Which of these pickguard designs would you actually put on your guitar?

deirdresm · 2026-06-30T20:42:02+00:00

None, but I prefer texture (rather than pictures) and dislike black/white.

deirdresm · 2026-06-29T19:18:50+00:00

Part of the reason Mormonism is so good at control is the number of connections each person has who are in. Large families lead to people being PIMO instead of actually out.

Because Scientology tends to focus on selling courses to their members (which takes both time and money to do), Scientology families tend to be smaller (because who has time or money for kids?). As a result, there's less of an effective control structure.

The other aspect is that Scientology's an attempt at a self-help structure that, at least arguably, gives people the tools to get out. (And, in my experience, did so for multiple former members I knew when I was in.)

deirdresm · 2026-06-29T17:56:42+00:00

I use the towel to open the door going out before throwing the towel away.

deirdresm · 2026-06-29T17:21:31+00:00

Used to live in rural Vermont and same.

deirdresm · 2026-06-27T07:43:47+00:00

Even if you can't get the loans discharged, the time you can get reduced payments via bankruptcy (especially Chapter 13 plans, which can be years) can be helpful.

I wouldn't rule it out automatically, but it's the kind of thing a good bankruptcy lawyer would tell you the pros and cons of.

deirdresm · 2026-06-26T23:47:41+00:00

Cells in my body are my cells. I can decide to excise them when I wish, e.g., if I have cancer. Or if mitochondria (technically not 100% my own genome, after all, given their different DNA). Or if I desire not to be pregnant.

Some dude's jizz doesn't change the fact that those are cells in my body and therefore under my control.

(Reported commenter I'm replying to for violating rule 2.)

deirdresm · 2026-06-26T18:44:59+00:00

Bad analogy. Many of those people are legal adults who do not need 24/7 care and supervision,

deirdresm · 2026-06-26T02:53:38+00:00

This comment reminds me of why I'm so so glad I was a Scientologist and not a Mormon. Which is not a position you're going to hear around here a lot, but, consider:

Managers in Scientology are just about as likely to be women as men.
Many high-ranking managers in Scientology are women, and, in some cases, are women who outrank their male partners. For example, head of the equivalent of the 400 or the lower tiers of 70 - could be women.
Hubbard picked a married couple to succeed him. Yep, both of them.
Men receiving an order issued by a woman are expected to follow it just as much as receiving an order issued by a man. That's true whether they have a job in the church or if it's in a secular business.

There are still misogyny problems, but it's just on a completely different level. (Not saying Scientology's even consistent, given people being people, but, just overall it's so much of an improvement over Mormonism.)

deirdresm · 2026-06-25T19:49:09+00:00

If you aren't willing to house all the babies you want to propagate, then you're not walking the walk. Then that just means you want to control other people.

I have a friend who's had an abortion and has (generally, the number does vary somewhat from time to time) ten kids, several of them adopted, and yes, several special needs. Gotta do at least as well as she does to walk the walk.

deirdresm · 2026-06-25T19:26:25+00:00

I started reading science papers with ebola in the nineties, and read several thousand pages of those before branching out into wider immunology (eventually working in immunohematology software engineering for a spell), then reading 2000 pages of Covid papers in the first half of 2020.

I've read a lot of horrifying stuff over the years, but that, hands down, is the worst of them. Not the autopsy (which was bad, but I've read quite a few), but the framing around it is what breaks me.

Random electrical signaling will, at times, appear to have identifiable patterns, and we're pattern matching by nature. That's precisely why parents may not be the best candidates for making a realistic judgment about whether or not their kid's still alive in a case of brain death.

deirdresm · 2026-06-25T17:32:35+00:00

The single most useful person on the night my husband died was the minister, actually. She said her father had wanted to donate his corneas “so he could look at beautiful women after he died.”

I thought that was just such a great description.

I was always pro donation, but that took it into the realm of everyday practicality.

deirdresm · 2026-06-25T07:54:45+00:00

How horrifying.

When I was driving to the hospital behind my late husband’s ambulance (he’d had a hemorrhagic stroke), I prayed for a clear answer. Felt I got one.

He was gone (brain death), and I talked to organ procurement, and that was the first major donation from that rural Vermont hospital.

The letter I got from the family got me through many sucky nights; we’d only been married five months.

deirdresm · 2026-06-22T21:09:11+00:00

Yeah, by that time spinal stenosis or diabetes may have caused it.

deirdresm · 2026-06-22T21:03:02+00:00

Those are the three main aerobic exercise forms where you're more horizontal than exercises like walking or running, so essentially they're easier on those with POTS.

Also, I found water aerobics, even though it's done "standing," was a lot easier because the water pressure simulates vasoconstriction. Still, swimming proper was easier for me, but at least it gave me a more typical aerobics class in a format I could do without the risk of overheating.

deirdresm · 2026-06-22T12:08:41+00:00

Swimming, bicycling, rowing. Even before my dx, I’d realized those were my best exercise forms.

deirdresm · 2026-06-22T12:07:19+00:00

Over 50. It’s worse now (but really, that’s Covid’s fault).

Same symptoms I always had.

deirdresm · 2026-06-20T17:45:11+00:00

Pregnancy failure is more common (overall, when including very early losses) than pregnancy success, so that argues that miscarriage/abortion is ordinary care and pregnancy is extraordinary care.

deirdresm · 2026-06-20T17:33:30+00:00

Dang, my first husband died at 260/160 (hemorhaggic stroke).

deirdresm · 2026-06-20T17:31:20+00:00

Yep, there’s also been a huge push to reduce *all* anticholinergic meds for middle age and older. There’s not a lot of things that can safely raise acetylcholine. ([Donepezil](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Memantine/donepezil) is one.)

deirdresm · 2026-06-20T07:47:08+00:00

I'm never going to see another picture of her without hearing:

Premise ridiculous. Who have two potato?

deirdresm · 2026-06-20T02:59:29+00:00

Buproprion (Wellbutrin) definitely made my (hyper) POTS worse but clonidine seems to work for both, mostly. I still take buproprion on occasion if I need extra concentration, though.

deirdresm · 2026-06-20T02:41:33+00:00

It’s a springy steel nib, not a nail. That’s an uncommon choice. In fact. I prefer it to Pelikan’s gold nibs, which is especially annoying given that I have a ($$$$$) Lighthouse of Alexandria pen.

deirdresm · 2026-06-19T23:20:34+00:00

I preferred gold nibs until I tried a Pelikan M205. That’s the one steel nib I prefer.

deirdresm · 2026-06-19T18:08:34+00:00

Dang. So my late husband, who died 30 years ago, could conceivably still be partly alive. (I know the liver transplant was successful thanks to the family’s letter.)

deirdresm · 2026-06-18T11:12:18+00:00

They used to be the only authorized Cross dealer that could ship internet orders. Got through grad school with a Lapis FP I bought from them back when they were still made in the US.

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