Hi there! I'm an Airbnb host. The hosts themselves can require different things from the people who want to rent from them, so the host of the place you're trying to book wants Airbnb to verify your ID (your previous hosts didn't). It's just one extra step in protecting their asset/property from people who might leave significant damages behind (if you know your identity is on file, you're less likely to damage property). I don't require it but totally get why some people do. Requiring ID doesn't say anything about the host except that they are just being pretty careful about who rents from them. If you provide your ID, it's Airbnb that will get the information, not the host. I have no problem providing it and have done so in the past without a problem. ETA - Just for information's sake, the same is true in return, to protect you. To become a host, we go through an extensive ID check, having to prove our identity in more ways than one. Airbnb does their best to make sure their hosts are on the up and up and aren't all about ripping people off somehow.

Some things I wonder about: Laxatives ahead of time? I haven't heard of that but if that's your instruction, make SURE not to overdose at all. I was in the ER recently for taking too many laxatives when I thought I could (due to a dietary issue), when really I shouldn't have. If a man ever wants to see what it's like to be in labor, they should take too many herbal (senna) laxative pills. It was bad and came in waves in the gut just like labor. Also, can she have milk up to the day before the procedure? All I "ate" the week of my Friday procedure was raw milk, Beginning the day before the procedure, I switched to vegetarian broth. Finally, if there's ANY way you can get the plain flavor -- in my experience -- I'd say try, try, try. I had to do the gallon (1/2 gallon the night before, 1/2 gallon morning of) and I was able to chug the drink fine, but it was that last swallow, when the fake lemon flavor was tasted, that I would gag.

That's what I thought might be the case. I asked a store employee about this the last time I was in, saying I was scared of spending more than the $40 I do because of the experience I've already had of them not lasting long and they tried to indicate "You get what you pay for" (and that more expensive ones would last longer). I still purchased the $40 ones.

I use headphones for several hours a day for my speech-to-text transcription work and I, too, am irritated by how often I have to buy headphones. I'm an adult who cares carefully for her work equipment (know how to plug in, not fidget with the cords, not wrap them around anything, etc.) and I still have to buy a couple pairs or more a year. I would think they should last longer than that. My first headphone set, about 2011, lasted two years if I recall correctly. Per the store's instruction, I am keeping the packaging and receipt now and if it's only been six months or so, I'm taking them back to the store for replacement if they break.

The link didn't work for me in Firefox, but did it Chrome. Just FYI to anyone interested.

See I didn't start watching ER until Clooney and Margulies were gone (or almost gone) so I think I missed that episode but I just read about it after I happy-googled "most memorable ER episodes." I just signed on to Hulu so I could watch it. Sigh. As for hospital shows before ER .... in addition to E/R (which I did actually watch during its run), in my young-girl life, there was also Emergency! and well, of course, General Hospital (lol!).

I YouTube this scene every once in while. That version of "Somewhere Over the Rainbow" touched me then and even comes back to haunt me in different ways now (most recently when my husband and I took our almost-a-nun daughter our for lunch for her high school graduation celebration; she didn't want an actual graduation event or party, so the three of us did lunch). The music playing over the speakers at the restaurant was annoyingly unfitting, but at the very moment her dad started saying some of our "official" words of graduation, that song came on -- I literally burst into tears. ER provided so many surreal shocking-horrifying-satisfying moments for me -- including the one with Dr. Greene, but also things like the way one season ended with the attack on Carter and Lucy (still SO vivid, the shock, to me), both incidents with Dr. Romano involving a helicopter (ack!! and ACK! ACK!), and how Dr. Pratt survived the ambulance explosion but was being treated in the ER, and the look on his face when he realized what was happening to him. Ugh. I never even thought about ER coming out as a series on Netflix or some such service. Like one of the posters said above, when I start to watch a series that I like, I realllly binge watch and am lost to all for a time. By the way, you do remember that George Clooney was in a hospital-based show before ER? It was called ..... E/R. It also starred Elliott Gould, Conchata Farrell, Mary McDonnell and Jason Alexander.

Thanks, Patty Joanna. Yes, that is pretty much what I was thinking. I was writing in the context of the Reformed idea of faith -- that God gives it to who He wills, so some will never have faith. But I think we can ALL have faith, should we choose to do so, and that in choosing to do so, it's a gift we give God, part of us back to Him. And yes, as you describe, because He already created something to have faith in, and enabled us to have faith in the first place, and then He gives back again to us, and we again back to him as we live a life of faith. A living faith.

Understood! That's where, for me, the educated non Christian people on this forum were a great help. More than one said, over the course of several weeks around the time we were leaving our Protestant church, something along the lines of "If anyone has a claim to be the historical church, it's the Orthodox," which led me to start reading writings from the early times and move forward in time with how things developed, rather than with my feet standing in the 20th century trying to look back through time. That was how it played out for our family, but I do totally understand that other groups feel the same way about their lineage.

I took it the way you meant it, if that is helpful. You were describing how your brain processed the experience within your personal context. ("Cookies"!)

I fixed your above request for you, LOL! From the way I understand it, it's a combination of both apostolic succession and the way those apostles were led by the Holy Spirit. From the first major church council in the book of Acts to the last one in about 800 AD, during which some of the theology and beliefs of the church were somewhat formalized, it was a conciliar action where one bishop had one vote.The Apostle James said, at the end of the first church council described in the book of Acts, "It seemed good to the Holy Spirit and to us .." when he announced the decision of that council. The bishop of Rome, the pope, had a primacy (a role of honor, a "first among equals"), but not a supremacy (a role as head) over the other four patriarchates and their bishops. [sIDE NOTE, that you can skip if you want - The attempt to develop that supremacy is one of the major things that led to the Great Schism. The other was Rome's addition of the filioque clause to the ancient Nicene Creed without the agreement of the other bishops; at the council of Nicea in 325 AD, when the Creed had been agreed upon, it was also agreed that no changes could be made without the full consent of all bishops. Thus the unfortunate event of the splitting of the church into east (with its four patriarchs) and the west (with its one).] Because of the loss of the Roman patriarch who had held that position of primacy, after the Great Schism in 1054 AD, the leader of the patriarchate of Constantinople (who you referred to in your post) now has this position of primacy. But that's all it is -- a place of honor among the other patriarchs of the church; he's a first among equals. He has no supremacy and cannot rule for the entire church. The church is still conciliar. And that's a big part of the "unchanged" comment made. As for theological beliefs, they, too, have gone unchanged. They were somewhat formalized through the councils, but what the councils did was formalize what the people of the church already believed. It didn't work the other way around -- doctrines were not introduced from the councils that the people then had to adhere to. If a foreign doctrine had been introduced, the lay people -- technically -- had the power to protest and resist. For example, and I will try and get this right, when some leaders tried to say that venerating icons was idolatrous (a practice from the very early days of the church, one that spoke to the incarnation of Christ), it was the Empress Theodora who led the church back to the practice. All of the above is what we collectively call Holy Tradition. Holy Tradition is the life of the church developed under the guidance of the Holy Spirit. Oh, as for practice -- those things can and do change a little bit over time. They are not dogma. For example, the earliest Divine Liturgy was that of St. James the Apostle. It was several hours long. Over time it was shortened and today we have two main liturgies, that of St. Basil the Great and that of St. John Chrysostom (between 1.5 and 2 hours long). While the liturgy on a Sunday is about 1600 years old, new troparia (songs) were written and added after that time, as different saints were canonized and honored and different feasts developed and practiced. The liturgy has always been serviced in the language of the native people in the different areas of the world. There are also different cultural practices in different parts of the world, and that's okay. This is not changing Holy Tradition. If something starts to get out of whack, the people -- and as needed, the bishops -- bring it back. Long answer, sorry. Hopefully it made some sense.

Yes, I think it would be correct to say that in this sense, Baptist is not reformed. You do have to accept Christ and are the one who makes the decision to follow Him. And it's not just Baptist who believe this, many Christian sects do. I know I did before I became Eastern Orthodox -- I was very very concerned for the people, especially loved ones but also others, who had not prayed to receive Christ. I hope it's okay to say that I enjoyed reading your last post; describing the various experiences you've had -- and the thoughts that went along with those experiences -- in the religious realm.

As a theology, it is my understanding that "reformed" refers -- generally speaking -- to the belief that we have no power to do anything and that God wills and does all. The way this plays out in the realm of personal faith is that it is God, then -- not we ourselves -- Who chooses who of us will have faith in Him and who of us will not. In yet other words, He creates some for eternal salvation with Him, and some for eternity apart from Him. Since we are His created beings, we submit to His creative hand; He created us, and He can create us for whatever end He desires. If we have to make a decision to follow Him, it's a works-based salvation; we have to do something -- believe -- in order to be saved; that would mean God is not in control and therefore not sovereign. That is the understanding I developed after I became Orthodox and read about this topic and talked with others who believed in it, anyway. It is a theology which most definitely is not Orthodox because it's a theology that developed in the west and was never part of the phronema of the east. But even more than that, is not the ancient teaching from the days of the early church until now, which instead teaches that all who will may come (think of the Prodigal Son returning home; he made the decision to return). Faith is a gift we give Him. I am more than willing to have things clarified/corrected by someone who does believe in reformed theology.

It reminds me of an cartoon I saw at Christmas time, for which I can't find a link, where a little boy on Santa's lap at the mall is asking the bearded man, "Homooisios or homoiusios?" The store Santa replies with a befuddled, "What?!" and the little boy sighs, "You're not the real St. Nicholas." :D

If I may, because my knowledge isn't as developed in this area, I pulled this quote from online and I think it describes this better than I could: [snip] “Coptic†means “Egyptian,†and Christians living in Egypt identify themselves as Coptic Christians. As a denomination they originated in the city of Alexandria, one of the most faithful, respected, and fruitful cities during the Apostolic Period. Proudly, the Coptic Christians acknowledge and herald John Mark, (author of the Gospel of Mark), as their founder and first bishop sometime between A.D. 42 - A.D. 62. The Coptic Church was actually involved in the very first major split in the Church, well before there was such a thing as "Roman" Catholicism, and it was also well before the East/West split. Prior to the “Great†East/West Schism of A.D. 1054, the Coptics were separated from the rest by the Council of Chalcedon in A.D. 451. The council met to discuss the Incarnation of Christ and declared that Christ was "one hypostasis in two natures" (i.e., one person who shares two distinct natures). This became standard orthodoxy for Eastern Orthodox, Roman Catholic, and Protestant churches from then on. The Coptic understanding is that Christ is one nature from two natures: "the Logos Incarnate." In this understanding, Christ is from, not in, two natures: full humanity and full divinity. [End snip] Quoted from here: https://www.gotquestions.org/Coptic-Christianity.html (Disclaimer: I don't know this website and whether or not it presents a balanced view of the different areas of Christianity.) ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ From what I understand, the oriental/coptic and eastern Orthodox Christian churches are much closer to unification today than are the RC and EO churches, because some think the difference described in the paragraph above was partly due to translation issues. But don't quote me on that. Patty Joanna or Princess Mommy may have more knowledge on that than I.

One of the things I learned and what I referred to in my post above is that there were three main parts of today's Christianity: Eastern Orthodox, Roman Catholic, and Protestant. As a charismatic evangelical Christian who was often all about "God doing a new thing!" I guess I only vaguely knew that; I certainly didn't know the intricacies of it all. I thought a church with a 100-year history was old. In what I hope is a fair and balanced summary, I will present the following (but I'm willing to be corrected / balanced!). This is how I understand the broad, general church history now and much of it I learned here on this board, from both Christians and non-Christians alike. * According to the EO, they have existed from the beginning without change and at the Great Schism in 1054 AD, Rome broke off -- or was excommunicated -- from the original church because the new dogmas coming to play in the west were incompatible with the original faith (things like Papal supremacy and adding the words "and the Son" to the 600+ year old Nicene Creed). The EO is, aptly, the eastern church of the EO/RC split. * According to the RC, they are the original church that has existed from the beginning and the EO broke off from them because they wouldn't follow the Pope as the supreme head of the church, or any of the dogmas coming out of the western councils. If the EO would come back under the headship of the pope, the churches could be reunited. The RC church is the western of the the EO/RC split. * According to the Protestant sects, the RC was in error and needed to be reformed, thus Luther and the resulting reformation. This also is the church in the west; the reformation and "Reformed/reformed" are western constructs in response to the RC church. There is probably no way to have reunification because each believes the other is fundamentally in error. Back to my EO perspective: From a historical point of view, the reformation had nothing to do with the eastern church; it just kept on as it had kept on from the beginning. Oh, and of course, there are some groups who claim to be from none of these three groups. Here is the most neutral graphic / timeline that I have seen describing the above: https://www.pinterest.com/pin/57350595225141318/ We became EO in the end, having looked at all of this (the timeline is what especially convinced me to seek that part of the three main sections of Christianity, but there were many other things as well).

I didn't know I was a Protestant when I was a Protestant, lol, so I didn't like the term because I didn't think it applied to me. I didn't like divisions in the church and thought this was just another division. I thought we should all "just be Christians" without the denominations. In my case, I then took a look at church history -- with the help of some people here, both Christian and non-Christian -- and realized that I was in fact a Protestant, but that I didn't have to be. There were other options.

For me, it was a matter of church history -- studying a timeline to see what happened when. I wanted to stick with the church that had the least adulterated line back through church history and for us, from what we saw in history as well as in theology and practice, that was Eastern Orthodox. But I have a feeling you mean how do the two differ in theology? That's why I posted the "discover" link -- to give a picture of EO beliefs. I was actually at the "what we believe" page of a local Anglican church the other day and I'm not a theologian, in fact feel inept in most theological discussions, but I do remember thinking that there were some differences. For example, that website spoke of the Bible being the foundation of the faith, whereas in Eastern Orthodoxy, the church and its holy tradition (of which the Bible is a big part) is the foundation of the faith. Another EO person is welcome to jump in and give a better answer than I am able to! What I do know is that we're eight years in now, this month, and we are still as thrilled as we were the day we were baptized to be EO. It's not the easiest of paths, because our journey takes us inward (so that the externals are not the main point), but it's a solid path, one leading us toward our salvation.

Oops! It's dot org; I'll correct it. http://www.antiochian.org/discover ETA: Thank you, Laura.

So, I'm going to throw Eastern Orthodox out there. We have infant baptism (and infant communion -- once baptized, a person is a full, practicing member of the community), are definitely as liturgical as it gets, and don't teach universal salvation. The itchy point is the reformed part -- by western, modern definition we are definitely not reformed, but what I would say is that reformed/not reformed is a western church construct. We just are what we've been from the beginning of the church, without something like the West's reformation and/or "reformed" doctrine (agreeing with the above, depending on what you mean by "reformed"). The east and west are separate/different in this and in the east, we are just pressing on with everything we've got in what we've always been and known and done. If you need to have some destined for heaven and some destined for hell as God choose/wills as part of your active faith, then we'd not be the church for you because we don't believe that (we believe that anyone who wills can come, per their choice and action). But if you can step outside that arena entirely and live a faith where the debate of whether that's right or wrong doesn't exist, then we may be. http://www.antiochian.org/discover

For us, we usually wait until the leavetaking of Theophany (so about Jan. 13). We put exterior house lights up on Dec. 13 and don't start decorating inside in earnest until about the 18th and our tree goes up around the 20th. So things still seem "new" to us and we're in no hurry. Some year I'd love to hold out until the Feast of the Presentation of Christ in the Temple (Feb. 2) but it does feel like a huge stretch!

Same as Patty Joanna, if/when I read, it's the Church's daily reading's for the day.

Searching for Bobby Fischer, one of my top five movies of all time. Based on a true story, it's about a child chess prodigy.

I asked this exact question last January. 🙂 http://forums.welltrainedmind.com/topic/634190-movies-like-hidden-figures

I have a system with which I only have to think about bills twice a month. You don't have to mark things on a calendar, make piles, file things chronologically, send anything in the mail and rarely even receive any bills in the mail. Don't let the length of this post scare you; I'm just uber thorough. It is easy to set up and implement and feelings of panic never arise.. 1) Get all your payees set up in the bill pay section at your bank (see note at the end of this paragraph if you don't currently use bill pay or don't want to). By the way, I don't mean automatic payments; I only use that if required to do so. When setting up bill pay, the bank will often say that automatic payments are available for certain payees and ask you to choose that option, but I just deny it and move on. Getting payees set up in bill pay will take a good amount of time but once done, it's done. Note 1: You could use paper bills instead of bill pay with this system, I just think it's far easier to not have to keep track of and sort bills, and to let the bank do the sending of the payment for you. No check writing, envelope stuffing, stamping and mailing on your part! Note 2: I don't like automatic payments because then I still have to mentally process each bill individually every month. I have to make sure the payment goes through, in other words have to see with my eyes that it hit my account. With this system, I don't have to do that. I see that they all go through all at once when I hit "pay." 2) Sign up for e-notices with as many payees as you can. You want to cut down drastically on paper bills arriving in your mailbox. You don't need them with this system. I don't even care about bills that might arrive in the mail, I just glance at them quickly to see if anything changed; if not, they just go right in the shredding garbage. If it's a bill jt has a varying amount due each month, I do note that amount before shredding it. See below. 3) Open a Word document and create a master list of all bills, divided into sections. I do "Pay first of month" and "Pay mid-month" (my dh gets paid on the last day of the month and I get paid on the 15th, so that's why I chose this system; you can choose any dates that work for your situation). I have what-goes-where evened out so that it's about 50/50 when it comes to the total of approximate amounts due, but this, too, could be varied if, for example, you have more money at the beginning of the month than at at mid-month. In the Word document, you want to note both the payee name AND the amount due. If it's a varying amount, see below. Some notes about bills: A high percentage are due at or around the first of the month. Many aren't though and you usually have a 7-10 days when the grace period is taken into account to pay most bills once they arrive. As mentioned above, with some payees, you can call and ask to change the due date so use this tool if available to better organize your list. If there's a bill that's due quarterly, I note the four different months it's due in the "notes" section at bill pay (where it will be visible when logged in to bill pay). Then I know at a glance if that's a bill that I need to pay that month. For bills that have a varying amount due, when you get the e-mail or bill telling you that amount due, note that amount in your Word document in parentheses next to the payee name. The point is to get your Word document organized with a payment system that works for you. Since the date due of the bill rarely changes (unless you have called to request a change), this system lets you not have to note each month when something is due. 4) On the 1st and 15th (or whatever dates you've chosen), open up bill pay and your Word document and pay all the bills noted for those days. It takes about 10 minutes twice a month and you're done. I've been using this system for years and haven't missed a bill yet. You do have to make changes with the payee if changes arise but you can easily adjust your Word document as needed.