The other day, I was actually able to help my high schooler with her homework. Unlike me or her father, she’s a math and science nerd. Her schoolwork started stumping us around 9th grade.
But this time, she came home tired from a late shift at the burrito factory and requested an assist on an AP English assignment. Well! Finally, something for which I’m qualified!
She said she got a 98 on the paper! Now I’m wondering why the teacher deducted those two points…
srv
Colbert tonight was pretty much like a late shift at the burrito factory too. Trump tried to graciously help, but I don’t think Colbert’s new schtick is working out for him.
leeleeFl
Maybe she spelled her name incorrectly!?
Amir Khalid
Because there’s no such thing as perfection?
craigie
Because she knows you helped.
NotMax
Wine stains.
:)
Ole Phat Stu
Because she was supposed to write ‘Murican, not English?
amk
the dogs/chickens did nasty on it without you knowing about it?
Arclite
Because she didn’t use the Oxford comma?
BillinGlendaleCA
We had burritos tonight, but it was from King Taco not the burrito factory.
Morzer
Clearly you misunderestimated the teacher’s minimum bribe level.
Amir Khalid
Is that the moon in the picture, a lemon, or an egg? It’s hard to tell.
Morzer
@Amir Khalid:
A gibbous egg
NotMax
@Amir Khalid
Could be a Rocky mountain oyster.
AnotherBruce
Sad day. Yogi Berra passed away at the age of 90.
BGinCHI
As an English Prof I would say, and this is from years of the most sophisticated pedagogical training and practice in the world: Because shut up that’s why.
Major Major Major Major
I’ll just sit here and not scratch.
http://imgur.com/rrJSKJd
BillinGlendaleCA
@Amir Khalid: This is the moon
BillinGlendaleCA
@Major Major Major Major: It’ll only get worse in the next few days, and then maybe 3 months later, it might hurt a bit again. (I got a new tat about 3 months ago).
ETA: You are putting A&D on it, right? If not, GET SOME and put it on it.
Botsplainer
Fuck, I’m up. I keep seeing the look on that guy’s face as he’s rushing up on the car and swinging the pistol up in my direction.
Pie Happens (opiejeanne)
@Botsplainer: Wait, is this something new? Last I heard someone tried to run you down with a car as it was leaving the scene of a hit and run.
BillinGlendaleCA
@Pie Happens (opiejeanne): He talked about it downstairs, he was doing lawyer stuff and the guy at the house pulled a gun on him.
BillinGlendaleCA
Going in a hike up in the hills with the kid in the morning, fun, fun, fun.
Botsplainer
@Pie Happens (opiejeanne):
So I went to hand deliver an invoice to the home of a needlessly deadbeat client yesterday, it was enough to chap my ass and was eating me. Took my secretary with me to witness any interaction and to have a second voice to verify that I wasn’t threatening.
The place looked abandoned. Knocked on the door, left the past due invoice on the stoop, knocked on the lower window and went to the car to scour my phone for alternative addresses.
Secretary suddenly said “oh, somebody is coming around the corner. AND HE’S CARRYING A GUN!!!”
He’s swinging the thing toward us, I start shouting “there are two of us in this car, and we’re unarmed”. Put both hands on the window and turned my whole body to take whatever. I just kept trying to defuse, he’s screaming at me and waving the gun at me for bringing the bill to his house. I avoid reaching in my pocket for the key. Finally, he backs off a step and starts to turn, I pop the parking brake and roll out the drive.
Pie Happens (opiejeanne)
@Botsplainer: Wow!
What now?
Thanks. I did look for your explanation in the thread just before this one, and that wasn’t the one where you mentioned this.
Botsplainer
@Pie Happens (opiejeanne):
Word is spreading around the local legal community like wildfire. He’s a guy who is constantly in jams and constantly has legal needs – this is the sort of conduct that results in someone being literally blacklisted, forever locked out of obtaining representation from any source.
It’s gonna suck to be him. He’s also going to find that one of his main income streams isn’t going to be interested in using him anymore.
A guy
Weed out the crappy clients. The key to practicing law
raven
RIP Yogi.
raven
The Yog
Botsplainer
@A guy:
I’m usually better about it, but it was a compressed flurry of work, so I got caught on the bad side of things. As uncollectables go, it’s $2500.00 – enough to piss me off, not enough to wreck me.
satby
@Botsplainer: That’s the kind of guy who shows up at the courthouse to take revenge on those who have “wronged” him. I hope you made out a police report.
satby
@raven: They broke the mold after they made him, for sure. RIP.
Patricia Kayden
@Botsplainer: Did you call the police? He needs to be reported for making threats, at the very least. Thank goodness neither you or your Secretary was hurt. That sounds scary as hell.
raven
@Patricia Kayden: The dude is a fucking lawyer. If he can’t figure out what to do the people on this blog are not going to be be able to help him.
Mustang Bobby
Went to see a play last night, got home around 10:45, finally fell asleep about 11:30, and jolted awake when the alarm went off at 3:00, and here I am at my desk…
Getting too old for this shit.
satby
For the second pay cycle in a row, my paycheck has not arrived on time. Which is making me feel less bad about deciding to quit my job. Nothing focuses your mind on a needed change like buying gas with nickels and dimes from your change jar because you used up all your quarters the last time. I drive my girls to school and pick them up because we live out of district, so I need to live less on the edge.
raven
@Mustang Bobby: I am dreading four days in LA for a wedding next week.
BillinGlendaleCA
@Mustang Bobby: I feel your pain, I’ve gotta be up in about 5 hours and get ready to head out on my hike with the kid.
BillinGlendaleCA
@raven: Looks like we may have ordered up some nice weather for ya.
Botsplainer
@satby:
It’s complicated. This guy is referred to as “Mr Rolodex” because he’s a compulsive collector of personal cellphone numbers of pols and officials, and constantly drops names. No fewer than three people whose opinions I respect advised me to refrain from filing criminal charges in order to NOT have him do just what you fear. And two of them dealt with him in the past – he’s a vindictive prick.
Mustang Bobby
@raven: Yeah, that should be loads of fun. Take your own water.
@BillinGlendaleCA: You’re a good dad.
Hey, any chances for a raven/BillinGlendaleCA meet-up?
raven
THE EMAIL SCANDAL BLEW UP YESTERDAY!!!!!!!
Mustang Bobby
@raven: You mean when I wrote a snarky reply to a co-worker about a budget transfer and hit Reply All by mistake? I already apologized for that.
raven
@Mustang Bobby: We had talked about that. We haven’t seen any “out there” family in three years and it’s going to be wall-to-wall except for a few hours Saturday when I’ll be locked in a motel room in Irivine watching, oh I don’t know, THE BIGGEST GAME for the Dawgs in the 31 years I’ve lived here!
raven
@Mustang Bobby: :)!
Botsplainer
@Patricia Kayden:
Nah. He’s barred from my offices and going to find local legal assistance VERY hard to get. That’s satisfactory to me at the moment.
I’ll be keeping tabs on him in the future, and every opportunity I have to twist the shiv I’ve got stuck in him (that he has yet to feel), I will.
satby
@Botsplainer: That’s how bullies win, they scare people into letting them slide on stuff that would otherwise come back to hurt them. And sooner or later he will escalate anyway.
But he didn’t point the gun at me and I don’t live there. And you have other shit on your plate to deal with, so I can understand you taking a pass on that.
BillinGlendaleCA
Sure Mika, it’s a 3 way contest; with Joe Biden who isn’t running. Can we please get a better press corpse.
ETA: Now they’re starting on the email crap, CLICK.
OzarkHillbilly
@raven: “Nobody goes there anymore. It’s too crowded.”
BillinGlendaleCA
@Mustang Bobby: We had a blast on our last hike up Mt. Hollywood and have been talking about heading up into the higher mountains(the Verdugos). She starts classes tomorrow so it’s out last chance, probably until xmas.
ETA: I think we’ve even convinced her mom to go along when the weather cools a bit.
Botsplainer
@satby:
Oh, he knew exactly who I was and why I was there from the beginning, and intended to intimidate. It wasn’t “curiousity about an interloper”, because he’s a notoriously hard defendant to serve – he doesn’t come to the door for anybody. Sheriffs and process servers are greeted by wood.
I worried for a bit about random JWs, Mormons and magazine sellers, then realized that they wouldn’t have gotten a response. Then I realized – I was visible, and he declined to drop the gun act when talking to me at the car.
I’ve never kept a gun at the office, but I do have fears about this guy, and am thinking I may need to change that policy.
MattF
Good morning!
@Botsplainer: One way to think about it is i.t.o. ‘behavioral repertoire’. Now that you know that ‘pull a gun’ is part of his repertoire (rather than, e.g., ‘negotiate’), you are free to put this guy on your list of ‘people I enjoy staying away from’.
Baud
@raven:
@BillinGlendaleCA:
Did something actually happen? I missed it completly.
raven
@Baud: Just asshole Joe.
BillinGlendaleCA
@Baud: No, it’s just Morning Joe. There was a poll with Biden 8 pts below Hillary and Bernie 2 pts below him.
ETA: On that note, I’m headed to sleep with the dogs and get some rest before getting ready(make breakfast for me and the kid and get the supplies together) for our hike.
Baud
@raven:
NYT says the FBI recovered deleted emails from the server, so that’s at least new.
The blurb says that “Mrs. Clinton has not been accused of wrongdoing.” So maybe the NYT is starting to feel the heat on how they are reporting on Clinton.
Van Buren
@raven: Nobody goes there anymore. It’s too crowded.
90% of this game is half mental.
MattF
@Baud: It’s also, mirable dictu, the opposite of what they were saying a few weeks ago.
Baud
@MattF:
And possibly what they’ll be saying a few weeks from now, depending on need.
Botsplainer
@MattF:
Dude goes 350-400 pounds, consisting primarily of ego and bullshit. Given his wheezing from hauling himself around the house, his sloppy gun handling and his sweaty agitation, I had concerns that he was going to keel over from a coronary and I’d somehow get blamed for refusing to render aid.
I won’t find it difficult to stay away.
I’m pretty certain I’m not the first person to come and try to personally collect on an obligation from him.
Baud
Re: Hillary’s emails and the facts and press, this Kevin Drum piece is awesome at laying it all out.
OzarkHillbilly
@Baud:
So they can’t even get that right? The Repubs have been accusing her of everything short of genocide ever since they finally noticed the addresses on the emails.
Mustang Bobby
@Baud: According to my made-his-fortune-writing-code brother, unless you destroy the hard drive, as in shred it and melt the pieces, data is recoverable. It all depends on how much you want to spend to get it back.
Keith G
First morning since Sunday that I have not had a low grade fever. Real bummer of a cough virus, it seems, but better days ahead.
Six months ago, I bought tickets for an up and coming indie rock band, Catfish and the Bottlemen for tonight. Hopefully, this afternoon I will be feeling strong enough to go.
Schlemazel
@Botsplainer:
I had a gun stuck in my face as a teen and I can still see it sometimes.
I hope this clown is all bluster and no action so nobody ever gets hurt.
Schlemazel
@Baud:
I know there are commercial tools that recover data that has been erased and over written I assume the big boys have better. When I worked on secret projects we had discs literally welded, bent and mashed when done. Now they have shredders for that. You can buy one for home use !
Randy P
@Mustang Bobby: Mine doesn’t go off till 4:30 am, but I feel for you. On the train to work right now.
Wednesday is the toughest morning in my week because I have two of those late nights followed by early mornings.
Re: Yogi Berra. That guy was such an institution, he was an institution when I was a kid and people were quoting these lines back then. And that was a LOOONG time ago. As a kid, I always thought it was strange that his name was so close to a cartoon characters (Yogi Bear). Yeah, I wasn’t too swift in some areas.
@Schlemazel: The government used to recommend overwriting 5 times as I recall, because 3 times wasn’t enough. And that was back in the 80s.
Botsplainer
@Schlemazel:
It’s my second go around – first was when I studied for the bar. I left my study pal’s apartment at 3 am and caught a guy trying to steal my car stereo. I was going to beat the shit out of him, was chasing him down, and then he turned and fired off a round to encourage me to stop. I honored his polite request.
For some reason, yesterday’s event was scarier.
Elizabelle
Good morning, all. Watching BBC World News. VW scandal is their top story.
I think they might get to Yogi Berra too …
Baud
@Mustang Bobby:
@Schlemazel:
Can you imagine if Hillary had physically destroyed her server?
But this is why I’ll never sell my old smart phones.
Baud
WSJ has an article on conservative Catholics who are angst ridden about Francis.
:-)
Elizabelle
@Baud: Poor babies. They were fine with calling the rest of us “cafeteria Catholics” and driving us out of the Church. I welcome their angst.
Mustang Bobby
@Baud: I have a couple of old phones in the desk drawer. If I ever get a smart phone — which is not too likely in the near future — I’m keeping it until it’s obsolete, replaced by the cerebral implant as seen in The President’s Analyst.
Baud
@Elizabelle:
They are feeling the drip, drip, drip of their shrinking privilege.
OzarkHillbilly
Heh.
All those questions aside, numbers are numbers: the majority of fans are in lock-step with Russell Wilson in believing God rewards athletes. So let’s all assume that is true for a moment and ask why NFL pregame shows do not employ a God Analyst in-studio. They tell us the weather and which backups are injured, but they don’t give us any info on who an all-powerful being may make win? Is that not insane to anyone else? Shouldn’t that really be the ONLY thing they tell us?
…
Steelers at Rams The Old Testament is pretty clear on this: If you want to win favor with God, sacrifice a ram. What more motivation could the Steelers need? Pittsburgh in a rout.
…
Broncos at Lions In the Book of Daniel, God keeps some lions from eating a guy. If you watched the first two games of the season, God is still hindering Lions. The Broncos win.
A prediction for every game at the link if you are they betting type. How can you lose?
Baud
@Mustang Bobby:
I love smartphones.
WereBear
@Botsplainer: There was a guy like this who terrorized an entire town. He even shot two of the residents, who didn’t die, but were so terrified of retaliation against themselves and their relatives they didn’t press charges.
Finally, someone in town shot him at long range. And no one in town talked. The investigation never went anywhere.
And you know what? I don’t blame them a bit.
OzarkHillbilly
@Botsplainer: You’re older, and evidently a little wiser.
OzarkHillbilly
@Baud: Raymund Burke’s head is about to explode. Couldn’t happen to a nastier douchebag.
Mustang Bobby
@WereBear: There was a TV movie made about that incident with Brian Dennehy as the bully. Perfect casting; nobody does understated menacing like him.
Morzer
@Baud:
So, Herr Brady, ve meet at last!
Central Planning
-2 because kids don’t use words like “perspicacious”?
Mustang Bobby
@Baud: I’m sure I would too, but two things have kept me from taking the plunge. First is the expense; I’m paying $30 a month for a plain cell, and I have yet to see a smart phone plan for that low. Second, I know myself too well; I’d spend too much time playing with it… not like I don’t do with my PC already…
Elizabelle
Happy first day of fall!
The Google doodle is wonderful today.
linky (duh): http://www.google.com/
Baud
@Morzer:
My campaign would be over if people learned about my shrunken balls.
@Mustang Bobby:
Productivity is overrated.
Plans are more expensive, however.
WereBear
@Botsplainer: I am so seeing a pattern here. Sad fact is, you could probably assemble a collection of such across the country, and no one could distinguish one from another.
I had a gun pulled on me once, and it’s true. That little hole in the barrel looks like the Holland Tunnel.
OzarkHillbilly
@Baud: @Mustang Bobby: I’m with Bobby, no way am I ever owning a phone that is smarter than I. I have enuf trouble with a cell phone that is just, you know, a cell phone.
Morzer
@Baud:
I am sure we could find a couple of assistants to do some good work with a needle and a pump.
Baud
@Elizabelle:
Thanks for the link. Saves me from having to Google it.
Baud
@OzarkHillbilly:
But with a smartphone you can comment while on the toilet! Try bringing your PC into the bathroom.
WereBear
@Mustang Bobby: I’ve read the book, didn’t catch the movie. But since I have Netflix, who knows what the future holds?
Ideally, we would craft scofflaw laws; ones that could enmesh such people with monitoring practices that catch them flouting their bond or parole so that their bullying attempts just give them more jail time. And a period where people could come forward without fear and just bury the guy in criminal complaints.
So many of our laws are predicated on “reasonable man” parameters that a psychopath can just flout them with apparent ease. Because they aren’t in any sense reasonable.
Baud
@Morzer:
Ow.
Morzer
@Baud:
I am interviewing one possibility tomorrow – a Mr S Walker of Wisconsin.
OzarkHillbilly
@Baud: If I did that, when would I read my National Geographic?
Mustang Bobby
@WereBear: The story of the bully basically follows the plot of the play Fuente Ovejuna by Lope de Vega wherein a Spanish town is being terrorized by a bully. [Spolier alert] But instead of no one stepping forward to claim credit for killing him, the whole town takes credit for it.
Mustang Bobby
@Baud: I got a Kindle Paperwhite for my birthday, so now I have something to read in the biffy.
HinTN
@raven: In theory, there should be no difference between theory and practice. In practice there is.
Elizabelle
@Botsplainer: Wow. Glad you and your secretary are OK.
How do you handle someone like that? He can’t get carte blanche to do this stuff because people fear the repercussions ….
There is the “In Broad Daylight” approach. (As several have alluded, up thread…)
WereBear
I have also been holding off on a smartphone, mostly because of data charges. I already have an iPod touch (though it is rapidly being superceded by my iPad mini.) I just don’t want to double our cell phone bill.
OzarkHillbilly
@WereBear:
The problem is that many cops aren’t really all that interested in enforcing laws like that. Anybody who’s had a restraining order with a psycho ex can tell innumerable stories of frustration with law enforcement. And any cop who has been around for more than a year can tell many more stories of restraining orders being broken by the even more psycho person who filed for it to begin with.
The fact is these are really messy situations and it is really hard to ascertain the “proper course of action” for a cop.
WereBear
@Mustang Bobby: Ah! In English, this is the Murder on the Orient Express ploy.
Botsplainer
@Elizabelle:
Fact is, the consequences for him of any criminal action would be inconsequential, and he already knows that. Most of our criminal laws count on there being some characteristic in the personality of the perpetrator to WANT to come into compliance. Our system is not set up for sociopaths who simply don’t comply.
raven
@Elizabelle: Not by talking about it.
WereBear
@OzarkHillbilly: I understand that. In domestic violence situations, if one party wasn’t vulnerable to mental disorders before they hooked up with the psychopath, they certainly have some after.
ThresherK
@AnotherBruce: Yogi: “If you don’t go to somebody’s funeral, he won’t go to yours.”
For a baseball player, he’s entered the pantheon of people about whom quips have been attributed which may have never happened, an exalted plane indeed, inhabited by a few such as Mark Twain, Dorothy Parker, Sam Goldwyn, and Groucho Marx.
“After my passing, the number of witticisms I’m supposed to have made has increased at an alarming rate.”
Patricia Kayden
@Elizabelle: I’m so crazy that I’ve waved to that squirrel several times this morning. LOL
Germy Shoemangler
@WereBear: Nice piece on the cat circus on Way Of Cats! Out of curiosity, I visited their website and checked their “ABOUT” section. The woman who runs the thing loves her cats and has an extensive background in animal care.
Snarkworth
@Botsplainer: Hmm. 400 lbs, anger management issues…..
Maybe you could send him a carton of cigarettes to speed up the inevitable.
debbie
@Botsplainer:
Is there any way or place to report bad clients like there is for bad attorneys?
WereBear
@Germy Shoemangler: Thanks! I appreciate being alerted to such a pertinent ad.
Behold! The first BJ inspired cat post:
Dear Pammy, Is a cat circus abuse?
debbie
@raven:
At the end of an NPR report this morning;
Whatta guy!
http://www.npr.org/2015/09/23/442744981/american-baseball-icon-yogi-berra-dies
Morzer
@Snarkworth:
And a couple of Papa John’s Pizza Abominations.
Germy Shoemangler
@WereBear: I read some of the reviews of the circus on their website. One thing I found amusing: the cats really do what they want. If they don’t feel like doing a trick they will sometimes wander offstage, to the delight of the audience.
The trainer sounds like good people. Uses healthy, natural “reward” treats that she prepares herself, no junk treats. I like the cat rock band; the guitarist leans over his guitar like the coolest rockstar.
debbie
@Mustang Bobby:
Dennehy didn’t need to do anything to seem menacing. Those shoulders said it all.
WereBear
@Germy Shoemangler: That fits right in with other trainers I’ve chatted with.
Feel free to share these insights on the post itself! I’m sure my readers would love to hear such interesting things.
Tom
@Mustang Bobby: Not to mention the fact that email resides in at least two locations – the sender and the recipient.
Very tough to completely delete, email.
Betty Cracker
@Amir Khalid: It’s supposed to be a moon, but I’m not very good at drawing circles. Especially with my fingers. I should get one of those stylus things for my iPad.
Elizabelle
@Patricia Kayden: lil creature makes me smile
Tom
@Baud:
You mean like Mike Huckabee and Mitt Romney did?
Tom
@Central Planning: To be fair, they use them — just not correctly.
Mustang Bobby
@debbie: He was a guest artist at the Stratford (Ontario) Shakespeare Festival a few years ago. I saw him do a couple of one-acts (Huey and Krapp’s Last Tape), Waiting for Godot (which he says is pronounced “God-oh, and who am I to argue with those shoulders), and Pinter’s The Homecoming. He was wonderful, but the best part was in the Pinter play, which I’d learned all through college and grad school was a deep, heavy work. But the way they did it was dry comedy, and Dennehy, as the family patriarch who was supposed to be so scary, came across as weak-willed and harmless, and wow, did it work.
Okay, enough theatre scholar pedantry.
PurpleGirl
@Elizabelle: I love Google doodles. (waves hand)
Elizabelle
@PurpleGirl: waves back.
They can be awesome.
I wish I could save this little waving squirrel for my home screen.
Anybody know if we can do that with a specific Google doodle?
Steeplejack
@Elizabelle:
I haven’t done it personally, but it looks possible. Here’s a helpful link.
debbie
@Mustang Bobby:
I like that kind of pedantry. A friend was in a Broadway revival of a Noel Coward play with Claudette Colbert and Jeremy Brett. I got to go backstage and meet them. They’re the only “stars” I’ve ever met, and they were both down to earth and lovely human beings.
Elizabelle
@Steeplejack: Thank you. Will try that. Watching PBO and Mrs. PBO now.
Central Planning
@Tom:
So, -2 for correctly using uncommon words :)
WaterGirl
@raven: Those are great, raven. I’m going to copy that list and save it for future reference. I also liked the one a commenter posted over at BooMan’s:
The game is 90% mental, the rest is in your head.