with apparently nothing wrong with him. So, huh.

Um, well, at least now you *know* that nothing is wrong? All in all, though, that is the best possible result, so good to read.

So many people here talk to me like I'm dumb.

Is it the case of people who think that if somebody doesn't know their own very specific narrow field of expertise, then that somebody is stupid?

Or of people who think that if somebody doesn't already know upside-down the thing that they're supposed to learn, then they are unable to learn it?

Or is it something else entirely?

Ugh. Breathe.

Whine! Um, that's what I do. I'm sure it delights everybody endlessly.

Write.

One of the treats that I dangle in front of myself after finishing this mess is reading your words [Edit: I've got a post bookmarked in Natter and everything]. So, yes, please.

Um, well, at least now you *know* that nothing is wrong? All in all, though, that is the best possible result, so good to read.

Thanks.

Breathe, Allyson! I'm going to guess that people who talk to you like you're dumb are not confident in their own abilities. Some people always have to make sure they're better than someone else. "Make sure."

(All of this is a long and strange way to spell: Thanks, amych. You're great.)

The long and strange way is a Buffista tradition.

As is amych being great, actually.

I am so glad your father is OK, Jesse.

Allyson-- I once had the head of display at JCPenney tell me I was the "stupidest person he had ever met"-- it took me a couple of years of working with him to realize that he was just defensive because my display, while not following the "Penney Way" which no one had told me, looked good.

So remember the other week when I was called "fat and ugly" out a car window. Well yesterday I was at the bus stop and some man came up to talk to me and ask me a lame-ass question and then say he just wanted an excuse to talk to me because I had really nice legs! Which annoyed me almost as much (I am at a nus-stop dude, and you are scary). I think riding the bus just encourages random people to talk to you.

Heh. There's a mentally-disabled guy who works in my building doing deliveries and whatnot, and a couple of times when I've been outside, he's told me I have nice legs. A couple of other times, he's just stared. I will always accept a compliment!

Also, I'm kind of waiting to talk to my mother to confirm that there's nothing actually wrong -- my father would tell me he feels fine, but leave out some crucial thing.

Sophia, while reading the first part of your post, I wanted to run to the posting box immediately and post how I think you're smart and lovely and stylish (I've seen pictures!).

And then I read the second paragraph, with the bus-stop-dude, and wanted to do that even more.

I'm kind of waiting to talk to my mother to confirm that there's nothing actually wrong -- my father would tell me he feels fine, but leave out some crucial thing.

Fingers still crossed, gotcha.

The artworld is a strange and wondrous place.

[link]

to wit:

GENEVA (AFP) - A giant inflatable dog turd by American artist Paul McCarthy blew away from an exhibition in the garden of a Swiss museum, bringing down a power line and breaking a greenhouse window before it landed again, the museum said Monday.

Giant.
Inflatable.
Dog turd.

The quote is "I'm gonna love him, and squeeze him and call him George." I comes from the book Of Mice and Men. You also hear it in an early Bugs Bunny cartoon. I also believe that Dot from the Animaniacs said it too.

While Lenny from Of Mice and Men was definitely the inspiration, that's not an exact quote from the book. The first cartoon character to use it was the Abominable Snowman, trying to make Bugs Bunny into his new pet. Later Elmyra on Tiny Toons used the same phrase. I don't remember Dot saying it on Animaniacs, but she may have. It's kind of become a thing in Warner Brothers cartoons -- a character saying "And I'll love him and pet him and call him George" while the animal/person they're holding desperately trying to escape from the crushing hold.

Y'know, I think that broadcasting gymnastics live really isn't a great idea. There are four or five events going on at once, so if there are two important things happening at the same time, they can only show one of them. Last night, for the mens team final, we got to see most of the US routines, several of the Chinese ones, and maybe two of the Japanese ones. Then at the very end, when it looked possible that Germany might get the bronze and they realized they hadn't broadcast any of the German routines, they just stuck the last two German pommel horse routines on the screen, and the commentators seemed to not even know the names of the gymnasts.

>I'm kind of waiting to talk to my mother to confirm that there's nothing actually wrong -- my father would tell me he feels fine, but leave out some crucial thing.

Will keep worrying, then.

Nilly- thank you