@MetaEd Sure does. Do we not like that? I can’t find anything against it on meta.

@JonPurdy Check the FAQ.

@MetaEd Ah, there it is. I think that’s something to address on a case-by-case basis. For example, I’d be more inclined to let such a question stand if it were posed by a non-native speaker, especially if it had a definitive answer. In this case though, voting to close.

I recently had a short discussion with Rachel about whether "in-joke" only applies if someone present doesn't "get" it. I think it can also be "only got by the cognoscenti". If you know C/C++, check out the 5th comment here

Hi.

Hi!

Hi again!

There is this birthday party on Saturday that I don't want to go to, but I don't really have an excuse. What to do?

@Cerberus Come down with a contagious disease.

@SpareOom Hehe, hmmm I could try that...

How expected are you to go?

But I'd rather come up with a vaguer excuse.

Can you just tell them you're going to be doing something else? I have other plans?

Make a plan before you tell them though. Even if it's not particularly exciting either.

@SpareOom The first invitation was an month and a half ago. Then a on Monday this week she sent everyone another e-mail asking if we could RSVP, which I shamefully forgot to reply to. Then yesterday she CCd an e-mail to me in which she answered a common friend of ours that she was delighted he would come and whether I would be there too.

@SpareOom Yeah I might have to do that. Or just go.

I'm totally whining here: I just don't know what to decide.

The thing is, the birthday consists of having drinks in a bar together with her sister and their friends. And she's not even paying.

That's why I felt the need to reply was less urgent than otherwise (though of course I should have replied earlier).

Try, "no, I won't be going".

Hehe.

I sort of feel I would need an excuse.

She is a high-school friend, though we are not very close.

oh you've already been invited to a party here on EL&U!

Haha yes!

That will work.

It's a different sort of party, but it will count!

I'd have to put it before the party commission for approval...

Who's on the party commission?

Hmm I don't know...the regulars here? The cast of Downton Abbey?

You could throw the party yourself. You invited a bunch of people already, didn't you?

Ehhh did I?

Perhaps I should just go.

How painful would it be?

How about "I'm not in the mood"?

Not very; probably a bit boring, and I need to go by bus.

whine whine

I don't get invited to parties, so I'm not particularly experienced at declining them. You shouldn't feel bad about just RSVPing "I will not be attending".

How come you're not invited? I don't believe that.

It's not her business to know your reason, especially if you're not close.

I would invite you.

Or pass on my invitation.

@SpareOom No, but it seems rude to RSVP late, say "no", and offer no explanation.

I suppose I should just go.

At least I can say I need to catch the last bus so I will have to leave before midnight.

How late do your parties go!?

There's no telling, they usually dwindle down after 1 or 2; but there will usually remain a decent bunch of people at least until 1, I imagine, or 2.

This is on the weekend though, so I guess late is ok. But you can say (truly maybe) that you didn't sleep well and need to catch up on rest.

Maybe even leave earlier.

It is true, but...she knows I never ever go to bed that early. When I sleep badly, as I often do, going to bed early makes it worse, alas.

But you're right, I should just go.

Who knows, it could be fun.

But why did you say you don't go to parties?

I never got invited to parties in school. Well, one in college. I'm too square.

Square? Well, those people and their parties were probably just stupid.

The parties I go to now don't last that late.

Ah OK, so they are rarely in a bar?

Plus I was/am a wall flower. Crowds make me nervous.

Yeah, I've been to a bar twice, I think.

Only twice? Hmm.

I don't imbibe.

I mean, I rarely socialize with people I don't know in bars; but, as long as there are some friends, it's OK.

Why not?

Then how are you going to destroy your brain and embarrass yourself in public?

I manage to embarrass myself often enough, plus I don't like the taste of alcohol in general.

It is sort of an acquired taste, and it gets better once some of it is thinning your blood already.

I never saw the point of acquiring a taste for it, especially since there are so many calories in it and also the whole thing about not being in control of yourself.

For the calories, I prefer chocolate.

Hmm understandable.

Chcolate is great.

But there aren't that many calories in alcohol.

A glass of beer is, what, 80 kc?

A bar of chocolate should be, what, 1000 kc?

Honestly, I don't know. But beer smells awful!

How about white wine?

Most people who aren't into alcoholic drinks can bear white wine.

Wine varies greatly. I had some once that was quite sweet.

I've never had white wine.

I had a peach daqueri once I think. I think those are high in calories.

I tried rum and coke once, which I didn't like either.

I'm pretty much done trying alcohol now.

Hmm.

So you didn't like the sweet wine or the daqueri?

Not that you have to: who cares!

Oh God, I have just learned about Facebook's "Other Messages".

That is, about a quarter of the new messages I get go into some hidden folder and I never get notified!!

Are they insane??

I found a message from August from an old friend that never arrived in my inbox.

Nor was I notified by e-mail.

This sucks.

redheadwriting.com/is-facebook-hiding-your-messages

I feel like her now.

Other messages?

I had never heard about them either.

I think that feature doesn't exist any more now, but I still found many old messages in it (about 20) that never reached me!!

Outrageous.

It said "20" next to "Other" before I clicked it.

I had pretty much quit checking my facebook regularly. I get email notifications that tell who leaves me messages and I see the message there.

I had been trying to cut down on notifications by email, but they started up after an earlier facebook change.

You din't get notifications for those messages.

At least I didn't.

I checked.

But thankfully this "feature" has been eliminated.

Maybe I should check, just in case.

Or so I believe: I don't see any recent messages in the Other box.

The most recent one is from August last year.

I must have seen any other messages already or lost them long ago.

What?

I kind of like the newer "lists" feature.

Oh, I didn't have an "other" message list.

Huh?

My message box must not have been so stuffed that it overflowed into the Other box.

It's not that: all messages not from friends or friends of friends were supposedly put in the Other box.

Even I had some, and I hardly ever use FB.

Who would be left to send messages then? Strangers?

Yes, and things like events, exhibitions, I don't know.

I got a couple of concerts in it too.

And some people I know but not on FB.

I thought those came under a different area - subscriptions, groups or the like.

I just found out they're tearing down my old elementary school!

Things change all the time, but the article above said they went into the Other box. Since I found several such messages in it, it must have happened like that for a while.

@SpareOom Aww!

Did you have a good time there?

> ... She wants her bridesmaids to have matching skin tones, she expects us to undergo spray tans. She invites hordes of people to her dress fittings and gets offended if people don't attend. She offered to pay for a gym membership for my mom. ...

This is from an advice column. Pretty funny.

I did! I was on the student council, visited the Principal's office often (in a good way). Really good memories.

Aww.

Well, does the school still exist but in a different building?

Matching skin tone? What if one of them were of a different race?

Bleach it.

lol

Or paint it black, whichever is appropriate.

Or purple. Who knows what the desired skin tone is.

Purple - good idea.

The old school is gone. They're putting in a retirement home where it was. :(

The high school photographer was in my classes from elementary school, and he took lots of photos of the gutting of the building and put them up on the group for the elem. school.

Sad.

Someone created the group a couple years back when they found out the school was going to be closed. It was fun to see faces from bygone years.

People were putting up old class pictures and reminiscing about the old times.

Yeah those are fun.

Ah, well. If it had been in an earlier time, it would be done without my ever hearing about it. Online community forever!

Yeah, hearing from people and things of the past is the main thing I like about these sites.

I used to like to listen to my grandma talk about the old days

I think we realize too late how valuable old people's stories can be.

Yeah, that's great as well.

Yeah, we have so many pictures of people of whom we don't know who they are any more. Only old aunt X will know, etc.

Yeah, same here.

If they'd only written on the back of the photos...

We do have a documentary-style short film in which various relatives tell stuff about the past; that's pretty cool.

@SpareOom Yeah they should have! But it's not too late: grab all your unknown photos and let your grandmother or great-and go through them while you note what she says.

And now, in the digital age, we have to remember to title the photos and label them too.

Which is a pain as well.

They passed away.

Pick the a few good ones, automatically have them printed in an album, and add comments in the album?

@SpareOom Aww.

A physical album is the best thing.

I mean, imagine you found an old punched card with information on it. You probably would never bother to find out what was on it. The same applies to finding an old hard drive fifty years from now.

It's up to mom to remember everything.

Oh, I hadn't thought about hard drives going the way of the punch card.

Physical albums are easier to look through with family too.

Yup!

Make sure you never store them in a cold or damp place (like a cellar).

Or even the floor of a wardrobe, in a cold bedroom.

I've had shoes gather loads of mould that way.

Oh mould. I hadn't thought of that. I think grandma's things might have gotten damaged.

She Mom is still going through some if her things.

Good. Things of the past are cool.

I bet the musty smell isn't good for you, but it smells like grandma's house. It's probably a little mouldy.

Heh.

@Cerberus Well, goodnight. Nice chatting with you.

A little bit probably won't do much harm.

@SpareOom Goodnight!

Such fun to close a question titled "Name of literary device" as a duplicate of "Style of this sentence"...

JUSTICE!!!!

@RegDwightѬſ道 You are easily amused.

@Reg @Rob new def war.

Great. Just as I am spent and need to motor.

morning, folks

Morning @MrShiny.

feeling better?

Yes. Tired though.

I cried a lot last night. Very embarrassing.

So of course the kind of thing I would share in chat.

Something wrong?

No, just tired.

Well, kinda, but I was crying because I was tired.

You can tell when I am exhausted because I fixate on things and get worked up about them.

Last night, I was convinced that I have inherited my mother's insanity, and that I am powerless to stop the slide.

Hm.

It made sense at the time.

It's possible I suppose.

Does she have an inheritable form of insanity?

A more reasonable explanation is that I have spent a lot of time in the last two weeks trying to digitize old home movies and pictures, and that it is causing me to feel a certain measure of grief.

All I really know about your mother is your blog post. Which didn't portray her as insane.

Yes, that does sound more reasonable.

Oh, she's nutty as a fruitcake.

You are a fairly reasonable person, most of the time.

Also, selfish and ego-centric.

Haha. That's a funny tween.

heheh yeah I see it now

@MrShinyandNew安宇 You don't think so? How would you describe her character? I'm curious.

@Kitḫ Well, the blog post seemed to characterize her as erm, talkative, and self-absorbed. I don't recall anything I'd characterize as "insanity".

Oh, true. I didn't really get into the conspiracy theories.

I suppose that's not really insanity either.

She's none too logical either.

But that's not really insanity either, I guess.

For example: quirky is always insisting on buying the same brand of peanut butter, and having exactly one jar in reserve, and putting it label-outwards on the shelf in the same spot every day. Insane would be insisting that failure to do so would result in government agents, who are outside watching you right now, coming in and taking your kids away because you're a filthy communist.

OK, well, then I'm quirky and my mother is insane.

:D

That seems more of just "conspiracy theory" than being necessarily insane.

Holla atcha @Grace.

(Also, good morning)

No, I mean literally believing that there are government agents out there right now, as opposed to a general belief that the government might be watching.

Hi Kit, Mr. Shiny & New

I'm glad you decided to visit.

I've actually been lollygagging in here for a bit, heh. Right in time for erotic poetry, no less.

Erotic poetry? Where?

All over the site.

(she responded in her typical fashion)

Insane user that was plaguing your site, Gaming, and possibly others.

I must be feeling better.

I miss all the good stuff.

That user even returned to Gaming a few hours later to reask the same stuff.

Lovely.

oh yeah the piss-flaps guy

Oh, wait. Piss-flaps. Yes. That rings a bell.

Yes, that one

I must have read something in the transcript about it.

sadly I don't think I'll be able to forget that word.

Too bad nobody answered his question, that it should be hyphenated.

We should have closed that Q as a dupe about some other hyphenation question.

Here's a question for EL&U: Which is more erotic: bunghole or starfruit? singe-word-request noun grammer erotic-poetry dating-advice word

Hi!

Ohai!

Hi @Matt! (Also, delayed, but Hi @RegDwight!)

you missed dating-advice

Ewww.

@MattЭллен Fixed it!

:D

I was surprised to find EL&U actually has a dating-advice tag

♪♪ AAAAAYYYY AAAMMMM TEH GREAT MIGHTY POOO AND IM GONNA THROW MY SHIT, AT, YOU! ♪♪♪

Rare poetry.

I noticed yesterday when JSB retagged something with it

Reg tagged my pedo question as dating advice.

Oh, wait, no, it was JSB, I think.

Who did what as what???

:D

It was funny.

aye

brb - cooking lunch

Yep, it was @JSB.

Way back when they hardly knew me.

And he wasn't sure if I would be offended or not.

Oh! hahaha

I forgot about that one.

There, starred nine months after the fact.

That might actually have been how I met JSB.

A catchy title for a TV series.

Oh right. You like that show.

Lies.

Oh, and I mean the whole sentence.

The whole sentence is a catchy title.

Though die-hard fans sometimes use the shorthand TMAHBHIMJSB.

Hmm. Maybe I should write a book with that title.

A series of short stories.

All of them ending with meeting JSB.

That's like groundhog deja vu all over again.

No, not like that.

Always different stories.

How is that relevant to my point?

What point?

What what?

Hahaha.

I mean. I don't get it.

Anyhow, while Kit is polishing her stories, I'll go create the tmahbhimjsb tag over on SF&F. Also, on Cooking. Just in case.

I still think "Consenting Eukaryotes" would be a good name for a band

@MattЭллен That's a rehash of a bash.org quote...

@GraceNote excellent :) that's some good sauce

grrr... there's no free tea... Hulk SMASH!