dvtv75

> salt makes food taste better

My stepfather would say the same thing. Whenever I'd eat a salad, he'd look at it and say "I can't eat that shit," then he'd eat a steak that had been fried in 1" of fat, some eggs also fried in the same 1" of fat, some home made chips/fries, also fried in the same fat. French toast, to him, was bread fried in 1" of fat.

I wish I was making this up. As a teenager, my diet was horrific, usually undercooked mincemeat with chunks of bone still in it, but I did get some vegetables. Unfortunately, they were "flash boiled" - cauliflower and cabbage that were nearly raw, mashed potatoes that had uncooked and unmashed chunks in it. I used to heap pepper and sauce (ketchup) on everything, so I couldn't taste a thing.

In the event he did eat something that resembled a salad, it was a heavily curried coleslaw, with heavily curried grated carrot, and heavily curried eggs.

When his doctor ordered him on a low fat and low cholesterol diet, he realized that the suggested margarine had less of the bad stuff in it so he could put more on his white bread, usually as thick as a half dozen playing cards.

When he grabbed the salt shaker, you knew he was going to die from a heart attack or a stroke - and he did. Without a word of exaggeration, he would shake salt over his food for half a minute or more. He always had a bottle of Coke beside him, too. He'd drink a couple of 1.5 liter bottles a day in summer.

As an aside, it was almost a decade after I left home before I re-discovered the idea of meals for pleasure. I'd been trained to stuff terrible food in my mouth for so long that I never bothered to taste anything. These days, I'd rather have some fresh-sliced tomato, leek in a white sauce, side dish of tortellini with a drizzle of olive oil over it, and some steamed mixed vegetables (corn, peas, brocolli, cauliflower) than any of the crap he ate, or forced me to eat. Unfortunately, now I'm hungry.

My greyhound rarely cocks his leg, and I would imagine that on the occasions he does that he's simply trying to mask a scent from a taller animal. He usually marks somewhat like a female, pressing his hips forward and just going on the ground.

Head down to Curio Bay and see the remains of a forest from 180mya, too.

I think that signal strength would decrease along the lines of the inverse square, so after you're some distance out, depending on the initial signal strength you'd find it had decayed to a level indistinguishable from background noise.

I think.

I worked for a business that sold videos burned to very cheap blank DVDs, for a pretty high price. We tested them onsite, and had about a 20% failure rate (they cheaped out on the equipment, too) and the passing discs wouldn't work for about a third of customers anyway. I think those discs delaminate after a few years.

I'd fully expect the business to fire him for unethical or immoral behavior...

You've given me quite a chuckle - I'm glad someone took the time, given how long I put into it :)

> as opposed to an inate talent (or set of talents) [...] I'm pretty sure I'm someone with that talent, since I was never taught how to do it.

I'm sure that it's innate, because I can't visualize even simple things.

There have been a number of people who insist that they can teach me how to do that. They always start off with "Picture a..." When I tell them that I can't, I'm just being negative or uncooperative. Eventually, they get angry, throw tantrums, insult me, and stomp off like a child because I'm doing everything I can to prove them wrong, yet it never occurs to them that I simply can't do it. No, I'm always lazy, negative, and am allowing a diagnosis to define me.

> My younger daughter is reading and writing simple words a full year before Kindergarten, thanks to engaging educational apps.

So was I. I was reading books to my parents and grandparents by the time I was three years old. By 8 years old, I had the reading age of an adult, and when my father eventually regained legal access to us (edit: when I was 9 years old), I was correcting his spelling, pronunciation, and grammar.

My entire family thought I was some kind of genius, but it turned out that I have a moderate-to-severe learning disability, and this was an early symptom of it.

I'm not trying to diagnose your daughter, don't even imagine that. However, I am suggesting that there may be other reasons for your daughter's apparent advancement.

A few years ago, I was assaulted after a fashion. (The event could have caused permanent injury, even though it wasn't actually intended.) A friend of mine was a reporter for a local paper, and she asked if she could do a piece on it. I thought it'd be OK, since she wouldn't want to ruin me.

Funny thing.

She changed my position from "I could have been permanently injured!" to "I want all of those potential weapons removed from the state!"

Like you, I won't be talking to journalists again.

I dual boot Win10 and Kubuntu 18.04, plus I run Kubuntu on my laptop. I use Skype in both Windows and Kubuntu. Under Windows, almost unbelievably, it never works right. It either can't find the camera or it can't find the mic, but if it can find the camera it still won't transmit from it. In Linux, I had a little mucking about to get the sound going, but now it just goes.

> Heck, they can understand eevn wehn yuo wrte lkie tihs.

Not aywlas. I keep sineeg tihs, and ftnrqleeuy fnid mlesyf nidneeg to dcgrusaioe (or at lesat cllhgeane) the ptsooiin. For slaml wdros it can wrok, but I fnid tihs is iltnrheeny dcfuliift (and dnniirag, as wlel as fttrrnsaiug!) to raed, and dns'eot slace to let you raed in a ceorneht fhisoan oevr a ranblaosee poierd wtih mtlui-sllibyac wrods.

Iiagnme a cueopmtr sncciee or poolsghcyy txet dylpaeisd or ogzeriand tihs way. It wulod be ulllnntiigbee, or at the vrey bset a sptmbuioal mhoted of trrrnfnseiag lraeg qnttaiiues of dlteeiad itfrimaoonn atalccurey.

Butifyou'regoingtomessupwordsandclaimreadability,whynottakeoutspacesandseehowyoumightfare?

Orsrmcablewrdosinsteeenncswhoitutseacps,too?

Hope there aren't any spelling mistakes, I tried to ensure everything was correct before I messed with it. I spent way too long on this, and since I've tried to check everything out I need a break. It was still quite enjoyable to do, although I'm sure it had a negative impact on my spelling.

My brother lived in Australia for a while. He has olive skin but he's of European descent and can't shave closely, he gets a mild rash on his face. Every time he flew back to New Zealand, he was pulled up for what was claimed to be a random search by New Zealand the security staff.

Some time back, my partner had a really sad event in her life, and she sat on the couch crying. We have two dogs, a happy yet dumb-as-a-rock greyhound, and a collie-staffie cross. The collie noticed, jumped up on the couch, and cuddled into her to (try and) make her happy again.

When we lost her pack mate to cancer, a few years ago, she sat on the couch for ten days, didn't eat, just lay with her head between her paws. We were all heartbroken, myself most of all, but she was too sad to help anyone this particular time. After she recovered, she helped me a lot.

We don't deserve dogs, but dogs are awesome and we could learn a lot from them. “Be the person your dog thinks you are!” ― J.W. Stephens