homesick_american

i don't think they were married....

I am sorry to hear of this Lisa.... glad things ended friendly though...

It's been so long since I've been here that I honestly can't remember who's applying for what.

In any case I'd advise anyone married to a Brit to check both sets of divorce laws. There are some definite stingers in British divorce law, one in particular that had the potential to screw me royally. In my case, Texas divorce law worked out to my advantage so that's the jurisdiction I chose. Just waiting on the final settlement doc to come back from him so I can prove it up in court and be done with him once and for all.

I've been back in America since late June and it's the best thing I ever did. No regrets. None. B)

Lisa, I'm pretty sure you'd have to be a monster to *enjoy* watching someone else lose something like that.

I'm so sorry, and I hope you will find a solution, if not now, then down the road.

Oh, I don't know; I got plenty of triumphant "I told you so's" when my marriage ended. Not saying who from; they know who they are.

Incidentally, the divorce is still pending but we're near to the end. We're not looking to screw one another financially, which is good because there's a substantial amount of payola involved. Luckily I persuaded him to do the divorce in Texas, so he can't ask for spousal support even though I make twice what he does.

I'd advise LisaD to NOT do a divorce in the UK.

There's life afterwards, by the way. I'm now engaged to someone else; the wedding is later this year.

Peace out.

The only time I had a problem with my Mercedes was back in 2005 on a road trip with D...it was raining really bad, and D told me not to have my wiper on so high for so long....I said 'they wouldn't make the speed so fast if there was a problem with having it on'....and we bickered until on some back road near Metter, GA....my winshield wiper arm literally broke off and flew off the car

ahhh good times...

Wow...I've never seen anything like that before!

Did Mercedes fix it for free? I'd certainly expect them to!

Here's the elephant in the room that everyone is ignoring. If memory serves, Bootylicious's husband used to be an illegal immigrant and only got to legalize by marrying Bootylicious. So....smoke20 isn't THAT far off.

memory serves correctly. and not ignoring, just waiting to see if anyone else remembered that.

and just where the hell were you two yesterday?

LOL...sorry smoke20.

I would hate to be a teen ... or early 20 something trying to make money for college or trying to get ahead while competing against illegals. Given todays market ... I would have had a very hard time paying for college as a USC. My parents couldn't afford ... it was all me. Yes , I did jobs that today ... illegals would have prevented me from having.

What chance do others that are like me, have today?

My thought ... send these illegals home and let the "enabled .. enlightened children" learn what it takes to survive.

That is a great point as well. Teens in America now have no chance of competing with illegal immigrants for low skilled jobs to earn a few bucks for things like college or a car or simply a bit of extra pocket money. The only people who are benefiting from exploiting illegal immigrants are small and medium businesses. I hope they do go bust and / or are fined.

Teens in America need the opportunity to work a thankless job, definitely. I worked at a cafe when I was in high school and I worked at one of those one hour photo processing places in college and those experiences motivated me to finish my education.

OP, you're on your way! congrats! Lovely car!

and your credit score isn't that bad...

Wonder why consumer reports bagged on Mercedes? I've had an SL for years and it's a great lil car car

consumer reports bases some of their history data from subscribers who answer surveys .. think about this

Well no one contacted me!

Mercedes makes a good car, but in terms of reliability the Asian imports are almost always better. A Mercedes has a much nicer feel to it though.

If I remember correctly, we have something like a 20 year deficit in road construction needs. Haven't raised the gas tax in ages, not enough funding for roads.

I tried to get close this morning to take a peak, but no such luck. They're not letting anyone anywhere near it.

It's looking like the death toll could be close to 30; there are 9 confirmed dead and 20 missing, and if those missing 20 are in the water...well...

It's not looking good. My heart goes out to people affected by this.

We need a serious investigation here. 35 is a major highway that runs north-south through the US from the Mexican border to the Canadian border. It runs all the way through Texas and splits into 35W and 35E to run through Fort Worth and Dallas respectively. It's an interstate and that would indicate at least some level of federal responsibility for it. If they're neglecting Minnesota, why wouldn't they neglect the Texas sections too? This is some pretty scary stuff here.

Also...this was the second bridge collapse in TWO DAYS; there was one in California on Tuesday. Just makes me wonder ####### is going on.

They have done that, just a poor job of enforcing it. Now they are a part of the free market. Removing them is not without consequences.

And when are THEY going to face the consequences for their illegal actions?

Welcome to the free market, where you will always have poor people. Just because they are in poverty doesn't mean they are jobless. And if more Americans took the jobs illegals are doing, they would likely still be in poverty. Those jobs don't pay much.

There are two solutions to this, much more equal wage distribution ( AKA very high progressive taxes), or more government services to meet the needs of the poor.

Nah, how bout not allowing illegals to reset the price value of a minimum salary for doing those jobs?

It doesn't matter. Its all relative. If the poorest person was making $100,000 a year they would still be in poverty. There will be a wage floor, either the government will set one, or the market will. But regardless, the market will compensate.

The government could decide to put the minimum wage at 20.00 per hour. While that may be nice for the short term, Stores are going to quickly raise their prices and you will quickly find that the 20.00 and hour wont buy you anymore than what 5.25 did.

It does matter. It's not all relative. The money is going into the pockets of the employer....you think the Applebee's with the illegals in the kitchen has cheaper food than other ABs? No, it doesn't. So the cost benefit for those illegals are not being passed to the consumer, therefore it's NOT all relative in this instance.

Conversely, the prices wouldn't rise at that ABs if they hired legal workers.

If a job would normally yield $9/hr but an illegal will do it for $4....then that is not a free market...that is benefitting off slave-type labor. And to sit here and overlook this fact is astounding. 'Oh the American economy will crumble otherwise'....well could that argument be made back in the days of slaves? Hell, let's enslave them then...that'll really get our economy movin...

Illegals cannot be praised as an integral part of our workforce because they are not part of the legitimate workforce...they are a subclass of workers that are being exploited whilst at the same time killing jobs off for Americans.

Well said.

to your edit: yes i feel there is a very good chance that there are illegal workers in a place of business when noone speaks...not prefer not to speak but can't speak english. whats wrong w/ that?

But again, how do you know if they can or can't speak english... you don't go to the back and actually converse with the kitchen staff, do you.. that's why everyone was getting so mad..

you don't know..

and like Bootylicious said.. her husband who is a legal resident doesn't speak english if he's surrounded by spanish speakers... he's more comfortable with the language too ..

therefore, he can, he just chooses not to speak english.. and you wouldn't know that by just walking by him.

Here's the elephant in the room that everyone is ignoring. If memory serves, Bootylicious's husband used to be an illegal immigrant and only got to legalize by marrying Bootylicious. So....smoke20 isn't THAT far off.

Cool. you were smart not buying brand new. People lose thousands of $$ by buying new.

I got mine for less than what the gently used 07 and 06 Sonatas were selling for.

Yes. It really depends on where you would purchase the used car because car dealerships are known for high mark-ups, especially with Accord's, Civic's and Camry's because of their high resale value.

I wouldn't buy mine from a private owner; I've had too many friends with horror stories of title transfers and all sorts of evil sh!t following them after the purchase of a car.

The only thing that really bothers me is the fact that people (after asking where I'm from) keep saying "Oh, I'm half - German too".

Well, I read somewhere a long time ago that more than two out of three Americans can claim some German background. In light of that, it's not surprising that you'd hear that as often. Besides, having some German in you is a good thing. As I keep telling Nani: Living with a German builds character.

I'm part German myself. If you're a white American, the odds are OUTSTANDING that you have German, Irish, or BOTH in your background. I don't know why Germans would find this irritating; it seems sort of intolerant to me.

Very sad and stressful.

The thing that pops into my mind is a Mythbusters episode where they tested ways of getting out of cars that fell/crashed into water. Most of the public has no idea how to do it because it's not something we learn. And I can't help but think of the people whose cars have sunk. I hope more people got out than I think.

(Anyone who drives over bridges everyday should learn how to get out of a sinking car. There might still be info at Mythbuster's website, they tested many ways. )

Anyone can just google it; there are a ton of websites with this info. Most of it is very similar.

It's a major city, but it's not NYC, SF, or DC. Less resonance. Kind of like Oklahoma City: a friend who works for, uh, the Treasury Department, explained they figured 'federal + Oklahoma' = homegrown, not international. In any case, it's not terrorism according to DHS, but... like, are their earthquakes in MN?

No quakes, but expansion and contraction due to temperature changes between winter and summer can easily weaken and road or bridge. This bridge has had 40 years of it.

That's no excuse though; a 40 year-old bridge doesn't just collapse. 40 years old is not old for a bridge.

but they just announced on our local news that a school bus full of children went into the river. Expecting many deaths, Divers deployed looking to recover bodes.

This happened right outside the office building of our parent company where my old boss works. My current boss is travelling there right now for a conference at that office tomorrow - due to land in an hour. He is going to have a dreadful time when he arrives.

Hope everyone is ok in our VJ family

According to CNN the school bus did NOT go into the river but just missed going in. I've seen footage of a yellow school bus not in the water but on a collapsed section of the bridge.

It's not looking good bros. 1 unconfirmed death and "many" in critical condition.

Yeah; there's no way everybody's gonna be alright, no Pollyanna ending here. CNN is saying 50-100 cars were on the bridge at the time it collapsed. Count a lot more deaths than the three already confirmed.

I mow my lawn. And I hate Applebees. Their food sucks.

There, I said it!

LOL

Retarded. He should be charged with theft, possibly vandalism....since the Korans didn't belong to him. Other than that, free speech.

Yup. There's a double standard. We must tread lightly around that religion as not to OUTRAGE certain members.

It does seem that way sometimes, yup.

ive narrowed down between the toyota sienna and the odyssey...now what do you think? which one is better??

Don't base your car-buying decision on what people here tell you; research them online, test drive them, and decide for yourself which is better for you. You won't be able to deal much on a Honda or Toyota since they sort of sell themselves so if I were you I'd look at other makes in addition to Honda and Toyota, specifically Nissan and Kia. Kia's supposed to make a very good minivan.

Safety and reliability should be your primary concerns. I'd pay more for side curtain airbags....definitely.

Retarded. He should be charged with theft, possibly vandalism....since the Korans didn't belong to him. Other than that, free speech.

Just have to watch Rick Mercer , Talking to Americans on Youtube, and you can see the kind of misconceptions some Americans have about Canada. WE're not talking about "stupid" Americans either *sigh*

I'm sure the way he asks questions throws them off too.

They're probably about as stupid as some European misconceptions about America...Texas in particular. Oh, the stupid questions I was asked. It goes both ways y'all.

Yeah - Dallas area is funny like that - really nice neighborhood sandwiched in between SCARY places (and vice versa.) You REALLY have to do your homework before moving or anything like that.

I saw a gorgeous townhouse today near 14th and Jupiter in Plano...the neighborhood looked a little iffy.

I've lived in Milwaukee now for nearly two years and I've still yet to meet The Fonz.

I feel cheated.

So would I!

Ok, I'm a little retarded today and dont know what I'm doing.

Disregard the previous post, and here's what I meant to say. Nissans loose value a lot quicker. My friend lost $7000 by selling her 2006 Altima this month.

We are a honda family, everyone everyone sticks to that brand & we are happy. Honda's depreciate very slowly and retain value in case you want to sell down the road. My husband and I have 2 civics (96) and we never had to do any work on them, except for routine stuff like oil changes. That tells you about quality!

Go to edmunds.com and request a quote from local dealers, tell them you are buying within the week, and they will get all excited and hurry to get you a good deal. Everytime I ever did this, the prices they came back with, beat those that you had to haggle to get at the dealership location.

Hondas and Toyotas are good but any new car will depreciate very quickly.

You can mitigate that by choosing popular options on your car; my car will be worth more at trade-in than some of the other trims because mine has a V6 engine and a leather-wrapped steering wheel...both are popular options here in Texas.

I also got some online quotes when I was car shopping but some of them were ridiculous. In the end, though, I bought the car from someone who gave me an extremely competitive quote via e-mail.

LOL, no. That's a very specific german term and I believe, depending on the region, it even has different names, but that would be the most known. But no, I would not expect anyone to know that. It's just funny when people try to describe it.

Well, it is kind of a funny outfit.