Steph, make a complaint directly to Amazon about the merchant pressuring you to remove a negative review.

I know someone who works in merchant support at Amazon, and I know they WANT customers to tell them when merchants do dumb, frustrating stuff like that.

For good things: human dresses up as dog's favorite toy. Amazeballs. [link]

I have already watched this eleventy times. I can stand to watch it a few more.

Are you sure? I am paranoid about hallucinating burning smells.

Do you know about this? [link] If someone makes a joke about a seizure after someone mentions a burning smell, I just assume they are Canadian.

If I want to leave work early because I want to get my hair cut or forgot to pick up cat food or something I'll ask permission, but for a family emergency I do word notifications as informing my superiors that I *will* be gone rather than asking if I may. I'll usually make a comment about getting back to the office as soon as I can and leave a cell number, though.

My aunt had phantom smells (particularly gasoline) before her TIAs and stroke, so I have a tendency to really want to identify where smells are coming from....

Haven't heard back from mechanic. I worry this means bad things.

Do you know about this?

I did not know about that specifically, no. I don't remember where I picked up that burning smell thing - it's been in my head a long time.

Car~ma, Theo.

Sorry, Jesse, but for a family emergency, I would never use the words I hope to be able to, because if it's non-optional, you don't give your boss wiggle room to say you can't. You know you would have said yes, but an employee has no way to know that.

Yeah, you give some bosses any kind of wiggle room, and they'll say "Are you sure you're the one who needs to go take care of this?", then they reluctantly acquiesce when you say "Yes, I do," and they hint very hard that you should prioritize the job over most anything else. And you get dinged for not being a "team player" in your evaluations.

Doctor Penfield! I immediately went to that, Sue.

I can't even with the emails. I am so over all of this.

My only jitteriness about the email thing is that voters who were on the fence and recently leaned toward HRC will hear "Clinton" and "emails" and leap to the worst assumption without actually seeking out the facts.

(Although, honestly, even *if* HRC had been deliberately shady with her emails [though I believe that what she did is fine], that still pales in comparison to the horror show that is Trump. He gets a huge pass for being the worst person in the world, and to beat him, she has to basically be flawless. It's bullshit.)

I voted! The poll workers said they have been slammed since the doors opened Monday. Lots of booths and people though so it was fast. Apparently I am in a minority, but I was completely thrilled to cast my ballot for a capable and competent candidate. People around me that were talking were Clinton folk, but that isn't a surprise in Palm Beach County.