then don't!

People who drive up to the delivery car and act like prats because they're impatient.

Someone's got a living to earn, you miserly old curmudgeon.

When someone says a simple phrase like "oh my god" on a video, in the comments section or on a facebook status or whatever, only to have some politically correct bible-nut trying to intervene by trying to lecture them about 'blasphemy' and 'taking the lord's name in vain'

Oh my God!

Excuse me? Excuse me?! It is EASTER, you know! You should be ashamed! You're going to hell! God hates you!

This forum still existing.

JUST LET IT GO ALREADY.

But if it hadn't, where would we have vented our innermost souls these last few months?

(Personally I have elsewhere, let's face it, but six or seven years ago, I literally had no-one to talk to and if I apply my current situation to back then, I'd have been eternally grateful for the chance to speak here).

The way 'Deal' has suddenly started taking all these random breaks in recent times. Ever since they abruptly dropped the weekend shows for the second time in October (Probably for good this time), the DoND weeks have just been getting shorter and shorter

The only reason I'm here is for Race to a Billion. And daniel123's posts. And sometimes yours. And I know I shouldn't be starting sentences with the word 'and'.

..then don't....

Oh, Jackie. The honour, the awe, the splendour!

Well, after a horrendous few days, what annoys me right now (title's irritates but I'll say as I please) - is...

...when a patient taking antipsychotic medication as a treatment for an illness, having come to the end of his prescribed week's worth of medication, returns to his chemist for the automatic repeat - only to be told it shan't be issued him for three days, because the next is dated for the 10th and today's the 7th and he'll have to wait. I say this because on the morning of the 10th, said patient might have to turn up at the local hospital because he's suicidal and in a black episode and thinks he's torn his life apart (an untrue assumption of course, but a very intense feeling at the time).

Now, these are qualified folks - surely they're aware of this possibility? If they're not, I'm doubly as scared of them, almost as much as I was of myself. I turned up at the hospital only because I know that's what I have to do when I feel like that, you know? My friend and I, as we are very much together in any sense, have a kind of...way of working, as it were. We know that neither of us is ever going to die by our own hand, we know that we are here for one another in every sense but most of all, in the literal sense. I know of the only obligations; try my hardest always, never give up.

Some might then point me to my relationship a few years back, but this is a thousand worlds away - that was abuse; here, we have safety, for each other and for us, at the forefront. I don't drink vodka or absinthe any more because I'm not allowed to have vodka or absinthe, and the reason for going to the hospital, rather than jumping off a bridge in Portsmouth, is exactly the same. Hurting myself, at any point in time, is never even something to give consideration to, because as plainly as anything, I know as much as I might feel it's better at the time, it's not happening. And it's not happening because we know what is best to ensure being safe, you know?

My point, if there is one, would be that people, myself included, have oft-criticised the rather non-consensual way in which at-risk patients and others are treated. Rights, their choice, all that. But I know that for me at the very least, it's so much better to know one has that security - the knowledge that regardless of what you might feel or want at that moment, you are ill and you know what to do, and to do it immediately.

In times of crisis, safety's paramount, regardless of how you get there.

A diary, an online journal, a support forum.

Just... this should just be left to rest. It'll pass, like tears in the rain. The powers that be aren't going to bother forking out the domain space for very long and, while it may be nostalgic to a select few of us, the world will move on regarding the forum's '2006-8' heyday.

Look, I am probably am being a dick, but I just find the idea of a very 'in the moment' game show's ultra niche fan forum still lingering on in 2015 to be... immaterial.

Perhaps some genuinely evocative or memorable threads can be saved in state in some 'net corner, but otherwise, just let it go.

Those are fair points, and I'm not going to sit here attempting to deny it, because I'd be a fool.

Interestingly enough, I did keep a journal, albeit from the ages of 14 to 15 and sporadically until 17. It was completely offline, because for many years, my computer wasn't connected to the internet, and it runs to around 89,000 words. It's nice (and sometimes not nice) to look back to, although my only real comment of note is on my writing style - I was precocious, but my talent was still rather raw. That aside, my recollection of those years is slowly fading to white, so these days, a read through that diary is not much more than a pleasant trip back to one hazy moment or another in my time. Probably for the best, all things considered.

The forum has been important for me, though, in that here there are other people, people with whom I can converse - in a rather distorted kind of way, but such is life in this modern century. That's no worry for 2015 Dan, who has friends and confidants, but for the Dan of years gone, it must have helped immensely. By that, of course, I mean that December 2008 Dan, in his bleak hours, no allies and what felt like the entire world against him, would have typed in the address to this forum and made some form of conversation with his fellow members here. And as I may have said before, the reason I still like this place is because it's helped me. Even in writing - and especially when I am unable to communicate effectively in spoken voice - such company is better than the blinding and defeaning black of being alone.

Heyday? Meh. Doesn't really matter to me right now. It was great, but I was a kid.

It's kind of bland now, like everything is at the minute because I managed to get the meds situation sorted last week. But I can't even pin down when last week was, everything is just drifting through time and space, and I've always valued and noted my pristine memory, so that's terrifying. But yes, all is bland, but at least it's quiet.

You most certainly have good points, psycho.

I've already had a good few rants on PCness, I’m sick of all these uptight, super-sensitive whiners in today’s times, who think that everything needs to be completely dumbed down, sugar-coated and homogenized because they can’t take a joke and that making jokes about someone who’s different to them in anyway is offensive (i.e. thinking that they hate black people when someone makes a joke about a rap song they like), even if the jokes have absolutely NOTHING to do with those differences


If a comedian makes satirical humour about a taboo subject, you can bet there will be some easily-offended baby who wasn’t even a fan of the comedian anyway, crying about how much it offended them. Then of course the media will blow it out of proportion to make the comedian look bad, the comedian gets sued, sometimes even fired, and forced to make a public apology, all because one or two people couldn’t take a joke

Then you have the ones who think that kids need EVERYTHING to be completely dumbed down and sugar-coated for them. I’ve heard that when they show old Road Runner cartoons now, they’ve edited a lot of stuff to cater to all the mega-sensitive Helen Lovejoys who think it’s ‘too violent’ for kids.

To put it in perspective, Disney and Warner Brothers were throwing Nazi imagery in their cartoons during WW2 (Yes, really!). Compare that to today where they’ve had to homogenize, sanitize and politically correct the Road Runner cartoons to look after all the do-gooders who are seemingly ultra-worried about kids being brainwashed by EVERYTHING they see!

I’ve watched Road Runner cartoons all my life and i’ve never dropped a 1000kg anvil on anyone or shot a boulder from a giant catapult

Right now, just that regardless of the day or situation, I always find a thousand and one holes to pick in myself. And it's all internal, as if the algorithm for thought processes is wired wrongly and I haven't got sufficient qualifications in electronics to repair it correctly, and as a consequence, my efforts resemble something more of a hatchet job.

People who don't put the period at the ends of certain abbreviations, such as Dr., Mr., Mrs., St., and so on. It looks incomplete to me.

I'm terrifically sorry to hear that, Mr David.

Oh, shots fired!