Official Off Topic Discussion Thread #1

[Kittiee Katt]

Hey guys! Haven't been on for a bit, had lots going on.

Hello; I get you are responding to someone else's comment but let me chime in. I am not and I do not think most others are suggesting you walk away only because things get tough. My take is you are not in a position to actually do anything at all about the situation. Walking away when you do not have any viable options is not the same as throwing an animal you are responsible for to the curb.
If I have missed some important points then I am wrong, but my take is you could not take in the animals right now even if the X-boyfriend was willing to give then to you????

Hello; Not the same sort of thing to my thinking. I had to take numerous insults and unpleasant situations during my work career. I recall writing a letter asking I be posted to a school closer to my home if a position opened up. I was sent to a school even further away due to a local political fight I had nothing to do with. When I asked for a meeting with the superintendent of schools she told me teachers were a dime a dozen so take it or leave it. I took it as I needed the job.

Hello; I want to be on your side and am not your enemy. I just do not see how you have much choice.

I can't take them now, no. But when I can take them I'd like to be able too. I'm trying really hard to get a house, I'm taking every shift I'm offered at work (I've had 3 days off in the last month) so that it looks like I have money when applying for rental properties I'm doing everything I can so I can get my fur-mily/fin-mily back, I just wish they'd accept something I'm offering.

I'm trying so hard and everything I try seems pointless and doesn't work. The only thing in my life right now that's actually going well is my job.

Why do you believe you are abandoning the animals, when it seems they are being withheld, even stolen? Perhaps I misunderstand the situation. Are they expecting you to retrieve all these animals at a future date?

Not all of them, but yeah. I'm supposed to be taking two of the four cats, our green terror and pleco, and the syno cat/loach/cae tank when I get a place.

The worst part is we (him and I) were getting along fine, we didn't have a nasty break up it was mutually agreed on because he wanted biological kids and I don't. Neither of us were buthurt and we even lived together for a few months after the break up. When I moved out he was doing water changes and if he couldn't do them he'd call me and I'd go around and do them, same as feeding or playing with the cats. And I'd give him half of whatever the water bill was when it came in as well as $120 a fortnight because that's half of what the cat food costs. Its only since the girlfriend moved in that everything's gone haywire.

The fact that they are basically stealing your cats, which I assume you had before the breakup, is not right or fair. Also charging you half the water bill was criminal, because he wasn’t doing what he said he was doing and charging you for water you didn’t use. This whole issue makes me very discontented with the way they are treating you and your pets. They are using your pets as leverage against you and again it is infuriating even to me.


I also have a question:
Did you buy the fish tanks or the fish? because that would make them your “property” and therefore yours which means that you could go your local authorities and demand that your “stolen property” be returned and maybe even some of your water bill.

Technically no, I got paid very little while we were together so the deal was I paid for the rent, water and power and he paid for food, pets and luxuries because that was more expensive. He couldn't manage his money for sh*t is why I paid the rent, water and power because I didn't want to be cold, homeless or unable to shower or wash my dishes.

When we broke up the money "we'd" saved was split between us equally because he said he would of had a cent of it without me. We got along great after we split, he was my partner of 8 and a half years which doesn't sound like much but that was a third of the time I'd been alive.

Three of the cats I could argue are mine maybe - my mums cat had kittens, Fey was from her first litter and Bonga was from her second - neither was paid for but both were given to me, and Rumpy is Feys kitten where the crafty b*tch got outside before we had her desexed.

But most of the fish he paid for, and most of the tanks were brought out of his money so legally I'm aware that I have no claim to them.

I don’t really have any good advice to offer. This is so upsetting and my heart goes out to you.

All good, I think just venting helps and I don't like venting to my friends and family too much because I don't want to worry anyone. And no advice is always better than bad advice.

 

[Ulu]

Kittiee, you put on your hard hat and just keep digging. The destination here is important to you now, but the true value of this journey will come to you in time.

About Charter Schools:
Being humanitarian at heart, libertarian in mind, and suspicious by nature, I would not let a government of politicians run the schools or the banks. I believe our founders would mainly agree.

While some statutory oversight may be needed, IMO all public schools should be run as tax-exempt charities, be they run by a church, or a club,or a business, or an organization formed for any given purpose. Art schools, tech schools, sports schools, or whatever.

All schools should be rated publically, so you should know what you will get for what money.

If parents don't pay (and many cannot) their kids can go to a charity school, but it would be pretty basic. Parents would be asked to perform some service for this right. The charities would be required to be proactive in getting the kids off the street, to school.

I don't know what to do about DOD schools and that sort of thing. With military kids you have a certain amount of security to think about. Of the kids, and that of the military as well. My DOD experience was limited to part of first and second grade.

All private schools would have private security. They would not rely on public law enforcement for policies, practices or personnel.

Modern text books should be burned. So many outright flaws & misrepresentations. It's because of how they are bought and sold, and because they are cranked out too fast by the wrong people.

I think one of the really smart things that are ex governor Brown said once was that what we need is something like Uber for education. I'm not certain what he actually meant, but I don't believe that the school needs to have permanent physical facilities. Nowadays everything can be online and when physical facilities are necessary they can be rented.

 

[Kittiee Katt]

If parents don't pay (and many cannot) their kids can go to a charity school, but it would be pretty basic. Parents would be asked to perform some service for this right. The charities would be required to be proactive in getting the kids off the street, to school.

I went to public schools all my life, and while I won't claim to know the in's and out's of American public schools I know one thing is for sure - ain't no way in hell my mum would have done community service or the likes just so I could go to school, she'd have sooner seen me not get an education before doing community service for it.. And she sure wouldn't have paid for me to get an education!

With the system you're suggesting, what would be done for kids who want to learn but whose parents weren't willing to work for their education?
I was born for no other reason than my mum didn't want to do the newly announced "work for the dole" program, once I'd been born and mum was exempt from WFTD she didn't really care what happened as long as I was alive and her exeption continued.

In your hypothetical system, what would happen to kids like me? Would they just be forgotten about until they were going through the court system for trying to stay alive (theft)? Or would there be something in place for kids like that so they still got an education? Would CPS get involved? I imagine without some sort of safety net there would be some kids who would be left behind and end up costing a lot of money going through the justice system later in life..

 

[Ulu]

Kittiee, all your deep feelings come from the government-as-caretaker system you were born to. Your Mom as well, unfortunately. (We are fighting that desperately here.) When you take the Dole you give up the hope of self improvement. But the Dole cannot improve one. It merely sustains the physical at the cost of all else. It's like sex with someone who doesn't love you. It's empty.

Go back and read Jeff's experiences as a teacher. That system is destined to make both teacher and student fail, because their needs keep the government in control. When they succeed the government isn't needed, and it can't steer public feelings about its criminal history.

This system's criminal nature of existence makes people ever more dependent, while it proclaims the opposite. It stifles incentive, will, creativity, hope, and love. It gives you only Hobson's choice: Our way or the Highway! It shouts "Fairness to all!" by starting out as unfair as possible to as many as possible.

Unless government can take their money, there's nothing to Dole! The government cannot just print more money. All the rich folks living off the government would find their fortunes reduced by inflation. They will do it at last resort, after converting their wealth to foreign assets. They must Keep Up Appearances, or foreign powers will be inclined to abuse them. They produce no income, but skim the labor of the nation. By handing most of it back out, they fight appearances of organized larceny. But that's what a government is. All of them tax you to a degree.

Sooo...
What would happen to kids like you?

Private schools would accept you because your government would pay the bill. They HAVE paid your bill, indeed, with taxpayer money, but inefficiently. You would not have gone to a great school, because wealthy parents would have them all sewed up, but there would have been teachers willing to teach you, to avoid the Dole, or even as WFTD as it were.

 

[PYRU]

My parents didn't work for my education. I went to a sub par public school. Life is what you make it. I don't like the handout idea. I feel it makes you weak and dependent. I'm fortunate enough to be born in a country that if you work hard and are determined you have no ceiling though...well until the idiots generations behind me give it up.

I like being the underdog it keeps me hungry and fighting. Working toward a higher purpose instead of settling for the sub par medium the gov wants to lump you into.


Im not as articulate as ulu but I agree

 

[pops]

sorry you all posting in volumes, I do not want read that much, call me a little mind, just not going to read it. keep it short, keep it sweet and I will read between getting house work done and animal husbandry done.

 

[pops]

oh? I feel a stiff Irish Whisky coming on. (chuckling)

 

[pops]

 

[pops]

OK, optioned out the whisky and went with a young cabernie and sharp cheddar and crackers, yummmm .

 

[Ulu]

I'll keep it short because I understand totally, Pops.
Before my eye surgery I didn't wanna read anymore.

I own 1500 books and I've even read some twice, but I literally quit because of the strain.
The eye surgery made it possible again.
.....................................

Our weather is wet and my arthritic elbow hurts when I type.

Digitizers have been obsolete for 20 years, but I still have digitizer elbow.
It's a techie version of the traditional washer-woman's elbow.

So . . . . . . education doesn't solve everything.