Hey there Smitty! Where the heck have you been? Hope all is well with you and your family.


TIS

Yeah, Smitty - I'll echo what TIS said!

Hope all is well with you - and stop by more often.

Signor V.

So I take it the BB made it thru this migration server?? GF and SF didn't get effed-up????



TIS

Re: The Kardashian wedding.

I'm rooting for an earthquake .

I still don't get what they are famous for but they were talking about it on the radio today (making lots of jokes). Evidently for your viewing pleasure, E will have a four hour broadcast of the event sometime in Oct. Mark your calendar.


TIS

The way they flaunt their wealth during the worst of economic times is beyond tacky, it's downright mean spirited. Now I ask you, if you're a single mother struggling with five kids living in a rental apartment, do you really want to hear about a 20 MILLION dollar wedding?

I really don't get it. I guess people just want to live vicariously through these nitwits.

Oh yeah, I give the marriage two years at the most.

I think it's "famous for being famous." Other than that, I'm drawing a blank. For years, I thought they were one of the alien races from Star Trek: The Next Generation. At least that would have meant something!



Optimist!

Signor V.

I'm going to blame this whole gaggle of people are famous for no reason other than they are famous on Larry David.

He started this nonsense by making a smash hit series about nothing. It was a short leap from that concpt to the concept of becoming famous for nothing.

Kardashian is famous for spreading her legs for any guy who flashes something of value at her.

I thought that was Paris Hilton.

I think the family first got into the public eye during the O.J. case. The father (Robert) was one of the scumbags who got him off.

Have you ever seen the two of them together at the same time?

Paris doesn't need a man to give her "valuables". She's worth a fortune, and it's not only inherited money. She's made a heck of a lot just being Paris.

Btw, anyone see the article in today's Wall Street Journal about Abercrombie & Fitch? They offered money to The Situation from "Jersey Shore" if he would stop wearing their clothes. It's a ridiculous publicity stunt considering that last year they carried a line of tops that said "GTL" (from the cast members list of Gym, Tan, Laundry) and another proclaiming it was "The Fitchuation".

Unemployment benefits got extended until November. In November it'll be a year I've been out of work.

Molly is doing great, she's 2 years old already somehow. I think she's flipping the calenders ahead or something.

Adderall has helped me a lot. I do things and I fix things and I like it. The garage is my sanctuary and my palace. Where I am the unquestioned King of the World. My World's Greatest Dad hat is my crown.

I want to be a farmer. I figured back breaking work that will keep me busy 7 days a week for the rest of my life would be great. But I need things like land and whatnot. You know, details.

Bought my first pistol the other day. Sure is purdy. And fun to shoot. Went with a .22 since I am not rich and you can get about 1650 .22 caliber bullets for the same price as 250 9mm. I'm not sure I've heard anyone talk about guns on this forum.

And there's a dead frog in my daughter's pool.

LN, considering the avatar you are currently using, should we be very afraid?

Signor V.

Nice to see you back LN. Molly is really two already? Holy cow. She must be getting into everything hu?

Don't know anything about guns. Are you a hunter or is this a protection gun?


TIS

Not at all, just give me your support. And by that I mean your wallet.



Molly is beautiful and cute and wonderful and amazing.

Molly sure can be a handful sometimes (all the time) but I still wonder how something can be so awesome and wonderful as watching her be cute or giving me a hug and a kiss. And how could I ever make her as happy as she makes me?

Here's a picture of my gun:
http://oi56.tinypic.com/makufd.jpg

It's a Sig Sauer Mosquito .22LR. My Skeeter. It was used, but it doesn't look like very much. The price was $350 and they knocked it down to $320 on sale, but I got them to come down to $300. Basically I got the sales tax knocked off.

It's a .22LR, which is just about the smallest caliber they have so it won't do a whole lot as far as protection (but still better than nothing). So I am just shooting targets, or making cans of pop explode, and having fun doing it.

My motivations for getting a gun are both for personal protection and because it is a fun hobby to shoot. I think hunting would be fun, and I like deer meat, but I'd need to get a rifle or shotgun. I do want to get a .22 rifle just for "plinking" and Walmart has one for $107. I'm finding that guns are like Lays chips, they taste a little salty and you can't have just one.

I am going to get a carry permit soon though. Indiana has a Lifetime Personal Protection option so instead of having to renew it every 4 years you can do it once. Go to the police department and sign the application from online and get fingerprinted and then hand over two money orders... $75 goes to Federal government and $50 to state (or vise versa) and then wait for it in the mail.

I probably won't carry my .22 but it's nice to have the option to, and it would be another layer of legal protection for things like transporting it from home to the range or a farm. My next pistol will be a 9mm. I went with a .22 first since you can get about 1,650 .22 caliber bullets for the same price as 250 9mm bullets. It's a lot cheaper, which means I can shoot a lot more for the same price. 9mm is the cheapest of the defense calibers. Kind of like looking at ink prices before buying a printer...

.22s are good to start off with too as far as practicing but I used to shoot BB guns all day long way back when (and I still got both my eyes) so I picked it up pretty quickly. I have a natural ability for it, an eye for angles at the pool table comes in handy here too.

The first response most people have is telling me to make sure Molly doesn't hurt herself with it. I think people who don't have a lot of experience around guns fear them either because they aren't familiar with them or because the only things you ever hear in the media about guns are negative, maybe both.

A gun will never decide to shoot anyone, or anything, even a target. I mean seriously, targets are just begging to be shot at. Those circles all piled inside of each other...

Guns today have more safety features than you might know about. Many guns (including mine) have an internal lock that requires a key to turn it to the right place or it won't fire. You wouldn't even know it was there unless someone told you. My gun won't fire if there is no magazine in it (so you can't put a bullet in the chamber and fire it). It has a double action trigger which requires 12 pounds of force to fire the gun, you can cock the hammer back to make it single action and then it only takes 4 pounds. But if you are carrying the gun in a holster or whatnot the 12 pounds is a nice safety feature. There's the usual safety switch too. Along with all kinds of locks and so on and so forth for miles and miles.

The best safety feature ever though is knowledge/education. I think it's important not to fear guns, but to respect them. I will teach Molly about guns and what to do and not do with it to use it safely. I'll take her to the range and let her shoot if she wants. There will be no mystery behind guns. She will know full well the dangers of them too. But my responsibility doesn't end there. Keeping the guns locked up and away from the ammo and so on all falls onto me.

Having and carrying a gun is a huge responsibility and I think it's worth it.


If you have any other questions I'll do my best to answer them.

Dating site OkCupid has tapped into their data to determine which cities across the U.S. have the most promiscuous residents. By analyzing how many people have profiles with "Casual Sex" marked as a type of relationship they're looking for and then tallying where those users live, OkCupid has found the cities with the highest percentage of bed-hoppers.

Who else made the list? Here's the top 10:

1.Portland (That would be Oregon. Sorry, Maine!)
2.Seattle
3.Pittsburgh
4.Miami
5.San Francisco
6.Dallas
7.San Bernardino, Calif.
8.Denver
9.San Diego
10.Houston


Read more: http://newsfeed.time.com/2011/08/19/over.../#ixzz1VbsBuIOZ

According to Geoff's announcement (which you can't directly reply to, dammit!), we're all gonna become migrants on Monday.

Yep, we're going to experience the Great Server Migration in two days. Sorta like a giant herd of wildebeests thundering across cyberspace... or maybe it's more like waiting for The Rapture.


Personally, I think this whole migration thing sounds very Sci-Fi...



But, what the hell do I know?

We'll see if we're all still here Monday night...or on Tralfamadore (which wouldn't be so bad if Valerie Perrine is still there).

Signor V.

So tomorrow is the server migration issue? Or in "our" world here, it's know as....BB-A-Geddon.



TIS

Just what I love to hear.....Must be nice.

Stay home and relax, enjoy the kids, have enough extra money to go out and buy a gun, Pop soda cans and have a good time....

and shit the best part is they send you a check!


For up to a year? ? ? No wonder we have so many people trying to get into this country!

Apparently, Libyan rebels have taken Tripoli. Hopefully, Libya is another country that will turn toward democracy.

Yes, I posted in the news thread. Pretty interesting.

On the same note, someone on twitter posted this:

Michele Bachmann is still cheering the fall of Libya because that's where all the Libs live


TIS

Watch closely...



30 Amazing Stanley Kubrick Cinemagraphs

How pathetic is this: we dropped A T & T as our phone land line. We got a refund check from them for .09cents. Really? Why even bother?

Pretty interesting (and kind of creepy) Gina. I still get a kick out of (and cringe) at Jack Nicholson at his very best. He looks so damn scary, even when he smiles.



TIS

Gi, you always find the coolest things to share!

Yeah, not for nothing, but you can't even find employment at a place like Walmart or Walgreens?!? Or Grocery stores who are ALWAYS hiring in some capacity or another???

Of course, as long as Barry's in office you've nothing to worry about, so milk it as long as possible, I guess.

Really? Because someone is out of work that means they're "milking the system"?? How ridiculous. I work in real estate, but my business is down significantly over the last few years. Because of that, I've been looking for work for some time now. I check monster.com each and every day. I've also registered with temp agencies. I've applied for jobs that I'm ridiculously over-qualified for, but I still haven't found a permanent job. The one position I've been offered was 10 hours a week for $12 per hour.

There was an editorial in our local paper this weekend about how employers are taking advantage of the economy. They don't hire, they have employees doing the work that used to be done by several people, despite the fact that US corporate profits are up 22% since 2007. People put in dozens of extra hours per month because they're terrified of losing their jobs, so they put up with ridiculous demands. McDonald's had approximately 62,000 job openings last year. They received over One Million applications.

Still think those that are out of work are just milking the system?

Yes, a young man who's perfectly healthy and fit to work should never be unemployed for an entire YEAR. That's completely ridiculous and does indeed equate to milking the system. I mean, I see 16 yr olds with zits and glasses flipping hash or sweeping floors all the time at malls or restaurants and you're telling me a grown-ass man can't find ANYTHING for 365 days???

What about waiting tables or bartending??? I know waiters and bartenders who bring in over a grand a week. Construction sites??? Whatever. There's plenty of work for a virile young guy who wants it.

LN isn't stupid, either. He's obviously a bright guy, and that's where some people get in trouble. They don't want to work jobs that they feel are beneath them or their qualifications.

As far as your situation, SB, again, it's about not being afraid to perform jobs you feel are beneath you or your expectations. It's not easy for someone who once made 6 figures to go to working the Clinique counter at your local department store, but those jobs ARE available, IF you truly want them.