You know, I'm actually okay with this. The biggest problem with Twilight was Stephanie Meyer's writing prowess - or lack thereof - but it's still a universe where there's interesting things to be done. I mean, tell me you don't want to hear a story about almost indestructible diamond golems that run on oil strained from mammalian blood who drive totally sweet cars, because that's Twilight right there.
It's fucking depressing the degree to which people don't seem to acknowledge or understand the pretty significant cultural shift in the US post 9/11. Younger people tend to make pithy, dismissive comparisons to the Cold War, etc. It's just unnerving. The US is far more paranoid at all levels of society than it was before that day, the PATRIOT Act, etc. Lockdown drills and man traps on schools and "I bet I'm on a watchlist" jokes that are only half jokes and on and on and on.
Sure, the Red Scare was fucked, but this shit is far more fundamental and really disturbing.
I personally just find the irony of the mantra "Don't let the terrorists win" amazing, because the integration of said mantra into the general psyche of the US is what made the terrorists win to an extend.
You can still come back from that if you do well on the others. I always fuck up with first tests because I either kill it then think the second one will be as easy or I do horrible and actually study for the next tests.
Also always talk to the teacher about it. See what they say. Sometimes they will give you special opportunities to prove yourself. It's insane how much people don't exploit teacher determination in college because they don't talk to them at all.
You can still come back from that if you do well on the others. I always fuck up with first tests because I either kill it then think the second one will be as easy or I do horrible and actually study for the next tests.
Also always talk to the teacher about it. See what they say. Sometimes they will give you special opportunities to prove yourself. It's insane how much people don't exploit teacher determination in college because they don't talk to them at all.
Not the worse advice, but if I wait to see how well I do on the second test I'm strapped in for the ride as it happens after the last day to withdraw. Also the professor made it pretty clear we don't get extra credit or special opportunities. I might see how I do on these next couple quizzes, but that was the easiest test and I got two questions right on it (his format is a little wonky).
FWIW I was pretty much in the same position as you and still pulled a B I think from the first Physics. I got like a 30 or 40 on the first test. I even did bad on the second one too if I remember right. But I got like near perfect scores on the 3rd test and the final. Plus I did pretty well on the homework.
One of my classmates from my first degree came back from a holiday to the US and her favourite thing in New York was watching a canoli eating competition. I'm not sure that it would be my highlight but I guess everyone has their own experiences.
No but really WTF, there were photos of a crowd of people watching 3 people jam food into their mouth.
Sad news. Aidan’s brother Bernard has just phoned to say that Aidan has only a few days to live. I went to see him on Tuesday and he was very weak but insisting that he did not wish to go into a hospice. Bernard and his mother, Maureen, are respecting his wish and he will stay at home.
Bernard asked me to pass on the news to the juggling community. I am just emailing those few people for whom I have email addresses; would you please let Aidan’s many friends around the world know. Anyone is welcome to contact me for more information if they wish.
Tudor
At least this time I got to spend some time with friend with cancer before he died, as Aidan stayed in with me in my parents' campervan for a week during a juggling festival in April. Still sucks.
My spine is fractured in 3 or 4 places and I'm finding it rather difficult to stand upright or walk. The hospital where I was inpatient until yesterday didn't seem to feel this was a problem and discharged me yesterday since my blood tests "looked good" after 3 grand mal seizures out of nowhere on Saturday.
Good times. My doctor's office won't see me because "the hospital hasn't sent the paperwork yet." Love my doctor, but boy do I hate his fucking staff.
(Warning, the thing to cause this rift is stupid and over D&D, but got much uglier)
Brother and I got into a pretty huge fight over D&D...again. We played and when I told him how I felt about the session, but told him "I was unhappy that I colossally failed and died in one shot by an old guy with an arrow." (As he's the DM and we started playing 5th Edition) I was comfortable we discussing my point, but I basically said that I got mad at the end just because it was really bad luck, bad planning, and not remembering notes that got me killed.
That caused him to argue "You only have fun when things only go your way." Still saying I'm not mad at him and admitting mistake, he constantly points out how I continued to mess up and how I'm entitled to being irrationally frustrated about this. This is an argument we've had several times about D&D where my frustrated is completely reflected back at me how it was my fault and I have bad exceptions/assumptions. So at that point I said, "I shouldn't play anymore if we keep arguing like that."
And then things got personal. He demanded that if I try and play again that I don't react like that. I honestly said that I can't 100% predict I won't get frustrated again from this game as it's happened so many times again. He just then went off saying terrible things about me. That I am not mature, I'm being an irrational, I'm being defeatist.
And what caps this discussion off? He believes that because I want to stop playing D&D right now: "What the hell are we supposed to do with you? No one wants to just sit around and drink and watch things. Do you even take consideration for what other people do for you?"
Yet...with all of his friends he will let them have those qualities. They can be immature. They can supply nothing. They can be internal about their private lives. But me, being the younger brother, can't. I don't know where our relationship is going to go from here...but, fuck, it sucks when your sibling can't respect you at all.
tl;dr: My brother is as Scrym defines as That Guy and dismisses my choice to stop playing D&D as a breach in friendship/trust/hope and that I've been a shitty person for being a guy who likes doing things alone.
I guess its nice that you guys at least do stuff. I pretty much never hang out with my brother. I do now more than previously but its still pretty seldom. We're just different people I suppose.
I've had the brother roller-coaster before too. We found each other annoying when we were kids, best friends as teenagers. I moved out for a few years came back and found out he had become a self important dick. Had a minimal relationship and then back to mutually being cool with each other. We started learning how to playing Ultra Street Fighter 4 together. Now he's moved to Canada.
I would just stay keep your brother at arms length and understand that he has a drastically different relationship with you than with your friends. He will feel like he can burn you in the moment yet still have some relationship with you later.
Went to try and buy a New 3DS LL today, but everywhere was plum sold out, and they had no idea when the next shipment is coming. You could buy as many of the little ones as you liked, though.
People in Germany who assert the privilege of not wanting to ever have their image captured and shared via photos or video over the enjoyment and benefit of others. A simple announcement like "A TV crew is here, as you can see by the camera gear, and if you don't want to appear on TV, then hang out in this area, and we'll not point the cameras that way" would fix it. But no. Ah well.
Amazing how social conservatives only acknowledge evolution when they're worried about a horribly deadly but poorly transmissible disease spontaneously becoming airborne.
Despite claiming it had found an acquirer to save it from death following a trademark complaint from Twitter, the photo sharing service today announced that didn’t happen and it’s game over on October 25th.
They couldn't have just, you know, sold to Twitter?
My spine is fractured in 3 or 4 places and I'm finding it rather difficult to stand upright or walk. The hospital where I was inpatient until yesterday didn't seem to feel this was a problem and discharged me yesterday since my blood tests "looked good" after 3 grand mal seizures out of nowhere on Saturday.
Good times. My doctor's office won't see me because "the hospital hasn't sent the paperwork yet." Love my doctor, but boy do I hate his fucking staff.
Still determining that. I'm suspicious that it may have been a sleepy middle-of-the-night prednisone overdose combined with a particular supplement (magnesium), but the only reason I think that is that those two things were present during my cardiac arrest last year, and not any other times. So... not exactly lab grade rigor, but...
The last time I had any seizure (unless my cardiac arrest was one), I was 14, which was... well, it was 23 years ago. So.. something's up.
Right now they've got me on Keppra and I'm not very happy about that. It makes me dopey and one-track minded. Not enjoying it.
I have osteoporosis because of my Crohn's (well, because of my Crohn's AND my Crohn's TREATMENT (low calcium diet, frequent steroid use)), and evidently the convulsions I was having back on the 4th were strong enough to fracture three honeycombed vertebrae.
The pain has actually improved considerably but I can't lift my 5 year old anymore and I feel held together with spit and tape. My range of motion sucks and my body just doesn't feel... durable... for lack of a better phrasing.
My tongue healed really, really fast despite the fact that I made it into hamburger while seizing, so small blessings, etc.
What I'm worried about (aside from death and all) is that I don't think any neurologist in the world is gonna say "Yeah I agree, you probably don't need anti-convulsants you need to determine pathology since you had a 23 year asymptomatic period without medication" and I'm not a fan of the idea of being on this crap long term. At all.
Yikes. Well... if you can, keep looking until you find a doc who's willing to go for the cause and not just treat the symptoms. It's important, even if it's frustrating as hell when you've been to 6 docs and none of them will listen!
We've been kind of reclusive since the wedding last weekend, so I'm just now catching up.
I'm way, waaaaaaaay out of every loop. Pretty much the entire week I was inpatient, I can't remember (ok maybe the last two days), and still synching back up with reality.
Comments
Sure, the Red Scare was fucked, but this shit is far more fundamental and really disturbing.
Also always talk to the teacher about it. See what they say. Sometimes they will give you special opportunities to prove yourself. It's insane how much people don't exploit teacher determination in college because they don't talk to them at all.
I'm not sure that it would be my highlight but I guess everyone has their own experiences.
No but really WTF, there were photos of a crowd of people watching 3 people jam food into their mouth.
Good times. My doctor's office won't see me because "the hospital hasn't sent the paperwork yet." Love my doctor, but boy do I hate his fucking staff.
Brother and I got into a pretty huge fight over D&D...again. We played and when I told him how I felt about the session, but told him "I was unhappy that I colossally failed and died in one shot by an old guy with an arrow." (As he's the DM and we started playing 5th Edition) I was comfortable we discussing my point, but I basically said that I got mad at the end just because it was really bad luck, bad planning, and not remembering notes that got me killed.
That caused him to argue "You only have fun when things only go your way." Still saying I'm not mad at him and admitting mistake, he constantly points out how I continued to mess up and how I'm entitled to being irrationally frustrated about this. This is an argument we've had several times about D&D where my frustrated is completely reflected back at me how it was my fault and I have bad exceptions/assumptions. So at that point I said, "I shouldn't play anymore if we keep arguing like that."
And then things got personal. He demanded that if I try and play again that I don't react like that. I honestly said that I can't 100% predict I won't get frustrated again from this game as it's happened so many times again. He just then went off saying terrible things about me. That I am not mature, I'm being an irrational, I'm being defeatist.
And what caps this discussion off? He believes that because I want to stop playing D&D right now: "What the hell are we supposed to do with you? No one wants to just sit around and drink and watch things. Do you even take consideration for what other people do for you?"
Yet...with all of his friends he will let them have those qualities. They can be immature. They can supply nothing. They can be internal about their private lives. But me, being the younger brother, can't. I don't know where our relationship is going to go from here...but, fuck, it sucks when your sibling can't respect you at all.
tl;dr: My brother is as Scrym defines as That Guy and dismisses my choice to stop playing D&D as a breach in friendship/trust/hope and that I've been a shitty person for being a guy who likes doing things alone.
I would just stay keep your brother at arms length and understand that he has a drastically different relationship with you than with your friends. He will feel like he can burn you in the moment yet still have some relationship with you later.
Everyone's different though.
The last time I had any seizure (unless my cardiac arrest was one), I was 14, which was... well, it was 23 years ago. So.. something's up.
Right now they've got me on Keppra and I'm not very happy about that. It makes me dopey and one-track minded. Not enjoying it.
I have osteoporosis because of my Crohn's (well, because of my Crohn's AND my Crohn's TREATMENT (low calcium diet, frequent steroid use)), and evidently the convulsions I was having back on the 4th were strong enough to fracture three honeycombed vertebrae.
The pain has actually improved considerably but I can't lift my 5 year old anymore and I feel held together with spit and tape. My range of motion sucks and my body just doesn't feel... durable... for lack of a better phrasing.
My tongue healed really, really fast despite the fact that I made it into hamburger while seizing, so small blessings, etc.
What I'm worried about (aside from death and all) is that I don't think any neurologist in the world is gonna say "Yeah I agree, you probably don't need anti-convulsants you need to determine pathology since you had a 23 year asymptomatic period without medication" and I'm not a fan of the idea of being on this crap long term. At all.
Thanks for asking, sorry for the book...
We've been kind of reclusive since the wedding last weekend, so I'm just now catching up.
I'm way, waaaaaaaay out of every loop. Pretty much the entire week I was inpatient, I can't remember (ok maybe the last two days), and still synching back up with reality.
And congrats! Very cool!