Hugs for anyone who needs them.
I think we’re a bit overdue for another open thread for personal stuff. As per usual, no trolls, no flames, no being a butthead.
I’ll paste in some recent personal comments from other threads.
Posted on November 2, 2013, in off topic, open thread. Bookmark the permalink. 993 Comments.
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Alas, money doesn’t quite solve everything. I’d offer you the place I’m currently spending an insomnic night packing up and preparing for the next renter, but to be honest, it’s nowhere near your location and like 1000 usd a month, so, probably not the kind of place you’d ever want to stay in, LBT. Plus, it’s old and windy and stuff.
Plus, neighbours kind of loud. Good luck with your shitty housing situation. I second ARgenti Aertheri’s recommendation, some place inside over the winter and then somewhere livable after.
Yeah, it sucks that you could afford a place, if only one existed.
I hope you find something, LBT; sorry your situation is so sucky.
I hope things get better for you soon, LBT!
On the plus side, I can totally rent an efficiency in Ohio for $350. Maybe I’ll just end up moving earlier than planned? Or something?
I think what’s really grinding is just NOT KNOWING. I have so many plans, but I can’t implement any of them until I get my housing situation settled. GRAH.
I hope the housing situation gets sorted soon, LBT. And Ally, I’m glad you were able to make that connection with your friend.
The cats are in a really bad position and I’m out of ideas. I’ve got two adolescents who hide from strangers, one adult who hates other cats and one adult who has event exhaustion and will attack people if I show her. If I bring them to events, they have no chance because either there’s no one there or it’s a big event and they have to compete against a bunch of cute kittens who show well. But if I don’t bring them to things, then of course they have no chance. It’s hopeless.
I don’t think I have any advice, katz. It sounds like maybe you want a different group of people than those who normally go to those events — like people who are specifically looking for an older/adult cat to rescue, rather than a kitten. Any of your fellow fosterers have any ideas? I wish I could adopt ALL THE KITTIES.
I got called to schedule a phone interview for the job I applied for. If I don’t blow it in that, the phone interview will be followed by a day-long in-person interview on location.
Oh, for the events… Have you tried Feliway to see if it has any effect on the cat who’s stressed out? And/or the timid ones?
Aw, I’m sorry, katz. That sucks. :( I even WANT to adopt a quiet older cat at some point, so I know there’s a market out there! I don’t really know anything about cat adoption, so can’t really offer advice, but I hope things will be okay and your cats find good, appreciative homes.
Brain bleach. :)
Are you allowed to put them on like petfinder.com or such? I know I poked around there when I was in a position to maybe get a cat. There are definitely people like LBT and I who want an older cat that hopefully won’t tear the place up.
I’m using Feliway but it’s not working. They’re all on Petfinder but think how many cats are on there. I’ve only ever gotten responses online for my kittens.
Feliway didn’t work when my cats were fighting, but I thought it was worth a shot. (The thing that finally stopped them from fighting was catnip, oddly enough — I got them both stoned out of their minds on catnip, and they forgot they hated each other.)
What happens if you don’t find homes for them within a reasonable time period?
Katz — you don’t happen to be in/near South Carolina? Cuz I have a cousin there who seem to collect cats. Idk if her husband would allow for more, but I could ask.
Hugs if you want them, katz. That’s a really tough situation to be in.
Prolly shouldn’t adopt out to someone with a bunch of cats, especially since the one that needs to be placed the most doesn’t like other cats.
katz, you’re in LA, aren’t you? I can write to my LA gf and ask if anyone she knows is looking for a cat.
Tonight my dad told me that, several years ago, an eye doctor told him that I have to get eyeglasses. Apparently I have 20/60 vision and a mild astigmatism.
Part of me is accepting of the idea of wearing glasses because it’ll be for my benefit. At the same time, I really don’t want to wear glasses. First of all, I’ve never experienced any major eye problems personally – the most bothersome thing that has happened is that I sometimes find it a little difficult to look at something very, very closely – like once something is within half a foot away from me, I get a little bit of double vision. Other than that, I have no other difficulties whatsoever in my experience.
Second, I still feel uncomfortable with the idea of wearing glasses. I remember hating that idea when I was a kid, and those feelings have stayed with me. And third, it’s my dad telling me all of this. Maybe I’m being whiny and immature for saying this, but I just really hate having to listen to him about decisions done for my own well-being. I just never want him to have any say in my life. Ugh. It’s a mess.
Why is he just telling you this NOW?
It’s not whiny and immature to question whether an abusive and gaslighting person is doing something for your own well being or if there is alternative reasons behind it.
He told me today because he was reminded of my condition once he had to take my little sister to the eye doctor (she needs glasses as well apparently).
I don’t really doubt that he is trying to help me out, but I just don’t want to be helped by him. No matter what he does, it’s always like he’s trying to control me and deprive me of agency.
@ally
Get contacts? I imagine your astigmatism can’t be that bad if you can read without glasses (I cannot, which is why I wear them pecunium, even if yours are much stronger :-P )
But I could get contacts anyways, so you probably can. Nobody has to know you’re wearing them and it isn’t what your father wants, win win.
Katz — ah, ok. Then no, sorry. I asked my mother and everyone she knows who’s doing cat adoptions is on the same end you are.
Pecunium! Know anyone in LA area who wants a kitty? I don’t know anyone out that way, but pretty sure you do.
He’s very much opposed to contact lenses, for reasons I don’t know. I’ll see if I can convince him anyway, though. I hope I can do it without him shaming me with baseless accusations of arrogance like “Oh, well forget about the glasses – clearly you know everything and your eyes are perfect!”
I love my glasses, but then no one forced/pressured me into getting them. Objectively, though, your vision is usually better with contact lenses; it’s just that after years of them, suddenly I was experiencing terrible dry/red eyes after a day’s work. I think most optometrists will support contact lenses as the better option, but vision insurance plans are generally terrible and support glasses over contact lenses. My insurance actually penalizes me if I try to use it to cover contact lenses, whereas it will cover a great deal of the cost of glasses.
Do you have trouble reading at all, Ally? If so, you could just get glasses for the close-up stuff; you might not need to wear them all the time.
What I can see coming out of this is that if you do get ‘em, the parental unit will want to choose the frames. There are so many really nice frames around, even among the not-ridiculously-expensive types, but bozo will undoubtedly want you in the ugliest he can find.
But if you escape that – and you’ll be able to get glasses of your choice eventually, if you do have to wear them – you might find that the pleasure of being able to see better than before makes up for it. If you’ve (general you) got dodgy eyesight and can’t recall having any other sort, it’s a really nice surprise to find out how well you see with specs on.
Have you ever had a look through magnifying glasses, the sort you get at a pharmacy? I use them for knitting, now, since my prescription specs don’t help for that. I’m short sighted and have worn glasses since I was 16, but now I’m getting the long-sighted thing that comes with age happening. (Be nice if they’d meet in the middle and give me 20/20, but noooo, of course that’s not going to happen.)
@kitteh
Honestly, I don’t have any trouble reading. I’ve never had a headache just from reading for a long time. I don’t even experience any difficulty when I stare at a laptop screen in a dark room. If it’s super bright, then yeah I might get a headache, but that’s not indicative of an eye problem as far as I know. And beyond all of that, I have a habit of looking away from the screen/book I’m reading every once in a while to give my eyes a break.
I don’t think he’ll be too controlling in that regard, and I’m sure he’ll want me to choose good frames. But at the same time his preference is going to be shaped by what he thinks looks good on a “young man”, which is shitty for obvious reasons.
I mean, I understand the benefits of eyeglasses, and I don’t think I’d look bad in them (they’ll make my face look smaller, for one thing) – I just don’t want to be pressured into wearing them. I generally don’t like to be pressured to make any personal choice that only affects me.
Do you drive, Ally? If you had 20/60 vision, the DMV would have caught that. I have astigmatism with 20/40 vision in my left eye, 20/30 or so in the right, and I can just barely pass the eye test with my left eye. One year, I read the left portion wrong and the woman administering the test subtly gave me the answer and let me take it again.
I don’t wear glasses, except reading glasses, which is to be expected at my age, but if my vision were just a tiny bit worse, I don’t think I’d be able to get along without them.
I’m not saying that your dad is lying to you, but is it possible he is so wrapped up in his own idea of controlling you for your own good that he’s remembering wrong?
That “for your own good” should have been in quotes up there – obviously his controlling behavior is not good for you!
Well, I used to have a valid driving permit, and I was asked to do an eye test when I was trying to apply for it. I passed very easily. And I don’t seem to have any vision-related driving issues, either.
That seems very likely, given that he tries to make me feel guilty for not doing what he says. And he also tends to suffer from minor memory problems these days.
Doesn’t sound like you need glasses at all, then. ::smh::
You could always get a test done if it’s affordable (do they bulk-bill eye tests at all in the US?) to confirm you don’t need them. That might shut him up for five minutes.
Ooh… the Editor of the OED just gave Dawkins a bit of a swipe:
re your father…
No way that you have 20/60 vision and don’t know about it; much less the astigmatism he’s added in.
That’s a significant loss of vision, meaning you can see about 1/3rd the distance of most people (i.e. what person with normal vision can see at 60′ you have to be 20′ from to make out).
Do you recall having an eye exam, with an optometrist? If not, then there is no way for an astigmatism to be known, as that is a distortion from round (things which are round appear to be enlongated/oval).
Can you read a street sign from across the street? If so, you don’t have 20/60 vision.
Yeeeaaah, Ally, I think your dad is stepping up his creeper game. I mean, I do have glasses, which I very rarely use (mostly for when I’ve been doing art way too long and need to rest my eyes) but yeah, you can’t NOT NOTICE 20/60 vision.
The last eye exam I had was when I was 12. And honestly, I don’t even remember having it. My dad just told me about it recently.=S
Yeeeaaaah, I dunno Ally, this smells really rotten and off to me.
At this point your dad is seriously just making shit up so he can force you to do things.
This one may not be a big problem because, unless he actually has the prescription from when you were 12, you’ll need to get a new eye exam anyway before you can get new glasses (I don’t know many places where you can just walk in and say “get me some 20/60 glasses”). And when you get the exam, it sounds pretty likely that you’ll turn out to be fine.
Re: needing glasses. Eyesight changes all the time, that’s why people generally need a prescription when they buy glasses to fix eyesight – to make sure it’s an accurate measurement of your current sightedness. And most places warn against filling out a prescription older than 2 years old, because again, quality of sightedness changes as you get older (usually worse, but sometimes for the better). Also, each eye will have a different vision level. If the glasses are the off-the-rack pharmacy kind, they’re probably not going to work correctly for both eyes and can actually damage your sight by over correcting.
I’d side-eye (pun slightly intended) any glasses whose use is based on a diagnosis made 7 years ago. That’s just not how it’s done.
katz — you can’t. Or at least, I can’t. But well…
“If not, then there is no way for an astigmatism to be known, as that is a distortion from round (things which are round appear to be enlongated/oval).”
Which is why I bother wearing them my dear! If you’d left them on and not been futzing for yours back, you’d have gone all “what’s straight? where’s up?”
I have astigmatism. Generally unless one moves one head on the Z-axis cylinder (the unit of correction for astigmatism) isn’t notable unless it’s after dark (at which point the coronae of lights is oval).
Since my astigmatism is at the level where paying for toroidal lenses isn’t worth it, I tend to not wear contacts after dark (when I use them).
As to prescriptions. I think Calif. has a 2 year limit on getting lenses made from a prescription.
Now I have to hope the stupidity which is WP password management doesn’t bite me in the ass.
I can fix it if it does. Once I solve what the FUCK the flag comment plugin broke (it works locally, so I have a confuzed)
No, you can’t. It has to do with how WP keeps track (or fails to) between different WP accounts for the same user.
pecunium – love that OED swipe at Dawkins. How ironic that Professor Miserygobshite wants to introduce “dundridge” as an insult for other people.
Perhaps we need the word dawkinsludge to describe a misogynistic, pompous, blinkered, racist and generally bigoted Oxbridge snob who thinks achievements in one field qualify him to pontificate on the world in general.
Dawkins is all like “I made up a word and now it’s in the dictionary. I’ll just start making up words for all my pet issues and then they will go in the dictionary and everyone will have to admit I’m right about everything!”
(Should we tell him that meme, as it’s actually used, means something totally different than what he meant?)
Nah, he’ll just react with his usual “LA LA LA I can’t hear you and also you are a poopyhead because you are not me” reaction.
Oh, katz, I emailed my gf in LA to see if she knows anyone looking for an adult cat.
React and reaction in one sentence, well done there.
In other amusing news, Creeper McCreepyson that I was having issues with earlier clutched his pearls over me blocking him. Obviously I am now the BAD kind of crazy, the kind that needs meds and counselling! (Note that this was the dude who was creepily fixated on my deep dark secrets and traumas. Guess he doesn’t like it so much that I have boundaries and actual wherewithal to give him the boot!)
So if you’re the Bad Dangerous type, how come he’s hanging around your blog? [rhetorical question]
You blocked him before, didn’t you? Has he done the new IP address thingy?
Maybe you need to wax your mo’ and practice twirling it to scare him off in true cartoon villain fashion.
Hm…I created an email to use for the admin account instead of exposing any of our emails to trolls…you want to use it?
RE: Kittehs and Argenti
Nah, he’s not that clever. He’s just whining on his own blog, and one of my friends told me about it. I ended up drawing myself holding a sign reading, U MAD BRO? I figure I won’t really have any more problems with him. He has two whines left in him, tops, and then I expect him to fizzle like a cheap erection.
Awesome, we have a post! Thanks, Ally!
LBT – oh, gotcha, I thought you meant he was doing a Mr 90% on your blog.
Re: Cats. I’m not really a pet person, but I have a friend who’s a retired cat behaviourist, and her cat has an advice blog: http://catadvisor.blogspot.ca
Ally, I agree that it sounds like your father is trying to mess with your head. Even when I was a kid, the optometrist included me in the conversation about my vision. Given his history of trying to control you, and the fact that you don’t experience any vision problems, it sounds like bullshit to me. (I got laser vision about 12 years ago. Best money I ever spent–but the trick is, of course, to have the money in the first place.)
Also, don’t get too hung up on the type of job you go after. It would be NICE if you could get something that would develop your skills and experience for the type of career you want to pursue, and it would be LOVELY if you do could something that feeds your soul and passion. But if the issue is money (and getting away from your dad for a few hours, and being less dependant on him), there’s nothing wrong with fast food or convenience store clerk, or janitor, or what have you. People your age are expected to have non-career jobs to pay some bills while you’re getting experience and credentials.
I do really appreciate everyone who tries to help my kitty cats; I wrote a post about them with photos in case anyone wants to share it.
@katz, I will share and ask all my friends to share too. I wish I could adopt Sweet Pea. Oh hell, I wish I could adopt them all…
You already found a forever home for one of my kitties and I will always be grateful for that!
Beth loves Shana so much. It’s sweet. I’ll signal boost all I can!
I really do wish I could take one more cat, because Sweet Pea is so adorable. Tawny is lovely too.
Remind me what the rules are, so when I post I don’t get any false positives…
I got a jury duty letter. FUCKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKK.
(Is it bad that I’m sort of excited even though transportation’s going to be a bitch?)
Oh shit. I just realized that I used a misogynistic slur. I’m sorry!
:(
Rules for adoptions? Indoor-only is the only important one.
I wish the kitties could travel via the intertubes and come here!
(All right, it’d have to be a kitty who likes other kitties, but still.)
Ech, jury duty. I got that letter once, but was excused because the trial conflicted with my teaching schedule. I didn’t know how stressful the whole thing was for me until I left the courthouse and realized I had NO IDEA where my car was, beyond that it was in the underground parkade. Took me about 45 minutes to track it down.
I’ve been called for jury duty a couple of times – first, didn’t go in at all, second, I’d just got some work and was able to beg off on that account. Haven’t been called since and that was thirteen years ago. ::crosses fingers::
It’s my first time, so I’ll have to see whether I’ll be called in. I had to postpone it so that it starts first day of Winter Break. FUN!
I really hope my dad isn’t actually lying to me about that eye doctor appointment. But’s most likely true, given that yesterday he never mentioned the eyeglasses again. I’m pretty sure he only mentioned the eyeglasses thing in an effort to make me feel guilty for not listening to him and obeying everything he says.
@moldybrehd
I…honestly had no idea that eyesight could improve over time. o_O That really changes my perspective on things.
Also, I just want to say that I really appreciate talking to all of you guys. I apologize for coming here all the time to dump negative thoughts, but it really does help. And with that, I should probably hit the sack.
I have cheering news – the witchy kitties have learnt how to use the catflap.
On the advice of a friend who came to stay, I spent the week with the catflap taped open (and with frozen feet as a consequence). Each day, the catflap was lowered a little so that the kitties gradually got used to pushing a little as they went through it. And this weekend, I removed the tape and was ruthless about leaving the kitties out in the cold. Strangely, when howling pathetically failed to bring their human under control, they decided to make use of the flap.
Ally — please see the words “open thread” above. Better to talk about it than let it fester and, well, open thread.
RE: Ally
As someone who’s somersaulted through a fair number of toxic relations, it’s actually really important to have other people reality-check you. Especially when you’re around gaslighters and manipulators of the calibre your father seems to be, eesh.