, or maybe I’ve just rewatched too many episodes of Danger 5 this week.
My driving instructor always used to say “for all its faults, a car is still highly addictive”, and he’s totally right. But of course how much you enjoy driving it depends on where and how much you do that. Congrats anyway! What type of car is it, and what style of name did you have in mind?
Celebrated with the young 'uns till 01:20 in the morning and no hangover, so two good things - can still drink moderately and stay up past midnight! Yay!
I’m revisiting old favourites of mine - the first two books of the “achtsam morden” (mindful murder) series by Karsten Dusse. Unfortunately they’re German so probably not of much interest to you, but if you happen to speak it or come across a translation that I’m not aware of, do give the first book a try.
The protagonist is a lawyer mainly working for a mobster he doesn’t like. He’s increasingly unhappy with his work and life, and his marriage and the relationship with his little daughter are falling apart… until his wife forces him to go to a mindfulness seminar. When he starts applying the things he learns there, his life takes a dramatic turn as the results of his mindfulness are the death of his boss, him taking his place as the leader of a criminal enterprise and eventually using the enterprise’s resources to kill his opponents one by one and secure his daughter a place in kindergarten.
Especially the first book is a pleasant read both for the protagonist’s stoically mindful handling of increasingly violent and unlikely situations and for the actual exercises in mindfulness explained and demonstrated to the reader. You learn both why you should still love your parents-in-law even if you hate their guts (and how to do that) as well as how to correctly detonate a couple of hand grenades taped to a mobster’s nuts, all from the point of view of a very smart lawyer (which the author actually is in real life). In that the book is both educational and entertaining at the same time.
Why do you say this? What gives you the idea that they will face some form of workload pressure because of this?
Oh, I’d be very surprised if any actual personal responsibility found its way to them. But they’re gonna have to look super busy and worried for the press for a while, find somebody else to pin the blame on, call friends in government to ‘expedite’ any investigations and reassure their shareholders. That’s gonna cost them a lot of time they could have spent on nicer things such as working on their handicap, doing coke in the coutry club’s bathroom or firing a couple of hundred workers.
I’m looking forward to the interview with the guy who got fired because he was late for work and offered “an airplane window fell on my car” as an excuse.
The past days have been a mixed bag. I’ve achieved dember’s objective to get everything at work and at home done before the holidays, but failed 2023’s objective to go on vacation at least once this year without getting sick within the first few days. I’m feeling better now but my voice is gone, so no video message or chat with my family or godchild. I didn’t get to spend a lot of time with the latter this year and feel like I’ve sort of failed her. This winter and spring I need to think of some things to do together.
Wanting to spread the holiday cheer (as an unbeliever, Christmas more or less means a break to enjoy time with yourself and your beloved ones), but lack of time and energy means I’ve done the bare minimum this year. Oh well, it’s just one year.
Still, we’re in a very nice and warm place with family, and as Don Hector Salamanca has accurately stated on behalf of apparently pretty much the entire country we’re currently visiting, la familia es todo. And it’s good to see my younger stepdaughter so happy and carefree for a change - she’s had a stressful year, too.
Tomorrow her friend (our fourth, inofficially adopted child) arrives, and in three days we’re on our way to Playa del Carmen where we can introduce the young 'uns to the nice crew at Señor Frog’s and then disappear before embarrassing them any further for being the uncool old farts in the place.
Other than that I expect to spend (and enjoy!) a few weeks without a lot of plans or appointments for a change. Let’s see how that goes.
It probably depends on what you want to achieve. At the moment it’s probably to avoid hyperinflation, another national bankruptcy and poverty levels climbing to new all-time highs. Massa (the other guy) is known for trying to counter the effects of the current massive inflation by printing more money for government subsidies (let that sink in for a moment), so one could argue that whatever Milei actually does, it can’t be worse than that.
His (to put it mildly) over-the-top rhetoric, homophobia/misogyny and the suggestions to sell your organs to make ends meet etc. are different beasts altogether, but I can’t blame the voters for ranking having food on the table higher than strengthening LGBTQ+ rights. I’m grateful I don’t have to make that choice in my own country.
Same here. Milei as an experiment could go either way, but staying the course would have led to certain disaster… and to be frank, the country as a whole doesn’t have a lot to lose at this point anyway.
I think that’s a bit oversimplified. Milei’s no doubt a knob and there’s a good chance he’ll screw up, but the alternative would have been the former minister of economy doing four years of the same, which would have been a 100% chance of screwing up. So before you make any more oversimplified statements, consider the alternative to Milei.
Milei has inherited a country on the brink of economic collapse and hyperinflation, caused by a government that has financed its overspending by just printing more money for decades, and borrowing whatever foreign currency it could. This is obviously not sustainable.
He wants to link the peso to the dollar (so the government can’t print more money at will anymore - not to mention the fact that many transactions are already half-legally done in dollars anyway) and do away with some of the many regulations that the Peronists have been promising for decades will help the economy, but which most experts agree have unsurprisingly crippled it further, and in many cases facilitated corruption.
His opponent’s political program can be summed up as “introduce more subsidies”.
Which one makes more sense to you?
Your guess is as good as mine. 🤷♂️ You know how the things politicians say before the elections and the things they do afterwards don’t necessarily have a lot in common, so I guess it remains exciting.
I admire your pragmatism. It’s a shame it didn’t work out, but at the very least it looks like it’s somehow led you to your second and better match, so there’s that!
Out of nothing more than personal curiosity, where in Germany did you live?
I still have Lieder, die Die Welt Nicht Braucht, by Die Doofen
Aah, I remember owning that one. Personally I’ve filed it under “those were the 90’s and it seemed like a good idea at the time”.
I really like the “for as long as it works” part.
Was that a religious ceremony of some kind or ‘just’ a civil wedding?
The song I picked for my second wedding was not a processional per se, but it was Nicht doof (loosely translated “Not Stupid”) by German band JBO. The male singer sings about how he enjoys somebody’s company because of a list of bad traits she doesn’t have: she’s not ugly, she’s not annoying, her farts don’t smell worse than his, she’s not an idiot etc. The melody is lovely though. The song was in line with the wedding theme, if you can call it that - the main event was a bad taste party at a swinger club, part of which was SO’s idea, which convinced me that she’s the one.
how's your week going, Beehaw
it’s week 2 of 2024 and Holy Fuck Is It Windy Out There right now, oh god
how's your year going, Beehaw
welcome to the new age
WD-40 and some tape are the only tools you need in this life. (pawb.social)
Alaska Airlines grounds 737 Max 9 planes after section blows out mid-air (www.bbc.com)
how's your holidays going, Beehaw
it’s a special Christmas/New Years edition of the Beehaw weekly thread! post all the shenanigans you’re up to
Milei begins dismantling the Argentine State by imposing 300 reforms in a single decree (english.elpais.com)
Argentina presidential election: far-right libertarian Javier Milei wins after rival concedes (www.theguardian.com)
What were your wedding processionals/recessionals and why?
I was just running through these, and, I think they’re rather illuminating....