Letters to the Editor
Amerigo
Published Letters: 955 Editor's Choice: 60
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Judging by the letters here...
[Read the article: We're sick of Southern California! Should we move to the Midwest? ]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]... there is no part of the US that is much good to live.
Probably the only solution is to move overseas. Minsk is supposed to be a nice city.
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How you dress
[Read the article: Not lady enough]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]Seems to me that the problem is really how you look to other users of the bathroom. If I am in the men's room and a woman comes in, she may explain that the women's loo is out of order or something, fair enough, but if I point out that she is in the wrong place and she whips out a male ID, I don't think this is acceptable at all. She/he should go in the ladies' if that is what she/he looks like.
You can't have much sympathy for someone who is bringing problems on him/her/itself because of the way they choose to dress and present themselves. In a lot of countries they would be arrested. Fortunately the US is fairly sympathetic to these unfortunate mixed-up people, but there is a limit.
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Tough one...
[Read the article: Lonely single guy tired of being lonely and single seeks person ]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]The key point here seems to be that there is no third date, and the third date, by an American tradition established on the Mayflower, is the one where you get lucky.
Being average looking is perfectly normal. Most people are average, a little below average, or, in certain parts of Minnesota, congenitally above average. So that is not the problem.
One assumes that you have decently brushed and flossed teeth, your hair is professionally styled, your shoes are polished, you wear a belt, press your clothes, pluck your ear hairs, and do all those other little things that show that you are effortlessly making an effort to please.
You have enough money and you are not a druggie or a drunk.
You go to church.
So you are every mother-in-law's prayer.
And yet...there is no third date.
As usual we have no idea where you live or what you do for a living, but we will assume there are no unusual circumstances and that you are not an Alaskan fisherman or a shepherd on Brokeback Mountain.
Now LW, I want to ask you are very personal question. Are you making your dates feel special? I feel the answer must be no. When you meet your blind date, the first thing you must say is "I had no idea you were so attractive. Your picture does no justice." This is how you get things off on the right foot. Of course, during the course of the date you may well discover that you and she have nothing in common, but at the start of the date, you have everything in common--you both want to be liked.
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And the winners are...
[Read the article: Ask the pilot]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]... the vendors of overpriced drinks made of sugar and colored water on the other side of the checkpoint.
Personally I am just waiting for someone to discover a bomb that can be disguised as a woman's brassiere.
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Monster ingratitude!
[Read the article: Will my family drag us down?]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]Those who are attacking Cary's advice are unnatural monsters, the Gonerils and Regans of our age. Enough said.
Huntington's Chorea is a truly terrible disease. (What were you thinking when you created this one, God? No, don't bother to anwer! You will only make it worse for yourself if you send a tsunami in reply. And as you know, I live inland).
Note that even the LW, a highly educated physician, ducked the issue past marriage, and only took the test when on the verge of impregnating his wife. Think how many times he must have ben on the verge and then his conscience said to "coitus interruptus", because he could not do what his father had done. This is truly mythical in proportion.
His sister has not yet bitten the bullet. His mother lives with the memory of her husband deteriorating and dying of this awful disease, and still not knowing if the same is in store for her daughter.
And the LW is still hoping for a relatively stress free life and wants to do the right thing. Good for you, LW and may the force be with you!
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Its Dawkins vs Jesus, the Avalanche at Altitude
[Read the article: Will my family drag us down?]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]Having read a number of the responses here, practically all of them, to be sure, it seems to me that the predominant view of Salonistas coincides sharply with the theories expounded in the classic work The Selfish Gene by Richard Dawkins in which Dawkins (did anyone know his full name is Clinton Richard Dawkins?) explains the apparent paradox of altruism in term of promoting the survival of ones own genes and those of those closely related to oneself who carry the same genes.
There is a horrible twist to this in the LW's case, since the family has the deadly gene for Huntington's Chorea, and clearly the majority of Salonistas feel that promoting the welfare of the LWs child, whom we know does not carry the deadly gene, is supremely preferable to expending resources (mental or monetary) on the sister and her offspring, who may well carry the hereditary taint.
Contrast this, if you will, to the teachings of Jesus, and many other religious visionaries, whose message is that true satisfaction comes only from obliterating the self in the service of others, taking up one's cross, turning the other cheek, etc., even at the expense of the pursuit of happiness and a stress-free existence.
Clearly Cary is coming from Jesus territory, so no surprise that he is taking a whipping from Salon readers, who are clearly in the camp of their hero Dawkins, assistant prof at Berkeley, tenured at Oxford etc., writer of books, lectures, TV programs, who even confronted the dreadful Haggard monster in his lair and lived to tell the tale.
The LW may or may not follow Cary's advice, but clearly he and his wife are supremely superior intellects whose thinking probably goes to places that us mortals don't even know exists. Maybe one day they will be winning Nobel prizes for work in the field of Huntington's.