Openly Eccentric - Open Thread 8/21/2016
Good Sunday Morning, and here's hoping you get some relief from the heat!
Yesterday was the 2nd Portland Area C99 Meetup, and a real joy, once again. Not as good a turnout as last time, but the quality of people was great as always, and thank you to everyone who showed up. I took far fewer pictures, and honestly am still a bit too exhausted to fight with my computer on uploading them so that may be an essay for another day.
Will say that I'm actually thinking about running for office as a result of today. If not me, Who? There's a dearth of good people in politics because we're not obsessed with control over our fellow human beings. So I'm thinking I should run, if for no other reason than to keep a slimebag out of power.
Today I also engaged in a traditional and very effective way of beating the heat. Siesta. I think it's time that we as a culture start thinking about making this part of our summer routine. The 9-5 schedule will soon be a thing of the past, as our energy costs to keep the workers working during the worst weather will show to be completely cost ineffective. Work should change to reflect the actual conditions outside, and the day to day life. In essence, we need to stop thinking about the work world as separate and artificial from the daily life on the planet. Work and play are not to be scheduled monotonously, but rather embraced and varied, as humans are truly wont to experience. No, it is not the most efficient, but is it truly efficient to spend vast sums of energy to maintain an artificial construction of work as drudgery?
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Good to know that we here in the US prosecute those who give away state secrets VIGOROUSLY. Oh not politicians, hell no. The soldier who wrote a book about killing Bin Laden, though? He cannot be allowed to profit from that! Every penny he made is going to go right back to the U.S. Government. Who will presumably spend it on one more day in the war that killing Bin Laden was supposed to end.
There was another big bombing in Turkey. Didn't hear about it? Not surprising. It was buried beneath the fold because it was just another suicide bomber in a primarily non-white country. I will say though, the trend in the Middle East seems to be "DON'T GET MARRIED".
So, why did I have to go to Australian News to get info about the US Space Program? Maybe because it's a joint mission with Canada. Still kinda cool to see pure research is still happening, despite the efforts of the MSM to destroy it.
And in a minor note, Watchmakers are becoming extinct. Apparently corporate rules and the massive use of cheap throwaway watches has reduced the demand to the point that we're actually losing an entire trade. Some may see it as similar to the decline of the horse drawn cart, but I disagree strongly, because watchmakers and the ability to make small precise machinery is one of the founding points for all of our modern technology. IMHO, this loss is a bit like knocking out the foundation of a HUGE building. It isn't going to last without the underpinnings.
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And for your Sunday Morning music, some Game music from one of my friends Tony Manfredonia. He's an awesome composer and a personal acquaintance. http://www.manfredoniamusic.com/ This is a bit of his music from an upcoming indie game, and I think folks will enjoy it.
[video:https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fiBbc3RKxJI][video:https://www.youtube.c...
Comments
With you on the watchmakers.
I keep telling people, and they never seem to understand, that you can't make an automatic screw machine without first making a screw.
Not quite sure I agree with the buggy makers part though. Those skills translated to construction and cabinetry. There are still a few craftsmen building fine houses and furniture. Unfortunately everyone seems most concerned with faster/cheaper. The third leg of better gets kicked out. Houses are built in a day and are out of square and plumb in a month. Woods once used to make furniture to last hundreds of years are now being ground to dust with the dust being pressured glued into boards to make furniture to last a few years at best before clogging the landfill. MDS doesn't even make good firewood.
I'm not really a Luddite, though I'm increasingly seeing how a lot of the old ways may have been better.
There is no such thing as TMI. It can always be held in reserve for extortion.
I'm of the 'If you can't fix it, you don't own it"
school of thought.
I know it's a bit of a throwback in this day and age, but I still prefer solid, heavy computers that I can mess around with and fix if I break.
And there's 9 new houses going up on a lot that shouldn't have more than 1 or two on it right down the street from me. Loathe the look of that construction because it just seems fake. Even my Army housing duplex feels more real than the McMansions.
I do not pretend I know what I do not know.
My son and I subscribe to the same school.
I can't afford to buy crap that has to be thrown away and replaced. So if Matt doesn't think something is repairable we don't bother. I really wanted to join the fun in Portland yesterday, but I work weekends and the coworker who would have replaced me is having serious gastro issues and started the first of two gallons of "golightly." So not fair to her. I intend to be at the next one.
I no longer believe in the religion of progress
"Golightly" is nasty stuff --
best regards to your friend; and I trust that she gets through the experience intact, and that you never have to experience the effects yourself --
When Cicero had finished speaking, the people said “How well he spoke”.
When Demosthenes had finished speaking, the people said “Let us march”.
Clockwork used to be essential to bomb ordnance (time fuzes) n/t
Grandfather clocks
are immune to EMPs.
There is no such thing as TMI. It can always be held in reserve for extortion.
What I agree with most
is that a valuable foundational skill is being lost here.
The thing we must understand about the world is that we all rely on cheap products made in China and abroad, and this is exactly why so many of us are employed. Cheap mass-manufacture has destroyed much of our industry, and its created a generation of people which has very few technical skills compared to previous ones.
But this mass manufacture continues because we have aritifically lowered the cost of oil and gas. In time, all that shipping across continents is going to cease. If that happens sooner rather than later, it would allow us to restart our own manufacture and rekindle our economy. We should welcome that. Our kids need those jobs, and ending this stupid usage of oil would help the climate.
If this goes on too long, we will have lost too many trades. At the same time that we are dealing with a world that is hotter, wilder, and more dangerous, we will also have to rebuild entire ways of thinking.
We can't afford to keep doing this. We must begin to adapt.
On a personal note:
It's the reason I'm so thrilled my daughter wants to learn Cello.
Modern music is so obsessed with computer modification of the sound, the skill is being lost. Of course, I'm a big proponent of musical education for the same reason I am a fan of ANY skills that the vast majority of the people don't have.
I do not pretend I know what I do not know.
OK, add your abbreviations to the acronym diary!
I first misread, "MD's don't make good firewood," and thought, "Of course not! They make good soylent green, though."
So. MDS? EMPs?
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Can't sat what MDS is.
Probably 1 in 20 or more in the lumber/construction trade could tell you what it stands for. It's sawdust held together with glue under pressure. Very heavy and very stable as it doesn't expand/contract with humidity. However it is very brittle so the joinerty gives way in huge chunks which really can't be repaired.
EMP is electro/magnetic pulse caused mainly by nuclear detonation, solar coronal mass ejection (CME), pulsars pointed our direction, and the military is working on EMP gun to knock out electronics.
There is no such thing as TMI. It can always be held in reserve for extortion.
I think you mean MDF - medium density fiberboard
So sayeth Google. (I don't think this needs to be on the c99p acronym list; not likely to come up often in discussions here.)
Yeah, probably.
I just hear it rattled off at the lumber store.
Like ABC, NBC, and CBS, I know what they are, but no idea what the letters stand for.
There is no such thing as TMI. It can always be held in reserve for extortion.
BTW, ec
Do you realize how few people actually understand the soylent green reference? I used it on my wife a few years ago and was astounded to find out she didn't understand it. We were on our way to a party so there I asked who understood the reference. Of the more than twenty people there, no one, none, Nada understood it, or admitted to it. A couple seemed to recall hearing the term, but that's it.
There is no such thing as TMI. It can always be held in reserve for extortion.
No, I did not know that! OK, how many here remember
soylent green? Or how many read this message and have no idea what we're talking about? It seems like this would be a group where it would be familiar to many.
Please check out Pet Vet Help, consider joining us to help pets, and follow me @ElenaCarlena on Twitter! Thank you.
Yeah, I assumed it was part
of the collective consciousness. Like Popeye, or Wyatt Earp. Or Barney Fife.
There is no such thing as TMI. It can always be held in reserve for extortion.
I do. I do.
"People! Its made of people!"
I no longer believe in the religion of progress
Heh. Once you've seen the movie, it's unforgettable, isn't it?
I remember being horrified when I was a kid. I used to love dystopian science fiction, though. OK, I was a weird kid.
Please check out Pet Vet Help, consider joining us to help pets, and follow me @ElenaCarlena on Twitter! Thank you.
Jakkalbessie's cheapo watches
The band on one hanging by a thread, the battery dead on the other. Tempted to dispose but now will go look for her a watchmaker.
A truth of the nuclear age/climate change: we can no longer have endless war and survive on this planet. Oh sh*t.
Outta curiosity, divineorder,
can you play Rachmaninoff?
Edited to say the joking lost all meaning by clearing up the typos. Yes, I know Typo is not just a small town in Kentucky, so when I read them, I have fun anal yzing (spacing is correct) them.
There is no such thing as TMI. It can always be held in reserve for extortion.
My late husband was a horologist. Degreed.
He repaired clocks and watches sent to him from all over the globe. Even he said it is high time (pun!) to gut the innards of Rolexes and insert batteries.
His recommendation to me was to get a Rolex to wear to court, get a Seiko if I wanted to know what time it was.
"We'll know our disinformation program is complete when everything the American public believes is false." ---- William Casey, CIA Director, 1981
I just wonder
at wat point we stop strip mining the environment for ever increasingly scarce materials to manufacture the batteries and microprocessors.
Roy Underhill had a good take in a TED Talk. https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=Au1TbIyLcPU
There is no such thing as TMI. It can always be held in reserve for extortion.
We mine for diamonds for the Rolexes.
Sun dials are made with metals.
We are just so screwed up.
"We'll know our disinformation program is complete when everything the American public believes is false." ---- William Casey, CIA Director, 1981
Sun dials can be made from wood, concrete, stone, plastic,
or anything else you have around.
That, in its essence, is fascism--ownership of government by an individual, by a group, or by any other controlling private power. -- Franklin D. Roosevelt --
I make my sundial
by putting my back toward the sun.
There is no such thing as TMI. It can always be held in reserve for extortion.
Diamonds are aesthetic
and not crucial to to the function of the watch. Iron,aluminum, copper, et al can be used practically indefinitely unlike the once use of lithium ion battery to go in the landfill.
Granted, it is more convenient to toss out the hammer and buy a new one than to just replace the handle. Just as it's more convenient to dump $20 on a camp chair good for one summer if lucky than to spend two hours with $10 in wood to make an Adirondack lasting ten to twenty years.
More convenient, but more costly...and not just monetarily. I don't remember how many times cheaper it is to recycle metals as opposed to mining, smelting and forging new, just remember it is many times over.
There is no such thing as TMI. It can always be held in reserve for extortion.
and also too
Cheap has a price.
We Americans love a bargain. That $8 lamp someone got at a predator store will break. They will buy another cheap lamp. It will break. They buy another cheap lamp. It's a cycle.
So they have now bought several cheap lamps when they could have saved and bought something made by a human, hopefully a neighbor or someone in the same time zone.
We have lost the art of art. We don't create. We obliterate.
We also need to live as if we are on a lifeboat. Something comes on, something needs to come off.
"Love One Another" ~ George Harrison
We don't create...we obliterate.
You ought to copywriter that and sell bumper stickers.
There is no such thing as TMI. It can always be held in reserve for extortion.
Hard to watch, but you'll be glad you did
It was hard to watch
and I am glad I did.
The older dr. seemed to be running on an energy not provided by nature.
We must find peace.
"We'll know our disinformation program is complete when everything the American public believes is false." ---- William Casey, CIA Director, 1981
Cluster Bombs, Drones and Red Mist - oh my
we have so much blood on our hands it will drop down to our grandchildrens.
If only my country worked half as hard towards peace than it does killing women and children.
"Love One Another" ~ George Harrison
So hard to watch! And thank you for posting
Miracles are occuring in spite of our nation's efforts to destroy the entire planet and all of its inhabitants. How incredible and humbling to observe those who fight for life in such horrendous circumstances.
I no longer believe in the religion of progress
Getting down to basics, isn't really the chip makers that we
cannot do without?
I still find it both amazing and infuriating that pretty much all our electronics are now made in China. Can you imagine if we ever shake our sabers at them?
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There's another part to this
spouse works for a major corporation that does MAKE things.
There's several problems going on. And it's not all China's fault. Or cheap labor.
1. It's hard to recruit Americans. Why? Our education system really sucks.
2. They are now instituting a relocation program because foreign families do not feel safe here. He just lost a valued team member, a genius, because his children were being bullied in school.
3. People are beginning to not want to move their families to America. People have left the company because they don't want to rotate to the US.
"Love One Another" ~ George Harrison
Yes, in America it seems
the more you suck at your job the better paid you are.
There is no such thing as TMI. It can always be held in reserve for extortion.
The harder you work, the less you get paid.
People who do back breaking work get squat. Grocery managers who walk around and smile.. they get 8 times more money than the grocery clerk who runs around all damn day working their ass off.
We made my old job a major success. Huge. They used to be progressive now they are just relying on the old reputation that we built.
Make your boss rich, you'll have to find a new job.
I'm so glad I no longer work in grocery retail. It's pure hell. Customers generally treat you like shit and then you get shit on by your "boss" which is actually 12 different managers.
"Love One Another" ~ George Harrison
I predict your old work place will collapse
the quality is way down, the selection is now hardly different than the competitors'. The only two things going for them are the people who work there and the ambience. While we still patronize them, we now shop other places too so they're getting less of our money.
It's like NPR or dKos. Those place started getting really bad but a lot of people went there out of habit and didn't necessarily notice how bad they were until they got really bad! That day, when people see that NS is not what they thought, is coming within the next few years.
My son barely can handle the "ambience" there anymore
The people, the workers, are wonderful. But as you can see, they are working with their eyes roaming for the next managerial assault.
They have cut hours. They've cut promotions. They rarely hire from within anymore but from out of state now.
But they've hired more managers. They have very little room to navigate the store because of their fucking displays. I can't stop to shop as I'll be hit by a cart. There's NO customer service anymore because the staff is short and unsupported. It's just the same as any store now.
I hear it from former customers all the time when I'm out and about. They generally tell me they no longer shop there or that they shop there less.
It used to be a wonderful store who was wonderful to customers, employees and vendors.
Their job was to take care of us so we could take care of you. Now they tell ya, "we're better than wal mart" - lesser of two evils...
I am so much happier since I left but I still go in time to time because I love their meat - but not their chicken anymore... and I love my old co-workers.
"Love One Another" ~ George Harrison
National Geographic magazine is now owned by Murdoch
Nat Geo, the cable TV channel, was already 2/3 Murdoch.
Just mentioning this as one example of how a brand’s value to a predator like Murdoch is the ability to coast on its past good reputation. That’s the immense power of branding. It’s hypnotic.
Different subject: why you can’t trust crowd-sourced content sites like Wikipedia or even TV Tropes when it comes to controversial topics. The “pepper-spray” UC Davis president Katehi spent up to $400,000 of the state’s money on, among other things, “managing” the Wikipedia page about her, with the aim of offsetting bad press about her role in the pepper-spray incident. From the Sacramento Bee:
http://www.sacbee.com/news/local/article94733812.html
Everywhere I look, figures I once liked and trusted are doing moral contortions and flocking to join The Committee to Re-elect the Clintonhood. It’s eerie.
That's really interesting. One question for spouse:
Have they tried recruiting older Americans? A lot of us were educated back when public schools were very good, yet have been unemployed or underemployed for a long time now. How about the disabled? I'll never forget my sister, the math genius, being turned down for cashier job after cashier job because she could not stand up for 8 hours straight. Yet today's cashier can't figure out why I give her $10.18 for a $9.93 purchase.
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Yes, they do :)
My husband is 58. And they hire vets and disabled.
"Love One Another" ~ George Harrison
Good for him! Tell him to keep it up, I'd bet they find the
people they need.
And if they need a writer/editor in Kentucky, be sure to give him my name!
Please check out Pet Vet Help, consider joining us to help pets, and follow me @ElenaCarlena on Twitter! Thank you.
OMG, I gave a drive thru cashier
$20.37 for some food that cost something like 12.37.
She handed me back change as if I'd just given her a $20.
When I said, "Excuse me. I gave you $20.37."
She said, "Soooo?" (like she was confused about what to do about it - the receipt said I gave her $20, but I always give exact change if I have it, and I had it.)
I said, "Soooo, I give you this loose change back and you give me another dollar bill."
Her response, "You don't have to be rude, Ma'am."
I was shocked. I was in no way rude. Had I demanded to speak to the manager because she made a simple mistake, that would've been rude, but I just told her how to correct the problem she sounded like she didn't know how to correct. And my tone was no where near rude. Seriously shocked at her response.
LoL! Sounds like she was defensive. I've had tons of these
"no idea what the change should be" incidents and haven't had one act like that! Makes me wonder if she was planning to keep that little bit of extra change for herself. The best defense is a good offense or something. If it happens again, I would speak with the manager - maybe park and go inside - because you're going to end up not wanting to go there and will probably not be the only one she does this to, and if they lose a lot of business that affects all the employees, not just the rude dumb window person.
There's a nice little Chinese restaurant by the WalMart. I've become so used to patiently explaining my cash behavior to the cashier that I did the same there. The Chinese cashier looked at me like "I may not speak very much English, but I'm not an idiot," and said, "I know". Oops! I asked her to go next door, then, and train the WalMart cashiers. She smiled.
Please check out Pet Vet Help, consider joining us to help pets, and follow me @ElenaCarlena on Twitter! Thank you.
Isaac Asimov had a perfect take on that in "Foundation"
Sneaky Salvor Hardin made all the Foundation's hostile neighbors totally dependent on their scientific goods, without their realizing it - and when one of said neighbors decided to get grabby, he just flipped off the switches. No guts, no glory, just a lot of convenient tools and gadgets that had abruptly turned into junk.
It should have been a warning to us too - but it wasn't.
There is no justice. There can be no peace.
Which is happier?
A country of educated, healthy people or warmongering war making country?
We spend so much money on war and ways to kill women and children. It's finally had it's toll. We have denied our children and our planet the right to thrive.
It was good to see you and the others. Sorry I had to leave after an hour. My non 9-5 schedule had me closing. Longer hours... for customers.
Wesley really enjoyed seeing the Quilting Sisters (The Sisters as he calls them) and he enjoyed sharing his thoughts and views. Also he loved the little postcard of art from AsterKitty who is looking for an art studio. He's an artist himself and picked a blue piece and it's on his desk.
"Love One Another" ~ George Harrison
Great idea about having a siesta. Thanks for the OT.
That, in its essence, is fascism--ownership of government by an individual, by a group, or by any other controlling private power. -- Franklin D. Roosevelt --
too bad everything had to happen on the 20th
as you know, I was shaking my left leg at a music festival during the meetup. Shaz was still shaken up about that poor kid getting killed on Hawthorne...she probably still is today. So she wasn't up to going out. We'll be there at the next one though. We should keep doing 'em.
I'm sure we have more meet ups
sorry to have missed you and Shaz. We almost bugged out because Hawthorn bridge was closed and all the detours through town. But I'm a Ninja driver and was able to cut across and made it home faster taking Morrison bridge than had I taken the Hawthorne.
Give Shaz a big hug for me.
"Love One Another" ~ George Harrison
Oh, y’all are in Portland, are you talking about this?
http://www.kgw.com/news/local/pedestrian-struck-on-southeast-hawthorne-b...
So they closed SE Hawthorne Boulevard all the way to the bridge? That’s a big area. Huh.
Gut-wrenching. That would shake me up.
Openly Eccentric, [edited] too eccentric
right? I tried to read and understand this stuff: Elon Musk:Fatalist after having forced myself to listen to this:
[video:https://youtu.be/2KK_kzrJPS8]
What and why do people think he is "something special".
https://www.euronews.com/live
I guess he just has that “Davos sparkle.” Tech is glamorous. n/t
right and I just have to show off my new sig line
because the "Davos sparkle" of the "Silicon Valley Tech darling" is just beaming out the "quasi-scientific subjugation of Man".
Too bad the sig-lines are limited by 255 characters. ...
https://www.euronews.com/live
And then you have Ray Kurzweil, “the Singularity,” & immortality
http://content.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,2048299,00.html
This kind of stuff is really appealing to Silicon Valley billionaires who can afford to blow part of their fortune robing quasi-science in a cultural cloak woven of fantasy, fashion, and mystique.