Letters to the Editor
Quiet Type
Published Letters: 813 Editor's Choice: 35
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unhip
[Read the article: My hip-to-waist ratio is nobody's business but mine]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]Thanks for the laugh - best headline ever.
LW, the only reason these sad robots are commenting on your "waist to hip ratio" is that this is this year's "in" paranoia. You can't have all of American womanhood not obsessing about a single aspect of their bodies, now can you? Take heart. By next year, you will be asked about your ankle to calf ratio.
I have a friend in her 40s who gets unsettled every time she sees a young woman whose thighs don't touch and feels a need to rue how hers do not.
Pitiful.
I have a comeback to waist-to-hip people.
"What is your i.q. to self-esteem ratio?"
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@guinvere
[Read the article: My hip-to-waist ratio is nobody's business but mine]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]Why bless YOUR heart!
(If I thought I could get away with that superb line without coming off like a complete big-city northern psycho, I'd have loved to use it for the last 30 years or so!)
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Truth in Typos
[Read the article: How can I convince my girlfriend that this is as good as it gets?]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]"An awful lot of men get blindsided when their wives stop arguing and start planning their exist strategy"
I agree.
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9/11 support
[Read the article: I've been passing out drunk and it's getting worse]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]Of all the sometimes poignant, sometimes calculated pronouncements that came out right after 9/11 ("if we don't don't play baseball, the terrorists win; if we don't shop, the terrorists win"), perhaps resolving to hold on to our mental health should have been among them.
These years later, are there PSAs, and of course, funding, to help the ongoing silent victims of the attack?
I'm not a New Yorker or a drinker, so I don't pretend to even begin to know what LW is going through. But a couple of days ago I happened upon the melancholy documentary made about the jumpers of WTC (there were 200 of them, it turns out). The camera caught faces of horrified onlookers, and I had this thought: "It's 7 years later. I wonder if these people have ever gotten over what they saw."
I'm guessing not. I'm guessing LW is not alone in his trauma, and I wonder if there are 9/11 support groups still meeting, somewhere in the city.
I hope so.
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gloomy but probable
[Read the article: Make less! Save more! ]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]America, make way for the trendy new extended family, coming to a crowded house near you.
(At least, that's if you're lucky enough to have kids who are nice enough to invite to let you live with them. I also think old-age suicide is going to spike.)
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the only moment this man has lived hand-to-mouth
[Read the article: Pregnant pause]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]I have occasionally stumbled upon some alleged body language on Fox breaking down the gestures and expressions of some important person they don't like.
I'd be interested in seeing what that covering the mouth thing is all about, in their opinion. Is he about to vomit at the thought? He is suppressing his desire to say what he actually thinks? Is he panicking at being put on the spot, or perhaps performing a defensive maneuver to make sure nobody "puts words in his mouth"?
It was fun to watch, I must say.
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Don't kick yourself out of paradise.
[Read the article: My company wants me to move to California ]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]All I'm getting is a mental picture of the snake trying to tempt you out of Eden. What's the point? You have a hundred kinds of happiness and contentment right now. You think there's any point to turning your back on all those lovely aspects of your life for the ego stroke of a promotion?
You already know the answer to this. You just think you need 50 or so responders to tell you it's okay to just say no to an empty promise -- (I'm sorry -- but the cost of housing alone without a commensurate salary is an empty promise)-- and to stay put and stay happy.
So count me among those who says to stay put and stay happy.
(P.S. This economy is crap. Imagine the turmoil if for some reason the promotion doesn't work out, you wind up hating the job, etc. If you're promotable where you are, you're promotable at another job in your own hometown, too.)
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Me so paranoid (of Karl Rove)
[Read the article: Legal expert says McCain may not be eligible for White House]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]Why do I get the feeling that the GOP, probably getting the feeling that McCain may not be able to win, is going to float this kind of stuff in a lead-up to an ultimate switcheroo this November. I have felt for quite some time that, if necessary, either a more palatable nominee is going to be hoisted into place at the last minute, and/or a "national emergency" is going to be trumped up to keep Bush in place.
Or maybe I'm just losing it. Yeah, that's it. I'm losing it.
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Dad won't like it either
[Read the article: Why wouldn't a 16-year-old boy want to live on a houseboat?]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]I think Dad is in a fantasy that he's going to enjoy actual day-to-day life on a houseboat with three children. Where will HE escape to get some privacy, to get away from the tumult of kids, to bring a girlfriend around?
I get claustrophobic just thinking about it.
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Rorschach test
[Read the article: Lizza defends New Yorker cover]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]I can't figure out if the New Yorker is:
Naive, to think that most of America outside New York even gets satire, or:
More naive, to think McCain's campaign won't use this to plant Muslim-Militant seeds everywhere they can (see reference to America, above), or:
Passive-aggressive, in actuality stumping for McCain but not willing to come right out and say so, or:
Forget passive-aggressive, try Machiavellian, or:
Just plain pr-starved and willing to feed the publicity beast at Obama's expense.
Whatever the motivation, McCain runs away with the win on this one. Thanks for nothing, New Yorker.
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think fast
[Read the article: My wife left me because the dolphins at Sea World gave me an erection]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]Thank you for posting this letter.
The meaning of "Daddy has to rest for a minute" has been a revelation.
In case this letter has even the tiniest kernel of truth to it: White lies keep the world from imploding. LW, why didn't you tell your wife the dolphins were making you fantasize about her as your mermaid? I think a lot of ladies would rather enjoy hearing that.
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Trainman's ESP
[Read the article: A plague of economic locusts]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]"Drill For More Oil
This will be the election marketing ploy used by Republicans hoping to distract voters from the real issues."
I watched Bush's little economy press conference today. Of all the usual childlike optimism and inarticulate babbling going on, yes, exactly: "Drill for more oil" was the only cogent message. (Well, and also "your bank deposits are federally guaranteed.")