Posts by Emma Hart
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What Rob said.
(The idea of everybody having a lawyer's dead body lying around is kind of intriguing too.)
I've had someone break into my house, go through my wardrobe, steal my clothes and jewellery. And I've had someone steal my writing, and by 'steal' I mean publish it verbatim over their own byline. The latter bugged me WAY more than the former. It upsets me emotionally because they're not just stealing something I own, they're stealing my skill and my reputation and using it to enhance their own.
In both cases, I had the law on my side - because yes actually, the state protects your physical property rights as well, rights which are unenforceable without state intervention. The difference was the practicality of enforcing the law. Like other writers I know who've had their content scraped and presented as someone else's work, you complain, and then you give up, because unless you have a Rowling-sized legal budget, you're screwed.
In other news, Language Log discusses philosophical isses around the Stephen Harper plagiarism case.
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My daughter's primary school had a uniform. It was a pain in the arse. We were always running out of clean uniform clothes.
Indeed. Sorry, uniform is NOT a blessing for parents, it's a huge PITA. While my kids' school makes a determined effort to keep the cost of the uniform down, having to get those clothes clean every weekend even when it's pissing with rain is an enormous pain. And I couldn't count how many uniform sweatshirts have been lost at school by my kids - they get taken off and thrown in a pile, and then they all look the same...
You might be surprised at how non-humiliating it is to have a trusted older student ask you to please pull your socks up.
So not my experience. I got into a violent argument with a prefect once because she was convinced that I shouldn't be allowed to have bare feet. The sandals were in the uniform code, therefore I should have to wear them. My point was that the jersey was also in the uniform code, and I wasn't wearing that either. The uniform was one place - not the only one by far - where the few prefects who were petty jerks could freely indulge their pettiness.
At my own school, 7th formers didn't have to wear uniform. (My first year at that school there were 3 7th formers.) After the first couple of days at school, you stopped worrying about what you were wearing. There was no bitching about clothes at all. And this:
There is also a counter argument that every minute students spend picking out clothes is a minute they don't spend learning.
certainly didn't apply, because I wasn't getting dressed on school time. Uniform inspections DO happen on school time.
My kids will be attending a non-uniform high school. I don't expect this to turn them into socially well-adjusted angels. Nor do I think they'll lose any benefit at all by not wearing uniform. And I'm certainly looking forward to not having to wash and replace uniforms, and not having to buy my daughter a $400 kilt and then replace it every time she gains height and the hem gets too far off the ground.
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it's christie innit!! bet he's the guy with the unicorn on his heel.
Ah, this has the makings of a fun game.
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You counting me? If so, who's the fourth?
Yes, and I dunno if I'm allowed to say.
By the way she did a post about how high your heels should be based on your height
One of my problems with judging heel height (for boots, of course) is that I think I'm about three inches shorter than I am. So I end up towering a bit.
That post is pretty great, btw.
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I have to admit I have a sort of gruding admiration for anyone who can use the phrase
one doesn't want to look like a corporate drone when going to a gallery opening dressed in Zambesi
with a straight face.
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which would be painful, because along the spine was *agony*.
*blushes* and the spine.
And that takes us to four! Four glorious PA writers* with tattoos. That I know of...
Anyway. Tattoos next week. Feet, people, feet.
*Once a PA writer, etc.
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I tried once in Lombok but they told me only girls did that.
On the feet is one of the most painful places to get a tattoo, like hands and neck. You catch me in the middle of ghost-writing a tattooing e-book. I'm actually planning next week's column to be about getting a tattoo.
But not on my feet.
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Check: I've had to sign a waiver or two in my time; one particular cinema flatly refused to let me in and the manager wasn't available to discuss the matter.
I also discovered this upon trying to enter an aeroplane a number of years back. Luckily purchasing a pair of 'flight socks' (?!?) were enough to get me onboard that time
I'd be interested to hear from someone in the know about the legal status of this. If I've PAID to fly, can they really refuse to deliver that service on the basis of my feet?
According to the barefooters site, this kind of thing isn't legal in the States:
Having bare feet in public or in a place of business open to the public (including restaurants) is not against any law. (It is also not against the law to drive barefoot anywhere in the United States)
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The stereotyping of 1st XV players on the PA forum is taking on NZ First type proportions ;-)
Sorry, here. I can testify that a former captain of the Nelson College 1st XV was a lovely, polite handsome young man more than happy to be of service to others.
In general schools with fearsome uniform regulations seem to have pretty good outcomes, but it's probably impossible to tease out uniforms from all the other factors at work without running some gigantic experiment.
I was delighted to learn when reading up on my old school yesterday that for the last two years, the trendy liberal school where the 7th formers don't have to wear uniform at all, and which gets the kids who get expelled from other schools, has beaten out every other Timaru High School in terms of NCEA results. The TBHS old boys must be spewing.
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I counted once, and I have over fifty pairs of shoes. Do I get pelted with old jandals for even venturing into this thread?
I have to admit I can't even picture what this looks like. I'm basically a hedonist, so I have no problems with taking pleasure from having lots of shoes, I just can't grok it.
I buy a pair of black boots at the start of every winter. When I do wear shoes I walk heel-first and hard - it's been described as the sort of walk Jessica Rabbit would have after joining the Wermacht, and it destroys the heels of boots. But I'm pretty sure I still haven't owned fifty pairs of shoes in my entire adult life.
But every time I go clothes shopping I have to forcibly tell myself that I don't need a sixth black skirt.
I do, however, wear shoes whenever i leave the house but mostly due to fear of bees.
Yeah, I get stung quite a bit.