Posted two days ago:
The preview box ends with “I can’t recommend it” so I had to click the link to find out whether what he really wrote was “I can’t recommend it enough.” (It was. Is this an example of Discourse itself breaking the Board rule against misleading quoting?)
I just realized that @Sunny_Daze hasn’t posted in almost 9 months.
It’s been a long time since we’ve seen @Grits_and_Hard_Toast . I recall all the “Name my new racehorse” threads that were fun.
i am as stupid as they come to with poster names,and but i miss the lady who worked at a NGO (grant work and iirc) and had an autistic child about 3 or 4 y.o.
Wish I could remember the name…
Spice Weasel?
yes @Spice_Weasel !!!
Hoping she is ok and just taking time out
IIRC, she’s had several extended absences from the board, due to real life. (I had not realized, until looking just now, that she has not been here since early July.)
@DrFidelius posted a year ago that he’d had spinal surgery and was in recovery. Haven’t seen him since. Hope he’s okay.
But he is rather active on facebook.
Any word from GusNSpot? I remember him from early on because I misread his username as ‘GunsNPot’.
Really good to hear that. If you’re chatting with him, please say « Hi » for me.
Would not surprise me if he’s no longer with us. As I recall, when he was posting, he was close to 80 and rather heavy.
I have a book of instructions on what is to be done with my estate when I die.
Among the instructions are the directions on how to notify the SDMB, and the Giraffe. And I have two names, one from each board, of folks to use snail mail to if somehow doing the notice online here doesn’t work.
@LSLGuy posted over the longest tenure thread a suggestion that he was gone.
That was surmise on my part based on what I knew of his age, his last posting date, and his health at that time. Which was 4-1/2 years ago and well after the Discourse transition. Even if his posting was not abruptly ended by his death then, the duration since then and no return strongly suggests he has died by now.
I actually thought about adding more disclaimer to that post of mine. In hindsight I should have. I’m sorry if anyone was misled.
I’m now reviewing the last couple months of this thread. Which I had not been following for some reason.
I am surprised I had not noticed @Riemann’s silence. But darn it’s obvious once you point it out.
We lost a hefty chunk of good posters with the Discourse transition. Which was IMO short-sighted on their part, but our loss was real.
I suspect that the election of trump will cost a bunch of folks more than we’ve noticed so far. Many have left with more to follow. Higher personal stress, dissatisfaction at the way the world seems to be headed, perhaps fear of persecution in a true American dystopia, etc. Lotta reasons to withdraw from the online world even if you’re still fully alive and breathing.
Plus all of us are getting older every day, and most of us are getting just plain old.
I’m alive, and have been lurking the last couple days because I have had a firehose of rage to spew somewhere regarding the suspension of federal funding and the dystopian nightmare that working in the nonprofit industry is about to become. It’s been a week. But time with my family and a regular meditation habit are keeping me reasonably grounded even in the middle of all this shit.
Since I’m updating, Wee Weasel is almost five, and yesterday the BCBA told us he’s “a stone’s throw away” from typical childhood development - minus social skills, but hey, everybody’s got something they struggle with. He is somehow both the smartest and sweetest child on the planet. ABA terminates in July and then he will be going to (mainstream) kindergarten in the Fall, continuing with OT, speech, feeding and a social skills group at his ABA place. Nobody is really sure how mainstreaming him is going to play out, but we are all choosing to be optimistic, and man, his capacity to express himself and his independent behaviors have grown so much in the past year, I think it’s some earned optimism.
Adorable anecdote #1: He recently informed me that I would have to start eating more fruits and vegetables so that I could join him for the country’s tri-centennial. I admire his optimism for our country’s future (and mine!)
Adorable anecdote #2: We were reading the old tearjerking classic “I Love You Forever” and he asked me to hold him and rock him back and forth like the Mama in the story.
Adorable anecdote #3: He’s very interested in old people, death, and dying. I showed him a picture of Jimmy Carter when he turned 100, and he was SO excited, that several days later, he blurted, “Will Jimmy Carter play with me?” I think he thinks that I knew Jimmy Carter personally. And after he died, he has since taken special interest in Jimmy Carter’s living relatives.
General bragging: I taught him the binary sequence. I showed him how to get the first three numbers and he got up to #36 before he needed help. This took all of 30 minutes.
We’ve been playing Universe Sandbox together, a “physics-based space simulator,” which is frickin’ awesome. Go look it up, I bet most Dopers will love it.
I know I’m obsessed with my kid. I know. But if you only knew.
Beyond the flaming wreckage of my former passion for my career, I have no complaints. I even terminated therapy in October, because apparently I have nothing clinical to treat. Things are pretty good, and I hope everyone is good. I think of you often.
Yep, he’s adorable all right!
It’s wonderful to hear from you Spicy, and your kid does sound adorable. Hang in there on the funding front; you aren’t alone with your rage.