Phaedrus

True. But as I understand it, there are two big issues that come into play now that a state (OK, two) have legalized it. First, the practicalities of enforcement; AFAIK most of the policing in any state or city is done by that state or city's own police dept, and if they aren't worrying about week the guys who work for the federal government won't have the resources to do so sensibly. Prosecutions would now also have to go through federal rather than local courts, which also limits how many they can have. Secondly, from both a legal and a political perspective, the whole issue of federalism suddenly comes into play. Prosecutions will not only meet opposition from the left; they'll also be opposed by those who are in favor of states' rights, rather than everyone being stomped all over by the folks inside the beltway. Anyway... I'll be watching this one with great interest!

Congrats Nicki!

Congratulations, Spud!

Some discuss this sort of thing on their websites. If you're seeing someone who doesn't, you can always ask.

Polish coffin-maker uses nude models to sell wares A Polish firm that makes coffins has angered the Catholic church by trying to drum up business with a calendar depicting topless models posing next to its caskets. One image from the 2013 edition of the calendar has a blonde model, wearing only a skimpy thong and with a snake draped around her neck, reclining on a coffin. In another, a woman wearing a crimson corset is depicted pulling out the heart of a man lying on a casket. "My son had the idea of creating the company's calendar... so that we could show something half-serious, colorful, beautiful; the beauty of Polish girls and the beauty of our coffins," said Zbigniew Lindner, the firm's owner. "We wanted to show that a coffin isn't a religious symbol. Its a product," he said. "Why are people afraid of coffins and not of business suits, cosmetics or jewelry?" As well as attracting publicity for his firm, the calendar is intended as a source of revenue. It is on sale on the company's website. Anyone who places an order receives a complementary key ring in the shape of a coffin. The Catholic church has condemned the calendar as inappropriate. A church spokesman has said that human death should be treated with solemnity and not mixed up with sex. The church and its teachings have been at the heart of Polish life for generations, but changes in society are challenging the faith. While 93 percent of Poles say they are Catholic, the proportion who attend church regularly is falling. Many people are starting to confront long-standing taboos about sexuality and religion. ------------ And for those who want to see what all the fuss is about, some of the pics are here.

Middle management. Time for a game... we have a choice! SSSSSSSSSS or nommag?

And that's the last I have to say on this.

Ice fishing, did you say?

Oh, dear. So, since I've written a reco for you, does that mean I'm totally fucked with his buddies? Ah, well... you can make it up to me sometime, by ensuring I'm really properly fucked :) Okay? So, back to the thread... Rogers. Rogers sucks more than I have words to express right now. If they were on fire, I wouldn't even bother pissing on them.

Tool? A hammer is a tool, right? Motorhead - The Hammer http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kOeQCTbbDME

I can't help but think that you should have arranged to have your other half walk out the front door just as the client was arriving, while pretending to be the last guy who was just leaving. No, it wouldn't have helped, but it would sure as hell have been amusing :) Which raises a serious question, actually. I've done the same. Obviously, I don't want to be late if I've arranged to meet at a particular time, and so it's good to aim to turn up a bit before time... but neither do I wish to be indiscreet. So, what to do? My usual approach is to drive to somewhere a little bit away, stop there and kill time, and then drive back to where I'm supposed to be at the time I'm supposed to be there. But I'd be interested to know what others feel is the best way to play this.

Just catching up on this thread... I should, perhaps, point out that despite there not actually being a SP-cleaning-fairy, I don't strap a pair of wings on my back and tour Ottawa with a scrubbing-brush at night either :) Sorry if anyone's disappointed by that...

G&T as an appetizer, beer to fill me up, and a glass of port for dessert. Fuck this week. Hello, Weekend! I love you!

I'm pretty sure that being on snow tires (rather than 4-seasons) has been the difference between staying on the road or not for me on at least a couple of occasions. Yes, having to swap them over sucks. But trashing your car sucks more.

I'd feast on all your brains. Sorry, did you think I was one of the good guys? Ha. Aha. BWAHAHAHAHAHA!!!!!

Alas, what matters here is not any individual state, but the Federal Government. If we legalize pot, then there's a good chance that the prohibitionist nuts in Congress will insist that the border be slammed shut... if not completely, it will at least be made far more inconvenient to cross it. That'd be a pain in the ass for many of us, and a very serious problem for Canadian businesses that do a lot of trade with our southern neighbors. Prohibition is a miserable failure. Reality will intervene, eventually. Things are moving in the right direction. But I really don't think it'd be practically sensible for things to be completely legalized here until the argument has been conclusively won south of the border. It's a shame, but life's like that.

A thought... If one SP sees a 250lb guy for an hour, and another sees two 125lb guys for an hour each, haven't they both seen the same volume of guy? (Sorry. It's been a long week.)

I'd have thought this was one of the main reasons to see a SP (rather than, say having an affair). She'll never ask you when you're leaving your wife for her. And rest assured... even if you can't keep sex and romance separate, she almost certainly can :)

Well, I can't comment on that without knowing what the problems are supposed to be, and how frequent they are, and what the evidence is for either a statistical or a causal link between that and vaccination. From the links you provided, they appear to be the standard bunch of conspiracy-theorists. Do you have any links to any peer-reviewed studies on this? So... what? There's money in healthcare? The companies that make drugs are profit-making corporations? This isn't news. FWIW, vaccination isn't anywhere close to being the biggest sector of the market - that goes to treating the chronic diseases of the affluent and aging West. Have a look at which drugs really rake in the $$$... they aren't vaccines. Of course it's plausible. Why do you think drug licensing exists? Why do you think new drugs aren't allowed to be sold without approval? This isn't just bureaucracy for the sake of it. It has no purpose other than to combat this tendency. Unfortunately, this is where the conspiracy-theorists demonstrate their utter lack of understanding of how science works. They equate "plausible" with "proven". If you're going to do that, please remember that your arguments, such as they are, are equally valid when applied to the food you eat, the water you drink, and even the air you breathe. The fact that a company wishes to sell more of its products does not prove that those products kill people. Er... no. People who are well informed about science know damn well that it can be wrong, and sometimes is, and that the quest for knowledge is by no means over. They understand that not every paper or every author is trustworthy, or independent. That's why peer-review and the disclosure of conflicting interests are considered so critical. However, they also know that science, imperfect as it is, is vastly better than unproven rumour. I won't deny that this has happened. But again, this is what the conspiracy theorists get so wrong: they fail to see the difference between "it happened once" and "it happens all the time". Which is why it's important to look at the data and the methodology, of course. "so many"? I'd dispute your characterization of that. You seem to have conflated two things here. The first is the normal progress of science: since you did statistics at university I'm sure you'll appreciate the vast improvement in knowledge provided by the millions of samples we get from real-life use of a drug, rather than the few hundred that exist in a clinical trial. Yes, giving a new drug to more people enables us to find out more about it. If you want certain knowledge and absolute safety, you won't get it; there will be no further advances in medicine if we adhere to that impossible standard. Secondly, there's the cases where adverse findings are covered up. This is rare (I can't think of an example off the top of my head, although I know it's happened), and this isn't about science; it's about common-or-garden criminality. My sympathies to her. But I suspect your grandmother was more right about this than you... back when this happened, did they use a fresh, sterile needle for every new patient? Her calling it a 'dirty' needle may well be exactly correct. Like what? Please read my earlier explanation in this thread of how the 'flu virus works and why it sometimes doesn't, with particular reference to the existence of many 'flu strains and the problems of trying to predict which ones will be important a year in advance. It's not perfect; it's better than nothing. For the same reason that I also eat food that I have not personally grown and prepared. I think most of us do this. I trust the likes of the FDA and the CDC because I have no reasonable choice in the matter; I don't have time to learn how to prepare vaccines from scratch and actually do so. Neither do I have time to carry out clinical trials myself. Also, when I visit a restaurant, I don't stand in the kitchen and personally ensure that the chef washes his hands while he prepares my meal. I knocked this one down in a previous post. The reason for this is that they MUST, by law, report anything which is reported by patients who have had the vaccine. This includes symptoms reported by very small numbers. Or a cold. Which the patient may have already been incubating before they got the shot. And yes, it's possible that they did get these symptoms as a result of exposure to the dead virus in the vaccination... in which case I really dread to think what will happen to them when they're exposed to the real thing. I guess this is why 'flu has a mortality rate. Yes, that's why they always ask you to wait 15 mins after getting the vaccine before you leave. Er, no. You can look at the published evidence, and gauge its credibility. This is why the double-blind trial and peer-reviewed publishing are so important, why it's so important for researchers to declare conflicts of interest and funding sources, and why not all the 'data' you may find is equal. Which, incidentally, brings me back to the MMR vaccine/autism thing. I said in a previous post that the doctor who was responsible for this bit of junk science was banned from practice. Please note, however, that he wasn't banned for being wrong; people being wrong and having theories disproved is just part of the normal progress of knowledge. He was banned for funding conflicts of interest, for falsifying data, and for abuse of children in his care. Trust the corporation? Of course not. But as I explained earlier, I do trust that they want to continue to be profitable. And I'm afraid I simply don't buy that everyone who works in the regulatory agencies has been completely bought up by the drug companies... although I guess this is why they're called "conspiracy" theories :) Er... ALL attempts at health improvement have a placebo effect. This is well understood. If you meant to say that 30% have no effect beyond the placebo... you may well be right - but please bear in mind that "attempts at health improvement" also includes things like magic crystals and homeopathy. While I'm on the subject, note that the FDA and similar organizations don't just assess the safety of a new drug before licensing it; it won't be licensed unless it's safe AND effective. That's why they don't approve many things that simply do no harm. This is pretty much par for the course for the conspiracy theorists, alas. Sure you can! Welcome to the Internet!

Time for an entertaining interlude... http://xkcd.com/1068/

By no means all do. And if you really want to see someone who asks for them, then I'd suggest you ask her directly. She may just say "no", but many SPs who ask for references will also be OK with just doing a bit of extra screening to make sure you're legit. I've never planned this in advance, and neither have I ever met a SP that I didn't want to do it with :) You'll find that you can only contact some through email :) Quite a few ladies won't give out their number until you've at least booked a meeting. This one's completely down to the individual SP; some have multiple methods of contact, in which case choose whatever you're most comfortable with; some only have one, in which case you're stuck with that.

And did you notice how vague it was? This is entirely deliberate. The tricky thing about making a commercial vaccine is making sure that it remains useful for a reasonable lifetime between the factory and the clinic. Most of those weird-sounding ingredients are preservatives and stabilizers, rather than things that have any biological effect. And some of those ingredients, and the cocktails of them that are used, are jealously-guarded commercial secrets, which is why the CDC don't get to publish (or possibly even know) the details of them. So, to answer the obvious next question: we know they're safe because of the clinical trials that are run. They've been tested in humans under controlled conditions; before that they were thoroughly tested in animals (I know many people don't like the idea, but it's the law) and before anything even gets as far as a lab cockroach it's been extensively tested for effectiveness and toxicity on cell cultures. They don't want to, no. But they have to :) The companies you mention, like all publicly-traded companies, are ultimately responsible to their shareholders. That means they need to make money. And they don't make money by letting their customers die, or by screwing up and producing unsafe products that result in their customers suing them. They make money by selling their customers a product that works, so those customers (that's us, by the way) can survive to buy more of their products in the future. They don't sell us working medical products because they're nice, or altruistic; they do it because that's where their profits come from. They don't invent new drugs out of a sense of social responsibility or charity; they do it because they want to continue to be profitable. I wouldn't, because I don't think anything fundamental has changed. What HAS changed is that these things are far more widely recognized and better understood than in the past, and therefore now diagnosed far more often. It's not that more kids have autism or ADHD today; it's just that they're actually being diagnosed with these conditions and helped, rather than just labelled as "a bit weird" or "an absolute little shit". I consider this to be a thoroughly good thing. And since you've raised this in the context of a thread about vaccination, I really must take the time to mention that the link between the MMR vaccine and autism that was publicized a lot in the UK (and elsewhere) has been completely debunked. It's bullshit. It always was, despite the scaremongering. The doctor who kicked the whole shitstorm off has been barred from practicing medicine as a result of his dishonesty. If you genuinely believe that there's any kind of link between the conditions you mentioned above and any vaccine, please do share the evidence. I'd be very interested to see it. No, they don't. Quite the opposite, in fact. We are all exposed to far fewer viruses and other pathogens than in the past, and one of the big reasons for this is that vaccination exists, and it works. Provided enough people take advantage of it to eliminate the breeding-grounds for disease, of course. A small amount of dead 'flu virus put into your arm is a lot less of a viral load than exposure to someone who's succumbed to the real thing. The allergies thing is fascinating, and one of the problems with it is that nobody really has a clue what's happening. Yes, allergies seem a lot more common. We don't know why. However, I don't propose to derail this thread to discuss it... but if you start another one I'll see you there :) No, people are not sicker now... and no, it's not up for debate. Look at the statistics. Look at mortality rates and life expectancies. The numbers don't lie. We are healthier for longer than ever before. Please bear in mind that one of the big reasons so many of us die of cancer or heart disease at eighty is that we didn't die of polio or smallpox at ten, and that's because of vaccination. There have certainly been many changes. But they're not all bad. As I explained previously, this decision doesn't just affect you personally. It affects the society you live in. Also, if you're really concerned about these things, don't ever read the labels on the food you eat, or the bottles of stuff you put on yourself in the bathroom. Just to return to that CDC list: did you happen to notice how many of those exotic-sounding ingredients are also in your food? Preservatives and stabilizers aren't just useful for keeping vaccines fresh. If you're serious about not putting these things into your body, I'd recommend that you quit modern society and move to a hunter-gatherer or subsistence-farming lifestyle. The problem of how to fund our aging population is undoubtedly a tricky one... and again, a subject for another thread. It has nothing to do with vaccination.