She doesn't understand what a partnership is. If you were earning money and she were home dealing with a difficult pregnancy, would you scream at her for not earning any money and throw gifts she'd given you? Right now, you're in a situation where you, for good reason, cannot earn a lot of money. A reasonable partner would understand that and would be glad that she's earning enough to lift both your boats. She's not reasonable, she's immature.

Also, odds are that her mother, sisters, and friends are to blame for part of this.

I've had an Iriver for several years. It was cheap, it has an fm tuner, it can record voice or from the radio (no more searching for scraps of paper to write down lyrics of a mystery song), and it's tiny. Also, I like big headphones, earbuds tickle.

I think the best thing about mp3 players, of any brand, is that they don't break as often as walkmen and discmen used to. It's not just that they have no/fewer moving parts, it's that when you drop a walkman it pulls the headphones off your head and the whole thing hits the ground, hard. When you drop an mp3 player (if you have a small, basic one) it just dangles at the end of the headphone cord and can be fished back up with no damage to device or cord.

Has the jackass apologized for killing Tara in the lamest ever re-telling of the lesbian-death cliche? No, he has not. Hence, I won't bother watching his new show and I hope it fails*.

*This time, without spawning a bunch of idiots like the Browncoats. They're more annoying than the Apple fanboys and Twilight squeegirls put together.

What annoys me most is liberals saying that everyone should have civil unions and churches should be awarded the sole privilege of bestowing marriages. You're essentially saying that atheist and non-religious couples should give up their right to marriage so gays can have a handful of rights. The Right is succeeding in creating another issue where groups that should work together will be at odds.

Also, if this "compromise" happened, and all gay couples and straight atheists/Deist couples were ghettoized into "civil unions", it's obvious that the religious zealots' next move would be to chip away at civil union rights.

I don't intend to see my (secular, straight) marriage reduced to a civil union.

I favor the European system, which others have mentioned, where the couple's civil marriage ceremony is performed at city hall. Later, if they choose, it can be followed by whatever sort of religious ceremony they want. Oh, you conservatives don't like the idea of having to go to City Hall first? Then be grateful that your religious organizations have the privilege of conducting the civil marriage at the same time as the religious ceremony.

How would you like it if the "compromise" we decided on was that religious ceremonies would merely produce "religious unions" and everyone who wanted a valid legal marriage would have to go to the courthouse?

It may have that connotation for you, but not for everyone. I would be fine with continuing to refer to the traditional civil/legal/contractual aspects of marriage as marriage and coining a new term for the religious aspects some people ascribe to their own marriages.

Think about it this way: all current marriages in America have the civil/legal/contractual aspects, but only some have the religious aspects. So the 100% should keep the name marriage and the smaller group is free to also call their relationships "religious unions". Then gay couples can be allowed to marry, and religious organizations would be free to refuse to bless their "religious unions". I really don't see a problem with this.