How did your brain even learn human speech? I'm just so curious.

Wash ,'Objects In Space'


Natter 55: It's the 55th Natter  

Off-topic discussion. Wanna talk about corsets, duct tape, or physics? This is the place. Detailed discussion of any current-season TV must be whitefonted.


Susan W. - Dec 22, 2007 2:02:31 pm PST #8968 of 10001
Good Trouble and Righteous Fights

Maybe it can only be a 10 day trip instead of 15.

Heh. I've only recently downgraded the dream from "stay all summer" to "maybe 4-6 weeks would still be a good trip."


beth b - Dec 22, 2007 2:11:45 pm PST #8969 of 10001
oh joy! Oh Rapture ! I have a brain!

ha. You dream bigger than I do. But then vacations are always GOGOGOGOGO for me - so I get tired. Our Dream of the Hadrian's wall walk would be wonderful at 4 weeks. I wonder if I could get DH to slow down that much


Kristen - Dec 22, 2007 2:31:55 pm PST #8970 of 10001

I thought we'd finally found the solution, and I took for granted that I had a good credit score, because I'd always paid on time, never missed a payment, etc. I knew it wouldn't be perfect because of the debt, but I'd still thought it would be around average.

I don't know which credit bureau you're looking at but keep in mind that your credit score can fluctuate wildly from month to month and from company to company. I have two credit cards that let me see my TransUnion credit score every month. In 18 months, I've watched my score soar to all time high, plummet almost 100 points (transferred balance to a new card and took out a short term loan) and then rebound. My Experian score has remained constant (and higher than the TU number). And my Equifax number is higher than both of them.

It's almost become a hobby for me. Like following the stock market.


Susan W. - Dec 22, 2007 2:34:24 pm PST #8971 of 10001
Good Trouble and Righteous Fights

Well, my idea of a long enough trip is tempered by the fact that I lived in England for a year and still feel like I barely scratched the surface of all there is to see in the UK.

I'm sorry for blowing up like I did before, and I'm going to go back and edit a little now that I've calmed down. I've really got to work on this catastrophizing thing that I do. It's not good for me or anyone around me, but I don't seem to know how to achieve a balance between bottling up my emotions and exploding completely. Probably something I should bring up with a counselor.

After Christmas. Everything is after Christmas now.


bon bon - Dec 22, 2007 2:59:03 pm PST #8972 of 10001
It's five thousand for kissing, ten thousand for snuggling... End of list.

Note also that Fair Isaac is changing its scoring formula for 2008 and your score will likely change under it. [link]


Allyson - Dec 22, 2007 2:59:42 pm PST #8973 of 10001
Wait, is this real-world child support, where the money goes to buy food for the kids, or MRA fantasyland child support where the women just buy Ferraris and cocaine? -Jessica

I just have a hard time not freaking out over the unknowns.

This will eventually eat you alive. I had some behavioral therapy to deal with that sort of panic that worked pretty well. I don't feel as sick about what may happen tomorrow, next week, or next year and kind of enjoy the serendipitous things that occur to iron things out. Plus I learned how to go through a list in my head, when I started feeling panicky about being a loser with no husband, kids, little in the way of financial planning...

I used to assault my friends with that particular worry, that I was all alone, and owned nothing, and in case of zombie attack, I'm screwed.

I work out the mantra of calm this way: I will never be homeless, I will never be hungry, I will always have a warm bed to sleep in, I don't have to be lonely, I am loved...all the way down to: there's bacon in the fridge, I have enough money to cover at least a month's expenses, my education is paid for, I can jump in my car and go get a pizza whenever I want, Noah and Grace are right here if I want to hug someone who won't tell anyone I was feeling crappy and needed to hug someone...

So you know, credit score will get ironed out. It just will. You're a responsible human being who manages to pay her bills and get out of bed every morning to ensure another human being is fed and comforted and healthy. It's no small thing.

Try and coast on that for exactly fifteen minutes without worrying about anything else in your world.

Then you can worry for five minutes.

It doesn't work for me all the time, but I'm less likely to find myself whipped into a frenzy of panic about shit like, "I WILL NEVER OWN A HOME AT THIS RATE."


-t - Dec 22, 2007 3:03:52 pm PST #8974 of 10001
I am a woman of various inclinations and only some of the time are they to burn everything down in frustration

I feel your pain, Susan. We were hemorrhaging money this year, and while that particular financial drain is stopped up, we've had unavoidable expenses that made me not even look at how close we were to our credit limits for a while because I would still have to spend the money and not looking kept me from being too stressed.

Well, yesterday I started paying attention again and it is not pretty. Thinking about how long it's going to take me to get out of debt makes my brain hurt. But I will get there, and so will you. You are doing everything right.


Steph L. - Dec 22, 2007 3:30:18 pm PST #8975 of 10001
Unusually and exceedingly peculiar and altogether quite impossible to describe

It doesn't work for me all the time, but I'm less likely to find myself whipped into a frenzy of panic about shit like, "I WILL NEVER OWN A HOME AT THIS RATE."

Allyson, you are awesome. I mean that very sincerely.


Ginger - Dec 22, 2007 3:43:05 pm PST #8976 of 10001
"It didn't taste good. It tasted soooo horrible. It tasted like....a vodka martini." - Matilda

Our Dream of the Hadrian's wall walk would be wonderful at 4 weeks.

Hey! That's my dream.


Kathy A - Dec 22, 2007 4:03:26 pm PST #8977 of 10001
We're very stretchy. - Connie Neil

I've got Muppets on the mind (bought Season 2 of the Muppet Show and have been watching some episodes), and I followed this link to a tribute song to Jim Henson by Tom Smith, "A Boy and His Frog." If you watch it, be prepared with some Kleenex.