mike carey

There should not be a policy at the Academy about sexual orientation. There would be one on drug use, it could be dismissal if a cadet has a drug problem or it could be one strike and you're gone. It sounds like 18yo experimentation that went wrong, but they would have known the rules.

Brazenly stolen from a twitter post of one of our escort members here. He didn't take credit for it.

I buy diesel. Looks like I'm in luck.

*Takes to the smelling salts and fans oneself*

I share your scepticism, and the article I looked at this time was loose in its language. In the case of Abidjan it referred specifically to its French speaking population, and for Kinshasa it was less specific. It ignores whether people have French as their first or second language or are truly bilingual. I suspect there are similar ambiguities over Francophone and Anglophone Montrealers but I take your point. I don't know enough about Francophone Africa and the language dynamics, probably different in capitals and the countryside. The closest comparison that I have any better idea about would be South Africa, where I think Cape Town and Johannesburg amongst others qualify as English speaking cities even though African languages are spoken by many of the people. Both cities are melting pots for different language groups in the country and English is a first language for some and a lingua franca for many of the rest. (I am cheekily including Afrikaans with the African languages.)

I realise this is a tangent and it has been mentioned before, but the start time is 0000UTC on 1 Jan 1970. What each of us sees reflects our current local time difference to UTC, so anyone in the US will see it as some time in the PM hours of 31 Dec and I would see 1100 1 Jan 1970.

Perhaps then, but now it's fourth, after Kinshasa, Paris and Abidjan.

Well, I wasn't confused. Mainly because it was already 10 Mar here when @easygoingpal posted his first comment. But I also knew I had plenty of time to text him because it wasn't yet 'the day' there.

'Hey Dudes, don't make it bad. Take a sad song and make it better.'

In the past I've done the same sorts of conversions in this thread as they did, but last time I cited my experience (a month ago) I just posted the AUD price per litre, and someone else posted a conversion and comparison with their part of the US. The lowest octane petrol is now within a cent or two of $2/litre in Canberra, and diesel (which I use) about $1.85 (USD1.46 and 1.35 respectively at today's exchange rate).

I've always thought that referring to one's parents as 'mother' or 'father' in English reflects the sort of reserve that is common in the English upper classes (real or self-imagined), and perhaps elsewhere, or a lack of affection. 'Mother' does not mean the same thing in English as 'my mother'. I don't think French has a usage of 'mère' equivalent to this impersonal use of 'mother' in English. A translation that didn't adopt the tone that 'mother' does might have used 'mum' (or mom). I'm not convinced that borrowing the French word 'maman' is the right approach though. 'Maman' doesn't bring its French emotional weight with it when used in an English sentence.

Indeed, and as to the other question, his 'other country' travel omission was not unambiguously untrue. How long was he in Spain, was he there when that declaration was made, was going to Australia via Serbia travel to 'other countries'. It's generally the case that if you 'clarify' (read 'correct') your written declaration on arrival, Australian Border Force will take the oral clarification as your definitive statement. Still, there will always be some observers who will see grey as either black or white.

In Australia and Aotearoa/New Zealand it's a feature of indigenous and Pasifica English.

In the pursuit of preventing the possibility of any rancour developing in this conversation, for the sake of precision, you are correct that @Benjamin_Nicholas did not have any link in the post you quoted. He did, however, post a link, in a separate post, to a source some 20 minutes later after another member had posted a comment, and before you and he had begun to discuss the issue. He did not subsequently add anything to the post you quoted. The effect of local prices and incomes in any city is a reasonable part of a discussion of escort rates there, and any information that adds to that data is appropriate.

I couldn't put a Haha reaction as I didn't want to laugh at your whole post. You hit the nail on the head right there!

That's how it appears on my laptop as well.

Yeah, it does sound odd. It fairly quickly became something that was in the background. It may have come and gone rather than being constant, but it's a consistent recollection. Time may have clouded my memories, of course. I've heard people say they enjoy eating durian.

The international cricket community has been rocked by the death in Thailand, apparently from a heart attack, at 52 of Shane Warne, a retired Australian bowler widely regarded as one of the best players of all time. I had not planned to post anything about it as it is of potentially zero interest to forum members, but a member sent me a PM about it, so I changed my mind. Cricket is a game that cherishes its history and traditions more than many sports seem to do. Where it's played widely cricket references have slipped into the language. 'That's not cricket' means that was not the way you should do things. It is the second most popular sport in the world. It remembers its heroes, the great and the not so great, even some of the obscure. You often see teams wearing black arm bands to mark the passing of a national player who lived to their 90s and had faded from the public consciousness. That is far from the case with Warne. He still coached teams, appeared as a commentator on cricket broadcasts and could be described as a celebrity. He was a legend still very much in the public eye, at his prime not in my childhood but my middle age. Within minutes of the story breaking, Twitter exploded, with tributes from ordinary people who knew him or had been inspired by him and from the great and good of international cricket, names like Brian Lara, Sir Vivian Richards, Sachin Tendulkar and Virat Kholi (perhaps not household names to readers here). On TV hardened veterans of the game, including a former England and a former Australian captain fought back tears. It has to some extent overshadowed what is a historic first Australian tour to Pakistan since 1998. Players and the crowd at the first test in Rawalpindi paused for a minute's silence before start of play on the second day, and both teams wore those black arm bands. So did both teams in the Australia-England game in the women's world cup in New Zealand. This New York Times staff sports writer (not some random writer from a cricket playing nation) captured the moment well, and in words that will make more sense to most people in this forum than mine probably could. https://www.nytimes.com/2022/03/04/sports/cricket/shane-warne-dead.html

You should never be surprised what you see in the deep north. It may, of course be a concession given that hundreds of Brisbane houses have been flooded out over the last week or so. Easier to wade through the floodwaters if you aren't constrained by clothes.

With Freddy Mercury fronting it? How is that possible. The name of the band wasn't a clue, of course.

Really? I thought it was an Abba reference. Oh, wait, that was 'A rich man's world'! Silly me.

Moderator's comment: Comments are starting to drift to the political. How current events may affect the role of Russian performers is no doubt of interest to those who follow events at the Met, but there are several threads in the Political Issues forum where we can continue to canvass such issues. The national anthem performed at the opening of one performance had already been mentioned there.

I disagree. It is possible for the two relationships to exist simultaneously. I have read people in here recount friendships with escorts enduring when the escort retired. I have friendships with escorts with whom I have discussed hiring (and not done so yet) and others where I have had social interactions and even travelled with, where we have kept the sexual part of our interactions professional without compromising the friendship. Not all escorts are open to that, but don't discount the idea that some may be. If I had a mate who was a lawyer or a plumber, would I engage them professionally without expecting free or discounted service? Of course I would.

I logged out of the site and that's one of the details that doesn't show up unless you are logged in to RM (don't know if being a premium member makes a difference).

Moderator's note: This thread is about Company. Let's not have it go down the rabbit warren of a general discussion about standing ovations. It's fine to comment about whether this performance deserves one, but if you want to have a broader discussion, start a new thread on Standing Ovations.