Phaedrus

Well, the newest country in the world is South Sudan, so here's something from there. Orababa Band - Tessa Benia http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cBHSpHxG3_k

No, wait... (although given the lack of fripples, I can only conclude that the snow is clearly face... :) )

I'm really at a bit of a loss as to what to say at this point, which is unusual for me. You'll be missed, Pete. I'm sure I'm not the only one who's sad to see you withdraw. But the flip-side of that is the reason you'll be missed: all your contributions in the past. Thank you for those; all the best for the future; and I hope you'll feel inclined to rejoin us eventually.

Many congratulations, Emma - and richly deserved!

Congratulations, Elizabeth!

One thing to note on this (warning: slightly technical stuff coming). When you do this, the CERB page (be it a profile page, or a normal thread page, or a group) includes the image by also sending a request to the image location you give it. CERB doesn't keep its own copy of the image. This means that every time anyone loads the CERB page, the other website gets a request - via CERB - for the image. Some websites seem to be absolutely fine with this (especially if they have their own logo in the image - free advertizing!) but others aren't - in particular, they may not want other websites freeloading on the bandwidth they pay for. They may even be OK with some other sites, but not, say, boards dedicated to adult-oriented activities. So, even when you do as suggested by WIT and Cato above, you may find that the image doesn't display on the page; or perhaps that it does, but then stop doing so a day later when the website it's on works out that it's being leeched. In this case there's not a lot you can do about it - but the Internet being what it is, it's rare that it's impossible to find the same image hosted on another site. Also, this doesn't apply to CERB albums, as AFAIK those images are uploaded to, and hosted by, CERB.

We appear to have a plague of naked guys in furry suits. Old Dog, I hate to break it to you, but the slightly different costumes aren't fooling anyone. They're not even all that different :) Happy Christmas to those celebrating it, and to those who aren't - have a damn good time anyway :)

Some people just don't deserve a lot of sympathy. This has been around for a while... ...which probably made this inevitable.

A rather less light-hearted take on a similar subject... Alice Cooper - Only Women Bleed http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kXW9w17Tf0A

"I'd like to think that God let Christopher Hitchens and Vaclav Havel pick the third." (not mine, and not sure of the source, or I'd have credited it)

I can only conclude that if you're thinking that far ahead, you're way more organized than I am :)

I wasn't planning on saying any more on this thread, but... three things: First up, yes, I'm well aware of the unavoidable irony of starting a new thread to bitch about people bitching about other threads. I suppose I should be grateful that nobody's started another meta-bitching thread to bitch about this one. I think there's probably a good Inception-related joke here, but I can't make it work, so please insert your own. Secondly, I didn't write my original post with any particular other thread in mind; it was more a child of growing frustration than any incident in particular. However, it's been interesting to see which examples others have latched on to. Finally:

Pfft. It doesn't take that long to drive between Orleans and Kanata, provided you avoid rush-hour and keep an eye on when the Sens are at home (and other big events happening there). Even better the other way, as you don't have to worry about the queues going west. I'm assuming, of course, that you drive - which doesn't apply to everyone. If you're going from Orleans to downtown, then Paradise or thereabouts is another ten minutes each way; perhaps less, if you allow for time spent sitting at red lights. However, I have the benefit of being downtown frequently, so going from there to pretty much anywhere else in town isn't too onerous..

I don't imagine it's just older gentlemen, though. Younger guys may not be quite so concerned about their personal safety, but nobody wants to emerge from a pleasant break from the mundane to find that some asshole has put a brick through their car window. Yes.. things change, sketchy areas get gentrified, and - very slowly - people's preconceptions are updated. I have a friend who moved to Vanier a while back; a lot of us thought he was crazy, but it turns out that the streets are not, in fact, paved with used needles...

I must admit, I like the idea of "sex tools". It makes me think of sex toys, but on an industrial scale. Maybe the Sybian would count? :) I have nothing useful to contribute to this thread, alas...

Or not, as the case may be? Apologies in advance to all and sundry, but I'm going to indulge myself with a rant on this. We have very clear and well-enforced rules here on CERB about what may be said, and what may not. However, these rules relate very much to *how* discussions are conducted; their aim is to ensure that both ads and recos are genuine (and therefore reliable and useful) and that the general tone of the site remains positive and mutually respectful. What we do *not* have, however, is a whole bunch of rules relating to what topics of conversation may not be had at all. Yes, illegal stuff is out, which seems like a sensible precaution to me, but that's about it. However, we periodically (and again recently) seem to have attempts by individuals, or groups of them, to shut down conversation on subjects which they happen to dislike. It may seem obvious, but it probably bears stating that if someone starts a thread, no matter how obscure or tedious the topic may seem to most, that's a demonstration that at least one person cares enough about it to bother posting. Maybe it'll become the new hot thread of the moment, and maybe it'll fall completely flat - but how will we ever find out if it never gets posted at all? In the meantime, the fact that someone cared enough to post in the first place means that there's likely to be at least a few readers who will be interested enough to read the thread and not consider it a complete waste of their time to have done so, even if they don't feel moved to post themselves. Is it too much to ask that those people who don't wish to discuss a particular subject simply leave it be and move on? I'm not talking about the occasional snarky comment about LOLcats here (I'm well aware that not everyone loves them, and frankly I think the world would be a very dull place if we all had the same tastes); I'm talking about efforts to get particular threads or subjects eliminated entirely. I don't mind the rules that have an obvious benefit for the site as a whole, but I thoroughly resent the existence and interference of self-appointed arbiters of what may or may not be discussed. We have one, and the Mod does a very good job; we don't need any more, thanks. If the Town Council decides to implement new policies then that's fine - but until any such changes are announced to the community at large by the Mod, could everyone else please refrain from attempting to impose their own preferences on everybody else? The general forum does tend to attract all the stuff that doesn't obviously fit in anywhere else. However, the fact that something doesn't have another obvious home is absolutely not a reason for it to be expelled from the general forum too. Maybe that just means we should have more forums so that we can categorize threads more effectively; maybe people should simply be a little more tolerant. A final point: I think we *all* benefit from the existence of a larger and more diverse community, rather than a smaller and narrower one. CERB gets more visitors, and presumably so, then, does EC. The SPs get a larger audience for their ads; those of us who see them get more SPs posting ads. And all of us who contribute get more friends, and potential friends, with whom we can argue, debate, laugh, joke and - on occasion, I daresay - have some good old-fashioned sexcapades. Every time we drive someone off by being exclusive or narrow-minded, or someone simply gets bored and leaves, we're all a little poorer for the loss. Okay, that's it. Thanks for reading, if you got this far.

It's probably got a lot of views because it has a lot of posts, and it seems to me that the reason it has a lot of posts is that it's been quite comprehensively hijacked. As it happens, I quite liked the original post, have no issues with its presence here, and can't imagine it'll have any effect at all on which local ladies I choose to visit or how often I do so. Thanks for posting, Cato.

I don't. I have no desire to give a mark out of ten for someone's incall, any more than I wish to give a mark out of ten to whoever I'm seeing there. Many of the same reasons apply, in particular the simple fact that my tastes in things may or may not be the same as anybody else's.

N.B. Bringing these is probably not an acceptable substitute for the above...