Bastet

Dr. Jeff's ability to provide treatment below cost - yet still employ his staff, keep the lights on, maintain the equipment, etc. - is due to having bought a building (in which he would not just practice, but live) in a crappy area and then sold it after gentrification paved the way for a nice profit, relying on volume to make up some of the difference, cutting some non-crucial corners, cultivating a network of donors who help off-set the non-paying/low-paying clients, and, of course, getting a TV show. I think he's a wonderful person and vet, but I don't like the perception created in some by the show that it's a simple matter of compassion for vets to offer services pro bono or at minimal cost; for most vets, if they did that, they'd go under, and then they wouldn't be able to help anyone. That's why many vets stopped offering payment plans; they kept getting stiffed, and it was jeopardizing their ability to keep the doors open. There are a lot of things that need to come together to make it possible to offer free/low-cost services with any regularity. I love his firm stance on not contributing to the homeless pet overpopulation crisis, from his work in spay/neuter clinics that really sparked his passion, to the Planned Pethood clinic name, to the "I'll do it, if you also let me fix your pet" policy. Great guy, and I'm keeping my fingers crossed for his long-term prognosis.

I just finished the series, and will now watch Major Crimes, but I'm so bummed there wasn't another season with both Brenda and Raydor. Their evolving relationship became my favorite thing about the show. Watching the whole series in such a short span of time, the number of times Flynn and Provenza stumbled into something started to feel ridiculous, but I really enjoyed each of those episodes on their own. I usually wish procedurals would have more character development, then when they do go into the characters' personal lives, I'm utterly bored (or annoyed) with those storylines and just want to get back to the case. This show got it right.

This was all so horribly reality show staged, but the tone in Jazz's voice when she asked, "So what are you doing in [my room]?" almost made up for it. Her dad's "Can I get that in writing?" when she speculates sex won't be part of her life until age 20 or so was also a forced presentation of a genuine emotion. Jazz has cat toys and trees in her room. And they put Nero on the scale as part of the family weigh-in. Cute. I like these people, and I understand why they've decided to take one for the team and expose their lives in this way. I'm just really uncomfortable with it, increasingly so as this series goes on. The documentary was great, interviews have been great. Even a short-run series seemed worthwhile given how few stories of transgender people - particularly transgender teens, and those who were fortunate enough to avoid undergoing puberty as the gender they were assigned at birth - are out there and the benefit that comes from people getting to know them through TV when they may never have such exposure in real life. But this is really starting to feel more invasive than the benefits justify.

forumfish, vent away. Being a caregiver for one person is a frequently exhausting and stressful existence, and you're taking care of a whole family. It's not a pity party to express the frustration that inevitably arises!

The only Garry Marshall-directed films I like are Beaches and Frankie and Johnny (although I have a few issues with that last one), but even in the ones I don't, there's always this certain kind of charm I can't deny. There's also always Hector Elizondo, so that helps. I most enjoyed him as an actor, particularly in A League of Their Own and Murphy Brown. I've never heard anyone say a bad word about him. Quite the opposite; he was widely regarded as a supportive person, and so many people who worked for him became his friend.

I would be sad, too, bilgistic. I'm an omnivore (with a set of rules on how the animals to become my dinner must be raised and slaughtered; a personal code for the ethical consumption of meat), and would be quite bummed if circumstances forced me to go vegetarian. Vegan, though, I can't even fathom, largely because of dairy. I have yet to consume a faux cheese that didn't make me angry.

I can't remember, and the HGTV summary only mentions his occupation: software engineer.

This speaks to what kind of mood I'm in today: I read humidity as humanity.

Such foundations are common here, yes, but you can use hardwood with a concrete slab, you just have to make sure it's good and dry (e.g. if the foundation was just poured a month ago, you're not going to be able to put down hardwood yet) and use proper technique.

The body of missing British author Helen Bailey has been found (along with that of her missing dog). Her partner has been charged with her murder.

Yeah, it was a nice little fantasy world in which the FBI doesn't accept sexist assholes.

Thanks, I thought so, but I was watching on a small TV and doing something else at the same time, so I wasn't sure.

I thought both Craftsman homes looked like some modern developer's attempt to call a generic home something different. Was the first one actually an older home? It didn't look like any traditional Craftsman I'm used to. I wouldn't live in one of those dome homes, but they're interesting to virtually tour, so it was interesting to include that - even though it was even more obvious a decoy than normal on this show. In a five-bedroom home, she declared that if he got the basement bedroom as his robot room, she wouldn't have a room for her crafts. Um, there are two of you, and five bedrooms; if one is the master and one is his office, that leaves three for you to choose from for your office. That still leaves one for a guest room and one a kid's room down the road. What is the problem?

I like them together, but we see them at work, so I don't want to see anything different than we do. I like the balance they're striking; we know they're still together and happily so by seeing little inside jokes, hearing about time spent together out of work, even juvenile teasing by co-workers, but since it's in the office, their interaction is of adults rather than googly-eyed teenagers. Refreshing on TV.

Jane's repeated grumbling at missing cool things - spontaneous human combustion, the hands still attached to the steering wheel, the fat bomb - was cracking me up, and we really needed one about her missing Maura chasing down a suspect. My favorite reference to spontaneous human combustion will likely always remain Mulder's, "Dear Diary, today my heart leapt when Agent Scully suggested spontaneous human combustion," but this is a good one: Nina: Again with the spontaneous human combustion? Frankie: It's possible, I'm just saying. Maura: I hope you'll stop saying it.

I continue to wish you the best, AgentRXS, and I'm sorry to hear your local resources haven't panned out yet; that is a shame. I really hope you're able to get in touch with someone/someplace who can better advise you of the options and process in your jurisdiction. Without knowing where you are, it's hard to offer anything more, unfortunately, as resources vary so much. If you happen to be in the Los Angeles area, let me know (privately, of course - and be assured I'll make no subsequent mention of it here) and I'll try to get you in the hands of people who can help. There is a national hotline, which may or may not be of any use, because local is better: http://www.thehotline.org/

If that 2015 exhibit is the same one I'm thinking of from that year, it was a replica of the living room set, but included a display of real props. Jerry Seinfeld (who has many pieces from the set - the couch, stools, table & chairs, even the door) is, in fact, looking for a museum that wants to display the original (per a Reddit AMA).

I tried to hang in, but I just could not with those two. Every.fucking.thing was a potential deathtrap. Their poor kids.

Okay, I don't want to be the harbinger of doom or a broken record, but you REALLY need to hook up with a DV agency for local resources and suggestions. Now. Do not just assume this guy is all talk. I hope he is! He may be; some of them are. But women wind up dead. It's not rare. At all. He has made a threat. Treat it as such - don't wait until next time.

A good therapist (one who's good, period, and a good match for you specifically) can help you break your own patterns, and I can't stress enough how important it is - since you have been with at least one abusive partner, and because that's the most-recent relationship - for you to find someone who specializes in domestic abuse. Not all therapists are trained equally, and there is such a special set of factors going on with domestic abusers, it would be beyond horrible for a therapist not properly educated to recognize and discuss those things to essentially (or outright!) blame you for someone else's malfunctions. I have long been involved in DV policy work, and spent several years running the legal clinic of a DV shelter (before I had to step away from direct representation to avoid wanting to jump off a cliff). The therapists I communicate with as part of that work all speak of clients who've had previous therapists frame their abuse exclusively in terms of what the client should have done differently. My advice remains to call a local DV hotline and tell them you've recently gotten out of a relationship with an abuser, and ask for a list of local therapists who specialize in this area. Then find someone with whom you're comfortable (and who's not a racist!) to help you work through the issues raised by this relationship, and by other relationships. You're off to a great start. You're staying strong about this asshole, you're not in denial about what was going on with him, you're recognizing your own patterns aside from him -- you are so well-equipped to shed those nagging "I must have done something to cause this" thoughts about this guy's abusive behavior, to further explore why you're vulnerable to bad relationships in general and how to avoid that, to learn tools to help you further the internal work you're obviously already doing. I'm so confident in you. We just all need a little help sometimes, and I really think you'll benefit.

Designing Women is another show filled with moments that have me cracking up every time I see them. I can't find Bernice's sanity hearing in its entirety, but here's Mary Jo demonstrating how to get dressed while massively pregnant: Nor can I find a clip of the scene in the It's a Wonderful Life episode, where Charlene recounts her disastrous business meeting. She's just back to work after maternity leave, and severely sleep-deprived. When Mary Jo asks her how it went, she reports that she nodded off and the client had to wake her up - apparently, she was snoring. Then she looked down and discovered she had breast milk spots on her blouse, and was so humiliated she started crying. So she jumped up, put on her coat (which has baby puke on it) - and fell flat on her face in the reception area, because she'd put her pantyhose on so twisted she'd been walking like John Wayne all day. This caused her purse to come open, spilling baby suppositories everywhere. "There I was, on my hands and knees, wet, sobbing, mascara running down my face, my pantyhose twisted, trying to gather up all these little white firecrackers. Two of the secretaries had to lift me off the floor and help me to my car. Or maybe they were throwing me out. I don't know. I never looked back." It's something that would probably have been too outlandish to watch, but just sitting there hearing it told - with Jean Smart's great delivery - makes it hilarious. And the women discuss plus-size clothing, giving Suzanne some terrific lines:

It depends on whether you're in a dramatic or comedic situation. In the former, the space under the bed will be pristine. In the latter, there will be a giant dust bunny, and wacky hijinks will ensue as you try to avoid giving yourself away via sneeze. The only thing under mine are my slippers and the pump for my Sleep Number mattress (and sometimes my cat), but there isn't enough vertical clearance for me to get under there should I ever need to hide from a killer.

Ants. Specifically, ants that get in the house. Riley just found little black ants in her dry food bowl (in the office), and not only did they come all the way from the far corner of the bedroom at the other end of the hallway, they took a route apparently inspired by that kid in the Family Circus comic strip. When I first moved into this house eleven years ago, I used to get ants in the cats' food a fair bit -- they'd come in through the dining room and kitchen into the service porch to get to the bowl. After dealing with that, I had only the occasional ant visitation over the years (and because Maddie took all day to finish her breakfast and all night to finish her dinner, there was always food out). So this isn't a chronic problem, and I shouldn't grumble. But I find dealing with ants annoying. They're so small, and there are so many of them. It's not like a spider or other bug that I can just pick up and put back outside.

I eat hot dogs so rarely that I generally don't bother with a reduced fat version, but having had those Hebrew Nationals, I can confirm they do, indeed, taste good. Not like the real thing, but good. Surprisingly, I think the 97% fat free ones taste better than the reduced fat ones. (At least, this was the case when I last tried them; it's been probably two or three years.)

My family has a knack for taking in cats who wind up needing expensive care throughout their life. Baxter ... oh my soul, The Bax. He apparently got a hold of some book on rare feline ailments and injuries and worked his way through them. It wasn't just that things kept happening, it was that vets kept shaking their heads saying, "This virtually never happens in cats." Well, that's what the specialists he often wound up with would say. Our primary care vet became used to it, and would just say, "How very Baxter." I'd just give him a kiss and pay another bill. Given his history, I feared I'd lose him early (and I did, at 13 to cardiac arrest), but I hoped he'd actually live a crazy long time so he could make his way through that whole book. I forgot to include one important development in my Riley update: I can pick her up and carry her now. Only for a short distance, and only tucked into my chest, not put over my shoulder, but this was completely verboten the first two weeks.