NightSG

Now we will never get a new version of The Ballad of Bilbo Baggins

Then what are the women for?

I guess that's why the missionaries got that funny look when they went to point something out during the fourth discussion and realized I had highlights, underlines and margin notes through the whole thing. I'd still love to find a Quad done like one of great grandma's Bibles; imagine printing it in the regular font, but centered up on 8.5x11" paper, so you have huge margins to take notes in. She still ran out of room in a few places, even with tiny handwriting.

But how is the border security and are all programs open to illegal immigrants in the name of "compassion?"

Then how do you deal with differing necessities? As a very common example, I have no need for feminine hygiene products, but they're pretty much indispensable for about half the people in the world. Then there are medications, which vary from person to person and month to month; I might need an expensive antibiotic to survive one month every ten years, while someone else could die a blood thinner every day of their life. The food allowance that gets me by just fine wouldn't work for someone with a legitimate allergy to a common ingredient who has to buy more expensive specialty foods. Much easier in the long run to make those items tax free, but then you run into a problem of how to decide and define which items; clothing is a basic need, but the Prada label isn't. Limiting untaxed consumption could also be an issue with tax-free items; I need enough socks to get through to the next laundry day, but if they're cheap enough I might just start tossing them rather than washing. That would encourage both material waste and wasteful spending.

Exactly, and I'm also fond of the idea of paying only once; not (for money) when I get it as income tax and again when I spend it as sales tax, or (for property) every year. User fees can handle the ongoing expense of services for the property. Then again, I'd also say that if the One who gave us life and everything else can settle for ten percent, no government should ever feel entitled to more than that.

And the problem is that these are virtually all a product of environment. Some people are more mature at 16 than others will be at 40. I know some women who were as much a mother to younger siblings as their actual mother, and I would say they probably were mentally and emotionally mature enough to start a family at 16, though because of those same experiences, they wanted a few years of childless adulthood behind them before having kids of their own.

You make two false assumptions; reliable and valued at $700. Blue book in excellent condition might be $700, but it's been wrecked at least twice before I got it, and it still needs quite a bit more work.

Government makes that happen; I feel poor right up until I do my taxes, then realize I'm apparently rich in the .gov's eyes. My $700 car and $300/mo apartment are apparently quite a bit more luxurious than I realized.

So in other words, he lets everybody sleep. That's also fair.

Wake up the HPs. If everybody else has to suffer through it, so do they.

The same could be said of members.

I wouldn't know; I never kissed President Kimball.

You missed one: "too much of a good thing" doesn't apply to kissing pretty ladies when you're single.

Then either she's legitimately changed and frustrated that you haven't fully accepted that yet, or she's getting tired of faking it. You need to find out which before you take any major action.

This is why I utterly despise the "don't date, just hang out and be friends, then see if something comes from that" mentality; you're establishing a "just friends" mindset that's nearly impossible to break.

Meh. Great great granddad hired both of his wife's sisters as housekeepers. Records are kind of sketchy, but his first three kids were born in different months within a nine month span. Nobody's quite sure which is from which sister. That makes for some guesswork in the genealogy...though it's at least convenient that they were sisters, so their kids all have the same grandparents.

This; of all the places I wouldn't expect to see someone say it's not right to skip somebody's wedding...

Only 17 more months. We had only been talking for a few weeks before she was scheduled to leave, and knowing that she was going, I didn't get too attached...until I heard her farewell talk. Until then, she was just a really cute lady with a good goal in sight. The talk really added a lot of depth of character that I had intentionally not looked for because I didn't want to be sitting around for 18 months trying not to get mushy in the letters or over-plan how I'd like to win her heart with the dinner date. I'm still not ring shopping by any stretch of the imagination, but I do hope the dinner will lead to at least a few more dates...if I'm still available, but any woman that can steal my heart before she gets back is going to have to be one heck of a catch.

Oh now you're just being silly. Next you'll say they should be taught how to dress and groom themselves like grownups so they don't show up for job interviews in shorts and a t shirt.

Actually, it's felt most acutely by those already making between the new wage and 2x that wage; very few of them have their wage pinned to minimum in some "minimum plus $x" form, so they don't get a raise, (or they don't until enough of their colleagues leave that the employer has to do something, which can take months) but they see the kid behind the counter suddenly making only $0.50 less than they've worked to gain the skills to earn, for the exact same job he was earning $2 less for yesterday, and the also see their relative buying power diminish significantly as the fry guy can afford the same car/apartment/whatever that they've worked much harder for.

Can I count the ones where the hero saves the day by sending bad people to meet Him in person?

Right, and those ordinances are, in your view, at worst, ultimately meaningless. Not evil, and performed with good intent though not with proper Priesthood authority. That's a bit different from something that is effectively an outright mockery of a sacred ordinance for a purpose that is clearly and repeatedly denounced by the Scripture behind every Judeo-Christian church. Would you attend to show support if some relative was having their child consecrated to the Flying Spaghetti Monster in a ritual specifically designed to look like a Catholic baptism?

It's not so much that as the "and there's this really incredibly interesting side note...but it's not really part of this story so I'm not going to tell you about it." As for Twilight, they missed a crossover opportunity that might have saved the series in my opinion:

Are you sure? I was so hoping for an engaging plot that explores the many facets of such an interesting city and gives ideas for new things to see and do next time I visit. Guess I'll have to pick a different date movie now.