Thread "2016 Rant/Share/General Discussion Thread" in forum "Comic Talk and General Discussion *"

Posted at 8:05PM, May. 31, 2016

bravo1102 wrote:
So the government can't restrict various freedoms but every private institution can and does.

Very cannily said!

ayesinback wrote:
The most fun factoid is that we are descended from some guy in Medieval France who was entitled "The Rude". I imagine that you can't get much ruder that someone the French deem rude.

"Rude" had a couple of meanings back then I think…
It's related to "rudimentary", it can mean "rough", "course", "crude", "simple", "basic", "nasty": Not only in the literal sense of what those words mean but also the symbolic meanings.
So he could have been a nasty, uncouth man, or a simple, rough hewn, brash sort of fellow maybe?
I LOVE the English language and how varied the meanings can be ^_^

Posted at 9:06AM, Jun. 1, 2016

Hah, the ancestry thing is interesting… well elements of mine are but it only goes so far. Most interesting part of mine is the Russian aspect as my great grandfather escaped a Gulag and hiked across Siberia eating roots and made his way to England and changed his surname to what my family name is now and so on.

My battle with anxiety etc had been going well. I even secured myself a new job which paid very well, but anxiety got the better of me and I never even made it to start working. Dammit! I guess I wasn't as ready as I thought.

Posted at 4:06PM, Jun. 1, 2016

I have some ancestors on my mother's side who were sent to Siberia where they were never heard from again.

My great great grandfather Augustus on my father's side was supposedly a very rude fellow. He was kicked out of the North Carolina volunteers during the Mexican American War but still managed to obtain a pension. He was every bit the rough hewn, curmudgeonly type. The stories of the bouts of melancholy start with his son. So it turns out depression runs in the family.

Posted at 6:06PM, Jun. 1, 2016

ozoneocean wrote:
"Rude" had a couple of meanings back then I think…
It's related to "rudimentary", it can mean "rough", "course", "crude", "simple", "basic", "nasty": Not only in the literal sense of what those words mean but also the symbolic meanings.
So he could have been a nasty, uncouth man, or a simple, rough hewn, brash sort of fellow maybe?
I LOVE the English language and how varied the meanings can be ^_^

Don't forget the other meaning - healthy, as in "He enjoyed a sort of rude health on account of his eating mainly grasshoppers". Maybe he was just very keen on excercise and healthy eating?

I haven't been back too far with ancestors, but the ones I've heard about seem more sociable than rude, such as the coachman who ran over the highwaymen attempting to hold him up. Apparently, he was so drunk at the reins, he neither saw them or heard them shouting stand and deliver.

Posted at 10:06PM, Jun. 2, 2016

Well… read an old article about a well known former Trademark Troll named Timothy Langdell. Obviously NOT a game developer, but he trademarked the word "Edge" and all of its similar forms in order to sue any game company that used the word in the title but has never made a game himself. And apparently he had two programmers working for him while in England only to sell their work for himself and fleeing England so he wouldn't be forced to pay them.

He could've kept going as a Trademark Troll but decided he could sue a company as big as Electronic Arts. It was like poking a very hungry grizzly bear with a stick. You can guess how that went down…

And I'm surprised he didn't get into more trouble for evidence he apparently fabricated to defend his ownership of the trademark…

https://www.rockpapershotgun.com/2011/06/16/tim-langdell-loses-in-future-edge-trial/#more-62378

I wonder though… where is he now? Hopefully on the run from all the companies he sued over a common word that should not have been trademarked in the first place…

Posted at 11:06AM, Jun. 4, 2016

Ironscarf wrote:
I haven't been back too far with ancestors, but the ones I've heard about seem more sociable than rude, such as the coachman who ran over the highwaymen attempting to hold him up. Apparently, he was so drunk at the reins, he neither saw them or heard them shouting stand and deliver.

Hahahaha! Take that Dick Turpin you piece of shit! XD

Family trees are weird… I mean the traditional idea of them is hat two ancient progenitors produce this ever expanding brood that goes down through time, generation after generation in an expanding tree-shape…

Which is all complete bullshit.
Actual family trees go the complete opposite direction. YOU are the apex of it, and after you it gets bigger and bigger as it goes back through the years, till you're related to almost everybody and the generations are thousands of people wide.
We tend to follow meandering paths of interest through those massive trees, because it's impossible to trace everyone in them so we pick out our own little paths and think that here's something special and singular about it, when really the only special thing was that we were able to trace it at all, while the rest of the gigantic tree is a complete blank to us.

I know I'm thinking too much about it.

Posted at 1:06PM, Jun. 4, 2016

Great. An old cartoon show I watched as a kid is getting a reboot. And Pixar is doing this! Even better… people who worked on Legend of Korra are working on this too! Now I have to revive my Netflix subscription because all the episodes of the show they're working on will be there… -_-

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MtqKaUc6Uas
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7MfB_0nTi-4

Posted at 4:06PM, Jun. 4, 2016

Having lived with my wife's genealogy hobby and gone to several conferences (she's at one now ) I can say you're completely off track.

They get the whole expanding tree and they want to trace down every little twig going back as far as they can. Most dead end when records become scarce. Anyone saying with certainty about things before the Middle Ages is extrapolating from a few scraps of information.

Usually someone can only go back to one or two progenitors because that is the only line that can be traced. The other names of wives and children just weren't recorded. Even well known figures didn't have their births or family relationships reliably recorded and certainly not the vast multitudes. Look at Shakespeare. And it's so easy to make up family trees as was often done to trace some current king to Troy or even Adam and Eve.

So they track down whatever branch they can and expand it out as far as they can constantly looking for more scraps of information to add more and more branches out into some mitochondrial eve in Africa hundreds of thousands of years ago. And she may have only been one of several .

Posted at 5:06PM, Jun. 4, 2016

That's exactly what I was saying though Bravo!
We can only trace back so far because all the other parts of the tree are blank to us. So we develop an artificial picture of tree shape with two people at the top, just because that's as far back as we can go.
If there are more results we develop artificial lines of importance, like tracing down from the "male line", as if that matters…

The data is still genuine, but the way we look at it is all a cultural construction.

Posted at 5:06PM, Jun. 4, 2016

Those two people at the top are usually a couple whose arrival someplace was recorded. Migration is a constant. So the tree goes back to the guy and his often nameless wife who came someplace hoping for a better life.

Genealogy is a cultural construction that is nearly universal among the whole species from Africa to Asia and the Pacific rim. So if all those cultures make the same thing again and again there is probably something deeper at work. If every time you make a wheel it's still round, it could be because physical laws of motion indicate round things roll better.

Posted at 10:06PM, Jun. 4, 2016

just gonna casually slide in and drop this little anecdote here.

So we just bought a house and spent the weekend moving in from our apartment. Hooray? Well, after dealing with my boyfriend messing up the moving truck reservation and getting a truck half the size of the one we needed, me coming down with bronchitis they day of the move, the seller nearly getting in a fight with us after we pointed out that the windows weren't fixed to the specifications he had claimed, and a good 15-minute panic attack when I thought one of my cats had gone missing (spoiler: she was behind the washing machine), we finally threw a blanket and some pillows atop our mattress and eagerly called it a night…

… for about three hours. Surprise! Our new neighbor has a pet rooster! A pet rooster that likes to gargle around right outside the master bedroom window!

We're referring to it as Richard. For obvious, nickname-related purposes :P

Posted at 11:06PM, Jun. 4, 2016

CZweig wrote:
We're referring to it as Richard. For obvious, nickname-related purposes :P

HAHAHAHA! What a dick cock! XD
Congrats on moving to your new house!

Posted at 12:06PM, Jun. 6, 2016

My last name is Shearin, and now everybody asks me if I'm related to the Singer (Ed Sheeran). At first I didn't know about the guy and was like "I have a great uncle named Ed, How'd you know?"
It's everywhere I go now. the grocery store, vendors at work. I'm going to start saying yes and making up fun holiday stories.

Posted at 1:06PM, Jun. 6, 2016

CZweig wrote:
just gonna casually slide in and drop this little anecdote here.

So we just bought a house …. Surprise! Our new neighbor has a pet rooster! A pet rooster that likes to gargle around right outside the master bedroom window!

We're referring to it as Richard. For obvious, nickname-related purposes :P

Congrats on the house, and commiserations on the rooster. Does your neighbour also have chickens? 'Cause at least then you might get some eggs for your troubles. If not, consider getting some chickens yourself. Or a velociraptor. Or just a cat named 'Velociraptor'.

Posted at 5:06PM, Jun. 6, 2016

My sister in law is looking at getting chickens. Just hens though she doesn't want any crowing. Of course her town is known for its growing population of foxes. I see them every night at work.

Posted at 5:06PM, Jun. 6, 2016

Bruno Harm wrote:
My last name is Shearin, and now everybody asks me if I'm related to the Singer (Ed Sheeran). At first I didn't know about the guy and was like "I have a great uncle named Ed, How'd you know?"

I share my name with an entertainer and song stylist. I have gotten phone calls asking if I was "Steve Willoughby the entertainer. "

——-
On a different note I saw the first two episodes of new season of Game of Thrones. And last night had a dream where I was drenched in blood and looking for a weapon to take my vengeance and a clean bathroom because I had to urinate. On top of that my father and brother were insisting I type reports for them or the mob would come finish the job on me.

Posted at 9:06PM, Jun. 6, 2016

Gunwallace wrote:
Or a velociraptor. Or just a cat named 'Velociraptor'.

Would a guinea pig named "Velociraptor" make for a great pet? :)

Posted at 9:06PM, Jun. 6, 2016

Super stressful week. I've been neglecting you guys a bit.

My dad went to cash out an RESP that he and my mom had opened years ago for my two sisters and me. Unfortunately it was in both my parents' names, and my mom insisted to the people at the bank (without discussing with any of us) that half of the money be sent to her, and half to my dad. Since then she's refused to answer text messages and emails from myself, my sisters and my dad, other than a vague assertion to my younger sister that she is planning on "reinvesting" it. Basically she seems to have absconded with our university money. So that's super shitty. After two messages with no response, I sent her a third one just telling her that I'm done. It's sort of a relief in a way, but I've always been waiting for the sky to fall every day since.

Posted at 1:06PM, Jun. 7, 2016

HippieVan wrote:
Super stressful week. I've been neglecting you guys a bit.

My dad went to cash out an RESP that he and my mom had opened years ago for my two sisters and me. Unfortunately it was in both my parents' names, and my mom insisted to the people at the bank (without discussing with any of us) that half of the money be sent to her, and half to my dad. Since then she's refused to answer text messages and emails from myself, my sisters and my dad, other than a vague assertion to my younger sister that she is planning on "reinvesting" it. Basically she seems to have absconded with our university money. So that's super shitty. After two messages with no response, I sent her a third one just telling her that I'm done. It's sort of a relief in a way, but I've always been waiting for the sky to fall every day since.

Owch… yikes… Honestly, I didn't think mothers could do that to their own children. If my mother were alive now and read this, she'd be horrified… O_O

Hopefully you have other sources of income to draw upon for your university years. :(

Posted at 4:06PM, Jun. 7, 2016

HippieVan wrote:
Super stressful week. I've been neglecting you guys a bit.

My dad went to cash out an RESP that he and my mom had opened years ago for my two sisters and me. Unfortunately it was in both my parents' names, and my mom insisted to the people at the bank (without discussing with any of us) that half of the money be sent to her, and half to my dad. Since then she's refused to answer text messages and emails from myself, my sisters and my dad, other than a vague assertion to my younger sister that she is planning on "reinvesting" it. Basically she seems to have absconded with our university money. So that's super shitty. After two messages with no response, I sent her a third one just telling her that I'm done. It's sort of a relief in a way, but I've always been waiting for the sky to fall every day since.

Sorry this happened…
Money and family doesn't mix well

I've learned that in the past

Posted at 7:06PM, Jun. 7, 2016

Sorry to hear that, Hippie; it's gotta be rough to deal with.

Posted at 2:06AM, Jun. 8, 2016

HippieVan wrote:
After two messages with no response, I sent her a third one just telling her that I'm done. It's sort of a relief in a way, but I've always been waiting for the sky to fall every day since.

The hard thing in these kinds of situation is to give the money up as basically "lost". She MAY have a change of heart and return it in future but it's very unlikely.

Being on good terms with her is more important than money, no matter how much you needed it and how much you lost. You can't get it back any easier by being on bad terms with her or severing communication anyway.

My advice would be to "forget" the money issue for now and bury the hatchet. Reconcile with her.
You could always guilt trip her later if she tried to be silly about something else like that in the future.

Posted at 3:06AM, Jun. 8, 2016

Holy fuck, for real? I don't mean to be harsh but that's super dumb advice to give to someone. Especially when you don't know the entire situation or the history of a relationship. My relationship with my mom has *never* been good. She left my sisters and I and moved across the country, for goodness sake. She belittles me, laughs at me when I share my feelings, and has never respected my boundaries. She has paid far less in child support for myself and my little sister than she ought to, all the while buying a big country house, a new phone, pets, a fancy camera, a trip to Africa, a tablet, etc. She made me spend time with her abusive alcoholic father. She refuses to communicate or outright lies when things go wrong. Even when I was a young kid, our relationship was always on her terms; spending time with her meant doing the things she liked to do.
The fact that I'm finally ready to stand up for myself and stop letting her hurt me endlessly is a good thing. It's a pretty important step for me really.

Edit: I really shouldn't have to add all that to justify my decision, either. "She stole from me the one time she had access to my money, knowing it was intended for my education" isn't a solid basis for any kind of relationship, nevermind a familial one.

Posted at 4:06AM, Jun. 8, 2016

Sorry Hippie, I didn't know all the full story of your relationship history with her. I was going off of the experiences in my own extended family with the feuds and money issues that have happened over he decades. There's always some huge sticking point that people let get between them that causes more and more issues for years after.

In your case it seems to be an issue of a "last straw". I understand that. It's a little different.

Posted at 7:06AM, Jun. 8, 2016

Hippie, I'm really sorry about how your Mom continues to fail at mothering.

My 2 brothers and I still rant about ours, and almost wish she would have abandoned us since she made it abundantly clear over the years what disappointments we are (well, not so much the MBA/CPA/JD one, except he's gay, so…).

I have trust issues that will probably always trip me up because of the parenting I got. So creating boundaries is critical. Definitely give yourself the space you need.

But I urge you not to use the word "never," ever.

My Mom is very ill now (a rather rare disorder related to Parkinson's). She can barely speak (it's a mental battle, and she had had a 149 IQ – I can guess what torture it is for her), so she has to choose what she's going to say. And after 50 years, she is now telling me that she loves me.

It doesn't make up for everything in the past, but being a parent myself, I realize how parents can be very faulty creatures. Some faults can't be forgiven, but life continues to reshape us all.

Give yourself the peace you need and deserve, but I urge you not to make any ultimatum that would grieve you in the future.

I 'm truly hoping the best for you.