We own something like 8 umbrellas. It hardly ever rains here, and I never remember to take one with me (I’m a menace with them when walking with anyone, too. Kelly could tell you).
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I don’t even know where my umbrellas are. I have them to take with me when I travel. I’ve been here 14 years and I can’t remember the last time I used one in WA.
Thing is, drive 18 miles north and cross into Canada? Everyone will be using an umbrella.
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LOL. That’s the colonial heritage from the Brits. If someone in the U.K. forgets or loses their brolly they react like they lost their firstborn kid. And folks lose umbrellas all the time. It’s probably the no 1 thing people forget they have, and freak when they realize they left it somewhere…
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Appliance update! Stove has continued working, but now the dishwasher just leaked all over. Always something. We fixed another leak in the dishwasher a couple years ago, and I guess that helped for some time, but now that it’s doing it again I’m leaning towards just replacing it. I guess all the appliances are the same age, so them all going at once is not entirely weird, but it is a bit frustrating.
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I swear appliances conspire against us in the night. It’s never just one at a time!
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GF got a job!
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Move to the U.K., if you can cope with dismal weather, it has some great benefits. Free healthcare. FREE. Gun control is taken seriously. Farmers and people who need them for their livelihood get licenses. Not for high calibre handguns or Kalashnikovs, basic rifles. No gun culture. I realize things change, but the U.K. is a pretty sound place to live. I felt sick when Trump was elected president. Surreal. How the FUCK did that happen? Our PM is a giant asshole, but Trump? And he intends all kinds of fuckery to get back into office. If I have to live in a damp country, England/Scotland/ Wales all have their merits. I’ve never lived in Ireland, but would definitely consider it if I hadn’t made deep roots in England. Ireland had the sense to remain in the EU. My son now lives in Australia and is loving life there. The US has lost it’s ever loving mind. I still love it, it’s where I was born and where I grew up, but someone like Trump becoming POTUS put paid to any chance of wanting to live there again.
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I’ve considered moving out of the US, especially during the 2020 election. Honestly, Canada would be the easiest since I’m so close. During the last election, I was wondering if I could move to Canada and keep my job in the US (I’m 18 miles from the border).
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I’ve been studying the English language, and American and British culture for 35 years now, but gun culture is something I will never understand about the US. Why is there this… passion, idk, this adoration for guns, and owning them and talking about them, and why has this become central in politics? It makes no sense whatsoever. They’re obviously a dangerous thing people treat frivolously. I just saw on FB a picture of a goddman minister in a small town, and he posed with his family in what seems to be a basketball court just outside his house with all the guns the family owns, and it’s like a small army. Why? Why do you need that? Why focus on that?? And he’s a fucking pastor!
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Fuck if I know.
I’ve lived in the US for 52 years and I don’t get it.
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Canada is wonderful. Margaret Atwood made it look like paradise with The Handmaid’s Tale, and the USA was renamed and had a sharp light shone on how politics can turn a country into a concentration camp.If Trump slimes himself or one of his ilk into positions of power prepare for Gilead, and run for your lives. I’ve been to Quebec once and Toronto many times. Love it there, blistering winters and all. Wish I could add to my bucket list of places to see. Definitely NW Canada, and Australia. But it won’t happen. Health insurance for flights with my medical conditions would bankrupt the family.
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I grew up around guns, coming from a family of hunters in rural Alabama and rural Georgia. All of my relatives had shotguns, rifles, and such. In my family, however, guns were simply viewed as tools for the purpose of hunting, or for the purpose of home defense. I learned how to shoot guns at an early age, and I went hunting a few times during my youth, but a gun was nothing more than another tool in the home.
These days, guns are viewed by more and more people as symbols of masculinity, as status symbols, and as symbols of self identity. I occasionally see social media posts of families proudly holding their guns in their living room. I occasionally see social media memes from women with ridiculous stuff like, “A man without a beard, tattoos, or a gun is not a real man.”
I grew up around guns, but I did not grow up around “gun culture”. so to speak. That is the difference. With my grandparents, uncles, aunts, and cousins, guns were simply things that you took off of the rack when you needed to use them. They were not toys for posing in front of cameras or for showing off to friends.
I do not own a gun. When I was much younger, I wanted one, but I lost that inclination at some point during my college years…mostly because there were cooler things that I wanted to spend money on, like concerts, CDs, or races. These days, I simply do not want to give any of my money to the industry or the culture. I do not want to take away people’s gun rights, but I would like to do my part to discourage the notion of guns as fetishism or as self identity validation.
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Of course guns have a reason to exist. They were invented for a reason or two that still stand. All that you describe is… well, alien to me, but still reasonable, because the objects serve a purpose.
It’s the adoration, the culture, the sheer necessity that I can’t understand. None of my friends have guns.
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That’s a divide I see more and more. People who’ve always had a gun or two around the house, usually a hunting rifle or shotgun and maybe a handgun, are looking more and more askance at the NRA and the extremists who want absolutely no regulations or limits on gun ownership. If you live in the country or you hunt, you need to have a gun, but you don’t need (or want) to use something that’s going to turn an animal into a fine mist.
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My uncle was a game hunter, he owned a double barrel shot gun for for small game, hare, quails & a .22 rifle for deer. He prided himself at bringing down game with a single shot. He would have said “you can’t shoot” to a game hunter who needs an assault rifle & he wasn’t afraid to get into a heated argument about it too.
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I went to the hospital. I was going for maintenence issues, due to one med becoming ineffective. Got better. Am out now. 'Nuff said.
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I’m two days away from three weeks off.
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Learned a portion of "Something in the Way "on guitar, with my teachers help.
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My oldest son started playing viola in school last year. The other day I wrote down some notes for him, played a riff on my guitar of a song we like, and he played the accompanying part along with me.
I’m not going to say that creating people who can play music with me is the entire reason I had kids, but I have been looking forward to it.
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Going into hospital for a procedure tomorrow. Bit worried but got my big boy pants on and the new Micheal Head and the Red Elastic Band LP on my phone so I am sure all will be well.
As mentioned above, despite our right wing government trying to dismantle it and farm out contracts to their donors, our National Health Service is our nations greatest achievement.
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