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.
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?
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.
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.
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.
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.
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.
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!
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.
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.
Not to defend Milei (he’s a total knob), but one could argue that Argentina’s social infrastructure is a big part of the problem. The state has been notorious for spending much more money than it makes for decades… and still poverty is rampant and rapidly increasing in many parts of the country. It’s obvious that the established system simply doesn’t work, and hasn’t worked for decades.
Doing away with corruption would obviously be a great thing, but the fact remains that too many people are dependent on some kind of government subsidy either because it’s the easiest way (heavily subsidised parts of the economy, cozy government ‘job’, …) or because they simply have no other option due to the bad economy.
the practice decidedly does not correspond with their stated principles for most of them
No argument here. It just bugs me how some people misappropriate words. It’s a bit like Swiss neo-Nazis having resorted to calling themselves “patriots”. Being a racist bellend doesn’t make you a patriot, just as wanting to roll back several decades of gender equality doesn’t make you a libertarian.
I just wish that people would understand that if you’re afraid to call yourself what you really are in public, you should probably reconsider your ideology, not the word you use to describe it. Yes, I’m aware that that’s asking too much.
I agree with you on the healthcare, but that’s not where I’d start changing things. The main problem I see (and our friends/relatives in Argentina tell us about) is that the state is expected to pay for a lot of basic necessities because people, even those with a full-time job, can’t afford them… and the various governments have a habit of doing the worst possible thing.
For instance when electricity prices exploded in 2019/2020, the government apparently paid out 5000 pesos to every household but did nothing to address the root cause. Another time retired people got a flat fee of 6000 pesos. No money went into improving the country’s electricity grid or power efficiency (or no money that wasn’t somehow ‘lost’ underway, anyways).
The same goes for unemployment money. While it is important, in the long term it would make more sense to create an environment where the economy can prosper instead of paying the unemployed what is frankly a pittance. Most unemployed people would rather work than live off welfare, if given the chance.
But then there’s the challenge of transforming the existing economy, especially industry, into something sustainable that could survive without heavy government subsidies. But that discussion is going to lead to a fundamental discussion about peronism, so let’s not go there please.
A lot of these things are probably at least partially caused by incompetence, but that’s not a valid excuse IMO. If you run for office, you should bring the necessary qualifications, and also be able to judge the qualifications of the people working for you
Personally I find it difficult to call him a libertarian when there are so many existing liberties that he wants to make illegal (see the parts of his agenda labelled ‘homophobia’ and ‘misogyny’).
Not that a label being misleading would ever have stopped a politician from applying it to themselves as long as they think it gets them votes…
So I know Halloween isn’t a day with a huge meal tradition like xmas or tday, but I’m having some dear friends stay with me that weekend and I would love to cook up something Halloweeny. So I’m curious, do any of you have any go-to meals/dishes for Halloween? No real requirements here, it can be outright spooky/gross or...
The above is sound advice. I’d like to add a generous amount of butter to the list - it adds flavour and smoothness.
Speaking of which, you also may want to add one small potato per pumpkin, though I wouldn’t experiment with this until the potato-less soup is in a satisfactory state.
Also, try using a high-quality vegetable broth instead of salt for seasoning. Go easy on the other spices then.
how's your week going, Beehaw
currently on book 4 for the year (goal of 40)
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 year going, Beehaw
welcome to the new age
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)
Argentina’s gig workers are rallying against regulation — and supporting the libertarian candidate (restofworld.org)
Give me your favorite Halloween meals! (beehaw.org)
So I know Halloween isn’t a day with a huge meal tradition like xmas or tday, but I’m having some dear friends stay with me that weekend and I would love to cook up something Halloweeny. So I’m curious, do any of you have any go-to meals/dishes for Halloween? No real requirements here, it can be outright spooky/gross or...