i'm so fuckin international, i should have been alabama's capital

Hi there.
First off, I'm fine and not in a depression or so - I just need some advice.

So I'm not the romantic type, but anyway managed to get the perfect boy for me and I love him with all my heart. The thing is, he would like me to show my feelings more, but I just... don't know how! I'm very shy and always unsure if an action (especially when it comes to emotional things) makes me look silly.

I keep seeing this same actress in commercials--for example, just now, watching Nick at Nite, I saw her in a commercial for Mucinex, and a little while ago I saw her in a commercial for Pam. I've also seen her in a recent one for K-Mart, and other things. I'm just wondering who the hell she is, why she seems to be in every other goddamn commercial I watch, and I have this vague feeling of unease that I'm actually dead and as I continue to watch TV she will appear in more and more commercials until finally she takes over my entire TV and turns to me, looks straight into my eyes and says "Okay, sir, it's time to leave now," and then she materializes in my living room and forces me to go outside and get in a black windowless van.

Okay, my "wise" mother-in-law has informed me of yet another thing that is ABSOLUTELY UNCONTESTABLY TRUE. For reference, the last one of these was "you can't jump up and down while you're pregnant or the baby will fall out."

She claims that when you have the measles, if you get hit by sunlight you can go blind. She had measles when she was 9, and had to sit in a dark room for seven full days and nights to avoid blindness.

What is up with this claim? I've never heard ANYTHING relating to this before; it seems like something you'd at least hear about if it were true. Stories? Anecdotes? Gimme what you know ^_^

I am getting all 4 of my wisdom teeth pulled out in about 10 hours from now.

Do you think that I will be well enough to go to a party on Friday night? (That will be a day and a half later after the pulling.)

Or if not, how long do you think it will take before I am able to eat real food again, or am I going to be on a liquid diet for a week?

*Sorry for many questions, I am a wee bit scared!*

I'm going to be in Los Angeles on my 18th birthday. Does anyone have any ideas of anything I could do that's special/memorable (that won't get me arrested)?

I'm out of ideas (plus I'm not getting a tattoo anytime soon).

The White House v. Howard Dean



When Howard Dean said the Senate should kill the health care bill, the White House took it personally, hitting back on its blog and at the daily press briefing.

Dean yesterday told Vermont Public Radio: "This is essentially the collapse of health care reform in the United States Senate. Honestly the best thing to do right now is kill the Senate bill." His comments came after word that Democrats were dropping both the public option and an expansion of Medicare.

Then today, on Good Morning America, Dean said the bill is "an insurance company's dream" and a "bigger bailout for the insurance industry than AIG."

The administration has not taken too kindly to the former DNC chair's statements.

In a post today on the official White House blog, communications director Dan Pfeiffer called Dean's argument "perplexing" and said "this bill will finally wrest power away from the insurance industry and put it in the hands of American consumers."

( Read more... )

Related: Landrieu And Dean Duel On Hardball

I support passing the bill but when the White House (reportedly) calls Dean "irrelevant" I'm like ~you mad?~. idk if that's smug. DC has been trying to keep Howard Dean down since 2003 (see the linked NY Times article), the Obama administration sadly bought into that CW, and now they're angry that he's actually speaking for people.

ps - the Most Influential People poll is going up tomorrow cause I was out today sorry

MAN WON!!!!!

serious props to moomsie

Bitch, come put my plate in the sink!

Bartow, Florida (CNN) -- After more than three decades in prison, James Bain is eager to be able to help his wheelchair-bound mother.

If all goes as planned in a Florida courtroom Thursday, Bain, 54, will be allowed to go home for the first time in 35 years -- free from his life sentence thanks to a DNA test that showed he was not the man who took a 9-year-old Lake Wales, Florida, boy from his bed in 1974 and raped him.
( read more )

source

Does anyone have a 'Searchlight' screensaver? If so, where can I get one?
It has a blank (or not) screen with circle(s) wandering, revealing part of the last page you were using?
or
What is a URL for a good selection of screen savers?

WHY HELLO!

The buzz around Trafigura and Carter-Ruck is getting louder again on the web
As reports vanish from mainstream media websites, the buzz about Trafigura and Carter-Ruck gets louder on blogs and other online outlets

The BBC report can no longer be found online

In May, Trafigura's lawyers announced that they had brought libel proceedings against the BBC over its Newsnight broadcast on Trafigura. Now, the BBC's Trafigura feature has disappeared from its website. But as reporting about the company involved in toxic waste dumping scandals in Abidjan in the Ivory Coast vanish from mainstream media sites, there is renewed activity elsewhere on the internet.

Several blogs and other online media have picked up the issue of the vanished Newsnight report. On the blog "Don't Get Fooled Again" Richard Wilson asks "UK's dysfunctional libel system strikes again? Newsnight feature on Trafigura disappears from BBC website". Journalist and conservative candidate Ian Dale writes on his blog about "BBC caves in to Carter-Ruck threats over Trafigura film". On The New Statesman rolling blog, George Eaton reported that "BBC removes Trafigura story after legal threat".

Last, but not least, Judith Townend asks on Journalism.co.uk "Where has the BBC's Trafigura feature gone?", and reports that a spokesperson for the BBC said: "We haven't got anything to say on this. As discussed earlier we are often not able to comment if there's a live legal action."

Meanwhile, Trafigura is buying relevant sponsored links on Google's search page to promote its side of the story.

Searching for Trafigura on Google brings up links sponsored by the the oil company As mainstream media has fallen silent, the buzz about Carter-Ruck on alternative media is getting louder again. Links to the BBC Newsnight report to YouTube are blogged, the video has been published on Wikileaks and the keywords "Trafigura" and "Carter-Ruck" are all over Twitter again.

You wonder if they will ever learn.


Let me see if I am understanding this correctly. The BBC did a newstory on an oil company about they were doing really bad and evil things and the company decided to sue them. Now it seems that an online copy of that news report is taken off the BBC website. And no one in the msm is taking a hit on this?

Would this fly in the US?

What do you British ontd_p'ers and peeps from the UK think about this?

Is this a BIG thing to worry about?

I've tried googling, but I've been getting either conflicting answers or things that don't really apply to what I need.

I have a necklace made out of fluorite attached to a metal bit that's then attached to the chain itself. Well, a few minutes ago, the fluorite fell out. I've been wearing it non-stop for somewhere around 2 years so I guess I can't be too surprised.

So... I need glue that will stick the metal to the fluorite again. Some pages said not to use super glue but it seems like the alternatives are meant for metal + plastic or metal + metal.

So can any of you tell me what kind of glue I should be looking for to put this back together properly so I can wear it again?

I'm all upset and want to cry because it's been a bad month (and day), I always have trouble around Christmastime and this was the last thing I needed right now(especially expense wise, I have so much else I need to pay for!), even though I know in the grand scheme of things that it shouldn't be a big deal, I'm just being pitiful about it. :( I love my necklace.

Edit: For reference, the necklace is almost exactly like this.

Detroit's Unemployment Rate Is Nearly 50%, According to the Detroit News

Officially, Detroit's unemployment rate is just under 30 percent. But the city's mayor and local leaders are suggesting a far more disturbing figure -- the actual jobless rate, they say, is closer to 50 percent.

As many have noted, the Bureau of Labor Statistics, which culls federal unemployment data, does not account for all of the jobless in its widely-quoted national unemployment figures. Among those omitted: part-time workers who are looking for full-time jobs and frustrated job seekers who abandon their job search altogether.

(For some context, the official national unemployment rate is 10 percent, but the "underemployment rate" is 17.2 percent.)

Detroit city officials argue that, when workers who are underemployed are added to the calculation, the number of city residents who are out of work is close to one in every two.

( Read more )

How would you feel about being nominated by friends, family, or your partner for a self-improvement show that incorporates some embarrassment?

Like in What Not to Wear: you're approached by the host and camera crew in public, they talk about the show and why you suck need it, and offer you $5000 and a makeover.

BBC Slammed For Debating Ugandan Bill To Kill Gays

The British Broadcasting Corp. suffered criticism from lawmakers Wednesday for inviting debate on whether homosexuals should face execution in Uganda.

The broadcaster launched an on-line debate over a proposed Ugandan law that would punish some homosexual acts by life imprisonment or death. Legislation being considered in the African country would impose the death penalty on some gay Ugandans, and their family and friends could face up to seven years in jail if they fail to report their homosexuality to authorities.

BBC's "Africa Have Your Say" Web site asked for people's views on whether Uganda has gone too far and whether there should be any laws against gays.

The page's title was originally "Should homosexuals face execution?" but was later changed to "Should Uganda debate gay execution?" Several British politicians said the taxpayer-funded broadcaster should not treat the execution of gays as a legitimate topic for discussion.

"We should be looking at what is going on in Uganda with abhorrence," said lawmaker Eric Joyce of the ruling Labour Party. "We should be condemning it, and the BBC should be condemning it. ... Instead it seems to have thought it appropriate to come up with something that suggests it's a subject for discussion."

Lynne Featherstone, a lawmaker from the opposition Liberal Democrats, said she has written to BBC executives seeking an apology and an end to the Web discussion.

"Suggesting that the state-sponsored murder of gay people is OK as a legitimate topic for debate is deeply offensive," she said.

The forum attracted more than 600 comments and triggered a lively Twitter discussion.

The BBC's World Service Africa program editor, David Stead, defended the debate. In a blog posted on the BBC Web site, he said editors had "thought long and hard about using this question" and sought to reflect the diverse views about homosexuality in Africa.

"We agree that it is a stark and challenging question, but think that it accurately focuses on and illustrates the real issue at stake," he said.