I gather this is an aquarium setup we're talking about. I'm with adj4u. Instead of complicating things with with metal valves and such, I would make a simple sealable enclosure from a piece of 4" PVC pipe with a threaded cap on each end and a couple of PVC nipples. Drill a hole in one cap for inserting the sterilizing unit and seal it with silicone. Simple is good.

There are alarms that sound when a toddler wanders out of range... there must be something like that for keys. If not, chain 'em to your cell phone so you can call and find out where they are.

A policeman walking his beat one evening encounters a man looking for his keys on the ground under a street light. He asks the man where exactly he lost the keys, to which the man points to a yard across the street and says, "Over there". "But then why are you looking for them over here?", asks the cop. "Because there's no light over there".

Insurance is great, isn't it? Especially non-insured motorist coverage for your mandatory auto insurance. Kind of like hiring a bail bondsman when your neighbor gets arrested.

Diligent,

As far as I can tell, the site you mentioned is all or mostly BS. I started to fill out a profile but my machine crashed halfway through and I never finished. Despite the empty profile, I was immediately inundated with "replies" from "single women" raving about my profile!

It's a shame you can't ask a simple question in a forum like this without being psychoanalyzed. Is there some sort of taboo I should know about that says we can only associate with people of a certain age? Whatever happened to "Life, Liberty and the Pursuit of Happiness"?

It seems that we as a nation... perhaps as a species, have forgotten what real communication is all about. Is it really so much more likely that a stranger that you meet today will be a predatory monster than it would have been in a society without traffic cams on every corner, Amber Alerts, and so forth? Or is the paranoia over meeting "stangers" just another result of filling our heads with mass media rather than living our own lives and learning from our own experiences?

Sites like this would be wonderful if people would be themselves instead of pretending to be what they think people want them to be. There's an old saying, "If you're not part of the solution, you're part of the problem", which I think is appropriate here. This is supposed to be a community site, which to me means a place where people interact with one another. So why not remove the restrictions on your profile and encourage people to say hello, and maybe even make it a point to introduce yourself to someone new every time you visit?

I've actually met people from this and other sites, and know you learn more about a person in one minute of face-to-face time than months of online exchange. But let's face it, it's not going to happen if you pre-judge people before you meet them, or have a laundry list of prerequisites. Remember that no two people are alike, and the more we stereotype others the more we become just another cardboard cutout. Which is fine, if that's also what you're looking for.

Short answer: With 6+ billion unique individuals on this planet, whoever you're looking for exists. Finding them, however, will take some effort. As Richard Bach put it, "Argue your limitations and sure enough, they're yours".

burned out lightbulbs (I'm building a darkroom)
and women...

still looking for an affordable one that doesn't require extensive restoration.

Sorry. Didn't realize I was under orders not to take it personally. Fortunately, I didn't. I'm really not trying to rain on your parade; I just think that the phenominon of labeling everything and passing blame has reached epic proportions and could be done without.

In my opinion, it's rather pointless to tell people they should have a highter opinion of themselves or should learn to love themselves. Being more accepting of others as they are and a little less eager to impose our views on them is perhaps a better path to that end.

I do not understand masochism, yet I respect that people who want to be beaten are free to do so. Is it our duty to save them from themselves, and if so, doesn't that open us up to being 'saved' to learning to enjoy being beaten as well??

Am I missing something here?

No one denies that abuse is wrong, but let's look at it on a case-by-case basis, shall we, instead of issuing blanket definitions that anyone who "orders" (as defined by not saying please and thank you) another person (assumed to be their significant other) is abusive. Half-truths are abusive!

For exampe: "I am better than you", when "at scratching between my butt cheeks" is omitted.

By the way, while loving yourself is a good thing, it is not a substitute for the love of another. You are so worth THAT! Usually it comes down to taking the bad with the good or giving them both up.

Condsidering the staggering divorce rate, I think it's safe to assume that many people are removing themselves rather than addressing their problems.