Idle Chat Thread

clandyone · Post by **clandyone** » Sat Sep 20, 2003 2:26 pm

<hijack>

I just found out that my father's neurotic wife, who is three years older than I, is pregnant. She is due in May. So I, at the age of 25, am to have a new baby brother or sister.

Considering what I know of my stepmother, I am tempted to kidnap it and move to Belize.

I don't really know what to think about this.

</hijack>

Badger · Post by **Badger** » Sat Sep 20, 2003 2:30 pm

I don't really know what to think about this.

1) remember that it wasn't your decision.

2) remember that it isn't your...problem.

3) remember to breath.

4) remember that Belize is really humid.

PJ · Post by PJ » Sat Sep 20, 2003 2:34 pm

clandyone wrote:I just found out that my father's neurotic wife, who is three years older than I, is pregnant. She is due in May. So I, at the age of 25, am to have a new baby brother or sister.

Considering what I know of my stepmother, I am tempted to kidnap it and move to Belize.

I don't really know what to think about this.

Tough decision. Not only does Belize have a lovely barrier reef, it also has some tropical rain forest. On the other hand, plenty of neuroses are heritable. Tough call. You might have to poison it and flee justice to Belize--that'd solve all the problems.

OregonRed · Post by **OregonRed** » Sat Sep 20, 2003 2:38 pm

PJ sez

You might have to poison it and flee justice to Belize--that'd solve all the problems.

But then she couldn't come to BRC, and THAT would be tragic.

clandyone · Post by **clandyone** » Sat Sep 20, 2003 3:10 pm

Badger wrote:
I don't really know what to think about this.
1) remember that it wasn't your decision.

2) remember that it isn't your...problem.

3) remember to breath.

4) remember that Belize is really humid.

Oh, I'm not meddling; it's their perfect right to reproduce and it's not my place to tell them what to do. It's just that my father will be 70 by the time my new sibling graduates from high school, and knowing my stepmother... I pity that kid. Also, they are quite isolated geographically and socially, so it will have very little in the way of other influences.

Fortunately my husband and I will be moving down there (there being south Texas) sometime in the next five years, to pursue our dream of starting a B&B/roadhouse/residency program for itinerant artists, so we'll be able to import a lot of nice freaks for the kid to grow up around, and I hope we'll also be able to derail my stepmother's (inevitably completely inept) parenting.

I also don't mind humid.

nymphgonebad · Post by **nymphgonebad** » Sat Sep 20, 2003 3:30 pm

with a kick-ass big sister like yourself, i'm certain she'll be just fine, no matter how inept her mother is. my niece ( the light and love of my life ) is more mature at 6 1/2 years than both her parents put together.

JonoVision · Post by **JonoVision** » Sun Sep 21, 2003 10:19 am

Lust4Life wrote: Been forever since I drank free beer at Austin City Limits. Ir anything in Austin. How's life in River City?

Yeah it's not so bad, though I'm just passing through and not really qualified to give an opinion on actually living here. But if I were to spend another five years in the State that Rhymes with Excess (perish the thought), I'd be here with all the godless pinko queer liberals for sure.

stu · Post by **stu** » Sun Sep 21, 2003 10:36 am

Hey Jono! Good to hear you are not in Baja yet, what with a hurricane blowing in and all.

Too bad I won't be there to see you wandering through the crowd in your jumpsuit; it would be kinda interesting to see the homeland security forces jumping on your ass as you leave people dropping to the ground after you pass by.

JonoVision · Post by **JonoVision** » Sun Sep 21, 2003 10:51 am

STU! I've been hoping to hear from you too compadre. Drop me an email when you get a chance -- I lost your addy and it's not in your profile.

Courtney got her pics back and there's a stellar one of you in front of the hanging granite thingy. If you give me a specific location for your bit of the northern woods I will make sure you get a copy.

Yeah it was pretty amusing to wander through the hordes of UT bubblegum girls and backwardcap boys. Got more than a few "ewww"'s, which made it most worthwhile.

Booker · Post by **Booker** » Sun Sep 21, 2003 2:05 pm

my husband and I will be moving down there (there being south Texas)

Say it ain't so! Couldn't that artist colony take root someplace else? In fact, are you SURE you'll get artists to come join you there? Ye gods! But hey, whatever works for ya.

I actually thought about the Belize emigration thing back in the late days of the Reagan administration. In retrospect, might not have been such a bad idear. Was gonna do the aquaculture thing: "Whoopie-tie-yi-yo, get along little shrimpy. It's yore misfortune and none of my own . . . " I'm not fond of mosquitos though.

PJ · Post by PJ » Sun Sep 21, 2003 2:42 pm

Booker wrote:I actually thought about the Belize emigration thing back in the late days of the Reagan administration. I'm not fond of mosquitoes though.

Why Belize? Why Reagan? (I myself had to emigrate to Antarctica during the Carter administration. Jobs for recent grads were nonexistent in central Minnesota at the time. Mosquitoes were plenty thick however.)

I spent a week in the rain forest of Belize and never saw a single biting or stinging insect. I was dumbfounded. Peoples' homes had no walls. Good roofs, but no walls. The only bugs I remember seeing were a couple of fireflies, which flew through one "wall" and out the other as I laid in bed.

Saw lots of big bats though, and surely they were eating something.

Angry Butterfly · Post by **Angry Butterfly** » Sun Sep 21, 2003 2:57 pm

UG. I had something simalar happen to me, my unmarried, man hating, 18 year old drop out chainsmoking evil stepsister got pregnant, My brother's wife was more Mad than I was, but that doesnt mean I wasn't a little p.o.ed. We were sure that baby was going to kill my dad, anyway, I said before i belive in the universal plan, right? On the way home from having to deal with this information while taking care of my dad after he had his brian tumor removed I met a girl in a similar situation, who's baby had died, and she saw 3 angels the next morning and she decided to leave her abusive boyfriend, and turn her life around, soon she found out she was expecting twins from the same guy, she left him anyway. So anyway, this girl inspired me to be more sympathetic to my evil stepsister. But the universe and chainsmoking took care of it, and now she takes birth control.

clandyone · Post by **clandyone** » Mon Sep 22, 2003 1:28 pm

Booker wrote:
my husband and I will be moving down there (there being south Texas)
Say it ain't so! Couldn't that artist colony take root someplace else? In fact, are you SURE you'll get artists to come join you there? Ye gods! But hey, whatever works for ya.

Actually, yes. We're eyeballing the area immediately north of San Antonio, which is actually a surprisingly bohemian place in its odd way, and of course Austin is nearby and as arty as all get-out. The area is also crawling with burners, and as Flipside gains momentum there will probably be even more folks out there representin'.

Also, land is cheap, regulations about what one does on one's own land are minimal, and I just like the place. It's weird and friendly, and we're kinda fed up with not having any breathing room here in the big city. The scorpions and man-eating mosquitoes are a bit of a problem, but c'est la vie.

I think we're capable of creating a "destination" spot for the likeminded, and are looking at other, similar projects elsewhere to figure out how best to approach it.

Rabbi Dali Rick · Post by **Rabbi Dali Rick** » Mon Sep 22, 2003 2:13 pm

clandyone wrote:looking at other, similar projects elsewhere to figure out how best to approach it.

Which similar projects any links?

"Don't put that in your mouth!"

emphaticly,
the rebbi

RebA! · Post by **RebA!** » Mon Sep 22, 2003 5:28 pm

So i am checking the stats of our burning man site just for shits and giggles. ANd then I saw they have the search terms people used to find our site thru google etc.

One of the ones that comes up a lot is shade structure. But I came across one that totally had me rolling.

It was "Suckoff"

I havent laughed that hard in a long time.

Booker · Post by **Booker** » Mon Sep 22, 2003 7:25 pm

Does sound nice, clandy. You every heard anything about the San Luis Valley in so. central Colorado? Many of the same characteristics you mention with better views (I'll wager) but most probably tougher winters. And Flipside would be more distant. Lotsa hot springs around to make up for both o' those last two, though.

precipitate · Post by **precipitate** » Tue Sep 23, 2003 6:07 pm

Bye, kids. I'm going home for the day.

I was in meetings all afternoon so I have 162 unread messages that are
now going to be MARKED READ. Harrumph.

girlie · Post by **girlie** » Wed Sep 24, 2003 12:31 pm

Going crazy in my cubicle. Must vent. No responses needed.

I don't like my job. I mean, i like aspects of it, and there are some days
when neat things happen, and occasionally i learn something new -- but
overall my job completely uninspires me and drains my soul. And i
always forget how much worse that soul sucking feels in the couple
months after burning man. Ugh. But i'm stuck here until my green card
comes in (actually, i'll be here for at least six months after my card
comes in) so i've got to come up with new ways to get into my job.

Every few months i ask my boss for more work (i need to be busy to be
productive) and never really get enough. There is tons of good work i
could create for myself here if i could get myself motivated, but every
time i recommit myself to my work that commitment only seems to last a
couple of days. Sometimes i try just not caring that i'm underutilized,
underworked and bored, but that just isn't me. I feel bad 'cuz i know i'm
not doing as good a job as i could. And it really freaks me out that
i've been here so long (almost 6 years now). Should i have left sooner
and gone back to Canada? Am i a fool for making this kind of
commitment to this wacked out, war-mongering country?

I dreamt last night that my green card had finally arrived (it's a few years
late). The struggle to drag myself out of bed and into the office after such
a dream was so pathetically sad. I hate being pathetically sad.

The worse part about this is that i'm still scared stiff that i won't be able to
figure out a new career for myself and will end up staying here long after
my green card arrives. I'm such a sucker for stability.

So, here i am. I've made myself a nice "to do" list for the day. But i
haven't done anything on it. I'll probably let it sit until 4pm and wait til my
procrastination adrenaline kicks in to get it all done. Or maybe i'll go
have a smoke and try to start in on some of it now.

Ugh.

Niacin · Post by **Niacin** » Wed Sep 24, 2003 12:36 pm

I dig on my job. It's really boring at times, but I get to play with some really cool tech, and I travel a lot. This year I've been to New York, Chicago 2x, Indianapolis 2x, and Spanish Cay in the Bahamas six days before going to Burning Man.

Perfect warm-up vacation.

Cheers,
Max

Ivy · Post by **Ivy** » Wed Sep 24, 2003 12:41 pm

Girile, I know you said no need to respond, but I just want to say "I hear ya sister" 'cause I feel like I'm in the same boat. Replace "waiting for the green card" with "paying off my bills" and we'd be the same employee...

PJ · Post by PJ » Wed Sep 24, 2003 12:47 pm

Ivy wrote:...Replace "waiting for the green card" with "paying off my bills" and we'd be the same employee.

The trick is to not let what would be unnecessary and foolish expenditures begin to seem important to you. Otherwise you'll end up a wage slave. And those wages can never be enough.

Simplify.

Ivy · Post by **Ivy** » Wed Sep 24, 2003 12:56 pm

I'm doing my best, PJ.

But damn, those vibrators are expensive. And you know that's not a foolish expenditure...

PJ · Post by PJ » Wed Sep 24, 2003 1:02 pm

Ivy wrote:damn, those vibrators are expensive. And you know that's not a foolish expenditure...

Agreed. Some things are necessities: food, oxygen, water, female orgasms. That's pretty much it though.

Ivy · Post by **Ivy** » Wed Sep 24, 2003 1:04 pm

Agreed. Some things are necessities: food, oxygen, water, female orgasms. That's pretty much it though.

Rest assured, that's where the money goes.

girlie · Post by **girlie** » Wed Sep 24, 2003 1:10 pm

>> The trick is to not let what would be unnecessary and foolish expenditures begin to seem important to you. Otherwise you'll end up a wage slave.

That's the other part of what i've got to figure out next year -- what do i
really need to live comfortably.

I'm in the process of paying off a bunch of debt and will be able to save a
bunch of money next year. Assuming my green card actually arrives
sometime within the next few months (that is the new estimate from the
lawyers [however i'll admit that they've said that 4 years in a row now]) i
should be able to leave my job or at least take a big leave of absence
next fall. I feel like i need a good stretch off time off to work on personal
projects and figure out what i may wanna do next.

However i'm torn because once i get all that money saved it seems like i
should use it to buy some land or something instead of using it for
personal development. So i need to think about what i need more --
time or real estate.

girlie · Post by **girlie** » Wed Sep 24, 2003 1:53 pm

>> Ask me about kneecapping crickets sometime.

Precipiate, can you tell us about kneecapping crickets?

precipitate · Post by **precipitate** » Wed Sep 24, 2003 2:50 pm

Kneecapping Crickets, or How I Grossed Out My Roommate

For years I had firebellied toads. They're small semi-aquatic amphibians.
They spend most of their time in the water, but feed on land. They eat
small insects, worms, grubs, etc. I've heard that they'll occasionally go
after small fish, but they never did in my tank.

They're incredibly horny little fuckers. The only one with a name was
Randy. He'd latch on to anything of approximately the right size and
clasp his forelegs around it, I guess waiting for it to become receptive.
I had all male toads, which I know because they make this "Get the fuck
off me, dumbass!" noise when mounted by another male.

So they're not really all that bright. I mean, they're toads, granted, but
Randy couldn't tell the difference between floating cork, my finger, and
another toad. Or maybe he just didn't care.

I had my toads in a river tank. That is, a tank with part land and part
running water. The tank was about 2/3 water, 1/3 heavily planted land.
The land area designed to allow the toads to eat and to provide shelter
for them when they were out of the water. The water area had a high
area, a low area, and a waterfall between the two. I had zebra danios
in the water that loved swimming up the waterfall. They kept breeding in
the tank, so I eventually had to move them elsewhere or be inundated
with fry.

The primary food for the toads was crickets, because they're cheap,
abundant, and were being fed to my other reptiles so I had a ready
supply.

Now, crickets are dumb too. They seem to have this incredible affinity
for water deeper than their legs, in which they drown. They also use their
powerful jumping legs to escape capture and when panicked. So when
you dump crickets into a river tank at feeding time, one of their
immediate reactions is to bounce bounce bounce all over the place,
eventually ending up in the water.

This is difficult with firebellied toads, because they don't generally try to
eat anything that's in the water. So you end up with a whole bunch of
dead or dying crickets in this running water and you have to fish them
out one by one to throw them away, or place the live ones (gently, ever
so gently) back on land so they can be eaten. And sticking your hand in
the tank tends to make the toads jump in the water even if they'd been
on land trying to feed, so you're really back at square one. Because the
toads are so dumb, they'll wait a long time before noticing that that thing
they were chasing earlier is still running around just asking to be eaten,
by which time several of the crickets will have tried to commit suicide
again and you have to reach in and rescue them. Repeat ad nauseum.

The solution: kneecap the crickets. If they can't jump, they're a lot less
likely to end up in the water because instead they'll scurry for cover in the
plants, which is where the toads lie in wait for them (well, sorta; firebellied
toads feeding is never as graceful as all that).

The procedure is simple. Take a cricket and grasp it gently but firmly by
the thorax. Using your fingernails or tweezers, gently squeeze the hind
leg just above the knee until it pops. The cricket will drop the entire leg
as a defense mechanism. Dispose of leg. Repeat on other side. Place
cricket in tank, where it can still drown but can't jump willy nilly into the
water. This is also a good method for feeding smaller, slower reptiles
that have trouble catching a whole, hale cricket.

Now, the difficulty for me in this whole scenario was step three of the
above procedure: Dispose of leg. I'd feed the toads a couple of times
a week, about two dozen crickets. That's four dozen legs. I generally
used the ash tray in the living room as a temporary cricket leg receptacle.
And I generally remembered to empty it immediately upon kneecapping
the final cricket. Alas, once or twice I forgot and my roommate came
home to bowl o' legs in her living room. She was pretty cool about most
of the odd stuff I did, but somehow the little bowl of disembodied limbs
(with little bits of cricket muscle hanging off the ends of some) was a bit
much. I guess I can't really blame her.

TestesInSac · Post by **TestesInSac** » Wed Sep 24, 2003 3:17 pm

Ok, LMAO!

Kinetic · Post by **Kinetic** » Wed Sep 24, 2003 3:40 pm

Umm., well....about Precip and her last post....

First there's the Gigsville card with a very impressive display of weaponry.

Then we have kneecapped crickets and cricket legs lying around the house.

Anyone else notice an overall theme here?

(I'll start queing up the Godfather music anytime now)

precipitate · Post by **precipitate** » Wed Sep 24, 2003 3:42 pm

Hey, why do you think I ended up in the 7th circle of hell (Violent)?

Idle Chat Thread

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