Ask MetaFilter questions tagged with insanity

The stupidest miracle

Lacking Subtlety — Thu, 19 Nov 2009 17:39:23 -0800

I just did something banally amazing. Now I'm overcome with a profound sense of dread. Is this legitimate? We just had some down time at work and we were throwing paper airplanes. Now I should say, that we never have downtime at this job, but this was different because our computers were down. So the fact that people kind of went nuts with the opportunity to play around and were super-into designing awesome paper airplanes.

Anywho, someone was watching us from down the hall and said, "Hey! someone throw it in here!" and placed a tall, thin glass on edge of their desk... this was a good 47 feet away, no lie. My co-worker tried first and it only went about 15 feet. Then I went.

I lined up and said the words "it's in there like swimwear" aloud in a sort of faux-pompous idiocy, then tossed it so nonchalantly, like I did it everyday. It had perfect arc. It swooped down, then back up for second, and went right into the freaking glass. Seriously this glass is a good three to three and half inches wide at best. And again 47 feet away (we retroactively measured it). Needless to say, when it happened people celebrated like we just one the Superbowl. People tried to replicate the event for the next hour and no one even came within 10 feet of the glass. People can't stop talking about it.

So Now Then.

About 3 hours have passed and I have been overcome with this weird sense that I will never, ever, in my entire life be so lucky or do something as great as this... I'm being serious. I know this is nowhere near as important as 99% of the things in my life, but I still feel a genuine sense of dread that what happened was just the coolest, and sadly most interesting thing I will ever do in my entire life. I am rather upset about this.

I realize there is nothing more trivial in the entire world as what I am saying. It was a funny, flukely, silly thing that involved coworkers and bored editors. No one else will care. And yet I am extremely bothered. I have no reason to feel like this. Also, I am not normally like this, as I am generally a worry-free and positive person.

Why would something so utterly trivial and stupid, actually bother me? Is anyone else effected by a whimsical situation that they feel has some sort of grand karmic affectation on their actual life?

I honestly just feel like I just used up my quota of luck.

Is this insane?

The correct answer is yes.

But is it insane to feel that way nonetheless?

Television advertisement showing the stock market as a frenzied sideshow

drdanger — Mon, 12 Oct 2009 17:10:10 -0800

Saw a television ad several years ago with fantastic art direction depicting the stock market as a circus or similar frenzy of colorful, somewhat frightening characters. Can anyone help me track it down? I'm guessing I saw this ad on American television about five years ago, but it could have been as early as 2000. The imagery and intensity struck me more like a Fellini movie than like a typical advertisement. It was colorful, kinetic, and showed a shouting, frenzied sideshow of crazy characters. There was the two-faced broker who yelled, "Buy! Buy! Buy" until he did a 180 and his other face yelled, "Sell! Sell! Sell!" There were carnival barkers and blimps and I can't remember what all else. The point, of course, was that the sponsor (Schwab? Ameritrade?) would offer you a refuge from the hysteria. I would love to find a video of this, but alternatively enough information to track it down in the real world (sponsor? agency?) would be enough for my eternal gratitude.

help me sleep... PLEASE.

isoman2kx — Tue, 28 Jul 2009 09:35:06 -0800

Please help me sleep. Please :( This is going to be VERY VERY VERY long because my sleeping problems have a 2-3 year history. Any replies I get beyond zero I will be very appreciative of.

I've posted questions/threads this in the past but the past has spanned a while hasn't it? As the months have progressed, each time I post this I'm increasingly frustrated and saddened that I will never have a normal sleeping life to get through college and get my degree. I started having sleeping problems when I started college. To this day, I cannot recall anything particularly horrific happening to me to traumatize my sleeping patterns. 4 years ago I switched from high school to college. That's what a good percentage of Americans do right and? Right.

I have a history of depression and a history of anxiety. Both I would say are not severe. The depression is moderate to slightly above moderate most of the time. I take 120 mg of Cymbalta for it and have done so for almost a year. I have anxiety, I used to take Xanax 3 times a day at .5 mg a clip and now I take it all at night to see if it helps me sleep any since I can cope with the anxiety in the day better now.

My depression/anxiety stems from lack of self-esteem and energy from a lack of sleep. So far it's all making sense right? Ok, let's keep going then.

I've always had a hard time winding down for sleep since I can remember and definitely before I started college. I'm sensitive to light before going to bed and I spend way too much time on the computer before bed (even though I've incorporated at least an hour to 2 hour cool down period before bed now after turning off the computer). I currently see an ENT doctor and a psychiatrist (and a psychologist for talk therapy sessions just to kinda vent really, I never have any big updates to give lol) . My ENT doctor is outstanding while I feel my psychiatrist is useless and I'm strictly on a seeing her every 2 month just because that's what you do I guess when you have all this shit going on. My psychologist/campus counselor is outstanding as well.

Roughly a year ago, I went in for a sleep study because as you'll see later on in this master thesis, I've tried every medication known to man for falling asleep and staying asleep. After an awful night in those horrendous laboratories they call sleep clinics, they said they had enough data despite my whopping 240 minutes of sleep. I was later diagnosed with sleep apnea and frequent arousals with my brain wave patterns. My options were CPAP, throat and uvula surgery (noooooooooo way. nooooooo way in hell), mandibular retainer, treating restless leg syndrome and jumping off a building. We tried a CPAP machine and I just got increasingly frustrating with the thing. At first the mask wasn't right, I got a new mask. Then I just detested all the maintenance you had to do to keep the piece of crap that didn't help me sleep all clean and functional. Later on, the sleep clinic and I tried to treat me for restless leg syndrome. Needless to say that didn't do a damn thing. I was on mirapex, although I don't remember the dosage. I just remember increasing it and then quitting the stuff. After I went back to them after all of that, I wrote them off as idiots and politely never scheduled another appointment with them again. I'm done with them. Best sleep clinic in Houston??? We fix the problems other clinics miss? Oh really???

So that led me to my ENT that I currently see. After a few months of trying nasal sprays (prescription), afrin, and useless saline rinses I decided to have sinus surgery on June 22, 2009. For the medical students out there... I had a balloon sinusplasty done combined with correcting a deviated septum (which doesn't cause problems in most peoples sleep) along with a right turbinate reduction. The surgery sucked balls but now I can breathe better, just no improvement in sleep. Hooray! :) The sinus surgery was my part one out of a two part plan for fixing my sleep. My ENT informed me that he could definitely get me breathing better but the surgery would not be primarily to fix my sleep. If it did so then that would be great, but if not then that was what we had understood going into the surgery so no big whoop. I secretly hoped it would though and had the surgery more so for that reason than fixing my day-time breathing. My second part would be using a mandibular retainer after my sinuses fully heal up. I think at this point, my ENT and I are "entertaining" the idea of when it's all healed I'll have great sleep. At this point, if I got a mandibular retainer it would be through a doctor that my ENT knows and not the useless sleep clinic that I previously went to. I don't even know what good that would do?

Now let us back track to what goes on once I manage to get relatively sleepy. I always eat before I go to bed because I've gotten so frustrated with every other method and medicine I've tried, so that's my first step. I then go to sleep and proceed to wake up anywhere from 3-4 times like god damn clockwork (for the past 4-5 years at least). I've consulted with other friends and they wake up too, but they fall asleep quickly. I usually eat before I go back to bed because in my mind I'm tiring my body out by using energy to digest food and thus it will help me get back to sleep. I know, but it's my theory, valid or not, lol. At this point when I post, I'm always asked well what do you think about when you wake up? Are you short of breath? What is your mood? How do you feel?

Well, I'm almost always irritated because I immediately think "great, it starts again. let's see how many times I wake up this night". Despite my severe sleep apnea diagnosis, I never wake up in a panic or short of breath. My mood of course is frustrated and irritated and I feel the same. Surprisingly, this is the point where I say there is nothing traumatic going on in my life that's causing me to wake up in the night like this. I've got the usual responsibilites such as being the man of the house since my dad passed away last year (again, sleep problems existed long before he passed away and I've discussed this with others at length), going to school trying to finish my degree through being tired as hell, helping my mom with daily house chores, running whatever errands I do, getting a good amount of exercise per week, getting together with friends, etc. It's not like I'm waking up every night 3-4 times because there's some lingering issue. If it's buried deep in my subconscious then that's where it must be and someone needs to Harry Potter my brain and extract whatever haunting fear or memory that is buried there with a magic wand because it sure as hell isn't anything out of the ordinary I can think of.

So now we're done with describing this. Have you fallen asleep yet? :). Within the last 3 months, we've replaced my bed and I have a brand new tempurpedic mattress and tempurpedic pillows - both of which I happen to like. However, the new bed and new pillows are not helping my waking up 3-4 times a night any. It's more comfortable to sleep on, but it's not helping the issue I bought it for.

Ok, aside from that paragraph I've stopped taking sleeping pills. They just don't work. Here is a list of what I have taken and I have been on each of these medications for at least 2 week periods (which in my mind is more than enough to see a difference, I've never believed that crap about give it more time...give it more time. 2 weeks is enough god damn time).

list (most are official sleeping pills, some are not):

Ambien
Ambien CR
Lunesta
Restoril
Rozerem
Trazodone
Seroquel

regular things I've tried:

all the sleep time teas in the world
valerian root capsules
different herbal cocktails (like those bottles that have valerian root, chamomile, etc in their capsules)
different indian teas.
hot baths for at least 30 mins, about an hour before I go to bed.
hot baths with epsom salt (yeah, it doesn't help sleep specifically, whatever right?)
hot baths with different "sleep" salts and other sleep mixtures.

what I haven't tried:

overdosing on drugs and getting permanent sleep. I'm kidding about this as I've entertained the idea, but you get the point of my situation.

After all of that and I really am sorry I had to put you through reading it, but there's just no way to sufficiently describe my situation. I wake up 4-5 days out of the week wanting to kill someone upon waking up or wanting to punch holes in my wall (which I haven't done yet).

What do you guys recommend? I am seriously convinced that certain pathways in my brain are screwed up and that I should almost see a neurologist to see what else could be going on with me. At this point, what would you do? I have tried so many things... so so many things and for what? What has it done for me besides nothing? Who should I take my problems to? Who should I see for this? What battery of tests can help me?

- Travis

somebody help me

Anonymous — Wed, 28 Jan 2009 19:53:44 -0800

I've recently taken on, what I've found to be, the most miserable and painful task ever. That is, finding a mental health provider that is covered by my insurance... (Long "please-for-the-love-of-everything-good-in-this-world-Help-me" story.) I haven't had much luck though and since I've decided to ask for help, and can't find any, my problems seem to have been exasperated and I'm feeling more and more helpless.
I don't know how long I've been like this, possibly forever. I feel crazy though. I'm often irritated, angry, depressed, exhausted and extremely anxious simultaneously. Today, for example, I really had a problem convincing myself that it was a good idea to go to work. Then, after finally forcing myself out of bed, I spent the day fighting back tears and feelings of rage. I fantasize about hurting myself when I can't handle these emotions. I have acted on those fantasies in the past, but not often. I do pick at my skin constantly, i.e. acne that's not really there, hangnails that I've created. I guess all that's really beside the point. I'm just feeling less and less in control and I'd like to know what I'm supposed to do.
I finally found a psychiatrist who will see me in two weeks. I don't know if I can wait that long, but I can't afford anyone outside my plan. Any ideas? Any similar experiences? Am I really crazy?

To Ph.D., or not to Ph.D? That is the question.

valkyryn — Sun, 02 Nov 2008 05:29:41 -0800

Should I get a Ph.D.? So I'm about to graduate from a top-25 law school. I've got a respectable but not stellar GPA (the school doesn't rank). I spent my last two summers working for a U.S. Attorney's Office and the Federal Communications Commission. Yay me.

Except that I don't have a job yet, and with the economy having tanked, prospects are not as rosy as they once were. BigLaw has already finished hiring, so that's off the table. The clerkship thing doesn't seem to have panned out. Which leaves me with public interest and small firms.

Thing is, what I really want to do is teach. Teach and write. And neither of jobs I'm most likely to be able to land at this point have a clear track back into academia. Tenure track law positions, hell, even non-tenure track law positions, generally require a few publications under one's belt. Which I don't have yet. I'm working on a paper that I think is really interesting, one that has the potential to be a major academic project, but there's no way I can have it even ready to submit for publication before the spring. Which is a problem, because academic hiring is going to be finished in about a month.

On the other hand, there's a Ph.D. program at my university that I'm completely fascinated by. History and Philosophy of Science. I'm currently taking my second non-law graduate class, and I've talked with my current professor, who happens to be attached to the program I'm looking at. I'll be sitting down with the program director week after next to see if I could actually do a course of study that would be satisfactory for all involved.

My question for the Hive Mind is whether or not I'm completely crazy. I turn 27 in a few months, I'm sitting on low six figures in educational debt, and I'm considering embarking on a 5-6 year academic program. Granted, my job prospects will be significantly better once I'm done--I'm told by law faculty that JD/Ph.D.s are in no small demand--but the thought of being in school until I'm 33 gives me pause. I love both research and writing, and assuming the program is willing to work with me on a few logistical issues (and, you know, admits me, though I'm not terribly worried about that) I know I can complete the program. Should I? Or should I just bite the bullet and get whatever real job I can?

Does insanity exist outside the subjective viewpoint of a given society?

datter — Thu, 02 Oct 2008 11:03:14 -0800

Does insanity exist, outside the subjective viewpoint of a given society? Imagine a man who takes to walking around naked in the streets talking aloud to God and insisting he was getting answers through the wind. If here were to do this every day out in public for all to see, society would label him insane. If that same man lived on an island where walking naked through the streets and talking to God was a common activity, he would not be labeled insane as he would be a normal part of that population. He might be labeled insane if he didn't behave in this manner while within that society.

Thus, insanity is a label hung on individual beliefs and actions and based strictly on the environmental and social norms of a given society and not inherent within the person in any way. Placing said individual in another environment more accepting of their behaviour and beliefs renders the definition meaningless as a descriptive term. This would apply to viewpoints both outside the society the individual is in, and from within a persons own experience.

Due to the relativity of it's definition, "insanity" as an objective term within ones own experience, does not exist.

Does this make any sense?

I thought I taw a pouldycat.

bingo — Fri, 23 May 2008 08:31:28 -0800

What is the deal with people who are following 800 others on Twitter and have no website linked to their account? I'm talking (apparently) private citizens here, not brands. You look at their twitter page, and it's just a photo, a name, and 800 friends. What are they trying to accomplish? Do they really read all the incoming tweets? Are they just hoping to make some random selection of people interested in them?

=(pulling my hair out + gah!)

fillsthepews — Fri, 14 Mar 2008 15:07:31 -0800

Excel for Mac - Where the hell did my comments go!!?? I'm using Excel 2004 for Mac. I've created a lovely spreadsheet to track work turned in, and I leave info about who did the job and when in the comments. Its a very simple, visual way for me to see where I'm at in an instant, and then mouse over for more info as needed.

When I save and close the document, and reopen, some - but not all - of my comments are gone. To be specific, I gray out the box when the work is turned in, and then create the comment. Usually. But even when the comment disappears, the gray remains.

I feel like I'm doing something wrong and its not just the program - but stranger things have happened!

Thanks.

Is it time to cut my losses?

Anonymous — Mon, 25 Feb 2008 20:08:32 -0800

My job isn't all it's cracked up to be. Do I keep at it and hope it will improve or do I take another leap? Fall 2007 I moved from the east coast to the mountain west for a job. On paper the job is great. There are many reasons why I like the job, but there are many reasons why it's making me nuts.

I was hired away from an adjacent industry with an offer of doing X for $10k less than I was making out east (technically a raise based on cost of living, etc). The industry is insanely hot, even in these uncertain economic times. I'm currently doing X + a few other things I enjoy + a bunch of stuff I don't. My boss gives me way more than can possibly be accomplished by one person (and usually it is the stuff I enjoy doing). My boss is also the one that sets my goals.

The CEO/Owner of my company shoots me over tasks that I'm "happy" to help with, but often I don't like doing them. But they need doing, so I do them. They are things that someone earning far less than I am should be doing. It boggles the mind that the CEO feels it's a good use of money to have me doing something a trained monkey could do. Before you say "he's trying to get rid of you" He's not. He sings my praises to all who will listen, we have a great relationship and I in no way believe he is trying to push me out the door. I think that he finds me entirely competent and trusts that I will do things right without him needing to double check everything.

Then there's the thing that I finally realized tonight. He's also asking that I do things that will prevent me from reaching my goals. The best way I can illustrate this is to compare what I do with a used car lot. Let's say I'm in charge of buying the cars for resale. My boss (not the CEO) and I know that Honda and Toyota have better resale value and therefore my company is likely to be able to sell those cars at a good resale price. The CEO of my company really has a penchant for Chevy Cavlaiers. He likes that they are US cars and just thinks they are a great value for the money. Yet, I know that we are unlikely to be able to sell these cars because everyone wants a Honda or a Toyota and the carrying costs don't make it worth the time or effort. So my goals are negatively impacted.

In addition to the above I work with mostly young "professionals" who haven't been out in the real world and don't know how to behave in a professional manner. They let emotion rule their work days and are incapable of completing tasks without extreme supervision and follow up.

I am loathe to give up this opportunity, because I really do see it as an opportunity, but I spent the last five years in a similar situation and I don't want to get complacent again.

I work in a very narrow internet industry. I am *very* good at my job and have little doubt I'd be able to find something in my field or an adjacent field to cover my needs. As a matter of fact there is already a great opportunity for me to become part owner in a startup, but it won't be profitable/paying anything for several more months. If I start working on that while still employed at my current position I'd be in serious breach of my non-compete. But it's oh so tempting.

I'm late thirties, female, no significant other, kids, pets, plants or debt. I have $10k+ liquid cash available to me. My monthly expenses other than rent (high for my area at $1200/mo incl. utils) include a $300 car payment (on which I only owe about $3300 total) and food. I spoke to my landlord tonight about possibly breaking my lease if I help find a replacement. She's open to it.

I'm plagued by too many options. Any help you can lend to clarifying my mudded mind would be appreciated.

Elvis be gone!

plague — Thu, 31 Jan 2008 14:49:23 -0800

There is a very loud, very bad Elvis impersonator within spitting distance from my office window. I work very hard in a high stress position at a non profit, and he is really ruining my job satisfaction. The cops won't do anything, I've tried. I don't get paid much, so I can't afford to bribe him. I have tried listening to music through headphones to drown him out but that's almost as distracting. I really don't want to have to talk to him - the reason I got into my line of work was to avoid talking to people. How can I get this jerkface to go away?

Not an easy task.

laughinglikemad — Thu, 27 Dec 2007 13:39:35 -0800

How do I help my brilliant - but broke - friend go to school? After her first day of kindergarten, her parents saw how excited she was about school, and knew they had to nip her future dreams in the bud. So they sat her down and said, "When you get older, you might hear about this thing called 'college.' You're not going." Her future has born that out.

She wants to go to school for psychology, and I'm looking for things like scholarships, programs, and paid internships that can help her get there. As is, she works as a cocktail waitress - which was a big step up from call centers before that - but she's lucky if she get enough sleep, let alone pay rent. Whenever anyone mentions school, she just gets depressed, because she sees it as totally unachievable. But she's also proud, which means that I can't chip in to a fund or anything from my meager savings.

She has a GED, having dropped out at the age of 16: she's taken a few community college courses back when she lived with her father, but she's on her own now. Her mother is mad - schizophrenic, and a horribly abusive person to boot - but has never been diagnosed. Her little brother is severely disabled, both mentally and physically - hunchback, bad heart, autistic - and my friend might one day have to care for him full-time (he's a minor, and living with his mad mother). She lives in Seattle, and has always lived in Washington.

I know that I can't solve her problems, but I still wanted to ask: a lot of opportunity comes from just knowing what's out there. Given those details, does she quality for any assistance - scholarships for children of crazy people, or family members of the disabled? Anyone out there who has overcome similar obstacles, to achieve similar goals?

I have accepted that if I wish to preserve my reproductive organs, I will need to acquire a long coat rather quickly. but what to look out for?

krautland — Sun, 03 Dec 2006 11:21:54 -0800

I have accepted that if I wish to preserve my reproductive organs, I will need to acquire a long coat rather quickly. but what to look out for? I don't know if you noticed but it's really damn cold in chicago today and the wind makes this all the more brutal. I have accepted that if I wish to preserve my reproductive organs, I will need to acquire a long coat rather quickly. someome was nice enough to hand me a 20% off coupon for macy's but my dilemma is that -besides the obvious taste questions- I don't know what to look out for. I've spent the last six years in california! I've never collected intel on what makes a coat a good coat or not. I only heard I should look out for pure wool and nothing else in order to stay warm.

Kenneth Cole Reaction "Wyatt" Wool/Cashmere Overcoat With Spill Out Hood
Calvin Klein "Plaza" Wool/Cashmere Overcoat

any recommendations? is there anything obviously wrong with these choices I made from their website? what else do I need to be looking out for?

Things that go WAAAA! in the night

mcstayinskool — Wed, 11 Oct 2006 07:44:01 -0800

Parents, what has worked for you in getting infants to sleep for longer stretches at night? Our second child, age 9.5 months, will not sleep through the night, and is usually up crying 2 or 3 times each night. My wife is now starting to lose it due to exhaustion and sleep deprevation, as she is up feeding her at least 1 or 2 of those times.

If it helps, the baby is breast-fed and is eating at least some rice cereal and/or baby food at breakfast/lunch/dinner.

I'm interested in practical success stories rather than general parenting philosophies.

I just got done reading several of the threads with baby+sleep tags, and there was some useful info there, but mostly dealt with getting babies to sleep initially, not with multiple wake-ups through the night.

chicagofilter: that noise is driving me nuts. what can I do about it?

krautland — Wed, 04 Oct 2006 16:03:49 -0800

chicagofilter: that noise is driving me nuts. what can I do about it? I recently moved into a swanky new apartment complex in downtown chicago. it's by all means perfect. supermarkets, restaurants, dry cleaner and other businesses are right in the building, the elevators are fast and the views are stunning. coming from manhattan, it's also dirt cheap. it almost was as if the building was challenging me to find something to hate it for.

of course I did find something and it's driving me nuts. it's a humming sound. a loud one. like a giant vacuum or the apu of a 757. it's the air condition attached to the parking garage of a business high-rise next to my building. it runs on weekends, it runs at night. it drives me loco. the dark, ominous humming sound is impossible to ignore. did I mention it's loud?

so. I need to do something. I can't concentrate in here. do you think I should (a) write the building managers and actually hope anything will happen, (b) write the city and hope anything will actually happen (are there laws on acceptable noise levels?), (c) write my building manager and hope anything will actually happen, (d) move out or (e) buy a handgun?

I've lost my hair, I've lost my youth and now it's time for my hearing to follow. recommend a stereo system, please.

krautland — Mon, 04 Sep 2006 14:01:08 -0800

I've lost my hair, I've lost my youth and now it's time for my hearing to follow. recommend a stereo system, please. I come to you with grave concern.
you see, I moved into a shiny new apartment complex. the elevators are fast, the views are vast and the food is delivered on time. I think I'd be ready to love this place if only the young asian couple next door would refrain from agreeing to each other so much and so intensely. besides, they have a habit of waking up early and their preferred wake-up call consists of agreeing to each other and european techno music I last heard in the early nineties, a period in time during which I wore neon yellow sweatpants. it's unfair that the kids today get to pick and choose what former trends to pick up again and it's unfair I now have to awake at five o'clock in the morning. my reputation of being the last in the office is at stake, as is my beauty sleep.

what is not at stake is my hearing. I am failing in the family tradition that is loss of hearing. my dad has been pumping up the tv further than a dog can stand for at least ten years now, my grandfather used to require no less than three repeats of every word uttered, just I am fine. people are beginning to suspect I've been adopted.

I have decided that a mix of faith no more as social commentary for the kiddos next door ("it's a dirty job but someone's got to do it") in combination with richard wagner for my hearing will fix my problems and I am willing to put my money where my fingers are (or, since this is the internet, my credit card).

so help me lose my hearing, will ya? recommend a mini stereo system I can play cd's with, listen to npr (isn't that what old liberals do?) ad perhaps hook my mac up to. I don't need anything fancy, just a good bass that can shake the 6 or so solid feet of concrete that separate us. I'm willing to throw between 100 and 300 bucks at it.

Bare Dementia

nlindstrom — Thu, 03 Aug 2006 15:18:36 -0800

A young woman suddenly starts shouting, and tearing at her clothing. Moments later, she is stark naked and dancing all over the sidewalk right in front of my house. Why? She was a young, good-looking lass in her early twenties, clean, dressed nicely, with curly brown hair. Her clothing was clean and neat, and there was nothing about her to suggest that she was a street person.

But in the blink of an eye, she went front standing sedately at the bus stop to shouting and yelping, plucking at her clothing and flinging it away as though it were full of angry bees. She quickly stripped down to just her bra and panties, flinging her shoes and clothing in the gutter, and danced around while slapping at her arms and legs. A moment later she tore off her bra and then her panties. It was quite clear by this point that there were no actual bugs on her; she was very clean and completely shaved from the neck down, a fact that was now on full display.

Throughout this latter stage I noticed several curious things: first, as she yelled she tended to thrust out her jaw and glare angrily about herself. Also, despite being completely naked on the corner of a busy San Francisco street, she kept one arm resolutely clamped across her full bosom. Despite whatever was going on, she retained an odd sense of decency -- odd when you consider her unwillingness to expose her breasts, yet at the same time she was kicking her legs high in the air. This last sense of modesty went by the wayside soon enough, as her leaping about quickly escalated into arm waving. She was sweating profusely, her nipples were hard, and loudly shouting while tears streamed down her face.

It took three cops and two paramedics to get her strapped down on a gurney, and even then, she fought on, throwing off a blanket they covered her with and if not for the paramedic’s hands, pounding her head on the gurney.

I've never before seen anything so sad in all my years of living in San Francisco, and a bit of Googling yielded nothing as to why she did all this. What possible causes are there for her actions?

Virginity is actually driving me insane ...

Anonymous — Tue, 25 Jul 2006 20:12:53 -0800

Here's the problem: I'm fat, I'm balding, I'm in my early thirties, I'm a virgin, and I am beginning to very much need sex. I never expected to get to my early thirties and still be a virgin, but I'm here. I went to a very conservative religious college where getting caught having sex was punishable by expulsion; that having been said, sex was had there by many and I really can't blame the institution for my virginity. I don't know what aspect of my personality or of my appearance has scared away women, or caused romances to fail, but we're getting near an impasse. Then, when I moved to a big city, I got lost amongst the millions; coming here already with a substantial weight around my middle, I just got larger, and I'm now well over three hundred.

I'm not only virginal (I'm hetero, if it matters), I'm severely physically and romantically inexperienced (to use the admittedly juvenile baseball metaphor, once with a college friend in first base, and once a stripper in another city I was visiting allowed me to get to second base) ...

... and I really don't have a good sense of when a natural relationship is going to arise wherein I'm going to be able to have sex as normal people do. Additionally, I face the added problem of being morbidly obese and having a large bald spot in the back of my head, making it unlikely that women are going to look at me and go, "Mmm-mmm, gotta get me some of that." (That last bit said in a tone of bleak black humor ... probably won't come across as well in text.)

I don't think I look bad, precisely: I think I've got good hair [from the front ;-)] and kind eyes and a good smile and a friendly, amiable personality and good conversational skills. I told a good friend I was a virgin, and he was blown away, for the very fact that I do seem to be able to break into conversation so easily with fellow employees at our mutual employer. But take the shirt off or the slacks off and I'm most definitely very, very, very, very, very far down on the "impressive physical specimen" scale. Do you remember the SNL skit when Chris Farley tried out for Chippendale's? (If not, it's findable on YouTube.) Add about 25-40% more weight to his figure in that scene, and that'll give you a visual idea of my appearance.

So, you tell me, go diet, work out, get fit. I've tried, for ten years now. I don't know what blocks my weight loss efforts, what's in my head. And even if I did, without abdominoplasty, I'm not going to look good with the excess skin that'll be left. And that's not the issue I really want to address here, either. What's really at issue here is that I'm beginning to absolutely go stark, raving, absolute bonkers because I've never had sex in my life and my libido is more and more getting far out of control.

I mean, think about human sexuality. Think about your own drives — the basic premise of looking at a beautiful woman and going she is beautiful, and I wish to [bleep] with her until the rooster crows. Now think about what it would be to have a perfectly natural sex drive that had absolutely no opportunity to express itself fully in over thirty-two years, and if you have good enough of an imagination, you'll see the brink of insanity I'm standing upon.

As it is, sad enough, every six to nine months I'll go down to a strip club and pay half a grand for a two-hour "V.I.P." session. Thanks to Puritanism, my city pretty much prohibits any sort of contact between a stripper and a patron. If visiting there was a scene out of Showgirls, I'd probably be pretty fine, at least libido-wise. But instead, time with a stripper in my town is more like The McLaughlin-Lehrer Report. (Admittedly, Jim Lehrer isn't a 20-something female with long hair and boobs that dances naked in front of you to '80s music.) Pretty much all "V.I.P." gives you in my town is entire nudity very, very close to you. And although that's nice, it pales after a while, too.

I've endured celibacy for a while, but I'm beginning to actually feel the breakdown of my endurance on this particular matter. Don't get me wrong, though. Somehow, part of the way I'm made up is the premise if it's not sexy for her, it's not sexy, meaning that it just would feel gross and wrong to do something like subway flashing or groping. And rape would never be something I'd consider even in the darkest and most frantic of moments, trust me. So when I say I'm close to breaking down on the "not having sex" front, I don't know what a post-breakdown would be like. But I just know that I'm getting close.

But I'm totally at a loss as to what to do next. I'd like to do something to have sex rather soon, even if it turns out it's not going to be with someone who actually loves me in return. That was the original dream, but hell, at least I have a good job, a place to live, etc. We don't always get everything we dream for.

I mean, I'm not the kind of guy that can walk into a bar and walk out into an evening of cheap sex. I don't have that skillset or the necessary appearance.

And I frankly have no idea how to go about hiring a "professional" (and I'm not even sure we can discuss that here, due to its illegality).

But at the same time, I'm beginning to really fray around the edges, and I don't know what to do or where to go next with this.

P.S. The first one who tells me I'm "putting the [ahem] on a pedestal" gets shot. I don't have the gorgeous Catherine Keener, a crew of well-connected streetwise, funny friends, or a '60s hippie musical number over end credits awaiting me.

What's the deal with the popularity of Moonbat?

Astro Zombie — Wed, 24 May 2006 23:11:52 -0800

Explain to me the popularity of "moonbat." I mean, I know the right wing, particularly those with libertarian leanings, like to use it against anybody even remotely to the left of them, and I know the mean those people are crazy. I know the history of this weird little phrase. I just don't get its popularity. I also don't understadn why it seems to be applied exclusively to the left -- the comparable phrase "wingnut" seems likely to be applied to the radical fringe of the left and the right alike.

So what's the dilly?

Beatles religious conspiracy email

nonemoreblack — Thu, 04 Aug 2005 19:31:29 -0800

This is the third in a series of ranting Beatles conspiracy emails I've recieved, roughly one every six months for the past year and a half. Where are they coming from? A cursory google reveals prolific message board and IMC spamming, but no definitive answers, or even an archive of older messages. Any clues, information on origins or similar experiences welcomed..

Dead Pixel

furiousxgeorge — Wed, 18 May 2005 19:55:45 -0800

I just got a new laptop which I like very much, but there is one dead pixel on the right side of the screen. I'm debating if I should exchange it. It really isn't that big a deal, but it seems like one of those little things that might slowly drive me insane if I keep it. Am I overreacting? One bad pixel worthy of exchange? If you have lived with pixel trouble I'd like to know what you think.

apt-get screwed my network interface!

jojopizza — Fri, 06 May 2005 10:54:35 -0800

Lords of Linux! Demigods of Debian! I beseech thee. I inadvertently apt-get installed etherconf, and it nuked my ethernet interface! I was doing an "apt-get upgrade apache", to get on the latest version. It presented me with a list of packages it wanted to upgrade in conjunction, and I blithely accepted. Well, it started churning away, and then it said it was installing etherconf. At this point I lost my ssh session to the server.

I drove down to the office to log on and see what was up. Logged on locally, I can see that it's not recognizing the eth0 interface anymore. Ifconfig -a just shows lo0, 127.0.0.1.

I ran "dpkg-reconfigure etherconf" and it says that the interface detector can't detect any network interfaces. Argh! After exiting from etherconf I get a message to the console: "eth0: ERROR while getting interface flags: No such device"

This nic was easily recognized by Debian when I did the initial install. It's been a few years, so I have no idea what kind it is, or where the drivers are, but I figure if I can get Debian to do whatever detection magic it did on the initial install, it will be able to recognize this card again. It's something very generic, like a Netgear, or an IBM card.

Oh, and I checked out /etc/network..
It still has eth0 listed in the interfaces, though it decided to change the ip address from .106 to .110. I changed it back and tried rebooting. No good!

Anyone got suggestions? I suppose I can reinstall Debian on another hard drive and try copying files over, but that sounds like it will be a long, dreary process.

Mental breakdown in 5... 4... 3... 2...

Anonymous — Fri, 06 May 2005 04:02:19 -0800

When work is getting far too crazy for you to keep up how do you cope? I've been made the lead on a project that was pretty out of control to start with and things have just been getting worse as the project gets more and more successful. What advice do you have for handling the stress before I find myself telling my CEO exactly where he can go stick whatever nearby objects are available for sticking. I'm the lead on a computer project that has found itself a lot more successful than anyone expected. So right now I have a woefully understaffed team, customers who are demanding all sorts of random things, a CTO/CEO who is breathing down my neck needing more demos, more features, more more more, and a bug list that is growing out of control.

This is the most responsibility I've ever had and I'm worried I'm going to screw it up. I'm beginning to lose track of what needs to be/has been done, and I've become pretty interrupt driven. My teams task lists are still growing faster than they are being completed and deadlines are coming really really soon. The team works well together and I'd like to think I'm a decent manager and that morale is pretty good considering, but by now the work load is making everyone a bit punchy, and that's of course making getting things done even harder.

All this is causing enough stress that stress itself is becoming an impediment to getting stuff done. How can I handle the stress? I know exercise is important and I'm making sure I don't avoid that, but I'm not sure where to go from there. How do you handle insane work stress. (And no, quitting is not something I'm interested in.)