sumbloke

Wishing you peace and consolation James. It's a blessing to hear that you parted at peace with each other. Jakob

Yay! OK, I admit I love this old skool music so much! These are really nice little profiles James. Thank you!

I don't think the closing of the crvboy forums is that significant. Different sites have different aims, goals and strengths. Crvboy is a small site and there's not the community crowding round it that there is here at GA but it attracts quality authors and updates regularly. Its back catalogue is impressive too. I don't know about restrictive practises but if they exist then they've been successful at least in the sense that the stories that are there are generally high quality. I kind of understand Nick's comment about stale design, but I confess, I don't much care about site design issues as long as a site has good navigation and crvboy does - it's the stories that matter at the end of the day. The small list of gay fiction sites I visit regularly includes crvboy (and the list is GA, AD, DW, CB). Jakob

Little brother Two cousins Aunt Uncle That's "legal" family. Solidarity family is so queer it's psychadelic.

Big (over 6'), shaggy blond hair. Should surf. Preferably Basque and must speak French and Occitan. Annoyingly environmentalist and must be able to solve partial differential equations in his head while he makes me breakfast. If you find him, let me know. Yak (Luckily he doesn't read English well so I think I'm safe from you-know-who)

Not little bro any more. But never on your own. Still here to catch you if you should fall. Happy Bday studmuffin. (I can say that now you're a 'dult)

Beast, the azaleas will be there tomorrow. Get into your biobed and rest. I love you because you give the overwhelming impression that when stuff needs doing you do it but I also get the impression that you sometimes need someone to rub your back and tell you to take it easy. I don't tell you this enough but you're an inspiration: scientist, humanist, geek, mensch and geek - you were exactly the guy I needed to meet two years ago to keep me on an even keel. However, I am screaming angry that I don't know what is going on with Jimmy - WRITE MORE. On a gardening note - azaleas like all rhododendrons are a pain because they grow like weeds. They're lovely but they will take over without discipline. But you knew that. Jakob

I don't find Rand shocking, just...wrong. Of course, the issue is does money represent the valuel of a person's productivity and if it does, is that all it represents? Is it possible for someone to be very productive and not gain monetarily? If money were a simple representation of productivity then one would expect that people who are similarly productive would be similarly recompensed in monetary terms (A = A as Rand likes to so often remind us). But it's not so. In different places for example people whose work is similarly productive don't receive the same monetary reward. Similarly it appears that money can represent things other than productivity (unless one takes the invidious step of making productive = getting money). The simple fact is that crime pays and so does usury. I think Rand's analysis fails because she misrepresents money. A neat defense of inherited wealth but it also reveals Rand's most basic assumption, that material accumulation is the real measure of a man's worth. Capability is capability to accrue money (she is quite explicity elsewhere that gold is the proper measure of a man's worth). But it's perfectly possible to believe that someone might be utterly uninterested and perhaps lacking any talent for making money but be deserving. Rand is naive as to the real origins of wealth. She sets up an ideal situation for capital accumulation - that all wealth is achieved through honest exchange - and then forgets that it is an ideal: in the real world capital always involves gangsters and robber barons; corrupt politics and dispossession. In her ideal world all you need is native talent and hard work and you will receive your worth in money and if you don't receive your monetary reward, why, then you obviously just aren't worth it. But you are aware it made no sense to Rand? She had utter contempt for the charitable impulse. I suspect that most people are like me, I think money is just a tool and of itself quite neutral. Money itself counts for nothing morally but what you do with it does. Jakob

I've generally got lots of recreational books on the go. Current or just completed: The Structure of Typed Programming Languages (Foundations of Computing) by David A. Schmidt OK, this is pretty geeky but I've got interested in type theory and language design so I'm having fun with it. Anarchy, State and Utopia by Robert Nozick This is a re-read and I'm enjoying it even more this time. Nozick makes a serious attempt to justify minarchism/libertarianism whatever you want to call it and to show that while an absolutely minimal state is justified nothing more is. He's wrong - on his own terms but thie book is worth reading because he isn't a cavalier laissez-faire warrior but a serious and sympathetic philosopher. Voices by Ursula Le Guin As you'd expect a beautiful and reflective masterpiece that is partly about the relationship of memory to consciousness; story telling and the power of myth; difference and friendship. As someone said, Le Guin's chidren's books are more serious and better written than many adult books. Persian Fire by Tom Holt Great fun. I wish I could say I prefer Herodotus but I can't. If you'd like to know what ancient history in the eastern aegean was about this will give you the low down. And I'm still reading Blue Jeans Buddha - just a page or two now and then and it's very sustaining. I'm an optimist about my own generation anyway, and when I read this book I know I'm right. Jakob

I've eaten meat twice and since last autumn I've been eating fish/seafood. On both the meat eating occasions I was pretty yucked by it but I'm sure that was just lack of familiarity. I don't think I'll be doing it again - don't see much reason to and although Buddhism doesn't mandate vegetarianism it does recommend it (note: consult your own local Buddhist authority since traditions vary!). Eating fish and seafood has been fine. It is really just a matter of convenience/sloth - my husband eats the stuff and we can't be bothered with the admittedly minimal effort it would make to always be cooking for two different diets. The issue of cruelty in farming is an odd one. Part of me just doesn't understand the passionate objection to factory farming from people who eat meat but I've learned not to be entirely dismissive. I think it is reasonable to prefer not to be involved (by paying) what you perceive as cruelty to food animals but you have to pay the piper. Looking round the supermarkets and butchers I can see the difference in cost between mass produced meat products and the free range/organic/locally produced stuff. If you have to feed your family then you may well have little choice realistically. I'm much more pious and irritating about healthy food I'm afraid. I have to confess that I see people eating fast food and well...I just wonder how anyone can put that stuff in their mouths! But, a chacun son gout. Living with a French man who has been brought up with pretty exacting food standards (which despite myth is not universal in France - there are McD's all over the place) means very little processed food and shopping for fresh food almost daily but then it's no hardship and we enjoy it. But then, we're students and pretty privileged students so we have the time and the money. Once you have food production for profit then it's difficult to see how you can prevent factory farming. You can regulate it but at the end of the day consumers will vote with their wallets.

Hang on! You mean there's a choice? Why didn't I get that memo? I don't think that we all want or need the same things. Me, I'm a big family person - I can't imagine life without family around me and a partner is a part of that. I don't say it's the only way to have a family or that it is necessarily a complete family but it's the start of one. I also need somone to be my strength from time to time - and of course that doesn't have to be a partner, but I find a certain security in having someone for whom I (in almost all cases) come first when I need something. Then there's sharing. I haven't done much in life so far but I have things I want to do and I want to share them. I want to build a house (well maybe not from the ground up but...) and I want to travel some more and other stuff and I want someone to share those things with. Does it have to be a life partner? No, but if I didn't have one I think I'd have to live in a commune. Jakob

A family friend who teaches stats at uni is apparently marking the day - he has to teach - by using statistics about discrimination against, educational success failure of, queer students for his classes tomorrow. Takes some planning I'd have thought though :-)

Hey Demetz! I don't know how things work in the US so this is just vapour but... Can't you take a Masters while you work? In the UK there are lots of institutions that offer two year part-time Masters programs for people in full time work. If you were working in the public sector - government or education for example - isn't it possible to negotiate help with graduate study with your employer? Again, that's common in the UK - public sector employers often offer assistance with fees for employees and give study leave and so on to help them complete their studies. Finally, scholarships. Again, the US and the UK are different but I know at least one student of my dad's who couldn't afford graduate study. She looked for scholarships and eventually made two things work. She targeted small scholarship funds that had specific aims - in her case she found a small private trust set up to help women complete their graduate studies. But she also wrote directly to people and just straight out explained her situation, the research she was doing and why needed money. She got all her personal expenses paid by people she approached that way! Write to the guys who just endowed that big law school in California: swallow your pride and tell them that you are a gay man who wants to work in public administration where you can do some good. You have nothing to lose! Jakob

Thank you all so much. I'm overcome! For the last couple of years GA has been a little bit of home for me and there have been times when it's been the first place I poured my heart out. The gang here have never been less than supportive and full of good advice and I thank you all for it. Above all, I hope no one will mind if I mention Myr. Thank you big guy, you make it all possible. Jakob

Wait...hold on...Doug Chew...as in the fit looking, cute as hell fashion designer and TV chef Doug Chew? But...but...*faints*. Oh yeah and a slightly belated Gong Xi Fa Cai/Kung He Fat Choi