Empress Urn! Awesome.

Em just walked up to Joe, pushing buttons on his old cell phone, and said, "Dude. I totally just texted you."

P.S. I still like you. Take that as you will.

FWIW, Shari I have no personal animus against you because you're a Republican. I just think supporting those planks of the Republican platform which disenfranchise people because they're gay is wrong.

I know there are libertarian leaning, fiscally conservative Republicans. I don't have a problem with that at all. I can even respect people (such as yourself) who have a different idea about what constitutes national security and when and where military intervention is required.

Though I don't think the torture issue is as slippery and open to interpretation as a lot of Republicans do. Waterboarding is torture. I don't believe torture is even effective as a means of intel.

I hate Dick Cheney for what he's done, not because he's a Republican.

I'd like to see more of THAT kind of tolerance here extend to politics. (wishful sigh)

Huh. I'd like to see some of that tolerance extended to my side from the Right.

And me, I'll take "enhanced interrogation" (and that is NOT torture, despite the hype) over another 9/11. (Torture is pulling out fingernails, not sleep dep, but let's not digress. If sleep dep is torture, I have a bone to pick with my children.)

Not ever having been a parent, I can only defer to What Jessica Said in regards to sleep dep and babies, but still. Really? Your kids keep you awake for days at a time? Jab you with pointy things or electric-shock you when you start to fall asleep? Tie your hands to the ceiling and make you stand on an unbalanced stool so if you fall asleep you fall and dislocate your shoulders? Really?

I've always tried to be tolerant and understand other peoples' point of view. It's a core tenet of my beliefs, also. But lately? I'm getting tired of it. I'm getting fed up with extending tolerance and understanding to people whose core beliefs include the idea that people like me are evil, who not only don't try to understand/tolerate me but actively try to suppress me as a bad influence. It feels like walking up to someone with open hands and getting slapped in the face, over and over again. Eventually you just start folding your arms and glaring. If you're not the kind of person who slaps back, which I (generally) am not.

Also, what DavidS and Windsparrow and javachik said.

I think I might be a fiscally conservative liberal. Is that even possible?

(I have a thesis in mind that one reason humans evolved to live in co-dependent social groups was so that no one would have to take care of the babies by herself, because human infants take so very long to become capable of caring for themselves that caring for them is so exhausting, any one person doing it alone would become unable to do anything else for the community or herself. But that's just me and my weird ideas about human evolution and the evolution of human societies.)

Aims, I love your urn! Also the fact that Joe declared it you final resting place. Y'all are cool.

I keep trying to post and I can't which seems to the just one tiny duckling nipping at me in a swarm of them trying to nibble me to death.

But let me try again.

I have had hallucinations, well one hallucination due to sleep deprivation. I brought the sleep deprivation on myself but it was scary and freaky and I releazed it wasn't real and that I was probably doing damage to myself and I needed to sleep so I did. But I had a choice. Someone who is being forced to stay awake as a method of torture would not be able to make it stop.

Also I know that the American government and the military doesn't want our troops tortured, I'm sure no government wants their troops tortured. But how can the American government or any government object to its citizens being tortured when America (or any other goverment) is torturing our prisoners of war?

To me it seems like such a basic thing. You don't do something you wouldn't want someone to do to you.

This is going to be an All Emeline All the Time Post:

• We took "her" phone away because she was throwing it around and declaring the worst phone ever. She got upset we took it and ran to her room, declaring hurt feelings and worst parents and she's never ever going to have a phone. And then she yelled, "My phone number is nothing!! Zero! NOTHING!"

• From her room: "You guys have stay here and I'm gonna live in a different house and we're never gonna play games and you're never gonna be my parents anymore and daddy can you get me some fresh milk, please?"

Joe and I are just laughing and laughing in the living room.

Tomorrow she goes up to a full 5mg of Adderall.

•From her room: "You guys have stay here and I'm gonna live in a different house and we're never gonna play games and you're never gonna be my parents anymore and daddy can you get me some fresh milk, please?"

That is awesome, and I love the fact that she added 'please' at the end.

steering clear of the US politics talk

Tangential question: I know that Amych once made her own corset, and that other people here have perhaps done the same, or are crafty/sewing types. Can anyone suggest me a good, clear online site from which to get instructions on How To Make A Proper Corset? Preferably with illustrations?

Thank you.

I know that Amych once made her own corset,

Dupioni silk. I remember it well.

Oh, and I'm massively too germ-phobic to actually drink bathwater in real life. I talk about it a lot as a measure of devotion, but the truth is, I don't drink out of people's glasses. Ever. Probably not Keith's either although I'd feel bad about it. Preppie cooties are still cooties, though.