I had an assistant who didn’t really need the job, but her parents forced her to have one. She was the youngest, and only girl, of a family of 5 siblings. All her older brothers worked at the race track that their family owned, and she was dating someone they didn’t approve of. I liked her boyfriend, he seemed friendly and soft-spoken, but her folks were like “if you’re going to date whom you want, you better have a job and live on your own.” Well, one day, she got mad because I asked her to work a shift she didn’t want to. So she simply didn’t show up, which really fucked me over. So I called her up, pretty pissed. No answer.

She didn’t show up for 3 days. So I fired her for job abandonment. She didn’t really need the job, right? Her parents owned a racetrack.

A week later, her folks called me, and asked if I’d seen her. No, she didn’t show up for work ever again. They panicked. “OMFG WE DON’T KNOW WHERE SHE IS!” They immediately assumed her BF kidnapped and/or murdered her. The police were called, an investigation was opened up. Her BF’s address showed he’d moved away. I had to sit with the police and go through an interrogation about her last whereabouts. She became a missing person, and once a week for two months, her parents called and asked if I had heard anything. The detective called with more questions. Then her car was found in an impound lot: it had been abandoned and looted in a New Jersey parking garage. Then the calls petered off and stopped.

A year went by, and I assumed the worst.

One day, one of the employees in another store in the mall told me he saw her with her BF. I didn’t believe them, but then other people said that they’d seen her, and corroborated some stories she told them. Apparently, she had been planning to run away for some time, and just ran away with her BF and went NC with her family. That didn’t work out so well, because both had trouble finding jobs and then their car got carjacked. Both of them were forced to return home, and her parents were forced to reconcile that she was never going to leave her BF.

I was pretty pissed, though, that I thought she was dead.

Cats can pant, I have seen it happen in times of extreme stress, and is often a bad sign. Like dogs, cats may pant if they are anxious or overheated. Strenuous exercise may be another reason, especially after a huge fight. Once your cat has had a chance to rest, calm down and cool down, this sort of painting should subside. However, even this type of panting is much more rarely seen in cats than in dogs. So, if you’re not 100% positive about why your cat is panting, it’s best to bring her to the vet.

A side note, however, I misread this as “since cat’s don’t like pants like dogs,” and wanted to point out that dogs also do not like to wear pants, before my anti-dyslexia medicine kicked in.

One revolution I have realized in baking is the recent trend to start talking about weight and not volume in recipes for certain dry ingredients like flour. Three cups of fluffy sifted flour is a lot less flour than three cups of densely packed flour. Same with brown sugar, or wondering if you need a “flat teaspoon” vs. a “heaping teaspoon” of something.

When eventually washed off, the aerogel is handily broken down by soil microbes.

I am not going to claim to be an expert on any of this BUT that wording sounds suspiciously like bullshit. Maybe it’s not, but it’s one of those phrases that sounds like when vitamin companies claim that more B12 has shown to fix whatever ails you. Or “our plastic is environmentally friendly: 100% recyclable, and breaks down into teeny micro-particles over time, and gets absorbed by the sea life like ordinary sand…”

That explains why it’s so hot outside.

I have had two tech jobs like that, even before COVID, starting in 2016. The first time, it was a company that outgrew their workspace. They put us in ‘rent-an-office’ spaces for a bit, and then my boss started working from home a few days a week. Then he allowed me to. We moved to a new office, but it was always empty in my section. That was fine, too, but the commute was terrible, so I started doing 2 days a week, then once a week, then a few times a month. I rarely saw my other coworkers in person, and nobody said anything aloud.

The next job started because of COVID, and when they started doing RTO, they also wanted to do “hot desking” (no assigned seating) and open office plans, and I was not having that. I was not going to work in a “cafeteria” like setting. So I got contracted work and have worked from home 100% for several years now. Nobody has office space, and we work all over the world to collaborate. I get paid very well.

I hope i never had to go back to an office. I reach retirement age in about 15 years, and I am hoping to make it.

Trying getting out of that in your 50s with arthritis setting in. Oof.

This was also where “yo momma” insults were also invisible to me. Like, “You don’t even know my mother, you’re just saying that and it makes no sense.” It wasn’t a trigger for me like it was other kids. I saw it for what it was. I’d tell my friends, “they just say that to get you mad, don’t listen,” but they’d get mad anyway. It’s like they couldn’t help it. I think dares were in that headspace as well.

I wasn’t popular growing up. I was really awkward and non-athletic, so I didn’t bow to peer pressure as much as the other kids. I was going to be unpopular either way, so…

I think this is one of the extreme examples of revenge instead of rehabilitation. It’s a prime breeding ground for control freaks who want to punish those that break the rules, and will stop at nothing to try to accomplish this by dealing out damage via a morality defense. And I think a lot of parents know this, at some level, as revenge for not conforming to their definition of normalcy. “Retribution for being bad.” Like mob mentality.

In the bible you get permission to declare your teenager wayward, take them outside the city gates and stone them to death.

I was like, “Really…?” But sure enough:

Deuteronomy 21:18-21

If a man have a stubborn and rebellious son, which will not obey the voice of his father, or the voice of his mother, and that, when they have chastened him, will not hearken unto them. Then shall his father and his mother lay hold on him, and bring him out unto the elders of his city, and unto the gate of his place. And they shall say unto the elders of his city, This our son is stubborn and rebellious, he will not obey our voice; he is a glutton, and a drunkard. And all the men of his city shall stone him with stones, that he die: so shalt thou put evil away from among you; and all Israel shall hear, and fear.

… k.

As a kid, I never got that concept because it seemed like being manipulated. “I dare you to do this dangerous thing for my amusement!” Uh. No? “Chicken!” Okay, whatever, dude.

Wait, didn’t spot become pregnant with an unknown other ship cat? This would imply at least some kind of free roaming.

https://memory-alpha.fandom.com/wiki/Spot

In 2370, Spot became pregnant by one of the twelve male cats aboard the Enterprise-D at that time. Data paid attention to her health, including bringing her to sickbay for a check-up just before giving birth. (TNG: “Genesis”)

I checked a transcript, and saw this line between him an Barclay, implying not only that Spot “escaped,” but that there are other cats also loose:

BARCLAY: I’m curious, sir. Who’s the father?

DATA: I am not certain. Spot has escaped from my quarters on several occasions and there are twelve male felines on board. I intend to run a full DNA analysis on the kittens once they [he is interrupted by Picard on speaker]

I mean, the Roman Empire was an olive tree superorganism. Prove me wrong.

This sounds kind of sad, but bear with me. This was c. 1976-1980.

My father was mostly absent, but I prefered his neglect to his abuse, so that was okay. He’d go on business trips a lot. My mom was an alcoholic, and sometimes she’d be passed out for days. I grew up an only child in a suburban home, and some weekends a year, I had the house to myself. From age 8-12, I had a few weekends here and there where fortune fell upon me and I’d be alone in the house with no real responsibilities. Friday night home from school to Monday morning going to school, all I had to do was check if my mother was still passed out, and if so, it was like one long vacation from my life to be myself. Bonus if there was still food in the house, which usually there was something I could cook myself.

I wasn’t allowed to watch TV as a kid, except sanctioned PBS shows, but we had a small B&W TV in the kitchen for my mom’s soap operas and cooking shows. I’d drag up all my Legos, pour them on the kitchen table, and watch “illegal TV” all weekend while building stuff with my Legos. Eating when I wanted to, or not, and I had free reign of pretty much anything there.

My positive childhood memories are scant and few, and most are just things like that. Like “sometimes the sun came out, if only for a brief time, before the storms returned.” I have a lot more as an adult.

This is something that influences a lot of culture. Like most people when they think of style and decor in the 1980s, are thinking of Los Angeles in the 1980s. The rest of America was not always neon pumps, leg warmers, and thin piano ties.

I had a motherboard like this: the USB ports didn’t work until it booted into an OS. You had to connect a PS2 to make changes in the BIOS, and could only boot from IDE. It was super-annoying.

We had a case not too long ago where someone “recruiting” for one of the GAFAM who was stealing PII by “accepting” applicants, getting their IDs and personal info for supposed employment, and when these people showed up for work, the real company had never heard of them. I think they got 30 people last time.

Not currently, but I did a few sides jobs in the last ten years.

I am a Linux systems administrator. Before I did full contract work, I did part time contract work (alongside my full time salary job) for a general contractor as a piecemeal basis. A job here, 20 hour support there. Some jobs I made $300, some $3000. It was sporadic and came in waves. I got this from a former contract job who recommended me when they folded.

I also did writing gigs. I optioned a few scripts and sold a few short stories. That’s still ongoing, but I haven’t sold anything for a few years.

Mental health never being addressed, so we’re also too tired.

“Decline.”

Working in IT, I have learned that a lot of meetings are by people who gain “respect and notoriety” by having large meetings. It doesn’t matter who shows up, it’s the number, that makes them seem popular. “Get the engineers in here, this is serious business!” You begin to learn which PMs do this, and can respond (or not) accordingly. If they ping you “where are you?” you can say, “I am in an [client] audit call. I cannot leave this call while the audit is taking place.” Or whatever your industry equivalent is. YMMV, some toxic environments I have been in, this was not possible.

I remember one PM was frozen in indecision. I had to tell him, “I can fix the problem, or having a meeting about it. Pick one.”

“Well, both–”

“No. I can fix the problem, or having a meeting about it. Pick one or the other.”

“I need you in this meeting!”

“When we explain to the customer that the fix was delayed by an hour, I can use YOUR name, as having a meeting about it instead of fixing it, correct?”

“The meeting is to be about fixing it!”

“No. I can fix the problem, or having a meeting about it. Pick one or the other.”

“… we can have the meeting in your office, then.”

Eventually, my boss shooed him away.