For the fancy nerd in your life.
“I Slept in Taylor Swift’s Casket and Did Not Rest in Peace”
Friday Afternoon Links
About The Author
Riven
[riv-uhn]
noun
1. a gaming, lifting, shooting, intoxicated, ravenous, and happily-taken nerd.
2. often aims to misbehave.
3. and though she be but little, she is fierce.*
And rumor has it that she (and her husband) are also delightful dinner companions. You didn't hear it from me, though.
Taylor Swift is a vampire?
Does she hang out with Pie?
You heard the rumors from Inez?
You can’t believe a word she says…. (most times)
Launchers suck, Steam sucks
Howdy folks
Steam sucks a bit less than launchers, though.
Luckily, I don’t play that AAA shit that tends to come with a launcher.
Steam is at least at this point (to me) an acceptable level of DRM. It allows for offline play for a month, has opt-ins for things like the hardware surveys, doesn’t matter how many machines have things installed (you can only be logged into your account on one machine at a time though), and allows for family library sharing (so I can let the girlfriend play games I bought that she may like).
I’ll also allow for individual game launchers that come up that allow you to set options, mods, and the like before launching the game proper. I got annoyed as hell when I was playing an Ubisoft game through the Xbox launcher, that would then launch the Ubisoft launcher with pop up ads before launching the game.
I was so happy when Games for Windows Live died a horrible death.
So happy it’s links time. It’s cloudy and depressing out, and I still have an hour + of work left.
You should be more stoic about that.
Hey, that was last post!
Ted’s never forgets
Apparently not, this is the second week in a row he did that.
Good afternoon everyone.
What is the product for the fancy nerd? I have one of those who I like to keep happy.
It’s the linked story:
https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/elderwood/dungeon-journal
Depends on the type of geek/nerd. There are different fancy options for all types.
As an example, for board game geeks, there are organizing inserts for games.
My nerd organizes her organizers.
Does she have a 3D printer?
She has access to one.
I would benefit from it mor than her. I’m interested.
That song slaps, as the kids probably don’t say anymore.
Anything by Northern States Power slaps, once a month.
I still have a Reddy Kilowatt pin, as well as his less popular cousin, Reddy Flame.
My first employer upon returning to the US with MSc in hand.
Lol
Funny you say, I almost linked it with the same sentiment.
I’d like to see a detailed comparison of the “microschool” methods and the Montessori method. Of course, Montessori isn’t NEW!!! and may be insufficiently buzzwordy for parents’ tastes.
Maybe it’s just too hard to spell.
My kids loved the public library, my daughter still talks about getting books when she was in first grade and the Inter Scholastic reading list books. She always wanted to order more, we’d have to go over the list she’d chosen, book by book, until she was down to 5, maybe.
Saturdays and a limited budget was a special day for us, I always got a couple for myself at the library.
I once told my mom I wanted to move into the library. 🙂📚
+1 Mrs. Basil E. Frankenweiler sorta
We spent a lot of time in the library when my kids were young, but we stopped going to the on base one and moved to the one out in town after I got called into my 1stSgt’s office because we had forgotten to return Winnie the Pooh and Tigger Too.
Somehow that book title got burned into my brain.
Obligatory: https://i.pinimg.com/474x/ae/70/18/ae7018e42d1df60a5a366b0efa8041fa–opus-the-closet.jpg
I thought the article sounded a lot like my daughter’s Montessori school, only smaller.
Montessori is probably slightly more structured, but barely.
We are planning on moving my daughter after 3rd grade, but I am getting more worried about the transition at the time. We are going to go to one of the classical charter schools, but it is still a traditional classroom (if the material isn’t quite so typical) and I wonder if it is best or not.
The worry is that if we stayed thru 6th grade, the move during middle school years would be even tougher.
It’s time to play “Guess the Cosmotarian”
Come on. that can’t be real.
“Modern Audiences”
Disney is DEAD to me.
Running a close 2nd place to the drinker as my favorite youtube commenter.
That was really great!
Robby?
That’s gotta be ENB’s beat.
Ding ding ding
Barf.
In a world with an increasing number of direct-to-consumer startups like Warby Parker, Dollar Shave Club, and Tuft & Needle that are circumventing the middleman to save money, Titan Casket is circumventing the middleman to save stress, and saving people money in the process.
Next time I catch a cold and start coffin, I’ll mention this company to my next of kin.
If we plot another pun thread, Swiss will bury us.
Damn your nimble fingers!
I’m sensing a plot to start a pun thread. A procession of bad puns no doubt. Swissy will bury you in no time.
Of corpse you guys are doing this again, and I just can’t deal with this any morgue.
You had to dig deep for that pun.
For fun or real?
We’ll be sure to pass it on.
I wouldn’t be caught dead using one of their products.
Swiss must’ve abandoned us — he just couldn’t take it any mort.
Where are you, Swiss? This thread is more than I can bear. Appalling!
Kiss coffins for the Kiss army member in your life.
https://www.mentalfloss.com/posts/kiss-kasket-history
We should probably have done this thread in the AM links, since Swiss isn’t a mourning person.
My last bit of wordplay entered a room and left ten bodies in its wake. Pun in, ten dead.
I think Swiss is busy trying to de-crypt his narrow gaze from the Edit Fairy strike…
As soon as he sees this he’ll undertake to narrowly gaze.
*narrows gaze*
*Contemplates strike breaking the Edit Fairy Union*
“I will continue to vote Republican until every pro-lockdown Democrat is out of office.
I will continue to vote Republican until every pro-perversion Democrat is out of office.
That is the only way the Democrats can get rid of the stench.”
https://adambcoleman.substack.com/p/i-voted-republican-for-the-first/
Interesting point of view.
Floating storage
More than 30 tankers carrying liquefied natural gas are idling off Europe’s coast as traders hold out for higher market prices, the Financial Times reported.
The ships, which combined are carrying LNG worth $2 billion, are at sea around north-west Europe and the Iberian peninsula, the FT reported Friday, citing Vortexa data.
“LNG vessels have been queued up outside European LNG receiving terminals, chasing what they expected to be the premium market for this LNG,” Vortexa’s Felix Booth told the FT.
Booth said it will likely take another month for the tankers to find a terminal to offload their cargo, as access has become more restricted as storage sites have filled up.
No kidding. High prices brought product to where it’s needed, and that’s bad.
It is cold and rainy outside.
I LOVE IT!!!
Hello, November, my favorite month of the year.
17 here at the moment. Got six inches of snow this week. Tomorrow morning I’ll probably
play with one of my big-boy toysget the tractor out and move some snow around.75 and sunny!
Relevant, even if it’s not the Carpenters.
55* and going back and forth between drizzly and “god whipped it out…”
I’m so old I don’t get any of the gamer stuff. My head just cocks to one side like a confused puppy.
So, apologies to Riven for going OT, but I’m going to offer up an alternative set of links, Laura’s Links from Mark Steyn. Laura drops links only on Thursdays.
https://www.steynonline.com/12966/just-say-no
“NBC News mysteriously PULLS its exclusive report on how Nancy Pelosi’s husband Paul, 82, calmly opened door to cops in his underpants – and then walked TOWARDS ‘hammer intruder’ who bludgeoned him”
https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-11390497/Paul-Pelosi-answered-door-cops-did-NOT-say-distress-new-police-account-claims.html
We’re never going to see a video.
Under… uh, other… circumstances people might wonder at what’s obviously going on here.
If it was a gay hook up, why would it be with some crazy guy who sleeps in a bus? How would Paul even know that guy?
Maybe it was a drug deal. Who the hell knows.
It’s fishy as hell, that’s all I know.
It was both.
“It’s fishy as hell, that’s all I know.”
No argument there.
I’m just thinking someone with his money would have a much better dealer, rent boy, whatever. Also, the other guy didn’t seem like he any making money either.
It would have been a heck of a lot easier to hook up with Larry Craig.
“MSNBC host Joy Reid claims Americans had NEVER heard the word ‘inflation’ until the GOP ‘taught it to them’ – as it rises to 40 year high under Biden”
https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-11391471/Joy-Reid-claims-Americans-NEVER-heard-word-inflation-GOP-introduced-it.html
I never heard of the Empire State Building until she tried to climb it.
So Joy Reid thinks everyone is as ignorant as she is?
LOL at Joy, pretending she’s a millennial.
Is she that pig-ignorant??
My mother-in-law (may she RIP) said when she was visiting at our home years ago looked at the paper copy of the MSJ on the kitchen table and loudly proclaimed “I don’t know ANYONE who reads the Wall Street Journal.
I considered reminding her that she knew me, and that I read the WSJ, but I thought better of it.
As a youth, I was a fan of Jack Kent Cooke’s Washington Redskins. So the passing of their stalwart defensive tackle from the ‘Skins glory days makes me a little sad.
He was a 305 pounder in the days when such were a rarity.
I liked big Butz, I cannot lie.
It is another Friday, I’ve got no plans, so I’ll be kicking off the Zoom/Happy Hour/Election Prediction Room at 20:00 Eastern.
Being more inclusive seems like not only the right thing to do but also a way it could help beauty pageants shed some of their old-fashioned, intolerant image and help with their lack of resonance with today’s audiences.
“Why can’t people be more like me? That’s what diversity means.”
Hi Riven!
Even when you’re working on Saturday, Friday afternoon still feels fine.
You aren’t kidding. For some reason, Friday afternoons are even better than Saturdays for me.
Sorry you have to work tomorrow, though.
Ah, it’s alright. People be dying every day. That’s the gig. As long as Saturday nights and Sunday mornings are free, that’s all I need
Why can’t a woman be more like a man?
Prices for natural gas in Europe have fallen back from their August highs, when they topped 346 euros per megawatt-hour thanks to concerns that Russia’s cuts to its export flows would cause an energy crisis in the winter.
Milder-than-usual temperatures, reduced gas consumption and Europe’s storage sites rapidly filling up ahead of winter have all helped pull prices lower.
But the traders keeping their tankers offshore are betting prices will gain in the months ahead, as colder weather sets in and lifts heating demand, and as gas is released from storage.
So messy. Price controls will fix this.
Mad Ex Update 3 (?)
She emailed me twice.
1. Do you really want to test me about returning that money, Evan? It’s not yours.
2. (4 hours later with no reply in between) You won’t even give back the money you owe? You truly are a garbage person.
I am not replying, don’t worry. Just keeping record. Just updating y’all. This really is a crazy one. She is very intelligent and outwardly has the willpower to use that…hrm. I’m not really worried, but it obviously is on my mind.
Let me know what ya think/your experiences. I have already ceased all contact.
I just put out a pretty damn good paper, by my calculation. For me and where I am in this process, I certainly had a damn good week. It was a long fucking week, but it got done.
Stoned. Nice walk. World Series.
Ghost her. Classify her texts and emails as spam so you don’t even see them.
Agreed. Based on her language she is about to give up yelling at you.
Methinks Evan finds the drama entertaining.
Also agreed.
Duh.
I once got a letter from my ex-wife’s lawyer
“If you don’t intend to pay, let me know”
I ‘did’ intend to pay, someday, maybe. He wanted me on record. At this point I was not longer paying him (I had to pay my lawyer and hers, judge said so) ’cause we were already divorced.
Ayup.
I didn’t know you had an American GF; I thought they were Asian.
What’s her NYS bar number? Take it to Forum if you like, would probably be most prudent. I am busier than a one-legged man, but maybe I could help. Or perhaps someone else here is more suited.
“She can’t do that to our pledges! Only we can do that to our pledges!” 😉
Ugh, she’s dunning you over a piddly three figures that’s probably less than her hourly rate?! Sorry, just angry on your behalf.
Friday Funbags save the day!
https://archive.ph/Z08Ni
The face diaper pic ruined it. Blech.
I just fear we’ll learn the wrong lessons on schooling from the pandemic shut down. Especially in regard to remote or computer education. Yes kids are behind due to the shut downs but the teachers’ unions will take that to mean only in person schooling works. It may mean that parents are not good at homeschooling/ working with teachers remotely. It may mean that teachers are not prepared to teach remotely. It may mean that Khan academy and the like only work as supplemental to in person teaching. I think there are too many variables to completely discount remote teaching.
Thing is it’s some of all of the above, plus the fact that different students learn differently. I learned that for me, personally, pure remote classes don’t work when I was finishing my BS and took Psychology (as a “required elective” sort of thing) online. I did fine in the class, but I didn’t actually learn much. There are almost certainly people that do learn well that way, so they likely thrived in the lockdown. But I suspect that’s a low percentage. All the other factors you mentioned almost certainly played a part. But the biggest problem is the insistence on “one size fits all” learning, which assumes (incorrectly) that it’ll work for the vast majority of students.
My working hypothesis is that the government schools and pubsec teachers did a completely shit job of remote teaching, and there is no larger lesson to be taken from it.
They used the rest of their time at home to study up on woke bs so now they can do shit job in person. The larger lesson is don’t subject your kids to government schools.
The remote “learning” I hated for my son the most was his AP Chemistry class. He still learned what he had to, took the AP exam in it afterward and did well, but this is a class that’s supposed to have lab work. And they did maybe two weeks at the end when they finally could go back in. English and history went okay on zoom – you read something on your own and have discussion. Mind you, this is a private school, so the kids are more engaged already than a public one. I read some horror stories of how few students showed up for any class for remote school – just staggering in LAUSD that a full year-plus were lost for so many kids.
I know math was a problem for even the kids at his school, though, since he’s a math tutor and he was helping quite a few lower grade kids.
I was issued a Walmart Capital One credit card. I don’t need one, but it promised me 5% off on all Walmart purchases and I buy dog and cat food there and stuff like paper towels because the prices are competitive, they deliver it for free and hey, they offered me an additional 5% off.
When I went to activate it, they had me call. The guy sent a link and said that to finish activating it, I had to email me some documents. Turns out one of those documents is a picture of my Social Security card. What a crock of shit. My Fico score is just under 800 and I’ve lived at the same address for nearly 40 years. I called them back and told them t0 go fuck themselves and made sure they canceled the card. I can live without the $15/month I’d save using it. Again, what a crock of shit. Does Capital One only issue credit to ne’er-do-wells?
I had that card. They didn’t ask me those things.
How long ago was that? Because this happened just an hour ago.
Last year.
That sounds shady AF.
That’s what I thought. I have never had this happen before. When I cancelled, they told me that by doing so I could never apply for a Capital One card again. The horror. The horror.
It’s a mystery
Twitter has suffered a “massive drop in revenue” because of advertisers pausing spending on the social media platform, Elon Musk, the new owner of the company, said Friday without providing numbers.
In a tweet, the Tesla, Twitter, and SpaceX CEO cast blame on “activist groups pressuring advertisers.” He said Twitter hasn’t changed its content moderation strategy, and added the company has done “everything we could to appease the activists.”
Musk didn’t specify how much revenue the company has lost from the pullback, or how he was able to attribute that loss to pressure from activist groups.
——-
Earlier this week Musk, who now calls himself “Chief Twit,” met with a group of leaders of civil society organizations to address concerns about hate speech and election-related misinformation on the platform.
Since Musk took the helm, online trolls and bigots raided Twitter, and hate speech has surged on the platform. Musk also tweeted out, then deleted, an unfounded and anti-LGBTQ conspiracy theory about a home invasion and assault on Paul Pelosi, husband of Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi.
Some of the organizations represented in the hourlong Zoom call on Tuesday have now co-signed an open letter to top Twitter advertisers urging them to suspend their ad spending if Musk fails to enforce the company’s safety standards and community guidelines.
Musk shot himself in the foot by exposing the bot numbers. That’s it.
I am honestly amazed by the amount of coverage the Twatterverse has gotten. Id it really that popular or important?
Uh huh. 🙄
It’s that important to the media
It’s important that wrongthinkers be barred from the public sphere.
How in the actual fuck is it “anti-LGBTQ”. Accusing a straight person of bein gay is anti-LGBTQ, accusing a gay person of being straight is anti-LGBTQ. Is that about where we’re at?
Having concerns about your young daughter chopping off her tits behind your back is also where we’re at.
Jeezus…yeah. The pace at which this happened is mind boggling.
Once they removed the concept of objective truth from society, there was no limit to the perversions
But the biggest problem is the insistence on “one size fits all” learning, which assumes (incorrectly) that it’ll work for the vast majority of students.
And, of course, the single best solution is the one deemed best (easiest) for the teachers. Who gives a shit about the students?
If Musk’s purchase of Twitter results in its demise, he’ll have done humanity a great service. That stupid platform didn’t even exist prior to 2006, but I do remember everyone in the media jumping on all at once and thinking, WTF for?
Things that really piss you off… #4,562:
1) Realizing after you plug a bunch of drives into an external enclosure to back up / rebuild / transfer your home NAS that you miscalculated and need one more drive to have size parity.
2) Knowing you can squeak by without it — but going ahead and ordering it because might as well get it done right… and it gets to you… and won’t f’ing even spin up (god awful high pitched repeated whine… so the motor is definitely trying, but something isn’t happy and it isn’t deciding it is ready… so it just… keeps… retrying….).
So now I get the fun of talking with bloody Seagate at some point next week when I can tolerate it.
It’ll probably go well — I had some drive problems a year and a half back or so and they replaced them pretty quickly after I plugged them into a spare box and ran their test program to show them the clear failures — I can’t imagine I’ll have to do that this time… the tests can’t do anything if the drive never responds, after all… But I really hate getting defective products right off. Grrrr…
Ugh. I never had good experiences dealing with Seagate. I’ve had lovely experiences dealing with Western Digital.
Guess who’s drives I continue to buy?
I had a whole slew of 12Tb NAS WDs die a couple of years back. The Exos line from Seagate were the only other drives you could get suitably sized and with decent reliability, so I switched over to them… they’ve been mostly good once they’re burned in (barring what is either heat issues in my current case, a very well hidden memory issue or btrfs just losing its mind sometimes giving me sneaky corruption… right (of course) in my workstation backups… which I only find when I decide to rebuild and restore, of course..).
But your comment did remind me that I shirked my duties last weekend and didn’t put the girlfriends new SSD into her machine.
That task is done now. I’ll kick off the Windows installation tomorrow before I leave the house.
https://twitter.com/stclairashley/status/1588520582173188096
LOLWTF??
Peak cringe?
This ad brought to you by the South Pittsburgh Community College Players from the looks of it.
I suppose it could have been worse — he could have started asking the kid if he liked movies about gladiators given the current crop of Dems.
It’s a 2016 ad.
OK, thanks.
“Accidentally”
https://www.dailystar.co.uk/real-life/woman-accidentally-ends-up-number-28347065
Damn… I didn’t think even Dr. J got up to 28,347,065 — weird that she felt the need to call her placement out, but hey… whatever floats her boat and all.
I would have thought the Germans would have preferred the No. 2 sex club, what with their love of Scheißeporn.
Wait, there’s a George Floyd foundation?
JFC.
Set up by the real estate investors from BLM?
They’re breathing life into the community.
https://twitter.com/SuspectRWFed/status/1580448312540696576
“what if it was the best Glow Job you’ve ever had in your life?”
Probably from Ft Bragg. The army runs a massive psyop program out of there. I wouldn’t be surprised if it dwarfs the CIA.
The federal government needs to go away forever. It’s completely out of control.