My mom's cat is, as we speak, on his way to the vet to be put down. It was an old cat, a stray origin, so we don't have an exact knowledge of his age, but until very recently he was in fine shape. I loved that cat; it's probably the closest you can get to a real-life version of Garfield. Very social, ate a ton, and always looked like he was half-asleep - he was the cutest thing ever. However, recently he started to lose a lot of weight combined with a tremendous hair loss, and yesterday his walking started to resemble that of a drunk, and it only got worse today, so we made the decision to put him down because it looked so unlikely that he'd recover. We're guessing either his liver or kidneys have failed. The hours have never felt so long as they have today, and I'm going to miss him.

And that's not all: my GF has gotten a fan in World Of Warcraft; he's a guildmaster, and keeps sending her gifts, complements her looks, etc. and while that's been fine with me all this time because the guy in question is a stereotypical nerd and my GF always tells me of their conversations, fairly recently he had asked my GF what she was wearing and seemed worried "what I would think of his questions", and while my GF naturally didn't describe her undergarments in detail to him, I got a little mad at the fucker for asking such questions and that my GF should let him know it's not at all appropriate, but as I should've expected, we got into a small argument over the matter as she thought we couldn't continue to just laugh at the poor fellow and his advances together anymore, and that she doesn't want to hurt his feelings as life's hard enough for him as it is. I guess deep down she finds all the extra attention fascinating, and while I'm sure that is as far as it will go, I'm finding a little difficult to adjust to the fact that somewhere out there, there's a sad geek who's probably masturbating at my GF's pics right as we speak. It should be made clear to him that he and my GF getting together will absolutely never happen, even if I wasn't in the picture, but apparently my GF doesn't realize the fact yet that if this keeps on going, he will progressively start asking even more inappropriate stuff, and once there's no other option left but to let him know that his efforts are wasted, it will be even harder for him then.

And finally, my holiday's almost over and I have to return to the office this Thursday.

Life can be such a bitch sometimes.

I'm terribly sorry for that. My parents have an old cat as well, and while I no longer live with them, I know that I'll be devastated when the poor old thing gives up the ghost.

That mustn't go on, full stop. I know of a vaguely similar case from a forum I used to frequent ages ago, and that ended very badly. I don't want to make you fear that you're dealing with a future murderer or anything, but it does seem that some degree of emotional instability is involved, which is never a good thing.

A couple of years ago my nine year old Bengal died in my arms. I still haven't gotten over that, not by a long shot.

What amazed me was when I found out university in Finland is free even for foreigners. I knew a girl in Japan who went to Finland for a few semesters for free. I should have done that! I took out loans to pay for school and living expenses - could have gotten away with just the living expense loans.

That is a horrible feeling. I still think about my family's dog being put down over a year ago - makes me incredibly sad.

My heartfelt sympathies man...my childhood cat had to get putdown while I was away from home, and that was not a good week for me at all, I had exams and ended up failing a class because I just couldn't concentrate to study. And a couple months ago my dad's cat died in his arms, I really loved that cat as well and am glad I was not around for it's last minutes.

Hence it is no wonder that there has been talks about changing that, ie. it wouldn't necessarily be free to foreigners anymore.

But I think the original positive reasoning was that if some bright minds from around the world come study here, they might even stay here later to work too. I know many for which this is true (especially ones who married here), especially back when Nokia was still doing strong. Nowadays it may be different.

Anyway, when talking about on a national level, to me non-cosmetic health care, and studying (including universities), should be free to all citizens. It somehow just doesn't compute to me that it would be right someone was denied of care in a hospital, or ability to study, just because he/she hasn't got enough money.

It's not all black and white of course, I guess rich kids here can also get better extra treatment (faster too), and maybe get a better education, at least if they decide to head abroad for some years.

Whatever you do, don't reveal your true identities. Too bad he has your photo(s) already, who knows how far that will take when Facebook and Google perfect their online face recognition technology.

I think your gf should not get mad, but at least a bit happy, that you are showing little signs of jealousy. It is a proof you care. :) I wouldn't be surprised she likes the attention from an outsider, my gf does too. She isn't in any online community that I know of (not even Facebook), but in real life she does sometimes get quite direct attention from other men.

And since I still trust her, I let her have also her little outside admiration. In a way that just makes me feel even better, as in "So, you are dreaming of someone I have for real?". Even my ex had some admirer all the way from Australia, and I found it a bit funny too.

But, I agree enough is enough, obviously the other guy has crossed a line.

Off-topic: Sure is lots of Finnish here. It is true, we are very unhappy, sorrowful people. (Take that as a joke though).

On-topic: Minor issues at hand; hungry, tired because of 5.40 AM mornings (Itella <3) and a bit worried about upcoming studies and shit, though I'm certain that it's not even bad, I bet.

99% of the people where I live are Finns and I don't even live on the same continent! Shit, we have a college here called "Finlandia". This is true and their bumper stickers/shirts actually say "F.U.".

Naming a college after a Vodka brand... I think that's a college I could imagine attending to :P

That actually sounds somewhere between badass and awesome :D

314 inches of snow this winter. Care to rethink that? :P

Okay we've derailed this one. Oh fuck it, who cares.

I completely agree and for exactly the same reasons. We still have the NHS which is one of the UK's finest services. It's slowly being eroded but is still something I believe most Brits are proud of. Education is hurtling towards a profit making industry - academies are popping up all over the place and government funding is slowly being curbed.
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What annoys me is when we then commit to providing Syrian rebels with multi-billion $'s of arms to help overthrow a regime that is not "western friendly" - what the bloody hell has it got to do with us? If we wanted to help, then direct money towards the victims who's food and medical supplies are limited.

Wonderful. I was contacted by policeman and I was told that my 3TB HDD I use for almost everything is in fact stolen from police storehouse by some frauding chick and I need to hand it over back to police. Then when there wil be trial with her, I'll need to go testimony there (the court is 300 km far from here) and only after the trial I will have chance to get my money back.

Now I need to find storage space for almost 3TB of data.

I have someone staying at my inn who was born and raised in the Soviet Union. I didn't know this and when he saw me wearing a CCCP shirt this morning he got kind of pissed. I'm not upset about offending him because I've had other Russians here who loved the shirt; my bitch is that this guy is here for several days and now I've got to put up with his dirty looks for the rest of the week.