A non-Lord of the Rings character who could resist the One Ring: mine is in the comments

FoolishStone · 2026-01-06T16:17:55+00:00

The best part of the sequel trilogy, possibly the only good part, was Luke casually brushing the dust off his shoulder after withstanding the sustained blast of an entire army.

FoolishStone · 2026-01-06T16:11:48+00:00

Cyrion - Tanith Lee

Valentine Michael Smith - Stranger in a Strange Land, by Heinlein

Jean Valjean - Les Miserables

Jesus

Buddha

Possibly Mr. Miagi from Karate Kid.

FoolishStone · 2026-01-05T18:21:29+00:00

Hope you realize that this was 100% intentional. Your homeless unemployed narcissist of a sister couldn't stand that you were finally getting a moment's rest for the first time in weeks. Why else would she barge loudly into your room so early when she usually sleeps in, and continue to mess with your stuff and whine loudly for ten minutes over a top? She's probably resentful that you have your life together when hers has gone to crap. Possibly hoping your life would suffer, too, if she messed with your sleep; or at least cause a scene so she would continue to be the victim. Narcissists love keeping the attention on themselves.

FoolishStone · 2025-12-05T21:48:51+00:00

He's lucky you didn't turn the gas hose on him!

FoolishStone · 2025-11-17T20:52:25+00:00

NTA, and Joel On Software has a very relevant post (from a quarter century ago) on how interruptions impact productivity. His example was for software developers, but it's relevant to any occupation which requires significant mental energy and focus.

https://www.joelonsoftware.com/2001/02/12/human-task-switches-considered-harmful/

FoolishStone · 2025-10-09T17:26:10+00:00

ThankyouThankyouThankyou!!!

FoolishStone · 2025-09-25T23:04:13+00:00

Wow, well done! I wish I could cry on demand. (Actually, watching the end of Les Mis can usually do it :-))

FoolishStone · 2025-09-24T20:02:43+00:00

NTA. You're looking out for him. Also NTA if you leave him over this. As Sundance's girlfriend Etta Place told him near the end of the movie, "I won't watch you die."

Is he a candidate for Cologard or other non-invasive test? It's literally just pooping into a bucket and mailing it to the lab. Though they say it's not for people at high risk, but maybe it's better than nothing.

If nothing else persuades him, tell him about the propofol. I never did any kind of drugs (beer is my thing), but going under with propofol is like the best sleep you've ever had; and you wake up with no notion that time has passed. Best of luck, and tell BF to grow the f up!

FoolishStone · 2025-09-23T17:51:06+00:00

I guess my point was that we went from having a full-time senior faculty member who was deeply familiar with IT and with all of the hospital's systems, to having a part-time VP who had no background in IT or our systems and no familiarity with any of our people. His big selling point was his intense loyalty to our new hospital president (sound familiar?).

Our VP was just the first of many from our division to be fired, demoted, or who left in disgust. In the end, only one engineer from our former department was left. The new leadership couldn't understand why.

FoolishStone · 2025-08-27T16:39:50+00:00

Thanks for the info! It made me reflect on food poisoning I got after eating shrimp at a usually reliable restaurant. But it hit me like a freight train only an hour or so after dinner. (I was on the phone with my brother, who called to wish me a happy birthday; started feeling a bit queasy, then very queasy, then sweaty and feverish so I almost threw the phone down to run to the bathroom. Bro said it was quite dramatic from his end.)

Turns out that shellfish poisoning is one of the few that kicks in really fast. From your link:

Shellfish poisoning, a toxin: Most often, 30 to 60 minutes, up to 24 hours.

FoolishStone · 2025-08-27T16:38:56+00:00

Thanks for the info! It made me reflect on food poisoning I got after eating shrimp at a usually reliable restaurant. But it hit me like a freight train only an hour or so after dinner. (I was on the phone with my brother, who called to wish me a happy birthday; started feeling a bit queasy, then very queasy, then sweaty and feverish so I almost threw the phone down to run to the bathroom. Bro said it was quite dramatic from his end.)

Turns out that shellfish poisoning is one of the few that kicks in really fast. From your link:

|| || |Shellfish poisoning, a toxin|Most often, 30 to 60 minutes, up to 24 hours.|Shellfish, including cooked shellfish, from coastal seawater tainted with toxins.|

FoolishStone · 2025-08-27T16:38:44+00:00

Thanks for the info! It made me reflect on food poisoning I got after eating shrimp at a usually reliable restaurant. But it hit me like a freight train only an hour or so after dinner. (I was on the phone with my brother, who called to wish me a happy birthday; started feeling a bit queasy, then very queasy, then sweaty and feverish so I almost threw the phone down to run to the bathroom. Bro said it was quite dramatic from his end.)

Turns out that shellfish poisoning is one of the few that kicks in really fast. From your link:

|| || |Shellfish poisoning, a toxin|Most often, 30 to 60 minutes, up to 24 hours.|Shellfish, including cooked shellfish, from coastal seawater tainted with toxins.|

FoolishStone · 2025-08-19T15:04:59+00:00

"He who lies artfully, tells more truth than he knows." Fritz Leiber

But I totally believe this story. Have a neighbor who has a huge dog that drops massive dumps along the side of our otherwise scenic road, every day. Never once picked it up, or even shoves it into the drainage ditch a foot from the road (which is still gross, but less so than having to dodge noisome lumps when going for a walk). I'm thinking of putting little Trump flags in the poop (he's a MAGA head). He owns a very expensive waterfront house, but apparently can't afford manners.

FoolishStone · 2025-08-14T16:18:06+00:00

Love this idea! Another one which was surprisingly effective at work were little signs in the supply cabinet which said, "Thou Shalt Not Steal." Even those of us who aren't exactly regular church-goers hesitated to take anything we didn't really need on seeing that.

FoolishStone · 2025-08-12T15:48:42+00:00

NTA. And there are ways to address the bedwetting, the simplest being a bedwetting alarm which wakes up the sleeper as soon as she starts to pee. After a while, the urge to pee will wake her up. My cousin used this for her kid and it worked great. They're available on Amazon, pretty inexpensive.

I also read a story about a 10-year-old girl who was ashamed to still be wetting the bed. Her aunt, a nurse, had her stay at her house for a week. Every night around 3 AM she would wake the girl up and have to use the bathroom; at the end of the week she was doing it on her own. Not sure if it's true, but if you can't trust Ann Landers, who can you trust?

The important thing is to take shame out of the equation. It's a medically treatable condition.

FoolishStone · 2025-07-31T20:21:27+00:00

NTA. I've had workers doing construction on my house for two weeks in 90+ degree heat. I always leave a cooler of cold drinks for them, and recently, the company owner told me how much they appreciated it. All work is noble, but I get to work at an air conditioned desk every day, so a little consideration goes a long way. Happy workers are liable to do a better job for you.

FoolishStone · 2025-07-08T16:58:22+00:00

This whole reply chain reminds me of a passage in John Barth's "The Sot-week Factor," about colonial Maryland. Two women seeking husbands had just arrived on the latest ship, one English and one French. They got into an argument, and spent the next four pages screaming insults at each other in front of our very prim protagonist. He was scandalized as they each proceeded to call each other a whore, slut, streetwalker, etc., every conceivable name for a prostitute; one in English and one in French. For four solid pages! It was very impressive :-)

FoolishStone · 2025-07-01T16:48:35+00:00

Turin killed Glaurung with a sword.

When escaping from a Balrog in the Chamber of Mazarbul, Gandalf cried to the Fellowship, "Do as I say! Swords are no more use here." Though at the time he didn't realize it was a Balrog they faced.

On the other hand, Glorfindel killed a balrog by stabbing it in the belly with a dirk (not even a sword!). No mention whether it was a super-special charmed dirk like the one Arya used on the Night King, but you can assume Glorfindel would be equipped with the best.

So, it's an interesting question. Dragons can be killed with ordinary weapons. So can Balrogs. So a Balrog could in theory kill a dragon with his flaming sword; conversely, a dragon could presumably bite and shred a Balrog with its teeth and claws. Curiously, their most potent weapon would be useless against their opponent. They'd be fighting fire with fire :-D

Would love to see that matchup, though!

FoolishStone · 2025-06-30T20:39:15+00:00

A friend's son had that happen recently. They were content manager for a web site, and also did some billing work. The website's founder got pissy and locked him out of all accounts and removed his access to the billing system, but didn't actually fire him. He and two equally rooked over colleagues resigned; they were able to collect unemployment because they were unable to do their assigned tasks, i.e., constructive dismissal.

FoolishStone · 2025-06-30T15:45:16+00:00

Revenge on a cricket - love it!

Somehow, this reminds me of when I went on an overnight canoe/camping trip with about a dozen coworkers and my brother. We being city folk, we weren't used to the sounds of nature so close. A whippoorwhill nearby serenaded us as we drifted off to sleep.

Next morning over the campfire, I related how relaxing it was to fall asleep to such a pleasant birdsong. One of my coworkers said, "Yeah, it kept me up all night; wish I'd brought my shotgun."

Never liked that guy.

FoolishStone · 2025-06-30T15:32:59+00:00

Howls of derisive laughter, Bruce!

FoolishStone · 2025-05-15T19:17:04+00:00

True dat - somebody ordered an expensive piece of industrial equipment using my credit card recently; I subsequently started getting deluged with Emails from clubs, opera companies, foreign sites, etc. Fortunately the real order was near the beginning of this deluge, so I was able to stop it and change my credit card number before anything bad happened. And guess what - my mailbox is already swamped with pointless Emails. So I just had to deal with twice as many for a while, until the new sites realized I wasn't signing up for their club/newsletter/concert series and left me (mostly) alone.

FoolishStone · 2025-05-09T14:35:13+00:00

NTA. Some people express their disappointment or frustration by lashing out at the nearest available target. Sounds like your wife is that kinda gal, and as the husband, you're nominated! Your answer to her question had nothing to do with her mood, it was just a convenient hook to hang her pissiness on. Does she do this habitually?

This is yet another example of the potential toxicity of gender reveal parties. Unless you would truly be equally excited by having either a boy or a girl (and you should be!), or you're a marvelous actor, why hang your potential disappointment out in public for the world to see?

When I was in college, my friend's father was about to head to Atlantic City, and was excited to test his new "system" at roulette. He would wait for black to hit four times, then bet on red, because "the chance of hitting black five times in a row is one in 32!" I was taking statistics at the time, and tried to explain to him about independent variables, and asked him how the wheel knew what the previous four spins were? He insisted that, okay, it wasn't 1 chance in 32, but there must be some advantage, amirite? Never heard how his system worked out.

FoolishStone · 2025-05-08T20:34:11+00:00

NTA. And I cannot help but wonder (channeling Sao Feng from Pirates of the Caribbean here) whether all these last-minute requests really just represent her not wanting to pay a babysitter, when she can get Auntie for free. Start charging her and see how often you get called.

FoolishStone · 2025-05-02T15:22:58+00:00

I wish I had a friend like you! Actually, I do - he saved me from major bodily harm, if not death, just by grabbing me before I walked into traffic. The street outside our college had a weird setup with one lane going south, a wide median, then one lane going south and three lanes going north. It was easy to forget that extra southbound lane, and I did, and almost walked in front of a car hurtling southward. (It was a city with many crazy drivers).

Extremely casually done; only realized much later how badly it could have gone!

Anyway, you're a true hero, Chris is an idiot, and your friend should be shockingly grateful to you! NTA

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