So tell me how you really feel
 

I'm crushed. I didn't know it was so painful for you. One wonders why you put yourself through it at all.

Sniff.

People who need to share stuff coming out of their nether regions
 

My husband and I got carded the other week. At dinner, like right at the table, by the waiter. WTF. Kind of funny, but then again, kind of annoying. We dutifully pulled out our IDs. It was an expensive restaurant too. Very odd.

People who need to share stuff coming out of their nether regions
 

Dear Mrs. Finch: I know you appreciated me holding your hand, wiping your brow, and giving you water during the ten most painful hours of your life. Sadly, I will not be available to do so again, because I learned today that it would make me uncivilized.

Sidd(judge much?)Finch

Sad news for Thrasher
 

Absolutely. But, in fairness, G3 was responding to people who were telling him that their lives were better than his.

Sad news for Thrasher
 

I realize that feelings about debt are not always the result of rational thought, so this will probably fall on deaf ears, but a mortgage isn't so bad.

Student debt is so crushing psycologically because you can't get away from it with self respect (not to mention that under bankruptcy laws it is very difficult to get away from period). It's there; you've got to pay it until its gone.

With a mortgage, on the other hand, one can always make choice to walk away - i.e. sell the house and pay it off. There is some risk of being "upside down" in a mortage, especially in the first few years, but the risk is small and the amount one is upside down is likely to be only a small percentage of the total loan. It is much more likely in most areas of the country that a short turn around on a home loan will result in a financial windfall.

If I lost my job tomorrow, or quit it because I just can't take it any more, I could sell my house and have no mortgage, but I'd still have the student loans. That's the difference. And its a big one.

Of course, none of this is to say that paying off a mortgage as fast as possible is bad (although there are arguments for just that), just that mortgages themselves aren't so bad.

Happiness and Bankruptcy
 

Actually, if you have some clue what you are about and a taste for some risk, you can combine these two sentences and pursue some jewelry-steal inspired happiness of your own. If you have a good jeweler around, you can do particularly well buying loose stones (appraised or not) and having them set. And, eBay has some interesting quirks that can work to your advantage, depending on what you are looking for. Haven't tried selling anything there, though - I'm afraid I'm still a packrat, and I feel for some reason that if I'm done with something I should give it to charity not sell it. :shrug:

Remember that jewelry appraisal prices are comically inflated. If I paid 1/2 of the appraisal price for anything I would feel like I got royally fucked. And I'd be right. Then again, I'm cheap as hell. I am sort of waiting for one friend of mine to maybe ask another friend of mine to marry him, and if I get wind that he is going to do it, I plan to coarsly offer to hold his hand while ring shopping, because I am convinced that I can find him 2x the ring at 1/2 the price, so long as he doesn't get sentimental on me about a Tiffany ring being "special" or some such bullshit.

BR(speaking of this seasons purses, I picked up a vintage crocodile number on eBay for a song)C

Sad news for Thrasher
 

Nice response.

I am still trying to not reach through the screen and smack Thurgreed and Greedy. Especially Thurgreed.

As you both age, you'll find fewer and fewer women to whom you can make these stupid comments. Or you can simply chase younger and younger skirts.

I can quickly tick off a half-dozen women friends who are in their early 30s and unable to conceive. We've all "joked" for the past three or four years how all of our children will look alike, since we will all be adopting. (The one girlfriend who is currently pregnant used IVF because they were unable to conceive naturally.)

The point is, many more people will be offended by your comments than you think. Rather than assume you will offend a very few, assume you will offend a great many.

People who need to share stuff coming out of their nether regions
 

After a very long night at work, I went to the store to buy champagne at midnight (for my birthday and because I felt I deserved it). It was a $65 bottle of champagne and all I brought into the store was my visa card. Dickhead highschool kid cashier decides to card me. I said to him, don't start with me, please don't make me go out to the car for my id, I have had a long day and besides if I was underage I would have bought the Malt Liquor. And I must have had that look on my face because he let me buy the champagne without my id.

People who need to share stuff coming out of their nether regions
 

WHilst delivering the Brazenette by c-section, my dear husband began to give me a blow by blow, Howard Cossell-ish running commentary. "Oh my word. She's made the first incision, all the way across your belly, and now she's reaching in..."

At this point, he looked at me and said, "Do you want me to continue?"

If it hadn't have been for the spinal, I'd have punched him right then.

There are some things I don't want to imagine, much less have described.

Bn'(but none of that annoying cone head for the Brazenette)B

Sad news for Thrasher
 

Couldn't the same be said of any unsecured debt? Mortgage debt is not bad because your payments are effectively going towards current consumption, not past consumption. With just about all other debts (car loans being a possible exception), you're paying for something in the past.

Student debt is particularly bad because, as a lawyer, you're paying for education you now are questioning the value of altogether.

Nananananana BATMAN!
 

http://cache.boston.com/images/daily/10/cars.jpg

From photos of the Frankfurt Autoshow. Available at boston.com

This looks like it would be fun to drive.

Sad news for Thrasher
 

May I quote you next time someone asks if they should or shouldn't consider going to law school?

People who need to share stuff coming out of their nether regions
 

Dude, maybe you missed my sign-off. I never said it would make you uncivilized. I said it would make him uncivilized. And me too, for that matter. De gustibus non disputandum est.

Now, if you tell me our life isn't complete without his witnessing the miracle of a 7 pound projectile shooting out of my crotch while I turn red faced and scream like a trapped hyena, that would make you uncivilized. My expressing any interest or opinion whatsoever on what you and your Mrs. feel is meaningful or appropriate interaction in the same situation would make me uncivilized.

Sad news for Thrasher
 

I'll make a deal. My post was in response to PJ's statement below:

I won't tell you how great it is to have kids, tempted as I often am, if no one else suggests that its a "dubious reward" (and I'm not offended by PJ's statement, I just feel a need to respond when it's made).

In response to another comment, I have heard all too often the word "miscarriage", luckily not every time.

Now, for those who wish other experiences, either now or forever, enjoy! When and if you get to this one, it's great. No offense was meant to anyone.

I am saving this
 

I was in a meeting and I missed this. I just wanted to see it again....and remove my name from the subject line.....and piss off TM but then I rethought and deleted the excess postage so now I must add an emoticon for him instead.
:bounce:

Sad news for Thrasher
 

Assuming we are not self-employed (with business loans), what other debt besides mortgage and student loans and car loans (also akin to a mortgage in most ways I think) would we be likely to have? I know that people run up credit cards, but anyone who runs up credit card debt that they know they won't be able to pay within a relatively short time obviously is not stressed out about being in debt. Unless they lost their job, etc. etc. and their only source of funds is the credit card, but then they're so stressed out that the unsecured debt really isn't the problem, it's more a symptom of the problem.

Sad news for Thrasher
 

(Anon because soooooo many people know this story)

A few months ago I was in the airport travelling with my very young kids, but without my wife. The lady in line behind me at the Starbucks was making faces at the kids and talking to them, the way that some people do where they are really talking to an adult by talking to their kids, you know, "Where's your mommy?", "Why isn't your mommy here with you?", "You shouldn't be on a trip with out your mommy," and (looking up at me with a disapproving smile "I bet you wish your mommy was here."

So I told her that we did all wish that their mommy was here, but unfortunately she had passed away recently.

Ashen face. Silence. She actually got out of line and walked away.

Sad news for Thrasher
 

Whoever you are...I love you.

Bn'B

Floatin' Down the Pasty River
 

So I'm sitting here trying to picture a raft with Danny Devito's face painted on it......

Anon? You should be proud to admit who you are
 

You....are....my....hero...

Who talks to kids like that? WTF? Get away from my kid, pervy. Now, I might pet someone's dog if everyone looks friendly and I ask first, but I wouldn't start talking to a stranger's kids. I mean, the store clerk may say hey to my kid but if the lady in line behind me started conversing with him I would find that odd. "I bet you wish mommy was here"???? She died during childbirth you ignorant bitch and now you just wasted five years of intense therapy with one unsolicited comment. Why don't you go ahead and tell him that Santa doesn't exist too.

People who need to share stuff coming out of their nether regions
 

Oh, bullshit. You said he woud wait outside "like a civilized person." Your meaning was perfectly clear, backtracking notwithstanding.

People who need to share stuff coming out of their nether regions
 

Don't forget the pooing. They never warn you about the potential for pooing.

Then again, maybe they shouldn't. If you don't have a mirror, you might never know, and any birth partner who would share such a thing with you later, or share it with a chat room of lawyers later still, would be an utter cad.

Sad news for Thrasher
 

Harsh, but justified. Even if it was more blithering thoughtlessness than malicious intent (I consider "why aren't you married?" and "why don't you have kids?" to have malicious intent per se as surely as "why haven't you been able to get your book published?" and "why haven't you gone back to work?"), but people should bloody well think.

And I commend you on accomplishing it without any unmannerliness on your own part.

People who need to share stuff coming out of their nether regions
 

Yeah. I learned about that recently (like, within the last couple years) and really, I think that is almost more of a disincentive than all the pain. Pooing on yourself and possibly the baby? Yuck.

Why isn't the pooing potential included in descriptions of (or films of) childbirth? There's blood, there's placenta, there's "water" breaking, there's pain. All of which is gross (though a necessary part of the miracle of life, I know). But pooing? Insult to injury. Coup de grace. Blech.

People who need to share stuff coming out of their nether regions
 

If the projectile were something other than a baby, like a croquet ball, you could make a lot of money doing this.

BBC2USA
 

One can only imagine your private hell.

Thank God.

People who need to share stuff coming out of their nether regions
 

Sidd, if you want to take how I live my life as a commentary on yours, feel free. Ditto if you wish to to so interpret my gentle self-mockery of my anachronistic sensibilities.

Sad news for Thrasher
 

It's interesting that the discussion about the article morphed into a group musing about conspicuous consumption. I thought the point of the article is that MWKs find themselves on a debt treadmill largely because of a bidding war for suburban housing and schools that made dual-income households necessary to compete for subsistence.

To me, it seems like the vast household income growth we experienced in the late '70s, '80s and early '90s was wholly attributable to families becoming dual-income. It doesn't take an economist to figure out that those gains would be entirely eaten up by price inflation in the markets in which those MWKs participate as consumers, like housing. Plus, we weren't really thinking about the economic and social costs of dual-income households, like paying others to perform domestic tasks.

I'm all for women having identical freedoms to men. But we didn't really consider the option of having the man stay home as primary caregiver, or other ways of addressing the problem. Now we've just suffered from the impact of inflation, pure and simple. For example, single working mothers wouldn't be as fucked as they are if they were competing in the resource marketplace with Ward Cleaver, Breadwinner alone. Or June Cleaver, Breadwinner, I don't care.

People who need to share stuff coming out of their nether regions
 

You can elect to have an enema when you present in labor which I believe helps to avoid the problem. I did not poo (and did not have an enema -- fuck you, TM). I did fluff more than once which my husband now finds funny because he thought I was incapable of doing so -- and has redeveloped the belief since -- and he said it was "cute" how I pardoned myself to the nurse each time it happened. This was only while pushing before the doc came in -- I did not fluff in the doctor's face.

People who need to share stuff coming out of their nether regions
 

What?!?!? Oh my goodness, I never heard of that. That is exactly the sort of thing I would hold over my child's head like a sword every time it acted up for its entire freaking life to guilt-trip it.

Edited to add, I am completely humbled by you moms, and will never, ever whine about some minor ache or pain again.

People who need to share stuff coming out of their nether regions
 

Every time I eat a late lunch at my desk, I get burned. Every fucking time.

What is that they say, about expecting different consequences from the same actions?

So, how about those Mets?
 

Bullshit. Many thin people I know exercise b/c they love food so much. Fat people mostly eat shit food like chips and fries. Thin people eat GOOD food.

I've told people my consumption priority mostly looks like this:

1. Sex
2. Food
3. Liquor

Sometimes the GF says it's:

1. Sex
2. Liquor
3. Food

Or:

1. Sex
2. Sex
3. Sex

I would say that every once in a while it's:

1. Food
2. Sex
3. Liquor

But that's when the food is phenomenal.

Also, some people have a large spectrum of food "like-a-bility". For example, some food registers as a 2 out of 10 and other food is a 9 out of 10. My spectrum starts at 6. Even bad food is a 6. And most food is at least a 7.

I like food.

BBC2USA
 

Apparently you've never vacationed where there be Germans.

People who need to share stuff coming out of their nether regions
 

Okay, you did NOT just use the word "fluff" in a sentence to mean fart, did you? I can't stand it!

Recently, I was out with my mother, my sister in law, and my 2 year old niece. My niece started to have a tantrum about something and my mother said "I think she's pissed off and M-A-D". Why she spelled MAD is beyond me.

So, how about those Mets?
 

That is also my preferred order of consumption.

I have never understood why the traditional romantic date involves a nice dinner, or more specifically, why anybody plans to have sex after a traditional romantic date. I usually feel too full after the risotto to want to romp around, and if I had a few drinks during the evening, I will likely be asleep by the time that full feeling has passed.

If I am really hot for a guy that I'm out to dinner with, I'll eat light.

People who need to share stuff coming out of their nether regions
 

I might, but probably not the way you intend.

You post, I read. I take your words for what they mean. In the context of a discussion where people have taken strongly differing positions, blanket statements about what is "correct" do not come across as self-mockery.

Given your readiness to condemn people for what they likely, if stupidly, regard as harmless pleasantries ("where's your mommy?"), I would think you could see this.

BBC2USA
 

Translation: I met Britassoc this summer.

Thurgreed(damn. that's cold even for me, which must surely make it obvious i'm joking)Marshall

BBC2USA
 

Dammit Sidd, read the footnotes!! Read the footnotes!!

So, how about those Mets?
 

Well, it was more of an order of importance, not a chronological list. If it were chrono I would say something like this:

1. Sex
2. Liquor
3. Food
4. Liquor
5. Sex
6. Maybe some assplay?

Nosy questions.
 

DS, why don't you have kids?

TM