jerryskids

Of course it is. Free Luigi! Does your 1500 count include that Brazilian guy who walked around and prayed?

Thanks for the info. Mayo is doing it for real; they also did their first transplant 6 months ago. Unfortunately, between my metastasis and the mess my throat is due to my reconstruction (including a pec flap where they sliced my chest off and sewed it to my throat), I'm pretty sure I'd never qualify.

I think Shapiro would be a good candidate; unfortunately he has chronic Jew-itis, which would likely disqualify him from the Hamas-loving wing of the party. Gallego is interesting -- he seems much more purple now than his smurf-blue record while in AZ politics. I think there are some skeletons in his closet about his divorce from Kate Gallego (mayor of Phoenix) which haven't come out yet. Or maybe they have; I don't follow that kinda stuff that closely. I'd at least listen to what they have both have to say. Whitmer or Newsom, that's a no from me dog. I think Vance is the obvious leader for Republicans at this time. The concern is that he is much more in the spotlight than past VPs, which will give the Leftie MSM plenty of stuff to rally lemmings around (e.g., he was mean to Zelensky$#@!). Don Jr., eesh, I hope it doesn't come to that.

No, type 1 diabetics (like my daughter) cannot join the military. To your initial question in the OP of making an argument, I'll let your own link argue for me: This podunk low-level activist judge is directly contradicting recent SCOTUS precedent. She should be impeached and disbarred. Further: Gender dysphoria is a mental health condition as per DSM-5, which in and of itself is sufficient to disallow joining. But in addition, it would likely lead to the person pursuing trans surgery, on the taxpayer's dime of course, in addition to all of the (expensive) daily medication which further precludes deployment. Your rebuttal on my argument?

I don't have a trach, I had a laryngectomy. I permanently breathe through a stoma in my trachea, unless they come up with a way to regrow my larynx. Which is actually being worked on at the Mayo here. I'm not sure if they would have needed to do something prior to my surgery to make such a procedure work, and I'm usually disqualified from such things because of the metastasis, but who knows, maybe someday. I've done swallow tests. My problem is a combo of (1) the reconstruction of my throat left some ridges that pool food and liquid, and (2) I speak through a prosthetic device between my trachea and esophagus (TEP, or trans-esophageal prosthetic). The TEP is basically a tube with a valve -- when I push air through it, the valve opens, my esophagus vibrates, and walla! sounds kinda like speech. Works quite well actually. Unfortunately, it is not a permanent device, as crud and fungus collects on the valve and affects the seal of the valve and the TEP cylinder itself. So some amount of aspiration eventually occurs. The trick is to determine when it is consistent enough to get it changed, which happens every few months. The change involves pliers to yank it out of my throat, then a device to jam the new one into my throat. It's not a pleasant experience. ETA: Regarding the swallow test: with a lary, my esophagus is completely isolated from my trachea, so that isn't the issue.with my aspiration. I mentioned above that I brought up the possibility of aspiration-related nodule, and the doc said it was possible. She didn't use the word pneumonia though. Googling around, it looks like usually this presents with infection-related issues (fever, etc.) which I don't have, nor do I have a cough. But it can cause a "lung abscess." It sounds like you had limited symptoms as well. I'm not inclined to delay the surgery any more, but thanks for the info. I really hope this is the cause.

No, it's a mostly peaceful protest

Will do, thanks.

I ended up not getting the buy 3 1 free deal on TP5s, as you can get 48 mint balls on eBay for 1/2 that price. But the ProVs did make some significant changes, plus they added the Left Dash I mentioned, so I'm thinking about splurging on those. You said you find a lot of balls; I don't find as many because the desert doesn't lead to as many lost balls, but by far the most balls I find of any type are ProVs. There are a lot of bad golfers out there paying a lot of money for balls they don't need. I'm working through a few dozens of those as I get back into golf shape, and implement the stuff I've learned in lessons. I'm like you -- if the swing is working, I much prefer the better balls I have (TP5s) around the green.

Dood, you should have seen us trying to find a date. The surgeon offered 3/27, we originally signed up but... wait, that's opening day for the DBacks, we never miss that, so I rescheduled. We moved it to 4/1, but my wife has some super important corporate meetings that day and the next. I pushed back on 4/8 because it would impact the draft, but since she's working and I'm retired, I reluctantly acquiesced. Priorities and all. In the giant scheme of things, 1.5 weeks won't matter for this procedure.

I appreciate the percentages, but in reality I'm likely wishcasting. Occam's Razor says it is my old buddy back for more fun. One thing I didn't say, since I had typed too much already, is that my immunotherapy treatments ended in fall 2023. This nodule first showed up in scans April 2024. One might conclude that the immuno had not killed it but rather kept it in check, and once the immuno ended, it started growing. This isn't necessarily a bad thing -- if it was just this one stubborn tumor, the surgery definitively gets rid of it. Either way, I expect I'll get back on a 3 month scan schedule (vs. 6 months) after the surgery. If other things pop up, I'll probably end up back on the chemo/immuno plan. It's been a while since chemo so that would be fine. As my wife says, we just need to keep me alive long enough for advancements in areas like targeted therapies to be available.

Somebody posted a laugh emoji on my update.

What version do you play? Have you looked at the new "left dash"?

Update... not great. I had my first scans in 6 months a few weeks ago, and for the first time in 3.5 years, there is a new nodule in my lung. Well, apparently not new, as there is evidence of it in my prior August and April scans, but it was too small to register. It's still small, 6 mm, so too small to biopsy or to see on a PET scan (needs to be 10 mm to reliably see). Given my history, and because there is just the one nodule, we've decided to have it surgically removed. Benefits of this is that it will definitely be removed (with chemo, immuno, and/or radiation, you never really know), and they will biopsy it while I'm still out on the table, so we'll know if it is cancer. It's less clear to me if they can conclude it is from my past metastasis, or if it might be some unrelated, less-threatening thing like an adenocarcinoma. Surgery is on Tuesday, 4/8. Because it requires collapsing my lung temporarily, they want to keep me overnight. Ending on a positive note, there are a few things in my favor. One, it is reassuring to have a plan. Two, in addition to the above adenocarcinoma, it could be benign. For instance, I occasionally aspirate (fancy for leak) food and drink from my esophagus into my trachea (and thus my lungs). If a particulate settled somewhere, my body might build a nodule around it. Given it's growth over the past year, unlikely, but maybe. Three, it's in my right lung, whereas my past tumors (lung and throat) were all on my left side. The lungs are interconnected via the trachea so the doc doesn't put much credibility in it, but the engineer in me finds it odd that there would be a single dormant nodule on the other side. Four, speaking of dormant, my original cancer (squamous cell carcinoma) is typically like a yip yip dog -- supposedly it either grows like a week and kills ya quick, or you kill it first. It's not like some breast cancers that lie dormant for a decade or more. Relatedly, it grew very fast the first time around, whereas this growth has been much slower. Five, I've never smoked and I exercise regularly, so my lungs are as awesome as 57 yr old lungs can be. The surgery is Masters week, so for my EdEx buddies, I'll probably have to come up with a plan to finish the draft (hopefully we can make my part of the 3-4 turn on Monday). I also have not only approval but insistence from my wife that I sit on my ass recovering and watch the tourney all weekend. Anyway, that's it for now, I'll update things after the surgery.

Looking at that poster's history, it looks like he is a semi-regular on the main board. So you probably did get reported. Maybe it's folks like him doing the reporting? People not used to our... colorful way of communicating with each other.

Why? Do you hate WASPs, or just want the country to implode?

I think a dilemma for the Democrats is their bench. https://www.yahoo.com/news/ocasio-cortez-leads-poll-democrats-145717114.html Oof, AOC, really? Does anyone over 30 NOT think she sounds like a child? Out of this list maybe Jeffries would have a shot? Or maybe Newsom can put on his carnie outfit and sell monorails to the Left.

Are we deporting WASPs from Western Europe? Because that's who we were letting in when the Statue of Liberty was given to us. Well, them and the coolies to be glorified slave labor to build RRs.

I'm not desperate, it was an easy win. Moving on, I'll agree with you on something: While I don't necessarily mind the deportations, what I don't get is how we can send these folks to a prison in El Salvador. I further understand that we are paying this prison to keep these folks, so... they have no incentive to ever let them out. This seems wrong on multiple levels.

It's certainly true that Trump is creating an environment where people on the Right think people on the Left are evil/bad, and that's unfortunate. But that has been true on the Left for decades, going back to Obama's "clinging to guns and religion" to Hillary's "deplorables." Until recently I believe the adage was true: Righties think Leftie ideas are bad; Lefties think Righties are bad. And before someone says "not me$#@!", of course this isn't 100%. I mentioned here recently my anecdotal experience that numerous Lefties on my social media feeds have proudly announced that they unfriended/deleted any connection to people who voted for Trump. I suspect that others have seen similar. Yet I have never seen the opposite. I'm disappointed that my side is losing it's position as the "adult in the room" on this topic.

Thanks for the lesson. Except... ... Congress decides the amount, but not the specific allocations or timelines, nor the number of employees ... The Executive Branch is responsible for the border and issues Executive Orders about it often. Gee, here is Biden when he first entered office: https://cmsny.org/biden-harris-immigration-executive-actions/ ... Departments report to the POTUS, and are run by people appointed by the POTUS. I don't know what we'd do without you explaining these things to us.

They are doing it to get those sweet sweet Medicaid payments, and the government encourages it. I mentioned this in another thread, but our country's economic strategy is to pay people to be unemployed, and rely on the US dollar being the world trade currency to print more to fund it. SS, Medicare, and means-tested welfare programs like Medicaid are a giant Ponzi scheme where we keep kicking the can down the road, but someday it will all come crashing down.

Fellas, let's be kind here. Our Leftie buddies don't like being reminded that they were gaslit for the entirety of the Biden... whatever you call those four years. After all, they are the party of smartz! It's kinda embarrassing. They don't mind not knowing who was running the country all that time, as long as it wasn't Trump.

If the code monkeys at my former companies sat around starting and posting in multiple TDS threads per day, I for sure wouldn't have had shiot to sell.

NP, I mistook the pathetic 5K+ per day average for your point about the diving catch by the autosigner. Enjoy the win. Also, looking back, I see that you and your girlfriends spent your Sunday concerned about my intelligence. I appreciate the concern. We can't all be code monkeys after all.

I said what I said big guy, twice. I'd post it a third time but you were too dense to get it the first few times. Check the chart here: https://www.axios.com/2025/03/04/illegal-border-crossings-february-decline-trump That's pathetic. Whoever autosigned for Biden was well into the 5K per day until the last few months. Congrats, big win there, objective poster guy.