Slashdot Mirror
Ask Slashdot: What Web Platform For a Small Municipality?
First time accepted submitter r3dR0v3r writes "I have the opportunity to help improve / replace the website of my small U.S. town (~6000 people). The town leaders are open to most any suggestions, and are open to the idea of having the website facilitate a more open government — by being a place at which town documents, meeting agendas, meeting minutes, legal forms, ordinances, etc. can be found in an organized way and downloaded. And of course the site should provide general info about the town, it's services, recreation opportunities, etc.. Now, we have no budget, so we'll be looking at free/open software. I've considered options such as Drupal, but I'm doing this as volunteer work so I don't want to start from scratch and spend overly much time. Thus, I'm looking for advice about any existing platforms made specifically for municipalities as a great way to get a jump start. I'm guessing there are other slashdotters that have helped their communities in this way. Your suggestions please?"
First let me say I have posting on Slashdot for years though I'd rather post this off topic story as an AC to avoid the karma ding. That said, it's all true (the payoff is at the end for the tl;dr crowd) and if you take it to heart, it could change your life for the better. Check it out.
So, here's how it went down. My girlfriend of 2 years revealed to me very early in the relationship how she had a submissive streak. She gave me a copy of "The Story of O" and asked me to read it. Oftentimes, I would come to her house and see only candles burning and when I'd go to the bedroom, she'd be laying there waiting for me having literally tied her own self up. Being very inexperienced I guess I didn't really see what I had so I kind of hemmed and hawed in really picking up the baton and running with it. Eventually her enthusiasm waned and it pretty much died down. Thing is, you don't miss something until it's gone so from time to time I'd clumsily try to rekindle that particular magic and she'd go for it some but never really put her heart into it. She'd get bitchy because I wasn't "doing it right" and it would shrivel on the vine.
Let me also mention that, ironically, my girl is very dominant in public. And as time wore on, she got bossier and bossier towards me. Basically, my power in the relationship was getting lesser and lesser and hers was growing. In the last 6 months it seems like all I ever thought about was doing what she wants.
It really started coming to a head in the last couple of months and I got into some deep thought over the issue. I thought about her submission thing and got kind of an epiphany when it hit me that she isn't submissive at all. The girl is dominant. Her game is to play the sub but really be pulling all the strings of her "dominant" puppet as her fantasy plays out. If I wrote the book, the details would bear this out but suffice to say, it's true. All fine and good but, first of all, if that were the case she should have just come out with it in the beginning. It would have been a fun game and I would almost certainly have went along. But she didn't. The second and more fundamental issue is, I'm nobody's sub. At least not for long after I figure out what's happening.
I stewed on this new-found revelation while the relationship just steadily got worse. She was ordering me around almost casually like I was her kid or something. When I'd snuggle up against her in bed, she'd always be "hot" and if I palmed her ass or held her boob while sleeping, I was as likely to get brushed off as anything else. And the constant smart-ass mouth, patronizing facial expressions, blank stares, ignoring me until I asked questions twice, and incessant bitching were bringing me to a boil like nothing before. It was maddening. How had my "sub" twisted me into this shell of a boyfriend obsessing over her every nuance wondering whether I'd made her mad or not.
I was perplexed as to how to turn it around so I figured I'd try to win her over one last time. I took her to the beach (Florida), dined her, played the chivalrous role, indulged her in her second-hand store addiction, and so on. It was flat exhausting and ridiculously time consuming. Like working a second job. Don't get me wrong, I like doing stuff for the woman I love, and it did improve things some, but I'd have to be independently wealthy and retired to sustain this kind of commitment. As my energy waned, her habits resumed with a renewed vengeance. Imagine everything above times 3. At the end of my rope and considering just cutting loose, here's what happened 3 days ago.
Sunday night, I was at my office sleeping and suffering a massive headache. It was so bad I couldn't even see straight. Wherewithal to argue was on negative empty. I had messaged her earlier and received no reply so I sent the final one with the usual goodnight, telling her how much I loved her, and she must be sleeping so sweet dreams, then sat the phone down. A bit later she texts me back with some smart comment about how she wasn't near her