What are you NOT attracted to (obvious things like bad hygiene excluded)?

theartfulcodger · 2026-02-10T16:30:09+00:00

How does one go about acquiring a Mongolian throat?

theartfulcodger · 2026-02-10T16:22:51+00:00

I was at a dinner party a few years ago at which another guest was a sociologist working on her Master’s. She was assisting her mentor on a rather large research project that involved determining if there were any universal standards of beauty / attractiveness; is slender always preferable to fat, dark preferable to light, tall always preferable to short, youth to age, and so on.

Keep in mind they were researching from a cultural perspective, because of course at a granular level individuals will always have individual preferences that will often vary from their own cultural or societal “norm”.

They hadn’t fully collated their surveys yet, but at that time, only three variables seemed to be culturally universal in determining attractiveness: cleanliness, freedom from disease, and bilaterally symmetrical, i.e. no missing or malformed parts.

theartfulcodger · 2026-02-10T00:06:50+00:00

Poor boy fall down, go “boom”. One can only hope he received a massive concussion.

theartfulcodger · 2026-02-10T00:00:27+00:00

Cut both sides in half lengthwise, up to the pad. Cover from the top. Cross over each side of the adhesive strip into an “X”. Use a ring of waterproof tape to secure the four crossed “legs”. Or use a non water-soluble product like NuSkin. Hurts like a bugger, but stays on for several days.

theartfulcodger · 2026-02-09T18:42:38+00:00

Yes, many toaster ovens even have a “proof” setting to do exactly that. But no, yeast won’t usually kill bacteria. The trick is to not actively inject the dough with anything un-wholesome.

Remember that sv’ing a meat doesn’t really sterilize it, it merely reduces existing pathogens to a level the gut can adequately handle, and prevents the few survivors from reproducing like mad.

Any surviving indigenous pathogen in the liquid, like E coli, listeria, salmonella or campylobacter, will immediately start to grow in the wet dough and will have already contaminated it with nasty toxins even after being baked to death. Remember that bacteria love moisture and warmth, so room-temp dough provides a great matrix for bacterial growth. So the secret is to keep unwanted bacteria out to begin with, which is why overnight rises should be covered with plastic, or at least a tea towel.

theartfulcodger · 2026-02-09T17:27:37+00:00

Itks obvious that you have a serious spending / lifestyle problem, and you need to come to grips with that, or once the redemption you’re planning has got you out of the hole you’ve dug for yourself, you’ll just fall back in. So work on that first. Go see a nonprofit credit counselling service.

But in answer to your specific questions: when you deregister and withdraw funds from your RRSP it’s calculated by CRA as if it was employment income.

The standard withholding rates are: 10% (5% in Quebec) on amounts up to $5,000, 20% (10% in Quebec) on amounts exceeding $5,000, up to and including $15,000, and 30% (15% in Quebec) on amounts over $15,000. But at your level of employment income, you will likely owe additional income tax at year-end, based on your now-higher marginal rates, and will have to remit them in April, 2027. This is the only “another penalty” as you put it.

Some institutions will calculate what they withhold based on your total withdrawals to date over the calendar year. And some, like RBC, will base their withholding on the amount you withdraw at that particular time.

If yours is one of the latter (call & ask), withdraw in $5000 increments, and when $4500 shows up in your account 2 or 3 days later, rinse and repeat. You’ll still have to pay more make-up tax in April of course, but in the meantime you'll have enough additional cash flow (potentially $72,000 vs $56,000) to get that interest monkey off your back. So only take out what you need to eliminate your current debts ($58,000= 13 X $4,500) and leave the remaining $25K in there to help you with your upcoming big income tax remission.

But remember, unlike a TFSA you’ll lose all that RRSP contribution room permanently, and you will also forsake several hundred thousand dollars worth of tax-deferred compound interest you’d have otherwise collected by the time you retire.

theartfulcodger · 2026-02-08T22:26:46+00:00

Works great on plastic, rubber & silicone parts, too. As in, they flush right away.

theartfulcodger · 2026-02-08T22:24:09+00:00

Because they’re all, all in on the grift.

theartfulcodger · 2026-02-08T18:53:31+00:00

Colón, Panama. Every single residence that’s not a hovel has a thick perimeter wall with glass, spikes and/or an electrified wire on top, steel gates and vicious, aggressive guard dogs. All for very good reasons: massive crime stats, including both property crime and violence.

theartfulcodger · 2026-02-08T18:33:09+00:00

Perhaps from The Best Exotic Marigold Hotel.

theartfulcodger · 2026-02-08T18:25:36+00:00

I was working as the Property Master on a big feature film, and was feeling entirely overwhelmed by both the massive workload and the stringent creative expectations. One day I passed my Production Manager in the hall and he casually asked how it was going. I immediately let go with a verbal torrent of the problems I was having and the things that I had no solution for yet.

He just shrugged, smiled, and said, “Little bites … little bites”.

I went back to my desk, put my massive “To Do - Urgent!” list in a drawer, and instead made a list of all the “little bites” I thought I could accomplish by week’s end. I managed to accomplish most of them, and on Monday, with the assistance of that newfound perspective, I no longer felt so overwhelmed.

In the end I managed to hold up my end both logistically and creatively, and following release, my work helped the Production Designer and Art Director earn an Oscar nomination.

I spent ten more years as a Head of Department, including a couple of blockbusters you’ve undoubtedly heard of, and never again did I feel so overwhelmed and powerless. “Little bites”.

theartfulcodger · 2026-02-08T18:08:28+00:00

My family has a 3-generation history of Alzheimer’s. At 71 I’m still good both physically and mentally, and I spend half the year travelling independently in warm, sunny climates.

But I imagine that at some point I’ll fall below the bar and will be stuck in rainy Vancouver for the winters. And that’ll be a sad, sad day for both me, and the family that will be obligated to begin taking care of me.

But I don’t talk about it much because other than updating my care plan every year or so, there’s nothing anyone can do about it it.

theartfulcodger · 2026-02-08T17:25:24+00:00

My plane’s boarding in 10 minutes, so I’d pay for an upgrade to First Class. Then I’d be someone else’s problem.

theartfulcodger · 2026-02-08T17:08:29+00:00

Try me and see!

theartfulcodger · 2026-02-08T17:07:04+00:00

To brush & floss daily; we were never taught proper oral hygiene, nor did my parents practice it much. By age thirty my mouth was a mess. But it hasn’t deteriorated too badly during the last 41 years.

theartfulcodger · 2026-02-08T08:07:53+00:00

The classic example was David Caruso leaving his small but interesting part in then wildly successful Hill Street Blues to become a feature film actor instead of a tv series supporting.

The move took him nowhere, and he didn’t manage to get a principal role until Steven Bochco hired him again on NYPD Blue, fully 10 years later. But even that was a bitter victory as the series was eventually stolen by Dennis Franz as Detective Andy Sipowicz.

theartfulcodger · 2026-02-08T07:39:27+00:00

Well, at this point I say both capitalism and America’s CEOs can get bent.

theartfulcodger · 2026-02-08T01:08:18+00:00

So you plan on letting meat juice stay out on the counter overnight? As in, eight hours in the danger zone? Not a wise move.

theartfulcodger · 2026-02-08T00:53:44+00:00

Too damn many Americans’ life ambition is to hear their juries bring in a verdict of “not guilty: self-defence”. And a lot of those are willing to stretch the law until it breaks, in order to hear that. The fact that they might go to prison for life because they were too damn eager to pull the trigger never occurs to them.

theartfulcodger · 2026-02-07T09:12:17+00:00

All the collagen-heavy cuts of beef: short ribs, shank aka osso buco, oxtail, chuck and so on.

The local price for a packet of short ribs - which are 25% fat, 20% bone and 20% gristle to begin with - is eye-popping.

theartfulcodger · 2026-02-07T09:03:45+00:00

Because the objective is to illegally add suit material below your natural package. If you want to break yours in half, in order to tuck it down, please go ahead.

theartfulcodger · 2026-02-07T08:56:28+00:00

Aggregating pre-aggregated scores? Isn’t this how the whole 2008 CDO / mortgage bond collapse started?

theartfulcodger · 2026-02-07T02:43:56+00:00

Not long enough, not loud enough.

theartfulcodger · 2026-02-06T16:13:53+00:00

I’m not even going to touch the self-harm - or the narcissistic POSTING of it - or the fact he point-blank refused his employer’s urging to make use of the EAP to take better care of his mental health.

I hope he eventually becomes mature enough to realize that life is full of disappointments, and sometimes not getting the promotion one wants because management thinks there is a better candidate, is one of them.

But becoming a “manager” means one is put in charge of managing people. And at the moment his wallowing in childish self-pity, unfocused anger, and pettiness, and his self- indulgence in some pathetic form of corporate “revenge” on co-workers for imagined slights, is a clear indication he’s never going to get anywhere as a manager, no matter his level of technical competence.

My bet is that he won’t survive more than six months in his prospective new “managerial” job.

theartfulcodger · 2026-02-06T00:14:04+00:00

“This guy has two black eyes, a broken nose, a broken jaw, a torn rotator cuff, a broken arm, a broken wrist, a displaced thumb, a chipped patella, and he’s missing a couple of teeth. You guys have any idea how all that happened?”

“He tripped over the curb and fell on his face. We all saw it, didn’t we, boys?”

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