BSR

Driving a $300,000 car in the poorest part of town, well before guilt set in, you would be carjacked and probably beaten to a pulp.

Blessed with almost ideal geography and an abundance of natural resources, Argentina was indeed one of the wealthiest nations in the world pre-1930. Today, more than 40% of Argentines live in poverty. Would I invest in Argentina? Eek! No way!! But I still dream of visiting Buenos Aires one day for a long stay, like at least 3 months. That porteño accent just melts me.

I hope we will always be able to share personal observations on this forum. Some are interesting, some amusing, and yes, occasionally some are questionable. But I like hearing anecdotes, like gay bars back in the day serving holiday meals. Questioning personal observations is fair game, of course. But there's a nice way to do it, and a nasty way. Right, @Marc in Calif?

Martina cited a WaPo/Kaiser Family Foundation poll that found that 69% of men who identify as trans women have not undergone hormone therapy and 84% have not had surgery. They can identify as women all they want, but physically, they're just like any other man. Martina herself got wrapped up in a battle of the sexes kerfuffle when Vitas Gerulaitis at the 1984 US Open said he would bet his house that the #100 ranked man could beat the then supremely dominant Navratilova (she went 86-1 the previous year). When Martina responded that she thought she'd have a chance, oh boy. Chris Evert basically said fat chance (not those exact words), and John McEnroe said that the #1,000 ranked man could probably beat Martina. It sounds like Martina has since changed her tune. As of the last ATP ranking, 372 men have a single ATP ranking point, and they're ranked between #1670 and #2042. My guess is more than half of those guys could beat #1 Iga Swiatek (hey, just my opinion). The 4-time world champ US Women's soccer team lost 5-2 to an under-15 boys soccer club. There's a reason for separate men's and women's divisions in sports.

My aunt suffers from terrible motion sickness (even a 5-minute car ride can make her green to the gills) yet is able to go on cruises without a hitch. She does what @Vegas_Millennial advises, lower deck midship cabin, plus she sticks to bigger, newer ships because they usually have better stabilizers. She does take medication (some European prescription she gets in the Philippines) that works like a charm, but I'm guessing something quite similar is available in the US.

If you're going to be nasty, at least be honest about it and take responsibility.

Like I said, either you're a car guy, or you're not. It's quite obvious you're not. I'm a big believer in letting people enjoy their hard-earned money. If you can't enjoy your money, why bother working? Just because a guy spends his money in a way I wouldn't, I'm not going make nasty assumptions about the guy. Live and let live.

As a wise old investment advisor once told me, "the reason old money has money is that they don't spend it." Or at least they refuse to spend it on something like a $400K Rolls Royce, yet they don't bat an eyelash about sending their kids to $50K/year private schools. I just googled the profile of the typical Rolls Royce owner: median net worth $30 million, salary $1-2 million/year, median age 43 (I would have guessed much older). Wow, if that's "aspirational" rich, how much $$ do the "real" rich have??

Honestly, I don't know how many people moved to Florida for political reasons. I'm guessing finances were a much more significant factor. High state & local taxes used to be fully deductible but are now capped at a $10K max. Residents of high-tax states got crushed, including a fair number of forum members.

Insurance costs have skyrocketed in Florida. If you live in a single-family home, not only are you dealing with staggering increases in premiums but also (for many) mandatory costs like roof replacement. For condo owners, their individual homeowners premiums have increased as well as the building's policy, which means much higher HOAs. Homeowners also face increases in property tax due to inflating home values. Huge increases in insurance and property taxes on top of too-high median home prices mean that many homeowners will be forced to sell, which leads to ... uh oh

Forget the gambling, alcohol, and escorts, come to Las Vegas for the foie gras! Plenty of posh restaurants offer it (usually seared, as an appetizer), and a couple of gourmet food stores sell whole foie gras. Even in California, where foie gras is banned from restaurants and retail stores, you can order it online and have it shipped to your CA address. Just ask the online seller if they send it in discreet packaging, LOL.

Even though @unicorn and I disagreed constantly, he was one of the forum members from the opposite end of the political spectrum I rather enjoyed debating. He was supersmart and knew how to make an argument. Granted, he was aggressive at times (lots of us got pretty heated in the old Politics subforum) but if you called him on it, he would calm down. At least that was my experience. Even now that the old Politics subforum is defunct, I will miss his participation around here.

The NYT has knowingly and intentionally published so many whopper lies yet somehow maintains a pristine reputation because the so-called newspaper pushes the narratives that certain people want to hear. If you like reading the NYT for other reasons -- the arts, fashion, NYC social scene -- it covers those areas like no other publication. But if you're looking for a legitimate news source, best look elsewhere.

Either you're a car guy, or you're not. If you're a car guy, you either buy the supercar of your dreams, or you dream about the supercar of your dreams. If you're not a car guy, you think such purchases are troubling signs of mental illness.

Thanks for the news about Pete's wife. I didn't know she was battling cancer. In that long 2 years before the 2002 US Open, tough times when his ranking dropped and he didn't win a single tournament, his wife's support never wavered. I remember him saying that was the one silver lining in all his struggles, at least he knew he married the right one. Now it's his turn to support her. I pray she beats the cancer and gets back to 100%.

I'm the opposite -- I watched every single episode of Friends, some episodes several times via reruns. I can't say that I was personally that affected by his death, just sad that such a talented person died far too young. He was so committed to helping others with addiction. Hopefully Perry's foundation continues his good work. I'm weird about comedies. As much as I love to laugh, I almost never like American comedy series. Friends was 1 of only 2 sitcoms I've ever liked (Mary Tyler Moore was the other one). So thank you Chandler Bing/Matthew Perry for all the belly-laughs. R.I.P.

The first place that comes to mind is Puerto Vallarta. I just googled it to verify that prostitution is legal in PV (it varies by state in Mexico). Not sure if they have any full-on Club Med-style gay resorts, but PV certainly has many gay-friendly accommodations. A few recent PV threads: Puerto Vallarta & Anything new in PV? & Costa Rica vs. Puerto Vallarta Happy hunting!

It's on my bucket list as well, although I do wonder if the idea (poshness, glamour) is better than the reality (7 days, no ports). The best tip I found about transatlantic crossings was to fly east and sail west so that you get an extra hour on 5 days of the journey. If you sail NYC->Southampton, you lose an hour on 5 days and will likely sleep through all those terrific English breakfasts.

Has anyone watched Season 7 of Élite yet? Half of me wants to cue it up because I was such a fan for the first 5 seasons; the other half of me is a-scared because Season 6 was so awful.

If Smollett has a substance-abuse problem and is genuinely trying to straighten his life out, then I support and applaud him. But this smacks of a PR stunt. Smollett destroyed his career by staging a pathetic hoax. What better way to redemption than a stint in rehab, after which he can very publicly claim that he's changed, grown, blah blah blah. Cue up the "I'm a totally different person now" interviews. Yeah, uh huh, sure you are.

Of course private companies can choose to demonetize whoever they want. I'm arguing that it is unethical to do so based on a mere accusation. So after the mob has destroyed your means of earning a living, your career, your reputation, basically your whole life, you're saying no big whoop because hey, you can always sue later. But that might be too late given that the public's attention span is so very short. Everyone will remember you as a serial rapist since according to the mob, an accusation is as good as a conviction in a court of law. Almost no one will hear or care about your successful civil suit after the fact. For all those cheering on mob rule, I sincerely hope that the mob never comes after you.

Hmm, I've never been much of a fan of commercial apple butter, but I bet the homemade stuff is yummy.

According to Wiki, Nassib is 30yo. A friend's husband played football from Pop Warner through college. As sad as he was when his playing days ended, he said that even at 22, his body couldn't take it any more. Imagine how much worse the pounding is in the NFL.

All the allegations span from 2006-13. Yes, Brand was a star, but he became something of a pariah starting in 2013 when he noted at the GQ Awards that one of the event's sponsors previously made uniforms for the Nazis. According to his IMDB page, his only production credit for a film was "Arthur" back in 2011. His producer credits since then are all his own projects. Big-time producers like Bill Cosby and Harvey Weinstein did wield real power in Hollywood. When they threatened to destroy a career, women knew those two could do so. Brand was nowhere near in the same league as Cosby & Weinstein, and whatever little power Brand once had faded significantly starting in 2013 . Why didn't the accusers come forward a decade ago?

Some of us in this thread are simply defending presumption of innocence. Why should being gay change one's opinion of presumption of innocence?