I could also tell you a story about how the doorknob on my bedroom door went crazy a while back and trapped me in there. Thank god I the hinges were inside

Both my bedroom and bathroom doors do this all the time. I don't even know how the lock is engaged, because there is no obvious way to lock the door that I can tell--it just happens when you fiddle with the handle in a certain way! I called maintenance over to see if they could fix it, and all they did was unlock both the doors and then give me a thin piece of wire to use in the little hole in the side facing the hallway if it locks again. Of course, this does me no good if I'm actually inside the room when it locks itself! I've taken to making sure I have a flathead screwdriver in both rooms to get the pins off.

From 1957: Spaceport of the Future (painting)

Awesome. From the awesome plan59 website.

Remember when I asked about the (to me) white lie to forestall a guy asking me out? I have been told that unless it's a stranger, that's cruel. Mostly I think that if he doesn't know whether I'm single or not, we're not that close, and I prioritise his feelings over the truth--I owe my friends the truth.

I haven't really changed my mind about how I'm going to deal with this guy, but now I've managed to make myself feel guilty about it.

Grr.

Oh for the good old days, when the family dressed up and watched TV together: [link]

A 1944 book or magazine for kids: Gay Teen Ideas

Gosh, do you think the girl on the cover really is... a teenager? Looks a little older to me....

eta: Also, WTF is supposed to be going on in this picture? [link]

Remember when I asked about the (to me) white lie to forestall a guy asking me out?

I don't think it's cruel, but IME it isn't necessarily effective. If he persists, you may need to say some version of "not interested."

Once upon a time, a former student of mine got up the gumption to ask me what my policy was on dating former students. While I gave him props for courage, I wasn't remotely attracted to him, so I just said that I didn't have a policy per se, but that I didn't think it was a good idea.

Funny how things turn out.

Gosh, do you think the girl on the cover really is... a teenager? Looks a little older to me....

She looks exactly like my mom did when she was in high school.

The "girl" on the cover of Gay Teen is older than I am.

Funny how things turn out.

::snicker::

IME it isn't necessarily effective. If he persists, you may need to say some version of "not interested."

Usually I go for "I got a man." and it works well enough. Guys that know me well enough to know I'm single don't ask me out.

Hmm. I'm reaching back into the vasty dustness of my memory to check that assumption, and it seems that to know me is to not love me. Or at the very least--to know me is to know better.

I can't remember ever having to discourage a woman who was interested in me. There were three or four guys, though....

You know those wooden doors where the top is made up of four panes? I once used a pliers to pry out the nails holding the baseboardy pieces in, scraped out some putty and used a suction cup to lift the windowpane out so I could reach in and unlock the door.

And then I put it all back together and you couldn't even tell!

Which is good because my landlady would have killed me if she knew since I was leaving town for good (for my current location, actually) that afternoon.

I might've looked like a robber, except I was barefoot and in my bathrobe. Thank god I'd packed my tools in the car already. (I had the car key...just not the house one.)

I'd have to call maintenance here. Steel door, exterior deadbolt, no good lockpicking skills. Or a ladder, if I'd left the balcony doors unlocked.