Although this is an old thread, bringing it back up to the top made me remember that early last month, I ran across an article (with examples) on amazing website run by a cancer survivor. The cards are what she would have wanted to receive/hear, and hopefully it will help others: I ran across this article in Slate and loved it. I want to find these cards, because they are amazing. And I could have used some of them, too, in the last few years: A Cancer Survivor Designs the Cards She Wishes She’d Received From Friends and Family Slate.com, May 6, 2015 (excerpt) "Los Angeles–based designer Emily McDowell was diagnosed with Stage 3 Hodgkin’s lymphoma at age 24, enduring nine months of chemo and radiation before going into remission. “The most difficult part of my illness wasn’t losing my hair, or being erroneously called ‘sir’ by Starbucks baristas, or sickness from chemo,” McDowell writes on her website. “It was the loneliness and isolation I felt when many of my close friends and family members disappeared because they didn’t know what to say, or said the absolute wrong thing without realizing it.” The 38-year-old designer has been cancer-free ever since. But the emotional impact of the experience lingered, inspiring her to design a newly launched series of Empathy Cards—emotionally direct greeting cards that say the things she wanted to hear when she was ill." Full article & examples of the cards: http://www.slate.com/blogs/the_eye/2015/05/06/empathy_cards_by_emily_mcdowell_are_greeting_cards_designed_for_cancer_patients.html

joyfulguy, southern Ontario, Canada, reputedly male (but I've said for years that it seems that folks expect [male] clergy to be [or act, at least] semi-female)

I have used those Argentina shrimp and think they taste more like lobster then a shrimp when butter dipped. That huge vein is roe in the shrimp, the vein lays under it. A lot of waste considering the heavy shell. They are unusually soft after còoking. My fish monger said he hears alot of complaints about texture. I have used them on and off for about a year. I always notice a much stronger smell from the opened bag and when cooking. Suspect they are not being handled carefully on the boat. None of the other kinds of shrimp have those issues. I worked in my family owned fish market for years, know fresh seafood does not smell. I will not buy the pink Argentina shrimp again.

Eld6161 -- Yes, I am mighty lucky to have fallen in love with and married a man who loves me completely in spite of my faults and idiosyncrasies. He will defend and protect me to the death. He was fully in support of me when I moved my brother in with us so that I could be his caregiver when he converted from being "just" HIV+ to having full-blown AIDS. He was right there with me as I was hugging my brother as he died. But lucky to live where we do? No. Well, yeah, we were lucky to get the particular lot that we wanted, but as far as where we are? No. That was simply a matter of needing to live close to where Hubs would be working when the State said his office was going to be relocating. For the first 16 months of our marriage (May 1986 through Sept 1987) Hubs' work location was approximately 225 miles from our home. We rented an apartment for him to live in during the week and every Friday night he'd leave the office, and drive the 225 miles to spend the weekend with me. Sunday nights he would drive back to the apartment. Some weekends I would drive there to spend the weekend with him. He also made the drive for every holiday. We decided it wouldn't be reasonable for me to give up my business (I was an independent fee appraiser) because the real estate market had gone crazy in LA and Orange Counties, and I was making around $10,000 to $12,000 per month (remember, this was 1986-1987). I did walk-through inspections no more than 3 days per week (this also involved driving by the comparable sales to take photos from the street), then the other days were when I would do the analysis and write up the forms. Then in September 1987 Hubs was named Regional Attorney for one of his agency's two designated regions. There was an increase in pay, and all of the other attorneys in that region reported to him. BUT, the office for that region was even further away from our home -- it was now about 350 miles from his workplace (and new apartment that we rented) to our home. Yep, every weekend and every holiday we were together. In 1987 the State was going to relocate most of his office to Sacramento, which would mean he'd be 450 miles from our home. No way was I going to have him (or me!) making that drive twice a week. So, the State paid the costs to sell our house, and paid the moving expenses to move me and everything we owned up here. We bought a townhouse in Citrus Heights (no time for us to really scope out the entire area to decide where we wanted to live as well as find a house that we both liked), and our move-in was mid-December. BUT, the State kept putting off the relocation of the office. The distance between us was now about 175 miles, and because I wasn't working, I went to him most weekends. We had three cats at the time, and 4 nights was as long as we wanted to "abandon" them at a time. Still never missed a weekend or a holiday. Then in February 1992 Hubs accepted a Sacramento position at another State agency. We've lived together ever since. :-) In May 1990 we put a deposit down on our current home (which is not in Citrus Heights) which was in the framing stage of construction at the time, and we moved in at the end of September 1990. So, I'm lucky to be living full-time with my husband, but as far as where we are -- I still say it isn't luck - it's just where we ended up.