supposebly

Not from what I know. I used to have a friend who worked as a waitress for a long time. The money she made was the tips. And she worked for below minimum wage. However, that was back in the early 2000s. Apparently, that was eliminated in 2022 in Ontario. https://nowtoronto.com/food-and-drink/how-does-the-new-minimum-wage-affect-tipping-at-restaurants/ And keep in mind, Ontario isn't Canada. Ontarians need to be reminded of that sometimes.😉

I'm in Canada and I just bought my first car in 30 years last year. It has that safety feature that the article talks about. It warns me when there is something on the back seat when I turn off the ignition. Is this mandatory now in the US? Or in Canada? Does anyone know? Brutal article. I can't imagine what that is like. I'm not surprised it happens. Our brains don't always work the way we would like them to.

Did they stay together?

I went to a Catholic convent school and we didn't say grace for lunch or breakfast. Not to the boarding part of the school. Not sure what the nuns might have made the boarders do.....They closed the boarding part of the school a year or two after I started. However, we recited the Lord's Prayer in Latin after our first year of Latin when Latin was the first class of the day. Now I'm realizing that this was probably only something our first Latin teacher thought was cool.🤨 He was kind of old school. Obviously.😉

Wouldn't a laptop bag count as "personal item"? Are they charging even for that on a budget airline?

There are certainly cultural differences when it comes to Catholicism. I grew up Catholic in small town Bavaria, which is more of a cultural thing and has less to do with actual faith. I'm sure for some, but I would suspect for less than half. I've never seen/heard anyone say grace until I saw it on American TV/movies. Both my parents went to Sunday mass when I was younger. My dad stopped at some point, I can't remember when but quite a long time ago. My mom still goes but prefers the local protestant service. She says it's shorter and the pews are more comfortable.😆 It's more of a spiritual and meditative thing for her. She's kind of a "just in case" Christian I call her. She prays for us "just in case" hell exists and we might end up in it.😆

Sorry, I had to laugh at the audacity of this person. And here I was, getting all worked up because an old friend of mine is coming for 2 weeks, which I thought is a quite long for a visitor who I haven't seen for more than half a day at a time in the last 30 years. At least, he doesn't expect me to buy a TV! Granted, I have a very big one already and have a guest account on my desktop computer for such cases. Can't you create a guest account for your guest on your laptop that doesn't give them access to your stuff? That's what I do. No need to input anything but keeps your stuff safe from prying eyes. I googled it and it seems that is a bit of an issue with ipads.https://www.imore.com/how-use-guided-access-put-your-ipad-or-iphone-guest-user-mode On Windows, it's fairly easy. https://www.howtogeek.com/779862/how-to-create-a-guest-account-on-windows-11/ I think "inexpensive" and "iPad" are oxymoronic. 😉

I totally understand. I've been toying with buying one myself over the years. But considering you probably won't eat that much ice cream, how about spending a little less money on some excellent ice cream at the nearest ice cream parlor? Twice a month? Made by a professional who knows how to make excellent ice cream?

I eat very little red meat because I hate how most animals are raised for food and because of the carbon footprint of raising them. I'm also trying to make up a bit for all the meat my cats eat. And the car I bought last year. Having the occasional impossible meat in a chili or burger or Bolognese sauce accomplishes that for me. I cook my own food most of the time and most of my animal protein comes from fish or shrimp, and the occasional chicken from the small farm from around here. I'm not trying to be vegetarian or vegan, just mindful of the amount of animals I eat and how they've been raised. It's not because of health reasons. I don't have any food related health issues, so that was never my concern. Now if I can have labgrown milk and there will be cheese from it, I would be very happy. Cheese, I can't give up. And real milk in my coffee. Oatmilk works in my muesli and for pancakes. Just not in coffee.

Only children have no problems acquiring a language or more than one. The ability to acquire languages with no direct instruction disappears with puberty and the success of whatever language learning one does then depends on multiple outside and personal factors. The ability to learn a language without accent disappears even earlier for most people. Meanings change even faster than actual grammar rules, so this is often within one generation. I'm Gen X and I've been speaking English on a daily basis since 1998 at the ripe age of 29 and I noticed the fewer/less thing back then in Toronto already since I was taught this rule back in Germany too. I'm still using it this way most of the time but not always. And the usage of 'less' with plurals has been around since the days of King Alfred, Merriam Webster tells me. https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/less

Knowing how to use formal language has nothing to do with intelligence. There is some correlation with education but again, that should not be reason to criticize or put down people because their rules are different. Knowing to use formal language in the right context is a skill that not everyone has the privilege to learn. And most "rules" that people criticize often don't exist in spoken vernacular. I don't know how often it needs saying but language rules change. From one generation to the next, from one place to the next, from one social class to the next, from one gender to the next, from one dialect to the next. What one person thinks is right isn't right for the next person or even situation. There are hundreds if not thousands of Englishes in the world. There is no ONE English grammar. We should celebrate that diversity, not put it down under some misconception that we know best.

If the first and the second thing a man says to you is a comment about your looks, I would run. But I have my own issues. Some people tell me I overreact. I don't think so.

In Formal Semantics, the branch of Linguistics that studies meaning in language from a logical POV, the operator for 'or' and its natural-language equivalent is considered ambiguous between an inclusive and an exclusive meaning. That means that one possible interpretation of 'or' is that it can be the one the survey was going for, the inclusive meaning. It's similar to 'and': (1)Would you be unhappy if "Biden won" is true and "Trump won" is true. Answering 'yes' means you would be unhappy if "Biden won" is true and "Trump won" is true. Both can be true at the same time, so you can be unhappy if either is true. Adding the word 'either' is supposed to disambiguate for the exclusive meaning: (2) Would you be unhappy if either "Biden won" is true or "Trump won" is true. Here, just one of them can be true at the same time. If you say 'yes' you would be unhappy if either one is true. But it's not clear which one. Just that one of them is true, i.e. one of them won. So, from a formal Semanticists' POV, you interpreted it as the exclusive meaning of (2) but they asked for the inclusive meaning in (1). The grammar is fine but the connection to meaning is ambiguous because 'or' is ambiguous. They disambiguated in the question but not for the answer. I find survey questions are very very often completely ambiguous. This is actually a minor one. I've seen much worse.

He might improve, he's still young. I have a shy one that used to take days to get used to visitors. After 5 years, she's down to hours. She's 8.5 years old. And yes, I'd block access to behind the stove. That sounds dangerous. He'll find another favorite if he needs to.

My plan is to go back to school when I'm retired. I got my dream job at 49.

In addition to everyone else's good advice, tell him to skip the shower. As someone who gets very anxious to get to the airport with time to spare, esp. larger airports, every minute counts!

I'm assuming this is rhetorical question.

When I upgraded my desktop with a new processor, motherboard and graphics card, all I had to do was plug in the drive that had Windows on it, and it worked. A few drivers needed upgrading, but that was it. If you can use your drive (it probably should be an SD drive, not one of those old big hard drive 'bricks', do they still make them?), you may be able to just plug it in. Assuming you're upgrading a desktop PC. I would guess the same principle might apply if everything is backed up on a cloud.

Yes, as early as 4 months although it's more common by 6 months. I volunteer for a rescue and we get so many teen moms with their kittens. The moms often don't grow much if they have kittens so young. It's hard for them to feed their young when they're so young themselves. Also keep in mind, cats have no problem with incest, both with siblings and parent-kitten incest. So, spaying/neutering as soon as possible is very important. Also to prevent inbreeding which comes with additional problems for the next generation. Hope everything goes well with the TNR! For mom and kids!

I can only echo @shapeshifter. From so many posts, your family sounds less than supportive of you and your career, so I don't see why you should be. You've been saying so often you need more income to help with paying bills, so this is more important. There are enough professional pet sitters around that do a great job. They can find help elsewhere. It's your life. It's time they understood that.

Alice Munro, Canadian master of the short story and Nobel Prize winner has passed. https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/alice-munro-author-dead-obit-1.7203737

But what about the Master? Or does the Doctor think he is dead at the moment?

Kirsten Dunst as Claudia in the 1994 movie Interview with the Vampire. Truly an old soul in a child's body. A fierce performance all the way through. She might not have known all the time what she was doing, but every time 'favorite performances' come up in conversation, she is on the top of my list.

Apparently, a lot of people. It will need hopefully just one more generation for this to become a non-issue. Kids growing up with this doctor may help.

First air quality statement from forest fires of the year....