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Talk to theatre staff about bad actor’s behaviour

DEAR MISS LONELYHEARTS: I like to go to the movie theatre during the day, totally alone. That way I can relax and focus on the movie. Ha! Not happening anymore. The last couple times a certain man has made his way across the theatre to sit two seats away from me! Then he strikes up a conversation over the empty seat before the movie is on.

I have tried to be pleasant and quietly respond to his questions. But, the last time I had to tell him, “Please! I want to watch the movie now!” He just kept talking.

I finally told him I was there to see the movie, not him. He called me a nasty name and moved to another row. I was so shocked by his behaviour I couldn’t enjoy the movie.

Now I feel uneasy going there by myself, but this is my special relax-and-recoup time. I live right near the theatre, and should not have to go across town to watch a movie! Why do certain men look at a woman like it’s their big chance to make a move, and then get upset when they’re turned down?

Be kind to yourself, others are listening

I always wonder if I’ve told my children I love them enough times in a day or if I’ve remembered to tell them how proud I am of them. I often think about the ways I could have shown love better.

Did I pay enough attention or actually stop what I was doing (even when I was busy) to listen to them? Did I indulge their requests for me to watch them do just this one part in a video game or hear some corny joke in a YouTube clip I would otherwise have no interest in if it wasn’t for them?

Did I let the little one have one more story past bedtime or, in the very least, have the courtesy to put my phone away during conversations? Did I ask the right questions about their day? Was I kind? Patient? Accepting?

I am constantly questioning myself, hoping I am at least getting it right most of the time. The thing is, sometimes (more than sometimes) I don’t offer myself the same consideration and grace or show myself love, kindness, patience or acceptance the way I ought to, and the way I strive to do for my children.

Don’t force yourself to follow daredevil dad

DEAR MISS LONELYHEARTS: My dad is a thrill-seeking adrenalin junky, and has been my whole life. However, the apple fell far from the tree, as I have no interest in extreme sports. I tend to puke (sorry to say, but it’s true).

Keeping exes close is down to more than generosity

DEAR MISS LONELYHEARTS: My girlfriend is a sweet and generous woman of 37, but the trouble is she has close ex-boyfriends she’s still friends with, and she even lends them money for stuff like car repairs. That drives me nuts. She says they always pay her back. Like that’s the point! Last night when I expressed my frustration about this, she called it petty jealousy.

Then she smiled and said her days of listening to men like me tell her what to do are long over. Ha! She’s Catholic and doesn’t even go to confession anymore, so I guess she thinks the priests are below her.

So, why do I keep hanging around this girl? Well, she’s far and away the most generous lover I’ve ever met — sometimes three times a night. You don’t meet women like her more than once in a lifetime.

How can I cope with the fact she gives too much of her self to past boyfriends and it makes me feel jealous.

Give partner’s sober, unexpected reunion a shot

DEAR MISS LONELYHEARTS: We arrived up at our cabin and were greeted by a man, who was already moving stuff into the rental cabin next door. The man said hello to me like he knew me, but I drew a blank. He was a totally bald man, athletic build and very tall. Then he spoke my first name and said, “Don’t you recognize me?”

I still didn’t. So, he said, like some kind of joke, “Then I’m not going to tell you.” I shrugged my shoulders and said, “So be it!” Then I went into our cabin. Two hours later my husband drove up and he said, “You’ll never guess who’s renting next door!” And I said, “Go ahead, tell me!”

He replied, “My old drinking buddy from way back in college. When he found out about this one beside us, he thought it’d be fun to come up with his wife and stay next door.” I must have looked sick.

He quickly added, “By the way, he quit drinking long ago, so no worries.” I’ve done nothing but worry since. My husband is finally sober now, and I want to keep him that way. Please help!

Yet another article on AI

“SOMETIMES I think it’s as if aliens have landed and people haven’t realized because they speak very good English,” said Geoffrey Hinton, the “godfather of AI” (artificial intelligence), who resigned from Google and now fears his godchildren will become “things more intelligent than us, taking control.”

AI pioneer Eliezer Yudkowsky, co-founder of the Machine Intelligence Research Institute, warns that “If somebody builds a too-powerful AI, under present conditions, I expect that every single member of the human species and all biological life on Earth dies shortly thereafter.”

And 1,100 people in the business, including Apple co-founder Steve Wozniak, cognitive scientist Gary Marcus, and engineers at Amazon, DeepMind, Google, Meta and Microsoft, signed an open letter in March calling for a six-month time-out in the development of the most powerful AI systems (anything “more powerful than GPT-4”).

There’s a media feeding frenzy about AI at the moment, and every working journalist is required to have an opinion on it. I turned to the task with some reluctance, as you can tell from the title I put on the piece.

Letters, June 1

Better options, fewer cars

I read Ray Kohanik’s opinion piece It’s time to make better transportation decisions (May 29) with interest.

His analysis is correct that widening Kenaston Boulevard is a project out of our budget, whether or not cost-sharing comes through this time from other levels of government. (For those keeping score at home, Kenaston has been twice rejected. Third time’s the charm?)

As it stands, by the city’s own analysis, traffic will have returned to Kenaston, and our commute times will be longer than they are now, before we have paid off the bill. The reality is we already have far more roads than we can properly afford to maintain given our tax base. Unless we want to double our property taxes and cut basically all of our services, we need to find a way to use our transportation infrastructure more efficiently if we want to give future generations a fighting chance for financial sustainability.