Ooops, traveling, the thread filled up. Here’s something quick to tide you over.
(Episode CCLX: Paleontologists are rock stars.)
Pharyngula
Evolution, development, and random biological ejaculations from a godless liberal
Ooops, traveling, the thread filled up. Here’s something quick to tide you over.
(Episode CCLX: Paleontologists are rock stars.)
Hmmm, with no portcullus, apparently everyone is still over there. More room here, guys!
Not possible.
I cannot be first.
Video is sweet.
I was just getting comfortable over there. New thread is nice though. Thanks!
Re-posting:
I’ve been invited to submit a piece for a contest so I’m doing that instead of working…I gotta stop this displacement stuff and get back to work. I don’t wanna.
Re-posting:
No.
Not at all.
Not even a little bit.
.
.
.
*Pbbbbbbt!*
.
.
.
.
Yes.
–
What an intriguing contest. Good luck.
Money or renown that may make more money. Hmm…good thing salad isn’t expensive for the boys.
Wow. How many times have I played that already?. Now I can watch it, too!
I spent the whole day reading Kyūkyoku!! Hentai Kamen.
google it yourselves.
I won’t be responsible.
I first encountered this manga in a coin-laundry in Ikebukuro in 1993.
The protagonist gains super-powers by put panties on his head.
’nuff said
*shrugs*
Hey y’all.
Glad you’re having fun.
I’m practicing some arias. I think I’m going to try out for a choir.
I’m lonely and I figure maybe I’ll meet people that way.
I wish I could meet some of you, but the truth is I probably never will.
Caine, *reciprocal adoration*
:)
–
Oh, hey, and no I am not jealous.
( I have some envy though.)
Ah, this thread is nice and sniny. Me like.
*sips beer*
Mmmm.
I’ve been toying with the idea of entering a writing contest that’s over on LiveJournal. It looks like fun but I’m not quite sure, honestly.
It’s all in the cooler by my foot. I’m going to work on my knitting for a bit.
Can I offer anyone a drink? I’ve got some Ommegang, some Dogfish Head, and some Strongbow.
There’s a pair of words doing their best to merge in the vernacular.
–
…somehow or another the last two paragraphs of my last got flipped. Huh.
I’m not jealous either, although I wish I could be there.
I hope you guys are all having an absolutely terrific time!
Esteleth, I blame the random temporal inversions.
–
I am midway through a bottle of La Fin Du Monde. It’s a heady beer, or maybe it’s going to my head. In any event, I am doing my best to be proscriptive on a pair of words that I truly appreciate the difference between.
Algernon
Didn’t you already touch The Walton?
Esteleth, got ethanol?
—
[anecdote]
Back when, I moved in with this other guy.
In our new rental place, we found a 300ml bottle of aniseed flavouring.
It was just flavouring and alcohol — like >90% alcohol.
(Need I say more? (It was a wonderful way to freak people out))
chigau, to this day, Walton’s FB photo features a certain someone else. :)
sniff, sniff. Aaaaah, the smell of a fresh thread! Hope everyone is having a good evening.
I have touched The Walton and even eaten cupcakes with him. This much is true.
Ah. FaceBook.
I wish I could understand what the fuck it’s for.
John Morales, I’ve got some HPLC grade ethanol. I’ve also got some 95%, but that’s been cut with methanol, so you don’t want that.
*rummages*
I’ve got some aqua vita.
Dhorvath:
Thanks. :)
Nerd:
More renown I don’t need. Money, well…I’m not in dire need, but I always want more cold, hard cash. Mmmmmmm, cash. After getting sidetracked for a week on the support Rebecca Watson project, I really, really, really should be back at work, hard.
I’m just enjoying doing different stuff right now. This contest gives me the chance to get back into doing a pencil, which I haven’t done in quite a long time. Working in pencil is one of my fave things.
It’s for spying on your internet friends :P
I don’t know if Walton has mentioned it here or wants to, but he’ll be down this way for a while over the holidays, Texas people. Don’t know if anyone is curious about that but I put it out there.
Hehehe… i was making something. But I have just gotten to the point where it makes me sob to try because I know I can not make anything worthwhile and that it will never be good enough.
So it looks like my mental problems will prevent me from sending much more than “well wishes” on the back of a napkin.
I am on FaceBook.
But nothing in my profile is true.
I think.
I keep forgetting my password.
Oh. The photo is of me.
Are you under the name Chigau? I’m not on the FB group, old drama/trauma so I usually don’t know who people are (I like it that way, if people like the FB me that’s nice… I’d rather not have to find my place in a pecking order or social group as I get that non-stop in the corporate world and it is hell on my mental health).
I have “well wishes” on a napkin that I have treasured for 20+ years.
Not a trivial thing.
My FB name is not chigau.
It’s a totally other thing I came up with in order to “sign in”.
I’ve never used it except to be able to look at stuff on FB.
lol. I have some things like that. It’s not too late yet. I’ve been forming a letter in my mind I think.
Algernon,
I had lamented your lack, but figured you had reason to avoid. My sadness is not your motivation.
Ah… mine is just my name. Which makes me easy to find. At one point I thought that was a great idea because I wanted to promote my music.
Now I’m kind of wishing I’d kept my FB pseudonymous.
BTW, that is lovely stuff.
BTW, that is lovely stuff.
Algernon@28, Nothing anybody makes will ever be perfect. If you try at all that makes it worthwhile. If you put in a good effort that makes it good enough. I don’t think anyone else would be as critical as you, yourself are. I would think you need to give others a chance to appreciate you and whatever you do.
I know I’m just a stranger commenting on a blog, but something about your comment resonated with me.
Best to you and Happy Monkey!
Meh… let’s just hope I don’t turn into a giant cockroach and die :P
In the meantime though, I pretty much accept all friend requests so it’s not like I’m a true recluse.
Happy Birthday, Audley!
And while on the topic, I would like to thank Tigger for my fabulous Dr Who coffee mug and Jamie Oliver cookbook. (She doesn’t know that’s what she got me.)
Algernon, go for the choir! I love it, and miss it, and have made many friends though singing in choir. Should be great – as long as it’s not a church choir. Or maybe even if it is, as long as it’s a wacky lefty queer-friendly woman-friendly church :)
Thanks Ray, are you new here?
I haven’t posted frequently in a while. At this point I’ve actually been busy with two concurrent projects that are going live by the new year. Work has been taking a lot of my energy away, and I’m not even an “important” person on the job. Just one of the cogs.
To take another direction:
is it possible for a pre-pubescent ADHD person to also be a bully and a bit of an asshole?
Is the bullying asshole because of the ADHD or is it just another personality trait?
Wow. First time I’ve ever been portcullis’d.
As I was saying:
We’re having a nano-Rhinebeck out here tomorrow, only with sushi instead of wool.
I think I know which of those I’d rather eat.
Oh man, there is no way I would sing in a church church choir! Luckily I live in a big city so there’s lots of other things going on. I just have to find a way to make it work in my schedule. When I sing sing my voice has been getting stronger with practice or age and I make a decent mezzo (not great but workable).
Algernon@41, The nym I use now is recent, used to just be “Ray”. Been mostly lurking & learning for the past 8 years or so, commenting infrequently. Completely sympathize with being “Just one of the cogs” that’s my exact job description.
I don’t know but that describes one of my friend’s kids very well, though he’s much younger. The sad thing is he is never like that around adults. He’s bright, fun, and has a sweet nature.
But he does very badly in school, and he just can’t help even picking on kids. He takes their toys, he pushes them around and acts like a boss. It’s sad. When asked about it he denies he did it, and then if he can’t get out of it he’s almost *too* remorseful (as if he’s faking).
He has been diagnosed with ADHD. I think maybe he gets impatient with other people, or bored and starts to “see what they’ll do” but I don’t know if that means there are other things going on. He does seem to *care* about others, he just doesn’t seem to see why taking their things or intimidating them doesn’t gel with caring about them. IOW, he’s surprised no one wants to play with him :( Hopefully it is a growing/learning issue and he’ll learn better social skills with time.
Do you cartwheel in that position?
Esteleth, impressive.
(I like your high spirits)
I tended to pranks in early schooling. Taking things from people’s space and putting it in others, moving chairs of standing individuals, tying shoelaces. Not quite bully, or at least, not the traditional in your face bully. Getting me out of normal school structure largely broke the habit – I went into a special program. I don’t know as I was ADHD, in fact I strongly suspect I was not, but I was most certainly bored and that caused me to act out. I got better: empathy and concern can be learned.
Good song. Thanks, PZ. Looks like she’s doing a humanist themed album.
Not just possible, but easier for the right person; that condition is in addition to their other personality-based predilections, but would facilitate such asocial attitude and behaviour.
(duh)
Well, I’m having a good time. The gig went great. It was like a contra dance orchestra. I’ll go out to see Josh, Audley, Mr. Fire, and the rest tomorrow.
Sally, give everyone a squeeze for me, and make sure you all have one drink for me. :)
So, when I see the bully/asshole/ADHD person for 1 hour on Monday and Friday, to teach him (generic pronoun) something.
Do I teach to the ADHD or to the bully or to the asshole?
what about the other 15 kids?
—-
John Morales
Could it be that assholeness is a result of ADHD?
chigau,
Yes, that is what I was getting at. For me being a jerk was a byproduct of not having good personal coping mechanisms for the differences between me and my classmates.
chigau:
As I wrote.
(Is the concept of ‘facilitation’ so obscure to you, then?)
I’d teach to the ADHD, but be aware of the bully and asshole for the sake of the others.
Caveat: I’m not a teacher!
Ah, Chromosolve Absolut. The Lady has expensive taste. I never did understand using MeOH instead of Vermouth in the cheap stuff, though
[BTW + metameta]
Cheers to you Rhinebeckers.
My brother gave me a knife blade.
This is what I’ve done with it:
http://imageshack.us/photo/my-images/4/bonehandleknife.jpg/
Like?
TLC, osseous awesomeness.
@Dhorvath, OM #49,
I did almost exactly the same things, but one I specialized in was placing thumbtacks on chairs and the desk seats. I only did the moving chair thing a few times because I felt bad about causing, not pain, but embarrassment. I empathized with that!
I still like to move things a bit on people, but even then I feel guilty so much that I’m almost compelled to make amends to them.
Compassion and practical joking don’t mix very well, I find.
ADHD or bright? Ritalin sparked drug addiction in me, although I’m sure I’d have got there quick enough anyway, and didn’t help me concentrate any better. I suspect that many people, esp. around here, that were diagnosed with ADHD and ADD were really just very smart, and bored.
Wow, Bridget, her daughter, Feynmaniac, and I made it to the Rhinebeck meetup (which is not yet in Rhinebeck but in Fishkill NY) safely after a long drive in the rain. We are looking forward to gazing at sheep and fondling wool (or vice versa) tomorrow. Daughter will be on the lookout for deep-fried Mars bars.
John Morales
So which came first, the “condition” or the “personality-based predilections”?
—
TLC
Nice.
I like the P1 as a cross-guard. (if that’s the correct term)
@Algernon, not any old church choir! But I do participate occasionally in one specific church choir – my music teacher is closely associated with them; I join in for special occasions. We sing fabulous classical works – Bach, Haydn and Handel and such. The priest is a woman; there’s gay deacons, and a progressive “feed the poor, welcome the refugees” approach. Basically it’s ultra-liberal Anglican.
On one of the sexism in atheism threads, someone said that they prefer to spend time with progressive religious people than sexist atheists. That.
Chigau: Not sure if it’s the right term or not, I just know it’s a knucklebone from a deer (I’m pretty sure).
John Morales: Thanks. For some reason, the finished product makes me think ‘Pirates of the Caribbean.’ no idea why.
chigau, my analogy was to a catalyst*; surely not all ADHD’s are so extroverted as to bully.
—
*(Either or both, depending)
TLC, remember how you wrote you made an atavistic libation over your kill?
(Similar thing — you’ve made a ritual implement.
(A Wiccan would recognise its power))
(Steals.)
(/For what, I haven’t decided yet…I may have to join FB, just to put that in my profile.)
John Morales: Ah, I see. Does it help that all these pieces of deer bone are from predator-kills I found while camping?
I even think the crossguard might have come from inside a predator’s den up on the hill (oooooh, talismanic!)
This is a rough sketch of what I’m going to do for the contest. I think.
The Laughing Coyote@60, Very cool looking! How are the bone pieces attached to the blade? I don’t see any rivet or screw holes. Hard to see detail though, what are you taking the pix with? (not trying to be critical, just curious)
[TLC, it pleases me you grok]
Ray: I use a webcam which is really hard to hold steady. I’m intending to get a better camera at some point
The fit in the back is hard to describe, and I’m probably gonna have to figure out a better one. Mostly its wedged in a friction fit with small slivers of hard wood. It feels solid enough for now but I always end up revising these things a bit until they suit me.
John Morales: Pleases me too. I don’t think it goes too far into the realm of woo to respect that these materials came from what was once part of a living creature.
And I’ll always remember how cool it was, finding that big excavation under the boulder overlooking the valley, littered with bone scraps and the dirt freshly scraped up (no legible tracks unfortunately, but my money’s on ‘cougar’. It just had that feel to it. Too small for a bear, and unlikely terrain for a coyote pack, but a perfect place for a big cat to stand and take in hir surroundings).
AJ Milne@69, As soon as I read your comment Quoting chigau@29 I flashed on Al Yankovic’s song “Everything you know is wrong” http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EGC09B810Yk
@Caine
What exactly is the support Rebecca Watson project? Other than the obvious I mean.
Ibis3, email Onion Girl for details at oniongirlsaysATgmailDOTcom for details. She’s in Rhinebeck this weekend though, so you might not hear back right away. Or if you like, email me at fleuretduamourATgmailDOTcom and I can forward the info to you and you can get back to Onion Girl about it.
The Laughing Coyote@74, Webcam would explain the “look” of the pic. A camera w/flash would help bring out detail & may help sharpen focus. I know how it goes though, you use what ya got until something better comes along!
re: revising, I totally know what you mean. I got the tinkering gene real bad from my dad.
How sweet. We have Christian Dating Site flavor Spam on the table.
Damn, no comments after my last for over an hour. I thought I broke it! It’s 3:00 am soooo, past time for beddy-bye. Y’all have a good’un.
Ray, you’re posting in the Deep Dark Night, where it’s
Cold and Lonely; others may be seeing Paradise By The Dashboard Light.
Goof morning
(It’s a typo, but I’m leaving it like that)
Gosh I’m feeling better. And I’m suddenly finding the energy I was so seriously lacking the last weeks.
Caine
I like the idea that she’s doing the blindfolding herself.
And RW will probably be swamped in tentacles.
I only hope that my stuff will arrive, international posting to a PO box and such.
creativity
I “need” my sewing and embroidery and generally making stuff. My hands need to work.
It also has the advantage of having stuff afterwards.
I also have a bit of a musical talent and learned to play the flute as a kid. I miss it sometimes.
The kids seem to have inherited my love and talent together with my serious lack of a singing voice.
Murphy’s Law
This morning, we had a new variety.
Both kids slept like small hibernating animals, all night and quite late for them. So we could technically sleep a bit longer than 7 o’clock on a Saturday morning.
Only that two smoke detectors though that this was the time to tell us they needed new batteries…
All people in Rhinebeck
Have a great time. I wished it were as close to me as the name obviously suggests.
Or dinner time, here in .au land. And I’ve just put the Xmas cake in the oven. (Should be done by 11pm)
Cruising on an overflowing river for dinner tonight, then beach tomorrow before a night flight home. What’s worse I wonder, being single and alone, or being in lust and love separated by 8000km ? I’ll find out, I guess. Either way, it doesn’t look like I will be running out of reasons to drink too much in a hurry. Got to see the positives.
I’m thinking there are a few people at Rhinebeck, who went to Rhinebeck and can’t sleep at Rhinebeck but maybe don’t want the sound of clicking keys to disturb the other folks at Rhinebeck.
Did I mention Rhinebeck?
Jealous, me? No, of course not, why do you ask?
TLC, very nice.
So you put shims in your shivs?
onion girl,
i now understand why your friend bought the rose and why she kissed you. i did not know what she was trying to tell me but i figured it out. all of it, including (i presume) our mutual friend from college. i accept and understand. now i will go onward.
rob
And there I always thought shiv was a Britspeak term. Huh. Maybe we imported it, or re-imported it or just share it, I suppose.
Other people’s mileage may vary, but for me, FB has been about turning internet-persona friends into real friends, and sometimes even meatspace friends. Of course, I pretty much defriended all the religious or teaparty meatspace people to enable FB to serve this purpose. This was another benefit of the FB group. (I am really really hopeful that Diaspora will take off so that we can STOP using FB’s spy system for this purpose.)
Rhinebeck is terrific. After maybe half an hour of that awful I’m-a-mutant-and-need-to-hide-from-people feeling, the evening settled into discussion of spinning, midwifery, whether there were Women in the Atheist Movement™, computer games, how exhausting PZ must find his life sometimes, and what to do about the problem of the Canadian Invasion™ (the latter sparked by a friend of DaughterSpawn’s, who complained via FB that Occupy Wall Street wasn’t actually an USAnian effort, but something foisted upon us by those wily Vancouver types from Adbusters, who were Telling Us What to Do in Our Country).
@ 83 Giliell, connaiseuse des choses bonnes
gets a “like” for “Goof morning”.
Goof morning to you too Giliell.
I know it’s way too soon to be talking Christmas, but Alethea H. Claw @84 started it… so blame hir. I’m an atheist who loves Christmas, and as Alethea is in .au land I’ll leave Tim Minchin to give some of the reasons why I love it so.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fCNvZqpa-7Q
all that! (apart from the sun)
Mattir #90
Now that’s a theory about Occupy Wall Street that I hadn’t considered. Um, I need to do some research.
Which would be especially egregious as the US has never, ever, ever told any other nation, or the people in any other nation, what they should or should not do.
No Anglicans much ’round these parts, but in reality I’d happily sing with some UU’s or something. I just mean I’m not going to audition for 1st Baptist or anything.
In case anyone wanted to buy a copy of Shelley’s song: http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B005A8CSUC/ref=dm_ty_trk
Here’s a guy that dives deeper into the Woo than Deepak Chopra.
http://issue3.tmmagazine.org/theory-of-everything.html
Excerpt:
Lynna,
That cracks me up, it’s pretty nearly a plot device from a Dan Simmons novel. That line between fantasy and fiction is far more permeable than I find comfortable.
John Morales@82, You made me laugh out loud with that one! Paradise By The Dashboard Light came out my junior year of high school and was played a lot my senior year. Good times, man.
Giliell@83, and a goof morning to you too!
The Sailor@87, made me chuckle that did.
far as I got, duty calls, gotta go
I can jump on that trend. Goof morning!
Goof morning, all!
Okay, okay, it’s after noon for me.
I got up early this morning and cleaned ALL the things. I scrubbed the counters, mopped, vacuumed, and flipped my mattress. Whew.
*flexes*
And now, lunch.
Hagelin is a Transcendental Meditation bigwig. Woo belief is a given.
Present for you, PZ. Paul Allen thinks our old fave, the Singularity, isn’t ocming anytime soon.
http://www.technologyreview.com/blog/guest/27206/?p1=A2
I keep thinking I should read Adbusters, but every time I look it’s a pop art mess, making it hard to do more than skim. I don’t get the impression they have any solutions for anything other than “Capitalism sucks, let’s get rid of it.” Style over substance.
I didn’t really understand your comment at 390 of the previous Epidode of TET, with the uncles’ names. If we make the analogy less strained, such that (1) people are all females who reproduce parthenogetically, and (2) by default you have the same last name as your mother, and (3) somebody asked why all your aunts were surnamed “Monkey” but you were not, that would be an excellent question.
Presumably the aunts are “Monkeys” because grandma was a “Monkey,” and if your mother changed her surname, there might be a very good reason, or it might just be that she felt like changing her name, and she’s not “not a Monkey” in any interesting factual sense—she’s “a Monkey” like both her aunts and all their kids, in all but name.
—
To avoid saying that “monkey” means “descended from the nearest common ancestor of all the monkeys,” as we would for most groups, we have to either
1) deny that the common ancestor was itself a monkey, and claim that the two “monkey” clades gained monkeyness independently, or
2) acknowledge that it was a monkey, but claim that the apes somehow lost monkeyness in becoming apes.
I can imagine either kind of story making sense. Which are you doing?
As for lumping vs. splitting, it seems to me a that a real splitter who’s unwilling to “lump” the apes into the monkeys could instead say
0) the New World “monkeys” aren’t monkeys at all—they just superficially look like the true monkeys (the Old World catarrhine monkeys) and are no more “monkeys” than apes are—and that apes are closer to “being monkeys” than New World “monkeys.”
Some people actually do that.
Which of the above three things are you arguing? (Or have I missed a fourth option?)
—
I can understand being a real splitter and saying that only OWM’s are monkeys.
I think it’s very much the wrong thing to do, though.
Clearly New World monkeys are forever monkeys in the vernacular sense, and if we’re salvaging a vernacular term by picking the best-fitting vernacular sense and adjusting it to the scientific facts, it’s vastly better to include the apes than exclude all of the American monkeys.
That fits perfectly with both an intuitive and traditional vernacular sense of “monkey” (inclusive of apes) and with the scientific facts.
If we exclude all the NWM’s, the very first thing we need to tell people about monkeys vs. apes is that half the things that are obviously “monkeys” to them are not really monkeys at all—e.g., if they see a monkey with the classic prehensile “monkey tail,” it’s not a monkey. (OWM’s don’t have such “monkey” tails, just plain tails.)
(We are “not monkeys” in the sense that monkeys that do have “monkey tails” are “not monkeys”? Hmm…)
If we don’t always tell them that, first, we should never say “apes didn’t evolve from monkeys.” They will systematically and utterly predictably misunderstand it, and we should not pretend we’re telling them the truth—it’s a huge lie of omission.
I think it’s just destroying the vernacular “monkey” village in order to save it, anyhow. It’s better to go with the other entrenched, vernacular sense of “monkey,” and work from there, i.e., just stop saying that “apes didn’t evolve from monkeys,” or “apes aren’t monkeys.”
—
It’s true that I’m very interested in how to talk about these things to the public, and the politics, but I don’t see that as being in conflict with getting the scientific, phyletic issues right—I think that it was simply a huge terminological mistake to even try to standardize the term “monkey” (in English) as exclusive of apes, starting around 100 years ago. We just fucked up.
What makes it hard to explain monkeys vs. apes isn’t really that it’s complicated—it’s not. It’s precisely that the current “correct” distinction doesn’t make any scientific sense. (That I can discern, anyhow.)
—
Here’s another of the PR-isms that galvanized me to bring this up.
This is from the second (non-creationist) FAQ I found when I googled about this stuff. It’s a bit better than the first one, from PBS (and NCSE), but it’s pretty horrendously messed up.
It’s from the Human Origins Initiative at the Smithsonian Institution. (We can trust them, right?)
IMO, this first sentence is just vague, and the second is false on any non-gotcha interpretation.
It’s saying that we are not descended from monkeys, “or any other primate living today,” as though there’s no such thing as an extinct monkey, so we couldn’t have evolved from monkeys.
But by that standard, we couldn’t have evolved from apes, either, so when they proceed to admit we evolved from an extinct ape—at least they get that right—it makes no sense at all.
They do acknowledge that humans and apes share “a more distant relative,” but that’s true of humans and amoebas; they already said we’re primates, so it’s not telling us anything about the question asked, about monkeys, and what it seems to be saying about our common ancestor with monkeys is false. It’s not “distant,” even on the scale of primate ancestors, especially if we’re talking about monkeys.
They flatly tell us it wasn’t a monkey, without telling that it’s exactly the nearest common ancestor of all the monkeys, and extremely monkey-like, or how such a very monkey-like nearest ancestor of all the monkeys could fail to be the definitive monkey.
That’s just not a “distant relative” of the monkeys, or even of the apes. Quite the opposite: it is the very nearest relative of all the extant monkeys, and an equally near relative of the all extant “apes” as well.
(Actually even nearer, if you just count generations since the common ancestor—most monkeys go through a lot more generations in a million years than any apes. Apes are even more closely related to all monkeys than any extant non-ape monkeys are, by that standard. They’re closer to the center of the monkey radiation. Monkeys typically radiate away from the common ancestor faster than apes, especially great apes, and most especially humans.)
It’s very hard to get any nearer than that, except in the even more interesting sense that we share even nearer common ancestors to many (Old World) monkeys than they share with any (New World) monkeys—so if anybody’s “not descended from a monkey,” but from “a more distant primate relative,” it is definitely those American “monkeys,” poseurs that they are, not us. (Or maybe it’s the particularly short-lived little monkeys in both the OWM and NWM clades, not big ones in either…)
But saying that would sound silly, because it is silly.
Nobody who needs to read a popular FAQ or short mass-audience essay about such things is asking about whether we descended from New World monkeys or Old World monkeys.
If they have even a vague general understanding of “descent,” and don’t know not to ask about “monkeys” as if that term made scientific sense, they’re asking about whether we descended from monkeys, in the exactly the sense that monkeys obviously descended from monkeys.
If they don’t know what a monkey really is, and what obviously monkey-like so-called “monkeys” somehow aren’t really monkeys, you have to tell them, or no answer you give will make any sense at all.
You can’t assume that they just know specialist definitions that even the scientific specialists in the subject don’t really agree on. If they did, they wouldn’t be asking you.
—
This the kind of crap that spokespeople for the Catholic Church say, and justify with the doctrine of “mental reservation”—that it’s not a lie if it’s not what you “meant,” even if you knew full well that others would inevitably think it was what you meant.
You can consider it “true” on some gymnastic interpretation of some obscure, poorly motivated technical definitions, but it’s misleading bullshit no matter how you slice it.
Scientists and educators shouldn’t bullshit like that.
FYI via BoingBoing: “Neuroscience explanations are more believable than mere psychological ones”
Maybe y’all knew this already but it was news to me, eh.
BB link
NCBI link, 2008
ChasCPeterson,
In the previous episode of the thread, you said that mammals didn’t evolve from reptiles, and were a sister clade or something, and both are amniotes.
The last cladistic chart of such things I looked at (on the wikipidea Amniotes page) seems to say that amniotes are exactly “reptiles,” and that mammals are in the reptile clade, hence “a kind of reptile” in the sense that birds are “a kind of reptile.”)
I suspect a whole lot depends on what exactly you consider a really, really ancient “reptile,” or just something “reptile-like,” before the evolution of the slightly less ancient extinct reptiles that led to the extant “reptiles” in the vernacular sense.
I have no opinion at all on that. (Or any idea whether I should have one; it’s not even clear that I should expect a clear truth of the matter of whether the earliest synapsids were “reptiles.”)
Anyhow, when I said that we’re not going to say that “mammals are reptiles,” I wasn’t talking about scientific truth about clades—just that whether or not we determine that mammals evolved from reptiles, I don’t think the mutually-exclusive vernacular use of “reptiles” vs. “mammals” (or “reptiles” vs. “birds”) is going to go away.
I could be wrong about that, but either way I don’t think the slippery slope argument about “monkeys” and “apes” works. It works fine to say that we are “apes” and to say that we are “mammals,” so we can pretty easily plug “monkey” in between, and the mutual exclusion buck doesn’t stop there. We are human apes, and ape monkeys, and monkey primates, and primate mammals. No problem, if we just stop telling people that we’re apes and primates but not monkeys.
If we decide that amniotes are reptiles, we might be able to get people to recognize that we’re mammal reptiles and reptile animals, but I don’t think we’re going to have much luck with “amniotes” (or even “vertebrates”). There’s only so many clades that are going to get into the vernacular.
Also, when I called “animal” wildly ambiguous, I didn’t mean that there’s not a clear scientific sense of “animal.” Just that for many people it’s a fuzzy, prototypey thing, not a clear definition. Some people use it to mean “mammal,” or roughly “tetrapod,” and may not call fish or insects “animals,” although they’re often inconsistent about that, depending on context. Or they may talk about things that can locomote as animals, especilly opposed to plants, which can’t. (Without having any clearer, more scientific sense of the term.) People do seem to generally get that it’s something like a really big clade, but they’re often fuzzy or inconsistent about its scope. Given that, it’s good that “mammal” has gotten into the vernacular, to help make it clear that the “animal” clade is (much) bigger than that.
They say that all good things must end some day
Autumn leaves must fall
Apropos of dancing, prevthread, this popped into my head: The Cat in the Hat, Virtual Insanity.
(“This isn’t dancing, it’s walking, with style!”)
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-asia-pacific-15319924
OWS goes global. Of course the American media concentrates on a few bad actors, out of 10s of thousands. I would bet money the bad actors are agent provocateurs.
Here’s CBS’s headline: “Occupy” protests go global, turn violent
Christopher Walken can dance.
Johnny Depp can dance (with CGI help.)
Futterwacken?
Futterwacken!
and of course the link before it would be FutterWalken.
Oh, man, if you’re going Fatboy Slim, how can it not be Praise You?
Last night, I had the sexism thread loaded on my computer before I went home to internetlessland. So I read it last night before bed. I nearly fell out of my chair giggling at some points, and because I wasn’t able to post I had to text my friend (who had no context for this question whatsoever) “What IS this? A ‘Stupidest Person on the Internet’ contest?”
—
I’m kinda happy today. Sitting in my little nook in the sculpture garden in the shade on a lovely day. I just gotta convince myself to work soon and not screw around on the internet, no matter how nice and relaxing this is. :)
~;>
Rock & Roll story, (you may want to tealdeer): My ex-GF and I went out to see a local Uni group perform. We live at one of the best music schools in the world, and this group is always great.
We got in, were seated in the showroom, a waitress had already taken our order, wheeeeeeeen the group’s manager came up and asked us to leave because it was a ‘closed rehearsal’ and the show didn’t start for another 1/2 hour.
I stood up and said ‘OK, but could everyone in the room who’s been nominated for a Grammy hold their hand up?’
Slowly, my GF held her hand up. The only hand raised.
Then I said ‘Everyone who has a Gold Record hold your hand up.’
Mine was the only hand raised.
We were seated and comped.
For you young musicians, the moral of the story is: You never know who is in the audience. Play your fucking heart out.
@Caine, about that art contest… is there anything more about the story anywhere? I’m thinking of submitting something, but it’s hard for me to draw a character without sufficient grasp of who they are.
Oh, the other moral is don’t be an asshole like me.
TLC, I would like to commission a custom knife. Do you do this? I want to send a gift to a friend of mine who is a blade aficionado.
At the very least, the ADHD would make a wonderful contributing factor! Attention span problem, tendancy to not think things through or consider consequences….sounds tailor-made.
–
“Morning” is a state of mind.
A sucky, sucky state of mind.
FSM, I hate mornings. </grump>
–
The second thing would be to define “prehensile” for them.
–
Goof evening. Happy Thursday. NASCAR tonight. Fun times.
Father Ogvorbis@122, What time zone are you in? It’s Saturday in mine. :) My problem with having a career in NASCAR is when I get out on the track, I can never remember which way to turn.
I like “goof morning” (or afternoon/evening/night) I think I’m going to use that from now on!
The Sailor@106, I love that song!
To the left, ever to the left
Never to the right, forever to the left
May our creed be always to exceed
Regulated speed, no matter what the need
Giliell:
Mmmph, I forgot about the blindfold, I might have to rework a little. Thanks!
I’m sure your stuff will get there okay, things didn’t have to be mailed until the 1st. I won’t be mailing mine until Monday or Tuesday. Tentacles crossed.
Drive-by hellooooo! To all the Rhinebeckers.
http://www.colouredsheep.org.nz/index.php
You’d love it here, really you would.
Pteryxx:
I have no idea, I haven’t had time to delve into the blog at all and I’m not on FB or twitter. I’d ask in the contest thread.
cicely:
Well, yeah, but I thought it went without saying. :-) I was actually thinking more along the lines of “those monkey tails they can wrap around branches and stuff.”
But maybe it’s a good word to go ahead and define, while you’re at it, and mention elephants’ prehensile penises. Keep ’em awake.
My two favorite starts to books:
Richard Condon: The human comedy begins with the vertical smile.
Don Winslow: Fuck you.
Courtesy of hoggle, talking about Ophelia Benson. Abbie – who, to be fair, might not have seen it yet – has said nothing. Neither has anyone else objected. This has to stop.
Except we all know it never will. :/
SC:
No surprise there.
That would be good, however, I don’t see that happening.
Feed your head.
3400 comments of shit like that? What do they achieve?
In general, perhaps not. But the science blogging community can collectively stand against it.
Ah yes, last night someone called Ophelia a “defective unit”. Time to pop over for some troll-smiting and Ophelia-hugs.
I always wish that song was longer. Maybe with a different pill?
@Sailor, one of Mrs Moniker’s favourite songs. Nice.
hi, this is what I learnt tonight
– the iOS 5 update has made my iPad less child-proof, for it has added all these multi-gestures which enable 1 y.o. infants to get out of the children apps they’re supposed to be staying inside. Hopefully there’s a way to turn multi-gestures off.
– interesting development regarding my bio-son and his two mothers: apparently he has started calling them “mama” in plural, but “ma” when addressing them individually. The stimulus presented to him was of course “mama”, so it must be the way he has parsed the word, as some kind of plural (though I think it is too early for complex morphology like that at 14 months, the next time I run into a language acquisition linguist I’ll ask them)
– I’ve come to the conclusion that I’m probably not transgendered. (I’m not saying that it’d be a bad thing, but just something I had been thinking about more closely in the last few years)
But even more favourite, Arlo Guthrie:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pzygFoMDiF8
Goof night all. ;)
I’ve posted about it. We can say that we can’t do something about every episode of violence, but we can speak out against veiled threats in our community. At least speak out.
http://saltycurrent.blogspot.com/2011/10/skeptical-atheist-community-needs-to.html
What annoyed me this morning was discovering that when I put the “hold” at my library on the new Dawkins tome, I put it on the audio book.
Now that I’ve corrected that to the print version, I’ve gone from 6th in line to 27th.
—-
I spent some time at the Edmonton version of “Occupy Wall Street”.
It seemed rather unfocused.
Which I see as a good thing.
The 99% were represented: Raging Grannies to “bikers” to christians.
I estimated about 800 persons before I departed.
I am not a happy camper. My tub & toilet decided to flood my bathroom. Even now they are happily gurgling to each other. I was watching TV when it started 2 hours ago.
My landlady says she called the plumber, probably another relative of hers. It’s also happening to my neighbor’s flat.
I have a hotel room for the night, I told my landlady this. I hope she realizes it’s coming out of my rent, just like the clean-up bills are.
ARRRRRRRrrrrrgggggghhhh!
I’m in the ‘Irregular WorkWeek’ time zone. Also known as the Ogvorbisverse.
And wow did I block that borkquote big time.
The Sailor
Be sure to empty the hotel ‘fridge of it’s $8 potato chips and add that to the landlady’s tab.
chigau, that’s a lovely suggestion … but I’m staying at the Motel 6. I’ve already changed my room once because I didn’t like the blood stains on the bedspread. No, I’m not kidding.
Hell, for what staying in town is costing me I could have gone to Rheinbeck (sp?), we’ll see how deducting the expenses goes.
In my favor, I’ve lived here for 10+ years, and raised my own rent once. In her favor, I don’t have a lease.
Ogvorbis, if that’s the hokey pokey ur doin it wrong.
Ohh, NASCAR, well OK then.
Some years ago, I was at a skating rink with my friend and his little sister for her birthday. When they started doing the Hokey Pokey, my reaction was, You have got to be shitting me! and I swore off going to skating rinks for the rest of my life.*
* Until, of course, Boy and Girl started going to birthday and school skating parties.**
** And I realized just how old I have become when the only two songs I recognized the entire night was the Hokey Pokey and The Chicken Dance.***
*** Which has got to be the absolute worst song/dance/whatever the fuck you call it ever invented.
[Oh. Look. They’re turning left.]^gazillion
and noisy.
and mind-numbingly boring.
(watching. I’m sure driving is interesting.)
Father Ogvorbis@145, Love the live blogging! I laughed so hard I was almost crying. I think I’ve got it now. Left, right?
I regularly have an irregular work week. Maybe I should call it the postalverse? I’m off Monday and Tuesday so my Friday is Sunday and my Monday is Wednesday, see? “And a horse has no udders and a cow can’t whinny and up is down and sideways is straight ahead.”
Ogvorbis, some day I’m going to show up at your work. (Hopefully the day job;-)
++++++++++++++++++++++
Still waiting for the plumber. Maybe I’m waiting for the electrician or someone like him.
“absolute worst song”
I’d hafta go with Amazing Grace played at funerals. on the bagpipes.
There exist a bunch of lovely laments for pipes.
There is no need to use a
The Sailor@153, Is the plumber/electrician named Godot?
Ray – “Left, right?” OK, I did laugh out loud. I’ll add the keyboard to my expenses this weekend.
chigau, sometimes they do road courses, or so I’ve heard. I don’t watch.
I like drag racing, but I’ve never been. 6 seconds and 300+ miles an hour? Oh yeah.
But I still can’t understand why anyone wants to go that fast and want to stay on the ground.
“And a horse has no udders and a cow can’t whinny and up is down and sideways is straight ahead.”
Gad, I ♥ that movie!
Even with all the extreme hokiness.
Well, the Mythies this week were crashing a car with a mixed binary Hollywood explosive in the trunk, with a small truck on a rocket sled (~300 mph), seeing if the crash (spectacular) would set off the explosive.
Bag pipes are just wrong. A diminutive, quiet friend of mine once punched out a bagpiper. A cheer went up. They’re like calliopes, best heard from a distance.
Amazing Grace & Danny Boy always bring a tear to my eye. AG has a wonderful back story.
chigau@157, Very hokie, but I love it too. I think I need to see if I can find it on DVD.
The Sailor@156, Sorry about the keyboard. I’ve heard from other commenters that things can be sent via USB port, as soon as I can figure out how, a new one will be on its way.
Nerd,
Once, before they had a decent budget and ran out of actual myths, they were mildly interesting.
(But that was long ago)
Nerd, I love (oh, shit, the fucking toilet and tub are gurgling again), now where was I, oh yeah, the Mythbusters are cool, but it’s not like it’s science.
I mainly watch them because Junkyard wars isn’t on anymore.
Ya know, a lot of people aren’t all thrilled and warm about that “backstory”. All well and fine for a slave owner to write a hymn and claim he’s all better now, but he was a christian before his supposed enlightenment. Writing a hymn did not make up for all the terrible things he did.
Ray, if I wasn’t waiting for the electrician or someone like him, I would have said “don’t crush that dwarf, hand me the pliers”.
I’ve heard drag racing compared to a more well known sport in Lord Chesterfields words: the pleasure is momentary, the position ridiculous, and the expense damnable.
Ray, rude-ass yankee
also try
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Circle_of_Iron
I have the DVD.
Somewhere.
Most of my DVDs are somewhere …
on a shelf
in a box
under the table
somewhere …
Caine, I find the back story kinda cool, a shipwrecked sailor realizes his whole life has been evil.
And we can’t really make up for the wrong things we have done, we just try to be better people.
As hymns go, I find it uplifting. At least there is some truth in it.
I went to ERV, and I responded to the veiled misogynistic threats. I said “No.” If anyone wants to speak up against the hate, please follow my link and add your No.
Wow, turns out I was waiting for the electrician or someone like him, and the panel van says Electric Services … and Plumbing Contractors.
Also, too, the boss plumbing contractor decided to give his employees the on-call weekend off. I guess he’s the on-cologist.
I love the pipes.
not Amazing Grace.
And how would you recognize me? We all wear the same thing.
What goes on at night is not considered work.
==============
So which is worse? A bagpipe, an accordian, or a poorly played violin? After all, they don’t call it ‘vile’ for nothing.
The Sailor: Oh I’m flattered, real flattered, but I’m not sure. My work is ‘good enough’, ‘for me’, but I’m honestly not sure I’m confident enough to actually make a knife for someone else and stand by it…. This isn’t a flat out refusal or anything…. just that it’s a hard one and one I’ll have to think about for a while.
The bone handle just ‘came together’. Somehow, nature and the knife blank seemed prefitted for each other and It ‘just worked’. And if it breaks on me, I can do something else with it. I would be mortified and embarrassed to hell if a knife I made for someone else ‘failed’ on them.
Still, we all have to start somewhere. What kind of custom work are you thinking?
I dunno bout Amazing Grace, but there’s one song permanently guaranteed to make my eye-holes leak… the song my uncles blasted from their car stereo as we put the grandparent’s ashes in the ground.
“Well the cat’s in the cradle with the silver spoon,
little boy blue and the man in the moon…”
Can’t remember the title. Though I know I should. It’s a permanent association now though. I’ll always get a little misty whenever I hear that song.
Please, no consolation. The death of my grandparents was a ‘beautiful thing’. We can’t say about afterlives, but their last moments in THIS life were spent surrounded by loving family. You can’t ask for a better end than that. They were loved, they were mourned, and they are remembered.
I’m sorry, I seem to have something stuck in my eye.
Like what? God taught me better and now I’ll go to heaven? Sorry, I’m with those who consider it insulting and offensive.
Ogvorbis:
A poorly played violin.
TLC:
The song is by Harry Chapin: Cat’s in the Cradle. Great song.
re custom knife
The SO
hashad a custom-made knife.The knife-maker measured the SO’s hand.
It was a a thing of beauty, but now it is somewhere …
Thank you Caine and John and others. Decency reigns.
Go No.
SC:
Done. However, the arguments are already coming in and I refuse to give erv anymore clicks and I do not want to deal with hoggle, either. Sorry.
Father Ogvorbis: It is, isn’t it? Even without the association, it’s the kind of emotional message that resonates with me.
TLC:
“Cat’s in the Cradle”, by Harry Chapin.
Brilliant song.
Another excellent one is “Vincent”, by Don McLean (of American Pie fame). Most people know it by its repeated lyric, “Starry Starry Night”.
PaulW:
‘Reptiles’–extant ‘reptiles’–has always meant the assemblage: turtles, lizards (inc. snakes) , tuataras, and crocs.
It’s the most famous example of a paraphyletic assemblage.
[as you know:] To be considered a monophyletic ‘clade’ (redundant), as required in modern phylogenetic taxonomy, the assemblage would have to include the common ancestor of those groups and all of its descendants.
For ‘reptiles’ to be a clade, then, it would also have to include birds (archosaurs as are crocs), but it still excludes mammals, since the most recent common ancestor of extant ‘reptiles’ was not an ancestor of mammals.
This clade, the formal ‘Reptilia’, is more often referred to these days as ‘Sauropsida’.
In this view, basal synapsids are better understood as ‘reptile-like mammals’ than as ‘mammal-like reptiles’.
Really, you don’t think ‘vertebrates’ is in the vernacular? That’s too bad.
I agree, although you’re correct that many many people don’t even make that distinction.
Caine,
That was my main objection, but I rationalised it thus: if her hate monument is what primarily garners page views and comments, that in itself is a (sad) monument to her.
Caine:
That’s it, thanks. That’s fantastic. Just the one word against threats – a “No” campaign.
Chas?
I’m on board with that, I can not see why I should give that vile cesspool of misogyny any other clicks, and to the woman who would like to see every other woman destroyed so that she can sit on top of the pile of hate like any other sick fuck that ever was born on this earth? Fuck her…
seriously.
If I were to spare her my contempt because she is female then *that* would indeed be sexist.
Every sick human fuck that ever walked this earth was human.
I have added my support to the ‘no’ campaign.
I think many parents hear that song and think, “Damn, what if that is the way I am a parent?” We get so involved in providing for the physical needs of our family that we miss out on the really good stuff.
Another really good song is Father and Son by Cat Stevens. Another song with haunting lyrics — it speaks so eloquently to the gap between old and young.
G’night, folks. Tomorrow is Friday!
I LOVE YOU GUYS.
Thanks, Algernon and TLC.
The Sailor (#159)
I got to hear one from ten feet away last Thursday. My animal physiology prof is friends with the piper, Tyrone Heade, and has him perform for the class as part of the lecture about avian ventilation. The guy was really good, though and took his hundred-year-old pipes apart to show us the different parts.
My parole officer is so proud of me
Bagpipes wail; they don’t so much make music as evoke passion.
—
I here recommend Lost Dorsai by Gordon R. Dickson.
(Powerful story)
Tastes differ.
“Cat’s in the Cradle”, by Harry Chapin. ickickickyuckeeewwbleah
“Vincent”, by Don McLean. pure genius
EEEEEEEWWWWWWW YOU MADE ME GO TO ERV!
I need a shower.
I couldn’t put in my real email. [email protected] says No.
ObLink: March of Cambreadth (by Heather Alexander*)
(A staple of military SF)
—
* Alexander James Adams
John:
True. I did go, I see the value in putting a NO there, I just don’t want to give her the clicks that would be generated if I kept going back to argue. I get enough of that here, and from what I’ve seen, there’s no reasoning with the hoggle monster anyway.
Ogvorbis:
That one, I identified with as a teen. I’ve always found Cat’s in the Cradle to be on the saccharine side and very negative, as though every parent in the world is going to end up the same way. Pffft.
this is fun. Stop me if I’m going too far.
-Franc Hoggle.
TEEHEEHEE
I am so fucking tired of スミスさん.
I hope he gets hit by a bus.
(Doin’ my Japanese Language homework.)
The Sailor@164, Whooosh: sound of reference going over my head. I didn’t look it up until after I made that comment@155. Got it now though. I may never get the hang of this. Hope the plumbers name really isn’t Godot though, you might be waiting a while.
chigau@166, Thanks, remember seeing it on HBO about 1979ish? I just need to search out a copy online, I doubt my local discount DVD place would have it.
SC (Salty Current), OM@168, Done.
G’night TET. Work upon the morrow waits. (or sumpin like that)
I’m avoiding doing my Japanese homework. By commenting on blogs. Which is funny because my Japanese homework is to comment on blogs.
Looks like SS/Monkey Genes/PaulG yada, yada, yada is back under the nym Truthsiss. Was that even 24 hours from the last ban?
A. Noyd:
I’m avoiding working on my piece by ripping out the rest of the carpet in my studio and re-organizing. Yes, that’s work, but it’s not the work I should be doing.
So, in addition to putting a “No” over at ERV, I actually read some of the comments.
WHAT THE FUCK IS WRONG WITH THOSE “PEOPLE”????
I’m mocking Hoggle. Please stop me if I’m going too far. This is too enjoyable. I’m a bad person.
TLC, there’s no such thing when it comes to Hoggle, and as long as it’s over at erv, eh, go crazy.
They never made it to decent human being.
it’s like he only ever posts in rant mode, teehee.
PZ Myers, if you read this, you are now known as the Baboon King. Apparently.
Count me in the ‘no’ brigade.
Thanks, again! Good night, and please carry on.
There’s just so much hatred and bile present in those threads at ERV. As someone on the job market at the moment, there is no way in hell that I’d want my name associated with those threads in anyway.
I’m happy to see the ‘no’s’ continue coming in.
Hoggle seems to not get that it’s not the cursing we’re objecting to, it’s the misogyny.
Such a proud paragon of free speech he is.
Been attending comic con.
Tired, but so much fun. Spent today missing the panels I highlighted to hang out at Artist Ally.
LOCK SHIELDS!*
*done
___
Oh, jesus christ, Mr. Hoggle thinks he’s the one being bullied and persecuted. They’re ‘rising up in rebellion.’ That’s Tea Party level obliviousness right there.
TLC, good luck and aim for the head.
TLC:
Yeah? Well PZ’s my Daddy*. Pbbffft.
*According to SS et al. Never mind that we’re the same age.
So pretty much EVR is the Rebecca Black of scienceblogs?
What will happen to ERV if National Geographic actually decides to implement ‘censorship’?
*stumbles in*. I love you guys.
Hey, did ERV ever defend her statement about the hpv vaccine and cervical cancer?
Wow, can’t even spell my name. It’s late and I’m tired.
Carliec
She finally managed to choke out that she was wrong.
Comment held in moderation, which is as good a time as any to leave the turds to float in their bowl. You people weren’t kidding about ERV. Yech.
I know now how the hyena feels after rolling in an aged carcass.
Carlie
I read Carliec as Celeriac and thought “yum”.
Now I’m going to bed.
I think that they eat them rather than roll in them.
TLC:
I expect the hyena rather likes that, whereas anyone who is a decent human being feels like they were tossed into a cesspit when over at erv. Blecch.
Goofnight Chigau. Dream well.
*sprays TLC with febreeze to dispel the monumental stench*
Bugger. That “eat” should be a link as in
“I think that they eat them rather than roll in them.”
I rather liked provoking hoggle. But, alas, I’m NOT a hyena, and as such, filth like that is only something to be indulged in occasionally.
Hoggle has it right I’m afraid, I’m a baboon now, remember, and IIRC a bunch of male baboons died somewhere from indulging in spoiled meat. This of course led to dire consequences for their society. I simply can’t risk that.
Not sure I qual for decent human being status but I’d describe the experience as suddenly being kicked in the chest by a cow who’s leg you were trying to bandage and then watching it hurl itself at the nearest stake like object.
TLC:
No, no you can’t. Hoggle is best left crooning to that angry inch of his.
Julian:
I think you do, haven’t noticed anyone kickin’ your ass off the bus, right? ;)
That’s a charitable description.
I’ve decided to embrace my new Baboon identity.
A long time ago, I used to hang out around some Civil War reenactors (I wasn’t seriously into reenacting myself, just hung out). During the blamming and screaming and marching and general chaos of one battle, Highland Unit bagpipes wailing above it all, I heard some grunt in the rear ranks yell “SHOOT THE PIPER! SHOOT THE PIPER!”
Sometimes I’m happy that I have a peer group now and socialize fairly regularly.
And sometimes I end up with them while they compile lists of their top 5 celebrities they’d want to fornicate with.
Noises outside, the trucks in the street
Will cover my flight, my hero’s retreat
I’m supposed to feel bad, but I don’t anymore
Only when you remind me
Air in my lungs, a cough and a wheeze
Holes in the bellows and blood on the keys
You move along, there’s nothing to see
Nobody loves you like me
TLC, in your honour I shall now paint my buttocks luminous red and moon you.
Meanwhile, has anyone here made Bircher muesli? I had some fabulous bircher muesli at a hotel in Sydney a couple of months back, and now it’s Spring and warming up it seems more appealling than porridge. But I find myself awash in recipes with ratios of oats:liquids varying by a good order of magnitude. A woman with one recipe can cook; a woman with 27 recipes just stares at the oats and looks confused.
Bagpipes are great! Particularly when the person playing them knows what they are doing. Unfortunately I was at a funeral last week where the piper absolutely butchered Mull of Kintyre. It was so bad that on the drive back I promised my Father that when his time came, I’d make sure that the piper knew what they were playing.
Alethea: Your baboon gesture of respect is appreciated.
Speaking of cereal, I was just browsing that section of the grocery store and came across a box of “Mallow Oats” from a brand called Mom’s Best Naturals. They claimed to have “natural marshmallow pieces” in them. What’s in a “natural marshmallow,” you ask? If you guessed it would have something to do with the marshmallow plant, you’re wrong. The answer is: “evaporated milled sugar, modified corn starch, corn syrup, dextrose, gelatin, blueberry, pumpkin and carrot concentrates for color, natural flavor.” Good to know that kids can be safe from synthetic dyes and flavors while eating their breakfast candy.
A. Noyd:
FFS. Sad thing is, there will plenty of people who will eat that up. (pun intended). Now if it had mallow buttons in it…
Alethea,
So, be an artist and improvise a culinary piece you can rehearse and — which if successful—incorporate into that corpus. :)
(Express yourself!)
[PS No, I haven’t forgotten you’re the Canberra cook!]
Could someone help confirm my memory, here?
Wasn’t “Mr. Dunderbak’s” a fairly widespread chain at one point? Apparently, there are only two or three left now, and I can’t even find any information about the chain.
Hello to all,
So I was told that this is the place for general discussions and I thought I’d try to wash away the bad taste in your mouths after my not-so-smooth entrance with a short introduction.
My name is Tomaž, I’m 32 and I live in a small town in Slovenia (do I need to write “former Yugoslavia” for you educated types here? :) ). I’m a physicist that works as a development/testing engineer. I’m trying to be active on topics of religion, atheism, secularism, quack-science, climate change, gay rights etc. Unfortunately, my activism is currently limited to on-line conversations and occasional letters to editors of newspapers and magazines. There are like-minded people in Slovenia and the goal is for us to organize in some way and be active in the public sphere. My main problem is finding the time for all this. If I’ll find the time, I hope to see PZ in Cologne at the 2012 European Atheist Convention.
I also play in a local amateur big band, here’s Georgia On My Mind for your listening pleasure :)
Bagpipes can be entertaining in no more than five minute intervals, that being how long it takes the drone to reach pounding irritation.
Picked up the PS3 release of Shadow of the Colossus/ICO. Biggest problem I had with Shadow before was the choppyness (probably an older model PS2), so it’s definitely improved. I do feel bad killing the colossuses, they keep looking at me with big puppy eyes.
Hi Tomaz, welcome to TET. You picked a quiet time, some of the regulars are having a get-together in Vermont this weekend and there’s a large meeting of regulars going on in Rhinebeck, NY this weekend. So, not too much going on right now.
Re Shadow of the Colossus
Favorite game of the PS2 era (however brief it was) Wish more people had played it and that instead of churning out Gears of World War 3 developers would make more games like it.
This may be apocryphal but I remember hearing stories of Scottish units being led into battle by the pipes as late as WW II.
Not apocryphal. There were several examples of it happening.
Indeed, google is my friend.
As clarification, my previous response was simply the first hit from a google search of “bagpipes leading into battle ww2”. For what it’s worth I think having the pipes playing in the background would be a moral booster, unless it’s an ambush.
Hi Tomaz, welcome aboard.
John, I decided to improv rather than follow recipes. I put it together before dinner and just checked in with it now and it was too solid, so I added some milk. Tomorrow morning will be the test.
I’m not cooking very much at the moment, I still have no breath to stand at counters and chop and lift things for more than a minute or two. Luckily my boiled fruitcake recipe is very easy to do in stages.
SC, OM@168,
Another No added.
Alethea:
That’s no good. Any hope for improvement?
Darkling:
See also Bill Millin
SteveV! Where ya been?
Alethea,
:(
So, is anybody else still on Eugene’s mailing list of Ultimate Homophobia? You know, the one from the poll that turned out to be a petition? I just got another mail from him. He has kindly informed me of Obama’s secret plan to sell out America to the homosexual agenda.
It’s riveting stuff. Although, I wish he would go a little easier on the underlining and text coloring. What is it with nutbags that they all have this fascination with fonts, colors and effects?
Thanks for the sympathies. I do think I’m getting closer to a diagnosis – it seems that I have a partially collapsed lung. My Dr is waiting on the cardiologist’s report before we go on. As chronic diseases go, I must say that this one is pretty good. Now that the chest infection’s cleared up, I’m in no pain. No discomfort at all, really, except for the breathlessness.
Any chance the lung will heal? That happened to a close friend of mine, but it did get better at least.
Hi Tomaž! Nice to meet you.
in re bagpipes, may I recommend two albums by Hamish Moore and Dick Lee: The Bees Knees (1990) and Farewell to Decorum (1992). Forget anything you ever thought about Scottish music in general and bagpipes in particular – this is jazz fusion.
Bet at least some of you never knew that there was such a thing as jazz (inc. some blinding free and semi-free) on a wild variety of different kinds of bagpipes (plus loads of other instruments) :) (although the tracks do include a couple of more traditional numbers (there’s no trad piping, though)).
Re “Amazing Grace” on the bagpipes:
The tune predates the hymn (lyrics) and is called “New Britain.”
When I hear it on the pipes I like it a lot better if I think of it as “New Britain.” The whole “grace” concept is creepy and makes me think of evil Calvinist insanity.
I’d always thought “New Britain” was a standard Scottish tune before it was “Amazing Grace,” but my friend google tells me that’s unclear. It’s apparently an combination of two older traditional tunes of unknown provenance, but maybe Scottish.
From Wikipedia:
I know nothing about the history of “Amazing grace” but I do like the music, on the other hand the lyrics…
Waiting for flight home now. In too good a mood to visit Abbie’s hate house right now, but will read SC’s blog post tomorrow, and then see what I can add. As to “it has to stop”, it’s Abbie’s place, she could stop it anytime. It’s just that she does not want to.
Thanks, KG and everyone. Man, that thread is sickening.
Welcome, Tomaž! I’ve been through Slovenia on a train. There are a lot of trees there! It looked beautiful. Most heavily forested country I’ve ever seen. Best of luck with your organizing.
Yes, I know. I really meant that it has to stop escalating without a resounding protest. I’d like for that protest to put an end to it, but it probably won’t. I don’t know how the remaining bloggers at Sb can stand to be on the same site with that thread.
*checks ERV*
Hmm… I wonder how many realize that wasn’t said to Rebecca Watson but to Amanda Ahlquist. Meh. Doesn’t matter. And of course there’s Ms. Smith encouraging it all. Lovely person, isn’t she?
Does it matter? They’re all cunts.
No, it was said about Ophelia Benson.
Now to the fair!
SC,
I do think that the buck stops with Abbie Smith, those other clowns don’t have blogs that anyone reads unless they can promote their shit via ERV, so if she closes comments, the haters will fade into obscurity. If it takes a campaign to NatGeo to achieve that, I’m in.
Algernon:
Yep, in a nutshell.
Oh – I wasn’t aware. That’s good news. Is it on that thread?
Are you sure? I first remember seeing it linked to in a piece discussing Ms. Ahlquist’s treatment by commentors at a Fox News Forum. But my memory is usally very spotty.
Rorschach:
Me too.
SC:
I don’t know. I mentioned her asinine behaviour about the vaccine in another thread recently and John Morales told me she’d corrected herself. I’ve been hopelessly behind and I don’t read erv, so I can’t point you to the relevant place.
Julian, yes, it was Ophelia Benson.
Dude, it was yesterday :):
https://proxy.freethought.online/butterfliesandwheels/2011/10/when-in-doubt-threaten/
Wasn’t at B&W. Anyway, my bad. Guess it was something else said about Ms. Ahlquist that reminded me of that.
Caine, Fleur du Mal
Hi Caine!
Workin’ n’ lurkin’
It was at B&W. Ophelia linked to it in that post about the comments about Ahlquist. You must have thought that was another of the comments about Ahlquist. You commented in that thread.
[ERV]
Wading through that shit just makes me feel ill. I tried to fight back for a while, but now I don’t see the point. I came in when the shit hit the fan and got out when the shit hit the fan.
Life is just to short to have to deal with those people.
Sorry.
Theophontes, I feel pretty much the same way about erv and what’s going on there, however, I did go and post a simple No. Maybe it’s pointless, but I think SC’s idea is a good one, to at least let people at large know that decent beings are sickened by the crap.
An interesting article about HOX genes and their role in vertebrate development.
I don’t know about decent people, but the only comment Abbie has made was:
Whatever that’s got to do with anything. Although, I am a bit glad I don’t understand whatever passes for humor there.
Contender for Idiot of the Month:
I see that Scented Nectar is using is using “femtard”.
Beatrice:
Oy. Still playing the chill girl, I see. :eyeroll:
Janine:
Lovely. Too bad xe’s not using it as a nym.
House moving this weekend. My new view is awesome. Surreal. I’m gonna steal the projector from work next weekend and project shit. Bladerunner on teh makedo. Linky, Linky2, Linky3
Caine, there is no need to use xe for SN. Save that for people who have not revealed a gender or prefer to not present one.
I think ERV has provided a useful service in one respect.
It seems there is no critical mass for stupidity. No matter how much stupidity is crammed in a space, no matter how dense the dense are, you cannot get stupidity to explode.
Best use petrol then.
PS: FB is not all bad. I discovered GOD…. More Linky
Janine, I used it because I don’t trust SN’s statement as to gender.
Caine, I understand. But my policy is to address a person as the gender that is presented. SN presents as a woman and so, until proved otherwise, I will refer to her as such. As repugnant as her views are.
Noob question: Is there any way to change the time settings? Everything for me is showing up at -1 while I’m at -6.
foodmetaphors
Dunno. Me at 11h42.
PM
(but I’m GMT +8) … (Ok, I’ll stop overposting)
foodmetaphors, no, there isn’t. The time was fine, until the last set of changes, then it ended up borked for everyone. Right now, where I am, it’s 11:00 am.
Found a little snippet on youtube in case anyone fancies a listen – it’s http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2TReEWVNMf4
Hamish Moore and Dick Lee – Concerto for Bagpipes and Jazz Orchestra
It starts off sounding very trad, but check out the segue at about 2:00 minutes, and then it does all sorts of things … most of them nice :-)
PS I previewed to check, and the link is just a link in preview – it surely shouldn’t embed or anything!?!?!
Teach me to post without the sources in front of me. Got that mixed up with some other things linked off of JT Eberhard’s and Digital Cuttlefish’s posts.
Opposablethumbs,
It was nice at the beginning with the Irish pipes, the trnsition left be a little bit flat. But once those highland pipes kicked in, it was awesome. I didn’t know you could get clean blue notes on the pipes. Thanks for sharing that..
Thanks for the birthday wishes, everyone! Mr Darkheart and I are travelling home after the fabulous Spokesgay sleepover, which was, you know, fabulous. Tons of beer and cake and pie were consumed with Josh, the Fires and Sally Strange. Good times.
Oh, and Josh gave me some of the sourdough starter, even though I’ve no fucking clue what to do with it*. Regardless, we named our starter “Hans Gruber”.
*Well, make bread, obvs, but I’ve never made bread before. It’ll be an adventure!
I love you. (In a totally not creepy way. I promise.)
@Therrin
While I have never played the game, from what I know about this game, the point of it is to make you feel bad about killing the huge monsters. Which means it is doing its job and it is better than 99% of the games out there.
Sleepover at Josh’s?! I’m so jealous.
Thanks Salty. Thanks all the no-sayers. Mind you – this isn’t about me or for me, in particular, it’s about women-who-speak-up in general. Jessica Ahlquist, Rebecca Watson, me, whoever. It’s the pattern. It’s “How do we stop the bitch?” (Remember that? Said by a woman, too.)
Alethea – I had scalp-liftingly good muesli at a hotel in Stockholm last year. I occasionally consider writing them to beg for the recipe. Maybe you could beg the Sydney hotel.
Beatrice,
Awe, I ♥ you, too (possibly in a very creepy way!). :D
Ophelia:
Which is one more reason all the uppity women need to keep on speaking up. We’re getting more and more reasons all the time. :sigh:
MikeG, glad you liked it. I think they’re a very interesting duo-plus-friends; the two albums have lots of other stuff in (loosely speaking) a similar-ish vein, some of which I think is merely pleasant but some of which is just blindingly good!
Have to say, they were amazing live (Edinburgh Festival, going back a bit now :-))
I made the mistake of going over to the thread on ERV, and it was like entering into a parallel reality. Just the sheer level of obtuseness on display is staggering. I saw whines about how the standard suggestions for the use of decaying porcupines adressed to trolls over here amounted to threats of violence and even hate speech. At one point there was even someone saying, apparently in all seriousness, that taking a stand against misogyny somehow belittles the suffering of male rape survivors, and whinging about nobody posting the statistics of male rape in the Congo.
I tried to leave a comment of my own in a (most likely pointless) bid to explain why we find misogynist language so offensive, and also register my own opposition top the ‘kick her in the c*nt’ line. Unfortunately, it appears my post is lost, seemingly forever, in the wasteland of moderation for some reason.
Gregory:
Shades of the intersection.
Yeah right. It’s thanks to the Horde that one memorable thread saw many rape survivors coming out of lurkdom to relate their experiences, including men.
Why in the hell would anyone think using the nym Christraper was okay? Some people…
Completely OT (if such a thing is possible on TET):
Last May the last combat veteran of World War I died and PZ posted a thread about it. In the discussion a googlemess recommended I read Niall Ferguson’s The Pity Of War: Explaining World War I. I just finished it this morning. My feelings are rather mixed.
Ferguson sets out to “disprove” ten major myths about the war. Although the book is well written, and the arguments clear, I’m not certain that the goal is obtained. First, scholars have recognized some of those myths as myths for decades. These certainly include the first two: The myth that war was inevitable due to economic rivalries, imperialism, secret military alliances, or an arms race; and the myth that Germany started the war because the German government felt strong relative to other European powers.
While his refutations of some other myths are analytically convincing, Ferguson fails to provide convincing non-analytical explanations for why his numbers come out the way they do. For example, he argues that contrary to the standard myth, the German army was tactically and operationally superior to the armies of Britain, France and the US through to the end of the war in 1918. His evidence essentially is that the average German soldier killed or wounded more than one enemy soldier before he himself was killed or wounded. I believe the numbers, but Ferguson doesn’t explain why they turned out that way. He just says the Germans developed better tactics for both attack and defense than their enemies, but doesn’t explain why.
Also there’s an eleventh myth that Ferguson argues against which has received great attention from other historians. This is the idea that Britain had to participate in the war to prevent Germany from dominating continental Europe and thereby destroying Britain as a great power. Ferguson argues that the original war aims of Germany in the west were relatively benign. After quickly defeating a France unaided by Britain, the Germans would have imposed heavy monetary reparations of France and then restored independence to both Belgium and France. Ferguson claims Germany would have forced both countries, along with much of central Europe, into an economic union, not much different and not much more dangerous to Britain than the German-centered European Union that exists today.
Ferguson says that German plans for serious annexations of territory, all of Belgium and the northwest of France, weren’t formulated until the war was a couple of months old. There are several problems with this argument. The most obvious to me, is that although France would have lost the war without the aid of Britain, the logistic problems encountered by the German army during the opening phase of the war meant it would have taken France several months to lose. Those several months would have given the Germans plenty of time to decide they deserved both territorial and political rewards for their war against France. So even a short war won by Germany would have left them as the type of people you don’t want as neighbors. Especially if you are the center of an empire based on sea power, and your new neighbors are going to control ports on the other side of the English Channel.
I must admit I was prejudiced against Ferguson before I read The Pity of War. I read his debate with Paul Krugman on the US economy in 2009. Basically Ferguson argued Obama administration’s policies were incoherent, being simultaneously Keynesian and monetarist, and specifically that the government’s issuance of bonds would cause an increase in interest rates. Krugman then extended the criticism to China and the European Union, as both pursued policies more in accord with Ferguson’s stance. Krugman argued that Ferguson’s view was that of a poseur who “…hasn’t bothered to understand the basics, relying on snide comments and surface cleverness to convey the impression of wisdom. It’s all style, no comprehension of substance.” In short, I agree with Krugman that Ferguson was attacking positions he didn’t understand.
Okay, lecture over. On your heads!
Caine:
Xe may see it as edgy, provocative, and insulting to theists. Which, in and of itself, would be good. So, +4 for effort, -84 for actual product.
Good evening
Well, some people went to Rhinebeck, I went to the Rhine ;)
But yesterday, my dad managed to create one of those memories for generations to come.
We made barbecue and grilled chicken. my mum asked if he wanted oil to put onto the chicken during the grilling and he said yes.
Some time later he asked me for a brush, because the spoon didn’t work.
Some more time later my mum asked if he’d prepared the marinade himself.
I said yes, he asked me for a brush.
When dinner was ready, my mum asked “did anybody see the salad dressing?”
Well, it won’t become my favourite chicken-style
Urgh, I’ll put on the rubber boots later and walk over to ERV
Ogvorbis:
I think that can be accomplished without calling yourself a raper. I no longer have any sense of humour about this sort of thing.
And I agree wholeheartedly with you. The ‘good’ part was coming up with an edgy ‘nym that might offend theists. The actual product xe came up with is execrable. Sorry. I am not making myself clear today.
Giliell:
It’s worth a try but it may be moot at this point, people are being stuck in moderation. Seems Abby isn’t too happy about the No comments.
Ogvorbis:
Your typing, however, is fantastic! :D
Giliell #314
You’re braver than I. I’ve been to the slimepit once. That was enough.
Just popping in to say that I went looking for an article I had linked to in the past about Ferguson’s imperialism and discovered that he married Ayaan Hirsi Ali last month. The report I read said that none of his children were there, but Henry Kissinger was.
Ferguson is supposed to be writing an authorized biography of Kissinger.
‘Tis:
It’s for a specific reason. See SC’s #168.
When ERV commenters get together in reallife do they knit one another cookies and spend the time in a group hug (like members of another blog I could mention) or do they all stand with their backs against the wall fingering their axes and glaring at each other?
I’ve gone to the slimepit and posted a one word, three character post: No. I then played a game of spider solitaire, went back and saw my post was displayed.
Addendum to my post #324.
I’ve washed my hands and had a shot of whisky.
Done over at the Slimepit. Almost actually read some of the thread, then realized what that would do to my day.
It’s already not shaping up too well. I had some more upsetting dreams and am craving more coffee. But my heart has barely been skipping yesterday and today so I must admit it’s probably working.
—
Hi Tomaz. Welcome. *wary look* Be good, y’hear?
OK, I made it, posted and restarted the browser
Oh, btw, I’m soliciting fudge recipies.
Only condition is that the ingredients are internationally avaible
Well I went on over and posted – same as ‘Tis, as it ‘appens – one word, three characters, No. Unfortunately I forgot to don a hazmat suit beforehand. And I don’t have any whisky :-(
Have some grog on the house. Hazmat suits are in the back if you need them.
It’s alive!
My nukazuke appears to be working.
I donned a hazmat suit (we have shitloads of tyvex around here) and posted “No.” Under my ‘nym (well, my short, one word ‘nym — Ogvorbis) about an hour ago and haven’t seen it on the screen. Maybe I missed it, but reading that stuff closely is really disturbing.
Thanks for the grog, Nerd, I think I need some!
Giliell, I’m not one for fudge, but one of my fave indulgences are truffles. These are my two favourite recipes (both happily using booze):
Guinness Stout Truffles:
1 kg dark chocolate in small chunks
400ml cream
100ml Guinness Stout
Zest of 1 Orange
Cocoa or coconut powder
Add the cream and Guinness to a saucepan and bring to the boil. Add the chocolate and grated orange zest. Mix together until the chocolate is fully melted. Leave the chocolate mix until it is cool to the touch, but not set. Take generous tea spoons of the mixture and roll in your hands to form small round truffles, dust in cocoa powder or coconut powder. Set in the fridge for 2 – 3 hours. Makes around 25 truffles.
Cabernet Chocolate Truffles:
2 (12 ounce bags) high quality bittersweet chocolate chips
1 Cup Cabernet Sauvignon
1/3 Cup heavy whipping cream (room temperature)
Bring Cabernet almost to a boil, then simmer uncovered and reduce to 1/3 cup (about 1 ½ hours). Melt 1 ½ bags of chocolate chips in a double boiler on low. Stir occasionally until completely melted. Stir in reduced wine and whipping cream. Stir until smooth. Transfer into a bowl and let cool completely (semi-firm).
Roll mixture into 5 or 6 balls and set on wax paper. Melt the rest of chocolate chips in double boiler on low. Roll chocolate balls in melted chocolate. Let cool on wax paper. A new form of decadence. Courtesy of Stevenot Winery.
There. So not what you asked for. :D
Alethea
Is it the standing that makes thing difficult?
If so, have you considered a bar-stool?
It would let you sit at counter-height.
Some even have wheels!
I got this disturbing email the other day, that said “Thank you for your recently signed petition. I am excited to know you are an American who is willing to take a stand for pro-family values.” By “pro-family”, they mean in this case anti-gay. Needless to say I had not signed any such petition. But they had my name, email address and zip code. They even provided a link that said “You were added to the system October 13, 2011. For more information click here.” That’s where I saw my zip code, as well as “A description of how your email address was obtained: These are single opt-in subscribers.” I checked my browser history for that time, and I wasn’t doing anything remotely relevant.
I tried to email them back, to take my name off any petition it might be on, but that just got the mailer daemon. There’s a link to unsubscribe, but that’s it. I don’t care if they spam me with their crap, but it upsets me to think they’re using my name.
The group is “Public Advocate”. The “From” address (that doesn’t work) is “[email protected]”. There’s also some mention of “bluehornet.com”.
Oh, I see LykeX @ 256 also got hit with this. A poll, you say? Hmm…
Tis
With regard to the causes of the First World war, I would recommend looking at The origins of the First World war (Origins of Modern wars) by Joll and Mantel, I got read it as a Library book but it is on Amazon.co.uk at £24.
Caine
The Guinness-Truffels sound yummy.
So I offer my recipe for the fastest pseudo-Belgian truffels in return:
Melt 200ml of favourite couverture, let cool down
Prepare a piping bag
Whip 200ml of very cold whipping cream
Carefully stir in chocolate
Fill into bag quickly
Make truffels onto a tray
Dust in coaco powder
Sometimes the TV gets it right:
(Swedish detective film)
The young female detective gets withdrawn from a case by her (male) boss.
Male colleague says: Hey, you can make me a coffee then!
She leaves, shooting him a glance.
Male boss to male collague:
Well, now you can make me a coffee
Oh, and I note that typing this can come off the wrong way: The boss totally didn’t mean “now you chased the woman away and we have to make coffee ourselves”, it really was the “you idiot, think yourself too good for making coffee and need a woman to do it”
Preview is my friend, I will preview my posts
Spot the mistake in my first post
OK, I think I’m up to speed now. Damnit. Sorry for being redundant. I don’t usually read the endless thread, because it’s… you know… endless.
Rather than “No,” I posted:
“Guys, don’t do this.”
Also, over at Ophelia’s, SC offered an excellent suggestion:
which I second.
Thanks, Giliell!
Tomaz, a very nice rendition of Georgia. I’ve always loved that song, and anything else by Hoagy Carmichael.
I was once privileged enough to speak with Georgia on the phone before I recorded a live album for the Hoagy Carmichael Jazz Society.
+++++++++++++++++++++
Conga Rats to Ogvorbis! Well deserved.
Perhaps we are too hard on the likes of Hoggle. After all, he’s only standing up for freedom of speech. By using his freedom of speech to express a desire to kick a woman whose opinions he dislikes in the nether regions, he’s definitely showing his commitment to free speech and tolerance for all dissenting opinions.
I must go reflect upon my life now, for my time in ERV has given me much to think about.
Laughing Baboon Coyote
I hope you actually mean you are going to drink some beverage and have a lovely meal.
Chigau: Nah, just smoke a doobie or two. I’m done reflecting. Upon reflection, Hoggle is still full of shit.
TLC, you should stop hanging in the slimepit. Else you’ll never get the smell out.
Posted my “No”
Nemo: This email seemed to work:
[email protected]
I’m shocked, shocked I say, that I’ve had no response from Mr. Delgaudio………
I rather favour the Blackadder explanation of the origins of the First World War: It was just too much effort not to have a war.
The sad thing is, there is truth in that explanation.
Caine: I haven’t been back since last night. The smell is intolerable.
Hi, thread. Not even remotely caught up, but I found three, count ’em, three pieces of religious crapola in the Boston Globe this week:
1. Fundie xtians are just what the environmental movement needs! Also, Wendell Berry, fundie environmentalist and noted anti-feminist, is just awesome. I guess I can’t expect that much from a privileged rich white guy who wanks a lot about how important “spirituality” is to saving the planet.
2. Since so many Americans are brainless godbots, psychologists ought to cater to their superstitions.
3. Saying “OMG!” makes the baby jeebus cry, but a life of devotion to the world’s largest pedophile ring? That’s fine. (Of course, this idiot also writes for National Review.)
And that’s not even counting the recent editorial calling any criticism of Mittens’ beliefs “offensive,” to which there are two good responses in Letters to the Editor.
And that’s not
My impression from reading about WWI is that everybody was pretty much into it, so they had a war.
Paris, London & Berlin all had crowds cheering the troops as they embarked; there was a lot of hoopla about having a glorious war and making a better world. They had no clue what a horrible, stagnant clusterfuck they were entering into.
They set themselves up with a couple of decades of diplomatic intrigue resulting in a bunch of treaties, agreements & commitments that set things up like a row of dominoes, just waiting on somebody to knock over the first one. The Germans didn’t help things when they decided they needed a navy to rival England’s, but I could never see how the thing could really be laid at their feet.
And the war itself–technology had advanced considerably, but tactics hadn’t. This resulted in a lot of soldiers running headlong into practically impregnable defenses. You know, for glory & country.
But like I said, that’s just my impression from reading various stuff.
TLC:
Yes, the stench is remarkable. All the more so for Abbie happily joining in the fun. Ugh.
The detox showers at the Pharyngula Saloon and Spanking Parlor™, Patricia, Princess of Pullets, Proprietor, have the latest in scientifically proven deodorization. A GCMS determines your odorant(s), and recommends specific procedures to allow you near anybody else. Guaranteed, with a weeks worth of free drinking if your spouse/partner/significant other makes you sleep on the couch for odor problems (you lip off, not our problem). Notarized statement (endorsed by the Pullet Patrol™) required for guarantee to be effective.
Hans Gruber has been fed and is now resting comfortably in the fridge and I’ve got a batch of cupcakes in the oven.
I love making a mess of my kitchen. :)
I found just the thing to wash it off though: an online copy of Godzilla vs Destoroyah!
This one has to be my favorite, tied closely with the original of course. Having Godzilla sick and dying and in pain adds a different angle to the rampage, and the human efforts against him look almost as much an effort to end his suffering as destroy him. Since I’m the kind of guy who pretty much ALWAYS roots for Godzilla, this angle really sorta jibes with me. It also helpt that Destoroyah himself is awesome and its one of the few films that portray ‘Godzilla Junior’ as actually looking like a juvenile Godzilla, and not friggin barney the dinosaur.
TLC, I’m not worried so much about functionality, more a unique art piece. I’m thinking bowie knife style, but way open to suggestions.
Think about it and let me know what thoughts you have. I can go up to $100. (Sorry I didn’t get back to you sooner, my motel last night didn’t have WiFi even tho they claimed to. I’m currently sitting in a bar to anesthetize myself before going back to the horror of my apt.)
Oh, completely forgot
TC
Love your knife.
Well, I love knives in general (and swords. And I really enjoyed hacking down bushes and cleaning out a wilderness with a machete). Mr. always dreads this look I get in my eyes when I see fiiiiiiine knives.
It’s funny how they (the crazies at ERV) like to point to the porcupine thing, as if telling someone to self-apply a deceased animal to his or her anus is the same thing as fantasizing about violence against women.
They obviously don’t have any useful working definition of what constitutes violent hate speech, and they also seem unaware that by using the “Well you do it too!” non-defense they are implicitly agreeing with the conclusion that such speech in unacceptable.
Also, glad to see that Hans Gruber made it home safe. I feel so privileged to have been present at his birth. Or rather, I guess, his budding.
It’s the #1 most active thread over on ScienceBlogs.
Sally:
Hans Gruber did explode out of its container twice on the way home, but most of it made it home with us safe-and-sound.
It’s the miracle of life, I tell ya.
The bowie style is always a classic. I’ve had this urge, next time I get leafspring, to make a short sword that’s basically an oversized bowie.
If I could find the right blade blank, I have these huge legbones from some kind of animal (moose is my guess) that I could cut handle scales for, but then I’d need to figure out the riveting. I think I might be able to do that.
My first impulse was to flat out refuse you, Sailor, but I can’t just sit around and remain within my narrow little self-pleasing comfort zone. I’ll try to figure something out, but no promises. It all depends on getting a good blade blank. I have something that might work, a blade from a previous ‘failed’ project that can probably be turned into a serviceable bowie, but I’m just not sure.
My concern about using xe for Scented Nectar is that it can read to me as vaguely gender policing which concerns me. I’m not saying she’s trustworthy, but I think it’s problematic to be second guessing someone’s stated gender.
Audley:
So do I, but I prefer someone else cleans up. :)
Muse, it’s not gender policing and it’s not as if I’m conversing with her, okay?
Caine:
Mr Darkheart does the cleanup when I cook meals*, but I take care of any baking mess ‘cos that shit can get rough.
*And I clean when he cooks.
Thank you Giliell.
This is an example of what I can do with leafspring: This is my ‘survival sword’. It’s debatable if it’s really a sword or not. The blade is ten inches and the handle plus crossguard is five, so it’s technically more of a ‘dagger’, but it swings and chops like a sword. No forging involved, just grinding. Crossguard and handle scales are hard eastern maple.
I based it on the military ‘smatchet’, but it actually kind of reminds me of a lot of bronze short swords I’ve seen online too.
FUCK: Forgot link. http://imageshack.us/photo/my-images/52/survivalsword.jpg/
Caine, granted regarding the not conversing with her, and I’m so not defending her wretched excuse for behavior.
Here, I thought that “the porcupine thing” was simply a more sofistikated and rephined way of saying “Up yours!”
——
post a link to a picture, I’ll ID ’em for you.
I am Arkyologist! I know bone stuff!
(as long as the critter
iswas from northern North America. and is not a bird. or a frog.)Sally:
It really is turning into a rerun of the Intersection pearl clutching event. (Starts @ #344).
I’ve added a No, too. (Sorry I’m late to the game: only just got back from Rhinebeck.)
And that will be the last time I ever read or post on ERV’s blog. I find it bizarre that the supposedly-image-oriented new Scienceblogs overlords seem to be perfectly ok with the graphic threats of violence and extreme misogyny that have become the norm in ERV-land.
TLC, no pressure. If it strikes your fancy, let me know. One of the things I hate about real objects that one creates is they go away to friends/customers &c.
When I do music or photography or anything digital I can keep it.
The nice (IHO) stained glass/brass work I’ve done and sold/given as presents makes me glad that other people enjoy them, but sad I don’t have them to gaze at. At the time I didn’t mind so much because all I could see were the flaws. When I see them later, I think “well, that didn’t suck.”
Walton, pics or it didn’t happen. (Why, yes I am jealous, why do you ask?)
Sure, but one can’t change the past; and I think people who feel genuine remorse for things they’ve done are entitled to be forgiven. After all, all of us have done shitty things to other people at one time or another, and none of us would like to be judged on everything in our pasts. (I certainly wouldn’t.)
(As an irrelevant side point: John Newton lived in Olney, North Buckinghamshire, a few miles north of my hometown of Milton Keynes.)
Walton:
I doubt anyone at NatGeo is aware of them or has read them. The slimepit threads are there, but Abby is blogging about other stuff and it’s not like the slimepit threads have titles like “Calling All Misogynists” or “Bitches Ain’t Shit”.
I’m trying to remember just how long it’s been since I posted here, and that I can’t probably means it’s been at least a few weeks.
But my epic, five-and-half-month, back-to-back theatre adventure (acting in Macbeth and then stage managing The Pillowman) has come to an end, and I’ve now got more time (and, just as importantly, headspace) on my hands to spend here.
The Sailor:
Not buying it. It’s offensive and insulting as hell and it was hardly an act of being shitty to someone. He claimed genuine remorse, however, we’ve seen how Christians act here, haven’t we? So what did he do? Ran around trying to proselytize people to death. As I said, he was a Christian before his “great revelation”. He used God to own slaves and then used God to excuse his actions as a slave-owner.
I get that you’re all into him because he was a sailor and shit, but I think you just don’t want to look at him critically because he was a sailor. Either way, we’re not going to agree, so I promise I’ll shut up about it now.
Wowbagger! Glad you’re back. How was the adventure?
@ TLC, thanks for always including a size scale in your pics (e.g. Bic lighter, ZigZags;-)
I think the last looks more like a Sailor’s Knife. Tho it does look like a main gauche.
+++++++++++++++
And yes, I am avoiding the conversation here about ERV, I’ve had enough (literal) shit to deal with in my life the past 2 days.
The slimepit seems to be in violation of SBs submissions policy. To quote the relevant section;
And it clearly
violatesmakes a mockery of the Code of Conduct;Here is the email address given for the editor, should anyone care to lodge a complaint.
[email protected]
Wowbagger, welcome back! (Did you bring blf with you?)
Caine, nice response, slightly mis-aimed;-)
Caine wrote:
Excellent, thanks for asking. Had a great time being on stage with a brilliant cast doing Shakespeare, which I loved. There was a real energy to the production, and I learned heaps. I also got great feedback from people whose opinions I value – you know, not just from friends who say everything you do is wonderful because they don’t want to hurt your feelings.
The Pillowman was another level entirely; we put on one of the best-received (critically) shows I’ve ever known – every critic adored it, and the people who saw it were blown away. The downside, though, was that that didn’t seem to be enough to get the audiences it deserved, and we only had decent houses rather than excellent ones.
It’s made me a little bitter and resentful towards certain people in the local theatre community, who I feel were obliged to see it but didn’t.
Caine: Er… that was me, not The Sailor. And I have no particular interest in John Newton.
I just don’t like the idea that there is any moral wrong too grave to be forgiven. Whether Newton was genuinely sorry I have no idea, since I know very little about him; nor do I really care, since he’s dead, and nothing we say about him makes any difference. I don’t give a crap about him specifically.
Rather, I was worried about the ramifications of applying the same thinking to people who are still living. I, for one, don’t want to be judged for the rest of my life on things which I did in the past and which I have since repudiated. And I think that compassion and forgiveness, for people who have done terrible things no less than for anyone else, are far healthier and more constructive than judging and blaming people. (It’s the same principle that leads me to support restorative justice, truth and reconciliation commissions, and the like, as alternatives to the horribly-destructive traditional retributive model of criminal justice.)
Chigau: http://imageshack.us/photo/my-images/23/legbone1.jpg/
http://imageshack.us/photo/my-images/208/legbone2.jpg/
This may be a question I should know the answer to, but
where has SGBM been?
The Sailor wrote:
Have I been away so long that a new intitialisation has been coined and entered popular usage without my knowing it?
The Sailor, apologies. I’m tired and my meds are turning my brain to mush.
Walton:
Yeah, I know your views, Walton. You take there is no such thing as an evil person and hand-wringing to a whole new level. I addressed this the first time you wrote a book about it on TET (back at sciblogs) and I ignored it the second time you wrote a book on it recently.
It’s all well and fine, Walton, for you to believe the way you do. As I said before, I’ve met evil. I hope you get to live all your days in halcyon bliss. That’s not a choice for some of us.
I have an astonishing amount of compassion and empathy, given my life. I don’t need you to tell me what you consider better, more enlightened and healthy. I don’t need you to tell me there’s no such thing as an unforgivable act, either. They happen. Here’s hoping they never happen to you.
Rev. BDC:
Dunno. I’ve been wondering myself.
I believe a person can reverse their evil views, but it’s only natural to be suspicious of miraculous turnarounds, and the burden of proof is upon them.
Caine, no apologies necessary, I can see your point.
+++++++++++++++++
Completely off topic: I just Googled myself. Yeah, yeah, stop laughing.
The top 25 results are actually me. My research group is amazing. (they aren’t my group, I’m just one of the lab rats;-)
A team I follow lost 59-7. In football. And the game wasn’t as close as it sounds.
A poorly-played oboe. Worse yet, two poorly-played oboes.
Three is right out.
–
Mike and the Mechanics-The Living Years.
–
Second. Or however many it may be by now.
–
A song with – to my ear at least – a well-played oboe: REM, ‘Nightswimming’
The Sailor@391, What is this “off topic” you speak of?
I really enjoy the free wheeling nature of the conversations here. So many interesting and smart people to listen to!
About googling yourself, not laughing, I’ve done it also. Difference is I apparently don’t exist.
Welcome back Wow. Your tankard of libation awaits you kind sir. Remember, sip, not swig…
A poorly played violin is painful, but any instrument played poorly is painful.
Even played well, bagpipes are painful. Just a heads up, Drones fly both ways.
cicely, Inadvertent Phytocidal Maniac@393, re: oboes, How about Five? (Or is that “right out” too?) We’ve already got one. Oldest son plays oboe in middle school band. So I’ve heard plenty of bad oboe noises. (He got better)
Was that enough oblique python references?
Ray, ’tis better to have Googled and lost, much better.
I’m frankly very uncomfortable with it, but I’m very happy for my colleagues.
You do know the difference between an oboe and a banjo, right?
The skid marks in the road?
I know the difference between a bagpipe and a trampoline…
Caine, I’m sorry, fwiw. I didn’t mean to come across as lecturing you.
No, you can tune an oboe.
Do you know what an oboe player means when xe says xe has perfect pitch?
I know it wasn’t me years ago…
Welcome in, Tomaž.
–
So…my “No” is probably stuck in moderation; I’m not going back over there to check. Penalty for being late out of the gate. Still…I did try….
–
Good news, everyone! I will not, after all, be trapped in the car with my evangilising sister-in-law all day tomorrow! *confetti*
–
Good news. Have some swill. *hands over dirty looking glass*
Xe didn’t hit the rim when xe threw it in the dumpster?
What’s the best thing about accordions?
Hey Tomasz, what instrument(s) do you play? Just curious; fellow musician here. I play clarinet and tenor sax.
As such I know approximately 3 million musician jokes. That’s also because my parents both play music also.
Do you know what an oboe player means when xe says xe has perfect pitch?
Hitting the center of the dumpster from 20 yards.
That’s good news!
By the way, for the record, I play guitar, trumpet and baritone. And I sort of sing.
Do you know how to convince a trumpeter to play forte?
You just need an extremely mobile orchestra, to utilize the Doppler effect.
Make the trumpeter first chair?
theophontes
The right side column made me laugh with “Others named Trailer Park Jesus”.
—
I must say Giliell’s recipe at 338 sounds like a much better used for bags of pipes than music.
Put a sheet of music in front of him.
Which is, curiously, also how you convince a guitar player to play pianissimo.
You mark the music pianissimo.
music jokes
Whooshing noise
O <-me
Heh. That’s how it was at a recent gig. The guitarist was fairly young and understandably not so great at sight-reading, but hardly a peep the whole time. Except, of course, for the occasional section with easy rhythm stuff and power chords — then suddenly it was time to rock the fucking house. I wanted to turn and say, “Balance, dude, have you heard of it?” To me the most annoying part was the constant (ppp) picking and strumming of random stuff between pieces and sets. I doubt it bothered the audience much, probably few even noticed, but that sort of shit doesn’t even fly at a rehearsal, much less a concert. Don’t get me started on percussionists.
Sally said:
You all should be jealous: Sally played the clarinet for Josh and me last night. :)
Nerd!
You’re handing out grog like it’s Halloween candy! What do I have to do to get a filthy mugful?
Oh Father Og, this VT guy’s stand-up must be legendary if he’s funnier than you!
I guess nobody knows this one…
They come pre-scored for slicing.
I’m not exactly sure what type of knife you mean by that. Is there a traditional sailor’s knife that looks like that?
You all know how to get two bagpipers to play in tune, right?
Shoot both of them.
That’ll do.
With piccolo players, you can get away with shooting just the one.
I’m back home from Rhinebeck, and I miss the Horde.
Way up there someone asked what facebook is good for. For me, it’s been my connection to this place while I’ve lacked regular onterne
One of my greatest weaknesses/sins as a musician (insert appropriate wind instrument verbs in the place of strumming and picking, of course). I’m a terrible between-set noodler. I’ve gotten better at keeping it under control over the years, but I still have to remind myself.
Oh, hehe.
I was saying “regular internet access.”
My next comment was to be about the difficulty of posting here from my phone.
That may be unnecessary now, though :-P
Wouldn’t take much.
Does it involve whiskey?
======
Once upon a time there was a professional accordian player. One day, his agent called and told him, “I’ve got some good news and bad news.”
The accordian player asked, “What’s the good news?”
The agent told him, “I got you a paying gig.”
The accordian player got very excited. Then he remembered that there was bad news, so he asked about that. The agent said, “Well, the gig is about 400 miles away.”
The accordian player decided that beggars (or accordian players) can’t be choosers, so he said yes.
As he drove to the gig, sipping coffee, he thought about how lucky he was. Of course, eventually, the coffee caught up with him so he eased into a rest area. He relieved the pressure, stretched his legs and worked the kinks out of his neck.
And then he realized he had left his accordian in the back seat. In plain sight. So he ran back to his car, fearing the worst, and saw that the back window was broken out. And as he looked inside, he realized that the worst had happened. Someone had not only broken out the window and left a second accordian.
The most excellent Wowbagger:
So do I.
I used to wanna be a musician, but I could never afford the lobotomy. [/instantrimshot.com]
Musicians prefer a bottle in front of me, not a frontal lobotomy.
Ask for it. *makes note on tab*
Better get them both, as they are both sharp, just one worse than the other.
So I am home safe from Rhinebeck and well-drugged, heading for bed very soon. I cannot express how lovely Rhinebeck was, and how incredible it was to spend time with such wonderful, progressive, subversive, witty, geekish and altogether whacko (in a wonderful way) people.
We crowned Walton, knighted Sili, turned Reality Enforcer into a model, gazed in awe at the beautiful Katherine Lorraine, taught more Horde members to drop spindle, made jewelry, swapped books & clothes, ate, drank, discussed everything under the sun, read a bed-time story, mocked the Book of Mormon and learned how Catholic boys stop masturbating. We laughed, snarked, and generally had an amazing time.
(no sheep were harmed during the gathering of this Horde.)
Next year, you are ALL coming. :)
∞∞∞∞∞∞∞∞∞∞
Also, the ‘nym change is due to my new non-existent lesbian girlfriend Muse, who I am apparently dating secretly (when I’m not cheating on her/flirting with Katherine or Jules or triskelethecat or Carlie or whomever).
The individual at #88 is a guy I was dating who thought it appropriate to discuss my personal meat-space interactions on a public blog. He apparently thinks that Muse playing a prank on me at the Renaissance Faire (she bought me a rose I had to pick up, by the teeth, from the rose-seller), and kissing me good-bye–on the cheek–means we are/were dating. (or something.)
Hmmm…since I hugged and kissed most of the Rhinebeck Horde–male and female–good-bye this morning, I must be dating all of them as well. My social life just became very complicated. ;)
∞∞∞∞∞∞∞∞∞∞
Finally, the Support Rebecca Watson project is pulling in folks from all over the world. :) Please keep spreading the word and contact me (oniongirlsays at gmail dot com) if you’d like to help!
And I’m off to bed!
May I have a filthy mugful, sweet Nerd?
Noodling is a good word for it.
Well, it takes a long time and a lot of work to be any good at it. Some day you too could be a great between-set noodler. ;)
To be fair, I probably came off too harsh in my last comment. I’m sure he was a bit nervous and just trying to work out some things so he wouldn’t screw it up (or play them pp, which is another way of saying screwing it up). I guess I found it annoying partly because it was a reminder, while we weren’t even playing, that he was screwing things up.
Back from Comicon. So much funness.
How many sopranos does it take to change a light bulb?
None, she just stands there and the world revolves around her.
Onion Girl, (**waves hi**), I hope to make it next year.
++++++++++++++
I like my local watering holes. Tonight I met a person who was awarded the Bundesverdienstkreuz.
Oh, and apparently he thinks he can sing.
Me, too. Generally when I’ve finished something, revulsion sets in and I can’t get rid of it fast enough to suit me; the flaws are so obvious and overwhelming. Later, I regret not having at least taken a picture.
–
Wowbagger is back!
blf is still missing; the peas are running riot in the street.
–
Well, there was something in the background at the end that might have been oboe, but it was so faint. I’d have guessed, maybe, harmonica, which is an odd misidentification to make.
–
The thought of five oboes being played badly, all at once (’cause you can’t really say “together”) makes my teeth ache just to think about it!
There’s no such thing as enough Python references. ;)
–
It’s possible to march while playing a banjo?
The reeds are cheaper for the banjo?
They make different noises when you break them over the players’ heads?
–
So you can. Tuning two oboes is trickier.
And, again, three is right out.
–
Thanks! *gulp* Hit me with another.
S-i-l, BTW, objects conscientiously to alcohol.
–
“Weird Al” Yankovic.
–
ROFLMAO!
–
Trick question. Forte is the default setting for trumpeters.
–
Jules!!! *hugs&chocolate&bacon&booze&kittens*
Repeat as necessary.
–
To onion girl’s excellent précis of Rhinebeck, I would only add that we also discovered the most adorable thing that exists anywhere in the universe: angora rabbits. They’re like little balls of fluff with cute bunny faces and ears.
“How many sopranos does it take to change a light bulb? ”
10, one to climb the ladder and 9 to kick it out from under her.
+++++++++++
How do you know a musician is at your door?
If it’s a lead singer, she doesn’t come in because she can’t find the key.
If it’s a drummer, when he knocks he speeds up and slows down.
If it’s keyboard player, he better be there 30 minutes or less.
If it’s a guitar player, you better be his girlfriend, otherwise he’s homeless.
Well, Oklahoma *gesture of aversion* is looming over the horizon, so bang the drum slowly, and all that. 4:00 a.m. will come all too soon.
If y’all never hear from me again, you’ll know that I’ve been coercively fire-hosed in the Blood of Jaysus, and am singing hymns (which will be their mistake, since I can only carry a tune if the bucket is big enough) in some Church of Ill Repute.
If that is the case, I don’t ask for anyone to organise a rescue; just send around a sharpshooter with a bullet.
Quick.
Clean.
Merciful.
–
‘Night, all.
They are wearing a Dominoes jacket and are asking to be paid for the piza?
How many bass players does it take to change a lightbulb?
None, the piano player can do it with her left hand.
—————
How many drummers does it take to change a lightbulb?
None, they have machines that do that now.
But that’s a fantastic musical!
Oh. The state. Not the musical. Bleah.
Pretty sure the sniper’d need a rifle, too. Bullets are kinda useless by themselves.
Rhinebeck sounds like so much work. All we did way lay around and drink and eat. Perfect.
recording The Walking Dead, looking forward to watching it after Boardwalk Empire.
How many bass players does it take to change a light bulb?
1…5…1… (1…4…5…5…1)
=========
And, to top you all:
Quite a number of years ago, the Seattle Symphony was doing Beethoven’s Symphony No. 9 under the baton of Milton Katims.
Now at this point, you must understand two things:
There’s a quite long segment in this symphony where the basses don’t have a thing to do. Not a single note for page after page.
There used to be a tavern called Dez’s 400, right across the street from the Seattle Opera House, rather favored by local musicians.
It had been decided that during this performance, once the bass players had played their parts in the opening of the symphony, they were to quietly lay down their instruments and leave the stage, rather than sit on thier stools looking and feeling dumb for twenty minutes. Once they got backstage, someone suggested that they trot across the street and quaff a few brews.
When they got there, a European nobleman recognized that they were musicians, and bought them several rounds of drinks. Two of the bassists passed out, and the rest of the section, not to mention the nobleman, were rather drunk. Finally, one of them looked at his watch and exclaimed, “Look at the time! We’ll be late!”
The remaining bassists tried in vain to wake up their section mates, but finally those who were still conscious had to give up and run across the street to the Opera House.
While they were on their way in, the bassist who suggested this excursion in the first place said, “I think we’ll still have enough time–I anticipated that something like this could happen, so I tied a string around the last pages of the score. When he gets down to there, Milton’s going to have to slow the tempo way down while he waves the baton with one hand and fumbles with the string with the other.”
Sure enough, when they got back to the stage they hadn’t missed their entrance, but one look at their conductor’s face told them they were still in serious trouble. Katims was furious! After all…
It was the bottom of the Ninth,
the basses were loaded,
the score was tied,
there were two men out,
and the Count was full.
cicely wrote:
The liner notes say it’s an oboe. I wouldn’t have known from how it sounds – I’d have just thought it was the low-end of a clarinet – if it weren’t for that.
But I guarantee it sounds a lot nicer on cd through a decent sound system (which I have) than I imagine it would on YouTube through (presumably) a pc. That was more for illustration purposes.
Has anyone heard about corduroy pillows?
Kind of getting off the musician joke track, but this is one of my favorite lightbulb jokes:
How many Deadheads does it take to change a lightbulb?
None, they just let it burn out and then follow it around for 40 years.
There are machines that could change my lightbulbs? That would be nice. I’ve been wondering when the world was going to start looking like The Jetsons, but Rosie got on my nerves anyway so I’ve never spoken up about it.
By the way, check out the EWI if you want to fear being replaced by a machine.
Michael Brecker noodlin’
Oh, we did have fun, and how we ate! Thanks for a great weekend Sally, Audley, and Fires. Tickle/snuggle BabyFire for me.
We talked about you Rhinebeckers, too, and it sounds like you all had a blast!
Check it out: The Smash-A-Bank Polka!
The band I’m playing in right now is quite similar to this band. Except we don’t do songs that require singing. But the protesting and ideological bent is quite similar. Hehe. Also, we have cool red jumpsuits.
“It was the bottom of the Ninth,” &c.
That joke? Kill it with fire. I will repeat it.
Rhinebeck sounds like it was excellent fun; all the FB posts have left me very envious. I’ve really got to get myself a passport and work on overcoming my
distaste forterror of flying…What’s the difference between a drummer and a drum machine? You only have to punch the information into the drum machine once.
The Laughing Coyote
That is fecking HUGE!
I’ll go with moose femur.
and fresh.
You wants I shoulds repeat it? Why? Just scroll up.
=====
Son: Mother, I want to grow up and be a rock-n-roll musician.
Mother: Now son, you have to pick one or the other. You can’t do both.
HEY!
Well, I guess that’s something.
And THAT they couldn’t figure out for months?? Oy. I’m glad you’re getting it diagnosed now, at least!
Sounds like so much fun! Wish we could have all been there. :)
The last he was here there was a fight going on, I think. I remember thinking he sounded like he’d had it for a while and was going to talke a break.
Also sounds good! I love seeing that people do happy things.
We talked about how we wished we could have merged – we need transporters!
You know who likes to hang out with musicians the most?
Drummers.
WOwbagger, the flying is easy, the landing, well that’s a different story.
Good news, everybody! My daughter hasn’t had any accidents at school for a couple weeks now. I still have her keeping a set of clothes in her locker but it seems (knockonwoodandothersuperstitiousthings) to be over with. The last time she had an accident, she said it was the worst thing that happened that day because a couple of her friends snickered at her. Up to that point she had been totally unconcerned about it, so maybe all she needed was a smidge of peer pressure.
So, your mom has trouble finding her keys then?
Doodle I did while listening to a panels…it’s squidy
Oh, I had premature epostulation. I meant to add: Kids are weird.
@lostinlace
You may want to rethink that particular comment…
Exactly! You get it !
I don’t think you do, though. Blanket statements based on unfounded negative stereotypes are, well, let’s just say they are not only not welcome, but can be harmful.
What’s there to get? Was that supposed to be some kind of joke? If so, it sucked. I thought you were just trying to brag about how few women you know.
Here’s a FUNNY joke:
Q: How many feminists does it take to change a lightbulb?
A: That’s not funny.
Because feminists have no sense of humor!?
Or else why?
No, because misogynists think that feminists have no sense of humor.
Oh I see funny then I guess :-)
lostinlace wrote:
You’ve demonstrated – aptly – that you’re in no position to judge what is or isn’t funny. You want to show how little you think of women, try ERV; it’ll be much more your scene.
No, because sexist assholes think that denying human rights to half of humanity is funny.
You had your three, cupcake. If you have something substantive to say, we’d love to hear it. If you are here to troll, let’s save some time and and I’ll just say get lost. Please.
Rev:
By all rights, I should be watching The Walking Dead, but I haven’t started it yet. It’s like there’s a certain amount of shows I can handle per week* and everything else gets shafted.
Boardwalk Empire, on the other hand, is a show that I absolutely will not miss. I’m a little disappointed that Richard Harrow has spent the season so far being a mopey sad-sack and not a total bad ass, though.
Josh:
I’m super excited about the sourdough starter (here’s hoping I didn’t screw it up!) and naming it “Hans Gruber” is making the process delightfully absurd.
Mr Darkheart: Are we going to bed now?
Me: In a little while! I need to see if Hans Gruber expands!
*Currently: Boardwalk Empire, Mythbusters, Community, and Top Gear.
lostinlace:
*sigh*
*facepalm*
*sigh*
On that note, I’m going to bed. Shut the fuck up, lil.
I don’t know because I am a feminist, so troll is not my position. I thought the joke was weird and maybe against-feminists!
lostinlace
or because you have no sense of humor.
Which sockpuppet are you?
No, you’re a troll. Please leave. You’re harshing my mellow.
Yeah, it’s a subtle difference, but that’s an oboe in Nightswimming.
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Soprano clarinets tend to have a darker, smoother timbre in their lower register (chalumeau, if you’re French). The same is basically true of bass clarinets and the like; but because of their size, including a larger mouthpiece and reed, they produce a reedier, rougher sound.
Similarly, the double reed causes much of the rough timbre you’ll hear in an oboe’s lower register (even more in an English horn or bassoon). Of course this all depends a great deal on the particular reed, the style of playing, the direction of the wind at dawn the previous Thursday, and other factors. Anyway, as the pitch goes higher, the reed vibrates fast enough that basically there’s not enough time for any “roughness” to occur.
Much of the timbral difference, which is a bit tougher to explain, is that clarinets have a cylindrical bore, whereas oboes are conical. That means clarinets only bleat out every other harmonic above the fundamental frequency, but with oboes you get them all. Thus, with oboes, you hear more tones above the fundamental (though your brain generally lumps it all together) which tends to make it sound more harsh or “out-of-tune” even if isn’t (excepting the harmonics) because the harmonics themselves aren’t in tune and quickly get very close together to clash with each other. I guess the point here is that tuning isn’t always the problem. Granted, oboes are small and can’t adjust very much, so that is a problem: orchestras tune to them for a reason. More often the problem is controlling timbre, and that really is difficult no matter what your instrument. It’s hard just to talk about it.
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As for me, I like to watch my TV shows in lumps, on account of I only ever watch them online. So I’m working my way through “Numb3rs” right now. After that’s done I may catch up on the last season of “Fringe.” Am contemplating starting one of the L&O shows; they’re all on instant view on Netflix now.
Perhaps you should try listening to some actual feminists sometime, rather than the strawwoman in your head. Just a suggestion.
I never knew that was the reason we always tuned to the damn oboe! Thanks for explaining that, CR.
I’m soliciting advice about registering domain names. I don’t want to use godaddy.com because I don’t want to reward their sexist ad campaigns. Can anyone with experience suggest another domain registrar?
OK wow, going.No respect to give or to take then?
What’s that? I can’t hear you in here, the music is too loud! Come on, let’s go talk outside! Okay, yeah, this way, the door is over here.
*slam*
Bye-bye!
onion girl, OM; imaginary lesbian@435, “Next year, you are ALL coming. :)”
OK, I’m up for it. Where do I pitch my tent?
kristinc, ~delicate snowflake~@468 “Kids are weird.”
I was a weird kid too, now I’m just a weird adult. Some things never change.
Images inadvertently inspired by that particular combination of words were extremely inappropriate. ;-)
lostinlace – do you get why we’re a bit pissed? That was a rather sexist little comment you spat out.
oops, in my soprano joke above that’s One not None. Preys Tpyos!
Damn damn damn, how is it that my blockquotes are perfect when I hit preview and borked when I don’t? (I just quoted the first joke)
Sally Strange, OM@492, That train of thought puts a whole different slant on my choice of words @491.
Oh, and I just caught the “pitching my tent” comment too. Derp. I’m slow sometimes.
Oh geez, and here I thought you MEANT it and I was just late in comprehending!
That makes it even more funny.
Respect is earned, not given. You had multiple chances to correct our reading of you. Instead, you dug in deeper, you continued to intentionally give the impression of mysogyny, and then played the ‘I am a feminist’ card which, in that context, was trying to take a trick with the deuce of clubs. In other words, given your writings here, I see no reason to treat your writings here with respect.
And, to top it off, you harshed my mellow before I could get into my collectoin of conductor jokes.
Good night, all. I hope lotsolace realizes how many holes there are in hir worldview fabric. If not, I hope xe sticks the flounce.
Unforgiveable.