It’s also really upsetting that since it’s across the office, presumably there were a lot of people hearing that who said nothing. I don’t know the dynamic, maybe they were intimidated and scared for their jobs too, but it still sucks to have to answer to that name in front of your silent colleagues.

Or someone was threatening to tell on him and he thought he could save the company/his cash flow by doing it first.

The best advice that I got from a shelter employee when I was looking to adopt a dog (and I got a lot of good advice) was 1) know your limits — in my case, don’t adopt a difficult dog when it’s your first one, and 2) you’ll know. And sure enough, when I met my pups it was love at first sight and I’ve had no regrets. I…

I think that’s exactly it... which is what makes it so frustrating to me (as a white person) that there are groups of white people who just lose their shit if anyone even implies that something that other white people have done pertain to them. A) Deal with it, and examine it because majorities often are either bad…

Mine has that exact tail coloring and the face, we know he’s also part Aussie and possibly Corgi... but he is certainly a mix of pack-animal-loves-everyone and random-mayhem. So your description sounds pretty on point. Everyone at the dog park gives us guesses about what he might have roots to and beagle has come up a…

I never did the old old dudes, but age differences mean more when you’re younger. I had a relationship with a guy who was 10 years older than me for several years from 16 - 18/maybe 19. At the time I thought that meant I was cool, even though he treated me really badly. In retrospect, that just meant he couldn’t…

What kind is the dog in the top photo? Mine is a mystery mix but they look like cousins!

I certainly wouldn’t date either of them. I don’t really have an opinion on whether or not she owes him money, though. Seems still pretty confusing.

It’s obscene that it’s almost an afterthought to him that parents were having their children ripped away from them (“Oh caveat! The kid stealing thing wasn’t the best, but you know everything else was good!”). Also even the slaveholder wives often didn’t have their own rights to property or their own money or divorce,…

I mostly read fiction so this might not apply... but I only read on my Kindle if it’s an easy book with not that many characters. In a complicated book with a lot to say, I have kind of a muscle memory of where certain plot points were, so it’s a lot easier in a book to flip back and remind myself than it is in an…

I worked at an indie within the last few years and the selling point was that we all (the random staff) had degrees in literature and if you could tell us a couple books you liked (or didn’t like) we could find you another that fit your taste. “You might also like...” tech might be helpful for some but there are still…

That’s inaccurate... the co-defendents say that in the process of spying on him with the spyware, she also saw their email exchanges with him (I think they were both exes). Doesn’t make it OK, but it’s not nearly as crazy as having put software on their computers as well.

In the US at least, the trend has been that the big chains can’t compete with Amazon so they close locations or shut down entirely. But at the same time, independent bookstores have been gaining strength because the staff is generally knowledgable and the offerings are well curated for people who still love books.

A friend of mine works for an airline and he also says part of the problem is you get people who tell their doctor that they’re afraid of flying and get given some pretty heavy sedatives that they’ve never taken before and end up blacking out and losing it.

Yeah the podcast is new to me but I subscribed to the email when I was also an English major, probably around 2004 or 5. I set it up with a gmail filter so it skips the inbox and goes into a folder. Then whenever I have a poetry urge I have over 10 years of them so I can read as many as I like. It’s been a good…

The big problem is the part about owners being allowed to keep the tips for themselves. When I was in college I worked for a family-owned restaurant that did that. They made us all pool our tips and then they distributed them at the end of the shift, supposedly to share out evenly amongst the workers, but mysteriously…

I agree- invasion of privacy is almost never OK (I put in the almost for the extreme cases where you are the protagonist in a Lifetime movie and your boyfriend is almost certainly plotting to kill you).

Thankfully that wasn’t her experience — she’s dealt with some real bullshit but not that.

My mother has a really great career in the corporate world and she said in the 70s and 80s it was common knowledge amongst women that you never, ever mentioned your children or partner if you had them. Even worse was family photos on the desk. Everyone would just assume that you weren’t going to be performing because…

Wow, I never knew that! I never had strong feelings about him one way or the other, but my boyfriend’s go-to podcast for washing dishes is the Writer’s Almanac so Keillor’s kind of my daily visit from somebody else’s grandpa. Sounds like this is not as surprising as I thought.