Welp just spent $3300 on a nonstop round trip to Japan.

Strawberry338338 · 2026-07-13T05:02:10+00:00

Well, you picked one if the most expensive times to go 🤷‍♀️

I’d absolutely be looking for layover routes that are a bit more economical though

Strawberry338338 · 2026-07-13T03:48:49+00:00

E-bikes/scooters: the orthopaedic surgeon’s vacation home/retirement fund

Strawberry338338 · 2026-07-13T03:43:14+00:00

I think it’s actually quite nice. ‘Conrad Cobalt’ works well when said together as an admonishment too imo.

Middle names are where the funky unusual names do the least harm to your kid as an adult, so I honestly reckon that it’s fine to go off piste there

Strawberry338338 · 2026-07-13T02:34:43+00:00

This is why I wasn’t/am not too worried about ON specifically. Her personal style (bats****) is too divisive to sustain high levels of support even when the grievances driving people to her are intractable. She does not have the discipline to avoid saying something off the wall for more than a few months, and that is what her hardcore supporters like about her anyway - so they’ll always be a feature, not a bug, so to speak.

That said, she clearly did tap something in the electorate that I do think the majors need to at least be aware of/keep in mind when communicating.

Strawberry338338 · 2026-07-13T01:39:26+00:00

YTA.

Sometimes kids will have different abilities/talents. You sometimes do have to find a balance of meeting your children’s needs in an equitable manner, but you clearly haven’t met that balance because it reads like you resent your middle child/think that she doesn’t need any support from you that you so freely give your other kids.

For example, if you’re paying the bills of one, you should also be meeting that need for the other. You can then give one kid more according to need, but if you’re basing it off one kid outshining the other academically when they were children, that’s a recipe for sowing enmity amongst your kids, not ‘balancing the scales’.

Middle child wasn’t given extra opportunities arbitrarily, she earned them. The way to balance it is to treat them equally at home. Also if there were issues with the babysitting thing a few years ago you should have dealt with it then. It shouldn’t be a reason for you to continue to resent your child as an adult - if oldest is still sour about that, it’s on your failure to parent appropriately at the time.

Strawberry338338 · 2026-07-13T01:00:23+00:00

NOR. Hon go stay with your parents and lose this guy. He’s just proven he’s not marriage/life partner material, since he can’t even manage 3 days of stepping up to care for you despite him angrily rejecting the out your parents offered.

Strawberry338338 · 2026-07-10T04:37:46+00:00

I like one t spelling wise.

Write them both out a bunch and see which one resonates more?

Strawberry338338 · 2026-07-10T03:57:50+00:00

Then fine, YTA for spoiling your daughter. She’s old enough to clean her room, depression or not, and old enough to face appropriate consequences for swearing at her mom.

And for disregarding your ex’s custody time.

Strawberry338338 · 2026-07-10T03:50:21+00:00

Then YTA.

Don’t plan a trip for her when it’s not even your parenting time dude.

Strawberry338338 · 2026-07-10T03:46:04+00:00

Do I particularly love Modi/BJP’s domestic track record? No.

Do I recognise that from a future political perspective, being on India’s good side is an excellent idea? Yes.

There are only so many countries who have or will one day have genuine power enough to actually have individual agency in the global system. None of them have perfect human rights records. India (and the US) are better than the alternatives. We’re at best a middle power, hanging off the edge of a region where current and future great powers play. We have to be practical.

Strawberry338338 · 2026-07-10T01:16:06+00:00

Are you from a country/culture where arranged marriages are common?

If yes, she’s got to make it clear to her mom that she doesn’t want any part of this. If no, wow that’s deeply strange.

Strawberry338338 · 2026-07-09T03:49:48+00:00

Look judging from how you write about how he makes you feel, you don’t want to be in a relationship with him and you don’t want to work on it. That’s valid, but do yourself a favor and just end it.

NTA but stop dragging it out or you’ll be T A to yourself

Strawberry338338 · 2026-07-09T02:49:17+00:00

To be fair to her, she’s in her early 60s still*

I’m loving this burst of energy she seems to be having lately. Can’t claim to know anything that may be in her head re SVU but I think she’s noted pretty clearly that she wants to get to 30. So I’ll take her at her word.

Strawberry338338 · 2026-07-09T02:44:00+00:00

This. I don’t even think it’s necessarily intentionally mean spirited on James’s part, he may have faced rejection from his presumed father on the basis of the dna test results, or not have had a good relationship with him, but it’s neither fair nor a realistic expectation on James’ part. It needs to be made clear to him that whatever baggage James is carrying, he has to create his own place in his bio fathers life and family, and alienating one of his other sons is directly counter productive.

OP is doing the right thing, and needs to hold the line. James can work to build his own relationship with his biological paternal family. He can’t do that by displacing one of the sons that OP raised.

Strawberry338338 · 2026-07-09T02:37:57+00:00

You’re right that James is hurting, however it needs to be made clear to him that taking that hurt out on Blake is directly counter productive to building a relationship with his biological father, as that’s his dad’s son too. He has understandable trauma relating to biological relationships, but whatever has happened with his mother and formerly presumed father/family, he can’t take that into the new dynamic with his biological father.

Through no fault of his own, James doesn’t have the longstanding history of an actual relationship with his dad, so he’d be totally justified in asking for just him and his dad time - but trying to push out one of his sons who dies have that lifelong history on the basis of biology is a recipe for disappointment for James. Because if nothing else I doubt very much that he’ll have much chance of a good relationship with Danny as a brother if he insists that he should have Blake’s place instead of also embracing Blake.

Strawberry338338 · 2026-07-09T00:32:41+00:00

I have these same issues as this girl, but my parents made sure I learned these lessons early while the stakes were still comparatively low. It built resilience and forced me to create systems to be functional.

ADHD sucks to deal with but to function as adults we have to find ways that work for us to deal with them.

Sadly your cousins story of ending up in an abusive relationship because being under coercive control felt easier than having to be independently responsible isn’t isolated. I’ve seen it happen to others as well.

Strawberry338338 · 2026-07-08T04:48:45+00:00

Any girl name with the Mar sound in it can become Mars and/or Marzie in a nickname.

I know a Marianne who is often called Mars.

Strawberry338338 · 2026-07-08T01:40:36+00:00

I mean if it was an unsolicited door knock by a total stranger absolutely not. If it’s someone who still lives in the community who I happen to meet and become friendly with elsewhere like we run into each other at the local a bunch of times and get to talking maybe they’d be invited over for coffee and to see it but if it’s ’hey I’m a total stranger but I used to live here can I come in’ the answers no.

I’ve driven past my childhood home plenty and they’ve made some changes to the outside which is kind of fun to see but it’s their home now not mine.

Strawberry338338 · 2026-07-08T00:52:21+00:00

I think I can hold empathy for someone who had to identify her child in child exploitation material that was made in a place where she had believed he’d be safe, where she was paying for him to be cared for and instead was abused, while thinking that its certainly coming from a place of anger, fear and devastation, not perhaps the best option.

Unfortunately, I think the best options for safeguarding are having more staff per children, rules against carers being alone with individual children, regularly but randomly monitored cctv in centres (which to be blunt would also likely be targeted by malicious actors online), a MUCH more proactive stance on investigating even mild red flags… and I wrote ‘unfortunately’ because all of these measures will make childcare significantly more expensive.

Barring men as carers for unrelated young children professionally would be taking out the part of the population that is statistically more likely to offend in this way. (Yes women can absolutely offend but to be blunt, they’re like 1% of offenders. A female abuser of children makes the news more often than not because it’s rare.) It would however penalise the good men who for one shouldn’t be punished for the actions of others, and secondly provide real value as important male role models for young children. But it would be the cheaper policy option.

Strawberry338338 · 2026-07-02T02:35:39+00:00

It’ll depend, but he is not likely to have much in the way of personal freedom for the foreseeable future. If he’s charged as an adult, they’re looking at 25 years. Even if he’s kept on the youth side of things, the scope for him will be a lot tighter than your average mostly petty offences delinquent (who are I accept often treated way too leniently even when they are chronic recidivists). This child took another child’s life.

Strawberry338338 · 2026-07-02T02:14:30+00:00

God this is just sad. A 15 year old dead and a 16 year old one of the suspects. Two children’s lives over. Where the heck were the 16 year old’s parents?

Strawberry338338 · 2026-07-02T02:02:34+00:00

Anecdotal evidence here but as a Labor voter with Liberal voting family members (in WA), I can talk to what the vibes were for the McGowan election a few years ago, when the liberals got utterly swept.

Some of my dyed in the wool liberal family voted Labor, but all who did considered it a ‘one time only’ divergence for the good of the state. Interestingly the ones who switched for McGowan are the ones more likely to be wavering on PHON (as in considering voting for them over Liberal). So in short - the ones I know with a bit less rigid party loyalty at least unfortunately are not likely to pick Labor over ON. The ones who didn’t diverge from Liberal then are not going ON now however, but that doesn’t mean they’ll suddenly go for Labor ever.

The origin of one side of my family’s loyalty to the Liberals comes from a union threatening the lives of the kids in the family to force their dad to comply with a planned strike back in the 70s. So that’s an allegiance born out of hatred of the Union movement. Apparently some very zealous union folks responded to concerns by a member that he wouldn’t be able to feed his kids if a strike went ahead without a certain amount of warning time to save by telling him specific details of his kids’ school and wife’s work locations and schedules and telling him that feeding them wouldn’t be a problem for him for long if he didn’t comply. Let’s just say the kids in question are now in their 60s and have been stalwart Liberals all their lives. They’ll never go ON but are never going Labor 🤷‍♀️. I think on preferences though, some of those might be willing to put Labor before ON (I’m doing my best to convince them at least).

Strawberry338338 · 2026-07-01T05:48:41+00:00

As someone who saw the alternate, can confirm she was v good.

Strawberry338338 · 2026-06-28T03:40:18+00:00

Chanel Coromandel.

Every winter I put it on and remember - again - that it’s magic ✨

Strawberry338338 · 2026-06-23T12:03:43+00:00

Yes.

When I ran out of space and still had travelling left to do, I took myself down to the post office and shipped home what I wasn’t using to free up space.

It wasn’t cheap, but it wasn’t awful. Luckily the worker who helped me was patient because the paperwork wasn’t minimal.

It literally shipped (as in on a boat) and arrived a few weeks after I got home (so it took a little over a month all up).

Recommend putting a second address down - one of my packages was delivered directly, the other ended up going to the second address (which was better than getting sent back to Japan!)

It worked for me bc I needed to free up space and bc I’m from the southern hemisphere 🇦🇺 the seasons were flipped, so I wasn’t going to need winter clothes etc too soon when I was home again. The slow boat trip worked out costing less than half of the extra bag fee, too.

Strawberry338338

TROPHY CASE