What is the world coming to…now we’ve got video games that trivialize cephalopods and turn them into goofy cutesie-pie characters. I must protest!
Pharyngula
Evolution, development, and random biological ejaculations from a godless liberal
What is the world coming to…now we’ve got video games that trivialize cephalopods and turn them into goofy cutesie-pie characters. I must protest!
What Dhorvath said, and she seems to started this monogamous relationship after joining the site. You can list yourself as looking for friends, “activity partners” (no nudge nudge implied) and even “long-distance pen pals” (grade school flashback) on that site.
Anyway, don’t cry for me, plenty of fish and all that jazz.
chigau – We have wild asparagus here, and once a year we go hog wild on it. It’s food too good for the gawds. *smirk*
Thank you Owlmirror, but it’s OK if I still pine for old HTML isn’t it? ;-)
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PTI, I made a mirrored candle holder for my boat that reflects and focuses the light to where I can read by candle light. It’s awkward to keep shifting the page but it’s doable.
I go nuts if I can’t read.
‘Tis, battened down the hatches eh, my friend?
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To all; I liked Obama’s talk when he said ‘take this seriously, we sent the navy out to sea to avoid this’ [/paraphrasing]
Part-Time Insomniac – the going without running water bit is for the birds. I am at the 24 hour mark right now and it SUCKS. I really shouldn’t whine too much though. Mine is just from crumbling infrastructure and incompetent water department. No hurricane worries here in Missouri.
Caribou live way out there,
up there,
somewhere.
Nobody cares. (except a bunch of
Nativesinjuns.)Oil and gas (and forestry and mineral exploration (PROGRESS)) are more important.
I may vomit.
(I’m watching the TV news.)
That’s freaking awesome, Caine!
Hugs of gratitude to all who helped me get through my doubts or shared my joy after, and hugs of comforting to Katherine Lorraine, Giliell, The Lone Coyote, Quodlibet, Psych-Oh, and Caine.
I lol’d.
True! Ee!
Patricia:
Nary a word. :eyeroll: I’m sure the results were available in a matter of several days, it just seems no one thinks I need to know.
Oh FFS. I swear, too many doctors seem to *adore* being vague (can’t discuss these things unless you’ve made an appointment, ya know!) then become happily unavailable. Treatments for what? Did you ever receive a straight answer as to what’s wrong?
Thank you muchly! I have not gotten as much work done as I should have today. :sigh:
Sailor: Really? Is it hard to make that type of holder?
——————————————-
MyMind: I just keep telling myself to do what I did in Costa Rica: wash up quick, don’t waste, no lingering. Only this time I have cans of seltzer water to provide some hydration (even if it’s not good to ingest so much).
Classical Cipher:
Thank you, Dearest! How you doin’?
PTI,
You can even fake it with a small mirror and a tealight on a shelf. We put mirrored surfaces behind candles, we even have some semi polished tins that we use as well.
Irene has lost strength and lost its eye, with not enough time remaining over open water for its eye to re-form and strengthen.
Because of its width, it will continue to push a storm surge that is much taller than would be expected for such a weak (Cat 1/weak Cat 2) hurricane. So coastal flooding is still a huge danger. And it’s passing through during a period of extra-high tides, so flood-safety margins need to account for that extra foot or so of high tide. And it’s moving slowly, so it has time to drop a foot of rain over any one area.
Still, it’s going to be a damp squib, not a raging disaster – which is good news for all the people who don’t lose their lives/livelihoods.
Me, I’m already worried about the evacuation-fatigue and cry-wolf syndrome which is going to set in when Irene passes without disaster, and then the next time people will say they won’t evacuate and don’t have to, because they lived through Irene just fine.
We have family on the coast in Carolina (out of touch right now, presumed fine but with phone service out) in PA (expecting a basement flood, nothing else) and in NYC, just above the mayor’s evacuation line. It’s the last I worry about – the chaos of any urban evacuation, and especially the advance decision to shut off public transit tomorrow at noon – seems more likely to cause harm than the hurricane itself would. Even if it came ashore in NY as a strong Cat 2 (which it won’t) it wouldn’t kill many people who had sheltered indoors above the first floor. But we’ve seen before that poor people who get stranded between home and some mythical safety end up ill or dead.
I wish there were something I could do rather than just fret from far away.
Caine – The cancer got ruled out, so I have no clue what further treatment I need. She didn’t leave it in her notes, because her nurse read them to me.
My needlework is suffering too. It’s so damned hot I don’t want to even tat with cotton thread. *grin*
An asparagus plant the Redhead put in the ground several years ago is now producing food grade product. They key word is the singular. The tomatoes have finally been transplanted to their bed, where the outlook is sunnier than in the past. We had to take down a large red maple tree (storm damage and heart rot), which makes the whole back end of the yard much sunnier.
Patricia, OM
We have feral asparagus in the river valley but the oldhats always get there before me.
There are also hazel nuts but the competition between the squirrels and the oldhats scares me away.
Patricia:
Oh wonderful. The only thing I can think of is a possible pre-cancerous state, which is treated to make sure it doesn’t become cancerous, but I’m not a doctor, so what the hell do I know? Perhaps Rorschach or Dianne would have a clue.
The “main predator” of caribou is NOT wolf, it is humans.
The main problem with caribou habitat is industrial development.
fuck
I’m going to get drunk.
Pretty well! Better than before anyhow. I might get to see my very dear friend who moved away from Jamestown while I was gone (!!! jerkface!) in a few days, and we’ll be visiting Jamestown after that for my brother’s birthday. Hey, we’ve missed you. Did you get your internet issues all sorted?
Whan that Ireen, with herr shoures soote
The droghte of Summre hath perced to the roote
And bathed every ville in swich binde,
Of which fere engendred in the winde;
Whan Zephirus eek with his sweete breeth
Inspired fere in every holt and heeth
The tendre pettes, and the yonge sonne
Hath in the raine his halfe cours yronne,
And alle familyes maken packinge,
That escapen in the nyght with mini vanne
Packed to the gilles with possesen;
Thanne longen familye goon on evacuashin!
Ah. Water has returned, though I wouldn’t drink it without boiling. The water department is leaving for the night with a huge gaping hole in the road left uncovered. This hole is big enough to trap Cthulhu in. There’s gotta be a regulation someone is ignoring.
“The thing I love about the Pacific Northwest is the giant slugs.”
You mean the kind that wrote Windows Vista?
Ugh, Brother Og @ 518, you brought back nightmares from my high school senior English class when we had to memorize that thing and then each one of us–all twenty-something of us–had to recite it in front of the rest of the class.
Irene is not looking to have as big an impact here (SW of DC) as first thought. Yay! Fam in SC says they (not on the coast) just got some rain, no big deal. I hope everyone on the coast is ok. And now the storm is weakening even further. :)
Local weatherperson* commented on the hysterics over Irene on TWC vs the NWS websites. Made me giggle a bit.
*spellcheck says it’s not a word…weatherwoman is not, either, but weatherman, is.
Squigit:
Writing out the intro, in Middle Englishe, with proper diacriticals, spelling and punctuation, was the only test I have ever cheated on. And it still bugs me that I did that.
Brother O., #518:
*clap clap clap*
A hot, oppressive day, so a cold, no-cook dinner: Andalusian gazpacho and chicken salad with craisins and walnuts.
Classical Cipher:
Oh, that will be nice! I hope the weather is good for you. It’s been hot lately.
Yeah, I think so. Got the replacement unit and it seems to be working okay. For now anyway. (They sent a ‘refurbished’ mifi, not a new one, so I’m not holding my breath here.)
Ava:
I would bow, but I threw my back out (and it, apparently, landed on something really painful).
I cheated once, on a Cicero translation test. I was so upset about it, that I turned myself in later that day (I was the teacher’s “helper” (i.e. had study hall with her versus the crazy old lady)). She immediately gave me a different version of the test to take. I made a C+.
I was also once caught plagiarizing. It was a complete accident. I had been doing research and this one author had done a ton of stuff on my topic. Still being in the developmental stages of my own writing style, I unintentionally began to imitate this person’s sentence structures. One of my sentences ended up being so close to one of his, that it tripped the plagiarism program that my teacher was using for our final papers. She said it was clearly an accident, but docked me 5 points for not being careful and had me re-write that section of the paper separately for grading.
Oh gawd, I hope that pre-cancerous thing doesn’t involve any more punching, or roto rootering. I’ve had it with that crap, and no amount of hail mary’s will make it better. Snort!
PTI – “Sailor: Really? Is it hard to make that type of holder?”
Nope. I did mine with a fractured mirror and my stained glass skills, but anyone can do it with glue/clay and a couple of mirror fragments. Just put the mirror fragments behind the candle and adjust the position till they focus on your reading spot. Mine is permanent, yours just needs to last a few days. It’s candlepower!
One candle doesn’t shed much light, but capturing that single point radiation and reflecting it multiplies it. And mirrors are very effective at reflecting light in the visible spectrum.
Well, that’s good to hear! Maybe by the time it reaches us here in CT, it will have lost even more strength and be even less of a worry.
I’ve never plagiarized (that I am aware of, anyway), but I did get accused of cribbing my sources.
I was writing a paper for Ancient History, an Overview, about sex and power in Athenian Greece. One of my sources was an ~1875 translation of a German text on ancient Greece. I found a perfect quote, one that illustrated one of my points to perfection, and used it, with full sourcing.
I got my paper back with a large ‘F’ written on the front.
I asked the professor (Professor Moriarty (no, I am not kidding)) and he said that I had cribbed my notes. I asked him why he thought that and he pulled out a not-quite-as-nice copy of the same book, opened it to the page I had cited, pointed out that the quote was not there, and then he flipped ten pages back and read the quote with significant differences in the text.
I was flabbergasted and gobsmacked. It was impossible. So I asked for a half-hour while I grabbed my source from my dorm room and he agreed.
I arrived with the book and pointed out the quote, with the phrasing I had used, on the correct page. We compared the publishing information. Both were the first printing. Same company. Same everything except that mine was the premier edition and his was the student edition.
He changed the grade to an ‘A’ and apologized. And no instructor at that school ever doubted one of my sources again.
To all, I love this song, and it’s never been played & sung better by Doc Watson / Earl Scruggs / Ricky Skaggs / Alison Krauss : Banks Of The Ohio
They show so much respect for the song.
OgVorbis, that’s really interesting – it sounds so similar to Australian bushfires and the history of management by our indigenous peoples.
well fuck, sorry all, I just meant to give the link, not embed the video. My apologies.
For those still using their custom css, this may be useful.
.comment object { display: none; }
:)
So my dad (78)0, who’s due for the brachytherapy procedure next month, had an EKG done, and discovered a bigeminy rhythm. He doesn’t have shortness of breath or anything negative, and had no indication of it’s existence until now. Is it likely to interfere with the procedure (since it seems fairly stable)? It (the brachytherapy procedure) uses a “mild general anesthetic”, according to him.
Not looking for a major diagnosis obviously. He’s supposed to see some specialist next Wednesday, but if someone has experience, I’d appreciate a little input.
-0
I took an undergrad primatology course which required us to go to the local zoo and do some observation on some monkeys for (maybe) 10 hours.
I left it to the last minute and found that my chosen group’s house was closed.
I went home and wrote the paper (pulling everything out of my butt).
I got an A+.
…Still catching up…
Happy belated birthday Josh! I’ll have to take you out sometime. Parima is closing. Perhaps we’ll hit it up before it finally shuts its doors forever.
Condolences to Cannabinaceae. My parents’ dog just died and when I got home I was disoriented by the lack of slobbery waggy wet nose pushing into my hand when I opened the door. It’s a sad thing indeed when beloved pets pass away.
My feminist organizing group has just had its mandatory blowup about trans women’s issues. We’re working it out. I offer muchas gracias to Katherine for sharing so much of her struggles and transformations, making it easier for me to see clearly why trans women and cis women, despite facing very different issues, must stand together to fight for equality for all.
Oh snap! That deserves a rimshot.
No, the slugs I’m talking about are much prettier.
Sally:
I got into one of the worst arguments of my life some years ago over such issues. A woman I knew, who was a staunch feminist, one day, suddenly spilled a wealth of dislike and contempt for transwomen, saying things like “what the fuck did they do to earn being a woman? Did they go through life having a period? No! They just want to be a woman so they can have the fun parts, dressing up, painting their nails and that sort of thing!”
That was one long fucking argument. Never did get anywhere with her, either. She viewed transwomen as utterly frivolous and getting to be women the “easy way”. Ouch.
Sally & Caine – I’ve been asked to be an officer for the new military widows group starting in our town. The office manager asked me if I could not mention my atheism. I said sure, I wouldn’t need to mention it as long as no one else mentioned their christianity. Sounds fair.
It won’t happen, there will be a huge shit throwing fight if I go.
Welcome back home, SallyStrange. Sit down, kick off your shoes, get comfy. :)
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Best of good luck to those impacted (literally or otherwise) by Irene’s arrival?…existence?…choice of flight-plan? Keep safe and dry.
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Nothing menaces at every turn.
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Patricia:
:Snortle: Yeah, like that’s gonna happen…I think I’d mention I’m an atheist.
My huge had-to-memorize piece in high school was Thanatopsis, first and last parts (phrasing and punctuation correct, of course). My dad spent hours with me in the living room helping me memorize it, setting up visual memory aids throughout the house. I’ve since learned that this is basically the strategy that super-memory people use as well (the ones who do memory contests), but I haven’t had much call to do it since.
TO HIM who in the love of Nature holds
Communion with her visible forms, (madonna covered in vines, in one corner holding a cracker) she speaks
A various language (word balloon!); for his gayer hours (confetti)
She has a voice of gladness (image of someone next to her named Gladys), and a smile (happy face)
And eloquence of beauty, and she glides (pretty elephant glides from that corner into the darker part of the room)
Into his darker musings, with a mild
And healing sympathy, (an orchestra) that steals away
Their sharpness, ere he is aware. (Hamburglar pops up from the orchestra with a knife)
and etc.
Hope the BigDumbChimp is OK, speaking of shit storms. Even our local news is full of nothing but Irene.
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Caine – Oh surely you know I won’t stand for a prayer meeting to get going if I can help it. (Haw!)
Carlie
That’s
just weirdinteresting.;) ;) ;)
Thread bankrupt.
Took my kids camping, 5 State Parks, 1 National Monument and 1 State Historic Site in 3 days.
Lots of fun, but I got home to discover earthquakes and hurricanes threatening much of the Horde.
I spend 4 months of the year asking myself why the hell I live in Minnesota. And then remember that the ground almost never moves, the ocean never tries to drown me, and tornadoes rarely bring homes crashing down around us.
Batten down the hatches and be safe, everyone.
There’s a generational split, and now that some of the younger feminists have made it clear that they consider transphobia to be a thing worth avoiding, the older women are resisting, insisting that they’re not “hateful” and it’s hateful to call them transphobic. Same shit, different argument. “I’m not racist, you’re racist for calling me racist!” One of them is saying that she didn’t think this group was going to be so radical–when one of the main topics of discussion at our original meetings was how mainstream feminism hasn’t been confrontational enough.
Oh well. I’m happy that they’re there, I’ve loved learning from them, especially the one who organized a “Ladies Against Women” spoof protest for a Phyllis Schlafly speech back in the 80s. But if being inclusive of trans women drives them away then I’m not going to look back. Forward momentum! as Miles Vorkosigan would say.
I look forward to hearing about the huge shit throwing fight.
Patricia:
So if you were a member of some bizarre and unusual Christian sect (for instance, the Pentacostal Uninuditarian Baptist Church) would you have been asked to keep that quiet?
Outer bands of Irene arrived a few hours ago. So far, so good, but the worst of the storm isn’t expected to arrive until tomorrow morning.
I hope Rev. BDC and his hive made it through fine.
Sally:
Thing was, the argument I was embroiled in? The woman who found herself so transphobic was 20+ years younger than me. I’d love to put this down to a generational split, but I’m not sure that covers it. I sincerely hope her attitude is not endemic.
This really is a major storm coming. In Virginia, the Cops and Donuts Fest in Richmond, VA. The Fest is sponsored by Krispy Kreme.
No, I am not kidding.
Ah, excellent point. Well, generational is how it has played out in our little group so far, and other members of the group (both young and old) have already put it down to that. I mean, there is a lot of data suggesting that support for gay rights is very much related to age, with younger people being more and more likely to support LGB equality. I would like to think that this also translates to more support for trans equality among younger people, but that would be a completely unsupported assumption, now that I think about it. Just like being female doesn’t make you smarter about race issues, being gay isn’t a magical mental prophylactic against transphobia.
I’m not particularly worried about the rain – we’re on a hill and unlikely to flood barring an even more dramatic than predicted rise in sea-levels. I am concerned about the trees, but there’s nothing I can do about a tree whomping my roof short of retreating to my friend’s basement. And now that I haz a generator, we’ll have water, so between our propane stove, our generator, and our basic common sense, we’ll be fine. Assuming no trees whomp the house. Last time we had a direct hit hurricane, electricity was down for 8 days. (DaughterSpawn just announced that the freaking hurricane is now spawning tornado warnings. Sheesh.)
I’m prepared as well as I have plenty of knitting, and Ann Budd’s new Sock Knitting Master Class book, which is really fun. Various PharynguSpawns may be receiving socks, since making socks for preschoolers is a nice way to try out the various techniques and doesn’t take as much time as knitting socks for the big honking feet of the various Mattir Family. Also some camel down spinning, since playing with fur is very soothing.
And an amusing Mattir Family story for your hurricane distraction: A couple weeks ago, we were discussing same-sex attraction as a perfectly normal part of most people’s life. I told the kids that I’d dated women before I’d dated Mr. M. They looked at me like I was an idiot, and said “No shit, Mom, that’s like the least surprising revelation you’ve ever made.” (I then tried to convince them then that I was a Cylon agent, but they told me that Cylons were fictional, while lesbians were real.) And then they moved on to discussing video games.
I hadn’t thought about how much the world has changed since the early 1980s – when I was in college, the Board of Trustees had meetings about “the lesbian problem” on campus, student loan applications for “known lesbians” were mysteriously lost, yadda, yadda, yadda. Secrecy was a big deal, and no one would EVER have thought of starting a student group or anything that open. Life really has gotten better, even for butch-looking middle-aged heterosexually married women.
Mattir-ritated:
Stay safe.
I’m not as worried for myself as I am for my parents, who are in D.C. right now. They’re in a hotel and scared shitless.
That was brought home to me about a year ago. A grandmotherly-type-older-woman was sitting on a bench with a pre-school girl. GMTOW was playing a word game: opposites.
GMTOW: “Up?”
LG: “Down.”
GMTOW: “In?”
LG: “Out.”
GMTOW: “Straight?”
LG: “Gay.”
GMTOW: “Hm. I never would have thought of that, but your right. I was thinking of ‘crooked’, but ‘gay’ works. Wet?”
LG: “Dry.”
I remember thinking that, even 25 years ago, a conversation like that would have been, basically, unthinkable.
G’night, all. Stay safe. And dry.
Mattir-ritated
Do you have any advice about spinning about 2 litres of wool?
Muskox wool.
I’d like to do this as “primitive” as possible.
ie I’m not getting a spinning wheel.
I was just thinking that I remembered that I had heard that some people think that Ashokan Farewell was an actual Civil War* era melody. I’m sure that most of the hyperliterate** among The Horde know the truth.
*USA-ian
**Redundant?***
***Self-congratulatory?****
****Justified?*****
*****Drunk?******
******Stoned?
@ Caine, #552,
i really don’t think that a transphobic attitude can become endemic in feminism. I’m only a man with anectodal evidence, but every feminist I’ve ever known has considered gay and trans rights to be a closely aligned with feminism. I haven’t had a conversation that I recall about whether or not trans women should be a part of the feminist umbrella, rather than just a part of the LGBT movement. But there’s so much natural overlap between the two movements that it doesn’t seem to be an issue with those I’ve encountered. Maybe I’m not paying close enough attention.
But I have trouble foreseeing a situation where your young interlocutor’s views somehow become widespread among feminists of any generation. The “they don’t have perods” thing is just so self-defeating. If she had ever known a trans woman, or looked closely at news coverage of a beating of a trans woman, she wouldn’t be making such dumbass statements, i would think.
I think people could start to care more. It wasn’t something I thought about until i was in the Navy and living in Guam where there is a huge trans community. I heard a lot of alarming hate speech among fellow sailors- the same people who were also pretty homophobic and misogynistic, but had learned to tone those kinds of views down a little- directed at them. I just don’t see many feminist women becoming de facto allies of those kinds of people.
I did not get the job. My car overheats TWICE. The world is fucking me.
Oh, and on the hurricane thingy: our basement will surely flood, and trees will come down in the neighborhood, perhaps some of our own trees. Other than that, well, depends upon the actual track. I may blow away. I won’t be sleeping* upstairs!
B.I.L. still has fantasies about having a surprise birthday party for his uncle at Camden Yards tomorrow afternoon. A pastry chef friend of the family just brought in the cake – a 40 inch hemisphere decorated as a baseball (Hank is a baseball lover); it’s lovely. Chocolate cake on top, whatever you call white colored cake on the bottom. We had to receive instructions on how best to cut it, it’s so big.
The beauty is – everybody from Virginia to upstate New York is recanting their RSVPs for some reason. Yet there the cake stands, not a mile and a half from my very house!
*well, I probably won’t be sleeping, but cowering in the (flooding) basement on the futoncouch.
chigau, be introduced to the drop spindle; many images here. Instructions here; youTube how-to video here.
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Well, since I’m living up to my namesake, let me just say that there are some songs that fulfill a role for me that hymns apparently do to the religious.
I’ll be in my bunk.
Sorry about the job. *hug* And about your car…I feel your pain. The car we are finally able to replace overheats as a function of time travelled, distance travelled, and external temperature. In the 100-degree-plus weather we had here recently, we could count on making it directly to or from the office, a distance of 3 miles, provided no stops were made on the way, and very little time was spent stopped at traffic signals. WalMart, at five miles from the house, was do-able only in the dead of the night. As it overheated, it would drop in and out of gear, and the gas mileage would drop; the day we mistakenly thought that we could risk a stop at Walmart on the way home, on a 98 degree day, we managed a top speed of about 20 mph, erratically, and were getting (so the digital read-out claimed) 3 miles to the gallon. I shit you not.
Also, the gas tank had a persistent leak.
And the air conditioning didn’t work.
Also and, there were a number of trifling little peccadillos (guzzling transmission fluid, temperamental fans that were replaced 3 times and still didn’t seem quite right, the charmingly-unpredictable way the horn would either work or not, I could go on, but why) that had us really sweating (haha!) it.
Pre-MRSAcre planning had called for replacing this POS before summer hit, but obviously that didn’t happen. The only reason we’re able to take it out ’round the barn and shoot it now is that one of our co-workers just got a new car, and is willing to let us buy his old car cheap and in installments.
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And on that, I’m off to bed, perchance to sleep until noon.
‘Night, all.
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OK, g’night. I’ve got some Jon Pertwee on a DVD and some unpopped corns. And some beer. And stuff. W.U. is in Okawville or Mascoutah or some such place.
I certainly did the first time I watched that series. It has a very 19th century quality, like a Scottish ballad. I found it so entrancing I couldn’t wait for the sheet music to arrive, I had to pick it out by ear on the piano and make up an accompaniment. The song still haunts me.
Squeeeee! Ashokan Farewell – one of my favorite ever “new” old songs.
-0-
Brother Og – I was a member of one of the most frightening fundamentalist christian cults. The snake kissin’ Kentucky old believers. Actually it might be funny if I tried to go into one of the old trance, speaking in tongues bullshit stunts. (No, I won’t) *Smirk*
Gyeong:
Automotive advice so as not to get ripped off:
1. What does “overheat” mean? Did your temperature gauge go up, and if so, how high?
Or, do you mean that steam came pouring out of your radiator? This makes a difference.
2. Check your coolant level. When the car is cold, open the radiator cap and see if it’s full. If it’s not, fill it with 50/50 mix of antifreeze and water. While you’re at it, buy a new radiator cap. Sometimes they go bad and lose pressure, causing overheating.
If your coolant is low, you might want to have the car checked for a leak.
3. Check the thermostat. It’s a little valve that opens up when the engine reaches operating temperature and allows the radiator coolant to flow. Sometimes they get stuck shut.
How to check? Buy a new one. It’s a five dollar part. If you have a socket wrench and can google, you can replace it in five minutes.
If you replace it and the car is fine, then you’re out $5.
4. When was the last time you had the cooling system backflushed? If it’s been forever, you should do that. A backflushing kit ($10 max.) can be had at any car parts store. Instructions on how to do it can be found on Youtube. Super easy, and requires only enough skill to use an exacto knife to cut a rubber hose.
You should try all these DIY cheap things before bringing it to a mechanic. If none of them work, it may be your water pump, which will cost somewhat more.
What kind of car is it?
Yep I have a few too, but I doubt I’d get any agreement on them so I’ll just keep them too myself.
BUTCH JOSH!
Brother Og – Here’s a short taste of my past complete idiocy. No none of those ladies are me, but you get the point.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EvFCI2bsajM&feature=related
-o-
Chimpy! Hooray, since you are still with us, I assume my prayers to Poseidon on your behalf worked. *smirk*
Died until I filled it with water and let it cool.
1990 Toyota Celica
Josh is a bear. :D
Give me that old time sedition
Give me that old time sedition
It was good enough for Emma
It’s good enough for me
Am not. Really. Not chunky enough (anymore), nor nearly hairy enough. Think boyish-faced teacher type starting to go grey.
Anyway, you should be able to do most of what I advised, Gyeong, on that car. Try to isolate where your car is leaking. When you get home, slip newspaper under the front end and watch for drips. If you’re lucky, it’s just a silly hose you can replace for a couple of bucks. But note carefully if it’s coming from somewhere else. Take notes or pix if you want, and email me.
A bear? *makes little hand-claws and rawrs experimentally* ?
Wheels and probably transmission. Previously, the shock and the timer belt were having problems. I always seem to be having wheel issue since it exploded on my way home from San Diego.
Still a good thing.
Oh honey, if you think that made your car overheat there’s no hope for you. You don’t know a damned thing about cars, Pickachu:)))) There, there. Let daddy take it to the nice mechanic for you.
Yeah that fully a reference to his car repair earlier.
Zyxek:
You’d be wrong. I’m sorry for that, I really am. I’m an old broad, I’ve been involved in feminist activism for well over 30 years. Thing is, people are people, whether or not they are feminists. Attitudes, fears, biases still come through. Whether or not someone is open-minded enough to realize those things is another thing altogether. Some people are, a lot of people aren’t. For a lot of people, it’s “I want [what I consider to be] my group to be recognized and heard, I want changes for them.
There’s always much work to be done. I do think the younger people up and coming tend to be more open and thoughtful, however, it’s always a mistake to assume how someone thinks going by age alone.
Yes Prayer did what they always do. I spent the afternoon > night at the bar on the island.
Just some wind and very little rain.
Hopefully my girls are ok. They got more wind up north.
Checking on them in the Am. Maybe catch a sunrise if I don’t consume too many adult beverages.
Thanks for caring!
CC:
Um…no. Here ya go.
Apparently my typos are manifesting in my inability to show the plural.
Classical Cipher,
Or just say WOOF. Yeah it doesn’t make sense but people say it. :P
Josh,
Oh, I know it’s not causing it to overheat. It just compounds the problem.
That’s why I called my dad.
“Daddy”? That sounds right and wrong at the same time. :3
Rev. BDC:
All tentacles crossed for them, I hope they came through it just fine!
Seriously glad you and yours are okay, such a trying time for everyone.
cicely
Thanks! for the links.
I don’t like the video Patricia posted.
It fails to explain the fact that when a snake handler handles a snake, and does not get bit, their hope that they are judged sinless is validated, making them euphoric, both because they have survived a dangerous experience unscathed, but much more so because they have been found worthy.
And if they are bit, they can always remember multiple sins which justify their being bit.
Snake handling is a practice which seems alien, but in fact fits neatly into the flaws in human psychology.
The video also refers to the practice as “snake worship”.
No, it’s Jesus worship, and it’s irresponsible to distance it from more typical sorts of Christianity; the belief that righteous behavior will result in protection from earthly dangers runs the depth and breadth of essentially all Christian religions. Snake handlers differ from other Christians primarily in the sincerity of their convictions, not in the character of their beliefs.
Llewelly:
Do you really think Patricia doesn’t know that? FFS, she doesn’t need you to school here in what she once did.
By the way, Snake Worship/Snake Handlers in the name of the bible do think themselves special, apart from others. Hence the name and the practice.
*bragging*
Not only do I know the truth, I’m personally acquainted with the composer. I missed my chance to play a benefit gig with Jay last time he was in Vermont but I’m sure I’ll get another chance.
*/bragging*
Jay Ungar is about as famous as it gets in the folk world. He got invited to play at Bush II’s White House. He says that Dubya, while shaking his hand, expressed a wish that accepting his invitation wouldn’t hurt his fan base. Heh.
My car’s brakes in the front passenger wheel well are acting weird. Josh, can you help? Pleeeez? It was fine during my long drive, then I fired it up again for a short drive and it was pulling to the right and smoke came out of the wheel well. When I was in NYS, I got stuck in the mud and had to do a lot of sudden starting and stopping, and noticed that the brakes, when I pressed hard on them, were sort of… snapping, sort of, under my foot. I dunno, I’m tired and should go to bed.
No, but feel free to do that again.
Every so often, one must have some Maggot Brain.
@ everyone who needs cheering up
Dusty vs The Watermelon
enjoy :-)
I know, Caine, I was only teasin’ :) Sorry for not being more overt with my silly.
Sally:
Sounds like you’ve got a stuck brake shoe on the side that’s pulling. Or a stuck caliper. We can try to grease it up and work it free if you wanna come over this weekend, but no guarantee you won’t have to take it to a garage.
I’m not a mechanic, but I may be able to help figure out what it is. If you can bring it over and let me drive it sometime over the next week. You know where to find me.
Thanks Josh. I’ll text you later.
Trollmore is really stinking up the libertarian thread. Must… pull… self… away from trainwreck.
I don’t want to log out. What if we do lose power? I’ll never catch up!
Note to self: invest in a generator.
Ki’y to wawomewo!
Why has there never been a female Dr Who?
not related, but here’s a pretty
Loreena
llewelly – The video I used is a ‘short’, used to show the practice of snake handling. It is not a documentary.
You are exactly correct that the practice is Jesus worship. It comes directly from Mark 16:18. This is also one of the verses used by anti-medical christians to justify their not taking their children to doctors for medical care.
Old believers do think of themselves as the only true christians. Every word in the bible is the inerrant word of god, no interpretations, no explanations.
This is one of the places the whole thing started to crack for me. If thy right eye offend thee, cast it out. If thy right hand offend thee cut it off. Nobody in church was doing that. Spare the rod, spoil the child, oh yeah, they could beat the shit out of their children and wives. But did they stone the adulterer? No.
Sorry you don’t like the example I chose. I can recommend some churches for you attend if you would like to experiance a “service” for yourself. And I’m not being a smart-ass here, if you actually want to go.
Bears.
Dittoed.
Songs:
Stan!
Easter Tree
Caine, Fleur du Mal, OM, OS | 27 August 2011 at 12:04 am :
My apologies. I did not intend to criticize Patricia. I intended to criticize the video. I did not intend to imply that Patricia agreed with the poor thinking and bad assumptions in the video; I knew that she did not.
llewelly – There are probably some here who do not know, as you and I do, about The Great Commission of the True Christian ™. So for their enlightenment, here goes:
15 Go ye into all the world, and preach the gospel to every creature.
16 He that believeth and is baptized shall be saved; but he that believeth not shall be damned.
17 And these signs shall follow them that believe; In my name they shall cast out devils; they shall speak with new tongues;
18 They shall take up serpents; and if they drink any deadly thing, it shall not hurt them; they shall lay hands on the sick, and they shall recover.
St. Mark 16:15-18
Those are the direct commandments of Jesus, and so now thou doesth seeth why they shalt pound upon thy door, and preach unto thy dog, guinea pig, and devil infested mother-in-law.
llewelly – I teaseth thee greatly.
Patricia, OM | 27 August 2011 at 12:46 am
I should have said that I did not think you were in any way to blame for the poor quality of the video; I don’t expect that there is a documentary on snake handling that addresses the points I raised.
All right, everybody! My plan is to take a Pharyngula day off tomorrow. Please help me stick to my plan by chasing me away with sticks and well no actually don’t chase me away with sticks because if you do I will be sad. Okay. But I’m still going to try. And do my laundry and work on my Greek and not be as completely antisocial as I usually am.
Just opened an odd-looking spam email that had been helpfully intercepted by the Yahoo! filters and had to laugh when I saw that it had been sent by an outfit called “Ethix Marketing LLC”. I guess that’s better than “Ethikal Marketing” or “Ethix in Marketing”:
“Yes, friends, if you’re lacking in ethics — excuse me, Ethix® brand moral judgment systems — you can purchase them from us, because we’re not using ours any more! Buy one for three easy payments of $19.95 and get a second one free!! We’ll even throw in a Pocket Pickerman, er, Fisherman!!! Take some Ethix® off our hands today — please!!!!”
Friendly:
One bit of marketing which has gone beyond stupid: thinking that an X makes everything super cool.
and while I’m at it, some self-advertisement (it’s for a good purpose, I swear): my thoughts on an article in Science about racial differences in awarding NIH funding. PZ has done some good write-ups on gender issues in science, I wish he’d write on the racial issues, too… in the meantime, you’re stuck only reading my thoughts on it (or at the very least, read the article itself, which is linked) :-p
Bearforce One. They never quite became the Village People they wanted to be, but still fun.
===
I used drop spindles in high school. We were also supposed to build our own spinning wheels, but I didn’t finish mine in time. I also forged my own (huge) pliers. See? Waldorf schools aren’t all bad.
* picks up stick
* hefts stick in hand
* looks meaningfully at Classical Cypher
* throws stick in a long, high arc way way way over there —>
See, bears going WOOF.
Rev BDC
I do hope that’s not a euphemism.
So I went on this lunch date today, right. A date, me ! It was particularly nice, involved cakes and playing with children on the beach and went really well all in all. And the most curious thing is, I suspect I might be in love. How unexpected !
*blink*
Also, I’m watching this Planet of the Apes remake, and it is a mighty bore.
I assumed “Snake Worship” was descriptive of the practice, not the object. Like “Sung Worship” or “Silent Worship”.
In other news, I have discovered why the Aprilia dealership in Canberra is so useless and clueless. They are a car dealership that has somehow taken on distribution for the bikes. Why they did that, though, is a complete mystery. Apparently nobody there even has a bike license. WTF?
Luckily there is a local scooter place that doesn’t sell bikes, but can still do proper Aprilia bike service if I decide to go that way. I have a fancy for the Mana, but haven’t had a chance to test-ride. May have to go to Sydney.
I’m not about to step into the Great Wilderness of Quills and Ass that the trollers have made of the Libertarian Thread Du Jour. However, all of Seymour’s whingeing about tone — in particular his hypocritical bits about how “being nasty isn’t changing anyone’s mind!” — suddenly reminded me of an article I once read. As a former self-styled “intellectual fundamentalist” (ugh!), I had a subscription for a while to the “journal” called First Things, which is devoted to the proposition that religion (or at least, the right types of religion) should not be excluded from the public square. One issue contained an article that contrasted the approaches of Booker T. Washington and W. E. B. Du Bois toward the racism they faced: Washington’s ideas seemed to boil down to “If African-Americans will just be the best and most upstanding people they can be, eventually Caucasians will become ashamed of the way they’re treating us and will change the laws and customs of the land,” whereas Du Bois’s plan seemed to be “We need to agitate and organize and protest and ‘misbehave’ or social conditions for African-Americans will never improve.”
Guess which approach the “First Things” authors favored? You guessed it, the article was all about what a shame it was that Booker T.’s plan wasn’t followed, and how much better the 20th Century could have been if fair-skinned folk had been shamed into action by the saintly forbearance and noble suffering of their colored brethren, instead of the civil-rights movement becoming a drawn-out process of confrontation and violence.
I ate it up at the time, but now I think to myself, “When has Washington’s approach worked for *any* oppressed group?” I can’t think of *any* disenfranchised or exploited minority that has *ever* been uplifted and accepted into the majority’s society because they “bore up under it so well” or “turned the other cheek so often” that their oppressors became *embarrassed* about it. People should just *sit there and take* injustice because the other people who run and enable the unjust system “have to decide to change themselves or the change won’t be real”?
Fuck that! I don’t condone riots, looting, etc., but if your group is being abused, you have to get up in your abusers’ faces in some way and shock them and put the real-life consequences of their actions and prejudices under their eyeballs. The status quo is a very comfortable place where many silent martyrs can be ignored. In the context of the aforementioned civil-rights movement, as horrible as it was for people to be beaten, water-cannoned, attacked with dogs, and killed, it seems to me that many white Americans’ attitudes didn’t start to change until the SNCC and other African-American activist groups started to confront the racist political structure head-on, with speechmaking (of Malcolm X’s kind as well as MLK’s) and sit-ins and marches and civil disobedience, while the television cameras rolled.
Which I guess is my long, roundabout way of getting to this point: I too had a problem with the tone here once upon a time. Sometimes particularly harsh expressions of it still make me cringe. But I promise never, ever to complain about it again. :-)
Cath, maybe they took it on when Gecko Motorcycles closed?
I don’t know where you could go around here for an Aprilia test ride. What a nuisance if the closest place is Sydney, unless you combine your trip with some other reason for being up there.
Tigger, that seems plausible if a little odd. Whyever would Aprilia choose such a useless dealer? Pity there isn’t a Queanbeyan dealer, though I do want to go out there to Eurotune to check out some Triumphs. The retro Bonnies are SOOO CUTE!eleventy1!!! – but maybe not so great for a longer ride?
Any of the resident doctors here? My chair broke and I fell on my back, on the broken back of the chair. The steel part that’s holding it together with the seat broke, and it came off with the back so I basically hit my lower back on that about 10cm long steel part. It hurt pretty badly. Mom was home and wanted to call ambulance but, since I’m already up and about, I really didn’t want to. So, if I hit my lower back but I can move and it only hurt like Fuuuuck! I can’t move! I want to scream! for a couple of minutes (might have been longer might have been shorter, it was agony) and then turned into something more bearable …. I don’t really have to call ambulance, right? If I’d broken something important, I would have probably felt it, as in – it would hurt like hell. Right? I hate doctors, but I rather wouldn’t find out that I hurt my spine when I eventually try to do something innocuous and shatter something important that was now only partly damaged.
Awwwwwwschach.
Um, when I said that I hate doctors I didn’t really mean I hate them… just hate going to the hospital. Yeah, just ignore the part where I said I hate doctors. (No, I didn’t hit my head, I say stupid things all the time)
Twunk?
Jadehawk – I know you were trying to find coverage on the science blogs. DrugMonkey’s been writing about the NIH story (cross-posted at Sb and their new blog at Scientopia):
http://scienceblogs.com/drugmonkey/
I didn’t realise that Cowboys vs Aliens had Harrison Ford in it ! Much better than the silly Apes movie.
Beatrice,
If you don’t have any numbness or tingling or loss of motor movements, it doesn’t sound like an emergency. I’d be concerned if you weren’t able to move, or the pain didn’t fade. It wouldn’t necessarily hurt if something major was severed, but I wouldn’t worry unless you feel worse tomorrow. Should make for a colorful bruise.
I’m not a doctor myself, but your description doesn’t set off any red flags. I would, however, advise avoiding chiropractors for, say, the rest of your life. -.-
Someone cracking my spine never sounded very tempting to me, so I think I’m safe there. ;)
It doesn’t hurt much now (although, I took a pain pill so that’s probably doing its job), but I was a bit worried. That steel thing I fell on looks pretty mean.
thanks!
Well, gonna sign off for now. Moving sale today (as if anyone will show up while preparing for the storm), then very possible loss of electricity on Sunday, so no computer. Got a deck of cards, books, candles, and food . . . see youse on the other side.
Beatrice,
I realize you don’t like seeing doctors and the pain has subsided somewhat, but pain is nature’s way of telling you there’s a problem. Go to the emergency room and let a professional decide if you’re okay or not.
drbunsen and Cath:
For a good (though slightly sensationalistic) discussion of forest management and viticulture, see 1491: New Revelations of the Americas Before Columbus, by Charles C. Mann. He tends to over-emphasize the antithesis of newer archaeologists, but the exploration of pre-Columbian agriculture, viticulture, and forest management to support higher populations is very well done.
Sexism, but these are pretty to look at.
Oh, great. Now Rorschach is going to get all gooey and smoochy, and we won’t get any good acerbic biting comments any more. The whole blog is going to be all rainbows and kittens and shit now. *sigh*
(*secret high-five to Rorschach*)
Carlie:
Was it you that posted the link to wunderground.com? If so, thanks– it’s a great site!
(We still have warnings for flooding, bah.)
Rorschach:
:D
Once I got over Daniel Craig’s accent* and the fact that he looks ridiculous in hats, I enjoyed it a lot. Is it great cinema? No. But it totally delivered, um, cowboys and aliens. (Plus, the aliens looked pretty damned cool.)
*It wasn’t bad, I just couldn’t accept that’s what he sounds like. :/
Hi there
Just skimming through
My whole flat glitters like drag queen club night, but daughter and I had tons of fun making the most sparkling crown in the history of 85ths birthdays, including the late queen mum.
And now I have a lot of chaos to attend to
All those of you affected by Irene:
keep safe, keep warm, good luck, hope to see you back ozt and about soon
@Caine
That’s really impressive. I’d never fifnish a project like that (that’s why sewing is my hobby, too impatient, need results quick)
Gyeong Hwa,
Sorry about the job. Double sorry about the car, hope super Josh has you on the right track and a mechanic isn’t in your future.
_
And on that note, commiseration for SallyStrange on car troubles as well.
___
Rorschach,
Good dates are good. Enjoy.
___
Beatrice,
If you are worried enough to ask, please ask a doctor. It sucks, it costs time, it may cause frazzling, but really is worth doing.
I know what you mean. Every doctor who’s ever treated my wounds or sewn me back together has been compassionate, gentle, concerned, and caring to a fault, but I still hate going.
When I broke my hand-bone (on my brother’s face!) I was so ashamed I kept going to work for about three days before the boss made me go to the doctor. By then there really wasn’t much the doc could do about it. Now the bone is forever foreshortened. A valuable lesson.
The Lone Coyote
How was your brother’s face?
Okay, so I’ve got all of my housecleaning done (including that nasty! turtle tank) and I’m off to buy some bottled water in a little bit.
Bring it on, hurricane! BRING IT ON.
PZ, are you lurking around?
Is there anything that you can do about YouTube videos automatically embedding in a thread?
Scary : Children preachers (one is four years old)
Warning : watching the four year old might cause flashbacks to “The Exorcist” (just without the vomit). Unless you count how it might make you vomit. Notice that it’s a documentary by National Geographic.
On NG site I found only this : (link)
Controversial? It’s child abuse, live, on camera.
———————–
Also, thanks all for the advice…. Even though I’m not actually going to follow it (that always makes me feel bad ’cause I asked and then did what I wanted anyway). I feel mostly ok now, so I’ll go to the emergency only if things get worse.
———————
The Lone Coyote
The only consequence I have for not going to the doctor when needed is a crooked finger. And that wasn’t my fault. I was underage and as we were in a foreign country, my grandmother decided it would be too much of a bother to take me to a doctor and that my finger wasn’t all that bad, so she just wrapped it up herself. The same went for most of my injuries in childhood. If I wasn’t in a danger of getting exsanguinated (hm, spell check doesn’t recognize the word), it meant it was an injury that could be dealt with at home. I guess that “I can take care of it” attitude stuck and nothing but a very serious injury or illness can make me seek professional help. Not healthy, I know. I guess I should be happy that I am generally healthy.
Laugh all you want, but I’m a big fan of chiropractors. I don’t let them do any of the woo shit, but when I’ve hurt my back and the muscle spasms are pulling it in odd directions I get immediate relief from an adjustment.
I discovered them after going to GP’s prescribing muscle relaxants & orthopedic doctors prescribing surgery that had a 50/50 chance of helping or hurting.
The drugs hide the fact that you’re hurting so you re-injure yourself and the surgery was not required. It doesn’t just make me feel better, I get mobility and strength back.
Sure, it’s just an anecdatum, but it works for me.
Sailor,
Muscle relaxants do more than just hiding an injury, they allow the muscles to release so that healing can occur. If it was just about hiding the damage, any pain killer would suit.
I use several stretches which allow for lumbar realignment so I can appreciate that it feels better after having an adjustment, but discounting a drug that actually helps seems a little contrary in it’s own right.
Chigau: Swollen.
we made a conscious decision after that to never allow ourselves to come to blows with each other again.
The Sailor: Well, without having much medical background knowledge or immediate access to any studies, I would say chiropractic practices at least seem more ‘plausible’ and based in actual knowledge of anatomy than your typical woo bullshit. Human spinal columns are after all somewhat unintelligently designed.
Cath – Hope you get to do a test ride soon. I expected to ride my new bike today. Buuuuut it sat with old gas in it, and now Naughty M has the carb off and is grumbling about shellack.
Dhorvath, I agree, my favorite combination would be for my chiro to be able to prescribe them. He agrees. If my muscles weren’t spasming they wouldn’t yank my spine back out of alignment. My point was that just muscle relaxants don’t treat the underlying problem.
When I had spares I would take one before an alignment. We both appreciated it;-)
Fuck that shit. :-þ
Patricia, shellacked carbs are a problem. Soaking parts, rebuild kits w/o the jet o-rings you need, reseating the jets, calibrating the float level … some days I’m happier that my vehicle is too complicated for me to work on.
My outboard motor on my boat is a different story. It’s a ’78 Johnson 9.9 and it never runs well, but it always runs.
Okay, I misunderstood what you meant. Backs aren’t meant to be fixed, just maintained, at least as far as I can tell. I do find that core strengthening goes a long way for me.
I am so glad I do my mechanicing on diesel engines. Injector kits always have o-rings or gaskets. Same with injector pumps.
There’s several things wrong here.
1) Pain can be the thing that’s really the problem. You have a minor injury/problem and the pain makes you automatically keep yourself in an even more unhealthy position that will make you hurt even more
2) Sometimes the only problem is pain. If you ever had a “witche’s stroke”, you’ll know how this is: The disks are totally ok, your muscles are soft and healthy, but you simply hurt a nerve.
@Audley
Speak about pets. The grey rabbit Pünktchen escaped from their run once again. I swear the rabbit does it purely to see me running behind him with a towel (note: never forget your towel) to throw.
@The Lone Coyote #373
I feel for your ex. It is truly difficult to maintain a warm and caring relationship with someone whose values are drastically different to yours. I tried to be best friends with a god-botherer and it did not last one year. I hope your ex will realise she’s much better off with someone who accepts her as she is.
My story: Right after High School I went to University to study biology. I was an awkward, borderline Asperger young person and making new relationships was difficult for me. So I became friends with people who chose me, instead of choosing my company myself.
There was this one girl who took several of the same outside curriculum courses that I took. We became friends. I considered her my best friend, in fact.
I knew she was a believer but we never talked about religion.
In Finland, the last of April/the first of May is a major event. That’s when all the student’s party their asses off. I certainly did, during my first ‘Vappu’. It ended badly. Using the modern parlance, I got ‘assanged’.
Next day I felt really bad and went to see my best friend, as I thought her to be. I wanted to spill my guts and recieve support and sympathy.
Well, what do you know, the sanctimonious god-botherer judged *me*. For I had had sex outside the wed-lock! I was mortified. I was shocked.
I grew up in a religion-free environment. The people in my vicinity varied from apatheism to atheism. The first seriously religious people I met were some students in the Uni. I had heard there are people like this ‘best friend’ of mine, but I´d never thought I meet one IRL.
From that moment on our friendship started to deteriorate. I just could not care about her anymore. There never was any real break up, we just ended with a whimper. I learned that people who have a strong commitment to their religious world view care nothing about compassion, empathy and pity. They have the Truth and they have the right to Judge. I wish they would keep playing with each other and leave the rest of us alone.
pj,
That’s horrible. Who was she helping, what good did she do, by treating you that way? Bloody well trained in rape apology by religion is what she was.
Herself. And she made herself feel damn gooood about herself.
–o–
I just heard Obama finally finding a solution to the Rebublan problem.
He urged everyone to get out of the way of Irene as soon and fast as possible.
I expect Cantor, Boehner and the rest of the fuckers to migrate to the coast en masse now.
Raining on and off here. I know we’re supposed to get hit tomorrow, and it might not be as bad as expected, but still, I hate waiting while all tensed like this. It actually makes me feel tired.
All right, off to try and distract myself somehow.
illuminata@ 370
speaking as a more or less lifelong Seattle resident, weather here is generally okay. We get our share of the good and our share of the bad. Rain is a loved companion, but not anywhere near as bad as mythologized. Of course when we have a snow day, there is no other news :-).
broken Soldier,OM has made an appearance on the Rats emboldened thread.Maybe everyone else was aware of his return to these parts but it was news to me.I am very relieved that he is back and is posting again.
Status update from an acquaintance in the Norfolk area of Virginia: “Is staring at the eye of the storm…it’s a beautiful thing to be in the will of God;) And it’s the safest place to be:)”
*sigh*
He shows up every three or four months, then goes back to lurking. Always a pleasure to have his contributions to our community.
a question for the biologists: do people see movement better out of the corner of their eye than directly head-on? Meaning, is there some qualitative difference between the visual receptors in the middle of the retina and the ones at the edges that would make the ones at the edges more susceptible to movement?
I’m asking because that’s something that seems to be happening to me: I notice flies and spiders as huge moving black dots when they’re at the edge of my vision, but have a hard time finding them when looking directly at where the movement was
There is, at the very least, a difference in receptors between the peripheral and central regions of the retina. As to how that shakes down for movement, well, I don’t know. What it does is make peripheral vision more sensitive to low levels of input.
from Friendly
Yeah. I still cringe occasionally. I still–and always will–dislike suggestions like “die in a fire”, but telling someone to fuck off or suggesting what to do with this ripe porcupine are fine with me. In fact, I am willing to use them myself.
————
Beatrice, I’m with Tis. If you find your pain increasing, if you have trouble moving around, and certainly if you find your urine has blood in it (possible if you bruised a kidney) then head for the emergency room. Believe me, most doctors hate the way the system forces them to treat you as much as you do but they really do want to help. Let them.
As for those who were talking about chiropractic, Please read the articles you can find by scrolling down to the “C”s here. Please.
Doctor Who tonight on BBCA!!!!!!
WOOOOOO!!!!!
And I almost missed it, except it was noted in a post today at The Mary Sue. Whew!
It’s “Let’s Kill Hitler”, which means I will have watched two sci-fi shows about Hitler in one week, because earlier this week I watched “Tomorrow I will scald myself with tea”, a 1977 Czech movie I heartily recommend.
Sorry, the correct title is “Tomorrow I’ll wake up and scald myself with tea”. Well, the correct title is “Zítra vstanu a opařím se čajem”.
Anyway, great movie. Was it here I heard about it in the first place? Nazis go back in time and try to give Hitler a hydrogen bomb, but mess it up and have to try again. And again. And there are identical twins.
I’m glad to know that I’m not the only one who’s really excited. I’ve been re-watching the other episodes from this season over the past two days.
bullofthewoods:
brokenSoldier also posted on the TAX THE RICH! thread a little earlier today.
Nope, he just kind of popped up. And it is great to see him again.
Believe it or not, we just discovered today that our cable has added BBCA. How’s that for good timing? We get to watch the marathon & the first new episode, go to bed and wake up when the roof blows off!
“a question for the biologists: do people see movement better out of the corner of their eye than directly head-on?”
Umm, I just work in vision research so I hope that qualifies: Why, yes, yes you do. In the periphery you have not only different photo receptors, (rods v. cones), but several rods can be hooked up to one neural pathway. At an individual level these rods are about 100x more sensitive than cones and will fire when light ripples across them and that’s the sensation of having caught movement in the ‘corner of your eye’.
Since it’s quite out there, (‘too quiet’;-), I’ll expound a bit: since there can be several receptors hooked to an interneuron there is a trade-off between resolution and sensitivity. Far peripheral vision will be blurry. Research suggests that there is a bias toward horizontal movement.
An amazing thing to me is that our brain adjusts for the 2 inputs and creates a whole visual field in color, whereas we ‘should’ see only the central vision area (just a few degrees) in color and the rest in grayscale.
NEW THREAD!