The way things can be taken PLEASE READ THIS!

The only way (speaking theoretically) I see it could be done is if you have two or more email addresses!

gm

Don't be silly - oops am I allowed to say that? It was the confustication of bags/absent gally/gillybob etc
Your posts are always pearls of wisdom, as are mine of course!

Stansgran I have found someone who thinks my posts are worth reading - thank you! I agree that some names can alike and that people changing their names can lead to confusion.

Gracesmum I hope the bit that was 'way off beam' didn't refer to my posts

Stansgran Look I can't be Greatnan, Bags and absent as has been suggested a number of times. I do have other things to do during my days. Also, it's a pretty rotten suggestion from Bags's and Greatnan's points of views. I think someone even suggested that JessM and I were the same person – an equally absurd notion. The only "other" person I have ever been on Gransnet was absentgrana before I resigned my membership, so it isn't difficult to recognise me now I have "unresigned".

To prove it, there is a picture of Bags and me, plus some other grannies on one or more of the Scottish granny's profiles. Bags is the attractive, neat-looking, small person; I am the long lanky one who resembles a man in drag.

GNHQ has explained a few times that they have arcane ways and means of preventing one person having two screen names at the same time. However, if someone resigns, they cannot use the same name if they rejoin. As a result, people's names do change even if they only add a different number to the end . Also, some people change their names because they don't want family members to recognise them or there has been some other problem. However, they still cannot use two names at the same time.

On a completely different subject, isn't it interesting how names that we would have considered horribly old-fashioned when our children were born have come back into fashion? I know a number of young Stanleys and Normans.

I still don't understand why one person would pretend to be two. Please would someone explain.

If they do, for whatever reason, is it fair to 'out' them? Just as when.if someone leaves and returns as someone else, is it fair to 'out' them? Surely they must have a reason?

Deep thoughts, Stansgran only way off beam alas. But I love the thought of us being tomorrow's virtual fish and chip paper! Gally and gillybob def different people also Bags and absent. Good idea for a party game though to guess which 2 Gransnetters' names belong to the same person!

I have noticed that posts that begin IMHO are posted by people who are very rarely humble. (Before anyone jumps down my throat I know Movedalot said IMO.)

I agree with Bags [clique alert emoticon] that if someone posts a comment, it either is their opinion or they are copying someone else. Either way, adding IMO (gosh, I hate acronyms) or I think is pretty pointless.

In my experience, anyone who believes themselves to be superior to someone else has never shown the slightest inclination to prove it. I should think it would be quite difficult to prove within the confines of a forum such as this, so something of a wasted effort.

It really helps to read only short posts. Too much intensity in long posts. Very regular posters bring their baggage with them. They remember what each other says and has said. In fact I think galley and golly bob re the same person because of the name on posts . also bags and absent.call it early onset somethingor other.and I find janeainswortj and kittylester are worth reading and interesting possibly because I think they give their own names? We are tomorrow,s fish and chip paper,cast into the recycling bin of the Internet.

"Creeps off to put away barebow and arrows)"

Why is that so funny coming from jeni.

Oh, jeni, you mustn't give up trying to be another Lady Barebow! I'm sure you,re a natural, anyhow!

I'm from Yorkshire where folks say what they think.

I'm an immigrant to Australia where folks call me a POM - usually in a friendly manner, sometimes not.

So I got a bit thick skinned over the years, as a survival mechanism.

But Australia, in linguistic terms, has an indirect culture - they don't always say what they think to your face, they sort of go round it in convoluted suggestions. But being a bit hopeless at reading between the lines, it all goes over my head.

So I get it wrong. A lot.

But being from Yorkshire I do tend to say what I think: in linguistic terms again, it is called being from a direct culture.

And I probably do the same on here, sometimes shamelessly taking the mick of things I don't believe in, like religion and the Tory party!

Mea culpa, mea culpa, mea maxima culpa.

Now I'm off to bed.

Or is "I think" to confident-sounding? (although, I don,t know what's wrong with that either).

Does saying "I think" count as "in my opinion"? I have always assumed it did.

can I argue a little, in a friendly way, with no.1? Well, not really argue, exactly, but explain what I generally do, and which I think is good practice because I was told it was when I was writing essays that then got criticised to pieces (in a good way – learning curve and all that).

Unless I specifically say otherwise, or use speech marks, because I'm repeating or describing what someone else has said or written either on granset or elsewhere, what I write on here will be my opinion. Who else's would it be? So it's not really necessary to keep telling people that, is it? It could get a bit tiresome not only to keep doing the telling, but to have to keep reading it too, IYSWIM.

Bags you not perfect?
And here was me using you as a role model.

(Creeps off to put away barebow and arrows)

[Biting my tongue emoticon]

Bags wasn't me, I use 'one' as well when appropriate.

May I add another couple which I feel rather strongly about and can't imagine why I left it out!

Please do not rewrite/misread/paraphrase what someone has said in response and make out that they have said something completely different to what they actually said!

When asked for clarification or an apology please do respond instead of just hiding away as if it had never happened. If you have made a mistake why not admit it and apologise, it will almost always be accepted with no hard feelings.

That's my basic rule too, graces. There are occasional blips because even I am not perfect [senseofhumouralert!].

So if I say something that people find controversial, I expect them to argue back in kind, rather than whinge because they don't like what or how I've said something in spitenof my efforts not to be personal or rude or deliberately offensive. In other words, I expect them to attack the substance of my post, not me. I expect them to play the ball, not the woman. (especially, as they mostly don't know the woman much at all).

Perhaps my thoughts on the subject should have been expressed here instead of the Farewell thread and then they might not have been so summarily dismissed.
As I said there "Do as you would be done by" sums it up for me and while movedalot has given a lot of thought to her list of suggestions(and I don't diagree with any of them) this one is easy to remember.

The most useful thing that anyone posting anything can do is to read what they have written before pressing the "post message" button. Once it has left and is on its way to the thread, any poison darts will find their mark, and any accusations will be laid open ready for counter-attacks and escalating posts from other readers. Just rephrasing it can say the same thing in a way that does not precipitate yet another series of "she said.." and "but she said ....first and started it...."

Thanks Absent
Peace.

whoops. 'Thought' not though.

moved, those are good suggestions. The problem for me is that even when all that has been done, there can still be a problem because one cannot always second guess other people's though processes, nor where they are coming from.

For instance, someone a while ago (I think it may even have been you, but apologies If I've misremembered that) said, or suggested, that they find the use of 'one' instead of 'you' to be patronising. When I use 'one' instead of 'you' I'm not doing it to be patronising, I'm doing it to make what I'm saying as impersonal as possible (your rule no.5). If someone chooses to regard what I've written as patronising, in spite of knowing my reasons for using 'one', what then?

BTW, jane, I forgot to mention that I appreciated your realising I wasn't being patronising in trying to describe my idea. Thanks.

I agree. good guidelines Move
Woof!