I think that a lot about how many couples I know have mild friction because one of them is an early riser and the other more of a night owl. It can be a bit annoying, but for most of human existence splitting the time you’re awake and vigilant must have been quite an advantage.

Why would I have to abduct my alternate? Can’t I just make a living for myself in the the other universe? I’d be going to one that had much more liberal ideas about identity and needing money. I’m old enough that decisions made during my lifetime could* have lead to fairly different state if lefty / anarchist forces had been more successful than oligarchs and right-wing reactionaries.

*I’m assuming the point of multiverses is they don’t need to be highly likely, just logically possible.

It’s not even upgrade, even twenty years ago, most of them were either always rinsing or on some sort of intermittent timer. I guess when they were just a big communal trench it didn’t make sense for them to be flushed by an individual. (UK / various Europe)

Yeah, I caused myself a lot of misery by trying to follow the “eat the frog first” strategy, and get the big important stuff out the way before the easy / less critical things. Just led to me wasting days not doing the big thing, and all the little things were snowballing into much larger problems.

Now I go with “put the frog on your plate” - I tell myself honestly that the important task should be top of my list, and then proceed to avoid it by doing all the other shit. Sure, I have to deal with the problems of leaving something important til the last minute (and they are numerous) but at least everything else isn’t also on fire.

To be fair, most cats ‘train’ every day, they just sleep in between. If you ate a controlled diet, spent most of the day sleeping, interspersed with some stretching and running and jumping on things, you’d be I’m pretty great shape.

I don’t hear them talking about trans men and toilets (I guess they think they’re st risk, but it’s their own fault?) but I’ve heard lots of criticism of trans men as telling women they aren’t allowed to be masculine, or erasing lesbians, or other poorly informed things.

Friend did this for an art project, it didn’t smell. Like all blood it dries to a kinda browny colour, but beyond that it was fairly unremarkable. The reactions from other people were certainly interesting though!

Same, was confused until I zoomed in.

Yup, looked weird to me, like some only had one central eye, or they looked mishapen. But since I was focused on the cross, they were out of focus, so it didn’t seem very significant that I couldn’t see them clearly and they looked weird?

Then for the last couple of seconds the faces started appearing in the centre of the screen, where I was looking. But they looked normal then, so don’t know of they started showing the same faces on either side so my brain started compostiting each eyes vision into a single central face. And that made me wonder if that’s what was suppose to happen with grotesque faces, they were suppose to composite and appear clearly but gross? Rather than just vague and peripheral.

This. I’m sure Mission Impossible series are entertaining action movies, but I really can’t stand looking at his smug face.

“I’m bored, wanna fool around?” sometimes, that’s all it takes.

There’s quite a lot of reviews and comments from the time hating ESB (a muppet as a spiritual guide? Contrived twist!) and RotJ (too cheesy! Just an excuse to sell toys!).

Looks cool!

Only knowing small TVs. Step by step, displays have inarguably improved massively, and I do love my giant OLED flatscreen. But watching TV was still great fun in the before times, people still watched the hell out of it, so can we say it brings people more joy now? Or is it just technically and visually better?

I think if you’re the kinda person watching beautiful premium shows, that’s an experience you couldn’t really get before. But I like TV that I can have on in the background, while I’m doing the dishes, and now we’re expected to pay attention to details on screen. Back when half the audience had tiny, grainy or monochrome displays, shows were written to suit listening as much as watching. And it’s not just scripts, shoddy visuals allowed costumes, sets and design that was evocative but cheap, in a way that cannot pass muster today.

And by comparison, it’s reduced the justification for going to cinema, and even kinda made the real world look bad. It used to be worth going somewhere in person because it would look infinitely better than seeing it on a screen. But now, it can actually be a disappointment, as the carefully composed filmed version with post production actually looks more impressive than irl. It’s the Connoisseurs Paradox, has it really deepend my pleasure, or merely raised my standards so much that I’m actually less satisfied?

I think it was just that those were the four main classes in 1st and 2nd edition, with others seen as variations of those (e.g. paladins / rangers were basically fighter subclasses). In the Basic D&D line, they were the only four human classes.

Due to this, adventure designers would include challenges that took advantage of thief skills, or Turn Undead, or whatever, to help all players contribute. Therefore, a smart party would have a mix of the main classes, because they knew they’d encounter obstacles that needed them (although it was never hard and fast, and a good adventure had multiple routes to victory.)

I believe the root of the word means ‘bread’ etymologically. But even in Hindi, नान means a flatbread that looks very like what English speakers would mean by naan, a flat bread, ideally baked in a tandoor.

You don’t need to personally own companies in those industries. The secret of insider trading is knowing what announcements will effect stock prices. If the government says that they’re going to ban cigarettes, the value of tobacco companies will fall. If I know that the government isn’t serious, and will never implement the ban, I can buy stock at a reduced rate safe in the knowledge that it’s real value hasn’t fallen.

If i run the government there’s countless ways to profit from that insider knowledge. Gold prices go up when the stock markets are uncertain and people are worried about financial choas. So, I could buy lots of gold ($2300 an oz in Jun 2024), then make some wild decisions and statements so that the markets start panicking, and watch the gold price rise (peaked at around $3400 last month) . So I sell my gold for a substantial profit, and dial back a bunch of the most wild policies and stuff goes mostly back to normal, but I’m a lot richer.

You’re right that there’s a real issue with globalisation And tariffs aren’t even an insane mechanism to use. But the way that the administration is using them is either a) well-intentioned but incredibly badly implemented, or b) a cynical manipulation.

The sad part is that it’s likely to make it harder to change things for better in the long run. Instead of a sane plan to develop domestic manufacturing we have this chaos, and once it’s over people will be wary of the very idea.

You should try it! Personally, I don’t find butter weird (I think it’s just people don’t think of it as an ‘Asian’ ingredient) but I was shocked by the mayo. But a couple of folks mentioned it, so I’m going to try!

And thanks for this post BTW, I’m a bachelor again for a week while my partner is away, so I’ll defintely be cracking out the ramen. And now I can pretend I’m experimenting, rather than just being lazy!

How do you make your naan bread? I’ve been making a quick and easy one with yogurt, flour and baking soda, and they’re good, but not quite as good as ‘real’ ones.