Thompson Clan Spreading Out

Who the f*ck wants to hear bitchin' from someone like the original "high-IQ" poster who simultaneously votes to have people lose access to affordable medical care complain about how much they've "struggled" with depression when they also claim they simultaneously have access to some of the best medical care in the world, it's like who gives a shit about your problems f*ck off

(...)

I write an article on how Psychology Today works and analyze one article. You are commenting on something involving affordable health care and depression, which were covered elsewhere in this thread. It would seem that you're not commenting on my article above, but rather on some other article.

From your news header, you're using Thunderbird on Linux:

On Windoze, Thunderbird tends to have problems with corrupted message indexes. Linux might have the same problem. I suggest that you repair those indexes by deleting and rebuilding the .MSF files as in: If that doesn't do the trick, some other things to try:

Otherwise, if it's not an accident or a broken index file, I suggest that you work on your diplomacy and consider the option of not posting anything that you would not consider worth reading.

If someone's chemistry is messed up, drugs can help... if used intelligently. What might be amiss is some enzyme or something.

Yep. A former ladyfriend was having problems that (to me) looked like depression. Her doctor wasn't doing anything useful, so I volunteered myself as amateur MD and diagnostician. I suspected that a blood test might uncover some manner of hidden cause, so I ordered some tests from: The common basic tests are quite cheap. The ones measuring trace amounts are expensive. The results showed that there were a few tests that showed numbers outside of the normal range. She presented the test results to her doctor, who after the predictable reaction to me playing amateur MD, recommended a necessary diet change and prescribed three drugs, which mostly solved the problem.

"Blood test unlocks new frontier in treating depression"

One of the best parts about the Internet is that one can learn a lot from smug superior-attitude nerds without like, ever having to be around them physically. Imagine having to work for 'em, sounds horrible

Not much imagination required. I worked with several "virtual companies" where all communications was via Skype or encrypted email. I may have met 1/4th of those involved. There were a few angry exchanges, but I don't recall any profanity. Anyway, you don't have to worry about waking up in the morning and discovering that you're working for me. I'm planning on retiring before the end of the year. Then, I can devote more time to off topic Usenet discussions and telling you how to fix your computer.

And the lord looked upon the usenet wasteland and proclaimed: "I have given unto thee a temple upon which thou may rant. Instead, though hath turned my temple into a den of iniquity and dung hole of misinformation. Unto thy ancestors, I gave 10 commandments, but unto thee I shall give but one; Thou shalt not post what thou also find unworthy of reading."

Hmmmm. I don't think "y'all" would sound quite right with an English accent. :-) It's unfortunate that I've adopted such careless phraseology. It's something I've frequently ranted against but the use of "you" in place of "one" is so prevalent these days that I've lately slid into using it (which I really must do something about).

Vivid dreams are a breeze compared to my worst ever side-effect: the dreaded time dilation nightmare. Don't bother googling for it as it doesn't exist. I'm the only one who suffers from it, apparently. Typically what happens is, in the space of a mere 8 hours whilst sleeping, I find myself doing some shitty job in a shitty factory for around 6 months. Every day I get up, drive to this factory and do this shitty job and have to suffer shitty co-workers abusing me for my entire shift. I then drive home and do it all again the next day, month after month after month, usually in the middle of winter so the drive in and back is even more depressing. Sometimes these dreams take another form and I'm a long-serving prisoner approaching the end of my sentence for some unspecified crime and waiting for parole, which I never get. My days are characterised by wandering around the jail with other prisoners constantly asking me in disbelief, "How come you're *still* here?? You should have been out *years* ago!" I could understand these experiences if I'd done LSD in the past at some time, then I could put it down to a flashback of a bad 'trip' or something, but I've never ever done acid in my entire life. Nor have I ever been spiked with it! Side effects are a real bitch when they assume such proportions.

They showed a documentary on Eric Clapton here on TV last night. He described heroin as being like wrapped up in pink cotton wool and nothing, no matter how bad it was, would bother him. Then he went on to explain that switching to booze & coke instead was even worse! I think you're very wise to be wary of a genetic predisposition to addiction; good awareness on your part and should protect you.

Yes of course, John. But I was referring to the so-called 'recreational drugs' as they're so often mis-described as. And *having* to take them!

Talking about work outside of work is frowned upon in the New England tech industry in any case. You'll definitely get some side-eye if you bring up Linux at a party. "Come on man what do you think this is, San Francisco?"

Amazing. I didn't know that. When I was working for various Silicon Valley corporations, outside work was discouraged by an employment contract which made anything that I invent, design, or even propose to be considered the property of the corporation. I wiggled around the problem fairly well, but it required planning and subterfuge.

After all that, I've been working for myself (self-employed) since about 1983. At various times, I've had anywhere between zero and five outside consulting jobs, contract work, startups, virtual companies, and favors for friends. My taxes were a mess, but since I did my own, it didn't matter much. I've been audited twice, but not for this mess. Rather, it was for a service company I ran in Smog Angeles that I failed to properly shut down and left multiple tax issues that eventually caught up with me.

I'm not sure if I could survive working for or running only one company. I get bored easily and find the permanent state of crisis to be umm... invigorating.

However, all good things must come to an end. I'm seriously considering retiring before the end of the year. I don't quite have the mountain of cash that I had planned, but I can make do on my savings and investments. The only real problem is floor space. I plan to shut down the office and move everything to the house. In order to do that, I would need to throw away or sell half of everything in the office and half of everything in the office. Despite having scribbled multiple science fiction business plans over the years, I had never considered how to perform an orderly closure of the business. I think I can do that in 5 months, but I'm not sure. At my present rate of progress, 5 years would be more reasonable. Sigh.

Workin' hard

Cute. Around here, it's more like hardly working: That's a cat warmer, not a computah. You really don't want to try to move the cat once she finds a warm place to take over.

It's funny how cats still insist on sitting on your lap even when you're using a laptop computer. They don't seem to have any consideration for how difficult they're making things.

You need to be smarter than the cat. Cats like to plant themselves in the warmest and softest place in the room, where they can keep an eye on everything around them. If your lap happens to match their selection criteria, you will find a cat parked in your lap. If you really want to avoid this, I suggest you provide an alternative location that is warm, soft, and has a good view of the room. I suggest a comfortable soft blanket on top of anything that gets warm, such as a laser printer. Personally, I think it's easier to learn how to type with a cat in your lap, than it is to provide an alternative landing zone.

For additional instructions, I vaguely recall that there is a chapter in a book on telecommuting titled something like "How to Work at Home with Kids, Dogs, Cats, and other Distractions".

to type with a cat in your lap..."

Yeah, on your LAP. Then some of them want to see you type. Then some of the m want to help you type.

Chip was a good cat, he wanted to see everything and one day as a kitten he was going across the back of the couch and decided to lite on my shoulder. I helped him of course in the beginning. It was so cool I put up with the blood from his claws. As he grew, he learned, especially when I went "OWWWW EEEE" that he was digging into me and learned to balance up there without d rawing blood. I think it actually resulted in him having stronger legs. I c ould feel him kinda clamp down, but no more claws.

So we walked all over the place, he watched me cook and whatever else, you name it he witnessed it, except sex. What can I say.

It was quite the surprise when he got pregnant. We had never been wrong on the gender of a cat before. We didn't have to check them out. We just knew from their personality. This time, we had maybe a h*mo here or something, e xcept for that pregnancy thing.

Now the cats we got won't touch human food. What a relief. But Chip knew ho w to make a hamburger, mac n cheese, a few other thing. How to solder. "He" just didn't have the paws for it.