LOST & MISPLACED A2K people.

Awwwww....

does anybody know what happened to steissd?
is he another of the disappeared?
i miss his 'interesting outlook on life'

He posts from time to time, I believe.

He's in the Israeli army (or was) and has had a few times of dropping off the radar for a while, then coming back.

steisd has been a reservist in the Israelian army, was without job for several months and became - as far as I remember - depressive.

He rejoined - ealier this year - only on weekends and stopped that in June/July.

Oh - depressed? I hope he is ok.

Patiodog is posting on my new apes thread as we speak!!!

...howdy...

...seems different 'round here...

ok thx for the responses peoples , i noticed that too about steissd (depression and all that)

man the guy needs to not take life so seriously, (then again i dont know his personal circumstances)
he could have a laugh at the crazyness of it all

anyway i hope hes ok too.....

There's been a naughty puppy missing....

What are you lookin' at patio. Good to see you're back with your dog.

Tool belts and puppies--it doesn't get much better than that. Welll, tools for the tool belt should be included...

Hey patio, we had a fiesta while you were gone...

ay, chingon.



have been away for good reasons. hope the same is true for steiss, the odd duck.

I know what you are referring to, but I don't think you understood it in the way I had meant it.

This is, in fact, an odd situation in which people "who use a free service would like a say in the way it's delivered to them". That's not a bad thing.

You responded as if I want people to pay for it, when in reality I am just pointing out the nature of the relationship between site and user and why we don't run a democracy. One reason is that the way it's resources are structured does not correlate with the number of members and there's no investment of interest required to be a member, unlike in a country where the decisions a democracy takes are decisions that the voters pay for themselves (hopefully ensuring at least a degree of interest).

I was pointing out what is, without comment on what should be (I happen to think the free relationship is the ideal).

Do you wonder if there is an added complexity to the matter that there were prior cyber-friendships for many members? Being close to management and visaversa creates awkward relationships in tense and wanting moments?

Husker is hitting on something I've often thought about. If Craven and the staff were invisible, it would all seem as automatic and unfeeling as the working of a clock. Then we would accept our fate and destiny unquestioningly, for there would be no court of appeal.

This is my take on all this stuff. I want to state from the outset that I'm not denigrating or slighting anyone and for the purposes of a metaphor not everything or everyone can be fitted in the right context.

A2k is like a huge three story house full of 100's of children and teenagers, playing, studying, misbehaving, and just generally interacting 24 hours a day.

The house has a dad who's not there a lot owing to the fact that he has to work long hours to pay the mortgage and even when he's there he's down in the basement fixing the hamster cage or he's up on the roof sealing the shingles. Every once in a while he drops in to a room where kids are interacting and he might have a little scolding for someone or a little nugget of wisdom or just an attaboy for someone who's not feeling too good.

Mom is there almost all the time and she's nurturing and kind although sometimes she has to deliver some bad news when there's a problem.
Some of the older kids are given responsibilities too and they try to maintain order and seperate scufflers so that mom and dad don't have to deal with everything.

The kids are all over the house and they're a huge mixture of personalities and races, temperaments and ideals and it seems they have a lot of opinions on everything including how the house is run. They stay there for free although some of the kids pay a litlle something and get extra priviliges.

They're in all the rooms, playing and interacting, screaming and yelling or just playing quietly with their dolls and dump trucks. There's even some in the kitchen practicing cooking and cake making.


The house is in a bit of a scary neighborhood, there's lots of pedophiles and robbers trying to get in through the security system that mom and dad have installed. Sometimes the kids forget to lock a door or a window and there's punishment meted out or one of the kids is sent away for the sake of all the other kids safety.


Sometimes a new baby comes home and all the kids gather 'round and poke it and make goo-goo eyes at it and welcome it home. If anyone plays too rough with the new baby they might be sent to their room for a few days or they might be warned with a time-out or they might just be sent to stand in the corner for a little while. Mom and dad don't have enough time to argue about the punishment so sometimes resentment runs a little high.

In the kitchen there's a small blackboard where the kids write messages for the kids that are missing or are gone for a short time. Sometimes the messages are for kids that have run away urging them to come back.

The house is alive and vibrant. All the inhabitants are lucky to be there although some don't realize it. Other houses full of kids became unmanageable or the parents divorced and the house was sold. Some of the kids ended up at our house where they were quickly welcomed or sometimes ridiculed for their strange dress and accents.


All in all it's a happy house, growing in leaps and bounds. The kids are a handful but happy. The parents and older kids are proud of what they've accomplished.

That was really quite lovely panzade.

Panzade, that's a really great analogy of A2K