Catch All Anything Thread

[Balta1701]

I had my 10 year class reunion last night. It was so much fun... going to the picnic this afternoon.

Get off my lawn!

[bigruss]

Anybody ever deal with depression on here? Ive had yet another friend openly admit that they are depressed to me, and during that same night 3 of my closest friends admitted that they have seriously considered suicide and gave really elaborate plans.

 

I try to give the best advice I can to them, but its just too overwhelming now. I have no idea what is going on, it seems like every friend of mine that I have grown up with is depressed and suicidal. I dont know if it's just the age that they are at (20) or what, but man it is freaking me out.

 

When Im on campus I dont see it as much even though I have a job on campus that puts me in the frontline of suicide watch, and so now Im wondering jsut how wide spread this feeling is. Did alot of you have friends who thought like this? Did you think like this?

[Sonik22]

Anybody ever deal with depression on here? Ive had yet another friend openly admit that they are depressed to me, and during that same night 3 of my closest friends admitted that they have seriously considered suicide and gave really elaborate plans.

 

I try to give the best advice I can to them, but its just too overwhelming now. I have no idea what is going on, it seems like every friend of mine that I have grown up with is depressed and suicidal. I dont know if it's just the age that they are at (20) or what, but man it is freaking me out.

 

When Im on campus I dont see it as much even though I have a job on campus that puts me in the frontline of suicide watch, and so now Im wondering jsut how wide spread this feeling is. Did alot of you have friends who thought like this? Did you think like this?

I have a couple friends that have been openly depressed with me, one that actually wrote a will and planned how he was going to kill himself as well. All around my age, 20, as well. Its hard to really talk to them about it when you aren't depressed yourself but I've had depressing times in my life so I know how that feels. Whenever even the slightest thought of suicide occurred I would realize how completely dumb and selfish it is. Also being afraid of death is another reason I never actually considered it. And I conveyed that same thought to them when they told me they were depressed. You accomplish nothing by killing yourself. Also being 20 years old you have so much life to live still. They just have to remember all the people they care about and all the things that make them happy in life and realize its not worth it to just throw it all away because they feel worthless. They need to know how many people care about them and how suicide would hurt so many people.

[Balta1701]

Really, the only thing I can say is that if I were in that position, I'd have a tough time saying that I was capable of handling it. I'd seek outside help, and I'd try to have the other people seek outside help as well.

[bigruss]

I have a couple friends that have been openly depressed with me, one that actually wrote a will and planned how he was going to kill himself as well. All around my age, 20, as well. Its hard to really talk to them about it when you aren't depressed yourself but I've had depressing times in my life so I know how that feels. Whenever even the slightest thought of suicide occurred I would realize how completely dumb and selfish it is. Also being afraid of death is another reason I never actually considered it. And I conveyed that same thought to them when they told me they were depressed. You accomplish nothing by killing yourself. Also being 20 years old you have so much life to live still. They just have to remember all the people they care about and all the things that make them happy in life and realize its not worth it to just throw it all away because they feel worthless. They need to know how many people care about them and how suicide would hurt so many people.

Yeah I have many of the same thoughts as you, death scares the s*** out of me (that finality of it is what creeps me out). Some of my friends openly admitted that the only reason they havent is because of family and friends and the impact that it would of have on them.

 

But some other friends were stating how they dont really care what others think and that it is their life. I just couldnt think of a response really because it was obvious that he knew it was a selfish act and was ok with it.

 

Some of these guys were telling me that they wanted to kill themselves by 18, and I was just shocked. Now they are saying by 27, because by then their best moments of their lives would have been lived.

 

I think many of these thoughts are stemming from them being unhappy with the direction their lives are taking (some of them are doing extremely well in school, but havent found direction yet) and they question if their life will really improve or ever be what they want it to be. I just didnt know how to respond to many of the ideas they brought up, because although you can express your opinions about being able to change your life, they dont really see your thinking. I also tried to tell them that you have your whole life to die, and you may as well take advantage of what you have now and see how it turns out before you give up on it.

 

And it's not like these guys are college drop outs or hardcore druggies, they all go to college and grew up in stable households.

[bigruss]

Really, the only thing I can say is that if I were in that position, I'd have a tough time saying that I was capable of handling it. I'd seek outside help, and I'd try to have the other people seek outside help as well.

I basically told them my views, and it helped a few of them, one basically had already known he wouldnt do it because of his family and friends, but there was one who was completely sincere still. I had nothing else to say and felt terrible because of that. I mean, how do you get help for someone like that?

[kapkomet]

I agree with Balta here. Generally, people (friends) aren't equipped to handle that kind of stuff - encourage people to go talk to someone (a professional). I know that people that are having problems find that difficult, but that's what they are there for - if you can get them to see that part of it.

[Balta1701]

I basically told them my views, and it helped a few of them, one basically had already known he wouldnt do it because of his family and friends, but there was one who was completely sincere still. I had nothing else to say and felt terrible because of that. I mean, how do you get help for someone like that?

Hard to say. Anything you can do to get them in the hands of a person who's actually qualified to deal with it. That's the general emotional shock treatment recommendation the Red Cross suggested to us...whatever we say, it's likely to wind up being the wrong thing in the case of a genuinely depressed, suicidal level person. We were basically trained to intervene if possible with the main goal being to pass the person upstairs to someone with training to deal with it.

[kapkomet]

Stop agreeing with me Balta, I might get depressed.

 

[Milkman delivers]

You definitely need to pass them along to somebody who is trained to deal with depression, not just for their own good, but for your own. Imagine the person ends up actually going through with it. There's a good chance you'd end up blaming yourself for something you couldn't control and have no training to deal with.

[bigruss]

Hard to say. Anything you can do to get them in the hands of a person who's actually qualified to deal with it. That's the general emotional shock treatment recommendation the Red Cross suggested to us...whatever we say, it's likely to wind up being the wrong thing in the case of a genuinely depressed, suicidal level person. We were basically trained to intervene if possible with the main goal being to pass the person upstairs to someone with training to deal with it.

Yea Im an RA on campus and that is what I would do if I saw anything like that there because we have a Suicide Prevention/Awareness team, but I dont know any resources here, guess Ill have to look it up.

[Balta1701]

Yea Im an RA on campus and that is what I would do if I saw anything like that there because we have a Suicide Prevention/Awareness team, but I dont know any resources here, guess Ill have to look it up.

Without knowing your campus, I'd call it highly likely that your health center has some sort of setup for counseling/depression issues, because they're going to likely see that a lot. Any school that doesn't have that setup is crazy.

 

That's who I'd try to get them to.

 

It's also noteable that the schools I've been to will also allow and encourage anonymous "referrals", such that, if you think an acquaintance of yours has a problem but you don't want them knowing it was you that referred them, you can tell them "this person needs your help but I don't want them to know that it was me" and they'll find a way to get in touch with them. That's a fairly common situation as well...their main goal is to get themselves in touch with the people that need to be in touch with them before something really bad happens, and they usually won't care how the contact starts.

[bigruss]

Without knowing your campus, I'd call it highly likely that your health center has some sort of setup for counseling/depression issues, because they're going to likely see that a lot. Any school that doesn't have that setup is crazy.

 

That's who I'd try to get them to.

 

It's also noteable that the schools I've been to will also allow and encourage anonymous "referrals", such that, if you think an acquaintance of yours has a problem but you don't want them knowing it was you that referred them, you can tell them "this person needs your help but I don't want them to know that it was me" and they'll find a way to get in touch with them. That's a fairly common situation as well...their main goal is to get themselves in touch with the people that need to be in touch with them before something really bad happens, and they usually won't care how the contact starts.

Yea, our campus has a rule that if anyone calls and says that you have shown any symptoms of appearing suicidal that they are mandated to going to 3 sessions with our school suicide specialst (basically a psychiatrist devoted fulltime to these issues).

 

Ill have to see if their schools have such a program. I know that they dont live on their campus so i dont know how that would affect them (they live in an apartment in Chicago, and all 3 that live there go to different schools. Two of them are ones who have admitted to being depressed, one of the them suicidal).

[Balta1701]

Ill have to see if their schools have such a program. I know that they dont live on their campus so i dont know how that would affect them (they live in an apartment in Chicago, and all 3 that live there go to different schools. Two of them are ones who have admitted to being depressed, one of the them suicidal).

Look up their health centers. I'm sure they have a web page on the university's main site, and I'm sure they have an email address for contact listed somewhere. If you can find a specific mental health link then use that, if not, then try a general email address.

 

Unless the universities they're at flat out suck at mental health care, they'll bend over backwards to accommodate you and to try to find the people who need their help.

 

Edi: Oh, and Russ, one more thing...I'd make 100% sure I kept records of every communication I had in this regard. If I send people an email, I either save the email or note the time, content, and who it was sent to, and I'd save every email I received. If someone from them called me, I'd consider asking for permission to record the call. If I didn't have the ability to record the call, I'd note somewhere the time and date of the call, the full name and contact information of the person I spoke to, and while it was fresh in my mind I'd write a summary of everything in the call.

[HuskyCaucasian]

Triceratops Was Juvenile Form Of Another Species Of Dinosaur, Scientists Say

New research from a duo at the Museum of the Rockies argues that the triceratops may never have existed.

 

After comparing the skull shape of the triceratops to that of its close relative, the torosaurus, researchers John Scannella and Jack Horner concluded that the triceratops may actually be a juvenile form of the torosaurus (not an entirely different species), as dinosaurs' skulls could change shapes during their lifetime.

 

New Scientist explains:

Now

S

cannella and Horner

s

ay that triceratop

s

i

s

merely the juvenile form of toro

s

auru

s

. A

s

the animal aged, it

s

horn

s

changed

s

hape and orientation and it

s

frill became longer, thinner and le

s

s

jagged. Finally it became fene

s

trated, producing the cla

s

s

ic toro

s

auru

s

form.

 

Thi

s

extreme

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hape-

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hifting wa

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po

s

s

ible becau

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e the bone ti

s

s

ue in the frill and horn

s

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tayed immature,

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pongy and riddled with blood ve

s

s

el

s

, never fully hardening into

s

olid bone a

s

happen

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in mo

s

t animal

s

during early adulthood. The only modern animal

k

nown to do anything

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imilar i

s

the ca

s

s

owary, de

s

cended from the dino

s

aur

s

, which develop

s

a large

s

pongy cre

s

t when it

s

s

k

ull i

s

about 80 per cent fully grown.

Scannella and Horner's findings would help explain why only adult torosaurus fossils have ever been uncovered. According to New Scientist, "torosaurus will now be abolished as a species and specimens reassigned to triceratops."

 

As Boing Boing points out, the new research highlights one of the major challenges of paleontology: "Paleontologists are tasked with reconstructing the lives of animals nobody has ever seen alive. And that creates a world where the obvious just isn't."

[FlaSoxxJim]

Interesting. I'm surprised the results of a single published study may result in the lumping of the two putative species, but if it happens I'm glad triceratops will prevail as the senior synonymy.

[iamshack]

Interesting. I'm surprised the results of a single published study may result in the lumping of the two putative species, but if it happens I'm glad triceratops will prevail as the senior synonymy.

Well, considering I've been lobbying for this realization for years now, I'm not surprised at all...

[Whitewashed in '05]

Anyone have any thoughts on Scion, the tC more specifically? I don't know anyone with one I can ask. I know they're Toyota, that's about it.

[Balta1701]

Anyone have any thoughts on Scion, the tC more specifically? I don't know anyone with one I can ask. I know they're Toyota, that's about it.

Good luck trying to brake.

[lostfan]

Ok so watch this story (s***ty situation, but the guy they choose to interview is hilarious)

 

And now Antoine Dobson in autotune:

[MHizzle85]

^ Probably the only time that I'll ever laugh at a case of attempted rape.

[HuskyCaucasian]

Best Title Ever....

Britains Stop Grabbing Jugs, Embrace Softer, Small Milk Bags

[smalls2598]

Whirlyball's Wikipedia entry contains this great piece of info:

 

"Games played by veterans at a national level can get particularly vicious, although it is extremely rare for a fatal injury to occur"

[Rowand44]

Whirlyball's Wikipedia entry contains this great piece of info:

 

"Games played by veterans at a national level can get particularly vicious, although it is extremely rare for a fatal injury to occur"

Whirlyball is f***in awesome. I have also never seen a fatal injury occur while playing ha.

[shipps]

Whirlyball is f***in awesome. I have also never seen a fatal injury occur while playing ha.

 

The only fatal injury was someone shooting the other guy for not f***ing passing the ball.......understandable.