isalicat

OK, now I'm confused. Is the person reducing you to tears your boss or someone else in your department? If it is your boss then why do you "actually...like" this person? I am clearly missing something as it sounded in previous posts like you were very unhappy with the situation. Sorry - not meaning to interrogate you, I just assume I'm not understanding properly.

No...I'm procrastinating a bit. I have all the salient docs piled right in front of me on my desk but am resisting the actual plunge, since I know that once I start, I won't do anything else until I get the f...ker all done, no matter what the cost. This all stems from my loathing of everything to do with numbers and math, which is kinda funny this year because I volunteered last month to do the tax return for the non-profit for which I am part-time employed (yes, I know - what WAS I thinking?). Fortunately the IRS actually provides video tutorials free on line for the non-profit tax return so I am praying that I find it all reasonably do-able, if not easy. Non-profit tax returns are not due until May at the earliest so I can procrastinate about that one after I finish stalling on my personal return 😸

Yeah, when I lived in the extreme northern California mountains and wanted to grow my own tomato plants I quickly learned there was no point buying seeds and doing seedlings (unless I wanted to fill my kitchen with seedling plants for months at a time), so I would wait until May, get some thriving plants that were already flowering and then they went into the ground mid- to late-May and the entire garden was done by early September (we had snow nine months out of the year back in the day - now with climate change, its much warmer there so I assume the growing season has expanded by a month or two as well). Nothing like your own grown tomatoes, though!

I know he has been discredited for valid reasons, but my husband and I watched and learned immensely from Jeff Smith, The Frugal Gourmet back in the day. He was on our local PBS station and really remarkable for that era in emphasizing cooking from scratch and using local ingredients.

Generally speaking, bullies operate on a path of least resistance. If your manager is being overtly harsh, are you speaking up to indicate that this is unacceptable, and more important, not a productive way to either have you do your job properly or to create a good working environment? If not, no time like the present - schedule a closed door meeting with said manager (do not do this at the same time as she is "beating you up" because you will not be calm enough to manage the conversation properly), and tell her quite directly how this is going from your perspective. Perhaps she doesn't realize that she is communicating in a way that intimidates you (sometimes very direct people can run "roughshod" over others without realizing it), but if she pushes back, then you calmly thank her for her time, and escalate - take it to whoever heads your HR function or your bosses' boss. If that doesn't get you anywhere, its time to find a new job.

We (the food pantry with which I work) do appreciate any donation, but the two issues which perennially arise are: (1) people donate stuff they bought and reconsidered using or stuff they have been gifted - so a lot of very peculiar and one-off food items that are not particularly useful as a nutritional, fresh and/or staple food for a hungry family. (2) at least once a month someone dies, their families clean out their kitchen cupboards and bring us endless food that expired anywhere from 2 to 20 years ago (I kid you not). We also have recently been given survivalist food - i.e. dehydrated everything in giant cans (these actually went to a place that makes meals for Meals on Wheels - they do enough volume to find this useful). I just went through this discussion with my new parish pastor, who has revived our food donation program, and his decision was based on exactly what you said. I'm not going to say no way, of course! He is emphasizing getting stuff we can use (rice, tuna, peanut butter) so its all good. 😸

Vera Season 13 will start streaming on February 28th on BritBox. 😺

And along these lines (I work at a food pantry twice a week and also sit on the Board of Directors), please remember that although food is nice (particularly if you are donating something the food bank says it needs) money is very much better. Any food bank/pantry can buy significantly more with a dollar than you can because they buy in bulk - so your can of tuna would be three cans of the same size for a food bank and it is easier to give out if they have all cans of the same size and variety. Just something to keep in mind!

Watched Season 11/Episode 1 last evening (it is streaming - 2 episodes are up - on BritBox). Bleah. I am a big fan of the G.K. Chesterton original and this iteration has really lost the feel of what Father Brown is all about. And I just can't stand Brenda - she is so out of place/time and clearly a token character with no real purpose.

I moved there in 1991, three weeks before my son was born (I am sure he "engineered" the entire move so he could grow up in Mt. Shasta, which was quite the perfect place to raise a kid), and we bought a home here at the beach in 2009 and went back and forth twice a year (spring and fall in Mt. Shasta, winter and summer here) for five years and then sold up in Mt. Shasta. Lake Shastina is a different world 😸 - much less snow and kinda flatish, no? As to the wood heat, I am entirely unconvinced that it leads to asthma - certainly none of us, including my son who lived with it for 18 full years before heading off to college, never developed any asthma, and I don't know anyone else who raised their kids there that has reported this. IMHO, asthma is an auto-immune reaction and my friends that have had it report great success with a gluten free diet and severely restricting sugar. If you live in a place with real winters and the power goes out, what else are you going to do to stay warm? I was once there by myself for five days with no power and continuous snow - I kept the stove going (shoveling out to the wood store twice a day - lost 7 lbs!) and cooked on it, melted snow for drinking and washing water, and had a very nice time with just me and the cat. I don't need a fireplace, but I won't mind one - they are so fundamentally lovely of a winter evening. (My next door neighbor put in one of those fake fireplaces but it was both expensive and clearly *fake*!)

And this is why I left beautiful Mt. Shasta after living there for 25 years...I just visited there last weekend and it is still gorgeous (and the town remarkably gentrified all of a sudden, with lots of new tony restaurants and lodgings), but it was SO cold and we got a foot of snow between Friday and Saturday night so I got to rediscover the joys of shoveling and clearing the car...Plus the summers there are now on average 10 degrees hotter than when we first moved there in 1991. Anything over 85 degrees is too hot for me. We had a wood stove (a must as the power would go out all the time) and space heaters. No air conditioning, just the night breeze off the mountain. Thus: I now live on the beach in central coastal California where there is pretty much two seasons - nice and nicer. 😸

Back to the talking to oneself topic: I am an only child and spent many, many blissful hours alone (reading! just give me a book - I had little desire to do anything else as a child other than almost daily ballet class), so never developed the habit of talking to myself in play. I do have two autistic friends (both in their late 20s - what they call "high functioning", I guess, as they are both verbally communicative and although they can't live on their own, they do hold down part time jobs etc.) and they both talk to themselves out loud (a lot!) whenever they are not actively talking to other people. They are both very amenable to being politely "shushed" in situations that call for it, but I think at this point it is pretty ingrained. They are very definitely not schizophrenic and I think that is kinda insulting to say to someone. 😾

This is true (I was a recruiter and lots of my candidates had this happen to them). More often though companies post openings (or have recruiters post them) that are not actually "open" (i.e. they are not really ready to hire) in order to collect resumes and pre-screen people so if they do decide to fund the opening (particularly if it is a new position, not a replacement scenario) they have a bunch of people theoretically "on tap". It is what it is...

I know salt is my particular "bugaboo" but unless they are completely unsalted, plain tortilla chips, this sounds like a salt on salt recipe for high blood pressure! (and even then...🙀 )

So I may have mentioned previously (like many times) that I work at a food pantry and we get lots of stuff donated from local grocery stores, including Trader Joe's. Although I am there twice a week, I am invariably surprised almost every time by a food item I have never heard of before (or even conceived of!), and yesterday it was Dill Pickle Salsa (really). So dill pickles chopped up with some peppers and onions added, all combined in a plastic tub. How is this different from pickle relish? (I assume the peppers, right?) I had no impulse to take one home and try it (well, its for our clients anyways) due to the incredible salt content but if any of you have tried this, is it good? I was thinking it would be awful on the usual places one uses salsa (tacos, any Mexican food...) but maybe great on the usual places for relish (hot dogs, etc.). Everyone who took some asked me if I had tried it and I honestly said no, but let me know what *you* think...so we'll see if I get any feedback next week.

Although there was problematic elements to the plot/story this season, I am definitely going to miss the breathtakingly beautiful opening photography that graces the beginning of each episode. What a glorious place! Hoping for a next season with both Tosh and Ruth.

Why not? I like sourdough but I think as long as tuna and melted cheese are involved, its whatever you like/have on hand! 😺

Here in central coastal California, there is only one place to get lunch (or any meal) for under ten dollars (including a beverage) and that is In-n-Out...where I can still get a cheeseburger with everything and a large decent cup of coffee for $5.00 including tax. (which is enough for me - I generally don't eat fries) Every time I've been to a sit down place recently, just a sandwich and coffee is $20-25 by the time you get done with tax and tip. Not eating out a lot, as my credit card usage for Christmas presents and charitable donations has been way over budget (I pay it all off every month) and I just found out my car (20 years old this month) needs a new starter, so that will be $1200. tomorrow...😿 And I love tuna melts...so I think I'm going to go make one right now! 😺

May I recommend her previous books, which include a very enjoyable series of murder mysteries featuring DI Adam Fawley, starting with Close to Home? There are five of these so far, and I enjoyed every one a lot! I did not read the one you did because the reviews were not so good and I don't really enjoy that particular form of story telling. The series is easily available in paperback here in the U.S.

Looks interesting but its behind a paywall...

Yes - keep it brief and complimentary! Say something nice about what caught your interest in that particular person...and if possible, what about you "corresponds" to that... Good luck!

I hope "throwing out" is actually: "donating"....lots of people would love to have your unwanted stuff. Clothes, especially, if not too worn or stained, can go to a shelter for domestic violence victims or to a reputable local thrift store (the latter of which will be happy to take your CDs and books too - bonus points for finding a thrift store that benefits a good cause!). A little while ago, the NY Times "wirecutter" feature did a survey of compression socks and recommended the best ones. If you can access that newspaper's website and do a search, that might be the way to find the perfect pair!

Yes, you do: you don't get diabetes! Peeve: Getting older is a bitch, and then you die 😸

This may be the thing for which there is no solution as bloodlines are clearly so important in your culture, and as you say, there is also a generational issue. The crucial thing, as with most parenting vs. grandparenting issues, is that this is *your son* and you must do what you think is the right thing (and that includes explaining to your father, maybe for the umpteenth time, that this is your child, as much as any child conceived anyhow, and you want him to know how loved and wanted he was, in every way possible). What other people outside your family think and do is extraordinarily non-consequential, n'est pas?

As a "real historian", I can tell you that all history is political, so I'm not sure you are going to get any consensus. All historians have their own biases, its unavoidable or you would not have these three books at all. As to what America's classrooms get....that changes with the political winds as well, from state to state, so it is really up to parents (at first), and eventually students themselves, to seek out as much original source material as they can and also alternative points of view, on every major historical issue if they really want to consider themselves educated historically speaking.