Myth Buster's isn't about education; it's an excuse to blow stuff up. Which I totally support!

That used to always be the day after Labor Day, although they've been bouncing the date around the last few years. For me, this year, it was August 31st.

Make sure your kids' friends don't try to stick a CD in the drive... Yes, I've seen it done. They fit, and are a pain the butt to get back out.

Machines of all types, not just computers... I had a 20-year-old washer & dryer set that my husband and I gave to his parents for re-purposing when we bought energy-saver replacements. I fully expect the old ones to outlive the new ones.

Does hardware failure count as old age or cruddy manufacturing?
I'm on my 2nd personal computer ever (not counting family computers that we had when I was a kid). I hung on to the first one through battery life having decayed to ~5 minutes, a RAM upgrade in order to run at something faster than a snail's pace, and a screen 'feature' that was cutting out a vertical strip of pixels ~1 character wide. Replacement didn't get seriously considered until the left half of the screen started periodically going 'staticy' (like a TV set with bad reception)... even with that, I was using just the right half of the screen for several months before Fry's had a good deal on a laptop that I bought as a replacement. I think I got 6+ years out of that laptop, and I'm hoping to pull something similar with this one. (although having just started a M. Architecture program which will require significant rendering capabilities might put a damper on going to the same extreme)

There's a free (spam) paper that gets delivered roughly weekly around here. I've requested to stop getting it because when I do it goes straight in the recycling; the environmentalist in me winces at the waste of resources, even though I'm not paying anything for it.

Also, what's with the British wording of the question?

Is this a reference to some recent/coming movie that I have no intention of seeing? Sorry, I'm not a movie/comics/TV buff...

-Sam

I'm seconding this statement.

With a robotic spouse, I'd be able to override the programming in order to put an end to the stalking/harassment instead of waiting for parents or police to take me seriously enough to do something about it.

My family is all bookworms, so half of our Christmas/Birthday/Hello presents are typically books. Most of them are pretty clearly new (a few well-cared for used books have probably slipped through) but I have no way of knowing whether they were purchased from a physical store or an online retailer. There's the collection of Marrion Zimmer Bradley books that my mom has gradually been building for me over the years... most of which are long since out of print, so finding them requires regular trips to the used book store.

If one were to categorize all of my books on a double spectrum of new vs. used and purchased myself vs. gifted, I think the largest category would be used gifts but given how long I've had most of them I honestly couldn't tell you where they came from.

And of course because I have way more books than I have time to read, only a small portion of these get handled in any given period of time. Looking at the current sampling of partially-read books sitting on my couch: one I purchased myself from a physical store, one I purchased myself from an online store, and one was a gift of unknown origin. The next three books on top of my to-read pile were all received as gifts, but if I get around to purchasing any books on my own then chances are that the new acquisitions will take priority.

I take 3 different prescription medications on a daily basis. On principle I'm anti-med... if something can be dealt with by lifestyle changes, tweaks to eating habits, etc then that's the best way to deal with it. In this case (these cases?), I've obviously got some quirky biochemistry and life is MUCH more pleasant for myself and the people who care about me when I'm properly medicated.

Can we get poll questions that actually make sense, please? Complete sentences (either in the question itself, or question + answer = sentence) would be a good start.

In this case, I see a question that appears to have nothing but a noun and a question mark... and all the of the answers include a yes/no option with an opinion that I assume applies to the original noun. Maybe the intended question was "Do you use Google+, and what is your opinion of it?"

Yeah, but 'throwing a punch or two' does wonders to get the bullies to back off. Get suspended once and then more or less get left alone for the rest of your time at that school really isn't that bad of a deal.

First, see my followup to a different branch in this same thread.

Second, you apparently managed to find yourself immune to the huge amount of harassment that happens in public schools. Maybe you were lucky enough to never be a primary target. Some of us weren't so fortunate. It took several years of karate before I was confident in being able to stand up for myself. Never had to smack anybody (discovered that the jocks have HORRIBLE form, which makes them much less intimidating once you know what a real fight stance looks like) but knowing that I could if I had to got myself and my friends out of trouble a few times.

"People like yourself who can't finish a project because their feeling are getting hurt..." Really? The company that hired me straight out of college kept me around for 4.5 years, and my job didn't disappear until the SECOND round of layoffs. I finished plenty of projects in that time, as well as coaching one of my coworkers on how to not get offended by the boss's unpredictable attitude. I've been offered recommendation letters from several of my previous coworkers.
Oh, and if we want to look at the record back in college... I worked as an inspector for ODOT and did such an impressive job of coordinating the job I was assigned to that I have a glowing letter of recommendation from the contractor's foreman from that project (and was offered a job with their company, if I wanted to go into their field). Reviewing my job performance is way outside what he would be expected to do, which should give you an idea of how impressed he was.

You ever heard the quote from Bill Gates? "Be nice to nerds. Chances are you'll end up working for one." I suggest that you try giving that advice some serious thought.

Way I see it, GEDs are for people too smart to slow their brains down to the snail's pace that public schools likes to teach at. [And the straight-A students are the ones dumb enough to think those grades matter.] I did a year at community college after high school, and no 4-year school even cared about my high school grades after that.

I thrived in college, probably would have done even more so if I wasn't dealing with PTSD from high school. I went straight from college (4.5 years to get a degree that most people take 5 years on) to a reasonably well-paying job IN MY FIELD, bought a house less than a year after graduation... Certainly not going to claim it's the best option for everybody (some people need those 6+ years of college to learn how to handle life on their own) but I think I would have been better off getting an early start on adult life.

[Yes, I deliberately inflated the number of years it takes to get a degree... my little sister is on year 6 and still is more than a year away from a Bachelor's degree.]

Specifically, high school. I'd have been MUCH better off getting a GED and avoiding 4 years of hell.