Toth

As a teacher myself, I... am noticing the same, but at the same time I can't but help but be annoyed that it happens at a time where everything's an Isekai now and particularly the boys latch onto this stuff because of the antiquated gender roles and it selling as power fantasies for a sexually frustrated audience. The girls in the meantime are clearly more into the K-Pop hype and cuteness of stuff... it's all just... so very stereotypical, imao. Granted, on top of that I am also kinda annoyed when they ask me about whether I watch any as a way of hoping I'd answer and waste time, but that's with all weird personal questions. Don't really want to get put into a situation where I'm asked for recommendations, answer that and will regret that when it's used against me, eh.

They disrupted the supply chain of Tesla's giant factory in Germany, so the Huthi just had to go...

Regarding the front lines question, some time ago I found this map on twitter: https://www.reddit.com/media?url=https%3A%2F%2Fi.redd.it%2F2qmfb00ypl9c1.jpeg Blue is territory gained by Russia last year, yellow is territory gained by Ukraine.

I feel like the conclusion to draw from that is not that the west can't ever possibly beat someone in a prolonged fight, but actually rather that it's pathetic we haven't managed in 2 years of war to set up a couple dozen ammunition factories...

In content yes, but I was thinking more of in scope and rhetoric. Heck, it's all the same conspiracy rabbit hole as they also ramble about QAnon and against Covid measures and shit. The T-Online article I read this morning also drew attention to a group named "Heirs of Arminius" that was trying to take lead during the farmer protests 2021. So it's downright neonazis as well. We live in bleak times.

Okay, so the Green party Vice Chancellor was attacked by a lynch mob the other day when returning from holidays: https://www.dw.com/en/habeck-angry-farmers-trap-german-minister-on-ferry/a-67895293 Note that yesterday the first articles emerged showing that the "concerned farmers" were actually directed to go there by telegram accounts with known involvement in the "Reichsbürger" scene, essentially Germany's QAnon far-right conspiracy lunatics. For next week farmer lobbies announced road blockades throughout the country, with far-right groups jumping on the bandwagon proudly proclaiming a general strike with the aim to unseat the government. And why are the farmer lobbies going postal? Because some tax exemptions to fuel and machinery purchases are going to be rolled back to balance the budget after the conservatives successfully sued the new budget for directing money earmarked for corona measures to industrial transformation projects and so the social democrat/green/liberal coalition was combing through everything to scratch together enough money to do shit in the last months. Meanwhile that same conservatives are going apeshit demanding that instead they should have gone after unemployment benefits because of course they are and calling for new elections, which under the current circumstances only the far-right would gain from. Is it just me or is anyone else so damn tired of so much stupidity? We are just getting out of a global pandemic and have a land war in Europe and yet polarization tears our democracies apart. The future looks so goddamn bleak at the moment.

I had logged in every day except the day they also gave away the Saints Row Reboot, imao. Though admittedly, I'd still have to find the time to play though... every other Saints Row game first, so there is that.

Fair enough, I had pretty much checked out at the time he accused the first guy of leaving with some Axanar stuff on his laptop and the legal mud slinging started and hadn't realized how many he eventually dragged into this stuff. Really a shame.

Mmh... I must admit, I am a backer (of 20 bucks)... and yes, I am frustrated, but... well, Alec Peters may be a megalomaniac buffoon, but I'm still curious to see what will come out of it. The Axanar Youtube channel is quite buzzing with Behind the Scenes footage of them shooting stuff. I have been following the Alec Peters side of things through the years and have followed how he tried to use the money to build his own studio and when that got axed, they wasted so much money building and rebuilding the sets like four times or so while they were in lawsuit limbo and moving around stages and then he started to burn bridges with many of the people he was working with. But even then, given the production value shown there, I am actually believing him when he says that he shielded Axanar by paying out with his own money (he auctioned off parts of his huge Star Trek props collection to keep things running) and am curious how the remaining episodes will look like now that they have actually finally gotten around to film the damned thing.

I'm actually a bit torn on that one. The deflector is so integral to the ship and damn hard to get across with brick builds. The latest medium size models are all pretty good, particularly the TOS Enterprise and Enterprise-A, and I have seen reviewers praising that Excelsior, but the pictures somehow never make it look like they actually got the deflector right: https://i.imgur.com/AOLBujV.png The whole ship looks a bit rough, I think: https://i.imgur.com/I2laZPL.png I wonder whether we will get a large size Excelsior at some point where that is less of an issue. The details just look sad in comparison with, for example, my Defiant: https://i.imgur.com/7xiKkCP.jpg Or aforementioned TOS Enterprise I'm eyeing: https://www.bluebrixx.com/img/items/105/105438/600/105438_1.jpg

Indeed! And... seriously, I don't want to know how much Lego would charge for such a monster. It has 1500 pieces and I paid 80€ for it in a sale. The wings can be adjusted with cogwheels and if you don't want to use the (admittedly a bit drab) stand, it also comes with landing gears.

Okay... the last time I posted about this in a Star Trek thread, the thread just died, so I'm not sure whether there is all that much interest on here, but... over the last few years I started a collection that may have gotten a little overboard and with my latest additions from Christmas and Black Friday Sales, I guess I want to show off a little: https://i.imgur.com/dL2Bs8D.jpg https://i.imgur.com/ljEhtpg.jpg I don't know how it's overseas, but I guess thanks to Corona here "Lego" style brickbuilds (but don't call them that, Lego's lawyers don't like that) have gotten a slight revitalization and because Lego itself has gotten absurdly expansive, people are branching out to other brands that make use of Lego's lack of a copyright on their standard forms. And one German company called Bluebrixx has gotten the official license to make Star Trek models and they have been churning out quite a number of them: https://www.bluebrixx.com/en/sets/star_trek I must admit, I have become a sucker for the minifigure scaled Shuttles as they... kind of give off the Lego Star Wars playset vibe, except that they are far more detailed with wholly printed out LCARS interiors and smoothed out floors. The Type 6 Shuttle and the Deltaflyer are amazing and quite sturdy to boot. The only exception I stumbled across so far is the Runabout, which is a damn shame since it's also the most expensive model I've built. It's fully kitted out interior with cockpit, conference room, sleeping cots and even a bathroom gives off Star Trek camper van vibes and would be fantastic, but unfortunately Bluebrixx' hinge pieces are both too stiff and don't have enough power to even vaguely keep the engine casings above the nacelles in place, making it fall apart whenever you look at them too sternly. A damn shame. The Bird of Prey actually has a similar issue with two casing pieces of the engine falling off if you touch them. But it's far less of an issue there and I'm stunned how sturdy the wings are (I bought it because I built a Bird of Prey as a kid with Lego and the wings falling off all the damn time was always an issue). The Enterprise D was quite overpriced, but I got it when the discount for the first wave models came in. It's still good as a model and throning atop my desk makes the shape come off quite well, but naturally you have to be careful moving it around with both hands because off its stand, the saucer section is too heavy for the neck. The medium sized Defiant I also found fantastic. It has the perfect shape and is also extremely sturdy. Bluebrixx has most models in three sizes and the big sized Defiant for my liking was far too expensive and big. From what I've seen in the reviews, people are also praising the large sized Voyager for being absolutely perfect. With landing gears, removable captain's yacht, a shuttle bay with a tiny shuttle and movable nacelles, it has everything you could wish for. There is also lots of praise for how cool the large NX-01 looks in silver bricks. Personally I have obviously long run out of space, but still am considering getting the mid-sized TOS Enterprise and maybe another shuttle or two (the NX-01 Shuttlepod and the TOS Galileo shuttle when it becomes available again). Bluebrixx also recently has acquired the rights to do Stargate sets, so I'm curious where that is going.

I apologize in advance, I'm in quite a foul mood. Another massive rocket and drone attack this night, likely in retaliation for the sinking of the ship... and more grim news about Ukrainians plagued by ammunition shortages. I guess the delivery of US cluster munition stockpiles was just delaying the inevitable, but is still depressing to see that Europe hasn't yet managed to get the ammunition factories rolling to give Ukraine what it needs to keep up with a Russia whose industry has successfully switched to war footing. Russia is focusing on the dumb, simple stuff, artillery and drones to keep the pain up and even though Ukraine is technically supplied with superior stuff, it's still nowhere near enough to change the tides decisively. And in fact it looks very much like the UA forces are taking unnecessary losses specifically because of these shortages. It boggles my mind why there is no political will to gear it up a notch. And yes, I say it also from a German POV where political infighting has also killed more support. To give a bit of a background: The German budget for the next year had been tanked on a technicality because the conservative opposition sued the government (because no longer deemed necessary funds earmarked for Coronavirus measures had been reallocated to industrial transformation subsidies) and that forced the government to make severe cuts to get the now missing funds from... with the latest news before the holidays saying they achieved a "breakthrough" by apparently cutting all military aid to Ukraine and telling the ministry of defense that all Ukraine support that they still want to do now has to be paid by the money intended to increase the Bundeswehr's readiness. Meaning effectively one or (very likely) both aims will be sacrificed: https://apnews.com/article/germany-economy-budget-crisis-solution-scholz-7cd740fa5ae7ada83913aca436954a89 And that is just one of the stories. The other one being the US polarization being omnipresent in how the Republicans block everything. So apparently the future of our post-Helsinki Accords world order is less important than internal bickering, essentially proving Putin that the West is as weak as he thinks and even if the war is still devastating to Russia, I can't imagine it's not being perceived as a confirmation that not pulling out and cut his losses, but instead pushing on and going for a long war of attrition until "the West"'s will of supporting Ukraine falters, actually can very well pay off. We completely bungled the idea to make a show of strength and unity to force Putin to back off and pretty much set in stone that this will be a long, grueling and also very, very costly affair. Both for the Ukrainian people as well as for us who need to keep the Ukrainian economy on life support for the years to come, because apparently paying them off is easier than producing the means for them to protect themselves.

Merry Christmas, happy holidays and happy birthday y'all! Am dead tired because I was up till 3 am and woke up with a scratchy throat, quite certainly getting sick... I am not sure I am in any condition to do more than grinch around.

Just read "If the Hamas hadn't attacked, the hostages wouldn't have been in that situation to get shot in the first place!". Now I'm sad...

I'm disappointed the GTA VI trailer showed no drone crashing at a construction site.

I will certainly not do that! Admitting to anxiety, even introversion is a quick way to repel people. I can't exactly fake confidence either, so I just have to... be normal me. Even if it's stressed and tired me that still has stuff not done in a 62 hour week. And as I said, I don't think she actually finds me "interesting", it's just I'm not used to basic friendliness that other people would consider normal I guess.

Crossing fingers that it will work out beyond the honeymoon phase! Sigh, this is probably the wrong thread and should get into the Mental Wellbeing thread, but I wanted to end on a positive note there. That I'm posting it here just proves I am making wrong assumptions, but I suppose I prefer it as some kind of inter-gender-relation worries. So... I've got a new coworker for a few months now and it is quite telling that my current slump of intense loneliness is warping my vision because I cannot help but feel a little taken aback and uneasy about her behavior. We actually barely interacted with each other despite her taking a seat next to me in the staff room, mostly since she is always busy elsewhere and I couldn't get beyond some standard questions about what she was teaching in general and at the moment. However a few weeks ago I helped her out in a rather... silly situation on the way home and noticed that since then she seems remarkably eager to greet me. With exaggerated waving and a big smile. At one point running after me to ask how I am while I was busily walking to class in the opposite direction. I know that's mostly her personality or rather something she just does because she isn't speaking the language too well and uses that to get her point across and I am so damned awkward in my reactions and despite wanting to just... have a normal interaction, I am still constantly fighting my reflex to go for avoidance until things return to my kind of normal. It is also rather telling that after that stupid little thing where I helped her, she asked whether my direction home is the same and I said no, wished her well and walked to the train station... only to realize later on that she was just taking the cablecar into the exact same direction and I probably could have joined her. Granted, that was more a mistake than anything else, but I guess it sets the mood to me being too focused on my own misery to pay attention.

So how did it go? Have you managed to stick to the mindset you expressed in your last post? It sounded like you had come around to accepting that this is a step they need to do for their own development. It didn't sound like it was directed in any way against you. I had one damn weekend where I was comparably fit. Oddly enough, it was one where I stressed to get all my work finished in the week and worked every day till late into the night, feeling quite tired throughout the day and then was too groggy to do anything anymore and spent almost the entire weekend mostly fiddling to get old videogames to run on my PC instead of anything productive. Weird how that was extremely refreshing... and yet I'm right back to spending almost all my time correcting exams, because I'm stupid and far too late with my stuff because I want sooo much time for practice. Unfortunately this free weekend I bought with being terribly behind at running after my students missing medical certificates for missing days... sigh...

Just so you know, according to my other go-to-forum for these kinds of current events debates woke-ism has turned you all into raving anti-Semites! Granted, I myself am staying clear of all rallies and stuff specifically to avoid getting lumped together with the actual anti-Semites shouting indefensible positions attracted to these events and whom no organizer can prevent from showing up (if they were even willing to, that is)... and yet I find it still sad how the last five pages of that forum were entirely conservative folks ranting/gloating about how Greta Thunberg, John Oliver, Robert Habeck, Joe Biden, hbomberguy, AOC and whoever else all have now revealed themselves to be anti-Semites on twitter, of course never linking to these posts or even quoting what they said and I'm just... okay, whatever. All the people countering them by now are banned from the thread or have given up and so it's just one massive circle-jerk... I think the Al-Shifa-raid wasn't even mentioned, or anything else going on on the ground, given that the war has now being completely turned into a tool to foster group-thinking and ammunition against political opponents. Sigh... humans suck...

There is a Russian POV video from the drone going around on Reddit and you can clearly see that the cockpit is painted on and the engines are cannibalized from... something else entirely. It looks like a plane, but certainly not a SU-25.

Fair enough. I guess I'm just... kinda cynical in that I doubt that even most people have it...

Mmh... I think what he means is not just about personal preference, but... the fear that in our modern dating world it would and certainly does cut down communication. I assume if you are focused on one person, you'll focus more on how to make it work, on discussing how to define your relationship and (hopefully in a healthy manner) both people adjust their expectations as long as nobody tears down any of their needed boundaries or decide to call quits when they are too incompatible. But when people become options, you'll see them as more immovable, are more prone to judge them without saying anything and drop people because someone else seems superficially less of a hassle at an early point in the process. Oh, and for bonus points they will get ghosted and will never learn what the reason was.

I had been a bit on a DC trip again these days and so I spent some time this weekend installing Arkham Knight. The only Arkham game I hadn't played as of yet (I installed it last year I think, but never got around to actually play it and so uninstalled it again). I... think it was a mistake to do so sooo late. The game has massive issues with both Windows 11 and my graphics card. Had to install third party software to even boot it up. Then had massive lag spikes and massively delayed lip movements in dialogue. Still managed to play a bit through the prologue, even if it was rough. Then booted it up again yesterday night, ended up facing even more severe lag to the point I couldn't get off the rooftop I spawned on. So I lowered the details, nothing changed. I lowered the resolution, nothing changed, except the picture becoming so blurry my eyes hurt. So I put the resolution back to where it was... and all of the sudden the game runs smooth like butter! The hell? I ended up reverting to the medium settings I started out with and yet somehow it had fixed the issue. What kind of spaghetti code nonsense is that? I played for half an hour and didn't encounter a single stutter, the graphics and physics even in the upscaled cutscenes were perfectly fluid. I'm not complaining. XD Also... maybe it's just because it was so long ago I played the games, but... somehow the combat in Arkham Knight feels better than in the previous games. Somehow smoother and less prone to mistime counters for silly reasons. I'm not sure, but I think to remember that I found the combat smoother in Asylum than in City and Origins and was a bit worried about Knight for that reason... and yet the game almost plays itself, despite not bothering with a tutorial as the developers seem to expect you to have played the previous ones and just drop you right into the game after a creepy prologue where you play a fear gassed police officer. Also booh, video game logic restrictions! Because I immediately caught that the guy in the booth was Scarecrow, I actually refused to shoot any of the monsters and just fired into the ceiling. When Batman meets the officer at the GCPD, the other officers still say "he will never forgive himself for what he did in that diner", despite me specifically not killing anyone. Would have been a fun easter egg if you get different dialogue for restraining yourself. Edit: Okay... kudos to the developers! I just looked it up and there IS different dialogue for the diner scene! But only if you don't fire your gun at all! If you do, it automatically assumes you shot people.

Least surprising news of the day: https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2023/nov/20/twelve-billionaires-climate-emissions-jeff-bezos-bill-gates-elon-musk-carbon-divide?CMP=Share_iOSApp_Other