Isolated Blurt Thread Again

Wow, friends and I can talk to you about anything but I have to read such important news in the writer's group forum. I feel like an idiot for caring so much. And a few weeks ago when you messaged me several times then asked for a business contact, I wondered. Then you never messaged me again. Yup, friends, not so much. :(
 
Forties yesterday. Thunderstorms tonight. I want summer back.
 
Sometimes, failing or giving up seems no acceptable option.

Sometimes you actively have to look for rays of light, and extract your happiness from the small victories you make, even if they stay unnoticed to others.

I'm not giving up. Twelve years is too long to throw away. I'm just discouraged. And I wonder if he has given up on me,and just feels stuck because I'm the paycheck.
 
I'm not giving up. Twelve years is too long to throw away. I'm just discouraged. And I wonder if he has given up on me,and just feels stuck because I'm the paycheck.

*hugs* Communication can be difficult but I'm learning the benefit of asking the hard questions, and the benefits of using a very well trained marriage counselor. Things have definitely gotten better here, even if we still have a long way to go.
 
Submitted a story on 09/30 right after midnight. Marked new on 10/01 and ready to go for 10/02 (I've posted enough stories to know what that means).

10/02 goes up and my NEW stories stays in pending. 6 new stories go up, but not mine, it just stays there glowing ORANGE NEW in the PENDING section. So, I take it down and resubmit it completely, have to wait in line. I PM'd Laurel about the glitch, got a response, but ... there's something always fucked up with my stories.

10/03 comes along and only 3 stories go up in the same category.

So, right now, if my story had gone up, 3 full days on the front page HUB looks like a good bet and lately, getting 3 full days on that HUB page is hard. So, I'm guessing that when my story does go up (I left an author's note asking to make sure my story doesn't get stuck as NEW on my PENDING PAGE) ... but, when it goes up I'm guessing it will get about 1 day on that front HUB page.

This site feels like one endless butt fuck.

This is an isolated blurt ... not looking for comments.

I've had enough of this site on this name. No goods come of it.
 
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My grandfather used to say, "If you're not happy then you are doing something wrong."

Relationships fall under the heading of doing something.

How very true.
My mate's ole Grandpa used to apply the theory of a potato trench to almost anything;

"You need a firm bottom".
 
Submitted a story on 09/30 right after midnight. Marked new on 10/01 and ready to go for 10/02 (I've posted enough stories to know what that means).

10/02 goes up and my NEW stories stays in pending. 6 new stories go up, but not mine, it just stays there glowing ORANGE NEW in the PENDING section. So, I take it down and resubmit it completely, have to wait in line. I PM'd Laurel about the glitch, got a response, but ... there's something always fucked up with my stories.

10/03 comes along and only 3 stories go up in the same category.

So, right now, if my story had gone up, 3 full days on the front page HUB looks like a good bet and lately, getting 3 full days on that HUB page is hard. So, I'm guessing that when my story does go up (I left an author's note asking to make sure my story doesn't get stuck as NEW on my PENDING PAGE) ... but, when it goes up I'm guessing it will get about 1 day on that front HUB page.

This site feels like one endless butt fuck.

This is an isolated blurt ... not looking for comments.

I've had enough of this site on this name. No goods come of it.

Is it an I/T story? I've found that to be a frustrating category to publish in for the very reason that depending upon when it gets published it may stay on the hub list for a few days or for only one day.

I had a story that was published on August 14, which I initially submitted on the 10th but pulled and resubmitted. It was published on the 14th, but on my submissions page it shows as having been published on the 10th, and when it did get published it had the least desirable position on the new story hub, and fell off after only one day. There's no doubt it dramatically affected the number of views it got. So there's a huge random factor that's just part of the system.

I think rather than seeing it as a butt fuck you just have to accept that the owners of this site run it as a shoestring operation and do the best they can with limited personnel.
 
Is it an I/T story? I've found that to be a frustrating category to publish in for the very reason that depending upon when it gets published it may stay on the hub list for a few days or for only one day.

I had a story that was published on August 14, which I initially submitted on the 10th but pulled and resubmitted. It was published on the 14th, but on my submissions page it shows as having been published on the 10th, and when it did get published it had the least desirable position on the new story hub, and fell off after only one day. There's no doubt it dramatically affected the number of views it got. So there's a huge random factor that's just part of the system.

I think rather than seeing it as a butt fuck you just have to accept that the owners of this site run it as a shoestring operation and do the best they can with limited personnel.

I've submitted the request for my stories to be removed and after that, this name.

I've got better options.

Oh, yeah, it's I/T. This name and that category is nothing but bad luck for me. (I'm not talking about rating. I know I have/had the highest rated story/stories there, dethroning people who were there for years - hubris anyone?) but it's everything else. I'm tired of it.
 
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I've submitted the request for my stories to be removed and after that, this name.

I've got better options.

My advice, fwiw: pause.

You've done this before, and you've changed your mind. Give it some time.

You have lots of followers and support on this site. It would be a loss if you dropped off. Take some time to weigh what you do and don't like. This site, whatever its shortcomings, offers things that other sites do not.

It's your decision, obviously, but I think it would be a mistake for you to drop off and remove your stories.
 
My advice, fwiw: pause.

You've done this before, and you've changed your mind. Give it some time.

You have lots of followers and support on this site. It would be a loss if you dropped off. Take some time to weigh what you do and don't like. This site, whatever its shortcomings, offers things that other sites do not.

It's your decision, obviously, but I think it would be a mistake for you to drop off and remove your stories.

No. This time the account goes as well as the stories.

It's a free site and if I don't like it, then I got to leave. I'm just waiting for Laurel to read my PM and get rid of the goods.
 
No. This time the account goes as well as the stories.

It's a free site and if I don't like it, then I got to leave. I'm just waiting for Laurel to read my PM and get rid of the goods.
You're now tagged as "Guest" with no posts. Your presence here might indeed be in its final shuffle.

Hope everything works out, in whatever ways you want.
 
Tonight we're going to see a live transmission of Shalespeare's The Winter's Tale from the Globe Theatre.

I've just checked. We will be a select few. Only about 12 seats have been taken in a movie auditorium for 150.

Edited to add: Have returned. It was better than the critics' reviews but a long way short of the best production I have seen. The 11 of us - one had a cold and didn't come with her friends - enjoyed it. The Paulina stole the show:

Paulina's Role:

https://www.shmoop.com/winters-tale/paulina.html
 
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If it is a Honda, it will start, go, stop and keep doing it.

When I had the Ariel Colt I had to carry spare spark plugs, a plug spanner, plug cleaner, a spare contact breaker and a set of spanners.

The BSA M20 was more robust. Many of them survived being blown up by German mines. The rider might have been injured but the BSA would start and carry on. But - you had to know how. It had an exhaust-valve lifter, an air control lever and a manual advance/retard lever. Set them wrongly and the kickstarter could throw you over the handlebars, as it did to some drunk who tried to steal mine in the 1960s.

I had set the levers to backfire. It did. A flame shot out of the open-throated carburettor, setting fire to his jeans, and the kickstarter tossed him into the road. He hobbled off beating out the flames on his legs.




That, sir, is a memorable tale related by one of Lit's foremost raconteurs.



 

That, sir, is a memorable tale related by one of Lit's foremost raconteurs.




Thank you.

That BSA M20 made many of my motorcycling friends laugh - until they tried to ride it. One of my friends had a brand new Triumph Bonneville. We swapped bikes to ride around the block.

I found the Triumph a delight and very easy to ride. It had suspension and grip on corners. I could lean the bike with no worry about losing adhesion. It was more responsive than the M20 so I kept the throttle opening slow and gentle.

My friend climbed on my BSA M20. I had already started it for him and set the ignition advance/retard and air levers correctly. He set off at about 20 mph. At the first corner he didn't make the turn. Instead of 90 degrees he did about 45 degrees and braked hard. He walked the M20 back to me.

"It doesn't turn," he complained. "The back wheel starts hopping sideways."

"Yes, it does turn," I retorted, "and the back wheel hops because there is no rear suspension. Go to the corner and watch me."

He walked to the corner. I took that corner at 30 mph. The rear wheel skipped across the road as I maintained a near upright stance, lifting my backside off the seat to transfer some of my weight to the front girder forks. I continued around the block and returned to him.

"You can keep your ancient machine," He said. "That scared me more than a ton-up in heavy traffic."

Later when I was courting my wife, I turned up at her parents' house on the M20. Her father was very interested in it. Some of his wartime colleagues in the RAF had ridden similar motorcycles. He wasn't impressed by the noise of the 500 cc single engine through the very crude silencer. It shattered the calm of the suburban street.

The passenger seat was just a block of rubber bolted to the top of the back mudguard. It wouldn't have been too bad if it had been rubber, but it was a 1944 rubber substitute that had set rock hard in the decades since 1944. It had the consistency and flexibility of a house brick and, of course, the M20 had no rear suspension and every imperfection in the road surface was transmitted undamped to the passenger's backside. The foot rests were cast iron with no rubber. They were meant to be used with heavy Army boots. They absorbed nothing.

My girlfriend climbed on the back for the half-mile ride to the local public house where we were going for a meal. After 100 yards she tapped me on the shoulder. She had tried shouting at me but the exhaust noise and our helmets had meant I couldn't hear her. She insisted that we should walk to and from the public house or else she wouldn't be able to sit down for a week. That was the first and only time she rode pillion on the M20. No one else survived even as long as 100 yards.

But I used that M20 for a 20 mile round trip commute in London for a decade. I could park it at my office in the City of London when my colleagues couldn't park their cars. I enjoyed weaving through London traffic. I never used the horn. It wouldn't have been heard above the exhaust. I never needed to use the horn. The exhaust, particularly when echoing in built up streets, was enough to warn the deafest pedestrian that I was coming.

The M20 is now ridden by my cousin's oldest son - but only at WW2 re-enactment events. It goes to and from them on a trailer. The brakes and lighting are now too pathetic for use in modern traffic.

Youtube of similar M20
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LcpMBXWWK1k

Rider's View:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ek1ZxD2VPXU
 
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Flu Jab?

This morning I went to the Doctors' Surgery for my annual flu jab for ancients like me.

At 9 am the queue of wrinklies went outside the car park. I went away.

At 10.30 am the queue of wrinklies had reduced to 50. I went away.

At 11.30 am I returned. They had run out of the flu jabs for wrinklies and have cancelled next week's session because they won't have new supplies by then.

I'll try again in a fortnight...
 
Phishing fails

I receive several emails a week purporting to come from my bank or other financial institution.

They are wasting their time. Why?

oggbashan does not have a bank account.
jeanne_d_artois does not have a bank account.
Fag-Ash_Lil does not have a bank account.

Even if the phishers accessed the personal information of the above three, they couldn't deprive them of any assets. Those three identities are FICTIONAL.

Sorry.

[I'm not! :)]
 
A decade or so ago, I had an alarm fitted (my now Ex felt safer with it).
After a load of wrangling, (including a take-over of the firm by another), I got told I was to have another one - an 'pgrade'.
There are miles of wires from here to there in my house, but they are no longer needed; it's all WiFi stuff.
And if I had a 'modern' mobile 'phone, I could enjoy watching a burglar in the house on it.

All I have to do now is remember where I put the Instructions for it.
 
A decade or so ago, I had an alarm fitted (my now Ex felt safer with it).
After a load of wrangling, (including a take-over of the firm by another), I got told I was to have another one - an 'pgrade'.
There are miles of wires from here to there in my house, but they are no longer needed; it's all WiFi stuff.
And if I had a 'modern' mobile 'phone, I could enjoy watching a burglar in the house on it.

All I have to do now is remember where I put the Instructions for it.

My burglar alarm company went bust. The administrators tried to bill me for a maintenance contract I didn't have. They were unsuccessful.

Two of the directors of the failed company set up a replacement company. They tried to bill me for a maintenance contract that I hadn't had with the failed company. They were unsuccessful. They went bust again.

The reason for both companies' failure? They had employed a thick cousin to do the paperwork for the first company and he messed it up beyond redemption so they employed him for the second company.

Why did they employ him? He had provided 80% of the finance. :rolleyes:

Edited for PS: The alarm still works perfectly.
 
Been in and out of the hospital all week. I had a few kidney stones giving me a ton of pain, which lead to vomiting, which made me dehydrated, and exacerbated my pain...

Had surgery to break up the stones and am home now.
 
Been in and out of the hospital all week. I had a few kidney stones giving me a ton of pain, which lead to vomiting, which made me dehydrated, and exacerbated my pain...

Had surgery to break up the stones and am home now.

Best wishes for a full recovery and no recurring stones.
 
I'm still afraid to masturbate. I haven't even tried since Tuesday before the pain started...
 
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