Pillowcases - lately, we can never have enough. The kid with acne is changing daily (or is supposed to). But at least they are small. :-)

Yeah, an extra set for each bed. I envy someone who can strip the bed, wash and dry the sheets, and get them back on the bed in the same day - on a regular basis. I can do it, but it's rather extraordinary and requires too much planning. :-) We also keep a set of flannel sheets for each bed. So, 3 sets per "permanent" bed. One of those would also be used if we needed the blowup mattress or had to put together a makeshift bed on the floor, etc.

I don't remember the last time I had a full night's sleep. I wake up at least once, more likely 2-3 times every night and often can't get back to sleep. My mind starts racing and I can't shut it off. If it wouldn't disturb my husband, I'd read for a bit to calm my brain. BTW I am 18 years post-menopause.

Well, I guess the question would be what the poster meant by "used to be" and in what type of culture. Sure, there have been polygamous cultures throughout time and across the world. I assumed the poster was talking about Western/European culture - I don't know why; maybe because that's the type of culture the couple in question live in. I think I recall from history studies, some young kings or princes having to marry a widowed in-law, but always he was single. In the Tudor dynasty, maybe? Anyway, my bad.

Not if he was married to someone else.

I mostly agree with this. My only point of disagreement is with regard to separation. If divorce proceedings have begun, then I'd say it's not an affair. If the couple has just separated and has not started divorce proceedings, then I'd call it an affair. But that is maybe too quibbly.

Right. It's everywhere. But, when I try to read stuff like that - it's empty. A low signal to noise ratio. Re: a different comment about people being reminded to get out of their ruts (paraphrased). "Rut" has a very negative connotation. Not many people are going to say they are happy when they're in a rut. But some people don't need a lot of change in their lives. They're happy to make a living, raise their families, help their kids do a little bit better than they (the parents) did. Not everyone needs world travel or loads of exciting experiences to not be in a rut. And frequent reminders to slow down and enjoy the journey become background noise quickly anyway - at least for me. And re: "being brave" (in the quoted post above) - sometimes being brave means staying where you are, living the life you committed to (or were given by circumstances, fate, God,,,), taking care of business, even if you see something over the fence that looks much more appealing. But, you know, I am old and cranky. For sure. :-)

To know what to put in a gift basket, you'd have to know the person pretty well. Just some ideas; some are duplicates of what others have said. Coffee or tea, easy food suited to the person's likes. I agree that alcohol wouldn't be quite right. I could see myself having the desire to drink myself into oblivion if such a thing happened to me. But also there's the link to her son's overdose. A living plant to take care of. A book on grief suited to the person's religious beliefs. When my mom died, a friend who knew I was a Christian gave me a book she'd found comforting in the past. It was from a perspective that was not helpful to me at all at, which she surely would have known. A book of prayers, if appropriate A journal and pen. Notes from coworkers; remembrances of the son if people knew him. A calendar with dates filled in that people will bring her dinner - which she is welcome to refuse if she likes. Not part of a care package but - calls every couple of days to see what she needs. Visits if she likes that. Yes, if she has a yard, be prepared to send people to mow, etc.

Yes, I can notice other peoples' smells, more from being in their house than from their stuff. It does make me wonder sometimes what my house smells like. I think a lot of it is the type of food they cook. We had some good friends from India whose house had a distinct "curry smell" about it, whether they were cooking curry when we were there or not. ETA: I forgot about this: detergent/fabric softener smell. I can tell when people use it. It comes with them into my house too. My husband sometimes has meetings at someone's house and he has to take allergy meds before he goes. When he comes home, he showers and I wash his clothes separately. It's that strong. My sister made me a quit once; it is beautiful and I love it. We were visiting her when she gave it to us, and the smell of it made one of my kids feel ill (like allergies) in the car on the way home. It took me weeks of laundering with various substances like baking soda, vinegar rinses, etc., and hanging out on the line before I could get her smell out of it.

We buy most of our cheese at Aldi, though I find their feta and goat seem tasteless to me. Prefer Trader Joe's for those. Most other dairy products too. Chips, other snacks. Frozen pizza. Frozen veggies and fish. Canned beans are a good value, though I think Wegman's brand costs about the same. They used to have a great buffalo chicken pizza, but I haven't seen that in a few years. Produce here is hit and miss. It is the first store I go to. I can't get everything there. But a lot of our basics and some fun stuff too. Oh, agreeing on the chocolate. And cookies. Oh yeah, and breads.

I think it's part of living an authentic life. Another thing I don't get. How can anyone's real life be inauthentic? I guess there have always been little catchphrases that people say. Little meaningless things that seem to have meaning but actually don't. Of course I can't think of any from the past. "Keep on keepin' on." '60s or '70s?

This has come up here before, a while back. I asked my daughter what she thought of a ceremony, something special... she was appalled. Of course everyone's different. I don't get the chocolate though. What is the point? Maybe it's because there is almost always chocolate in some form in the house and people eat it when they want to (within reason of course) that I don't get it. Sorry for the derail. And I don't get the painkillers either, I guess. We have painkillers in the house too, to use as needed. Sorry if I am being a big party-pooper. I guess I'm just confused. I do think having a bag with supplies is an excellent idea!

I haven't had this problem, but I think it's because my two are close in age. So, there aren't younger siblings doing "kiddie" things. This thread is reminding me of my older brother though. We are 10 years apart. I remember when he got really jerky on our annual camping trips, and then stopped going altogether. It was sad for me... for a bit... then it was nice because his sulky self was not around. I think the camping trips stopped when my sister (5 years older, right in between big bro and me) started getting to that point. This was in the mid-to-late '60s. So, obviously nothing new!

This thread made me decide to go looking. Redeemer Presbyterian Church has one.

I put reminders on my google calendar - appointments, things I need to do. Reminders will keep showing up till it's marked as done. For a while I used Todoist. That's also free, and easy to work with. It was more helpful to me when I had more homeschool stuff to keep track of. Lots of people like the paper bullet journal. I did that for a while too. But I found having it on my phone worked better for me.

Yes this. There seems to be so much anger about this. The fact that a hapless (and anonymous) store clerk may be misusing the word doesn't take anything away from people who are truly suffering from PTSD.

The only thing that couldn't apply to males here is cleavage, and that's simply because they don't have any. If boys are also not allowed to wear shorts that are too short (some of you might remember the short, tight shorts guys wore in the '80s, ugh), have their belly exposed, etc. then it's equal. Just because guys don't tend to wear stuff like that doesn't mean it's unequal. Covered shoulders? Does that mean no strapless tops? Gah, I'd ban those in school because they are such a distraction to the wearer. I don't think I've ever seen anyone wearing a strapless top who wasn't always fiddling with it to keep it up. Bride dresses are an exception. I guess those are so constructed they aren't going to be falling down. :-) I think something like "no skin-tight trousers" would cover leggings and skinny jeans. But even the skinniest jeans I've seen are not as revealing as most leggings.

Asphalt is softer, more giving than concrete. Not much, but enough that some people prefer to run or walk on it rather than the concrete sidewalks. I see it all the time in my neighborhood, but it is quiet so walking in the street isn't particularly dangerous. http://www.runnersworld.com/running-tips/should-i-run-on-asphalt-or-concrete ETA: Whoops, MEMama already said it.

You just made my day! I am going to get some of this today. My son has struggled mightily with acne for years. It seems to come and go. One summer, when he was at a camp for a week and swam in a chlorinated pool daily, he came home with beautifully clear skin. But the acne came back after a few weeks. We have no pool available for daily swimming. :-) He used all the "big gun" remedies and everything seemed to work for a while, then stop. Adapalene, and later, Epiduo did help, at least for a while. He was on isotretinoan (accutane) for a long time. That cleared it up well too. But then it came back. Then, his dermatologist invited him to be part of a study. For that, he had to use no medications for some period of time beforehand. His skin cleared up when he was just cleaning with a gentle cleanser. All through the study he was clear. But a few months after it ended... acne started coming back. I'm hopeful that the OTC adapalene will help, at least for a while.

If the target demographic is British women, why use an American narrator - Maya Angelou? (rhetorical question) That just seems odd to me. I dunno. Different things are motivating to different people. I never liked any form of exercise even as a kid. Well, I always liked to hike and explore. But if that wasn't available (which it usually wasn't) I wanted to stay home and read. Now I exercise because I know I have to. Hiking is not an option most of the time but I do walk daily and get out to the woods when I can. Anyway, I can see how it might be motivating to some but did nothing for me personally. Like Sparkly, I can't do most group exercises. I am clumsy and out of step. But those types of classes are too expensive for me anyway.

:grouphug: :grouphug:

I suspect that if you and I were talking this over in person, instead of back-and-forth online, we would find we are in agreement more than in disagreement. I am nodding a lot as I read your posts. The thing is - what bothers me is - that in my experience so many women put up with crap simply for the sake of having a boyfriend. I saw it so many times over the years in my work environment and still do though to a lesser extent. For whatever reason, women will start to date a guy, and know right away that he's not good, but will continue to date him, have sex and sometimes babies with him, perhaps thinking she can change him, perhaps just feeling that he is better than nothing. I was single for a long time, 12 years between my divorce from an early stupid marriage (see, I was not immune) and the time I met my 2nd (current, permanent) husband. I worked with a lot of women. If there was one thing I could have imparted to some of them, it would be: There are worse things than being alone. So many of them even knew they should have dumped the guy right off, but they did not. Instead they became more immersed and more dependent. And that is what I mean about rewarding men for bad behavior. If a guy can be a jerk, but the girl will still come running every time he calls... she's rewarded him. And I can't help but think, what if women just stopped letting guys get away with it? If by two weeks or months or whatever into the relationship, just dump him. If guys got dumped enough, some of them might change. So, I think in that regard women have more power over men than they sometimes realize. And again, I'm not talking about the woman who marries or gets into a long-term relationship with a man, has kids, etc., and it goes bad. I'm talking about recognizing that the guy is bad right from the start, but hanging in there with him.

This is quite true. But that is not what I'm saying. I'm saying that women can decide to stop associating with men who treat them badly early on in the relationship, such as the coworker I described upthread. Note: I am NOT talking about battered women in long-term relationships with kids, etc. I am talking about women who are dating guys and who could just stop dating them. People respond to incentives and rewards. Guys who are inclined to mistreat women they date are rewarded when their bad behavior doesn't result in the woman leaving them. I'll repeat: I am talking about the early stages of a relationship, when people are dating and getting to know each other, and the woman perceives that the man isn't treating her well but she persists in dating him. Perhaps because she believes she can change him. I'm not talking about long-term relationships where the man becomes abusive, the woman is trapped in a marriage, with kids, etc.

You've never known any irresponsible, jerky guys who always had plenty of women doting on them, making excuses for them, always being available to them? Never known any women who enable their boyfriend's bad habits, make excuses for their bad behavior, and go running when the guy calls? I'm thinking now of my old coworker Kathy, who had a boyfriend who would call her from jail every few weeks. She'd bail him out; he'd be nice for a while, then he'd cheat on her, or otherwise mistreat her... she always made excuses and would go back to him when he wanted her. She was a professional woman, able to support herself - she didn't need him. But she wanted him - except when she didn't, because he treated her badly. There have been others but I'll spare you the anecdotes. If those guys had been refused the company of women because of their bad behavior, they might have straightened up. Seriously, you've never come across that? You think it's impossible? Or is it just not OK to say that some women are, in some part, to blame for bad behavior in men because they tolerate it?

Men continue to be irresponsible because women will still have sex with them. I've known so many women - not so much now, but when I was younger - who always went for the "bad boys" and ignored the good guys. There is one young woman I know, supposedly desperate to marry, who keeps rejecting stand-up guys because they're too boring. So she keeps going out with jerks who keep breaking her heart.