Bastet

I think I'm caught up, and this is the new episode: The “when she comes back home” language really puts a period on the language in the previous episode indicating this Rachel/Megan roommate situation is temporary, and I respect the show being more open about that than when Steven and Sean’s similar short-term experiment was presented as a real, ongoing thing, but I’m still a bit irked, I think just from the overall feel of this show. How the street harassment all women face is exacerbated for women with a disability was a good theme to explore. And Rachel was impressive in the self-defense class; even typical women and even in the artificial environment of such a class can feel meek, especially with previous negative experience, and that is absolutely nothing against them, just a nod to Rachel embracing the learning experience so quickly. But WTF with the “Public transport is scary, so my dad suggested Uber” storyline? Yeah, because that’s less likely to put a female passenger, let alone one with a disability, in danger. Not. Kris being pleased that Megan and Rachel can problem solve together – and it inspired a couple of different emotions in me that Rachel kept jumping in to help Megan place the delivery order – was nice, along with the moms forcing themselves to chill on the couch. To have a thirty-something child for whom ordering food is an ordeal to get through and applaud is something most of us – me most certainly included, as I’d never have a child, period and would be utterly at sea if somehow despite my efforts been tasked with a DS child – can only partially understand. “You better eat before you come” and “we have chips and salsa” about the ravioli was funny. Didn’t someone, if not getting licensed, practice driving in an earlier season, and wasn’t that most likely Steven given his mosaic version of DS? I may be pulling this out of my ass, but I feel like driving has come up before with someone driving around a parking lot with cones. Holy balls, Kris saying with utter sarcasm, “Imagine my pride when Megan does best with the pole-dancing parade” is one of my favorite moments.

Another re-run, but new to me, I think the episode prior to the most recent one: Oh crap, Rocco is back. But, then, okay, good. It has always been a thing where, in theory, I like the inclusion of a family dealing with the education and similar rights issues the parents of adult children with DS navigated long before we the audience came along, but these folks just bug. But tonight I liked what his mom relating of their experiences added to the show. And I loved Laurie, talking about the need to correct the behavior of a kid with DS rather than just excusing it. It was also interesting to hear her and Kris talk about how a kid with DS ever living in anything other than the family home or an institution wasn’t a realistic thought in their day. I also - since I hate the "Don't Limit Me" crap (we're all limited, by various factors) - liked Kris's take on encouraging a "version of success" when a kid expresses an unrealistic goal. If only she practiced what she preaches. Typical – Rachel wants to have a “girl’s night,” and Megan wants to include guys. But I do agree if this was real, their first house-warming would better be open to everyone, and then have the women over next time. Who the hell are the two idiots who bought the Sean blanket or whatever that monstrosity was? And here we go again with Sean’s parents – who are the biggest part of his problem – treating something obnoxious, and sexist, as cute; “Burrito, Beer, Babes.” Bugger off. And, of course, all his "what I want in a girlfriend" requirements are all about him. Kris comes up in Megan’s phone as Diva Mom Drama Queen and Laurie comes up in Rachel’s as Laurie. Heh. But is it any wonder Kris is frightened? If she had a typical child to whom she couldn’t talk sense and acted this way, would it be received the same as her reaction to an overgrown toddler of an adult doing the same things? Unlike the other parents on this show, Kris had Megan young and raised her alone. That’s not an all-out pass, but I do cut her some slack as a result. “Who’s paying for all this [wedding]?” The show.

Ha – I’m watching last week’s episode right now, and I know the Drag Queen Bingo they’re going to. A friend of a friend performs, and I’ve gone a couple of times to their monthly event at a bar local to my friend. This was a small benefit for the place Elena works, done for the show, but some of the usual performers were there. From that same episode: Why is Megan pulling clothes (ostensibly in her existing home to pack for her new home) out of a utility closet? The breaker box is in there! That is some seriously faked location footage. I cannot with Sean’s hair. (I cannot with Sean, period, and the hair is far from the most offensive thing about him, but that hair just makes him particularly bothersome to watch.) Mariano being taken aback that Rachel is 35, Rachel’s dad saying, “Well, I’m, like 90,” and Mariano responding, “Yeah, but you look it, she doesn’t” was some hilarious ribbing. So how long is this “trial period” and “experiment” of Rachel and Megan living together lasting – a long weekend like Sean and Steven? I really miss season one, when this was more documentary series than reality show. However short-term, the parents handling the good-byes, the kids hugging and giggling after shutting the door behind them, and then Megan needing to run out and give Kris another hug really tugged at the old heartstrings. As did Rachel’s letter. I hope she really wrote that without prodding, but the repetition of “you guys” makes me think she did. I’m surprised Rachel hasn’t yet mastered making the bed. That seems like a skill she’d have been displaying at home for a while. I’m not surprised, however, to see Megan doesn’t know how to deal with batteries – but she got it. And putting a pillow in a pillow case is a much more basic skill, especially for someone as relatively advanced as Rachel. Elena being happy in her own life, at the group home, and not begrudging her parents wanting to live together full-time if that means in another country, is nice. As is Steven knowing he can’t afford his parents’ L.A. house if they move to Iowa. Cristina is a wonderful friend, daughter, and overall person, but she’s a handful as a girlfriend/fiancée, and that’s only going to get worse as a wife. And Angel is no, well, angel, either, of course. The parents and grandparents are going to need to continue to talk with them about what such a relationship should be, but if anyone is up for that ongoing task, I think it’s them. It amuses me that Angel’s grandma is a little wary of Cristina, yet she works to trust her fundamental goodness and genuine love for Angel and thus support all this.

There's something about Maria Bello that I always really like in the several things I've seen her in. I liked Anna a lot, and she was the only one of Carter's love interests/potential love interests where I liked the relationship. I, too, wish she'd stayed longer, in general, and because I'd have liked to see the continued evolution of their relationship, as they dealt with the fallout of his faux poverty stunt. Carla as originally written, not as retconned into every racist and sexist stereotype foisted on black women on TV, is not at all a "someone like her" character to me. And don't they know each other from the neighborhood or something?

Oh, poor Tigger! That is not a happy face. I'm glad you emphasized the need to stay on top of the pain, because these first few days are when she'll really need it and they don't tend to show the full extent of their pain/illness, so just going by how she's acting could easily lead to unnecessary pain via under-medicating her. Did the vet put her on methimazole for the hyperthyroidism? Most cats are easily regulated on it, at least for a while, and at 20 "a while" would last her all the time she needs; getting those thyroid hormone levels under control would ease a good bit of strain on her poor old body, which now also has to recover from this fracture. These "kids" and their freak accidents!

Yep; I refrigerate for several hours and it really does help. Even then, I'll occasionally still have one fall apart on me when I flip it, but I just set the ugly one aside for the cook and call it Quality Assurance; I'd rather have that happen once in a while than use more binder and have a lesser crab cake. I think I mentioned this last time we had the crab cake technique discussion, but I still haven't tried it -- someone told me she first cooks hers in the broiler, to brown the top, then puts them in a pan to fry the bottom (thus never having to flip).

I knew that "kids today" were too young to be Millenials, but didn't know what silly nickname had been adopted for their generation. I think iGeneration is better than Post-Millenials (just like I think Millenials is better than Generation Y; I guess I just don't like branching off from the nickname for the prior generation rather than coming up with something new). But, ultimately, I hate the whole thing, because I think "Baby Boomers" is the only one that accurately and inoffensively describes something about that generation; rather than trying to assign a set of characteristics to a huge group of people, it simply refers to the fact there was an uptick in babies born in that period. (Now, yes, there are all sorts of stereotypes heaped upon Baby Boomers just as there are with every one of these generational groups, and they're pretty much the first one it became A Thing to pontificate about in that way, but just the name, on its face, is innocuous.) I agree (and I don't even really like the idea of someone using the stall when no one else is in there, because what if the next person who comes in needs the handicapped stall and now has to wait for it, when had the able-bodied person just used one of the regular empty stalls, both people could be doing their business at the same time), but there are disabilities that make one eligible to use the handicap-accessible stall yet aren't obvious to observers. So, given how many inconsiderate people there are, this probably was some jerk (especially if they walked past you to score the stall), but, just in general, it's possible for there to be someone with a cane and someone without, where both people are entitled to use the stall, and it thus belongs to whomever is first in line.

Crab cakes, even at nice restaurants/places that specialize in seafood, are never as good as homemade, so I've largely stopped ordering them. Even when they're very good, I wind up thinking my flavor profile is slightly better, so I should have ordered something that I don't normally make. So I will still sometimes get crab cakes as one of a variety of appetizers (e.g. at a steak house, we'll usually start with shrimp cocktail, crab cakes, and then a wild card depending on the options), but that's about it. And, oh boy, do I dread going to an event and seeing crab cakes among the passed appetizers. Because I know they're going to be the kind that are more accurately described as bread cakes with a woefully inadequate amount of crab mixed in (if a crab cake is not right on the brink of falling apart, it has too much filler), yet I am too stupid to skip it -- I will always take one.

Lack of notice to a stranger with whom the sole "interaction" consists of both people clicking on a like button and one writing an initial message is not rude. Your perspective is consistently skewed towards assigning more weight than things deserve, and casting aspersions on the women for instead treating things as they really are. A first date doesn't click, so there's no second, and you refer to it as her dumping you. A profile disappears before you've even "talked" via messaging, and you call it rude and a punch to the gut. Given that pattern, I suspect you may be giving off some wrong vibes.

Ugh, yes. Another one of those things that looks good in select bathrooms (you just have to make the rest of the room boring neutral enough to make it work) yet quickly became annoying as hell on this show for the repetition, regardless of home style.

And then turn around and test the product on animals, rather than using cruelty-free procedures to determine safety. (Unless something has changed with P&G in the past couple of years, but last time I dug in, Dawn was still among its many products that had undergone animal testing, and a quick internet search didn't reveal any indication of a change. And certainly P&G's overall product testing philosophy hasn't changed.)

My best friend and I do wear the same size clothes and shoes, and the few times we have needed to borrow something from each other, we have remarked on what a stroke of luck it is. My other two closest friends are both significantly shorter than me, with feet several sizes smaller. The only thing I could borrow from one of them would be a scarf.

It's hard to get a complete feel for the situation, but I take it someone not showing up affects the group in some significant way, since when New Member - who you said isn't even participating in X, anyway - comes up with one of her many last-minute requests, the group response is to indeed reschedule rather than just say, "Sorry you can't make it; hope to see you next time"? If so, is there any sort of policy about excess cancellations without adequate notice, so that she could be asked to leave the group if she keeps doing this?

I really want to laugh that Cristina put "the prettiest one" Meg in such an ugly bridesmaid dress, but poor Elena had to wear that curtain fabric, too. At least maid of honor Rachel got to wear a different dress and look nice.

I watched this at my parents' house last night, and my mom and I laughed our way through that segment, because one of our cats when I was a kid was like that. If anyone on staff attempted to retrieve her from the cage, they had to don those gloves and prepare to do battle. But if they were smart and asked one of us to come back and get her, she was just as sweet as could be. Me too. Anything produced in nature rather than a lab is worth a try, and what I particularly like about CBD is it mostly prompts the body to produce/use more of its own cannabinoids. It's a natural means of reducing chronic pain and inflammation, and well worth a try. I had been surprised Max's story was featured, as this show tends to avoid stories with negative outcomes, and now I'm thinking it was included so Dr. Jeff could talk about CBD.

A little while back I asked which wife Provenza married twice -- it's whomever was number two and four (so, not Liz, as she was the original). Lifetime clearly has some programming hours to fill and/or this is doing well in the ratings for syndication, because I came across a season one episode tonight. In it, Provenza compares Brenda's nagging phone call to that of his ex-wife; Andy asks which one, and he says, "Number two. And number four. I forgot how annoying she was and married her again."

He describes his parenting/grandparenting philosophy in an episode of Major Crimes, and it is very hands-off. He sees them on birthdays, Father's Day, and Christmas, basically.

I don't think it's right to insist on that. I'm never getting married, so there is no chance of having to deal with this issue, but hypothetically: I would not be comfortable calling my mother-in-law "Mom" (and I wouldn't want to hear my husband address my mom that way, either [nor would my mom go for that - yes, this has come up in conversation]). If someone says, "You can call me Mom," okay, because that's just an offer one can accept or decline, but insisting? Nope. I generally think you should address someone they way they request, but I'd take a hard pass on that one. Huh. I don't think I've ever heard anyone do that, just say, "This is my [Whatever]," rather than "This is my [Whatever], [Name]."

Sometimes laziness, sometimes "eh, it's just a dog" mentality (then don't have a pet!), I'm sure there's some anti-vaccination hysteria for pets just like there is for kids* ... But I have no idea what the reason was for this owner. He obviously cared, emotionally, but there's just no excuse. *Now, a whole lot of cats and dogs are over-vaccinated, because the booster shot protocol that stubbornly lingers exposes pets to FAR more doses than they need (increasing their risk of vaccine-associated sarcoma, also called injection site sarcoma, each time, which is still a small risk but a wholly unnecessary one under those circumstances). But they do very much need their initial vaccinations (the "puppy shots" or "kitten shots" which should generally also be given to adult pets with an unknown vaccination history upon adoption)!

Points for flipping the script, where it would usually be the mom presented as being oblivious to the privacy needs of a boy going through puberty (and, conversely, the dad acting as if a girl of the same age wouldn't have the same need for privacy)? Okay, no, probably just dumb as always. But now I want to catch a re-airing of this for the mom's side-eye.

Wow, almost 20 years. It feels like that long, and then it doesn't; I know exactly who and where I was at the time, because I lost a colleague/acquaintance in that crash. I never liked Aaliyah's music, but obviously I've always felt very sorry for the loss of her young life as well. It was a tragedy that should not have happened, and there are so many what ifs as a result.

I'm getting ready to watch the re-airing of this to fill in a lot of blanks since I initially watched in spurts, but: 1) Parvo is a completely preventable disease. Vaccinate your fucking dog. 2) Between a horse and a dog, this episode was a nice illustration of how much diet can matter (something even more important for cats, who are more prone to diet-related illnesses). That, yes, you can feed lesser food and get away with it - all animals are different, and genetics are a big factor, just like humans can exist on frozen food and take-out yet reach 80 or eat predominantly fresh meals and croak at 50 - but if your pet is among those who suffers the ill effects of an inferior diet, you need to make the change. So if you can afford it from the beginning AND your pet likes it (because the healthiest food in the world is of no use if an animal won't eat enough of it to get adequate nutrition), feed that.

Let's just skip to "motion carries." Because, yeah. Especially since "complete gut job" usually means "the appliances aren't stainless steel."

I love those two things! Every moment of Carter and Benton in the OR is pure delight, and I love that gross player Mark* winds up dining not with any of the women he has in mind, but Doug. The two actors play that perfectly. *Doug as Doug is bad enough; divorcing/divorced Mark as the new Doug is just unbearable.

Designing Women had a good scene about this; one of the characters read one of those awful headlines, and they all complained about it for the obvious reasons. Julia said something about how you'd see "Grandmother Wins Nobel Prize," but post-election coverage (this was the Bush I era) didn't read, "Grandfather Elected President."