167 Comments

There is something absolutely hypnotic about watching other people work.

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What did you call your grandmother(s)? Gramma? Gam Gam? Ama?

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Both are Nana

Cucla Nana and Nunu Nana, to distinguish the two: prefixes are nonsense words I'd invented as a child

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Father's side (white): Grandma

Mother's side (Chinese): Po-po (pronounced "paw paw")

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Grandma, both of them.

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Both of mine were grandma too. We clarified which one we were talking about by using their last name. Both had the same first name.

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samsies

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My wife's are g-ma and pop pop though

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Grandma on one side and Grammy on the other.

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Popo

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Tones make a difference. Otherwise...

https://pbs.twimg.com/media/EC6MHoLW4A8GwDS.png

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I can read some pinyin, but I’m not familiar with the ways of expressing tones in Cantonese.

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婆婆 but we said this to both mother side and father side.

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Apparently it is po4 po2

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(it should be maa maa for your parental side - popo is only your maternal grandmother)

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A-ma on both sides

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my mom's side: hao pó and my dad's side: pó pó.

My kids use nai nai for my mom and grandma for their mom's mom.

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Both of mine were "grandma".

One generation older: "Bachan".

One generation younger: Grandma and Nana.

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one generation younger?

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I only ever met my step-grandmother. Everyone called her Ba.

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Grandma on Mom's side, Nonni on Dad's side. My mother is Grammy to her grandchildren.

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Old guy stuff:

What was that career test you took in junior high in the 1960s in which you poke holes with a pin?

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The only career test I ever took was ASVAB - the armed forces one. I got 99 on everything and the recruiters mailed forever.

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Ditto. And the CIA, FBI, etc. kept calling and being disappointed because I wasn't a citizen then and wouldn't have been able to work on anything classified

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Too many to count really...

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People who have had Philz Coffee. Is it worth the hype?

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I wonder if my opinion of it has changed - thought it was good, better than Starbucks, but not worth the hype. I had it a couple of times 2-3 years ago, but my consumption of coffee has gone way up in the past 18 months or so, partly due to the amount of time spent in Europe (so I also kind of have higher expectation of coffees).

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like most things it is pretty amazing the first time.

i personally really like it and get it every day when i am in Bay Area (there is also one in Adams Morgan in DC)

sometimes i think that it would be cool to have that in NYC, but then i realize that no New Yorker has time to stand in line that long.

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New Yorkers don't stand in line...

They stand "on line" 😉

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I stand online. I sit online. I do everything online. Don’t we all?

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I like it. I wouldn't crawl through the desert to get some or anything, but it's a very solid option if you don't need something espresso-based.

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no. It's fine coffee, but not the be-all of the world.

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It's Ok. Since they closed their cafe on Shattuck I haven't had it.

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The worst professor/teacher/TA you ever had

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Worst teacher was Chemistry in HS. She spoke in a slow monotone and regularly used the overhead projector. The combination of her voice, the hum and warm fan of the overhead and the dim lights led to many days of trying to stay awake.

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I had one guy in grad school who was a good researcher but clearly had no experience or training when it came to teaching. He had no idea how to pace himself or explain anything in a way that would help students understand it.

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It's also very plausible that he got a lot better at teaching with more experience. I would like to think that my explanations got better between my first semester of TAing and later years. One thing that took a while for me to learn is that sometimes it's good to just repeat explanations rather than always looking for a different way to explain things (partly because I thought that's what the students wanted and partly due to me getting bored). Anyhow, teaching is hard, particularly for someone like me who may be a bit antisocial growing up.

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He probably got better later on assuming he stuck with it: he wasn't a jerk, and recognized that he really didn't know what he was doing. He shouldn't have been put in that position in the first place, though.

Teaching is indeed hard, but I usually got better results when I tried to explain the same concept different ways.

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On the second point, I agree with that in general. My mistake was that I was changing too much and end up babbling. The important step for me was to look at the student and figure out whether he/she even understood the first explanation before I tried to introduce the same topic from a different direction. Something something about teaching being more of an interactive thing rather than just me babbling.

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Heh my physics GSI was definitely only there for research. Discussion and lab were at 8am, and only lab was mandatory, so sometimes, I'd be the only one to show up for discussion. He was really cute, though.

He and his wife had mild COVID-19 symptoms last month, and his dad and stepmom both got it (but have recovered). Scary times!

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The worst professor was probably from the English department at SC - he had arrived from Princeton presumably to be semi-retired in the sun and spent most of his time telling a freshman honors class, most of whom would have been perfectly capable of coping at an Ivy, how stupid we were... without actually demonstrating any ability to complete a 90 minute lecture that was engaging or linear or anything really. Funnily enough my father in law (BA / MA / PhD from Princeton) had known him many years previously and said he had been on a glide path for years before he left.

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I hadn’t realized we could expand this to high school- going to a tiny catholic prep school meant we had almost no middle ground in teachers, they were great or atrocious. Perhaps the least qualified (without being the worst) was the woman who came to teach chemistry from her gig as an aerobics teacher and who couldn’t reliably work the units the right way for metric measurements.

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I fear that for some people, that would be me, during my first year in grad school. I got better though.

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At least you have demonstrated written communication skills. For some reason, there are people who put people in position to instruct who lack 1 or more of those traits, and some times all 4 of them, and still somehow expect that to yield positive results.

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Part of the problem was that I went straight to grad school from undergrad so I didn’t have the mental separation I needed. I got no training, so I had nothing to fall back on when classes were inert. It took a while for me to accept that I simply had to act like I was in charge for people to play their role. It also took a while to accept that some students were always going to think I was an asshole or incompetent. I don’t know if it was just an Ivy thing but some of them simply couldn’t tell the difference between having a serious manner (which I don’t) and being serious about the content and helping them master it.

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probably some of the teachers for mandatory safety training classes we have. OMFG. a boring reading of the handouts would be more interesting and informative than some of the presentations.

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I do a Red Cross certification every two years and I've had great teachers every time. They get why most people are there and just try to be entertaining and engaging for the ~6hrs you have to be present.

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I had to do some mine training for the site that housed my experiment in grad school. We also have to do refresher courses every year. There is one practical part of it that was useful while the rest was mostly a waste of time. One of the instructors (his pretty well-compensated government job is to teach) just spent 2/3 of the time saying crap about his ex-wife. The other guy that I liked a lot more ended up hitting it big when his son became a first round MLB draft pick of the Marlins.

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I first read this and thought you were doing mime training.

<<mime_in_box.gif>>

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If you ever see me attempt a mime performance, then you would know right away that I have never had any mime training.

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I had a TA who gave me an F on a paper about Korean chaebols. She had never heard of chaebols before and concluded that I must have plagiarized my report. I complained and she changed it a C-minus because she didn't like the topic. Ironically, I ended up writing professionally about Korean chaebols later; my paper was correct.

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I did a lot of East Asian developmental politics classes as upper division coursework - I can understand why someone had never heard of chaebols, but it's not that difficult to look up, even without computers

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Poli Sci 2 TA. I hated him and his very polarizing way of teaching to his own political *feelings*, but he was also dating my roommate and revealed that, and my sorority affiliation to the class, which I thought was a huge violation of privacy.

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Math 1B TA - he clearly knew his stuff, but his English skills were so terrible and I was already having so much trouble with the subject matter - it was a bad mix.

History 16A - she must have been one of those Cal profs who were much better at research instead of teaching - however, I thought the freshman breadth requirement classes should have been those professors who were best at teaching. She was not.

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Yeah, same thing, Calculus - 1B the TA had really terrible English skills to the point it was impossible to communicate at all.

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I had the same issue with a math teacher. Eastern European guy and I just couldn't penetrate his accent.

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Me too. Visiting Polish professor. I couldn't understand him and he wrote so fast. Had to lean on my TA a lot that semester. I did not do very well.

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HS Spanish teacher. Her tests were brutal. Silliest sentences that were like 3-4 lines long each.

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My HS Spanish teachers ran the gamut. Mr. Willy (Sp1) was engaging with stories and very conversational and focused on helping people get basic conversation down. The class was a genuine pleasure to attend. Mrs. Danieli (Sp2) was authoritarian and very focused on conjugation and the written language. Tests were brutal and she was not forgiving (most Campo kids can attest to this). To her credit she was effective and I probably learned the bulk of my vocab from her. Mrs. Taylor (Sp3) I had as a senior taking Spanish after a year off and ended up getting on her good side early. She had a good balance of written and conversational focus. But I was pretty neutral on her style.

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Miss Danielli was who I was referencing. I hated the tests. My freshman teacher died toward the end of the 2nd semester and we all of a sudden got Miss Danielli tests. I think the highest score was D+. Then I had Miss Curry sophomore year. HSB was in that class with me. A few of us may have gotten in trouble for talking throughout the year.

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BST I specifically requested to not have her and then received Danielli for my junior year, so I had to go in person to drop the class after school. She had me sit on the side of the classroom until she was done with all the other kids asking questions , then did some grading, then called me up. She berated me and called me a quitter for about 10 minutes before signing the drop slip.

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I hated how when she would return tests she would imply how well or poorly someone did. Especially since I didn't do that great on the tests. Still got a 3 on the AP on Spanish 4 though.

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wow

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it was pretty bad and demeaning if you were not getting good grades. it was more or less public shaming. as she handed out test it would be something like "HAG, not so good this time. long way to go before you crack a B+"

i am surprised in this day and age she can still get away w/ that stuff. i have heard that enough people have tried to get her fired over the years.

i was also in that freshman class where our teacher died. it was quite a shock going from the easiest Spanish teacher at Campo to Curry and then Danielli.

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Had a couple of professors, Cal and nonCal, who basically said go teach yourself.

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French TA during freshman year. I absolutely hated the guy for a number of reasons.

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You are being sent back in time to the dark ages. What one item would you bring with you if your goal was to be accused of witchcraft/sorcery as soon as possible?

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A box of Bic Stic pens

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To my mind, one of the most amazing feats of industrial design - cheap, ubiquitous, and you could spend vastly more money on a pen / refill and not have better writing experience.

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Flying broomstick

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The Magic Wand baby!

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My rejected answers were “a vibrator and a case of tampons” to be popular with the other witches

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Walkie Talkies.

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Video camera with Big display

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Shower gel

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A massive 1981 boom box

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With a double cassette of The Clash?

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Anything would do really

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And extra batteries

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flashlight

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Neon light! Spot light!

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Now, I lay me down to sleep

Ooh, I just can't find a beat

Flash light (ohh, I will never dance!)

Flash light

Flash light

Flash light

Ha da da dee da hada hada da da

Oh, it's no use!

Flash light

Red light

Neon light

Ooh, stop light

Now I lay me down to sleep

I guess I'll go count the sheep

Oh, but I will never dance

Most of all he needs the funk (shine it)

Help him find the funk (ha, funk it!)

Most of all he needs the funk

Help him find the funk (get him)

Most of all he needs the funk (I know we can get him)

Help him find the funk (ho!)

Most of all he needs the funk (ha, don't!)

Help him find the funk (I know you will! Dance, sucker!)

Most of all he needs the funk (Shine the spotlight on him!)

Help him find the funk (Oh funk me!)

Ha da da dee da hada hada da da…

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or maybe a lighter

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But the flame at least would be understandable; flashlight less so.

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Dumb Rules

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If you receive a gift, a prompt thank-you is required.

I have concluded that I am the social weirdo because I almost never get them in return.

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How formal is the thank you you're sending?

I don't think mailed cards are required any more, but a text message or phone call acknowledgement/expression of gratitude seems appropriate

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My wife mandates this for the children and will not rest until it’s accomplished

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Don't drive barefoot. *eyeroll*

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I thought they got rid of that in CA and HI

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I didn't think it actually was a law was it? I figured I would just put my feet in the slides if I ever got pulled over.

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I have no idea, I just remember my step dad yelling at my sister for doing it in high school and her yelling back that it was no longer illegal. I have done zero research beyond that event in 1999 or 2000

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I used to keep a pair of shoes in my car to drive in when I was wearing flip flops just because I didn't like the feel of flip flops on the pedals and definitely did not like to drive barefoot

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i try to do as many things barefoot as possible (aside from go into the garage)

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I'm usually in socks after my shower and barefoot before. And usually when I go to the garage just to get something I may put on slides but may just be wearing socks.

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Ditto (without the garage caveat)

o/

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I have NEVER driven barefoot, the idea sounds insane.

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I've done it plenty of times post surfing in our VW bus, but that was only a ~1mi drive on city streets. I prefer barefoot to flip flops with a manual though, but never did it in my old c230 because the pedals had grips that were very uncomfortable for a barefoot.

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Way to easy. I knew that that was before even clicking on it.

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I did it decades ago in hot weather. It felt very ordinary.

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FET

Remember when Toyota was having an uncontrollable acceleration problem, which started with Toyota blaming people getting their shoes/mat wedged into the accelerator and ended up being a software problem? I thought "how stupid... who gets a shoe wedged into the accelerator?" Then it happened to me. I accidentally wedged my flip flop in the accelerator and had a heart-stopping second or two when I couldn't control my car's speed. Ever since then, I kick my right flip-flop off when I drive.

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That's funny that you remember it as the Toyota issue (and that was more recent) but for me, this is forever an Audi problem from the Audi 5000.

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which is interesting because SGBear is basically our age so Audi 5000 is right in our wheelhouse.

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Y'all are insane.

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What do you find insane about it?

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Funnily enough, not a habit I’ve ever picked up despite being a flip flop wearer most of the summer

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I find I can't drive with slides/flip flops so I always go barefoot when I have them.

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I can, it just just takes more concentration, especially for working the clutch.

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I think it's because I feel like I have less feel for the pedals and that my foot could slip when in slides. And barefoot I get better feel than in slides.

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Your clutch pull and gear ratio is also a lot more sensitive than mine.

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1 - no open toed shoes in the garage. you know never know when something heavy will drop on your toes!

2 - never leave the house w/o being prepared for the weather even if you think you will be in the car and inside the whole time. you never know if your car will break down and be forced to walk!

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Those don't seem like dumb rules at all...

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Those both seem perfectly reasonable to me, especially living in an area with brisk winter weather

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come to think of it, my life is full of DUMB RULES. just about everything i do has some dumb internal rule.

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COVID-19

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here is something i came across on my FB feed that seems to be getting fwd'ed around. while i agree w/ very little of it, it is pretty clear that a good fraction of people might.

i have plenty of opinions about it and the person who posted. regardless, it is interesting to see how people react in times like this ...

---

If you want to stay home, stay home. That's your sovereign right to choose.

If you want to wear a mask, wear a mask. That's your sovereign right to choose.

If you want to avoid large crowds, avoid large crowds. That's your sovereign right to choose.

I am not required to descend into poverty for you.

I am not required to abstain from human contact for you.

I refuse to participate in "quarantine life" until there's an unsafe, untested vaccine released in eighteen months.

I refuse to receive said vaccine to make others feel more safe.

That's my sovereign right to choose.

If you're convinced the vaccine is safe and effective, you can get it yourself.

Some of you are allowing fear and policies devoid of scientifically accurate data to destroy our country and ruin lives.

I can't control your self-destructive behaviors, but we all have a say in this world.

We need to tell legislators that we demand options.

We have a constitutional right to take risks. Life is full of bacteria and viruses--many of which spread before symptoms manifest and after they subside.

We have a soverign right to receive OR refuse vaccines.

KNOW THIS....the data was inaccurate at best; purposely overblown to justify government overreach at worst.

Stop allowing the government to destroy:

The Food Supply

Small Businesses

Medical Autonomy

Access to Healthcare

Religious Gatherings

Privacy Rights

Fellowship

Our Mental Health

Our Freedom

When the "new normal" is filled with starvation, depression, suicide, child abuse, domestic violence, imprisonment, governmental spying, and pure DESPERATION, the virus is going to look preferable to the world YOU helped facilitate.

I'm going to turn this around on people from now on. Those that say I'm (or anyone that supports the mission to get America back open) is putting money over lives wanting the country back open for business...

HEAR THIS:

-YOU don't care about the people that will kill themselves out of hopelessness

-YOU don't care about small businesses that'll close their doors (THEIR LIVELIHOOD) permanently

-YOU don't care about the children/women/men that'll be victims of domestic abuse

-YOU don't care about people defaulting on their mortgages

-YOU don't care about bills going unpaid by families with ZERO income right now

-YOU don't care about people wondering where their next meal will come from

-YOU don't care about the people that'll lose their sobriety and slip back into addiction

-YOU don't care about the people that will starve

-YOU support the inevitable looting that'll take place

-YOU don't care about anyone that's murdered the longer this shut down goes on

-YOU don't care about people's mental health

-YOU don't care about the children that DO need teachers and educators to guide & educate them

-YOU don't care about the economy crashing down around us

-YOU DON'T CARE.

-YOU love your shackles

-YOU are pathetic, begging your leaders for MORE shut down and MORE regulations

I will NOT tolerate another person telling me that I don't care about lives.

I care about the situation in its entirety.

But YOU don't care about any of that so...

YOU stay home.

YOU wear a mask.

YOU live in fear.

-Author unknown

Copy & paste!

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Anyone who uses sovereign right gets ignored.

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Inconvenience is not Oppression

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Oh for the days when the seat belt law was infringing on ones rights. Sovereign rights? I’m not a sovereign as far as I know.

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Nobody's a sovereign. We live in a society, in a country.

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Just another anti-vax jerk rationalizing their own selfishness.

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People be stupid.

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Sovereign right to be so.

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It’s like a viral way of posting “AITA” without having to go on Reddit. I was chatting via text with a friend who’s more conservative than me and while I’m not as skeptical as he is about the value of shutdowns, we had a reasonable discussion because it was in good faith. That post is based on a declaration that all opposition is a sign of bad faith and moral rot.

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Wow, so many false equivalences included in this, particularly the anti-vaccine part. Then again, I guess it's easy to have a coalition of various ideas when you're "fighting the power".

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Our director is back in the office this week after about two months out/working from home/being in out of the country/sick time.

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Our Crumbling Democracy

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FBI Issues warrants; seizes cell phones in investigation of Senator Richard Burr for stock sales.

https://www.latimes.com/politics/story/2020-05-13/fbi-serves-warrant-on-senator-stock-investigation

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CA District 25 (Rep Katie Hill's vacant seat) apparently switches to Republican

https://twitter.com/MikeGarcia2020/status/1260433593265983496

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1. Remember that late ballots can often shift heavily Democratic, so we should wait on this.

2. There will basically be a do-over in November anyway, probably with higher turnout.

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1. Garcia is about 17K votes ahead, probably not enough uncounted to make that up.

2. yes.

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This is no surprise whatsoever.

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Garcia's Trump-looking campaign signs were EVERYWHERE in Palmdale, Lancaster and Agua Dulce. Which did not surprise me at all.

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Pro

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ESPN's Top 74 players. Top 10 announced today. I disagree.

1. MJ

2. LeBron

3. Kareem

4. Bill Russell

5. Magic

6. Wilt

7. Larry Legend

8. Duncan

9. Kobe

10. Shaq

I still think LeBron is too high. Physically/Athletically he's probably #1 but I think the players in the 80s were much mentally tougher.

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35. The Kidd From Cal

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Kobe is not Top 10.

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You are clearly a hater.

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He's still Top 20!

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ooh....hot take.

11. Oscar Robertson

12. The Dream

13. Steph

14. KD

15. Dr J.

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Hakeem and Big O can go ahead of him.

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I want to know how they determined the ranking. When 41-74 came out I compared what they had to the old NBA top 50 players a few years ago. I couldn't remember if the top 50 were only those that had retired, which I think was the case. There are plenty of current players that would be in the top 50.

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I would prefer they just go back to the same style they had in the 80s, but if there must be an update (and there must, as there is merchandise to sell) then this is a decent spin on that theme.

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Better looking than the new logo, FWIW.

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Yep, the logo is trash, but I'm digging the new uniforms. Glad they are ditching the St. Louis colors.

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Not bad. Looking forward to seeing Jared in one of those new helmets. But, this season he has to cut down on the number of INTs and fumbles. I know it's tough with small hands, but...

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The colors are nice...

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Cal

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I remember when the video dropped when he went off against the one team after the coach said, "You're going to Georgetown to sit". That was a Louisville HS team. He turned out to have a good freshman year. He would be someone, along with Bradley, that can get his own shot. That's assuming Bradley is still here in 2 years.

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I forgot about the possibility of transfer waivers this year.

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or it looks like he may be asking for an injury waiver.

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Go Bears!

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GO BEARS!

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