Badmovies.org Forum

ER- have you read a lot of Emile Bronte and Louise May Alcott?
I only ask because you seem like the kind of person who would.

It would help to spell the authors names right...

That's... pretty personal, RC.

I've never read anything by Alcott except her diary, and I did read Wuthering Heights by Bronte.

Excuse me! Louisa!
Personal question, John- do you like baked potatoes?  :question:

Yeah, I know it's not ....I don't know.
I just get that vibe.
And I never read any of these authors.  :bluesad:
Of old writers- I admire the style of Charles Fort who questioned everything- but never really took any of it too serious.

Yes, I ate one last night. 
That's "personal"?   :question:

Yes! Who else am I going to ask if you like baked potatoes?
Would you ask a stranger on the street- " Do you like baked potatoes?"

RC, what is your favourite issue of your favourite magazine and why?

Alex, is there a relationship you regret so much you wish it had never happened?

^ Castle of Frankenstein #25, 1975- the final issue. I bought it in 1975. It had a lengthy review of the TEXAS CHAINSAW MASSACRE, and none of all the 'monster' magazines at the time even gave a passing comment on it. And, unlike those other mags, CoF was a mag written for adults, not 12 year olds.

(https://i.imgur.com/NBI6Vcv.jpg) (https://lunapic.com)

Yes.

Hallows- Have you ever read Charles Fort?

That's one helluva personal question!  Nope. 

OK- I'll ask something else.
Have you ever lost faith in your religion?

Cerebus- Do you have any religious preference?

You don't have to state it. Yes or no; none of your f**king business; I'm a Satanist, et. al.

Hey, I was kidding.  The answer was "nope". 

All kidding aside, how could you not understand that that IS a personal question?  I answer: yes. 

I was testing the waters.
You know me- I don't want to p**s people off.





(https://i.imgur.com/Qd1T7VK.gif) (https://lunapic.com)

Hey, I answered you!  And in the long run, I'm a clown. 

I'm a Teenage Werewolf!  :drink:

RC - have you ever considered giving up pot altogether?

 ^ YES! between 1981 and 1986 I smoked no weed.
In fact, I rarely smoked weed at all until it was legalized in Michigan a couple years ago. I couldn't afford it. Plus it made me paranoid. But about 5 years ago, I started smoking more. It stopped me from drinking myself to death.
But I'm an addictive personality- so no. Not in the near future. And I'm almost 60.

RC, have you ever had a night terror?

 ^ I've had  episodes of sleep paralysis as a child and in my 20's,  and it was terrifying, if that counts.

To you all: you all do know how much I love you all?  :smile:

That's sweet of you to say, Trevor. You're cared about and valued by others here too.  :smile:




But as for personal questions, so, are we done probing each other?

Hey, Trevor, what's the longest you've ever worn a pair of underwear between changes?

In 1983 at boarding school, we attended a two week long "cadet camp". Marvelous fun, they even gave me a 7.62 caliber rifle to shoot at targets with  :buggedout:.

Answer: I didn't change my clothes, including socks and undies for almost 2 weeks: my undies stood up on their own after that.  :buggedout: :tongueout: :twirl: :wink:

Rev- what drew you to Bad/ Psychotronic films?

Everything makes sense now!

A PLAN 9 FROM OUTER SPACE screening on PBS. The idea of a movie that was so bad it was funny sounded appealing, and it turned out I loved it. Later I moved to Dallas and Joe Bob Briggs expanded my knowledge and appreciation of exploitation movies (this was when he was just a local columnist, before his TV show). A little later I bought Michael Weldon's books and I was off.

 ^I loved PBS in the 70's. They played NOSFERATU, the BATTLESHIP POTMEKIN, MABUSE THE GAMBLER, The CABINET OF DR. CALIGARI and many other silent films.

Hey, indy, y'ever sleep wearing socks?

I'm trying to think . . . not that I can remember.   Even when it's cold, I rarely wear more than my skivvies to bed.
Maybe once, when I was camping out about 30 years ago - I do remember sleeping fully clothed that trip.
I presume that included socks.

John- do you ever chuckle to yourself when you're alone?

Often. 

Anyone else here ever throw loose change into open fields and along riverbanks, seeding future artifacts for people to find someday?

Can't say I have.

Never. I put it in a dish on a desk.

I normally chuck random loose change out of my window and then I hear "Yo! WTF is the matter with you?" from outside.  :teddyr:

Hey Alex, do Scots still eat traditional sheep-stomach haggis? Have you ever had it and if so do you like it?

Yes they do (although there are other versions available), and I do enjoy it. Most people find it tastes entirely different to what they expect. I'd say 80% of the people I've seen try it from the US have liked it (normally to their surprise).

Hey, Rev, what do you think of Southeast Christian Church?

I don't think much of any Church. However, I do think that's the church my ex-addict cousin goes to and receives support that keeps him from going back to drugs, so they're good in that regard.

Also, every time we drive past it my mother says she's glad my father doesn't make her go there anymore. Neither of them have ever been inside in their lives.

Somebody ask me something and I will likely answer. After all, couldn't be rougher than my little "Ask Me Anything" event last year.

What happened?  :question:

Ha, I told people I knew to "Ask Me Anything" and they shore did....

So how many times have you...oops.  Editing myself.   :smile:

Do you usually put your left shoe on before your right?

 ^I never paid attention. Whatever shoe is closest, I guess.

edit:  Oh yeah, these days the left first...  :bouncegiggle:

What is one fact about you that would surprise other people if they knew?


Something that those who don't know me closely may not guess is that I have lived a lot of my life afraid of someone.

That person who scares you: I have a cricket bat with their name on it.  :hatred:

There's a lot of things I keep secret about myself and some people would be surprised if they knew.

1. I am an abuse survivor: people who know me well and have kids will quite happily let me look after their kids as they know no harm will come to them as I won't allow it.
2. I lived through a war https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rhodesian_Bush_War (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rhodesian_Bush_War) which messed me up mentally.
3. Most adults find me very scary: I have been told I have a madness in my eyes at times but kids like me for some weird reason and they don't find me scary at all.
4. Some people think I am either homophobic, racist or both: I am neither.
5. I am the son of a former criminal turned cop and a radical feminist.

I once (briefly) held an Australian death adder.

when i was very young, i stuttered, and had a severe lisp. i took speech classes for 3 years, but it( the stutter)  still shows up when i'm under severe stress. the lisp came back when my wisdom teeth grew out of the roof of my mouth, but i can work around it, mostly.

What movie do you wish you could forget watching so you could enjoy watching it again as if it were the first time?

I'd go with the first Saw movie.

David Millin ASC's landmark war film Shangani Patrol (1970): I would like to watch it as for the first time I screened it publicly with 120 people in the cinema in 1999. Mom was in the audience and Dad was with me in the projection booth  :smile:

Here's the film: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8T5pcpzY6mE (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8T5pcpzY6mE)

Most of the movies I love are because I have looked at them numerous times.  I watched THE LAST EMPEROR (1987) last night and immediately thought of it with your question... in a way, the fun of discovering a movie I love is seldom and one of life's great joys.  If I forgot THE LAST EMPEROR and discovered it anew last night that would've been wonderful.

5 Centimeters Per Second

If you could change one thing about yourself, what would it be? (Not like x-ray vision, something doable.)

I think I'd like to have artistic talent. Or to be better at sleeping.

Hmmmm.
That's a good question.
I'd make myself a lot richer, I guess!  So tired of scrimping and saving and barely getting bills paid each month.

You would be me.

MONEY SEX, POWER....

In order of most important to you to least important to you, rank which you'd want to have: money, sex, power?

Me, I think that's the order I'd choose, money, sex, power, since money can get the other two, assuming I even wanted power, which I don't, but I can think of cases where an excess of the other two doesn't bring money. (Like a streetwalker who has sex for a living but has no money or power, or a religious or civil rights leader who might have power but isn't rich, and in the case of Gandhi or a Pope, supposedly celibate.)

So, yeah, money, sex, power, in that order.

Anyone?

Eh- I can't say. I've never had to choose because it was never a problem. I never had any of it. I didn't even care. I still don't care. Except money...I gotta pay the bills.

what id'd change about myself? i'd be a great deal more cynical and a great deal less trusting.
what i'd want? money. that allows people to hide from reality.

I do not ever wish for any of those.  My sister (whom I don't speak with) thinks I'm "rich", I could always get sex and was pursued but lived like a monk, and power I've had and was pressured or resented for it.

Do you leave the water running when you brush your teeth?

Is this some kind of trap joke I don’t know about?  Does this have something to do with your winky nightmare?

 I do let the water run, but I don’t understand why this is controversial?  Does everyone else’s tap water warm up instantly?  When I turn the hot water on, it’s cold/coldish right away, I fill my rinse cup and rinse my toothbrush with it and leave the water running to warm up while I brush.  By the time I’m done brushing (which is like a minute, not 40 years - maybe I'm a bad brusher) the water is hot/warm enough to rinse the frothy toothbrush, then I wash my face and hands with the warm water.  Every where I’ve ever been to tend to personal toilet - home, hotels, etc. - the water more often than not takes about a minute or 2 to reach maximum warmness.  If I want warm water, I need to let it run so I think I’m being more efficient by using the cold water to fill my cup and rinse my brush and letting the water warm up while I brush then using the warm water to wash my face and hands. 

My daughter was just criticizing me for this too and I was like what the heck you don’t know how to wash!  Am I a monster?

I leave the water running too. I don't think it's a big deal. Sometimes the hot water smells like rotton eggs.

Running water while you brush your teeth must make you some kind of eco-terrorist, because even Barney the Purple Dinosaur sings against it, and he's pretty darn accepting.

He'd just lose his purple mind if he knew my son runs the sink water when he pees.

In the morning, part of my routine when I wake up involves going into the toilet, turning on the tap, then going for a pee after which I will then brush my teeth and if I haven't done so the night before, then shaving.

I do that when I poop at other peoples houses sometimes.  For that I accept the title of eco-terrorist.

Now I think I've made this the TMI thread instead of Personal Questions.

Guilty.

When I think of purple I think of the color Prince used to wear. Barney isn't a purple dinosaur, he's more of a violet dinosaur.

If you asked your friends to guess how many people you've had sex with, do you think they'd get it right?

(I should try this. Now where can I make some friends?)

No way! I don't tell anyone about people I've had sex with. (If you saw the people I've had sex with, you'd understand why!)

Shrug, just declare bankruptcy on your sex life and wipe it clean. It's easy....

It depends. If it's a really ugly woman, no.

I doubt they'd get it right. I never considered the looks of the woman to be important though, it was more about the experience itself for me.

I really don't want to gross anyone out with this but the person I was with in my so far last relationship said that I was the best lover she ever had. 😳

Respect!! :cheers:

The old claim is that men tend to inflate their body count and women to downplay it, but I don't know I've found that to seem true.

One thing I have noticed is women will be more detailed and descriptive about sexual events than most men are. Men will say, "I banged her." Women will....tell you extreme details. I've had my late friend Amy in my thoughts lately, even written about her here, and she more than any human being I ever knew in my life would regale everyone with near-pornographic accounts of what she'd been getting up to, and she was prolific in her adventuring too.

Annnnnieway, just had crossed my mind to wonder if friends would make an accurate guess. ("Let's go with 25!") I wonder all kinds of things at random through the day, like if local girls in Nazareth had the hots for Jesus and wondered if he was gay for hanging with men and not having a girlfriend. Or if newborn babies assume this world is just a terrible dream that'll end soon. Or if it's true jungle rot could get under eyelids. Or if Walt Disney had a mistress. Or if Taco Bell realizes its food is basically all the same, like Thomas Kincaid paintings. Or if Bob Ross ever painted sad little trees. You know, unanswerable things.

I mean I just spend my life wondering about stuff. Wonder if that makes me rare? (See, I did it again!)

Problem is, most would. I'm blatantly honest and open with everyone so like, I mean.

Assuming reincarnation and karma exist, realistically, what would your next earthly lifetime be like, based on the way in which you've lived your current life, its excesses and failings and lessons learned?


Me, I figure I'd come back as a professional insect catcher for the wealthy in Dhaka, since I spent this life working for powerful people without growing wise, so I'd try again from a lower rung. Bug catcher. Fourth World.

My husband would be a celibate nun in Nigeria. Gee, he'd love that.

My late neighbor Mrs. Glenn would be a Chinese girl with an eating disorder.

My friend Hugh would be a helpless child born with a debilitating disease, to teach him existence is not about power and control.

My mom would teach classes in sociology in Canberra.

RC Merchant would transmigrate into an ant for a few months just for the sheer fun of being an ant, since he enjoys watching them.

indy will ascend to a higher plane with my grandma; like her he's done with the world.

Dana will come back as a fluffy Persian cat much loved by a gay couple in Malibu, whom she'll befriend but bite sometimes for no reason.

Lester will Quantum Leap into Tony Hawk circa 1999.

My Uncle Jerk will get eaten by roaches for ten straight lives as lepers.

And my buddy Edie will for sure be German.

As for my children, hey, they're going to live forever.


But seriously, what would fill the tracks you made in this lifetime?

I would become the next South African President and bring in the following laws which should fix our broken country:

1. No appointment to jobs on the basis of race or gender: merit only.
2. Closure of the apartheid style censorship board.
3. GBV and abuse - against women and children -to be declared a crime and punishable with a very long prison term.
4. Re-institution of the death penalty.
5. Re-introduction of armed forces conscription.
6. Sex work to be legalized.
7. Marijuana use to be legalized but only for religious or medicinal use.
8. Whole scale theft and corruption are to be punished severely.
9. No more re-naming of places in this country: it destroys history.

Hmm . . .
Given my lifelong record of premarital celibacy and marital fidelity, I'd probably come back as a gigolo.

As a punishment, of course . . .  :wink:

I used to think reincarnation was hogwash, but then I heard some perspectives on it that I hadn’t thought of.  What made sense to me was that there are a multitude of experiences one must go through for the soul to reach maturity, far too many to complete in a single lifetime.  Once those have been achieved you can move on to the next thing which I guess would be a spirit guide or something cool like that.  I also heard that souls travel in circles, so someone’s brother in one life might be their child or best friend in the next – my best friend is exactly 9 months younger than me to the day so… sounds legit.

I like to think that we have a checklist on our nightstand on the “otherside” and when we’re done, we look at it and have a Homer Simpson “doh!” moment because we missed one or two simple things like “hug a Jewish person”. Then in our next life we get pre-loaded with certain attributes to help us out and that’s where those weird “huggers” come from.

That said, I’d probably come back as ER 2.0 because I think the life you’ve led is so polar opposite to mine that anything I didn’t check off in this life would be checked off living yours. 

Hug a Jewish person?  :question:

That's how you can feel if they're wearing the secret treasure map to their hidden Judengeld. Hey, I've listened to Eric Cartman, I know the score....

Is that a personal question?  Sheesh.  I answer yes! 

^ I dunno. See what Paquita wrote.

I suspect I'd end up being a pacifist vegan, but I would not be happy about it.

I do not understand what Paquita wrote, but I now understand why you asked.   :question:  :twirl:

Ever held a secret so dark and deep that if it were known it would change your life?

Er, not me, nope.

Yes. And no, I can't tell you what any of them are.

Nope. I blurt out all sortsa stupid sh!t.

Yeah, me too, only in my case I merrily post them on this one obscure message board.

Same here 😳😊😊🐢

Jellybeans or peeps?

Jellybeans. I find those marshmallow things kind of disgusting, wouldn't eat one by choice.

Jelly beans. Peeps are gross. Like sugar coated styrafoam.

When I was a kid, marshmallows made me gag as they tasted (to me) like they were made from snot. I will only eat toasted ones.

Are you now, or have you ever been, a member of the Communist party?

No, friend computer. (I'll be impressed if anyone gets that reference).

No. But I would party with a commie!

In my last year of high school (1984) my parents went to a PTA meeting and the headmaster greeted my Dad with the words "Ah, you must be Comrade Moses." Dad's reply? "Who the *EXPLETIVE DELETED* is your *EXPLETIVE DELETED* comrade?"  :teddyr: :teddyr:

That was the last PTA meeting my folks went to  :buggedout: :wink: :wink:

You know, I have had to sign papers attesting to the fact I am not and never have been a member of the Communist Party.

^ When? 1950?  :question:
It's not against the law, you know.

I had to do the same thing when I joined up mate. It isn't uncommon.

Yeah, they ask about all sorts of affiliations, though they've by that time investigated you so thoroughly that it's half formality, half control measure, since if they ever did miss something and you lied about it they could prosecute you. (Though they would probably be less about punishing you at that point and more about using you, since facing jail time you might prove malleable.)

One of my positions, albeit briefly and late in things, was handling federal background checks.

ER- Have you ever seen a horror film in the theater?

I have. Let's see....
The Sixth Sense
The Others
The Blair Witch Project
The Ring

Uhhhj.... I'm sure there were more.

Ever faked being drunk to fit in someplace?

AHAHAHAHAHA!  :bouncegiggle:

What do you think?  :drink:

Hypothetically, if a retired entrepreneur were to offer a service where after your death you could have your life story written in your blood and bound with your actual skin, would that interest you?

Man you are so weird.

Sooo, putcha down two copies? :teddyr:

Life story? I can't even remember what I did last week!

Well, it isn't like I'd have a use for it any more.

That's how I always feel at the BMV when I'm renewing my license and they read this rote pitch to me about putting "organ donor" on my license so they can harvest my parts if I die suddenly. I think well I'm not going to need them anymore, but I also do wonder if I could have arranged to sell them, maybe leave my family a few extra bob.

For some reason, the only part of me it would bother me to donate is my eyes. I just don't like the thought of doing that for whatever reason.

Does shaking hands bother you? I've never particularly liked it, to be honest. I'll do it, but I don't understand why so many people feel it is necessary.

I enjoy shaking hands, hugging, and generally having physical contact with people I'm fond of.

Well yeah, but you're a living saint.

No. I like connecting with folks.

I think that's a BIT of an exaggeration.  I just like people until they give me a reason not to.

^ I like folks- and like Indy said.

In the wake of Covid, I am less inclined towards physical contact, but shaking hands, hugging and even kissing are things I enjoy when warm feelings are mutual. 

If you were offered a 2,000 square foot new house at no cost, an acre of ground with it, and $25,000 per year, tax free, in addition to any other income you earned, would you be willing to relocate permanently to an isolated town in rural North Dakota?

I'd say no.

way

In a NY minute!

Ever had a dream in which you murdered someone?

On a stupefyingly hot night in 1997 I dreamed I murdered an old lady who worked in a library in a small town. (The old lady and the library were only in my dream, not real.) The feeling of sheer dread I experienced in the dream, the sickening certainty I was going to be caught, the awfulness of being at my victim's funeral, not caught yet but sure I would be, and feeling remorse, too, was like few dreams I've ever had, and I was so glad to wake up and realize it wasn't real.

Rate in order of personal importance:

Sex
Drugs
Rock and Roll

(R&R, sex, drugs.)

Sex, drugs, and rock and roll a distant, distant third. I'm reminded of a stand-up's line that after the 60s passed, he realized that when you took out the sex and drugs, rock and roll wasn't all that good.

Rock and Roll, drugs (as in pot), sex.

If you lost your sense of touch (a condition called hypoesthesia) and felt nothing, would you still want to have sex? And if so, why? Procreation, nostalgia, for the status of it? Think about it....wouldn't that kind of make the act ....meaningless?

Well, I've had sex with people I haven't enjoyed, but did so on the basis that I knew it would make them happy, so I'd have to go with yes.

Do other people have conversations that include lines like "What about Juanita, the transsexual rage mage. How does she fit into your theory?" or is that just me and my circle of friends?

Altruistic sex gets you into Heaven, you know.

No! Can you believe I never have had that sentence in a single one of my conversations?

I don't have sex now. If I lost my sense of touch, it wouldn't bother me.

No. I never had anyone say that around me.

No, I don't know anyone named Juanita. 

If you see a penny lying on the ground, how likely are you to pick it up?

^ Always.

Even if the penny is face-down, and bad luck? ;-)

Yeah, I usually pick up coins too.

Very likely.  However, a neighbor I don't know has a little display sign with cup that reads " Garden Tour 5c " so if I had a coin, I'd typically leave a dime.  They always disappeared. 

Ever in your entire life, even once, even for a second, experienced the strange feeling that land masses have relocated on printed maps in your house, making you wonder if you are in another reality, another dimension, on another plane, have taken too much sugar with your peyote, are being pranked, were wrong the day before, or are just plain bats**t nuts?

Can't say it has, Ma'am.  :buggedout:

Dang, really? I could swear on a stack of (insert chosen holy book) that Sri Lanka suddenly up and moved a few years ago, and I am obsessed with geography.

I dunno, man!  :question:

The weird thing is I looked online and other people said the same thing, "It ain't where it used to be!" I mean....islands don't just get up and waltz somewhere else like that, I have found no maps whatsoever that show Sri Lanka sitting where all my life I always took it for granted it was (due south of  the Indian subcontinent) but I admit it was one of the rare times when I felt some sympathy for the Mandela Effect tinfoil beanie crowd because it puzzled me too. Shrug.

Nope, Sri Lanka is still off the eastern coast of Canada, where it's always been.

Once while playing World of Warcraft, it was mentioned that I'd spent time in the Falkland Isles. One of the players went looking for it, thinking it was somewhere off the coast of Kalimdor.

Ah, thanks, you guys are making this former empress of Russia feel so reassured about Sri Lanka that I will put in a good word for you with my husband Jesus.

I remember seeing a classroom globe for sale about ten years ago where it had RHODESIA printed over the country of Zimbabwe 😳

Dark Side of the Moon, or The Wall?

(Guess which one I say...)

For me, it's Wish You Were Here- I'll say you like the Wall.
Animals is also good.

I agree with RC - Wish You Were Here is their peak. Dark Side of the Moon > The Wall.

Dark Side of the Moon is probably the superior album between the two, but I actually prefer The Wall, but then I find I often favor a book or song or movie that isn't considered the maker's best work over one that is. (For instance Eyes Wide Shut is my favorite Kubrick movie, even though it's not his best.)

Wish You Were Here has a couple of songs I like a lot but Pink Floyd almost seems to demand the album be listened to as a whole, a single entity with many bodies conjoined and somehow....

"Well, I mean occasionally it seems to have, how shall one say?"

"Too many notes, Your Majesty?"

"Exactly. Very well put. Too many notes."

PINK FLOYD's best album is Wish You Were Here.  I agree with ER that it almost demands listening in its entirety.  
I suspect ER prefers The Wall as its PINK FLOYD's most Pop record.  That would be my own normal inclination.  
I listen to The Wall more than Dark Side... and Atom Heart Mother more than either! 

The Wall was banned in South Africa in 1980 😳

Who's your favorite movie star? 

I honestly don't think I have one. 

Hmmm...I dunno?  :tongueout:

(https://i.imgur.com/gHDIXoX.gif) (https://lunapic.com)

:teddyr:  One of the few I'm always interested in watching, like this lady: INGRID BERGMAN

(https://media1.giphy.com/media/HjxkUATryCupG/giphy.gif)

I like Hepburn, but Bette Davis has got to be one of my favorite actresses of that era- or any era!

(https://i.imgur.com/6YORGSr.jpg) (https://lunapic.com)

Uhm... the picture is INGRID BERGMAN...

Yup! I'm an idiot!  :lookingup:

Do you like seafood?

As far as meat goes, yeah. About once a year I'll have shrimp.

I love seafood. The only seafood that I don't like are oysters and salmon.

I hate seafood. Freshwater fish- yeah. Seafood- NO.

Like it all, with one exception: Oysters.  I'll eat them, but I don't really care for them.
Anything else that comes out of the ocean, I'm in.

"Pray, never eat oysters!"
---Oscar Wilde

Have the most intimate relationships of your life been the carnal ones?

No, I think it was one where I killed many, many, people.

Seriously, I lived with Tiana for 11 years, and she's still my best friend.

OK, if it's out of line to ask this, feel free to throw shade at me, but where are the bodies buried I have known a lot of people who say they married their best friend (or lived with them a long time, etc.) and that idea has always seemed foreign to me, because, well, how do you have sex with your best friend? To me the nature of a best friend is entirely different from the relationship you have with a lover. Have I been deprived one of life's best experiences?

The two deepest and most personal relationships of my life are on opposite sides of that question.
My wife I've known now since we were 7 - that's 52 years - and we are both emotionally close and physically intimate.
The deepest friendship/relationship I've ever had beyond that is with a person whom I've never met face to face.  We are incredibly intimate, but not in the physical sense.

No, I think my most intimate relationship was with my mother. Particularly considering the very earliest years of my life.

Mostly my most intimate ones have been non-carnal. There are a few exceptions, but I've generally kept myself emotionally separate from people I was just having sex with.

Like Alex says, sex is just sex.  And yes, you can have sex with your friends. Who else would you have sex with? Your enemies? A stranger, I guess, or a hooker.

Not to gross anyone out but I stayed a virgin until I was 36.  :buggedout:

I feel like one of the games where someone says something and if you've done it, you need to take a drink. Yes, I've had sex with an enemy and strangers. Even a strange enemy.

Congratulations, you just triggered one of my uncontrolled laughing fits.

Oh, man, I need help.

No.  Undoubtedly the most intimate relationship I've had is with my brother's wife.  We were always close, but we experienced perhaps the most difficult time of our lives together which forged an unbreakable bond.  Death breaks all bonds. 

Not gross, you were being who you are, and who you are seems like a pretty decent bloke.

So which of those two relationships would you consider the more intimate? Considering you've known me since I was twenty-one, since two months before Brian died, actually, when I was apparently more flirty and lighthearted with everyone, as you once described, ha, I can probably get away with asking you that, and I am curious. The spouse or the mouse?
PS I won't tell either one.

I will go all Solomon on this one and say equally intimate in very different ways.

Dude, that was a slow pitch over home plate to say your wife.  Be abashed, Indy, be abashed. :bouncegiggle:

What is your relationship with this third party you are intimate with that you've never met?

If you were picked by lottery to execute someone on death row whose identity and crime were not revealed to you, or if you refused, this person would be set free, would you execute this person?

BTW, as much as I oppose the death penalty---which isn't that passionately, though I do think it's wrong---I believe in that case I would trust American justice enough to think the greater evil would be releasing a presumably convicted murderer out into society, so I'd choose to be the executioner, and hope it would be just throwing a switch and I didn't have to stab or beat someone to death.

Simply the closest friend I've ever had, who knows all my secrets and the depths of my soul.
I love my wife more, of course, but this person knows some things about me I've never told another soul.

No. Such an absurd condition would suggest a corrupt motive.

Oh hell no. I am for the death penalty, but under those rules- f**k no.
That's Nazi s**t.

Indy, I don't mean to pull teeth.  How did you come in contact? 

A rather long story, TBH.  Our friendship grew very slowly for the first ten years.
We became much closer over the last decade.

You guys have minds that work differently from mine. I enjoy contemplating strange scenarios like that.  :teddyr:

Like today I was pondering, if two people were drowning in front of me and I could only save one, and one was a five year old, the other a much-hated middle-aged billionaire jerk who vowed to build a children's cancer hospital if I saved him, what would I do, save one child directly, or potentially save thousands of children indirectly? I thought about that all the time I sat through this extremely remedial lecture I had to go to.

Middle-aged billionaire jerks have a lousy track record of keeping their promises.

Yeah, but remember, Hitler was once a five year old. Do I gamble on the odds of this one being another Hitler and pull the mite out of the water?

Yeah- but I bet on the present- not the future. A child is innocent. f**k rich scumbags.

Aw, you know I'm just bumblefuggin' around, RC, I'd pull the child out without thinking twice. I just amuse myself constructing odd scenarios.

Goodnight to you and all. I hope you're doing well.  :cheers:

^ I might even help him die!
Not the kid. Well, maybe. Depending on how hungry I am at the time.

Seriously, what the hell are you all talking about? 

^ Drowning babies and billonaires, of course.  :bouncegiggle:

But of course!

(Insomnia yet again.)

Have you ever had a memorable bodily accident?

Yes. I totaled a truck. I broke both my legs, got a big ass scar on my chin. Second car wreck (I wasn't driving this time) I went threw a sunroof while the car was doing endos in a cornfield and broke my neck.

The one-car crash I've been in, was the day we later found out that Kristi was pregnant with Ash. Pretty sure I'll remember that day.

Oh my yes. One almost killed me when I was fifteen.

Waaaait. You didn't mean "accident" as in like needing to change undergarments, did you? (Oh, Trevor's starting to influence me.)

Have you ever p**sed on someone. I mean take a p**s on them.

Does being a baby count?

I reckon!
I lived in an old trailer across from a biker bar in Marcellus, Michigan. Melvilles!
Anyway, me and my brother were sh!tfaced. Glenn passed out on a couch, I was trying to find the bathroom half asleep, and p**sed on Glenn by mistake. He was p**sed! More ways than one!  :bouncegiggle:

When he was a newborn my son peed in my mouth. Perfect shot as I was talking while changing him, zing, a splash of it went bullseye. I thought my husband was gonna die laughing and all I could think of to say to him  with the faintly sweet taste of baby pee in my mouth was come give a kiss.

But did YOU ever p**s on somebody?
My son's Jed and Eddie p**sed on me all the time.

My buddie Eathon was hammered. I was too. I passed out on the couch with him, and he p**sed himself.
We were watching some horror movie. His girlfreind Destiny was there too. She thought it was funny!
I guess it was!

Yes, I did!   :teddyr:

As my friend Empreror Palapatine said "Good, good, let my influence flow through you....."  :buggedout: :wink:

Who was your first celebrity crush?

Mine was - don't laugh!!! - Debby Boone.

I think Carrie Fisher, but it might have been Debbie Harry.

Dame Joan Collins very closely followed by Princess Diana.

Singers: I had quite a crush on Sheena Easton and Dame Olivia Newton-John too.

I feel left out but I don't think I ever had a thing for celebrities or celebrity culture. The closest I got was liking certain characters on screen, but more because they were in shows I enjoyed.

At various times Catharine Bach, Lynda Carter, Jacklyn Smith, Dawn French, and Barbara Eden. Not really "crushes" per se, just the women I found attractive.

Nobody.

Dou you like horseradish?

Love it!  The hotter the better!

Yes, I like the sting.

Not so much by itself, but in things like wasabi and cocktail sauce, ABSOLUTELY!

Me too.

Ever known a Flat Earther?

I have, and it's amazing how detailed and thought-out their erroneous views can be. Some of them may be crazy but they aren't all stupid.

I haven't met any flat earthers, but I did used to spar with a holocaust denier, and it's the same thing - they're incredibly invested in their flawed worldview and can cite "evidence" to support it while finding creative ways to dismiss all real evidence to the contrary.

Holocaust deniers are hard to get. Where do they think the Jewish population of the Pale and elsewhere in Europe went? What about all the eyewitnesses? I heard one on TV say the Holocaust couldn't have happened because Germany didn't have enough fuel to incinerate so many bodies. That was his evidence. I think the default setting of far to many people is to believe what they want and then try to find evidence to support it. (I also remember on September 11, 2001, literally ON that day, before it was over there were people saying in effect it never happened.)

The guy I got into it with claimed that there was not trace evidence of cyanide on the gas chamber walls at Auschwitz, therefore they were just showers, not gas chambers.
Beneath his veil of polite skepticism lurked a nasty anti-Semitism.  I asked him once about the tens of thousands of eyewitnesses who had seen the horrors in the camps, who had lost loved ones there, etc.  The mask dropped for a minute and he said:
"They've gotten away with this for far too long!"

Yes. Tara Sue's son Jim was one, just before he died.
At least flat-earthers are harmless. Holocaust deniers- f**k them all to hell.

Whenever a holocaust denier starts with me I always say the same thing: My granddad was one of the guys who liberated Belsin. Might want to be very careful what you say next, cos it might just be engraved on your gravestone.

None of them have ever said anything next.

Let me think up one of these before bed....


OK, here's one. Have you ever been so afraid you couldn't seem to move a muscle?

I felt that way one night alone in a tent in a forest in Maine, miles from where anyone was supposed to be. It was as dark as the interior of a cave outside, and someone was walking around very close to me, taking small quiet footsteps. It was absolutely terrifying.

Never. Nothing scares me. I swear to...? My Ma's grave.
I may get scared for a second- but that turns into anger very fast. I don't think that's a healthy reaction, but it's the truth.

One of my earliest memories involves waking up from a night terror (I still remember what I was dreaming of. We left that house where I had that dream when I was 3), and being unable to move or cry out.

How long do you sleep?

I average about five hours a night, which I'm told is not enough, and will bite me in some way down the road.

Generally 4 hours and night and ditto on the shortened lifespan as a result.

I shoot for (and average) 8 hours a night, prefer 9 if I can get it. If I have less than 7 hours I drag noticeably the next day.

Because of issues I have with anxiety and depression, I'm happy if I can get five hours of sleep per night.

I get about 5 - 6 hours' sleep nightly when I'm working, rarely more.  In the summers, when I'm off, I generally sleep till I wake up - which is usually after about 7 hours.

This is a disturbing question, or at least I find the subject disturbing, and I lived contentedly a long time* before I was even aware of the stereotype/accusation, but do you think it's true that funeral directors and morticians are often sexually attracted to dead people?

(*I found out when the necrophile House Hlaalu dark elf in Oblivion joked about the fine in Cyrodiil, and someone brought that subject this up, so like 2007-ish.)

Uhm. I'll PM you a story (not involving me directly, but it is pretty damn dark).

I don't think it's OFTEN, but it does happen.

^ Hey, look at that, indy's got 2,500 karma!  :cheers:

Ugh.  I hope not.  I'd put mortician in the realm of proctologist; money must be the motivation.  And somebody has to do it.

Did you ever hear that in France under Napoleon III the government paid doctors a modest sum to conduct medical exams on sex workers in brothels in order to try to curb the spread of diseases, but so many doctors applied for these relatively low-paying jobs that someone got the idea of charging doctors for the license to perform this formerly salaried task, and the government actually found it a lucrative source of revenue? I've often thought about that when people have suggested phsicians become asexual when examining patients. (Maybe some do but apparently some at least find other motivations beyond the application of their medical training.)

Ever experienced a sexual attraction that ran contrary to what you thought of as your sexual identity?

I truly don't think I have.

I have been kissed by at least two women that I can think of off the top of my head, both of them did it abruptly, and I had a friend get very odd and physical with me once, though I don't think that was sexual as much as her seeking some form of comfort considering the state she was in, and I also had a waxer one time leave me wondering, um, are you sure you need to be doing that?

But that was all them to me, not me to them. (Though I did hold my friend tightly that night when she was being like she was.)

No.

Yes, quite a few times.

Nope. But, when I was 18, there was a brief period when I did go to a lot of gay bars, because they would let us in and sell us beer without checking I.D. Stopped because as a straight guy, getting hit on by gay guys is annoying. (I sympathize with women in bars.)

No. I've had a couple of gay guys come on to me, but I've just had no interest. One gay guy did once tell me that I was the least gay man on the planet.

Ha, BTW, I married a guy who used to get hit on by gay men cawnstantly.

I've known an oddly significant number of people who work in funeral homes (my stepfather's family owned several, plus a couple other connections), and they often knew other people in the industry of course.  A surprisingly large number of them were just family businesses still, so the children just were very used to it, grew up in it, weren't creeped out by being around the dead, and then became funeral directors or had related jobs like morticians and worked for the family.  Helps that it's constantly in demand, it's not like funerals dry up, and the profit margins are good.  There's not really huge corporate groups buying up all the little funeral homes yet, like family farms, and booting families to the side.  I mean, there's a little of that, but not to the same extent.

Getting back to important things...
Ever poop yerself? 
Ever pee yerself? 

Yes. When I was in the hospital in November. I was so weak for about 2 months I couldn't walk. I lost over 25 pounds. I went from 145 to 110 pounds in weight. I had to wear an adult diaper. I'm ok now!              

Thanks.  I was thinking more along the lines of stuck in the car, couldn't hold it in school, childhood oops...

About 35 years ago, all in office were let go early for an impending storm that hadn't yet started... I remembered this story because of ER's story about her son "never don't pee before you get in the car" or such... I hurried out of the building briefly considering a pit stop I didn't make and six or seven hours later when I finally got home I made it... :hatred:  I had staying power!   

I remember being stuck at the front of an Iron Maiden concert and being desperate for a pee. I couldn't get out and wanted to pee myself just to relieve the pressure on my bladder, but couldn't bring myself to do it.

Does when water breaks before labor count?

If you had to pick an Elder Scrolls race/species to live as, which one would it be? (Yes, I know this is a really, really personal question.)

Except for Skyrim making them out to be total choads, I always was partial to High Elves.

Orc. I like being on the fringes of society.

' Elder Scrolls' ?  :question:

I think it's Lord of the Rings sh!t.  The movies are overblown and pompous.  Lots to recommend.  BORING! 

^ No wonder I don't know what it is! Tara Sue LOVED the books! She saw a couple of the movies before she died. I bought her the whole series of books on Ebay. She loved them. Her daughter Angel has them now.
I still have 5 her paintings. All hanging on my walls.
Her son Jimmy had the rest. He died in the Philipines last year. He married a girl out their. He was in the Iraq war in search and destroy missions. He died last year. I loved him too. He was 35.
Why is my crazy old ass still alive?  :bluesad: :question: My brother, mother, father, cousin Ricky who committed suicide in 1979, Tara, Jim, Gramma, my Uncle Ron, Aunt Barb, my best friend Larry Conklin.
My sister Brenda is about to die. "All my friends and they die."

I suppose...

About 2006 when my employer died became a long "time of dying".  It really hasn't ended, because dying is life will go on. 

No, Elder Scrolls is a fantasy, open world adventure video game series.

(And THE LORD OF THE RINGS trilogy is the greatest cinematic effort in history, you Philistine!!!!   :twirl: :twirl: :twirl: )

I loved being  a Wood Elf.  Mad archery skills, and great at sneaking past bad guys!

Of course you're right about Elder Scrolls 'cause it was a guess but it's that same Fantasy stuff I dislike.  The closest I got to admiring the genre was GENE WOLFE's Torturer series of books...  he was a Catholic SciFi writer.

^ I'm with John. I don't like LORD OF THE RINGS or any of that elf/ dragon fantasy s**t.
LORD OF THE RINGS, HARRY POTTER, etc movies make me wanna set my TV on fire.

So you've finally given up on Sucker Punch?  :teddyr:

Different genre, but still one of my all time favorite movies.

One word to describe your whole life.

Mine would be "unexpected."

That sums it up start to now, how it began, how it deviated from script, so much that's happened, (and likely how it will end): unexpected.

Coincidence. Most of my major life events have had odds against them that were almost astronomical against them happening.

 :buggedout: :teddyr: :teddyr: :teddyr: :teddyr:

Complicated.

Lucky.

That's a great outlook!

I have to go with "lucky" too. 

Worse than I desire, better than I deserve.

(That's more than one word, innit?)

OK . . .

Ordinary.

I was going to say "hedonistic," but "lucky" actually fits better.

Would you rather remove one person from your sexual history, or add one? (The addition can't be some fantasy figure, it's realistically someone you have known, maybe someone who got away, that sort of deal. No hot 'n heavy Marilyn Monroe weekend in Hawaii.)

Remove. I slept with some real mutts.

Add. I've had some women I found bored me in bed, but on balance, I'd rather have sex with more than less. Besides only removing the person from my sexual history still leaves me knowing them in a non-carnal way.

Add. I can think of numerous opportunities I missed that I would have liked to correct.

Considering I'm a lifelong monogamist, removing someone would leave me without sex altogether for my 59 years on this planet.
So I'd say add, I guess.

I cannot remove or add anyone.  I did say lucky didn't I?  :teddyr: :lookingup:

Meaning you have never been with anyone? (Thought I'd ask you to clarify, because that's how I read it, which is fine if that's how it is, your life to live, even a certain honor in it possibly, I just wasn't sure I understood what you meant and didn't want to get what you were saying wrong.)

Before I go I guess it's only fair I answer my own question.

I've spent a long time attempting to figure someone out, and I still don't know, but I'd have to be insane not to wish him away.

I am unique in my experience and have been in love thrice, hence my sex partners.  I'm very happily married. There is little more uncomfortable than someone you don't care for touching you.  I have never experienced real casual sex.  And I'm proud of it.  

Cool! Just when you said you "could not" it kind of threw me.

Well you did rule out any fantasy get-away Hawaii Marilyn Monroe type trysts!   

What is your favorite style/kind of painting?

I like many pour paintings, which are abstracts, but most abstracts I don't care for. Impressionism was often beautiful, photorealism can be impressive, the PRB has held my interest to the point I even sought out some of their graves in London, but in the mid-2010s I saw a trailer for a film called Tim's Vermeer, sponsored by Penn & Teller, and on the trailer Penn said, "When you look at Vermeer's paintings, you are essentially looking at photographs of the 17th century." Something about him saying that captivated me and I was never able to see Vermeer's works in the same way again. Ever since then I have found them not just masterful but magical.

No one should be surprised to hear me answer Surrealism.

(https://davidcharlesfox.com/blg/dcf/user_img/20220504/1651721712542811.webp)

I like realistic paintings, leaning more towards landscapes than portraits (which strikes me more as an ego thing). Turner would be a good example, although I'm fairly sure he'd be horrified at some of the trash the prize awarded in his name goes to each year nowadays.

Pop art, I guess.
Cartoon art.

(https://i.imgur.com/TXwACY7.jpg) (https://lunapic.com)

Ever found a four-leaf clover?

No.

I find lots of them.  I always carry little plastic baggies with me to collect them.

While alone you see a blinding light from above and hear a booming voice that claims to be God, and this voice tells you to go forth into society and repeat a certain (non-violent and mostly beneficial) message word for word, telling everyone God told you to say this. How do you react?

Tell him to get off his lazy arse and do it his damn self.

^ What he said.

People called by God so often led subsequent lives of misery that the Catholic Church used this as an indication that the claims of divine visitation were valid. In other words, as John Lennon said, I'd run. (Hopefully in my case it'd work out better.)

When I was in Primary school (ages 5 to 12), we used to have to listen to I guess what would now be a weekly podcast, but back then was sent out on cassette tapes. It would be all about some religious figure and a group could Sherwood (if I recall correctly), would sing some uplifting song. I remember when they were telling us all about Livingston and his missionary work in Africa, realising that every week the person they told us about ended up disease-ridden, poor, oppressed and quite often burned at the stake. I decided that day that if god ever came calling with a mission for me, he'd get turned out on his ear and told to bugger off since he cared so poorly for the wellbeing of his employees. I would have been I guess somewhere between 9 and 11 when I came to that conclusion.

It's further proof of what I've long said: if God is real, God is strange.

Do you ever watch a news report about a disaster, and you're appalled on the surface, but something deep down in your reptile brain finds pleasant satisfaction in the carnage and destruction?

^ Not really.  :bluesad:

Really?  You are strange.  Free will is a malleable concept. 


WTF?  NEVER.  You ARE strange. 

Normally no.

Oh, I can assemble a good case for God's strangeness, lol.

And if you think that reptile brain question was strange (a question you seem to think I answered based on how  you attacked me) you'd really have leaned closer to your screen over some I've decided not to ask.  :bouncegiggle:

Never be afraid to open your mind to uncomfortable things, John, and exercise that God-given imagination. It can take you to unexpected places.

God?
Never think it may exist.
That some almighty enity you have never seen and have no proof that it really exists except old scripts. The idea of God will come for you if you f**ked up- you will be punished. It became a cult.

I did not attack you, merely reacted.  I apologize.  Other than "lucky" I would describe myself as "unafraid".  My mind is open wide and I nary indulge my own wishes or wants.  I am a pragmatist yet always uncomfortable with the idea of suffering, particularly savored.  I am not naive. 

 You tell John to open his mind? Open YOUR mind.
What if a GOD doesn't exist- and the whole concept of some unseen enity created the universe is myth?
 An unseen being looks over us and rules us? Determines my destiny and controls my life even after I'm dead? Will send me to hell? If I don't love him? THAT is EVIL.  Dumbest s**t I ever heard.  I'm sorry. I don't try to s**t on your weird imaginings. But DON'T mock folks who don't follow that party line. I'm a hardcore atheist- I get mocked all the time. Like I'm evil. I'm not evil.
And you think it's enjoyable to watch people die? f**k that.  :hatred:
God is strange. Bulls**t. If there was a God- he's a scumbag.

OK! Being I'm on this stupid rant- Do you believe in a God?

Dad was raised in the Jewish faith, Mom was raised in the Dutch Reformed Church and I was raised Presbyterian after Dad converted from Judaism in order to marry Mom as her Dad said that he didn't want his youngest daughter marrying someone who was Jewish.

I was raised to believe in God and I still do but man, my faith has taken a serious knock since 1997. I haven't been to church since 2008 when Dad passed.  :bluesad:

^ Hey man. I feel for you. I can understand folks who have faith. I'm sorry for your pain. My Ma, my little brother Richie, my Dad, Tara Sue. I wish I could help more than just being an a***ole on the internet.
Thing is- your strong, man. Have faith in yourself.

I think you know my answer to that question!
Yes, I believe there is a God because that makes more sense than there not being one.
I believe the God of the Bible is real because I believe the Gospels are accurate works of history about a remarkable moment in human history when God walked among us.

^ That's cool, Indy. I respect you, my friend, because you do good work. You follow the Word, and don't use it as a tool for power. Your a good man.

I hope I'm not coming across as anti religion. You can believe Mickey Mouse is a God- that's ok with me. It's when people start killing one another because they have different faiths. That is evil. That is religion- used as an excuse to control and kill those you fell "unworthy". That's politics.
It ain't cool, man.

Again, Ronny, I think you confuse religion with God. One is a human construct, the other may exist and be outside of human comprehension. One is an attempted path to the other. I am not a great fan of one, but I do try to figure out the other, even though I know it is a futile quest and I will die no more enlightened than I began.

You often attack me for things I never even said, including in this thread, and when you do I try to take it as revealing of yourself, in sometimes sad ways, as someone should be able to face most ideas without sliding into an enraged response. I think anger has been your shield and companion for so long it's left you closed-minded and hostile to some contemplations, and you blame religion for what's really human nature, tribalism, xenophobia, things like that, showing that your hatred of God is rooted in a lot of hurt more than it is in disbelief.

I'd say never close your mind to possibilities, including the fact there may be a creator of everything, or there may not be. Actually I'd agree, if there is a God, God is a scumbag. (Or "strange" as I more tactfully put it, lol.)

I'd also say unless your life is working to the point it is making you happy, don't close off avenues for improvement. In any case, we should all do our best to be polite to one another and not stifle ideas, like the Nazis did, don't you agree?  :smile:

My" hatred" of God?  :question:  I hate the way folks weaponize it.
And yes, Ma'am, I do agree on many points. Is their something after death? It's arrogant to think we insects in the universe know wtf is really going on.

(https://i.imgur.com/PMFnti6.gif) (https://lunapic.com)

"- and all is one and one is all- is aaalll-!"  
If there is a God, I reckon I'll find out when I die. Easy as that.

Ok. Do you have favorite authors?
Mine would be Shirley Jackson-#1.

(https://i.imgur.com/vlrViuf.jpg) (https://lunapic.com)

She's great.  :smile:

The American ambassador's home in Pretoria is called Hill House, believe it or not  :buggedout: :wink:

^ I ain't going there!  :buggedout:

I don't think I could pick a single favourite author.

Well, you know, an author you enjoy.

Vladimir Nabokov.

 :teddyr: :teddyr:

It's quite nice from the outside.

https://www.jacarandafm.com/news/news/us-dignitaries-sa-keeping-close-eye-elections/ (https://www.jacarandafm.com/news/news/us-dignitaries-sa-keeping-close-eye-elections/)

David Gemmell.

Stephen King
Alistair MacLean
Desmond Bagley
Herge
Goscinny and Uderzo
Wilbur Smith

A baker's dozen: Oscar Wilde, Neil Gaiman, Joyce Carol Oates, Shirley Jackson, Gary Jennings, Arthur Conan Doyle, Flannery O'Connor, Dorothy Parker, Peter Straub, Jane Austen, Stephen King, Garrison Keillor, King Solomon.

 

We Have Always Lived In The Castle  has long been a favorite of mine.  The last story I read was probably The Lottery... which I had reread just a few years ago.  Her personal life was troubled... mostly by neighbors!   

I also like F. Scott Fitzgerald  Thomas Harris  Ernest Hemingway  Mark Twain  Stephen King  Anne Rice   Gene Wolfe  ...

Can you taste the difference in an orange and a tangerine?

^ No.

I also enjoy HP Lovecraft, Issiac Asimov, Sandra Dee, William Shirer, Clive Barker, Stephan King, Charles Fort, Ivan Sanderson, and others of course.

Have you ever got high from huffing? (glue, gas, paint)

I have on all 3. Glue, because I built monster model and WWII model kits as a kit. Got high as a kite.
Gas- yes as well. Also when I was a kid, we lived in an old farmhouse, and there was a pipe coming out of the ground in the backyard with a large rusty ball on top of it. Most been an old pump there, because I usta huff on that thing.
Paint- again yes. I painted houses, machines at work, etc. When I'd be about half-way through I'd be high as a kite.

Nope, but we did do whipits and poppers...

I've never done that, but I do find I am in a minority in that I kind of think gasoline smells interesting, and turpentine smells downright good.

Ever known a Scientologist?

 (https://i.chzbgr.com/full/6766980352/hD93A7540/scientology)

Yes.  The textures and taste are similar, but the smell is distinctly different. 

Not beyond bumping into random recruiters. I've heard their numbers are falling which hopefully is true.

^ The saying on that Scientology poster is hilarious.

I was approached by a Scientologist who was handing out fliers and I said "No thanks, I've seen the movie Going Clear." He yanked that paper out of my hand so quickly I got a paper cut 😳

Nope. Don't care too.

The more you get into it, the more you get out of it...  :bouncegiggle:

"The better you look, the more you see."

Every time some man I knew said that back in the day, I'd think, that narcissist is tainting that clever bit of double meaning. (But it is a cool saying.)

Which brings me to my question: Ever loved and hated someone at the same time?

I used to but I think I got over it.

Sort of. There have been people in my life (normally female), who have been going through tough times and I've wanted to help, but they have been so determined to sort out their problems their own way and kept digging themselves into more and more trouble. Eventually I've had to say enough and step away rather than let myself be dragged down further into their issues. Those people, no matter how much I have cared about them I have also ended up being really p**sed off at by the time I reached the point where I walked away and left them to it.

Has anyone else ever picked up a universal remote control and tuned it into their neighbour's TV just so you could randomly change channels on them and generally mess with their heads?

My Dad.

No, but my grandson Aiden did. To me!

I haven't done that with a remote but I once had a supervisor who routinely did that to his neighbor., keeping it up even after he'd seen a cable trucks in his driveway over the course of weeks. (His neighbor was even a cop!)

The last time I was home in Zimbabwe (1997) the motel I stayed in would regularly and without warning its' guests, change the channel being screened in all the rooms.  I ended up watching the movie Needful Things three times in one day that way :buggedout:

 (https://i.chzbgr.com/full/6766980352/hD93A7540/scientology) 



No.

Have you ever built a sandcastle?

Having lived close to the ocean for the vast majority of my life, yes many times.

No.

If you could offer your younger self----let's say age 15-20 or thereabouts---personal advice (not stuff like "Buy Amazon!") what would it be?


I'd tell myself to stop trying to figure things out, quit worrying, enjoy the moment, go for the ride, things will be more or less fine.

In my case it would be as a teen to stop worrying about school, exams and zits. :buggedout: :wink:

Hmm, generally he had things figured out well enough and things worked out ok, so the only thing I'd say to my younger self is buy less stuff from GW.

I'd say to myself " Don't drink so much! It will bite you in the ass later!"

On your way to Earth for your next life, God gives you a last-minute choice: win a huge lottery at twenty but die a virgin at eighty, or just take your chances with sex and money?

I'd take my chances.

I think I'd take my chances.

I'd stay a virgin 😉

Cheese and crackers, who wouldn't take their chances?   Oh.  I can name two.  I would take my chances. 

Here's a related question- when's the last time you had sex?
Me- about 6 years ago.  :bluesad:

Last Thursday. (I was gone all weekend)

I don't know if anyone wants to know my answer as it might gross them out  :buggedout: but the last time I was with anyone was in August 2004: been celibate since then.

^ Why is that gross?  :question:
Gross would be- "Last night, with a freshly decapitated chicken."

Yesterday, although I am hoping to get some later today after we've dropped Ash off at school.

That's what happened in August 2004 😳😉😉😆🐢

I'd take my chances too.

Health concerns deny me of that pleasure in too long a time to remember. 

The man's a poet, and don't know it.

Ginger or Mary Ann?

Mrs. Howell.  :buggedout:

No- Mary Ann.

I've always thought Mary Ann was by far the better choice. If nothing else, in a survival situation she'd have had no qualms about killing, cleaning, and eating Ginger.

Ask me anything, and tomorrow I may answer it. Goodnight.

When was the last time you had sex?

August 2004: oh, sorry wrong person 😉🐢

What are the details to access your bank account?  :bouncegiggle:

Ha! Someone hacking my bank account would be very disappointed with the meager results these days, lol. Decent net worth in property; not overflowing with spending cash.

I'd rather not say.

Neither did I.  
 

^ I don't think so. I enjoy his films.

What was your caste designation in high school?

Someone told me I was hard to classify because I had so many contradictions. It was the most flattering thing he ever said.

I always thought I was the coolest of the nerds, or the nerdiest one in the cool crowd. I transferred high schools when I was a junior and was pretty much a loner, no one knew what to make of me but they didn't try to f**k with me. Later on I hung out with the punks because they were the most interesting, even though I never really liked the music.

I hung out with the farmers, mostly. Because they were my neighbors. And they all drank and smoked weed. And liked hard rock.  What was odd is that lotsa kids liked me because I was a good artist, and made them laugh. Even most teachers liked me, because I was smart. I was even elected class president in my sophmore year! I quit because they asked some of us to select a movie for Thanksgiving movie s**t. We picked PSYCHO.
But some prissy ass girl, who was a teachers daughter, almost p**sed herself at a screening, so they showed the Beatles MAGICAL MYSTERY TOUR (ugh!) and almost all the kids in the auditorium walked out. I resigned the next day. They people talked, and the elite ruled. f**k that!

Q: Is JAMES DEAN over-rated?

^ I answered that earlier, before you edited it. I said no, I think he's good.

Got it.  Then got buried.  I am interested in everyone's opinion.

^ Do you think he's overrated?  :question:

Yes.  The only movie I really like is REBEL WITHOUT A CAUSE.    The other two are kind of overblown, particularly GIANT. 
I'm interested in what people think of him now.  I was thinking about a few of that generation of 50s bad boy trouble actors like Brando  Clift  Perkins  ...

The only film of his I've ever seen was Rebel Without A Cause and that was a long time ago. I don't recall being particularly impressed by him so based on that limited exposure, I'd have to say yes, overrated.

You guys should give EAST OF EDEN (1955) a try. I like it better than REBEL WITHOUT A CAUSE.

I'm on the fence with this one: his tragic early death made him an icon and his performances were good but I'm not sure if he's over or under rated. My first memory of him is seeing him in Giant, all covered in oil. :smile:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KkUeztGivQg (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KkUeztGivQg)

^ Creepy.

Have you ever stole anything? Be honest!
I have. I usta buy monster mags, and hide a comic book in the middle. Never got caught. I did fell real bad.
I did it about 3 times. I had to get my Famous Monsters mag, and I only had a dollar. And they had the new Captain America (Kirby!)...ah... no excuse. But otherwise... :bluesad:

I stole a Christmas tree. (Should've saved that one for the true or false thread).

I was a teenager when I stole the comic books. Christmas tree? How do you steal a Christmas tree?

 
 :bouncegiggle:  Easily.

If the only answer is yes or no with nothing in between, then, yes, James Dean is overrated. (I went to visit his grave in high school with some boy I knew who was into him.) Death can be a terrific career move for cool young people. Nothing wrong with his acting but had he lived longer I seriously doubt he'd have been so revered.


Have I stolen? One thing that comes to mind is as a teenager I used to walk out with library books marked adult, not in the porn sense but our library would not let people under eighteen check out certain books, mostly ones with bad language or anything sexual in nature in them at all, which included a lot of Clive Barker, Stephen King, a lot of James Joyce, No One Here Gets Out Alive, Tropic of Cancer, The Pillars of the Earth, and quite a few others I wanted to read, so I used to take them and then bring them back when I was done. I figured it was pragmatism mingled social protest against a nanny state.

There was a big stack of them at a store like Big Lots. Drove up in a pickup truck, jumped out, grabbed one, threw it into the truck bed, rode off. Alcohol may have been involved.

 ^May have, huh?  :drink:

I stole a Snickers bar from the store as a kid.

What was the attitude toward religion in your family when you were growing up?

Dad and Mary Joe sent us to a holy roller church. I HATED it. They never went, of course. It was just to get us out of the house for a couple of hours.
I lived in a Catholic orphanage for a short time as a small child. The nuns were very sweet.

We were forced to go to church every Sunday, and then Sunday school. Must have been 4 hours all in. I used to spend most of it trying to think of ways not to get bored. My family were the only people in the building who weren't past retirement age. Other than Sunday religion wasn't a big factor in our lives though. No saying grace before dinner etc. Once my mum left my dad, it would be many years before I'd set foot in a church. I went for a couple of months in my mid-20s, but still found it spiritually dead.

My Dad was a Baptist preacher and my Mom played the piano for church services, so I had little choice about attending.
But I enjoyed church, and the people there, and what it taught me about God and the Bible.
I still attend every Sunday to this day.

Mom was brought up in an Afrikaans language church and when she met Dad (raised in the Jewish faith) he had to very quickly leave that faith as her Dad didn't want his little girl marrying a Jewish person so he became a Presbyterian and so did she.

I was raised to believe in a higher power and was even a Sunday School teacher in 1986.

My mom was raised in a Catholic family so devout that growing up she was told there was no salvation outside the Church, and while she was never that severe herself, she did come over with notions that were beyond those my dad was raised with in the US (his background was church on Sunday morning and that was mostly it) and so I grew up with her trying to guide me toward what she thought was right, going to church on Sunday and days of obligation, saying the rosary with her about once a week, keeping Lent, going to Catholic school, and to confession.

She also was artistically talented, though, and had good taste in rock, and wasn't a Bible thumper, she just had it drilled into her brain that you had to live under Church doctrines or else you weren't doing what you should be doing. Mostly she let me read what I wanted and wasn't unreasonably strict about anything, and I enjoyed being with her. She was so pretty and so kind, and honestly very young, (and apparently, secretly, unhappy).

My dad could take or leave religion growing up and later but didn't disregard it either, and told me to listen to my mom when she told me to go to church or things like that. When he was in school and his teachers got wind of how intelligent he was the Jesuits tried HARD to recruit my dad, and got absolutely nowhere: he liked girls way too much, lol.

My mother believes there's a good chance I am going to go to Hell, and that disturbs and saddens her.

I was given zero instruction in any direction.  Not dissuaded from it, not pushed into it.  My mom is from a very Catholic family, so I'm pretty sure that was a deliberate decision.  

My parents answered questions I had honestly, but were generally neutral.  My dad was skeptical of organized religion, but more vague on the possibility of God, he was agnostic but possibly leaning slightly in a deistic kind of direction.  I quite liked it all around really, I think it was a good way to approach it.  Myself and both my sisters are non-religious as adults.  


Hah, we did that one year when I was a teenager.  We (my mother and I, I couldn't drive yet) went to buy a tree Christmas Eve, but the place closed early!  So we parked near the edge of where the trees were, grabbed it and quickly tossed it into our van, and drove it home.  The leftovers just get woodchipped anyway, so I can't say I feel bad about it.

What do you call soft drinks?
Some call it Pop (like me). Soda? Soda Pop? a Coke?
And what's your favorite flavors? I like Grape. I can't find Welch's grape pop no more, so it's Grape Crush. Or a Grape Stewarts if I can find it.

(https://i.imgur.com/ZK9cfcZ.png) (https://lunapic.com)

The Catholic Church was the one true church.  All of us received sacraments through Confirmation.

All 5 of us went to Catholic schools.  My oldest brother and sister both graduated from Catholic High Schools. 

My father was a school teacher and made little money; yet they found tuition for 5 of us. 

My father had a "falling out" with the church after my mother left and then he felt my other brother had been mistreated by the school.  He pulled us out and we went to public school.

The Catholics are my tribe.

Just call/called it soft drink. For some reason my son calls it soda, but I'm not sure where he picked that up. (I know a lot of people do, I just mean no one else at home does.)

For a while in the "90s I'd drink Mountain Dew sometimes, which along with Snapple was a fad, but most of my life I didn't drink much soft drink, and today I won't touch the stuff because I think it's worse for people's health than is generally acknowledged.

I rarely drink pop either. When I do, it's grape. Or Verneer's. I prefer tea or ice tea. Unsweetened. With a little lemon in the ice tea. I usta like Big Red, but don't see it around any more.

We always just called it Soda.
I drank regular Dr. Pepper for years. Shifted to Diet about 10 years ago.
Drink a ridiculous quantity of it daily.

I do not know why, but it is referred as ginger here.

Ever been inside a mine?

No.

I believe so, on a vacation out west.
And I've ridden the RUNAWAY MINE TRAIN at Six Flags more times than I can count!

Have you ever eaten cow tounge?
I have- it's quite good!

Yeah, had it a few times.

Surprisingly, yes. A Chinese restaurant used to serve it.

Why don't men carry purses?

Because we have pockets.

Some do, a thing called a man purse.
I have never seen someone wearing one, but if I did I would rip it from his body and beat him with it.

Would you rather be seen as:

Cunning, formidable, popular and seductive

Or:

Forgiving, loyal, generous and kind?

Well, I'm not any of #1, so 2, I guess.

I'd rather be commonly seen as 1, but actually be 2.

None of them: I am perfect 😉

Being the second sounds like a recipe for spending your life being walked over, used and abused so I'll have to go with the first option.

Ever had intimate carnal relations with a virgin?

Yes. Two different ones.

Myself!
When I was a little jerk off!

I remember when I was fifteen being told what a perplexing mystery it was that puzzled many a young male where all the virgins went when so few guys had ever been with one. The only explanation they could come up with was that a small minority of men were getting everybody else's share. I could tell I'd truly hit on a topic much lamented over and great puzzling to them all, something that had eaten up many a beer-drinking session.

OK. This is getting real creepy!  :bouncegiggle:

Have you ever eaten live earth worms? Like night crawlers.

Probably, but not to my knowledge. I did read a book called How To Eat Fried Worms. We were taught in survival situations there are many bugs you could eat, but not earthworms.

^ I'm from Michigan. I eat road kill.

HAVE YOU?   :question:

Now, John, do I strike you as the sort who'd enjoy playing tennis against a novice?

Er, well, once, yes. So Alex, Indy and I are the only punchers of v-cards in the place?

My wife and I are each other's first and only partners.  So yes for us both.

You had refused to answer a comparable question so I was surprised by your latest. 
Now, Evelyn, you strike me as cagey. 
And my answer to your question is yes.  Once.  The first time. 

Yes, I was the virgin 😉

I hadn't asked the question that I declined to answer the other day. If I ask a question for a topic it's only fair that I'd answer it too. I also don't think I've sidestepped too many sexual subjects, lol.

Thanks for playing!

What decade from the 1960s to (ahem) now has had your favorite music?

For me deciding between the '80s and '90s is hard but some of my favorite groups were in the classic rock era. I'll go with....the '90s.

80's all the way, baby!!!!  (With a bit of late 70's thrown in).

60's.

The 90s were the "classic rock era" my posterior.  


 

That's the ticket!

Sigh. John, if I had a farthing for every time you've misread my posts, I'd finance Indy's retirement.  :lookingup:

Whatever that might mean, Ms Cagey. 

I guess you need greater annotation then. If you read more carefully you might notice I was not saying the 1990s was classic rock, I was saying some of my favorite bands were in the era of classic rock. So your posterior remains safe.

That wasn't a post I thought I'd have to explain, but glad to help.

60s, followed by 90s.

In the sixties you had a real wealth of great music because rock was still rising, but jazz-based styles were not yet dead.

Tap dancing.  Cagey.  Define the "classic rock era". 

For me it was the 1970s with Boston, Kansas, Led Zeppelin, The Who, ACDC etc.

I once read that radio stations label rock older than 25 years as "classic rock", and songs older than 50 years as "golden oldies".

1974 - 1998 - Classic Rock
1973 and older - Golden Oldies

50 years ago, writers and record labels routinely defined 10 or 15 year old records as "golden oldies". 

Do you worry about being murdered?

Anyone could be a murder victim, I think we all know that on some level, but the odds are so low that most people seem to give it little thought. Me, I admit I think about it, and I've even been told the things we obsess over are pulled toward our lives. I don't know if that's true but so various acquaintances of mine have claimed. For most of the first twenty-nine years of my life I was sure I would die at age twenty-nine. I was so sure of it it was like being aware of a meeting scheduled for a time ahead. People who knew me then remember how much a part of my life and identity, my very existence, that strange certainty was. It colored everything, even not wanting to be married and have children, if I wouldn't be with my family. I recall the morning I turned thirty, waking up and realizing it never happened, this thing that had walked with me for years, like a shadow, proving even the strongest premonitions can be wrong.

So I don't pay to much attention anymore to that inner feeling I'll meet a violent, probably sudden, end, but one thing I know is whoever came for me would be paid back in a multitude of unpleasant and far-reaching ways that would go on and on like ripples in water. I don't get revenge, it's an ugly thing, forgive, forget, move on, life is a tiny little spark in the greatness of time, just enjoy having it, but some people I know seem absolutely in love with vengeance and payback, and they'd act on my behalf making cruelty follow cruelty, not what I'd want. But it'd happen.

High stress time now. Someone I love is dying painfully. Haven't slept in a long time. Thoughts like these....whatever.

Nope.

 

Define the "classic rock era". 

I'm very fortunate that I have little money and no real enemies that I know of.
If I am murdered, it will be in a random act of violence, like a school shooting.  And in that circumstance, I like to think that I would do all I could to protect the innocent, even if it meant sacrificing myself to do so.

I'd rather die quickly, whether from a gunshot wound or a sudden heart attack, than fade out by inches over a period of years, my mind trapped inside a failing body, lamenting my lost youth . . .

My uncle (by marriage, a marriage that ended) used to own radio stations and he'd use terms like "Hot AC" and various codes for genres, and his classic rock station out west, and the "classic rock" channel on the radio locally and the classic rock setting on the music streaming service we get plays music from maybe the mid-1960s to the mid or late 1970s. That is my take on Classic Rock as a commercial genre rather than a description, and what I was referring to in my post from ...way back


Can I ask, John, is there a reason you obsessively focus on me so much and seem to have so much snideness toward me? This "grouch with a grudge" vibe? Whatever the reason, it'd be nice if you'd stop because it disturbs the sense of community this site so often has and which I think for the most part everyone enjoys.

Yes!  Not so much anymore, but when I was living in the city, it was always a possibility in the back of my mind.  I had been followed home by strangers multiple times, stalked, almost pulled into a gangway and probably would have been raped and murdered just feet from my house (“almost” thanks to my ever-watchful grandmother), and once got lost and stupidly accepted a ride home from a stranger – all before high school ended.  As an adult, I’d continue to be followed by strangers coming off the train after work and had long-standing tensions with a family on my block that I am pretty sure have connections with drug trafficking, possibly worse.  It was when my daughter ended up in the same class as one of their kids and started saying they were “best friends” that I decided we had to move immediately.  That and the boy that was murdered in front of our house that had drawn droves of “mourners” that would come at all hours of the day and loiter, tag, shout, fight and basically engage in every possible activity you can think of to put a giant target on our area to be ripe for more drive-by shootings.

Shortly after we moved to the suburbs, there was this weird salesman that came to my door trying to sell educational materials.  He insisted he needed to come into the house to “lay things out” for me to see all the offerings and said everyone else he spoke to in the neighborhood had allowed him in.  Of course I didn’t let him in, but he did give me a card with his picture on it which I thought was odd if he really was a murderer, still very suspicious.  I don’t think it’s a very good business practice for door-to-door salesmen to insist on coming into someone’s house these days.

Now I’m just worried about my kids after seeing all these adolescent/teen killers in the suburbs.  I want to be sure they know the red flags if they make friends with anyone like that, and I want to be sure they don’t become one themselves. 

Are you kidding?  You play games.  I disagreed with an assertion you had made.  To which you responded typically with an INSULT. 
As usual, you avoid answering perhaps because you can't find a way to be right.  You stated I did not read your post correctly.  Terms defined would help, like "classic rock era".  Actually, I think you realized your writing was not precise... and debatable.

Thanks for your answer, John. You're insane, but thanks for your answer.

Thank you again for another insult.  I am not insane but YOU tap dance.  We could have had a friendly exchange, a direction I thought we were headed in.  It is worth pointing out that you had written to me privately essentially on the same topic.   Seems friendly.  It's not.  It's your self absorption. 

What's the longest you've ever walked in one day? (Distance or time, either works.)

I think thirty-two miles is my record.

The man I was going to walk the AZT with (along with his family) did the twenty-four hour challenge on the Appalachian Trail and put in sixty-six miles in twenty-four almost continuous hours.  :drink:

I walked for 2 days hitchhiking from Michigan to New York with my brother Glenn. I was 16, and he was 14.

Have you ever been in Psychotherapy?

Three times in my 50 + years on this planet.

Was it of use for you? 

Kind of. Rehab- twice.

I wanted the help but all three specialists I went to said that they couldn't help me as they found it hard to get through to me 😳

 

Three specialists?  Sounds like three failures at their profession. 

 :teddyr: Can you blame them for failing? I was their patient.  :wink:

You should curb making jokes at your own expense.  If you needed help, sought it out and they blamed you for their failure to help, these "specialists" were ass backwards.  Unqualified.  Were these people therapists or doctors? 

Thanks: my ability at self deprecation's helped me a lot in my life to cope with all the crap that's happened to me - abandonment, physical abuse, etc - so if I didn't have a sense of humor about myself and the situations I find myself in a lot, I wouldn't be alive.

I genuinely think these doctors had issues with getting through to me like so many people have had in the past, like my school teachers.

Dad's advice to me back then was "**** them son, you'll be OK, live your life as best you can."  :smile:

Did you refuse to open up? Never been to a psychiatrist but if I ever did I would tell everything so they could help me to get better. Isn't that the whole point of going there?

I told them that I wanted help and was 100 % open with them but they said that they couldn't find a way to get through to me and assist me, so I left it there and haven't been in therapy since.

How do you want to be remembered?

As a good Christian, a loving father and husband, a loyal friend, and a teacher who loved his students.

I don't care.

exactly as i will be. as barri.

I would like to be forgotten. That's why I don't even want a tombstone. As one of my favorite poems says it so well:


Earth, that nourished thee, shall claim   
Thy growth, to be resolved to earth again,
And, lost each human trace, surrendering up   
Thine individual being, shalt thou go   
To mix for ever with the elements,   
To be a brother to the insensible rock   
And to the sluggish clod, which the rude swain   
Turns with his share, and treads upon. The oak   
Shall send his roots abroad, and pierce thy mould. 
     Yet not to thine eternal resting-place   
Shalt thou retire alone, nor couldst thou wish   
Couch more magnificent. Thou shalt lie down   
With patriarchs of the infant world—with kings,   
The powerful of the earth—the wise, the good,   
Fair forms, and hoary seers of ages past,   
All in one mighty sepulchre.   The hills   
Rock-ribbed and ancient as the sun,—the vales   
Stretching in pensive quietness between;   
The venerable woods—rivers that move   
In majesty, and the complaining brooks   
That make the meadows green; and, poured round all,   
Old Ocean’s gray and melancholy waste,—   
Are but the solemn decorations all   
Of the great tomb of man.

As long as any of us who know you survive, my friend, you will NEVER be forgotten!

Do you like hot peppers?
I LOVE hot peppers. But I won't go beyond jabeneros. I HAVE- but not with my gut like it is. Heartburn would kill me.

I like hot food, although it gives Kristi asthma attacks, so I very rarely get to eat it these days. I suspect I've lost my tolerance for it.

What is the longest time in your life you've spend afraid?

That's a good question; I'm not a  fearful person - not on my own account, anyway.
The longest I was afraid for myself was probably the three days it took USS Lockwood to ride out a huge Pacific typhoon.  No joke; those waves were 30-40 feet tall and were breaking over the bow of the ship.  I was seasick, scared, and homesick all at once.

As far as being fearful for others - once I didn't hear from my best friend, with whom I write back and forth several times a day, for over a week.  I was scared something awful had happened.

A second or two. I don't get scared- I get angry.

Dig it.  What we have in common I've pointed out: lucky... to be alive.  

 

Oh yeah, pickled hot peppers on pizza, sub sandwich, chili, love 'em!

Then you're all  lucky. I've been afraid many times and sometimes for a long time. Always with reason though, and I always kept going.

You're a courageous person.

I've been afraid many times. Fear is something that has evolved to help us survive. I think the most I've ever been afraid was the night we lost Lilly-Beth and Kristi was having a bad reaction to the medication she'd been given. Nothing life-threatening, but that isn't how it felt. I really thought I was going to lose both of them. When my mind was playing tricks on me and I couldn't trust my own senses or memory, I was definitely afraid that I'd never be able to trust it again. That would be the longest I've been afraid of. I can't remember exactly how long that went on, but I'd estimate a couple of months before I got it under control. I suspect I was very afraid when I was being shot at or stabbed, but I was too busy dealing with the situation to really take notice of it. I remember being scared when I was on a lift that suddenly broke and plunged down, but I managed to keep myself calm and deal with it without panicking. Every time I get on an airplane, during take-off and landing I have an unreasonable fear that one of the wings will fall off, but I don't let it stop me from flying.

For anyone who has never felt afraid, I'd suggest going for therapy. You are missing a vital part of your psychological makeup that prevents you from doing stupid things. Not feeling it is not a good thing, quite the opposite. As long as you can deal with feeling it, it is a normal, healthy reaction.

I haven't spent much time considering fear, but I have experienced it.  Going to a new school is frightening when you're young.  Work problems like Am I going to be fired...?  Rough plane rides are scary.  Death beds are the worst, fear and sorrow. 

Kristi is watching Eurovision and I am afraid she is going to expect me to pay attention.  :bouncegiggle: I am watching The Doom That Came To Gotham instead.

Considering fear, I forgot two TERRIFYING car rides I've been in with 2 different reckless drivers.  I haven't driven with either of them behind the wheel since.

All right, what's the bravest thing you've ever done?

I once had to get close to a genuine psychopath, someone I later associated with the concept of yandere. He could go from kind and generous and quiet to explosively violent and suspicious in an instant. Terrifying human being, and out of everything I ever did, being around him was the thing I was sure was most likely to get me killed in the long or short term. He later got murdered in prison.

On the lighter side, when I was a teenager Brian used to like to be up on tall places like hilltops and the roofs of buildings, and one night he started walking on the ledge of a building about sixty or seventy feet up and finally sat down with his feet hanging over the side and said come sit with me. I decided I'd rather fall to my death than let him know how terrified I was, so I went and sat beside him, and it was pretty cool being up there unseen above people, our legs dangling in open space, but I was scared the whole time, trying to hide it, which questionable judgment aside, was probably the bravest thing I'd done to that point in my life. Crazy time....

I guess it would have been when I was 11. I was out for Samhain taking two younger kids out. We were crossing an open park when a guy attacked the younger pair with a knife. I jumped between them and shouted to the pair to go get help while I tried to fight off an older attacker. Got my first knife wound that night when my left eyelid was slashed open, but luckily for me it didn't go any deeper and cut the eyeball itself.

Probably not killing myself after being horribly abused in my teens, facing up to the abuse and trying to move on with my life ☹️

Lived on the streets of NYC in the 80's.
Never had any real problems, except for finding food. You would be surprised what you would do. Eat garbage. And I do mean garbage. Not brave. Not afraid. Just going on survival mode.

America's gun culture is horrifying, no denying, but that knife s**t you guys got going on over there is twelve kinds of awful. That'd spook the hell out of me.

I'll take facing down someone with a knife over a gun any day of the week myself.

^ Imagine if people were just nice to each other.

In 2002, as my wife and I were in the process of moving to our current abode, I saw a home next to the highway we took that was on fire.  No one had arrived on the scene yet, so we pulled into the driveway.  My wife called the local fire department, and I kicked in the back door of the house to see if anyone was trapped inside.  You couldn't see the ceiling of the room due to the dense cloud of smoke filling the air, but I crawled on my hands and knees into the house, calling out to see if anyone was home.  No one was, and I backed out pretty quickly - but later on I realized that I had just kicked down a door and gone into a blazing home with zero protective gear or experience!
Firefighters appeared moments later and got the fire under control before it broke through the roof, and the owners were able to repair the house.  Then, two years later, it caught fire again and burned to the ground.  Weird.

3 months. my husband's old heart doctor convinced us that curtis would die without a new pacemaker battery, it too me 3 months to get together the money to pay for 1/2 of the operation. 6 months later, his new doctor told us he has never been pacemaker dependent at all. we could easily have waited for his medicare to start and the whole thing would have been free. yes, i'm in a class action suit to sue the old doctor.

hhhmmm.... does it count if i didn't know it was " brave' at the time?

Do you think WWIII will happen in your lifetime?

(https://i.imgur.com/a42dfhx.gif) (https://lunapic.com)

I'm about to turn 60.
Frankly, I think not.  The Russians can't even conquer Ukraine; the Chinese don't need to resort to nukes as they plan on dominating the world economically. And since the grown-ups are back in control of the government and Trump's chances of getting elected again appear to be diminishing by the day, I don't see us starting it either.

Me neither, buddy.  :smile:

Doubt. There are nothing to gain economically from it and I don't think(at least currently) any ideological movement is strong enough rn to force it

I'm doubtful, too, although the chances are much greater than I would have thought ten years ago.

One silver-lining outcome of the Ukraine conflict is that aggressors will (hopefully) learn by example that, in the modern world, warfare isn't worth it. Watching what's going on, I don't think China is making plans to go after Taiwan.

After growing up in the environment I did, I always felt that a third world war wasn't far off until Gorbachev started speaking about perestroika ☺️

I think Taiwan is more likely to kick things off than Ukraine. I am expecting trouble there before the end of the decade.

So far, has your life been a comedy or a tragedy?

Mine has been a very black comedy.

While I've had elements of both, I'd have to go with neither.

Tragi-comedy, especially in the last three years.

Mine is one of those sappy-sweet 80's sitcoms with moments of Indiana Jones thrown in.

The EVIL DEAD 2
Sometimes it's so f**ked up it's funny.

(https://i.imgur.com/DkuYkUz.gif) (https://lunapic.com)

How much would you miss this site, if you left?

If I left- not at all. I mean, I left, didn't I?  :question:
Now if I left because I died- I wouldn't miss anything. I'd be dead.
If it shut down, yeah- I'd miss it.

same here. so far, it's been one hell of a ride! :cheers:

OK, this question isn't personal but it is strange, and I was thinking about it last night on a plane....

Why are the digits on a keyboard's number pad and the digits on a phone reversed? (The "1"  is on the upper left on a phone, the lower left on most keyboards.)

It's on the upper left of my keyboard and phone.

Have you ever set a house on fire?

No, am I missing out?

I don't know. I haven't either.
My brother Glenn burned my Ma's house down! He passed out with a candle sitting next to a curtain. Dum f**k.

Ever walked into a restaurant and seen the people working there and thought....m'gawd, I wouldn't want you touching something I owned, let alone have you fixing something I was going to consume?

^ No. I've eaten jail food.

Which gives you more pleasure, giving someone a gift and seeing the happiness it brings, or getting a gift yourself?

(I've been given some nice things but honestly I think I've gotten more joy from making others happy.)

 :buggedout: :buggedout:

I love giving gifts. I think I enjoy giving them often more than people like receiving them.

no, having spent most of my adulthood in the food service industry, i don't judge people by what they look like.

So what a person looked like, the level of hygiene you observed, the state of health, there's nothing about appearance whatsoever that would factor into whether you ate something prepared by this person?

^ Where do you eat at where the people preparing the food are so filthy?
Jail? A dive bar run by a greasy slob? C'mon- gimme a break.

I know there used to be a lassie who worked in a local shop who always had a fake tan, but it just made her look dirty. I refused to let her serve me.

^ I dunno. I ate jail food served by some nappy looking cons. I ate it.
If you don't have cash for commissary- you ate it or you ate nothing. And you will get hungry sooner or later.
I ate hocks and beans made by my first wife- and she was nasty as homemade soap. But she made some good beans! With onions and hot peppers! She was a Texan.

Sometimes I've gone into a place and the people don't strike me as clean. It's not a particular group I am leery of, that summation has stretched across cultural boundaries and age and types of cuisine, but if someone looks dirty to me, I don't want that person making my food. I got bad vibes off a Taco Bell in Maine years ago, just before the health department closed it down over a hep-b outbreak. Guy the other day in this restaurant had some of the filthiest hair I had ever seen, way beyond any normal "he needs a good shampoo" range, and I thought....nah. Gotta look out for yourself and your family in this life, and I'd rather support a place that maintains higher standards than to have a worker with hair that stinks up the whole cash register area be around something I might eat.

BTW, I try not to be a pain in the butt customer and usually tip 30% unless someone really gives bad service. I have even sent money back to the kitchen many times along with compliments. I like rewarding working people directly, but...seriously, dirty folks shouldn't be in the business.

^ There you go! Taco Bell! That food tastes like it's made of dirt!
I wouldn't feed that slop to my dog!

Agreed. Way worse than it was in the '90s, and it was practically horsemeat back then.

No but friends of mine had a restaurant in Pretoria central and they named a burger after me: a Trevor burger, no sauce, no garnish, just the bun and a well cooked patty. That was until my vegan sister begged me to cut down on red meat.  :smile:

Many years ago, before I moved up this way, I was passing through Inverness. Felt hungry and popped into a nearby kebab shop. I was walked in a rather dirty looking fat man wearing a string vest and with way too much body hair sat down at a table and planted his face in his food, eating it like that. Decided not to eat in that place afterall. The next time I came through two years later it had thankfully closed down. Turned out the fat guy was the chef.

^  :bouncegiggle: :bouncegiggle: :bouncegiggle:

 :bouncegiggle:

   i look at 3 things in that sense. do they have any open sores? if so, i report the whole establishment. do they have their hair/beard/whatever properly restrained? again, if not the health department gets a call. the third is are they wearing gloves? and when i spend 3-4 minutes observing them, do they treat their gloves and hands appropriately? and again, if not i turn in the whole place.
   if i can't trust the management to hire people that follow health codes, i turn them in, and i eat elsewhere. we get sweaty in food service, and we don't always smell like roses. we also get flushed from the heat, and people THINK we're sick. or we have tats and scars and piercings that make people ASSUME we MUST be filthy nasty people.
     

Does it bother you to see babies with piercings?

😳😝😝😂😂

I haven't eaten in a kebab shop since.

Yes. It does the kid no good; it's for the a***ole parents to show off the kid.

It bothers me too. I saw a baby girl with a stud in her nose the other day and it made me mad. Getting common to see babies with pierced ears too. Used to be getting your ears pierced was a kind of rite of passage, freely chosen.

Ash certainly won't get any piercings unless he asks for them. It should be something with a minimum age requirement.

When you are dipping/if you ever dipped out of a carton of Neapolitan ice cream, have you/would you scoop across all three flavors, or concentrate on one?

All three.  :thumbup:

Me too!
Otherwise:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lYSBPo_mAD0 (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lYSBPo_mAD0)

I do one at a time with a little bit of overhang at the edges. BTW I recommend Kroger Neapolitan Ice Cream Sandwiches.

sorry, i can't answer this since i can't eat ice cream, and my old guy would die before he ate strawberry anything, lol!

What candy is the worst?
I'm going with Peeps and Kandy Korn.

Anything with licorice.  That's a flavor I can't abide!

^ I LOVE black licorce!

Me too!

I don't like anything marshmallow-based.

Agreed: marshmallows taste like snot to me, always have. If its toasted on a stick then yes. Otherwise 😳

American candy is strange. I can understand why so many of my stateside friends and family get me to bring over stuff they can't get there. Kristi once sent me a bag of Hershey's hugs and kisses. When I tried one I seriously thought this was her way of telling me I was dumped. It tasted like someone had just vomited in my mouth. Because of the adverts in comics I'd read as a kid I'd always wanted to try Twinkies and Jolly Ranchers. When I did, I pretty much spat them straight back out.

I don't know if there are any candies worse tasting than any of those, but after those experiences, I gave up trying them. Good job the cheeseburgers made up for things (we are arranging for someone to have a Pace's Countryboy Double Burger waiting for me when I get off the plane).

I don't know about candy but I once bought a bottle of root beer: ice cold on a hot day and I almost 🤢🤮😝

Agreed on Twinkies, I have always found them pretty disgusting. The Hershey's kisses might have gone bad; I can see someone not liking them, but I can't see describing them as tasting like vomit. Jolly Ranchers are a bit sour and not my favorite, but they're OK. I guess root beer might be an acquired taste, but I expect Trevor didn't sample the highest quality bottle.

I don't like Twinkies either. I enjoy a good bottle of root beer on occasion, but rarely drink soda pop.

Speaking of candy, what is a candy that is local to you that outsiders might not have tried? Here in KY we make bourbon balls, which are literally chocolates with liquid bourbon centers. Delicious but decadent.

I bought one of this company's products: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Frankie%27s (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Frankie%27s)  Not nice at all :drink: :tongueout: :tongueout:

I know Kristi won't touch Hershey's chocolate. Certainly, the impression I've gotten from her friends and family when they've visited was that they weren't a very liked brand. One of the local shops started selling it when some US troops got permanently based here with the P-8s. The box is still sitting there pretty much untouched (unless the boxes of them get emptied really quickly and I've only seen them just after they've been replaced) over a year later so I got the impression they weren't really that popular with anyone. I would say the hugs and kisses were the foulest-tasting sweets I have ever tried, a position that had been previously held for 20 odd years by Fishermen's Friends.

Those lozenges taste like they've been made with run-off from my undies but they do work.  :wink:

I've never liked Skittles even a little bit. Plus in college a friend left a pack in her car overnight in sub-zero weather, popped one in her mouth the next day and chipped her tooth it so so frozen solid.

Skittles do have one neat use though:

https://www.youtube.com/shorts/ihN8dR9N1-M (https://www.youtube.com/shorts/ihN8dR9N1-M)

They used to be the #1 selling chocolate brand here and probably still are. They are fine, but a little boring. The chocolate bar with almonds is excellent.

I found this: https://www.quora.com/Why-do-most-Europeans-hate-Hershey-s-chocolate (https://www.quora.com/Why-do-most-Europeans-hate-Hershey-s-chocolate) that may explain the "vomit" comment. Personally I can't tell much difference between Hershey's and European style chocolate. Of course dark chocolate tastes much different (and better).

Chocolate covered pecans are one of my favorite treats, but they are pricey!

I like Raisonettes and Goobers (chocolate covered peanuts.)

I try to keep my sugar intake low, so when I eat chocolate, it's almost always a high-cacao dark chocolate, but honestly, I find chocolate in general, like coffee, leaves me jittery, so I don't eat it too often.

Would you rather be eaten by a shark, or die from leprosy?

Getting eaten by a shark is WAY cooler.

Y'all ever lie awake with insomnia late at night and watch 1950s faith healer videos on YouTube? The kind where they are all in a big tent in Oklahoma or Arkansas and the men wear tiny ties and plaid suits and the women have on little hats and lace cloths hanging over their shoulders even though it's clearly 100 degrees inside there, and the preachers have slicked-back hair and whack the faithful on the forehead with their hands and shake their cupped heads violently before shouting in tongues and asking the sick if they can hear/walk/breathe now? Those are fartin' awesome. I mean like more out there than '80s Japanimation clips. Those engross me.

Ahem. Yes, that's my question.

No, I have not been drinking but I did get stung by what looked like a flying scorpion earlier, so I may be experiencing the onset of mutant powers. Fingers crossed....

^ Hmm. No.

I can't say I ever have.

What's a personality trait that you wish you had/had more of?

Me, I wish I was more mellow and less driven.

More self-confidence.

I would not have guessed that about you. You seem plenty confident and capable.

Trust me, self-confidence is my biggest weakness. Holds me back from a lot of things, like submitting stuff to see if I can get published.

FWIW, submitting manuscripts takes a certain amount of masochism.

I will be doing that exact thing on Tuesday: I feel like I'm losing a part of me.

It's so funny you asked that question.  On that same day I had a dream that Octomom wanted a baby girl from me.  She was so sure she was going to get her that she showed up at the hospital on the delivery day and had the baby's ears pierced and nails painted.  I was furious.

That said, I have known some girls that have had their ears pierced since they were a baby and they were grateful that they didn't have to go through the unpleasantness of the maintenance when they were older.  I would still never do it.

 cynicism.

Would you rather lose an arm or a leg?

I'd go for leg.

NO!

My leg. Would taste better.

I would have to go with leg. Someone in my house has to be able to open jars.

I think I taught Bronte (Jane Eyre), once for a grad school lit theory class (in light of Gilbert and Gubar's Madwoman in the Attic), and another for an undergrad gothic lit.

I can't remember using Alcott, but I remember watching the 1994 movie after Christmas, and in the theater. It was OK, but Winona was still a hottie.

?

Do you like boiled cabbage?  :question:

Actually it's not bad.

No. Cabbages and Brussel sprouts are both evil.

I can eat cabbage in things, but not boiled by itself.

Cabbage is one of the only cruciferous vegetables I can tolerate.

Cabbage has always tasted like boiled underpants 😝

I do not want to know how you know what they taste like.  :lookingup:

I like it with corn beef and carrots and cabbage. It's boiled. Glumpki's- stuffed cabbage. I make my own on occasion. I'm a Norwegian hillbilly, who grew up around old farmers. Mostly Polacks and Russians. I can cook anything.  :drink:

Waffles or pancakes?

Pancakes. Waffles lie too much. They promise something tasty and never deliver.  :bouncegiggle:

When I was a kid pancakes were my absolute favorite food in the world but somewhere in time I flipped to liking waffles more.

You know how sometimes you will never have heard of something in your life, then you'll suddenly start hearing about it or encountering it everywhere, all the time for a brief while?

When's the last time you remember that happening to you?

It's not quite the same thing but lately I have been waking up at 3:11 AM... A LOT, and what's a little added weirdness, several times this week I'll look to see what time it is and my phone will be right then that exact instant switching to 3:11 PM.

What's the story, morning glory???

^ In the AMITYVILLE HORROR it's always 3:14 or 3:15.

I tried to clean my only pair a little better and well, you know what happened 😳😝🤧😉😉🐢

http://www.badmovies.org/forum/index.php/topic,157088.msg678762.html#msg678762 (http://www.badmovies.org/forum/index.php/topic,157088.msg678762.html#msg678762)

Do you call it soda, pop, coke, or soda pop?
I swear, some folks from down south I met call every flavor "coke".
I say soda pop.
What's your favorite flover? Mine's either grape or ginger ale. I rarely dink the s**t though. Kool-Aid is cheaper. And I got lotsa family here a lot lately.

We call it pop or ginger.

Soft drink.

I don't drink it though.

" Soft drink"?
That's kinda snooty!
In a Snooty voice-
"Neeew- I don't partake of soft drinks". :bouncegiggle:

We call any kind of soft drink a colddrink  :drink:

Down here it's usually "soda" or "coke" (even if it's really Dr. Pepper!)

Soft drink and ginger ale, though if I drink one its usually a Coke Zero for the caffeine.

One of the ways I lost nearly 100 pounds years ago was by cutting out regular cokes. One bottle has as many calories as a damn ice cream cone, it's insane!

I like soda pop, I just can't afford it. Ice tea and Kool-Aid.

What are you "sick and tired" of right now?

I'm tired of seemingly endless hot sunny days with the same pale blue cloudless skies. How do people stand this?

Cleaning baths that have been crapped in.

Sick of getting the runaround from movie rights holders.

Donald Trump's stupid ass.

My mom asking, "what door am I going to go out when I leave?" twenty times an hour.

PREACH IT, BROTHER!!!!!
I long for the day when I never see his face, hear his name, or have to listen to that incredibly annoying voice again.

Politicians attacking the LGBTQ+

^ They don't have an agenda for this country- so they push an agenda on people they don't like.  Moral f**kheads who wouldn't know true morals if it bit them in the ass.
Crybaby pinheads.

All right, on the flip side, a much harder question to answer, what is something you're grateful for right now?

I am grateful that people are capable of forgiveness. I mean that very sincerely from the bottom of my heart.

I am grateful for my family. My sons and grandkids.

I'm grateful that my mother's still here to ask me 20 times an hour which door she's going to exit by when she leaves.

I'm grateful for my wife and family and my best friend.

Also grateful for having been blessed with the sexiest nostrils west of the Mississippi!

^I wish the best for your Ma, man.

What do you think your life will be like in five years?

Mine will be stable and happy with a touch of calm sometimes heretofore lacking.

Dead.

Leaving a job I am currently looking to start (although there is a chance I'll do 8 instead).

About the same as today, but with more money since I'll be able to withdraw from my IRA without penalty.

 :teddyr: :teddyr:

If you see a note lying crumbled on the sidewalk and pick it up to see what is written on it, and you then put the paper back down, have you yourself littered, or does the fact you are basically continuing a pre-existing state of litter cancel out your action?

I'd set it on fire and dance around it.

OK, that'd definitely be littering.....

^ No- because it would burn to ashes and blow away. Gone!

You are so brilliant sometimes.

It's all an act.

(https://i.imgur.com/O4sOaMa.gif) (https://lunapic.com)

I found the biggest leap of faith in Psycho II was the makers expecting us to believe Norman could have survived twenty years of therapeutic incarceration without getting shanked.

^ He was in a mental hospital. Not a prison. 2 of my brothers did time in the nuthouse. No one get's "shanked".
The man who's life this was loosely based on was Ed Gein. He was arrested in 1957, and died in a mental hospital in 1984. the TEXAS CHAINSAW MASSACRE was also loosely based on Gein. The best movie about Gein is DERANGED (1973).
The town burned his house down. It had been filled with body parts and his mother's corpse. He had a woman hung up like a deer. Gutted. The true story is so much worse than movies because IT'S TRUE.

(https://i.imgur.com/SkbNajP.png) (https://lunapic.com)

^ I know he was in a mental hospital, that's why I called it "therapeutic" incarceration. They're dangerous places based on conversations I've had with several therapists who have worked in them.

^My brothers were in there, a number of times. Richie (who shot himself) twice, and Glenn, who escaped and went to San Francisco. He's a Nazi now. My brother Mike was too, come to think of it. He went to prison for stabbing a women, then the nuthouse for attacking a women and her son from his church in a shopping mall with a baseball bat. He pulled a knife on me about 15 years ago when he came to visit and lost his meds. He was arrested. My son called the cops. I explained to the cops he lost his meds. He's a very quite religious man now. But he can go off like a bullet. He's on anti-psychotic dope to keep him stable.
So yeah- I know a little.

What do you think about the "divine ratio"?

God's fingerprint on the universe.

Some really complicated math stuff. I hate math.

^ You know what I have often thought, is that a divine being that could create math and insert this ratio into even the tiniest objects would surely be too complicated and logical to have authored the codes held by most religions. But then again, I don't know. Maybe God is above such things but the point is that humans are no and that's why God would demand those observances of us. A rabbi I enjoy listening to claims that God /G-d, ha, is "infinite everything": infinite joy, sorrow, wonder, fear, love, infinite all things, including infinite loneliness, so perhaps aspects of human religions do move something in such a being if there is some element within God that needs us. One thing I have long accepted is that (at least in this lifetime) I will never have the answers to the questions which have been at the forefront of my mind for most of my life.

How old are you? Don't be shy- I'm about to be 61.

I'm proud to say I am forty-four, which is significantly farther than I thought I'd get. I have squeezed every drop out of life's lemons, and savored its champagne.

55 in 2 days. I'll be eligible for discounted movie tickets!

49 and wondering how I got here. I've been feeling a lot recently that I've won at life.

56 this September: my bad start in life meant I wasn't supposed to be here that long - plus all the other crap I've been through in my life but here I am. 😊

59 and still wondering how that happened!

I turn 40 in October. 

Do you enjoy discussing/debating/arguing politics, and if so, why or why not?

I'm generally a big "no," at least on forums. I find the only way to discuss these things fruitfully is in a one-on-one situation with a reasonable person (whether I agree or disagree). When it goes public, people have too much pride invested: they don't want to lose, they want to "beat" the other other side. But people never come to any sort of agreement or epiphany, and there's never any winner; everyone leaves with their opinion reinforced in their own minds.

Having been born in a country where politics and propaganda ruled and then moving to one where everyone was governed by Nazi like laws, I prefer not to discuss politics of any country, so no. Any other subject, no problem.

No. I find the activity tends to lack attachment to facts, degenerates quickly into personal attacks, rarely rises above the airing of emotions. It's a fruitless and usually unpleasant pursuit and boring at that. It appeals most to people who enjoy anger.

Depends very much on the person. The majority of people in a democracy will vote for a single party their entire lives. They tend not to actually know how the party they vote for affects them although they themselves will not recognise this and will vehemently claim otherwise. Those people I don't consider it to be worth my time to discuss politics with. Floating voters, I find tend to more open to discussing what each party does and means for them. Those people I can have a good conversation with.

Not really, because I dislike ALL parties, and tend to call people a***oles- while making an ass of myself.

How comfortable are you talking about sex?

Me, I don't get either the taboos about it as a subject or why others seem only able to get lurid and salacious. It's just a topic.

I don't find the need to advertise my sex life.

Lost my virginia at age 36 and I been celibate since 😳😉🐢