When you search for or click on a hashtag in Twitter, it shows you a feed of all tweets with that hashtag. Useful!
If you then click on the "Tweet" button while this hashtag feed is open, it populates the tweet composition box with the hashtag in question, on the assumption that you're going to tweet using the hashtag in question. Useful!
Problem: Sometimes the hashtag that populates the tweet composition box is written in all lowercase, even if the hashtag you originally searched on or clicked on was written in a combination of capital and lowercase.
This is an issue because screen readers use the capitalization in hashtags to determine when a new word starts, and writing hashtags in all lowercase makes the screen reader attempt to pronounce the hashtag as all one word. And, aside from that, #CapitalizingEachWordLikeThis is easier to read than #writingthewholethinginlowercase.
What Twitter should do: make sure that any capitalization in the hashtag clicked on or searched for is retained when populating the tweet composition box. This means people who have already made the effort to make their hashtags accessible don't have to repeat that effort every time they tweet.
While writing this blog post, I tried to determine the specific conditions under which Twitter retains the capitalization of the hashtag versus when it changes it to all lowercase, and I wasn't able to pinpoint it with any consistency. All I can tell you is sometimes it retains capitalization, and sometimes it goes all lowercase.
However, the fact that it sometimes retains capitalization means that retaining capitalization is technologically possible, so Twitter should make that happen all the time.
Saturday, July 13, 2019
Sunday, July 07, 2019
Aidez-moi à transcrire les phrases français dans Let Me Go par Cake
This post is available in English here.
Les paroles de la chanson Let Me Go par Cake sont bien en anglais, mais il y a quelques phrases parlés en français, qui sont en-dessous de la mélodie et donc difficile à entendre.
Chaque fois que j’entends cette chanson, je me demande qu’est-ce que les mots français disent, mais je ne peux en comprendre que quelques mots.
J’ai effectué plusieurs recherches Internet pour ces mots français pendant les années, et il me semble que personne ne les a jamais transcrits.
Donc il nous incombe de le faire nous-mêmes.
Voici Let Me Go, au moment où le français commence.
Les quelques mot que j’entends : « ??? au contraire ??? conserver les échantillons ??? papier, plastique ??? »
Seriez-vous en mesure de combler les lacunes?
Les paroles de la chanson Let Me Go par Cake sont bien en anglais, mais il y a quelques phrases parlés en français, qui sont en-dessous de la mélodie et donc difficile à entendre.
Chaque fois que j’entends cette chanson, je me demande qu’est-ce que les mots français disent, mais je ne peux en comprendre que quelques mots.
J’ai effectué plusieurs recherches Internet pour ces mots français pendant les années, et il me semble que personne ne les a jamais transcrits.
Donc il nous incombe de le faire nous-mêmes.
Voici Let Me Go, au moment où le français commence.
Les quelques mot que j’entends : « ??? au contraire ??? conserver les échantillons ??? papier, plastique ??? »
Seriez-vous en mesure de combler les lacunes?
Saturday, July 06, 2019
The French words in Let Me Go by Cake
Ce poste est disponible en français ici.
Every time I hear to the song Let Me Go by Cake, I wonder what the French words spoken under the melody line are saying.
I do understand French, but I'm also lyric deaf, so the music gets in the way of my hearing all the words (in any language).
Every time I wonder this at a time when it's convenient to google, I try to see if anyone on the recorded internet has written down what the French says, and I can never find anyone who has.
So we're going to have to do it ourselves.
Here is Let Me Go by Cake, cued up to the point where the French starts.
Here's what I hear:
"[unintelligible] au contraire [unintelligible] conserver les échantillons [unintelligible] papier, plastique [unintelligible]"
Can you fill in any gaps?
For those who don't speak French:
au contraire = the same as in English: literally "to the contrary", a general indicator of disagreement
conserver les échantillons = keep/store/preserve the samples
papier, plastique = paper, plastic
Every time I hear to the song Let Me Go by Cake, I wonder what the French words spoken under the melody line are saying.
I do understand French, but I'm also lyric deaf, so the music gets in the way of my hearing all the words (in any language).
Every time I wonder this at a time when it's convenient to google, I try to see if anyone on the recorded internet has written down what the French says, and I can never find anyone who has.
So we're going to have to do it ourselves.
Here is Let Me Go by Cake, cued up to the point where the French starts.
Here's what I hear:
"[unintelligible] au contraire [unintelligible] conserver les échantillons [unintelligible] papier, plastique [unintelligible]"
Can you fill in any gaps?
For those who don't speak French:
au contraire = the same as in English: literally "to the contrary", a general indicator of disagreement
conserver les échantillons = keep/store/preserve the samples
papier, plastique = paper, plastic
Friday, July 05, 2019
Wanted: emergency radio with long shelf life
Today I had a power outage for the first time in years, so it occurred to me that I should test my emergency radio.
And it turns out the battery doesn't hold a charge. I keep the radio in a place where it gets direct sun every day, but when I turn it on the battery light blinks out after a second, before I can even tune it to a radio station. The same thing happens when I crank it up - the battery appears to charge, but it doesn't hold the charge long enough to pick up a radio station, which, of course, defeats the purpose.
This happened with my previous emergency radio too. After a few years, the battery simply stopped holding a charge, rendering it useless.
Can anyone recommend an emergency radio that will retain functionality after years of neglect?
I'm willing and able to keep it somewhere where it gets direct sunlight every day for solar charging. I'm also willing and able to keep it in the dark if constant charging is bad for battery life, but in that case I'd need it to charge fairly quickly (e.g. under 15 minutes) in normal indoor ambient light levels
Ideally, I'd also like to be able to charge devices with it. Alternatively, I'd be interested in any other gizmos that let me charge devices from solar and crank power - or even from the ordinary Duracell batteries I have sitting around in a desk drawer! - regardless of whether they have a radio. A flashlight feature would also be a plus. (I already have multiple flashlights, but I wouldn't mind one that could charge by solar.) But, again, these devices would need long shelf life, so I can neglect them for years and then they'll be ready for me in an emergency.
Interestingly, during this adventure, I discovered that the radio on my old middle-school Walkman still works beautifully if I just pop in a couple of the ordinary Duracell batteries that I have sitting around in my desk drawer. So for an emergency device, I'd need better.
And it turns out the battery doesn't hold a charge. I keep the radio in a place where it gets direct sun every day, but when I turn it on the battery light blinks out after a second, before I can even tune it to a radio station. The same thing happens when I crank it up - the battery appears to charge, but it doesn't hold the charge long enough to pick up a radio station, which, of course, defeats the purpose.
This happened with my previous emergency radio too. After a few years, the battery simply stopped holding a charge, rendering it useless.
Can anyone recommend an emergency radio that will retain functionality after years of neglect?
I'm willing and able to keep it somewhere where it gets direct sunlight every day for solar charging. I'm also willing and able to keep it in the dark if constant charging is bad for battery life, but in that case I'd need it to charge fairly quickly (e.g. under 15 minutes) in normal indoor ambient light levels
Ideally, I'd also like to be able to charge devices with it. Alternatively, I'd be interested in any other gizmos that let me charge devices from solar and crank power - or even from the ordinary Duracell batteries I have sitting around in a desk drawer! - regardless of whether they have a radio. A flashlight feature would also be a plus. (I already have multiple flashlights, but I wouldn't mind one that could charge by solar.) But, again, these devices would need long shelf life, so I can neglect them for years and then they'll be ready for me in an emergency.
Interestingly, during this adventure, I discovered that the radio on my old middle-school Walkman still works beautifully if I just pop in a couple of the ordinary Duracell batteries that I have sitting around in my desk drawer. So for an emergency device, I'd need better.
Monday, July 01, 2019
Brandingthink
On the front page of today's Globe and Mail, I noticed a small blurb about their logo:
Do they actually think that consolidating the design "restat[es their] dedication to groundbreaking journalism, no matter the platform"? Or was there a committee sitting around the table trying to come up with something?
Or was this the wording of the design brief, and the designer produced the logo and asserted that it achieves these things?
It's also interesting to me that they felt it was necessary to print a statement of intent behind their logo change, rather than just printing the new logo. I don't know that I would have noticed. Or, if I did notice, I would have just though "Meh, newspapers change their design from time to time."
The fact that they printed a statement of intent leans towards the idea of someone actually thinking that changing the logo "restat[es their] dedication to groundbreaking journalism", because if they didn't think that, they could have just not printed an explanation rather than thinking up an explanation. But, to my non-design brain, these things seem completely unrelated (like how my choice of font is completely unrelated to my commitment to a vegetarian lifestyle), so I'm intrigued that other people's brains can do this.
This is interesting to me, and, in my capacity as a non-design person, I find myself pondering the thinking and process behind it - not the change in the logo, but the explanation and its wording.On Monday The Globe and Mail is introducing the next evolution of our print nameplate.The refreshed red logo is the same typeface and styling that appears online at the top of our homepage. By consolidating our print and digital designs, we are restating our dedication to groundbreaking journalism, no matter the platform.
Do they actually think that consolidating the design "restat[es their] dedication to groundbreaking journalism, no matter the platform"? Or was there a committee sitting around the table trying to come up with something?
Or was this the wording of the design brief, and the designer produced the logo and asserted that it achieves these things?
It's also interesting to me that they felt it was necessary to print a statement of intent behind their logo change, rather than just printing the new logo. I don't know that I would have noticed. Or, if I did notice, I would have just though "Meh, newspapers change their design from time to time."
The fact that they printed a statement of intent leans towards the idea of someone actually thinking that changing the logo "restat[es their] dedication to groundbreaking journalism", because if they didn't think that, they could have just not printed an explanation rather than thinking up an explanation. But, to my non-design brain, these things seem completely unrelated (like how my choice of font is completely unrelated to my commitment to a vegetarian lifestyle), so I'm intrigued that other people's brains can do this.
Sunday, June 30, 2019
Books read in June 2019
New:
1. So You Want to Talk about Race by by Ijeoma Oluo
2. Hyperfocus: How to be More Productive in a World of Distraction by Chris Bailey
3. As Long as the Rivers Flow by Larry Loyie
4. Victoria: The Heart and Mind of a Young Queen by Helen Rappaport
Reread:
1. Rapture in Death
1. So You Want to Talk about Race by by Ijeoma Oluo
2. Hyperfocus: How to be More Productive in a World of Distraction by Chris Bailey
3. As Long as the Rivers Flow by Larry Loyie
4. Victoria: The Heart and Mind of a Young Queen by Helen Rappaport
Reread:
1. Rapture in Death
Friday, June 28, 2019
How I made my sweaters stop acting like clutter
While searching for a different old post, I found this old post about trying to figure out a way to stop my sweaters from cluttering up my living room, and I realized that I've solved the problem at some point.
When I'm sitting at my desk and I have to remove a sweater, I stand up. Then, as I'm removing the sweater, I take two steps until I'm standing in the door of my bedroom. Then I throw the sweater on my bed.
This means I have to hang up the sweater before I can go to sleep because it's lying on my bed, but that isn't too much of an imposition because my bedtime routine already includes putting away clothes that have ended up on my bed in the course of the day. (For example, when I'm dressing in the morning, I tend to take off my bathrobe and throw it on my bed. If I change clothes when I get home, I tend to lie the old ones on my bed.)
Yes, a perfectly diligent person wouldn't leave clothes lying around on the bed and would instead put them away immediately. But we've already established that I'm not a perfectly diligent person, and throwing the sweaters on the bed instead of hanging them on my desk chair puts the sweaters closer to where they should be while preventing them from cluttering up the room where they shouldn't be.
I don't remember when or why I started doing this, but it solves my silly problem!
When I'm sitting at my desk and I have to remove a sweater, I stand up. Then, as I'm removing the sweater, I take two steps until I'm standing in the door of my bedroom. Then I throw the sweater on my bed.
This means I have to hang up the sweater before I can go to sleep because it's lying on my bed, but that isn't too much of an imposition because my bedtime routine already includes putting away clothes that have ended up on my bed in the course of the day. (For example, when I'm dressing in the morning, I tend to take off my bathrobe and throw it on my bed. If I change clothes when I get home, I tend to lie the old ones on my bed.)
Yes, a perfectly diligent person wouldn't leave clothes lying around on the bed and would instead put them away immediately. But we've already established that I'm not a perfectly diligent person, and throwing the sweaters on the bed instead of hanging them on my desk chair puts the sweaters closer to where they should be while preventing them from cluttering up the room where they shouldn't be.
I don't remember when or why I started doing this, but it solves my silly problem!
Thursday, June 27, 2019
Phosphenes and false memories
When I was a little girl, I had an unsuitably early bedtime. I wasn't even tired until about 2 hours after my bedtime. (Not a good parenting strategy, BTW. I became incapable of falling asleep in less than 2 hours even when I was tired, and it took until I was nearly 30 to overcome this.)
However, when I was small I did want to be a good girl, so I would lie in bed with my eyes closed trying really hard to fall asleep.
But a small child doesn't have the inner resources to just lie there doing nothing. I needed something to amuse myself. Something that I could do while lying in bed with my eyes closed.
So I started watching the colours that I saw behind my eyelids when I closed my eyes (which, I would learn decades later, are called phosphenes). They would move and morph of their own volition, making for an interesting light show.
After some time, I gradually gained control over how the phosphenes moved and morphed. It never became easy to move them - imagine the nuance of playing a theramin combined with the force required to fight the repulsion of like magnetic poles - but with effort I could manipulate them. I made it into a game, with my goal being to produce a red and blue checkerboard (the reason why I chose a red and blue checkerboard was lost to history) and I was able to reach the checkerboard almost every night.
However, around the age of 8, I developed a new intellectual skill. At the time I called it "thinks", but I now know that it's called Mary Sue fanfiction - mentally writing stories inserting myself into various works of fiction. I found this a far more enjoyable way to spend the hours before I fell asleep, and my phosphenes fell by the wayside.
That pattern has continued ever since, with the addition of romantic fantasies once I reached the point in my life where that was of interest. But every once in a while, during a bout of insomnia, I'd reach for the phosphenes again and find that I was out of practice, but could still manipulate them.
Until my head injury.
In the aftermath of my head injury, I completely lost the ability to daydream or fantasize. (It began returning 4 months later, but even now a year later, it's still not available 100% of the time like it was before the head injury.)
So, as I lay in bed waiting to fall asleep, I reached for my phosphenes.
And they weren't there.
I could see a pattern that looked like a red and green lava lamp, but it wasn't moving at all. And, behind the lava lamp, I could see the eye of Sauron. But it wasn't my phosphenes. It was immovable, unchanging, and vaguely terrifying.
I spent a lot of time lying in bed with my eyes closed after my head injury, and this eye of Sauron was always staring back at me through the lava lamp. I couldn't control it, I couldn't change it, my old familiar patterns weren't there, and I couldn't even fantasize.
I wasn't even sure if I was human any more.
After some months, the eye of Sauron went away. (Its departure correlated with my first burst of vision therapy progress, but I can't tell if this is a cause and effect relationship.) I also regained the ability to fantasize, so I luxuriated in my newly-regained imagination and stopped worrying about my phosphenes.
Then, a few weeks ago, my phosphenes came back.
And they're completely different!
Sometimes they consist of green figures that remind me of Chinese characters (I can't read Chinese so I couldn't tell you if they're actually Chinese characters, and it's not logistically possible for me to draw them. But wouldn't it be interesting if they said something in Chinese!)
Sometimes they consist of indescribable shapes and colours that are completely different from the indescribable shapes and colours I had previously.
A new and interesting feature is that occasionally a cartoon character will peek its head out from behind the swirling shapes and colours. I can't name any of the cartoon characters, but I have no idea if they're my brain's own creation or existing cartoon characters that my subconscious memory somehow internalized. (Again, it's not logistically possible to draw them, and I haven't been able to google my way to a "Yes! That's it!" moment of recognition.)
These new phosphenes are so interesting and different that I've put daydreaming/fantasy aside, and spend some time exploring them every night as I wait for sleep to overtake me. I can't control them like I could the old ones (or, at least, I can't yet control them - I haven't a clue whether I'll eventually regain that ability), but I can sort of look around, zoom in, and generally watch the show.
But the most fascinating thing about Phosphenes 2.0 is that after I spend some time watching them, I get a false memory.
Example of a false memory: I was climbing up the side of a building. Partway through I thought "This doesn't seem safe - I shouldn't be able to hang onto the side of a building with just my fingertips." Then I thought "Don't be silly, you've done this thousands of times, people do it every day!"
Of course, I've never actually climbed the side of a building, and I'm not physically capable of hanging off a building by just my fingertips. And people don't do it every day.
But, somehow, my brain served up that ridiculousness like a memory (as opposed to like a dream or a predream).
Ever since my phosphenes returned, this happens every night. The Phosphenes 2.0 Show, followed by a false memory, followed by the realization that the false memory is false, and then I promptly fall asleep.
It will be interesting to see how long my brain keeps this up for!
However, when I was small I did want to be a good girl, so I would lie in bed with my eyes closed trying really hard to fall asleep.
But a small child doesn't have the inner resources to just lie there doing nothing. I needed something to amuse myself. Something that I could do while lying in bed with my eyes closed.
So I started watching the colours that I saw behind my eyelids when I closed my eyes (which, I would learn decades later, are called phosphenes). They would move and morph of their own volition, making for an interesting light show.
After some time, I gradually gained control over how the phosphenes moved and morphed. It never became easy to move them - imagine the nuance of playing a theramin combined with the force required to fight the repulsion of like magnetic poles - but with effort I could manipulate them. I made it into a game, with my goal being to produce a red and blue checkerboard (the reason why I chose a red and blue checkerboard was lost to history) and I was able to reach the checkerboard almost every night.
However, around the age of 8, I developed a new intellectual skill. At the time I called it "thinks", but I now know that it's called Mary Sue fanfiction - mentally writing stories inserting myself into various works of fiction. I found this a far more enjoyable way to spend the hours before I fell asleep, and my phosphenes fell by the wayside.
That pattern has continued ever since, with the addition of romantic fantasies once I reached the point in my life where that was of interest. But every once in a while, during a bout of insomnia, I'd reach for the phosphenes again and find that I was out of practice, but could still manipulate them.
Until my head injury.
In the aftermath of my head injury, I completely lost the ability to daydream or fantasize. (It began returning 4 months later, but even now a year later, it's still not available 100% of the time like it was before the head injury.)
So, as I lay in bed waiting to fall asleep, I reached for my phosphenes.
And they weren't there.
I could see a pattern that looked like a red and green lava lamp, but it wasn't moving at all. And, behind the lava lamp, I could see the eye of Sauron. But it wasn't my phosphenes. It was immovable, unchanging, and vaguely terrifying.
I spent a lot of time lying in bed with my eyes closed after my head injury, and this eye of Sauron was always staring back at me through the lava lamp. I couldn't control it, I couldn't change it, my old familiar patterns weren't there, and I couldn't even fantasize.
I wasn't even sure if I was human any more.
After some months, the eye of Sauron went away. (Its departure correlated with my first burst of vision therapy progress, but I can't tell if this is a cause and effect relationship.) I also regained the ability to fantasize, so I luxuriated in my newly-regained imagination and stopped worrying about my phosphenes.
Then, a few weeks ago, my phosphenes came back.
And they're completely different!
Sometimes they consist of green figures that remind me of Chinese characters (I can't read Chinese so I couldn't tell you if they're actually Chinese characters, and it's not logistically possible for me to draw them. But wouldn't it be interesting if they said something in Chinese!)
Sometimes they consist of indescribable shapes and colours that are completely different from the indescribable shapes and colours I had previously.
A new and interesting feature is that occasionally a cartoon character will peek its head out from behind the swirling shapes and colours. I can't name any of the cartoon characters, but I have no idea if they're my brain's own creation or existing cartoon characters that my subconscious memory somehow internalized. (Again, it's not logistically possible to draw them, and I haven't been able to google my way to a "Yes! That's it!" moment of recognition.)
These new phosphenes are so interesting and different that I've put daydreaming/fantasy aside, and spend some time exploring them every night as I wait for sleep to overtake me. I can't control them like I could the old ones (or, at least, I can't yet control them - I haven't a clue whether I'll eventually regain that ability), but I can sort of look around, zoom in, and generally watch the show.
But the most fascinating thing about Phosphenes 2.0 is that after I spend some time watching them, I get a false memory.
Example of a false memory: I was climbing up the side of a building. Partway through I thought "This doesn't seem safe - I shouldn't be able to hang onto the side of a building with just my fingertips." Then I thought "Don't be silly, you've done this thousands of times, people do it every day!"
Of course, I've never actually climbed the side of a building, and I'm not physically capable of hanging off a building by just my fingertips. And people don't do it every day.
But, somehow, my brain served up that ridiculousness like a memory (as opposed to like a dream or a predream).
Ever since my phosphenes returned, this happens every night. The Phosphenes 2.0 Show, followed by a false memory, followed by the realization that the false memory is false, and then I promptly fall asleep.
It will be interesting to see how long my brain keeps this up for!
Friday, June 14, 2019
Adventures in persistent spoonerisms
Chipo[l/t]e
The first time I ever saw the word chipotle, my mind inverted the T and the L and read it as "chipolte". Then, after some time, I realized I had it backwards. So I set a sort of mental flag. Whenever the word came up, I'd tell myself "Wait, you have it backwards, remember to invert those two letters." Then I'd successfully say "chipotle".
However, I didn't realize that I'd cured my spoonerism. The mental flag persisted. Whenever I went to say "chipotle" I'd stop and tell myself "Wait, you have it backwards, remember to invert those two letters." Then I'd say "chipolte".
So then I had to tell myself "Okay, you got this, no need to invert the letters any more." But it was too late. I'd gone charging right past "chipotle" back to "chipolte". So I had to tell myself to invert it again.
This pendulum has swung back and forth over the years, and somehow I've never arrived at the ability to permanently and consistently pronounce or spell "chipotle" correctly. No matter where I am in the cycle, I seem to get it right less than 50% of the time.
I looked it up multiple times while writing this post, and I'm sure I got it wrong at least once. (Weirdly, spellcheck isn't consistent about when it gives either spelling squiggles.)
Jolelujah
The internet told me that Leonard Cohen's Hallelujah (link is to the k.d. lang version because that's the one that speaks to me) and Dolly Parton's Jolene can be sung to each other's tunes.
I tried it out, and it turns out they can! The choruses you have to fudge a bit, but the verses work perfectly - and Leonard Cohen's melody really adds a delicious anguish to Dolly Parton's lyrics.
Then I had the idea of a comedic arrangement - the singer starts singing one song and somehow gets lost and ends up in the other, or, perhaps there are two singers trying to upstage each other and getting stuck in each other's songs.
So I was workshopping this in the shower, trying to figure out how the comedic timing worked, and I suddenly lost the ability to sing the verse melody of Jolene. I tried, but it kept coming out as Hallelujah!
So when I got out of the shower I listened to a recording of Jolene and got that melody back, but then I lost Hallelujah - it kept coming out as Jolene!
Now I can't hold the melody of either song, even when I'm trying to do just one song without any mashups whatsoever. It keeps changing, it's completely beyond my control, and it never comes out the same way twice!
And, to add insult to injury, it never once comes out with effective comedic timing either!
The first time I ever saw the word chipotle, my mind inverted the T and the L and read it as "chipolte". Then, after some time, I realized I had it backwards. So I set a sort of mental flag. Whenever the word came up, I'd tell myself "Wait, you have it backwards, remember to invert those two letters." Then I'd successfully say "chipotle".
However, I didn't realize that I'd cured my spoonerism. The mental flag persisted. Whenever I went to say "chipotle" I'd stop and tell myself "Wait, you have it backwards, remember to invert those two letters." Then I'd say "chipolte".
So then I had to tell myself "Okay, you got this, no need to invert the letters any more." But it was too late. I'd gone charging right past "chipotle" back to "chipolte". So I had to tell myself to invert it again.
This pendulum has swung back and forth over the years, and somehow I've never arrived at the ability to permanently and consistently pronounce or spell "chipotle" correctly. No matter where I am in the cycle, I seem to get it right less than 50% of the time.
I looked it up multiple times while writing this post, and I'm sure I got it wrong at least once. (Weirdly, spellcheck isn't consistent about when it gives either spelling squiggles.)
Jolelujah
The internet told me that Leonard Cohen's Hallelujah (link is to the k.d. lang version because that's the one that speaks to me) and Dolly Parton's Jolene can be sung to each other's tunes.
I tried it out, and it turns out they can! The choruses you have to fudge a bit, but the verses work perfectly - and Leonard Cohen's melody really adds a delicious anguish to Dolly Parton's lyrics.
Then I had the idea of a comedic arrangement - the singer starts singing one song and somehow gets lost and ends up in the other, or, perhaps there are two singers trying to upstage each other and getting stuck in each other's songs.
So I was workshopping this in the shower, trying to figure out how the comedic timing worked, and I suddenly lost the ability to sing the verse melody of Jolene. I tried, but it kept coming out as Hallelujah!
So when I got out of the shower I listened to a recording of Jolene and got that melody back, but then I lost Hallelujah - it kept coming out as Jolene!
Now I can't hold the melody of either song, even when I'm trying to do just one song without any mashups whatsoever. It keeps changing, it's completely beyond my control, and it never comes out the same way twice!
And, to add insult to injury, it never once comes out with effective comedic timing either!
Sunday, June 09, 2019
A different point of view for Captain Awkward #1203
Captain Awkward #1203:
I interpreted LW's situation as more that the "not inviting family" part was already set in stone, and it's more a question of how to explain that they're not invited without hurting any feelings.
I think the answer to that lies in the "otherness" of Catholicism in the eyes of your family.
Your family isn't Catholic, they've probably never heard of this ceremony (I was raised Catholic and I'd never heard of it!), so you can present it as a church thing that has nothing to do with them.
Mention it when it comes up naturally in conversation, but don't, like, announce it to them proactively, because it's a church thing that has nothing to do with them. Depending on what works best for the personalities or dynamics involved, you could answer any questions they might have, or you could wave it off with "It's a church thing, don't worry about it."
Your response here should be analogous to how you'd respond to someone unfamiliar with Palm Sunday asking what your palm frond is for - either explain it or wave it off, depending on how the person will take it. (I know IRL your consecration ceremony is a far bigger deal than Palm Sunday, but for non-church people they're of equal importance, i.e. it's a church thing, nothing to do with them.)
Now, as Captain Awkward points out in her answer, the price of this approach is you can't ask or expect them to be as happy for you / excited / invested in this ceremony as perhaps you'd like. The more you push this as something they should care deeply about, the more likely they are to feel left out at not being invited.
If, upon thinking this through, you find you do want this emotional investment from your family, you're certainly free to frame it that way. But that would increase the risk of hurt feelings and the very drama you're hoping to avoid. To avoid that drama, avoid the emotional investment by waving it off as nothing to do with them.
Hi Captain!
I’m 24 years old, and next year I’m undergoing the “consecration of virgins” ceremony from Catholic tradition, where essentially I agree to give up romantic attatchments and “marry” myself to God, like halfway to being a nun. I’m very excited about this, and have already started plans for the ceremony, including dresses and rings and whatnot. Hurray for future fancy clothes day! \o/
My problem is with my family. None of my family are invited to the ceremony – I haven’t even told them that I’m undergoing it. I’m keeping the ceremony strictly in-faith, mainly because of the “woo” factor, but my family aren’t Catholic, and while my family are subscribed to the Big Man In The Sky idea, they’re not sold on the more “woo” aspects like divine intervention or godspousery. While they can believe what they like, freedom of faith and all that jazz, I’m not comfortable handling the spiritual disbelief of half my guests at my “wedding”. There’s also complicated history between us which I don’t want encroaching on what is a really important day for me. But I know they’re going to be hurt if I don’t invite them, and I feel horribly guilty about it, especially since this’ll be the closest thing they’ll get to a big white wedding for me!
How do I explain to my family about my upcoming “marriage” and why they’re not invited?
Thanks!
All The Lace
(ps: although I know you probably wouldn’t do this, I just want to make it clear that I’m not interested in any advice on finding “real” datemates to have a “real” marriage)Captain Awkward's response had more focus on the question of how to decide whether to invite family and how family might respond to invitations than I thought LW was going for.
I interpreted LW's situation as more that the "not inviting family" part was already set in stone, and it's more a question of how to explain that they're not invited without hurting any feelings.
I think the answer to that lies in the "otherness" of Catholicism in the eyes of your family.
Your family isn't Catholic, they've probably never heard of this ceremony (I was raised Catholic and I'd never heard of it!), so you can present it as a church thing that has nothing to do with them.
Mention it when it comes up naturally in conversation, but don't, like, announce it to them proactively, because it's a church thing that has nothing to do with them. Depending on what works best for the personalities or dynamics involved, you could answer any questions they might have, or you could wave it off with "It's a church thing, don't worry about it."
Your response here should be analogous to how you'd respond to someone unfamiliar with Palm Sunday asking what your palm frond is for - either explain it or wave it off, depending on how the person will take it. (I know IRL your consecration ceremony is a far bigger deal than Palm Sunday, but for non-church people they're of equal importance, i.e. it's a church thing, nothing to do with them.)
Now, as Captain Awkward points out in her answer, the price of this approach is you can't ask or expect them to be as happy for you / excited / invested in this ceremony as perhaps you'd like. The more you push this as something they should care deeply about, the more likely they are to feel left out at not being invited.
If, upon thinking this through, you find you do want this emotional investment from your family, you're certainly free to frame it that way. But that would increase the risk of hurt feelings and the very drama you're hoping to avoid. To avoid that drama, avoid the emotional investment by waving it off as nothing to do with them.
Saturday, June 08, 2019
Things the City of Toronto Should Invent: monthly property tax bills
I knew that when I switched from renting to owning that I would have to pay property taxes separately (rather than property taxes being included in my rent).
What I didn't know was how weird the City of Toronto's billing schedule would be.
I have six scheduled property tax payments a year. Any sensible person would conclude "Okay, so one payment every two months," but it doesn't work that way - they're unevenly spaced! My six payments a year are due in March, April, May, July, August and September.
This spacing means that the payments always feel like a burden. Because I get five months in a row without a payment, it doesn't feel like the kind of regular recurring expense I would mentally take into consideration in my budget. But, at the same time, the fact that it happens multiple months in a row doesn't make it feel like a one-off expense that hurts a bit in the month where it occurs but ultimately my bank account reachieves equilibrium. This arrangement is the worst of both worlds.
Solution: 12 monthly property tax payments
People are accustomed to sizeable monthly payments being due on the first of the month - after all, that's how rent works! So not only would monthly payments make each cheque smaller, but, by fitting into the pattern to which we're accustomed, it would make it more painless.
I previously came up with a conspiracy theory that sales tax isn't included in sticker price to stoke anti-tax sentiment, by making it an unpleasant surprise at the cash register.
I wonder if that's also the intention behind this erratic property tax schedule?
What I didn't know was how weird the City of Toronto's billing schedule would be.
I have six scheduled property tax payments a year. Any sensible person would conclude "Okay, so one payment every two months," but it doesn't work that way - they're unevenly spaced! My six payments a year are due in March, April, May, July, August and September.
This spacing means that the payments always feel like a burden. Because I get five months in a row without a payment, it doesn't feel like the kind of regular recurring expense I would mentally take into consideration in my budget. But, at the same time, the fact that it happens multiple months in a row doesn't make it feel like a one-off expense that hurts a bit in the month where it occurs but ultimately my bank account reachieves equilibrium. This arrangement is the worst of both worlds.
Solution: 12 monthly property tax payments
People are accustomed to sizeable monthly payments being due on the first of the month - after all, that's how rent works! So not only would monthly payments make each cheque smaller, but, by fitting into the pattern to which we're accustomed, it would make it more painless.
I previously came up with a conspiracy theory that sales tax isn't included in sticker price to stoke anti-tax sentiment, by making it an unpleasant surprise at the cash register.
I wonder if that's also the intention behind this erratic property tax schedule?
Saturday, June 01, 2019
Parenting advice from the childfree
I recently fell down an internet rabbit hole and ended up reading a parenting advice column. And it seems I have Opinions, even though I don't have children.
Many parents would say at this point "Of course my kids know that they can come to me with anything!", but less than 100% of their kids would agree with that assessment.
My own parents would probably think their kids can come to them with anything, but I wouldn't have felt safe coming to them with an unwanted pregnancy. (And, given that I didn't know abortion as a safe, controlled medical procedure existed until nearly a decade after menarche, the results could have been disastrous!)
But, because my mother once mentioned in passing that my parents had used birth control and plan their family, I never felt the need to conceal my birth control from them.
I am exactly the kind of kid you're worried about - I always interpreted adults words and actions in ways the didn't intend! - and I can assure you it never once occurred to me that squirt guns and real guns are in any way synonymous or interchangeable, any more than I thought they were interchangeable with glue guns or staple guns.
For example, in the case where they're in a car and the daughter wants the windows up, she has no control whatsoever. She can't roll up the windows herself. She can't move since she's strapped into a carseat. She can't add or remove a layer of clothing since she's strapped into a carseat. She probably didn't even get a choice about whether she's going on a car ride at that moment and to that destination in the first place! At this moment, she has no control over her life or her body and is entirely at the mercy of your whims, including your (in her eyes) nonsensical whim to have the window open when it's clearly more comfortable to have it closed.
Giving more consideration to your daughter's needs and wants, however petty, in situations where the logistical requirements of childhood put you in full control over her life and her body would, in her eyes, put you in a better moral position to argue that she can't control other people's lives or bodies.
Fifty-fifty custody is something chosen for a theoretical notion of fairness that doesn't necessarily reflect the actual needs of the actual people in the situation. That might make sense when a kid is younger and doesn't have and/or can't express specific custody-related needs and preferences, but it makes less sense the older the kid gets.
If you imagine a household where a kid lives with two parents, they almost certainly don't spend 50% of their time with each parent. They spend the amount of time that makes sense given the personal factors involved. And, the older the kid gets, the more time the kid spends with neither parent - at school or work or involved in their own activities or at home alone.
Perhaps it would be better if your custody arrangement reflected this, and allowed your daughter to choose how much time she spends with which parent.
In a few short years, she'll be able to stay home alone and to travel to and from each parent's house independently, so the logistical issues of childcare and transportation will be gone.
Surely you can do better than an arrangement where the courts require your daughter to spend half your time with (and dependent upon, and at the mercy of) someone who has offered to pay to get rid of her.
Many years ago, before I got married, I had an abortion. I do not regret it, and it was the correct choice for me at the time. (I was a freshman in college and had no familial support.) Now I have two kind and lovely daughters in their early teens, and I am wondering if this is something I should talk to them about.
My husband is unsure, leaning toward no, and I can’t say I exactly relish the idea of having this conversation with my daughters, but especially considering the current political climate in the United States, I feel like I … should? Just tell me if I should, and if the answer is yes, how to do it.One benefit of telling your daughters that you had an abortion is that they'll be more likely to feel that they're safe going to you if they ever need an abortion or otherwise have to deal with an unwanted pregnancy.
Many parents would say at this point "Of course my kids know that they can come to me with anything!", but less than 100% of their kids would agree with that assessment.
My own parents would probably think their kids can come to them with anything, but I wouldn't have felt safe coming to them with an unwanted pregnancy. (And, given that I didn't know abortion as a safe, controlled medical procedure existed until nearly a decade after menarche, the results could have been disastrous!)
But, because my mother once mentioned in passing that my parents had used birth control and plan their family, I never felt the need to conceal my birth control from them.
For my preschool-aged son’s birthday party, we bought (zany, colorful) squirt guns as a party favor. Our kids love to run around in the backyard squirting each other on hot summer days, and I’m fine with that—over time, it has given us good opportunities to talk about challenging subjects in bite-size, age-appropriate ways (i.e., guns: never touch a real gun; if you ever see a real gun or someone tries to show you one, leave immediately and tell a grown-up; it is only a game if everyone is having fun, etc.). However, I’m unsure whether giving squirt guns to others’ children is appropriate. If it matters, we aren’t gun owners; my partner did not grow up around them, but I did, and neither of us would ever want a real gun in our home.
I’m debating creating separate gift bags without the squirt guns, making a partywide PSA such as “never touch a real gun—and remember, squirting someone with a squirt gun is only a game if both people are having fun,” or something to that effect. My partner feels my concerns are overblown and says mentioning it would make things weird, but wouldn’t stop me if I insist on it. I feel the conversation is important but don’t know if this is the right place for it or what exactly to say. Any advice?
I am exactly the kind of kid you're worried about - I always interpreted adults words and actions in ways the didn't intend! - and I can assure you it never once occurred to me that squirt guns and real guns are in any way synonymous or interchangeable, any more than I thought they were interchangeable with glue guns or staple guns.
How long do kids get to be dictators? How long should we just do whatever they want to avoid massive tantrums? I know the whole “is this the hill you want to die on” argument, but there are times when I just get tired of the fact that my toddler’s whims and desires completely outweigh mine! And I know that I’m supposed to be the adult and be the bigger person here, but sometimes the frustration gets to me.
My daughter is 3½ and very stubborn. She comes by it honestly: I’m pretty stubborn too. She’s also very dramatic and there have always been a few things that she just has to have a certain way or else she’ll lose her mind. For example, if we’re in the car listening to Disney music, she doesn’t like it if I sing along. She has gotten much better about asking me to please not sing, and as long as she asks and doesn’t scream at me, I’ll do what she wants. If I’m sitting on the couch, I can’t have a blanket on me. (I’m usually cold and like to snuggle under a blanket to keep warm.) If I don’t take it off, she loses her mind. She hates it when her dad and I try to have a conversation because she wants to talk to Dad. The other day she wanted me to put the windows up in the car. So I put hers up and put mine up almost all the way, but left it open some because it was a nice day. She lost her mind because she wanted them all up. I don’t want to have to dance on eggshells and do anything to avoid upsetting her. Sometimes (a lot of times) things don’t go the way you want and everyone just needs to learn to process that as best as they can!
The columnist advises focusing on situations where she's trying to control other people's lives or bodies (such as the situation where the kid doesn't like that LW is under a blanket) but another thing to keep in mind is situations where your daughter has no control over her own life or her own body.I know she’s a toddler and can’t process things the same way an adult does. And I know that I’m probably fucking up royally by taking actions that I know will result in her losing her mind. But in the moment, sometimes I just can’t handle being bossed around by a 3-year-old. Am I really supposed to just let her have her way all the time? Does that not lead to her becoming an entitled asshole who thinks the world revolves around her? Since most of the time it basically does, I’d like to try to introduce the concept that she isn’t the center of the universe. Or am I just being a complete asshole?
For example, in the case where they're in a car and the daughter wants the windows up, she has no control whatsoever. She can't roll up the windows herself. She can't move since she's strapped into a carseat. She can't add or remove a layer of clothing since she's strapped into a carseat. She probably didn't even get a choice about whether she's going on a car ride at that moment and to that destination in the first place! At this moment, she has no control over her life or her body and is entirely at the mercy of your whims, including your (in her eyes) nonsensical whim to have the window open when it's clearly more comfortable to have it closed.
Giving more consideration to your daughter's needs and wants, however petty, in situations where the logistical requirements of childhood put you in full control over her life and her body would, in her eyes, put you in a better moral position to argue that she can't control other people's lives or bodies.
I’m divorced with an 11-year-old. She’s not the easiest child to parent as she is very independent, strong-willed, and opinionated. I love her though and honestly have no issues parenting her. I share 50 percent custody with her dad. Every week I hear from one of them about a fight they’ve had. He tells me she’s difficult, moody, angry, challenges him. She tells me he’s inflexible, always yelling, and unreasonable.
The columnist suggests at the end of her advice that if none of her other suggestions work you might consider re-opening the 50/50 custody agreement, but I think they should look at adjusting the custody agreement on principle, even if they're able to resolve this specific issue without changing custody.I sympathize with her and try to give him advice. But what is my role here? I don’t share with her that I think the problem is her dad. He seems out of his depth in parenting and has twice offered to pay me money to take her off his hands. My biggest problem with being married to him has been that he had no empathy and I believe it’s showing up in his relationship with our daughter. But do I keep giving advice (which I don’t know if he even takes or not)? And since I am not there and don’t see the whole picture, I’m afraid I might be giving the wrong advice. Should I take my daughter to therapy to deal with her dad? The angry, moody child he cites is sometimes there when she is with me, but she is also funny, pleasant, and engaging, and has no problems following house rules. Do I just let them figure it out? I’m just worried.
Fifty-fifty custody is something chosen for a theoretical notion of fairness that doesn't necessarily reflect the actual needs of the actual people in the situation. That might make sense when a kid is younger and doesn't have and/or can't express specific custody-related needs and preferences, but it makes less sense the older the kid gets.
If you imagine a household where a kid lives with two parents, they almost certainly don't spend 50% of their time with each parent. They spend the amount of time that makes sense given the personal factors involved. And, the older the kid gets, the more time the kid spends with neither parent - at school or work or involved in their own activities or at home alone.
Perhaps it would be better if your custody arrangement reflected this, and allowed your daughter to choose how much time she spends with which parent.
In a few short years, she'll be able to stay home alone and to travel to and from each parent's house independently, so the logistical issues of childcare and transportation will be gone.
Surely you can do better than an arrangement where the courts require your daughter to spend half your time with (and dependent upon, and at the mercy of) someone who has offered to pay to get rid of her.
Friday, May 31, 2019
Books read in May 2018
New:
1. Lethal White by Robert Galbraith
2. The Pemmican Eaters by Marilyn Dumont
3. I'm Afraid of Men by Vivek Shraya
Reread:
1. Immortal in Death
1. Lethal White by Robert Galbraith
2. The Pemmican Eaters by Marilyn Dumont
3. I'm Afraid of Men by Vivek Shraya
Reread:
1. Immortal in Death
Things the LCBO Should Invent (or, rather, re-implement)
1. Indicate on your Favourite Products list whether each product is available in your preferred store.
2. Indicate on your Favourite Products list which products are on sale.
Both of these functions were available in the previous version of their website, but were eliminated in their last website update, and it really cramps my style!
I was thrilled when the Favourite Products list was introduced, because it made the way I shop so much easier! Whenever I particularly enjoy a product, or hear about a new product that sounds interesting, I add it to my list. Then, next time I'm going to buy a bottle, I simply scroll through my list, see at a glance what's both on sale and in stock at my local store, and buy whichever of those items best meets my current needs.
But since they changed their website, I now have to click through to each item to see if it's on sale, and to see if it's in stock.
The new website design seems more focused on trying to get you to order online, but that also cramps my style.
Online orders take multiple days to ship, and even ordering online and picking up in store takes multiple hours. In contrast, my local LCBO store is literally across the street, so I can go buy a bottle and be back home in under 10 minutes if the lines aren't too long.
Also, the LCBO website has a minimum order of $50, whereas I tend to buy only one (cheap) bottle at a time for personal use.
(Given the LCBO's mandate, perhaps they shouldn't be incentivizing buying larger quantities all at once? I've heard that alcoholics will drink all available alcohol, so if anything the LCBO should be incentivizing buying only one bottle at a time!)
They had a fantastic feature that met my needs perfectly, and then changed it for no apparent reason! I wish I knew how to convince them to bring it back!
2. Indicate on your Favourite Products list which products are on sale.
Both of these functions were available in the previous version of their website, but were eliminated in their last website update, and it really cramps my style!
I was thrilled when the Favourite Products list was introduced, because it made the way I shop so much easier! Whenever I particularly enjoy a product, or hear about a new product that sounds interesting, I add it to my list. Then, next time I'm going to buy a bottle, I simply scroll through my list, see at a glance what's both on sale and in stock at my local store, and buy whichever of those items best meets my current needs.
But since they changed their website, I now have to click through to each item to see if it's on sale, and to see if it's in stock.
The new website design seems more focused on trying to get you to order online, but that also cramps my style.
Online orders take multiple days to ship, and even ordering online and picking up in store takes multiple hours. In contrast, my local LCBO store is literally across the street, so I can go buy a bottle and be back home in under 10 minutes if the lines aren't too long.
Also, the LCBO website has a minimum order of $50, whereas I tend to buy only one (cheap) bottle at a time for personal use.
(Given the LCBO's mandate, perhaps they shouldn't be incentivizing buying larger quantities all at once? I've heard that alcoholics will drink all available alcohol, so if anything the LCBO should be incentivizing buying only one bottle at a time!)
They had a fantastic feature that met my needs perfectly, and then changed it for no apparent reason! I wish I knew how to convince them to bring it back!
Wednesday, May 29, 2019
Sentences
The following is a quote from Hyper Focus: How to be More Productive in a World of Distraction by Chris Bailey. As usual, any typos are my own.
I always thought of learning to read as simply sounding out words until you can do it automatically, but upon reading this I realize it involves so many more mental processes than I originally thought, not all of which are natural, but all of which the majority of the population can learn to do automatically with just a few years of instruction and practice!
And this also extrapolates to spoken language (although spoken language isn't nearly as recent and our brains have had more time to evolve accordingly). Our brains learn to pick up not just the meaning of words and how syntax works, but the very concept of a sentence - picking up cues that mean "This thought is done, save to memory", and, conversely, conveying those cues.
Language surely did not emerge with a fully-formed grammar, so human brains had to figure out both how to indicate "This thought is done, save to memory" and to process that concept.
I wonder if, in the very early days of human language, processing these concepts was difficult, like how reading is hard work when you're a little kid? I wonder if elders were thinking "Kids Today! Why can't they just point and grunt?"
I wonder if there are, or ever have been, any languages that don't have the concept of a sentence?
As you read, your brain is hard at work converting the raw bits of perceptual information into facts, stories and lessons that you remember and internalize. After your eyes register the waves of light emanating from the page, your mind generates words from them. These words temporarily fill your attentional space. You then begin connecting the words to form syntactic units and clauses - the fundamental building blocks of sentences. Finally, using your attentional space as a scratch pad, your brain groups those combinations of words together into complete idea so you can extract their higher-level meaning.This is super interesting to me, because reading isn't natural! It's an entirely artificial construct that, for the vast majority of people who are literate today, has only been available to our ancestors for a few generations - not nearly long enough for our brains to evolve to accommodate it. (For example, compulsory public education was introduced recently enough in the various places where my ancestors lived that I have personally met the first people in each branch of the family to have access to it. Some were my great-grandparents and some were my grandparents. One of them is still living.)
Sentence structure can influence this process and slow down or speed up how quickly you read. Much as the world doesn't combine many groups of data in to sets greater than seven, every book is structured to accommodate a reader's restricted attentional space. Sentences have a limited length and are punctuated by commas, semicolons, and dashes. According ton one study, the period at the end of a sentence is the point when our attentional space "stops being loaded, and what has been present in it up to that moment, must be in some way stored in a summarized form in a short-term memory."
I always thought of learning to read as simply sounding out words until you can do it automatically, but upon reading this I realize it involves so many more mental processes than I originally thought, not all of which are natural, but all of which the majority of the population can learn to do automatically with just a few years of instruction and practice!
And this also extrapolates to spoken language (although spoken language isn't nearly as recent and our brains have had more time to evolve accordingly). Our brains learn to pick up not just the meaning of words and how syntax works, but the very concept of a sentence - picking up cues that mean "This thought is done, save to memory", and, conversely, conveying those cues.
Language surely did not emerge with a fully-formed grammar, so human brains had to figure out both how to indicate "This thought is done, save to memory" and to process that concept.
I wonder if, in the very early days of human language, processing these concepts was difficult, like how reading is hard work when you're a little kid? I wonder if elders were thinking "Kids Today! Why can't they just point and grunt?"
I wonder if there are, or ever have been, any languages that don't have the concept of a sentence?
Thursday, May 23, 2019
How the Big Bang Theory writing team is like a deadbeat dad
This post contains full spoilers for The Big Bang Theory, up to and including the end of the finale.
Bringing a new baby into the universe means work. You have to care for the baby and the subsequent child and the subsequent teen and the subsequent adult, providing for their physical and emotional and material and logistical needs and launching them into an adult who can function and thrive in the society into which they were born and whatever that society evolves into.
Bringing a new baby into a fictional universe also entails a certain amount of work. You have to figure out and reflect in the story you're telling how this new baby affects their parents and the characters around them, and how they are affected by the particularities of the universe you're bringing them into. When you're starting with pregnancy, you have to address how the pregnant parent feels about the pregnancy, how this affects their relationship if they're coupled, the implications pregnancy and childbirth and childrearing have for their life (and for the plot).
But the writers of Big Bang Theory didn't do any of this work when they decided to make Penny pregnant in the season finale.
Penny is the one character who has expressed the wish to never have children. The show has spent some time on this, and on what it means for her marriage to Leonard (who is amenable to having children).
But when they presented her as pregnant in the series finale, they didn't show us how she got from her previously-established point of never wanting children to her new point of having no apparent objections.
As everyone who has ever either made a choice to have children or made a choice not to have children knows, this is not a decision made lightly or on a whim.
And as those of us who have changed our minds know, changing your mind requires even more soul-searching than making the original decision. I myself spent night after night working my way from "Aww, babies are cute and make my ovaries ache!" to "Given what I suffer in day-to-day life, could I really look my child in the eye and justify bringing them into the world" to "You know, what I want isn't actually a human being that I have to keep forever - I just want a small adorable creature to look at me with love in its eyes."
Changing one's mind about whether to have children is an excruciating process of working through hard truths, and that needs to be honoured.
What hard truths did Penny have to work through? What did she think and feel? What is it like to find yourself with an unwanted pregnancy while married to someone who wants children? Did she consider terminating the pregnancy? Did she talk to anyone? Did she tell Leonard? Before or after she made the decision to keep it?
There's a lot going on here, in a character that the show worked hard to make us care about from the beginning and in a relationship the show worked hard to make us care about from the beginning, and they didn't do the work of showing us any of it.
And it doesn't just stop with the decision to keep and welcome the baby - there's also the future to think about. How does a baby affect their lives and careers and housing situation? Penny is the primary breadwinner - how does her pregnancy affect her career? How does that end up affecting their finances? How does that end up affecting their relationship? How does a pregnancy affect Penny's health, both during and after the pregnancy? How does the whole situation affect the baby? What's it like to be a child who was originally unwanted? How does the fact that Penny originally didn't want the child affect her relationship with the child? How does Leonard's fraught relationship with his mother affect his relationship with the child? What happens if the kid gets Leonard's looks and Penny's brains? And then has another sibling who gets Penny's looks and Leonard's brains?
The writers spent 12 years carefully crafting a scenario that gives rise to all these interesting questions, then abdicated responsibility for answering any of them.
If they didn't want to raise all these questions, they could have not brought up the idea that Penny doesn't want to have children - they could have simply not mentioned it at all and instead focused on the geeky science antics that we're all here for in the first place! But since they did introduce the idea that Penny doesn't want children in the first place, their duty as writers is to work through the consequences of this decision and their subsequent reversal of the decision.
And on top of all this, we live in a reality where the "but what if you change your mind" excuse is all too often used to deny people the reproductive health care that's best for them. The Big Bang Theory is both set and produced in the US, and this episode aired at a moment when laws are being changed in the US to deny people the reproductive health care that's best for them. And the Big Bang Theory people who are on Twitter do seem to object to this development. And yet they made a much-watched season finale that reinforced the excuses used to deny people the reproductive health care that's best for them.
So basically, after 12 years of working on making us care and proactively reassuring us that they wanted a childfree marriage, the Big Bang Theory writers up and impregnated the one person who had expressed the desire never to have children, then ended things and ran off without doing any of the work that resulted from the pregnancy.
They never gave a moment's thought to our feelings and the expectations that they had spent 12 years building up. They never gave a moment's thought to what this means for the baby. They never gave a moment's thought to what this means for the mother. They never gave a moment's thought to what this means for the marriage. They never gave a moment's thought to the example they're setting for the many other people over whom they have influence that they've carefully cultivated over years.
Where I come from, we call that a deadbeat dad.
Bringing a new baby into the universe means work. You have to care for the baby and the subsequent child and the subsequent teen and the subsequent adult, providing for their physical and emotional and material and logistical needs and launching them into an adult who can function and thrive in the society into which they were born and whatever that society evolves into.
Bringing a new baby into a fictional universe also entails a certain amount of work. You have to figure out and reflect in the story you're telling how this new baby affects their parents and the characters around them, and how they are affected by the particularities of the universe you're bringing them into. When you're starting with pregnancy, you have to address how the pregnant parent feels about the pregnancy, how this affects their relationship if they're coupled, the implications pregnancy and childbirth and childrearing have for their life (and for the plot).
But the writers of Big Bang Theory didn't do any of this work when they decided to make Penny pregnant in the season finale.
Penny is the one character who has expressed the wish to never have children. The show has spent some time on this, and on what it means for her marriage to Leonard (who is amenable to having children).
But when they presented her as pregnant in the series finale, they didn't show us how she got from her previously-established point of never wanting children to her new point of having no apparent objections.
As everyone who has ever either made a choice to have children or made a choice not to have children knows, this is not a decision made lightly or on a whim.
And as those of us who have changed our minds know, changing your mind requires even more soul-searching than making the original decision. I myself spent night after night working my way from "Aww, babies are cute and make my ovaries ache!" to "Given what I suffer in day-to-day life, could I really look my child in the eye and justify bringing them into the world" to "You know, what I want isn't actually a human being that I have to keep forever - I just want a small adorable creature to look at me with love in its eyes."
Changing one's mind about whether to have children is an excruciating process of working through hard truths, and that needs to be honoured.
What hard truths did Penny have to work through? What did she think and feel? What is it like to find yourself with an unwanted pregnancy while married to someone who wants children? Did she consider terminating the pregnancy? Did she talk to anyone? Did she tell Leonard? Before or after she made the decision to keep it?
There's a lot going on here, in a character that the show worked hard to make us care about from the beginning and in a relationship the show worked hard to make us care about from the beginning, and they didn't do the work of showing us any of it.
And it doesn't just stop with the decision to keep and welcome the baby - there's also the future to think about. How does a baby affect their lives and careers and housing situation? Penny is the primary breadwinner - how does her pregnancy affect her career? How does that end up affecting their finances? How does that end up affecting their relationship? How does a pregnancy affect Penny's health, both during and after the pregnancy? How does the whole situation affect the baby? What's it like to be a child who was originally unwanted? How does the fact that Penny originally didn't want the child affect her relationship with the child? How does Leonard's fraught relationship with his mother affect his relationship with the child? What happens if the kid gets Leonard's looks and Penny's brains? And then has another sibling who gets Penny's looks and Leonard's brains?
The writers spent 12 years carefully crafting a scenario that gives rise to all these interesting questions, then abdicated responsibility for answering any of them.
If they didn't want to raise all these questions, they could have not brought up the idea that Penny doesn't want to have children - they could have simply not mentioned it at all and instead focused on the geeky science antics that we're all here for in the first place! But since they did introduce the idea that Penny doesn't want children in the first place, their duty as writers is to work through the consequences of this decision and their subsequent reversal of the decision.
And on top of all this, we live in a reality where the "but what if you change your mind" excuse is all too often used to deny people the reproductive health care that's best for them. The Big Bang Theory is both set and produced in the US, and this episode aired at a moment when laws are being changed in the US to deny people the reproductive health care that's best for them. And the Big Bang Theory people who are on Twitter do seem to object to this development. And yet they made a much-watched season finale that reinforced the excuses used to deny people the reproductive health care that's best for them.
So basically, after 12 years of working on making us care and proactively reassuring us that they wanted a childfree marriage, the Big Bang Theory writers up and impregnated the one person who had expressed the desire never to have children, then ended things and ran off without doing any of the work that resulted from the pregnancy.
They never gave a moment's thought to our feelings and the expectations that they had spent 12 years building up. They never gave a moment's thought to what this means for the baby. They never gave a moment's thought to what this means for the mother. They never gave a moment's thought to what this means for the marriage. They never gave a moment's thought to the example they're setting for the many other people over whom they have influence that they've carefully cultivated over years.
Where I come from, we call that a deadbeat dad.
Sunday, May 12, 2019
What if they didn't tell the heir about the entail?
The estate is entailed upon the male line! But the current master of the estate only has daughters! When he dies, the estate will be inherited by some distant cousin nobody has ever met! And the heir would be perfectly entitled to throw the widow and daughters out of their home! What do???
This is a common trope in fiction - well-known examples include Pride and Prejudice and Downton Abbey - as well as, I'm sure, being something that happened from time to time in real life.
But I wonder, what would happen if they just...didn't tell the heir that he's the heir?
It seems like it would be reasonably easy to conceal that information in an era before computerization and mass communication - it's just sitting in a file in some office somewhere, no one can look it up on a database or anything. It probably wouldn't even be too difficult to destroy the records if needed. (Maybe the lawyer whose office they're in is bribable?)
In Downton they have the additional complication that Lord Grantham is an earl with a seat in the House of Lords so his empty seat would be conspicuous, but Mr. Collins in Pride and Prejudice has no such distinction (and doesn't even share the Bennet surname!) If they just didn't tell people the estate was entailed, people probably wouldn't even notice if they just kept living there after Mr. Bennet died.
Even if people did know the estate was entailed, what if they just told the neighbours that the heir was kind enough to let them continue living there? Matthew Crawley legit would have let the Crawleys continue living at Downton, and it's perfectly plausible to stranger that Mr. Collins, being a man of the cloth, would have done the same. Or they could tell their neighbours that their lawyer discovered that the heir had died, thereby breaking the entail.
Or, if the heir did know he was the heir, what if they just didn't tell him when the master of the estate died? Under normal circumstances (in the absence of the Darcy-de Bourgh connection), Mr. Collins would have no way of knowing anything that happened at Longbourn.
It also occurs to me that an imposter absentee heir could be brought in. Get some guy that one of the daughters is enthusiastic about marrying, tell everyone that he's the heir, and ultimately the children of the daughter who marries him will inherit the estate. If the actual heir turns up and the imposter heir has already done the work of ingratiating himself to the neighbours, it should be fairly straightforward to accuse the actual heir of being the imposter - it's not like they have photo ID!
Was there some kind of central authority enforcing these entails and communicating to these distant heirs the fact that they were the heir? Because if there wasn't, it seems like they would be one lawyer bribe away from it not being a problem.
This is a common trope in fiction - well-known examples include Pride and Prejudice and Downton Abbey - as well as, I'm sure, being something that happened from time to time in real life.
But I wonder, what would happen if they just...didn't tell the heir that he's the heir?
It seems like it would be reasonably easy to conceal that information in an era before computerization and mass communication - it's just sitting in a file in some office somewhere, no one can look it up on a database or anything. It probably wouldn't even be too difficult to destroy the records if needed. (Maybe the lawyer whose office they're in is bribable?)
In Downton they have the additional complication that Lord Grantham is an earl with a seat in the House of Lords so his empty seat would be conspicuous, but Mr. Collins in Pride and Prejudice has no such distinction (and doesn't even share the Bennet surname!) If they just didn't tell people the estate was entailed, people probably wouldn't even notice if they just kept living there after Mr. Bennet died.
Even if people did know the estate was entailed, what if they just told the neighbours that the heir was kind enough to let them continue living there? Matthew Crawley legit would have let the Crawleys continue living at Downton, and it's perfectly plausible to stranger that Mr. Collins, being a man of the cloth, would have done the same. Or they could tell their neighbours that their lawyer discovered that the heir had died, thereby breaking the entail.
Or, if the heir did know he was the heir, what if they just didn't tell him when the master of the estate died? Under normal circumstances (in the absence of the Darcy-de Bourgh connection), Mr. Collins would have no way of knowing anything that happened at Longbourn.
It also occurs to me that an imposter absentee heir could be brought in. Get some guy that one of the daughters is enthusiastic about marrying, tell everyone that he's the heir, and ultimately the children of the daughter who marries him will inherit the estate. If the actual heir turns up and the imposter heir has already done the work of ingratiating himself to the neighbours, it should be fairly straightforward to accuse the actual heir of being the imposter - it's not like they have photo ID!
Was there some kind of central authority enforcing these entails and communicating to these distant heirs the fact that they were the heir? Because if there wasn't, it seems like they would be one lawyer bribe away from it not being a problem.
Monday, May 06, 2019
What to do if you feel guilty about receiving an unneeded scholarship
From the third letter in this Ethicist column:
If you can't afford to donate funds for a scholarship in perpetuity, I doubt they'd say no to a one-time scholarship to put one student through four years of high school.
If (like mine) your old high school has since closed, you could donate to another comparable school in your community of origin, or in your current community.
If there isn't a high school that's a suitable option, another possibility would be to donate the amount of a typical Catholic high school tuition towards the post-secondary education of a needy student (someone from the public high school your classmate attended?).
In any case, you'd be using the fruits of your education to make a comparable education available to someone else, thereby, at a minimum, balancing the scales.
When I was in eighth grade at a parochial school in the Midwest, I received a scholarship to the high school as the No. 1 student. This was a school tradition. For 70 years, I have felt guilty that the No. 2 student transferred to the public high school instead of continuing his Catholic education. My family was not wealthy, but I would have gone to the Catholic high school whether it was free or not. Should we have refused the scholarship so that someone more needy could use it?A way to mitigate the guilt that has followed you for 70 years could be to pay it forward by donating a scholarship to your high school, perhaps for the #2 student from your elementary school, or for a high performing student with financial need. I'm sure the school would be happy to guide you in how to best target the scholarship.
If you can't afford to donate funds for a scholarship in perpetuity, I doubt they'd say no to a one-time scholarship to put one student through four years of high school.
If (like mine) your old high school has since closed, you could donate to another comparable school in your community of origin, or in your current community.
If there isn't a high school that's a suitable option, another possibility would be to donate the amount of a typical Catholic high school tuition towards the post-secondary education of a needy student (someone from the public high school your classmate attended?).
In any case, you'd be using the fruits of your education to make a comparable education available to someone else, thereby, at a minimum, balancing the scales.
Friday, May 03, 2019
How to calculate a personal cost-benefit analysis for the Ontario Library Service
Short version:
To calculate how much actual money you pay to support the Ontario Library Service, multiply line 428 of your tax return * 0.00003181673.
Full version:
Last year, I calculated a personal cost-benefit analysis of the tax dollars that I, personally, pay in support of my local public library.
In the wake of recent cuts, I was going to write up a personal cost-benefit analysis for the Ontario Library Service, but before I could do so, the Toronto Public Library announced that these cuts wouldn't affect their services.
However, there is much more to Ontario than just Toronto, and the differences in population and population density mean libraries in many other parts of Ontario have smaller collections (and therefore need more interlibrary loans) and smaller municipal tax bases (and therefore are more dependent on provincial funding.)
So, for everyone else in Ontario, here's how to calculate your own cost-benefit analysis of the Ontario Library Service.
Ontario's total revenue for the 2017-2018 fiscal year was $150.6 billion.
The Ministry of Tourism, Culture and Sport's 2017-2018 funding for Ontario Library Service North was $1,645,800, and for the Southern Ontario Library Service was $3,145,800.
$1,645,800 + $3,145,800 = $4,791,600 in total funding for the Ontario Library Service.
$4,791,600 / $150.6 billion = 0.00003181673. This is the portion of your provincial taxes that support the Ontario Library Service. (If you prefer percentages, that's approximately 0.003%)
The amount you paid in provincial taxes can be found on line 428 of your tax return.
Therefore:
To calculate how much actual money you pay to support the Ontario Library Service, multiply line 428 of your tax return * 0.00003181673
To calculate the amount saved by the recent cuts, divide this number by 2.
Then you can look at the resulting dollar amount and see how it compares with the library services you use over a year.
You can also look at how this will add up over your lifetime, and how that will compare with the library services you use over your lifetime.
If you don't want to do the math yourself:
A single TTC fare is currently $3.25, which is 43 years of OLS cuts. In 43 years I will be 85, and 3 of my 4 grandparents died by that age. So if I ever, even once, have to leave my neighbourhood to fetch a book because it is not available by interlibrary loan (for example, if it can only be sourced from a library that's affected by these cuts), I will not have gotten my money's worth.
Mailing a book would cost even more than that. And buying a book would cost even more than that.
So basically, if I am ever, even once in my life, inconvenienced by these cuts, I will not have gotten my money's worth.
Considerations:
The Ontario fiscal year runs from April to March, so the 2017-2018 numbers are from April 2017 to March 2018. I've used these because I couldn't find the 2018-2019 public accounts. The tax return numbers I've suggested using for your own salary and taxes paid are from January 2018 to December 2018 (assuming you used your 2018 return). If anyone can provide a source for more current numbers, or for numbers that cover the exact same time period, please post in the comments.
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