Condolences/Birthdays/HAIR/Mlists/Scholastic/Age Discrimination/name: Chang

[Catlady (Rita Prince Winston)]

Anna dradamsapple wrote:

<< My father-in-law passed away after a 35 year battle with Diabetes. 
It is very sad, however (snip) it was time. (snip) it was an awful 
thing for anyone to see, never mind go through. Especially since his 
body stopped functioning, but his mind didn't. Anyhow, sorry for the 
rant, I guess I just needed to vent. >>

I've never learned how to say comforting things about bereavement, but 
I'm glad that at least you have this place to vent. *hugs*  

Rylly the Birthday Elf wrote on May 19 :

<< Today's birthday honourees are Michelle and Fiona. >>

Michelle the Pingu! I tried to YM a Joyeux Jour de Fete message to 
you, but I'm not sure it worked. I don't know how to say Happy 
Birthday in Greek. And I don't know in what language to say Happy 
Birthday to Fiona.

Sheryll the bad Birthday Elf wrote on May 22:

<< Yesterday's birthday honouree was Mirzam Black. >>

Bad Birthday Elf! But you could claim that the Taurus-Gemini cusp is 
somewhere around here and confusing you. What is it like to be mixed 
of the stability of Taurus and the flightiness of Gemini? Btw, Natal 
Congratulations to Mirzam (whose name I used to keep mistaking for 
'Miriam').

Happy Birthay May 22 to Jen P the secret Oprah watcher and 
husband-shaver!

Tabouli wrote:

<< Cindy:
> Am I the only woman who thinks the proliferation of bald men is a 
> fabulous development?
(the salad's jaw drops, aghast, from between its long dark crowning 
curtains)
Cindy! What is this hair-razing blasphemy against the most glorious 
substance produced by the human body? Wash out your follicles with 
soap and water! ;o) 
And what's these other women *agreeing* with her sentiments? Is mine 
to be the only voice raised in protest? Tsk tsk tsk. >>

Tabouli! I agree with you! And kudos on 'hair-raZing'. Btw, if that 
was your birthday, I hope it was a good one.

Cindy wrote:

<< My daughters are blessed with natural ringlets -- the only thing 
their hair requires to form fabulous ringlets is water -- and they 
*hate* their hair. They pine for straight hair. >>

This is excessively common. Despite infinite cliches of women with 
straight hair yearning for curls, I know so many women with lovely 
wavy/curly hair who claim it's an ugly mess and yearn for straight 
hair. Back in NYC, if they were close enough friends for me to joke 
coarsely with, I accused them of racialized self-hatred, "you just 
don't like your hair because it's Jewish/Italian hair, you want WASP 
hair because it's upper-class." (Judy replied seriously: "I don't 
want to be *blonde*, I just want *Japanese* hair, black and 
*straight*.") Here in LA, I could only accuse them of wanting to join 
the Pacific Rim majority (East Asian and Latino).

<< Fortunately for them, they can have straight hair anytime they 
like -- all they need is a hot blow dryer. And if they use a 
flat-iron, then they get these luxurious waves. >>

I share your envy!

David quoted Cindy:
<< How much work is it to stay bald, anyway? Do you have to shave 
your head every morning? >>
and replied:
<< Never having tried, I can't answer this, though the option is open 
to women, too, so a little experimentation might tell you, Cindy. >>

David, your whole post was a hoot, especially that bit. Btw, Tim once 
shaved his head (when he was a teen-ager, long before I met him), 
because his father nagged him about his hair getting long like some 
kind of hippy.

Charis Julia wrote:

<< it is * so* unfair that most of the guys in her life have better 
hair than she does. It's like eyelashes. Have you ever noticed that 
men have longer and curlier eyelashes than women? It's true. . . >>

Men's head hair grows faster than women's, an average of eight inches 
a year versus six. But they won't have better hair than you once male 
pattern baldness sets in. But they'll still have better eyelashes ... 
men have longer, thicker eyelashes than women because men are (except 
for the bald spot) hairier than women.

Heidi asked:

<< How many of you have your first experience with Usenet, mailing 
lists or message boards because of your interest in HP? And what's it 
like, being a newbie to both the list/board/group *and* to the 
concept/method of discussion? What do you think when you see the 
style of posting, etc.? >>

I don't do Usenet, but I think my first experience with Yahoo!Clubs, 
Egroups, etc, was because of HP. I can remember wanting to discuss HP 
with someone less easily bored by it than my RL and APA-L friends, 
and suddenly having having the realization (flash of lighning) that 
there might be a ... was it e-group? >b and using their search 
function and finding a hundred, mostly useless, but one was HPA 
(Harry Potter Anonymous) and I think Heidi lived the rest of the 
story (the flight to HPfGU Yahoo!Club, the migration of HPfGU from 
Y!Clubs to e-groups, the consumption of E-groups by Yahoo into 
Y!Groups ... )

I suppose I *must* have had some previous contacg with E-groups to 
even think of looking there for HP ... 

At that time, HPA and HPfGU were small enough that I was able to read 
their entire web-archive of back posts before I first posted. I don't 
recall having any trouble with the style of nested quotes and so on, 
and already knew the major smilies :) and soon someone helpfully 
explained <veg> (which has nothing to do with vegetables) ... I 
believe that I immediately felt at home with the style, and attribute 
that to many years of living in old-fashioned hard-copy APAs ... APA 
stands for Amateur Publishing Association and you can probably find 
a lot of history about hobbyists of fine printing and so on, but as 
an sf fan, to me APAs are a means of conversation, no matter how bad 
the typing and mimeography or photocopying (whichever is cheaper at 
the time) might be. 	

David wrote:

<< If you go to The Leaky Cauldron (www.the-leaky-cauldron.org/) or 
direct to
www.scholastic.com/aboutscholastic/news/press_05192003.htm
You can see details of Scholastic's marketing campaign. >>

Thanks for the info, I looked at the Scholastic PR and it seems to me 
that the 'marketting campaign' is mostly just suitable celebration of 
such a big, important, happy event. Except: why is Major League 
Baseball involved? They are NOT Quidditch.

Jen P wrote:

<< Well, that's what the *tell* people (and you know it's bad when 
they actually tell people something like that). From my experience 
(as a young person hired instead of an older person), it's mostly 
just a matter of money. >>

I'm under the impression that part of the matter of money is that 
group health insurance price factors include the percentage of 
coverees in various age groups (under 30, under 40, under 55).

<< young kids fresh out of college can live in studio apartments with 
2 roommates and eat ramen and Mac 'n' Cheese from a box. >>

Physically speaking, the young people are better at pulling 
all-nighers and going without sleep. And culturally, they don't 
have to waste some of their waking hours to childcare and yardwork 
(neither do I, but I'm an exception).

Prittylina wrote:

<< Perhaps HK, but Cantonese really doesn't have "Chang" as a surname 
(Cantonese would be "Cheung")... >>

At my university, there was a student from Hong Kong living in my dorm 
named Miao Chang. I dearly love the name 'Miao' but she had a little 
Pekinese dog living in her room with her, not a cat.