This is women's history month. Men don't even have a history month. Losers

Anything that can engage our amygdala, aka our default mode brain. Survival. The brain is a forward looking computer model, it seeks out what is going to be a threat to the mind and body. The media has figured out how to predict, dominate and the new horizon is guide your behavior. You have a new master.

@aqua-letifer said in Do you agree with Rick?: @doctor-phibes said in Do you agree with Rick?: One of the things I like about him is that he's very open-minded about music. Often times—and especially when they can explain themselves—it's a good indication someone knows more than me about a thing. I like hearing from folks like that. Just don't listen to him talk about music theory. He doesn't make it any simpler. I'm sure he knows what he means, but I very much doubt that anybody else does.

@andyd Andy, we have lots of wrens here, too. Every year we have at least one pair that nest in our yard. Their song is one of my favorites. They're so tiny, yet fierce in protecting their nesting area. When we get too close they start hollering. For a small bird, they can be quite vocal. That reminds me that it's time to add a couple new nesting boxes for them, to gradually replace ones that are worn out from years of use and weather. We repair the birdhouses as long as we can, because they seem to like having the familiar boxes from year to year. Eventually, there's no fix left except replacement. It seems to help to have the new ones out for a year to let them age or weather a bit, and then the birds accept it as a substitute. It helps to have several houses for them, and the males build in multiple homes. The females shop to pick one they like, and add their own touches to it. I think 89th has just gone through this, too.

Big deal, indeed. Considering how much freight gets transported by rail in the US, I wonder what the impact will be.

@george-k said in Not Cages: @george-k said in Not Cages: By the way, AOC has tweeted about the border crisis challenge since Biden took office exactly .... twice. Not that I'm cynical, but, it's almost like she was using this for political purposes. From the RWEC: "Why has AOC gone AWOL now, when this crisis gives her a perfect opportunity to build some credibility as an activist? One has to wonder whether she’s looking for a position in the Biden administration, or whether she has some trouble heading her way and wants to lower her profile ahead of it. If it’s not either of those, then the only answer is that AOC’s an opportunist when opportunism involves zero cost. And that might be the simplest answer of all." The Famous Razor...

@xenon said in Who Dis?: He looks amazing for 90 Star Trek XXX: "The Search for Kirk's Toupee."

Yep. Docs tend to use what they think will work, even if it's only a slim chance. Slim beats none...

IIRC, Joe has $87B for housing illegals, including a crapload of hotel rooms. Don't know if the come with room service....

@klaus said in Making Everything Compatible. (More camera experiments.): If you like the look of old lenses, did you ever look into Petzval lenses? Nope, but I'm going to have to now! I'm kinda picky about them, though. I don't necessarily want rare ones or lenses that create some kind of strange effect—I have an idea in mind for how I hope certain types of pictures would turn out, and then look for lenses that (hopefully) provide that. More fun, more comprehensive of an effect, and a hell of a lot faster than Photoshop in my opinion.

@klaus said in Hard lockdown in Germany: My sentiment about Germany at the moment is similar to Larry's sentiment about the US on a day after the democrats won an election. ouch!

@aqua-letifer said in Long Covid horror story: @loki said in Long Covid horror story: Wow is right. I would love an expert on suicide to weigh in on how Covid symptoms and a person’s capacity for suicide ideation relate. I read somewhere that rates basically doubled for teens and the elderly in areas where firm lockdowns were put into place. Obviously for the elderly, COVID deaths were still greater in number by orders of magnitude. I think Loki was looking for suicide ideation among Covid patients. Specifically long-haulers. The general suicide rate is another conversation entirely. @George-K just posted an article.

Front and center! The piano, especially a grand piano deserves top billing wherever it resides. Period! One of the best pieces of advice my piano teacher ever gave me was, "practice so much, that you send everyone else running out of the house!" I told him, I actually used to do exactly that in my youth, when I would practice my drums for 2 or 3 hours straight.

@george-k said in Let's Boogie!: @horace said in Let's Boogie!: With Larry gone, I'm finally the best piano player on this forum. That is not a crown I bear lightly. Which reminds me, how's the hand? The thumb is garbage, about 20 degree bend at most. But better than what it was when the flexor tendon was ruptured. I'm still getting used to it. Picking up a chopstick from the table for instance is not easy. But in general I don't notice it too much. I trained myself to use my left thumb for the space bar while typing and now that I could go back, I don't. Haven't tried building models yet, I'll get to that at some point.

[copper-channel/on] Because white people are ugly. [copper-channel/off] ETA: Except for Klaus, of course.

@klaus said in Our real estate market is nuts: @taiwan_girl said in Our real estate market is nuts: @klaus said in Our real estate market is nuts: Actually, many Germans do. But most of them for reasons that are not exactly noble. I don't want to be confused with one of those... Yes, I have seen some of them (not only Germans, but other Westerners). Some of them are quite sad. They move to Thailand because they can live cheaper, but after a while, they are frustrated with Thailand, but do not have enough money to return to Germany (or another country), and spend their time drinking beer and complaining about how bad life is for them. The main reason that is usually quoted here is that they move there to have cheap sex and/or "buy" a wife. I think some do that, and some because they can live cheaply, and some for a combination of both. Like anytime there is a move to a new country, there are the stages where at first everything is great. But then, reality comes up. Then they find that living on Euro1500/month (for example) is really not that good. But, they have cut off "ties" back to their home country and, in a way, become trapped in the foreign country. They cannot afford to move back, they hate where they are, so it is a bad cycle.