@alwaysamy: Thank you for mentioning the All of a Kind Family series. I loved it as a kid, but I have been trying to remember the name of it for years. Hurray! Now I can get myself a new set.

@ampersands: Not necessarily.

@YomikoReadman: You too, huh?

@fuzzymuffin: I had a very similar encounter when I worked at a bakery when I was sixteen. After asking these two mumbling guys to speak up several times, they finally loudly blurted out, "Do you sell hair pie?"

When it's done by an individual, it's denounced as "playing the system".

@Lulubell: Guess what - it's easily and freely available all over the internet. There are dozens of sites that collate this sort of information, and most provide at least some of it with only a few mouse clicks. A lot of it is outdated or flat-out wrong, but there's enough raw data on just about everybody out there…

@TheRaconteurasaurus: My mom's best advice was, "Watch out for the quiet ones." Was she right, or what?

@Gingerlime: Lord, lord, both my mom and I always hear that criticism from the people we dine with. We know how hard food service work is, and we also believe that if you can't afford the tip, you can't afford to eat out. So we tip well. Always. But do we catch hell from other people for leaving decent tips. My mom…

I will bet lunch that the backstory here is that it was an incident connected to a student or employee with mental health problems, which is why Harvard now can't go into detail about why the story has changed.

Hmmm. Since there was no pre-nup, Camille ordinarily wouldn't need this to ensure getting a huge settlement. Which leads me to guess it is more in the measure of a pre-emptive strike, say, that she learned Kelsey was planning on making public (more like confirming) some of the more unsavory things out of Camille's…

@Malle.Babbe: Or it could be the emphasis the Catholic Church places on good works. These women's good works are befriending violent cons. Hey! It's godly! Add forgiveness as another religious virtue, and these woman probably see themselves as edgy/sexy Madonnas (the BVM one) or Mother Teresas.

@a4ashley: No. According to her, they'd had rough sex, and the guy overdid things. She said he thought she was enjoying it. I suspect that's just her rationalization for why he hurt her.

@a4ashley: It's called pumping. You've probably heard of penis pumps, well - women can do it, too. Cover the vulva with a cup-shaped object (sometimes a real cup) that's connected to a hose and hand pump. Give it a few strokes, wait a few minutes, pump some more. Swells up the genitals and makes them redder, more…

@RaisinGirl doesn't drink white whine: You know what that means: you have to have been the most interesting person in your class. It's always the people on the fringe of the crowd, or totally separate from it, who turn out to be the ones most worth knowing.

It's also not a bad idea to ask the local cop shop about the frequency of their visits to that address. It's a good way to get a handle on how problematic some of your potential future neighbors might be.

I had one of my brothers tell me he just felt he had to confront me about my weight (the "I care about your health" excuse). Before he could go any further, I told him I felt I had to talk to him about his divorce and his relationships with women.

@Ipomoea: And we need patrons to tell us, because we WANT to get these assholes trespassed, believe you me. Every extra pair of eyes helps create a safer environment for us all.

@Flackette Knits A Lot: I'm a public employee too. Yes, our pay is public information, but that doesn't keep the administration honest. They still hire their friends at higher rates of pay, still try to give raises or bonuses to their favorites. When they do this with unionized job classes, our stewards and local…

[www.despair.com]