The most recent 20 comments posted to Making Light by P J Evans:

Lila, is any of the turkey edible afterward?

#45
dcb, there are needle threaders that have built-in thread cutters (advantage: the exposed blade is small enough that it's not obvious). Mill Hill sells them; I don't know about others.

314
I figured that one out (art history/appreciation ... it had to be good for something).

I have sympathy, and all the advice on soups is good. (Braces required removal of four premolars, as two pairs, and later two wisdom teeh. Fortunately they were simple extractions, done under local anesthetic.)

72/73
I've seen it modified to 'TO OT' (or, with a letter added, 'TOOOT').

Am I the only one wondering what kind of lurking horror could be called up with a 3-d Mandelbrot diagram? Or have I just read too many of Charlie's Laundry stories for my own good?

#120
My mother should have been high-risk; her mother died of metastasizing breast cancer. But none of the other females in that generation did, my mother didn't have it, and, IIRC, only one of the others had breast cancer - at age 90. So there's still a lot of randomness in there. I'd say it's okay to get them before 50, but it isn't necessary for everyone. (The one person I knew who died of it was in her early 50s and had been fighting it for 15 years.)

on m*grams:
I'd say that if there's a real risk factor, like mother, sister, or aunts who had it before they were 50 or 60, then, yes, start getting them early.

#121
Most of Kansas is a bit too far from Chicago for day trips, and even from KC I'd think it was a long day. Only happens in an alternate universe, I suspect ....

Avram, I think that the procedure is that (a) you aren't supposed to go up if you're not eligible and (b) you're supposed to be turned away quietly (or with minimal fuss) if you do go up.

I can see, though, that Rudy would ignore both of those, and would make a Big Thing out of it if he were turned away.

So I think the answer is 'all of the above'.

Avram, it's that all the rules I've heard about say that Rudy shouldn't have been in that line; he certainly would have known that. His affairs were public enough that I can't imagine anyone in that diocese not being aware of who he was and what he'd done. Not doing anything right then, I can understand, but they should have spoken to him beforehand.

I'll add that the RC church is supposed to deny the sacraments to people who remarry without a canonical annulment of their previous marriage. They allowed Rudy Giuliani, twice divorced, three times married, and an admitted adulterer, to take the Eucharist, very publicly, without comment of any kind. (They also seem to have no problem with Newt Gingrich.)

So I find a bit out of line their protests about what they might have to do if a secular law affecting secular benefits passes.

As long as we have no vote in their internal political decisions, they should keep their hands out of ours.

albatross, the version I heard was that the church claims that their rights would be violated in some way if same-sex marriage is legal in DC. If their charitable work was limited to Catholics, I might see their point.

(They used this argument also about foster families and adoption in other places: allowing same-sex couples to use their agencies, even when there weren't any other agencies serving the area, was somehow immoral.)

I think that when churches are running something that's open to the general public, they should be required to follow the same rules as non-churches that are doing the same stuff, and not be allowed to claim that those rules shouldn't apply because it's being run by a church. (Note that I feel the same way about the Salvation Army and the Baptists and any other churches running hospitals and charitable programs.)

#36
Right up there with the other one I see so often, which drops the 'l' from 'public'.

Aw, W#E$%^&*().

Someone actually put together a parody called 'Going Rouge'. It's a 'coloring and activities boo', according to its subtitle. Comes out Tuesday, also.

#742
The only mall-type development I met in the UK (1979) was Victoria Market in Nottingham, which actually has a fairly traditional market in it. It's more sort-of-a-mall than the US kind, which made it interesting to me. (The 'Time Fountain' was worth seeing; get there early enough and you can watch it open, literally.)

Ginger, I know that. (New Jersey should also count as east of it, I think). It was the bit about being east of a line that generally runs east and west ....

[checking map and compass]
East of the Mason-Dixon line?

And what is the Schmuck doing these days
Motivational seminars. Srsly.

I can't see why anyone would want to go listen to that idjit, but then I'm not in his target audience.

645
Apparently, for stuff they did in office, yes.
(First you need to have people in Congress who are willing to go for it.)

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