Hedwig sings a song about this myth, Origin of Love.

“Low taper fade”?

In the US it must be Springfield because there’s so fucking many of them that they named made a TV show after it.

Stupid sexy autocorrect.

There will ALWAYS be mistakes, bias, and corruption. There is no such thing as incontrovertible evidence. And even if there was some fantastical magical way to know absolute truth, that is still a pretty poor justification for more murder.

Execution of innocent people is (and always has been) the entirely predictable, inevitable, and probably unavoidable result of capital punishment. There is no getting around the fact that, as long as the state executes prisoners, innocent people will be executed and “the state”, i.e. taxpayers, will pay more for it than they ever would have imprisoning the convicted for life.

It’s a damn shame that we haven’t built a microwave that actually listens to the pops and stops when the pops slow, just like every bag of popcorn instructs you to do. We’ve got gun shot detectors; you’d think we could build a chip to analyze popping popcorn.

TV static in recent movies and shows that are set in the past almost always instantly pull me out of the narrative because no one seems to be able to get it right and some are just stunningly bad. It’s usually very subtle, so much so that I’m not sure I could even describe what’s wrong. Makes me feel old to notice it.

Like quibbling over the difference between rape and sexual assault.

Let this be a lesson to you then. Checking the logs should be your first troubleshooting step, not installing a variety of distros until one “just works”. Good luck.

Chopsticks. Use them. It takes a little practice, but they are perfect for snacking, especially popcorn. Cheetos are easiest of the chips, but others are possible. No more residue on your finger tips, or the backs of your hands from reaching into the bag. I also switched to chopsticks for things like salads (fruit or vege variety), noodles, and getting olives and such out of jars. Even a good stew or chili can be eaten with chopsticks and a spoon. Now I just need to get better at using chopsticks with my nondominant hand.

Shit, my bus stop was at least a half mile away without so much as a sidewalk anywhere, just a dirt road and a canal. You didn’t even get a bus stop if you were less than 2 miles from school. We regularly rode our bikes like 12 miles away from home to the movie theater, I think we were pre-teens. Technically I could have ridden my bike to grade 6 (it was on the way to the movie theater), but who wants to show up to 6th grade everyday drenched in sweat or rain (it would always have been one or the other).

I’ll phrase it like a shower thought:

“Avoiding politics is about as useless as avoiding economics, math, science, or the arts; they permeate everything we do. We even use them to define what it means to be human. We might as well avoid breathing.”

I think avoiding partisanship and incivility might be more productive, but it has the problem of being more vague and requiring judgement, thus requiring more effort to enforce fairly and consistently. I don’t think there is an answer that will satisfy everyone. Avoiding politics may be a good rule for this community, even if it’s pointless.

My work boot socks are Kirkland brand Merino and I’ve bought some Smartwool socks. This is not a recommendation of those brands, just the easiest one’s to find with a reliable amount of wool when I bought them. They’re both ok, but really any sock with a sufficient amount of wool in the blend and a good fit will work. The one’s with more wool and less stretch will obviously not stretch as much, but they will eventually confirm to your foot shape surprisingly well. The one’s with less wool in the blend also seem to not last as long. If you’re wearing them in a boot and expect some actually dirt getting in there, a thicker sock will hold up better and protect your feet better long term. At least that is my impression.

Opposite. I wear wool socks. Sometimes my socks are sopping wet, but my feet feel dry.

Some people get a lot out of sitting very still and clearing their minds completely. Some people get more clarity in motion, while running, rowing, cycling, or walking. There is another way on meditation that involves almost the opposite of a clear mind, where you focus on experiencing and really noticing absolutely everything around you; every breath, birdsong, machine noise, footstep, squirrel chittering, and insect buzzing. Sometimes while focusing on a puzzle or game like Tetris, Sodoku, or a Rubik’s cube, it feels meditative to me. I don’t know if that’s real meditation. But my point is that everyone’s built differently, find what works for you and stop worrying about failing. If you’re trying, you’re not failing.

Mostmaps people use to make some point, especially some political point, turn out to just be population density maps.

No. No. No. Don’t just buy a raw one if you don’t know what to do with it. Find a place that has prepared it in something. I recommend durian ice cream. The waitress warned me that it tasted like gas. I asked her if she meant the fuel or farts and she just repeated “gassy”. It smelled sweet like unburned gasoline at a classic car show and earthy like a belt loosening fart. And yet somehow it doesn’t actually taste bad. It’s mostly just unsettling that it tastes as good as it does. I’m not sure I’d order it again, except on a dare or to horrify any companions that haven’t experienced it yet. It’s like spicy food, sometimes you’ve got to power through the initial stink/spice to really get to the hidden flavors.

Pretty much all of the Sci-Fi written by Ursula K. LeGuin features people more than machines. There are technologies in the stories that play a role, but the are described as vaguely as possible to support the plot. As a result, often her sci-fi stories feel more like fantasy.

Octavia Butler wrote the Xenogenesis series which features an alien “species” whose system of technology is entirely biological.

Judge appointments work in a similar way, I assume other offices do as well. Judges often decide precisely when they are going to retire in order to manipulate how their replacement is chosen, by vote or by appointment. These positions SHOULD be mostly non-political and merit based in general. In reality, just like economics, politics is inevitably everywhere. The real solution here is to get out the vote for every election at every level, not just the big federal one every 4 years.

That’s the way voting in a Republic, where you’re not voting directly for every position, law, and amendment, should work. The Republic falls apart and corruption and manipulation of the public will becomes easier when people don’t turn out to vote at the smaller election cycles. The death of local news plays into this too as it becomes much more difficult to stay informed about the people and politics of those smaller local elections. If you think our representative system is broken and needs to change, the solution is the same, get out and vote for every election and support local investigative journalism.

The “E” (and similarly the “IE”) at the end is a very different pronunciation indicator than an “E” in the middle of the word.

There’s no need for the weird hate in your spoiler tag just because you don’t understand something.