threenorns

we're canadian, both immigrants, i came over as a baby and he's been in canada some 20-odd years. the problem is our house.

my background is british/finnish/scandinavian - i like natural stuff like wood, stone, rough or tumbled glass, woodsy-type plants, etc. i like dark, rich colours like eggplant, blood red, etc, and i love copper but hate gold and silver. i don't much care for patterns unless they're more subdued - not at all big on florals. i like pale, rich wood (think maple) or dark wood (teak, mahogany); don't like pine.

his is east indian/trinidad - he likes black lacquer, loud colours, lots of brass/gold/etc, lots of brocades and florals. he likes neutral coloured wood - not too light, not too dark. he loves glass tables (ixnay on that with kids or pets around!) and kitschy stuff like hammock chairs and big blowsy fern-type plants and mirror art and fibre-optic flower arrangements.

an example: i would like to have pennies cover the floor coming down the split entry and continuing into the basement. he thinks that's the stupidest idea ever. he wants laminate - i think that's horrible simply because of the water problem (canadian winters, you know).

so right now our house has cream walls, nothing on them; nothing on the floor because the ancient carpet HAD to go; my tiny little couch in the living room and a set of hand-me-down coffee tables. that's it.

how do we mix such disparate styles without it looking, well, awful?

i live in a 2nd-floor walkup with a balcony *right over* a river. i mean literally, step off the rail and "splash!". so i always see fish down there and today i thought "why not catch lunch?" and tossed a line over. within minutes, i was hauling up fish after fish. i tossed the bigger ones back (for conservation purposes - they're of breeding size) and kept the smaller ones for eating (sweeter and tastier than the big ones anyway).

couple hours later, my landlord is knocking on the door - decent about it, but still - telling me it's illegal to fish off the balcony and i'll get him in trouble.

now, there's a dock about 20ft downstream and ppl (including the landlord) frequently fish off it.

so what's the difference, except i can't get as far into the stream as they can (half of them don't even bother pulling lines when boats and floaties go by!).

my 4yr old had dental surgery this morning (exactly 12hrs ago). she's fine - except for being a bit more clingy and cranky than usual, she's basically back to normal (20min after leaving the dentist, she was knocking back honey-garlic meatballs and an apple juice).

thing is, her breath REEKS like a chemical factory - it's the gas they used to knock her out.

i've been put under any number of times (numerous facial operations) and i don't remember it taking this long for it to clear, but then i was put under with a needle, not a mask, and i don't remember from when i was her age.

she's been asleep for a couple hours and i've been checking her every 30 minutes (which i will do until she wakes up on her own) but that smell just gets to me - i can smell it as soon as i get near the bed. i'm wondering if it's an indicator that her body is not clearing the stuff from her system as well as it should.

a friend of mine does it - sometimes she loses money but not often. usually she makes money. she started with a small sum (three or four hundred, kinda thing) and she said every month she can pretty much count on making enough to pay off a few bills or buy groceries without ever having to add more money from her pocket. basically, she's partially living off the proceeds.

i opened a practice account and so far, my initial $200 in play money has more than tripled.

is it really this easy?

what am i missing?

i have two older daughters now grown and gone but my youngest isn't even 4 yet. by the time she reaches her age of majority, i'll be pushing 60 - given family medical history, i have to face the fact that there's a good chance i'll cack it before she's old enough to be independent. i want to secure her future but in a way that will keep it from the public eye - i don't want to bust my hump only to have her money nibbled away by taxes and user fees or, worse, outright theft and fraud. i was thinking of investing it somehow and having it locked away to be released only upon reaching the age of 20 or when the trustees agree. i've already set up an RESP but i also want her to have money that's hers - it would be dreadful if she (or her legal guardian) was forced to cash in her RESP just to meet day to day expenses.

what should i look at? GICs? mutual funds? foreign currencies? something else?

ideas?

to put it simply: if you were ONLY allowed one movie EVER AGAIN, which would it be?

and please: details! ***why*** do you love this movie so much?

what movie was the one you wished you could've pulled your eyes out of their sockets before watching and what was it about the movie that totally killed it for you?

we all know movies that are BAD - but we still love to watch them in spite of holes in plot or logic you could drive a semi through. for example, Day After Tomorrow - i love that movie, even though the sight of the characters clambering about a METAL ship BARE-HANDED in temperatures so cold people are freezing to death within a few hours makes me grind my teeth. and then there's the "wolf" thing - totally gratuitous and completely unfair to that noble animal - that drives me quietly insane.

but i still like the movie - it's a good story.

"on golden pond", now.... AAACCH, ptooie!!!!!!

i mean, the boyfriend is socially correct enough to request the father's blessing to sleep with the daughter in the same bed but then doesn't bother to stop by to introduce himself as the son-in-law after marrying the daughter in europe!?

AND he leaves his 13yr old troubled son with two frail, elderly ppl he knows nothing about, one of whom is clearly suffering alzheimer's or dementia!?

i cry BS!

so which movie makes you want to throw a brick through the screen and why?

i've had three girls and i've noticed that while my oldest was Failure to Thrive and really did look awful, nobody said anything except what next i should try diet-wise.

on the other hand, i know someone whose boy is not even "skinny", he's just a bit shrimpy (if you understand the difference) and she's being threatened with having him siezed and hospitalized if he doesn't put weight on pdq.

my youngest daughter is BIG - she's huge. she's the size, in all aspects: height, weight, and shoe size - of an average 5 or 6yr old, and i never hear the end of it. i should put her on a diet, i should cut out the junk food (that she doesn't get except for special occasions), i should put her in sports (that she's too young to play for the most part), etc, etc, etc. i don't force-feed her - in my house, the rule is definitely not "clean your plate" - it's "eat what you need and leave the rest". she has a very healthy diet - got mad compliments from two public health nurses when they did an all-day review (two nurses, two different occasionas) and saw what she eats on a day-to-day basis. they only had two comments: she eats a LOT and she is insanely hyper.

someone else in town has a boy that is practically my daughter's identical twin and nobody's said anything to the mother at all about it. he's not on any monitoring program, he doesn't have to see the doctor every three months to be weighed and measured, and so on.

could there be actual scientific rationale behind this apparent hypocracy or do you think it's a societal bias?

when you look at a bottle of, f.ex, children's tylenol, there's a column for age and a column for weight.

i've been told by more than one pharmacist that not all meds should be calculated by weight because the development of the internal organs, such as the liver, is dependant on age, not size.

example: my daughter was 51 lbs at 20mo. if you look on the label for children's motrin, by weight she should've received a dosage more suited to a 7yr old while in the age column, it won't even give you any information, just tells you to consult your doctor.

it's not so bad now, she's 47-1/2lbs at 3yrs 9mo (wears size 6x and growing out of a size 13 shoe! yikes!) but the disparity, although not as great, is still there. so how do i know which medications should be done by age and which by weight?

first off, WHERE IS THE OFF BUTTON!??? i'd be happy with the mute button at this point!

my family doctor has categorically diagnosed her with ADHD and says it's one of the worst cases he's seen in someone so young.

honestly, she never EVER just walks anywhere, she has to run, jump, skip, hop. when she sits and watches tv, she's rocking, tapping, bobbing her head from side to side, hiking the chair across the floor, even standing on the floor with her bum up and her head on the ground watching the TV from between her knees and flapping her arms back and forth (that's what she's doing now).

yesterday, she had one hand on the top of a large water cooler bottle that was standing on the floor - it was full - and she ran around it in circles for easily a half-hour at a time. she knocked it over when she got dizzy and i'm not kidding: she just went to the end of the bottle and picked it back up like it was nothing! then she perched herself on top of it and balanced with her feet on the shoulders of the bottle.

she's 3-1/2 and very large: 47-1/2lbs, 42", size 13 feet, size 6x clothing (except for undies, those are size 4 or 5) - height of a 50% 5-1/2yr old, weight of a 50% six and a half year old. is this maybe related?

i have a rebounder for her that she'll jump on for hours (when she was a baby, she loved her jolly jumper - it was common for her to bounce away like a mad thing for literally hours on end until she got too heavy for it at 10 months - they only go up to 25lbs but we managed to make it last until she was 28lbs and it just wouldn't bounce any more, just groaned pathetically. this is the very first time she was put into it when she was 5-1/2mo old (it's a crap vid - what can i say): http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0t0v0PZsv0Y

she NEVER slowed down from that.

right now, she's sitting on a laundry basket full of clean (of course!) laundry, naked and covered with coconut liquid soap, rocking the basket back and forth while gargling with blackcurrant juice.

if i try to put the brakes on her, it's a pompeiian explosion that she's perfectly capable of sustaining for 2hrs plus (her record is 7 hrs).

every morning, it's a mind-scraping hassle to get the clothes on her and the breakfast in her. she used to dress herself - she doesn't any more. literally, the time it takes to get one sock on her foot all the way, she's thought of something or seen something and off she goes.

at the day care, they say she's "perfectly fine" but i've watched when nobody knows i've arrived yet and i've noticed they do spend a lot of time keeping her on track or seated at the table to finish a craft or a meal - she's just not a spoiled brat like some of the others so i guess they don't view her as a problem.

redirection - doesn't work.

time out - total disaster (that experiment resulted in a cracked door frame)

her diet is much cleaner than the usual kid's (*loves* her veggies and she's still nursing) - i don't give her red-coloured candies, cookies, etc, and she NEVER gets pop. i will not be putting her on meds because i don't believe that a 3-1/2 yr old should be taking anti-psychotics.

any tips or techniques you've found that's worked?

then why is donating breast milk viewed with such mixed reaction?

many ppl emailed me that they had wanted to answer but i'd already closed the question so i've reposted it.

occasionally, ppl give me a "wow! great job!" when i explain why i'm in the (*very* clean and sanitary or i don't dare) bathroom (or nursing station or other secluded place) pumping breast milk when i clearly have no infant (my youngest being 3-1/2yrs old and yes, she is still nursing).

occasionally but slightly more frequently, they react with unmistakable revulsion and say things like "omg, what kind of moron would give milk from another woman to their baby!?".

the vast majority is a pause, a look of half-horrified fascination then "uhhh... okay then. dunno why, but... sure. whatever." or a similar such reaction indicating they think i'm several ants short of a picnic.

what is your thought on breast milk donation? have you had experience (on either side)?

WHY is blood donation perfectly fine but breast milk donation not?

[this is a cross-post from "society and culture"]

donating breast milk is something mostly viewed with disdain or even outright disgust?

if i tell someone "i donate blood", pretty much the universal reaction is "oh really! wow! that's so great!"

if i tell someone "i donate breast milk", most reaction ranges from "uuuuh.... okay" through "why would you even want to!?" right on down to outright revulsion. rarely, someone will give uncondition...al approval, usually a breastfeeding parent (yes, i include dads who give whole-hearted support to their breastfeeding wives).

now, why IS that? it doesn't make sense. clearly, if my blood is good enough to save someone's life my breast milk certainly is - and yet, it's not the same.

how would you feel if you found out a woman you know was donating breast milk? what makes you feel that way?

donating breast milk is something mostly viewed with disdain or even outright disgust?

if i tell someone "i donate blood", pretty much the universal reaction is "oh really! wow! that's so great!"

if i tell someone "i donate breast milk", most reaction ranges from "uuuuh.... okay" through "why would you even want to!?" right on down to outright revulsion. rarely, someone will give uncondition...al approval, usually a breastfeeding parent (yes, i include dads who give whole-hearted support to their breastfeeding wives).

now, why IS that? it doesn't make sense. clearly, if my blood is good enough to save someone's life my breast milk certainly is - and yet, it's not the same.

how would you feel if you found out a woman you know was donating breast milk? what makes you feel that way?

she's 63yrs old. a few months ago, she moved in and she is NOT how i remember her. i remember her washing my mouth out with soap because i said "damn" - yet she seems to think it's okay to call my daughter a "f--g spoiled brat" because she was crying for her daddy (he'd just gone home after a visit). then mom said my daughter was "playing me like a harmonica" and was devious and sneaky - my daughter at that time was just over 3yrs old.

then she told me my daughter was a princess - an angel! so adorable!

she told me i was a "doormat", letting my daughter "rule the roost" and walk all over me.

she *insists* my daughter wear clothes in the house and will get right mean if my daughter doesn't put on panties - last time i finally blew up and said "why don't you go look in the mirror!?" (because for some reason, my mother has taken to walking around the house in full view of windows and everything stark naked - not at all a pleasant sight). that was different: "i have the right to walk around my own house dressed however i want".

my daughter has problems, one of them being she gets these tantrums that are impossible to stop. all i can do is manage them. she woke up at 3am with a bad case of the runs. i was consoling her on the toilet while she cried because her butt was burning and right in the middle of it all, mom comes in with this stupid chirpy grin and says "hello? gonna be done soon? i have to pee"

i said oh, come on, you gotta be kidding me! can't you go in the sink or the tub or grab a bucket? she's kind of in a situation here.

mom's face went mean and she said "i SAID i have to pee!" so i told my daughter just wait, i'll clean you up, let nana go and you can get right back on. she lost it - crying and screaming that she didn't want to poo on the floor and she was clinging to the toilet and she was getting that wierd glassy look in her eyes right before she flips into mindless hysteria.

the only thing to do is to shock her out of it, so i shouted in my deepest, sternest voice "KNOCK IT OFF!!!"

next thing i know, mom's flying at me, jabbing her finger in my face shrieking "YOU knock it off! YOU knock it off!!!" she ranted on, telling me she was sick of my "abuse", telling me my daughter was "terrified" of me, she wanted me out of the house, and so on. i kept telling her to listen, you don't understand but she wouldn't stop. my daughter was so frightened she fell into the toilet. i bent over to pick her up and mom flew at me and pushed me backward into the tub. i was so shocked i didn't know what to do - i used to be a powerlifter so i was able to hold my bodyweight on just my quads and i pulled myself back up with a hand on the cementboard (i haven't tiled yet).`

i was literally stunned. the only thing i could think was to help my daughter so i bent for her again and i don't know if mom thought the same thing or was coming after me but the only thought in my mind was "get away from me!" and i shoved her shoulders.

now, this is what happened: she stared at me, her face set in a "how dare you!" look, as she tiptoed backward with her arms outstretched. she stopped at the doorframe, clutched it, paused, then sat down. then she lay back. then straightened her legs. then she lay still. i stared at her, bemused, wondering "what was all that about!?" for a few seconds before asking "mom? you okay?"

she said leave me alone.

i looked around the corner and she was lying on the floor. she sat up, looked at me, then put a hand to the side of her head and said "i hit my head on the sink". i looked from her to the sink and back and said "no physical way could you have contacted the sink unless you were two feet taller". she looked around, pointing vaguely, then settled on a mirror that was on the floor tucked under the pedestal sink (waiting to be put up) and now it's the back of her head she hit.

anyhow, my daughter fled the bathroom and when i tried to go after her mom leaped up and confronted me. she wouldn't let me leave and all the time she was screaming at me until finally i blew up and let her have it. when she tried to tell me she was an expert parent, i said "bull - if it wasn't for the dog, my sisters and i would've been dead five times over before we even started school!" (this is god's honest truth and no exaggeration: that dog saved us many times, including from running into the highway, falling into the well, a rooster attack, a cattle stampeded when we snuck into the cow pasture, alerted mom when i was stuck up a very thin sapling and when my sister was impaled through the palm of her hand hanging from a barbed-wire fence - mom's idea of parenting was

okay, so i got this bird - a cockatiel. his name is "buh" (bob - my daughter named him when she was pre-verbal and all things flying were "BUH!!!! BUH!!!!"

he

does

NOT

shut

tf

UP!!!!

i gave him away - they gave him back to me *plus* a better cage and a budgie on top it! they said it was because they felt guilty about "dumping" him back on me.

i'm seriously thinking of looking up cockatiel recipes if he doesn't jam it soon - all day, all night, it's EEP!!!! EEEEP!!! EEEP!!!!

covering the case - doesn't help.

food and water are always fresh and in cleaned containers.

temperature is fine - it's a little warm for me but he seems perfectly content with it.

he's an evil, evil bird and he lives for the day he can take my eye out.

help!?? somebody!??

my mother is moving in with me and, at my insistence, bringing along her golden doodle who's 17mo old. she bought the dog against my advice because a couple of her grandkids are *deadly* allergic to other animals. she was totally devastated when it turned out to be WAY too much dog for a senior with medical conditions. my mom was told by the breeder that loosey would be "small to medium - maximum 35lbs".

HAH!

Loosey turned out to be quite a bit larger than my mom expected and WAY too much energy. the jumping, chewing, barking, etc, was impossible for my mother to control so the dog spent much of her life in a crate, only being let out for a few minutes at a time to "do her business". as a result, Loosey gained so much weight she literally looked like a curly-coated pig, complete with waddle. i tried to walk her and it was a fiasco - the dog couldn't go even half a block without having to stop and sit down for a bit and forget doggy things like jumping up onto park benches or running up the stairs.

months of lecturing my mother and finally threatening to take the dog from her finally got her to get someone to walk the dog on a quasi-regular basis, stop locking her in the crate all the time, and stop leaving full bowls of crap dog food lying around. Loosey has lost weight and is now about 65lbs or so. it's to the point you can *almost* feel her ribs (you still have to dig for them through the fat pad around her torso) but her skin!

i'm not kidding: i'm going to a circus and have her billed as "the incredible melting dog" because when she lies down, it literally puddles on the floor! when she walks, there are large, loose folds between torso and hind legs and there's a flap of skin running down underneath the length of her body from chest to stomach. my mom thinks it's "adorable" but i find it deplorable. it makes me angry to see it because it was all so unnecessary and so easily prevented.

does anyone have experience with this? given that she's still young, will her skin tighten up with a proper raw diet and daily exercise? i am a devout walker - if i don't walk my own dog at least 6 miles a day, he's bouncing off the ceiling. if it's too hot to walk, we go to one of the local water bodies (can't walk 5min without falling into a river or lake where i live) and swim. Loosey doesn't know how to swim but i expect it'll be easy enough to teach her as both goldens and poodles are water dogs.

will massage help tighten up her skin?

any other ideas?

MANY many times, i've seen dogs that are ***desperately*** in need of regular walking but their owners don't. "no time", "he pulls too much", "it's boring", "i'm too tired". "my health is too poor", etc. meanwhile the dog is going out of its mind with boredom and pent-up frustration and energy. i HAVE to walk a lot - i walk my own dog six miles a day for his benefit as much as mine - he's a border collie mix and *uber*-high-energy - or i'm looking at an artificial hip before i'm 50. so i'm always offering to walk ppl's dogs - they live right on my route, it'd be no hassle to swing by after i've dropped my dog off and pick theirs up, no charge.

honestly, you'd think i suggested doing something immoral with a small chicken, the responses i get!

"uhh... no. no, thanks. no way."

"oh... that's, uh, very nice of you, dear, but i don't think it would do at all"

and a flat-out "oh, i don't like that idea at all".

i have no clue why - if i didn't have to lose weight and someone wanted to walk my dog for me, i'd name my next child after them!

i've been invited to move to france but i'm concerned because my daughter is half hindu. i've heard some pretty not-so-nice things about the way non-white and mixed ppl are treated even by officials (schoolteachers, police, govt, etc). i've been told they also forbid the wearing of religious symbols in public - she wears a bindi (little dot or jewel on her forehead). is that covered under religious symbols or is it more like crucifixes, star of david, hijab, etc?

ppl have told me france is a lovely country, very warm and welcoming - others have said they're that way for tourists, not so much for those seeking residency.

anybody have any hard facts to help me make the right decision?

this is not to discuss the (dubious) health benefits of total castration, all such answer/rants will be reported.

if you have a neutered male dog, please answer the following:

when was your dog neutered:

1 - less than six months

2 - six months to less than one year

3 - one year to less than two years

4 - two years or more

5 - no idea - he was that way when i got him

are you happy your dog was neutered?

1 - yes, totally and without reservation

2 - yes, but i have regrets

3 - no

since your dog was neutered, have you noticed any physical changes?

1 - yes: i like them

2 - yes: i don't like them

3 - no

since your dog was neutered, have you noticed any mental/emotional/behavioral changes:

1 - yes: i like them

2 - yes: i don't like them

3 - no

if you had the chance, would you have chosen a vasectomy (tubes tied) for your dog, rather than a total castration (yes/no)?