Bastet

I showed Audrie & Daisy to a friend last night, and sitting through that a second time was just as emotional as the first. My friend took one look at the sheriff in Daisy's case and asked me, "I'm going to want to punch him in the face, aren't I?" Oh, yeah. The fact that asshole is raising daughters is every bit as frightening as the fact he's the head of law enforcement. One of the (umpteen) things that really gets to me in that film is when they're showing messages that went back and forth between Audrie and one of the guys, with him telling her it's no big deal -- people will talk about it for a week and move on to something else -- and she writes back, "You have no idea what it's like to be a girl."

Oh, that's delightful.

Oh my, I'd pay a nice little chunk of change to watch LT drop Tom Brady on his ass just once.

I don't remember him (I even watched the video to see if seeing/hearing him would spark my memory, with no luck), but good for him! If I lived there, I'd go have a meal in order to register my support.

I don't think they were supposed to mash up breakfast and lunch, I think they were supposed to mash up two foods in a creative way into something new, the end result being something appropriate to eat for brunch (e.g. the cronut). (Of course, brunch is a mix between breakfast and lunch, so the breakfast/lunch thing is in play that way, I just don't remember them specifically being told to combine a breakfast food and a lunch food.)

I laugh at that commercial, because - like the Cheetos dad, apparently - Tell It To My Heart is one of those songs I must turn up and sing along to when it comes on in the car (Can't Fight Fate even more so; I guess Taylor Dayne is my jam).

Yeah, excessive grooming is a common self-soothing measure, and unfortunately some cats can do it so much they create sores rather than just lose (or discolor) their fur. Given the timing, stress is a likely culprit for his actions. Just keep an eye on it while you give him some time to get back into his groove. If it turns into a recurring problem, or he makes a sore this time, we can chat about potential remedies, but for now I don't think there's any need to do anything other than exactly what you're doing. And, for heaven's sake, don't steal his nap spot with your laundry, silly human! :-)

She explained it during at least one episode in the Agua Dulce era, too.

There are people who don't?! I kid, because I don't have a dishwasher and I don't care how anyone loads their own dishwasher, so I'm not in a position to be bothered by this. However, when I lived someplace with a dishwasher and someone would help out by loading it, I did spend some time cringing. I didn't say anything, go back and rearrange it after they left, or anything (unless I needed to in order to get more stuff in), but I admit some people's loading habits puzzled me. What does bug me: I have a friend who I absolutely cannot watch as she loads her dishwasher, because she wastes so much water. If your dishwasher is relatively modern works properly, you should be scraping rather than rinsing to begin with. (Yes, this is quite the peeve for me; I'll spare you links on my other peeve about how most people use far too much laundry detergent in their washing machines.) But if you're going to rinse, good grief, don't be wasteful about it. Especially here, where we're in a perpetual drought. She rinses the dishes so thoroughly they're practically washed by the time she loads them, and has the water running the whole time.

I watched Kathleen Madigan's Bothering Jesus stand-up special, which contains a bit on watching this show, and she'd fit in nicely here -- she thinks half the couples featured shouldn't be married, she says if she was the realtor for half these people, she'd punch them in the face, she goes off on wanting granite counter tops with a budget of $8, she tells the people whining about needing space for entertaining "No one is coming to see you, anyway," etc.

Yes, we've been prolific with our peeves this morning, so it's a "hot topic" right now. And, ari333, rant away -- it's what we do.

I normally skip it for the same reason, but I found I couldn't look away from this one as soon as it started. It was a great little mini-show, interesting to both look at and listen to, without me saying, "Oh, just get on with it already" like I've done so many times. And, yeah, Prince will probably forever be the gold standard of halftime performances.

Oh, of course I bring a little something for the host. That's a separate thing entirely from sending out an invitation that instructs all guests to take up the task of supplying food and drink.

Yeah, I think potlucks have their place in socializing (e.g. for a group that gathers regularly, but someplace other than in someone's home, so rotating hosting duties isn't possible), but people who routinely or randomly invite guests to a party in their home without actually, you know, hosting a party chap my ass, and I stay home. I have friends in the early stages of wedding planning, and they both make great money but don't save a penny of it, so they keep talking about stuff they don't want to provide to their guests because of cost, and I am sitting there saying, "Then these invitations damn well better say 'Absolutely no gifts,' you tacky twits." Or, you know, just go get married without all of us; nice and cheap.

What did she do when she found out it was KFC? I certainly would not be extending any future invites to her; I'd see the nephew alone.

They had to change it in order to get FOX to air it.

To quote the late, great Carrie Fisher: Years of living longer makes you look worse. Who knew?

ABay, you're among good company; most sentient beings are freaking their shit. The best weight loss strategy is to feed fewer calories per day (e.g. 180 for weight loss in an average cat, but it can be more or less depending on the cat's size and what has been previously fed) of a nutritious food -- in other words, "diet" food is usually crap, and it's far better to feed less of a good food -- but portion control becomes a real battle for those who have more than one cat. It's hard to feed two cats two separate diets, especially if they won't both just eat breakfast in a set time and be done, and lather, rinse, repeat at dinner (in which case you can separate them for an hour twice a day and be done). With the girl's mobility issues (if they still exist), is there someplace high you can put the boy's food that she can't jump to access? Baxter was great at eating each meal within 30-45 minutes of when I put it down, and a total big who'd eat his entire meal in that time frame, but Maddie was a grazer who took most of the day to eat her breakfast and most of the night to eat her dinner. Thankfully, Baxter had an ass made of lead, so he couldn't jump like she could, so I put her food on top of the dryer; she could return to it all day/night, but he couldn't steal it because despite his nose telling him good things were up there, he couldn't haul his body up to infiltrate. In the most general terms, you want to reduce the caloric intake of the dieter by 20%, and you'll probably have to get creative as to how to do this while letting the non-dieter go to town. If you feel like sharing some specifics of the two cats and their feeding habits, dietary needs, etc. I may be able to help brainstorm some individualized strategies. But, basically, it all comes down to keeping Thing One out of Thing Two's food, regardless of who is who and who eats what. And how best to try that depends on how each one approaches food. It's hard, and we do the best we can. Continued good thoughts and kudos to you.

True. I can only extrapolate that it's the same in business, but I know with elected officials and the way constituent response is tallied and weighted, letters are at the top of the food chain -- those people put forth the most effort, and thus felt the most strongly about the opinion being expressed. Social media response does rank higher than responses with a similar level of effort, though, because it's something seen by others in addition to the recipient. So if you use social media (I don't, so I'm "do as I say, not as I do" here), it would be a good idea to do both. But not to skip the letter in favor of social media only.

They're not a no-kill shelter (as has been explicitly stated on the show). Tia has said several times there are dogs who are not adoptable but who can lead good lives as "lifers" (and they have a relatively small number of those), and there are also those who are simply wired wrong or otherwise cannot be saved; in those cases, they opt to euthanize as it's the most humane choice given the mental anguish the dog lives with.

Since I feel the same way as Schlamme about government, and about this "politician is a dirty word" culture, I loved this:

I thought the fish drew criticism, too.

So was this the swan song for the New Orleans crew, and Tampa is replacing them? It certainly felt like it, and the wording of most of the promos suggested it, but then there was one promo that made it sound like Tampa was an addition rather than a replacement. At any rate, despite how "only done for the show" it was, I enjoyed seeing the EMS crew off duty, enjoying each other. I wish the show would ditch the cops, and just focus on EMS with occasional appearances by Fire.

The editors aren't even trying anymore; including the judges saying they're sad about their decision and, especially, the "Both fell apart in execution, but one at least was trying for a mash-up" commentary made it clear Brooke was going home. Oh, wait. Nice fake-out, guys. That could have gone either way; they both really screwed up, and didn't cook anywhere near as well as they're capable of, and they both knew it and owned up to it. Sad elimination, and it was going to be either way. I felt for Shirley in the QF -- I, too, would have had to take meds to get out on that boat, and then I, too, would have been foggy-brained and sluggish (nothing that doesn't cause those side effects keeps me from puking - or wishing I would puke). I also felt bad for Casey; they're all so talented, and we're so far along in the competition, that people are going to be in the bottom and go home for great dishes, but basically last time she heard her dish was great and the only reason it wasn't quite as great as the others was it needed three grains of salt, and this time she added four grains and heard, "It's great, but one fewer grain of salt and you'd be in the winning group." When I heard the EC challenge, commanding them to be creative, I figured Brooke had it in the bag, since she is one of the most creative chefs I've ever seen on this show. But then I heard John talk about what it's like to be told, "Be creative" and realized he made sense; I then figured it was going to be a struggle for several of them. And poor Brooke -- the thing she just made in the last EC would have been perfect for this one. I'd have had a hard time getting out of my head and coming up with something else under those circumstances. Then Sheldon got the phone call from home scene and I got nervous for him. Especially when I saw him opening bags of waffles! Funny that they never even mentioned it. And then Sylva's eggs came out of the oven under-cooked, and I worried about him. Nerve-wracking episode; other than John, this is a really likable group of chefs to me, so I'm enjoying them beyond their food. Someone has to go home, I know, but I was going to be sad to lose anyone other than him. Oh, and also -- I hated John's plating; it looked like he'd used dirty bowls. Brooke's plating was awful, too, but that wasn't what she intended to do.

I was going to answer this in Small Talk, but either I'm blind or we don't have one. So: In the garage. Many people here fill their entire garages with crap, and then park their cars outside. Which is so not my style, because in my garage I want my car, my workbench (and room to work) and all my tools, but to each their own. Most of my stuff is in my closets, but things like Christmas decorations, an air mattress, folding chairs, and such -- things that only get used occasionally -- are on a big overhead shelf in the garage. And then there are a few big things that are rarely used, but at times necessary, up in the rafters.