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Questions and Answers - Part 3

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20:12 / 21.08.06

hi, how do you say in French

The money has been sent by post, expect shortly!

thanks!

10:59 / 22.08.06

Does anyone know if taking beta-blockers before having a blood test is likely to skew the results?

Blood tests have a way of making me faint and throw-up so I think I could use the help.

11:13 / 22.08.06

paw:

J'ai envoyé l'argent par la poste. Vous le recevrez bientôt!

11:28 / 22.08.06

Any advice for me, Mr Medical Professional?

All Acting Regiment

13:10 / 22.08.06

The Marquis de Sade. I've heard him talked about as an early queer theorist/feminist, and I'm interested in reading his stuff, but: is it worth reading, or is it actually just an old guy talking about hitting people? And if it is worth reading, where should I start?

13:35 / 22.08.06

The Marquis de Sade. I've heard him talked about as an early queer theorist/feminist, and I'm interested in reading his stuff, but: is it worth reading, or is it actually just an old guy talking about hitting people? And if it is worth reading, where should I start?

Something about hearing de Sade framed this way made me laugh really hard.

He's a pervy bastard that wrote some great pervy stuff for his time. His work deals with the idea of women as sexual beings which maybe construed by some folks as feminist but there's way too much misogyny happening in it for me to say de Sade is a feminist. His work deals with class issues, homosexual acts, and sexual politics and things we'd call S/M drives.
He's frolicing in the filthy wonder of repressed sexual urges and so does sometimes come up with gems of rare insight. I shall always be indebted to him for helping me discover exactly how I like an omelette served.

If you like smut, sure it is worth while. If you want to read queer/feminist theory not so much. If you want to read one man's thoughful and honest unraveling of his world view, yes you should. If nothing else after you read it you'll have plenty to talk about at parties.

a good place to start

Essential Dazzler

13:42 / 22.08.06

Online De Sade library

13:56 / 22.08.06

Chao,

thanks for that link.

I'm getting the Angela Carter book now. Looks fabulous.

the Sadeian Woman

Ex

14:03 / 22.08.06

I wrote my undergraduate dissertation on de Sade from a postmodern queerish perspective, but it was terrible.

He does do interesting stuff in Days of Sodom where his characters are apparently trying to set up a whole new society with different erotic divisions - but there are some things which don't really get altered or interrogated, around class, age and sex. Towards the beginning, it seems as though his invoking of additional restrictions in order to break them is a recognition of how sexual categories are constructed, but towards the end it's just a catalogue of horrid things happening to ladies.

Philosophy in the Bedroom is, as recommended by xk, more interesting than most.

Roland Barthes' Sade/Fourier/Loyola is more fuel to the discussion.

15:35 / 22.08.06

Dr Xoc will see you now, Boboss.

You don't faint at the sight of blood? If you do, then beta blockers aren't going to do you any favours. Better with a valium.

If you're just taking it to subdue nerves, can't think of any counter-indication for most blood tests. It might be wise to tell them you've taken 20mg of Propranolol or whatever for anxiety. If they didn't want you to take medications at all, for a fasting test of some sort, that might be different but they'd have instructed you about that.

It's your blood pressure that it'll affect, essentially, and the test won't be affected by that. Timing needs to be right though. I took some once before an interview but the interview was delayed. I was very, very chilled in the waiting room and then pouring with sweat and stuttering in the interview, when it came.

Now, please drop your pants and bend over. And cough when you feel fingers meet scrotum...

19:04 / 22.08.06

Thanks, Xoc. I faint at the sight of blood tests, well, blood tests that are being conducted on me, at any rate.

Funnily enough needles, in any other context, don't really bother me at all.

Luckily for me I managed to avoid a blood test this afternoon, but did get to chat with the doctor about what measures I could take to armour me against fainting when having my blood drained. Apparently beta-blockers will fuck with my cholesterol levels so they'd be no good (if I have a blood test it'll be my cholesterol levels they'll be interested in), which is okay 'cause, like you said, I doubt they'd be very effective. Diazapan on the other hand should do he trick, so I'll be sure to pick some up if it turns out I'm going to have to be leeched.

19:07 / 22.08.06

Boboss, have you ever tried simply not looking at the blood? I mean, close your eyes or something. Would that work for you?

19:52 / 22.08.06

We're talking about a proper phobia here - an almost physiological reaction - and as I said, it's not the blood it's the process. In fact, to get really specific, while there's a lot I don't like about blood tests, it's the feeling of the needle as it's pulled out of my flesh that really sets me off.

I'm not too good with heights, neither, although they don't make me faint.

09:34 / 23.08.06

I seem to have borked my MSN. For sometime now a message has popped up at the beginning of MSN conversations, but now it won't stop and I can't type anything since it just pops up every second. IE:

Jub says:
Find out who's blocking you on MSN, Download it free from http://www.block-checker.com

Jub says:
Hey you can see who's blocking you on MSN! Download it now http://www.block-checker.com

Jub says:
Did they block you too? Download a free MSN Block Checker
http://www.block-checker.com

So, what's it all about and how can I stop it?

10:24 / 23.08.06

Maybe Ad Aware?

...it seems to get rid of most nastiness that pops up on my computer...

Tabitha Tickletooth

10:37 / 23.08.06

Even by my standards, this is a stupid one but...

New question: When in a modern American novel someone asks whether you take 'cream and sugar' in coffee (as it almost invariably is, but it could be tea) do they actually *mean* cream, or do they mean milk? I'm not harking back to traditional silver service coffee/tea drinking days of olde, I mean right now (the reference that has prompted this facile question is in a Jack Reacher - blame Miss W). If it is really referring to cream, do Americans generally drink cream in coffee rather than milk? Forgive my ignorance...

11:36 / 23.08.06

Yes. Yes we do.

I've just dolloped my morning java with cream and two sugars, as a matter of fact. It's pretty common. Milk is my second choice and doesn't add that extra bit of "body" I like in my coffee, but it works in a pinch.

miss wonderstarr

11:46 / 23.08.06

But Coffee Mate "coffee creamer" isn't cream, surely? It's a non-dairy product.

12:23 / 23.08.06

Ah. Well, you've got me there. Put it this way: If you order coffee in a restaurant in the States, the wait staff will ask if you want "cream and sugar", but what they will deliver to your table will be a non-dairy creamer. This shorthand infects our culture and has the unfortunate side-effect of making us Staters occasionally look like silly-billies on message boards.

miss wonderstarr

12:33 / 23.08.06

I didn't know that about restaurants serving non-dairy creamer. It's interesting though because one thing I do like about the US (I like many things about it) is the cream with coffee, and I've never really been able to find the right type in the UK. (In fact, I order "half-and-half" in the US... a brand, or anyway a type of beverage, that I think is unavailable here). Now I know it's just Coffee-Mate, I may be able to buy it in London; but I think I've only ever seen that product in either powdered form, or tiny pots like the one you illustrate.

Don't feel silly, you have helped!

12:50 / 23.08.06

Never buy coffee-mate in it's powdered form. It's horrible, horrible stuff.

miss wonderstarr

12:56 / 23.08.06

I agree, and I've only ever found the little pots in cheapish hotel rooms ~ they weren't very nice either.

Tabitha Tickletooth

13:11 / 23.08.06

Wow - thanks all. That *is* interesting. I have heard of coffee mate, but for some reason I had assumed it to be some kind of 'diet' option: lower fat than full fat fresh milk. Again, this is probably due to the fact that in the UK and Australia I have largely only seen it in powdered form. I assumed that in the little liquid pot form it was like UHT (so called 'long-life' milk) or the condensed milk in tubes that people add to their tea when camping in Australia. YUCK.

Anyway, I now want to try this US-style cream in coffee. Are we just talking about single cream poured in? Doesn't it separate? I've had whipped cream on coffee but I'm guessing that is different. I love coffee.

miss wonderstarr

13:18 / 23.08.06

I assumed that in the little liquid pot form it was like UHT (so called 'long-life' milk)

I thought that too. If it's non-dairy creamer, then to be honest I still suspect that. I am surprised if the crappy little pots you get in hotels are the stuff they use in American restaurants, because it's never tasted the same to me ~ but I am happy to be proved wrong.

Anyway, I now want to try this US-style cream in coffee. Are we just talking about single cream poured in?

I'm sure I tried that after one trip to New York in a vain attempt to recreate that "diner experience", and it didn't taste right at all.

13:28 / 23.08.06

Well, it's only in the cheaper restaurants (like fast food joints and greasy diners) where they give you those non-dairy creamers. Most American restaurants (in my experience) give you actual cream for your coffee. You have to ask for milk specifically if you prefer that. Cream is generally prefered over milk for coffee.

13:31 / 23.08.06

If you order coffee in a restaurant in the States, the wait staff will ask if you want "cream and sugar", but what they will deliver to your table will be a non-dairy creamer.

You need to start patronizing restaurants that aren't operated by mentally defectives, then; because at a normal, sensible eating establishment that serves victuals actually fit for human consumption, patrons who request cream will indeed be supplied with cream—generally light cream (25% butterfat, somewhere between a single cream and a whipping cream). It comes in a blister-pack like the one pictured above, but it contains honest-to-Allah dairy product, not the sinister synthetic Wite-Out (which I think our transAtlantic cousins would call Tippex) that is CoffeeMate.

Many Americans prefer (and many fine dining establishments provide) half-and-half, which is less heavy than cream, being half whole milk and half light cream, for a fat content of 12%. It's still got plenty of heft to it, though. In the UK, that would be "half cream." Wikipedia, of course, has more.

13:37 / 23.08.06

Wonderstarr: More likely your attempt to recreate the diner experience failed because of the coffee, rather than the cream.

For authentic diner-style coffee, you need to brew it drip-style, strong, let it sit in its glass carafe on the burner for about two hours, pour most of it out, then brew a fresh pot into the remains of the old one. Repeat this every two hours for about three weeks, being careful to never, ever wash the carafe, so it can acquire a patina.

Drink enough of this stuff, and your insides, too, will begin to acquire a patina.

miss wonderstarr

13:41 / 23.08.06

It's that "half cream" I think I need, Jack. *narrows eyes* That's what. I. Need.

13:52 / 23.08.06

Half-and-half really is the best for coffee. Most of the coffee shops around here are cream-your-own style with the bench of creams and sugars you add yourself - I usually mix half light cream and half whole milk to get the right body. Skim milk in coffee is an abomination.

Now for the Stupid Computer Question of the day: I want to get rid of my laptop, which has becoming a waking nightmare to me. Is there any way to completely erase my hard drive before selling/giving it away? For a few years I've been running Quickbooks for my business on it, with a lot of personal financial info and bank account numbers that I obviously do not want anyone to salvage. If I can't erase it... what do people do when they sell second hand computers to prevent fraud?

14:05 / 23.08.06

Ibis - Assuming you're using Windows I would recommend erasing all of your financial files with something along the lines of ultrashredder (majorgeeks.com download). That'll put the files beyond all but forensic recovery. Then I suggest defragmenting the hard drive (this tends to make any files you've forgotten about harder to recover). Then, when that's done, reformat the drive completely and reinstall Windows, or just get rid of the machine with a blank disk, for linux or other people's Windows copies, or whatever.

Once you've done that, no-one's going to bother because most people just chuck the disks out without erasing everything, so there's plenty of lower-hanging fruit for people with nefarious intentions to take.

14:33 / 23.08.06

nameinuse - thanks... one problem, part of my laptop's fuckedness is that it can't go online anymore (I'm currently using my roommate's). I also can't seem to defragment and don't have a copy of Windows anymore. Yay me. Anyway, is there something akin to ultrashredder than I can buy on disc rather than download?

18:41 / 23.08.06

Beg, borrow or steal a CD writer, it's only a little program. A USB memory key (even and old, crap, or possibly freebie one) would do.

If you've not got the windows media anymore I'd just let the next person who has the laptop deal with it (tell them first, obviously. If you give the laptop to a geek you won't have someone who forever phones you because they've dropped it in a puddle and now "that windows thing" is all wonky). Your data's got to be more important, anyway.

23:30 / 23.08.06

i would like to be able to make posters like this:

how do i do that?
i am too lazy and busy to try too many errors at the moment, but i woud really like to expand my knowledge in that direction.

any thoughts?
i have fireworks, and have no idea where to start.
i cat paint for shit, so it will have to be all trickery.

00:32 / 24.08.06

Well, first, I have to ask if you have any friends with landscaping businesses or gardening equipment.

And then you have to see if they'd be willing to wear the mask....

01:30 / 24.08.06

Can anyone recommend a good, basic Soundforge tutorial online?

I'm doing this performance and I need to cut one of the songs I'm using shorter than it is. Alternately, if anyone wants to do me a huge favour, I could ysi the song and explain what I need, and maybe you could do it and ysi it back? (Please PM me if you could do this.)

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