The Small Stuff That Doesn't Need, or Even Want, a Thread. #6

[Zorral]

It all goes together, to show her ugly and him a cuk.  Even so, neither of these exceedingly successful people will ever date any of Those losers, no matter what They call two of the most successful people currently living.  Of course nobody else will date Them either, because They smell and are boring, as well as stupid..

[Spockydog]

Just added our first robot to the R&D roadmap. Lol. 

[BigFatCoward]

Will you be a millionaire by Christmas 2024? 

[Spockydog]

45 minutes ago, BigFatCoward said:

Will you be a millionaire by Christmas 2024? 

No, probably not. Though my patent is probably worth quite a bit.

[A Horse Named Stranger]

In random news.

If you happened to be an Orca. Never eat more than six otters.

Or at least chew properly.

[Fragile Bird]

21 hours ago, A Horse Named Stranger said:

In random news.

If you happened to be an Orca. Never eat more than six otters.

Or at least chew properly.

She otter’ve known better.

[Liffguard]

This is a fairly small gripe in the grand scheme of things, but as I'm increasingly turning into a grumpy old fuck in my 30s, please indulge me.

I've recently moved towards ditching my smartphone. I still have one, but I don't carry it around with me most of the time. The reason for this is that I'm trying to break the habit of unthinking compulsive scrolling.

Anyway, I still enjoy listening to music on the move, so I thought I'd dust off my old mp3 player and save a bunch of new music onto it. But since the rise of spotify there's been loads of new bands I've been getting into. So I go online to (legally) download a bunch of their music so that I have permanent copies that I actually own.

For some, this is fine. But for a surprising number of them, this option doesn't seem to exist. It looks like for a lot of bands and artists now, streaming is the only way to access their music online.

If spotify were to disappear tomorrow, a huge amount of the music I love would basically just disappear into the ether. It's one of the reason that I always try to buy physical albums - whether they be cd or vinyl - from any band I see live.

And it seems like this doesn't only apply to music. How much art and media is off there floating in the cloud, totally at the mercy of whatever streaming service holds onto it (or potentially delete it)? How much of the software we use daily is now a subscription service rather than a product that we own?

[Larry of the Lawn]

3 hours ago, Liffguard said:

This is a fairly small gripe in the grand scheme of things, but as I'm increasingly turning into a grumpy old fuck in my 30s, please indulge me.

I've recently moved towards ditching my smartphone. I still have one, but I don't carry it around with me most of the time. The reason for this is that I'm trying to break the habit of unthinking compulsive scrolling.

Anyway, I still enjoy listening to music on the move, so I thought I'd dust off my old mp3 player and save a bunch of new music onto it. But since the rise of spotify there's been loads of new bands I've been getting into. So I go online to (legally) download a bunch of their music so that I have permanent copies that I actually own.

For some, this is fine. But for a surprising number of them, this option doesn't seem to exist. It looks like for a lot of bands and artists now, streaming is the only way to access their music online.

If spotify were to disappear tomorrow, a huge amount of the music I love would basically just disappear into the ether. It's one of the reason that I always try to buy physical albums - whether they be cd or vinyl - from any band I see live.

And it seems like this doesn't only apply to music. How much art and media is off there floating in the cloud, totally at the mercy of whatever streaming service holds onto it (or potentially delete it)? How much of the software we use daily is now a subscription service rather than a product that we own?

This chaps my ass sometimes too.  I find a little bit of comfort (just a little) in thinking that digitized art is mostly probably ephemeral too, and maybe a bunch of wonderful stuff will be buried in the sands of time along with all the other amazing art and music that has been made, appreciated, and forgotten all the way back to the first time some hominid banged out a beat on two rocks or carved a bone flute.  

[polishgenius]

Honestly: it's not a small gripe. It's a big fucking gripe. It's a process that is leaving art in the grip of the corporations. We've already seen films and series wiped from legal existence because Disney needed a tax break or because David Zaslav finds them objectionable.

[Spockydog]

4 hours ago, Liffguard said:

For some, this is fine. But for a surprising number of them, this option doesn't seem to exist. It looks like for a lot of bands and artists now, streaming is the only way to access their music online.

I am vehemently anti-Spotify. I only listen to the radio and stuff that I buy.

And most bands have a Bandcamp page where you can buy from them directly. FLAC, baby.

[dog-days]

Given the horrors of the Middle East right now, it seems odd to be talking about one small thing, but anyway. The comedian Mark Steel has cancer. He's written a very fine article about it. 

I saw him live when he visited a town I had a connection with for some time. (The connection being the ex). One of his jokes from then ended up being kept as a running one en famille.  I still remember spotting him after the show sitting/slumping in an Indian restaurant with some friends and looking completely shattered as if the adrenaline had run out of him all at once. 

[dog-days]

Ashkenazi Jewish data from 23andMe leaked online. Deeply, deeply sinister. 

[JGP]

Tyrion's French teacher has taken to addressing her as Lannister, which annoys the fuck out of her, and provides me a couple moments of amusement on a weekly basis.

Edited October 12, 2023 by JGP

[Fragile Bird]

On 10/10/2023 at 1:56 PM, dog-days said:

Ashkenazi Jewish data from 23andMe leaked online. Deeply, deeply sinister. 

Holy fuck.

[LongRider]

I was today years old when I found out that some people knit scarves while they run marathons.  "Oh, really?" Any reasonable person would say, "Pics or it didn't happen!"  It happened!

A Running Record Falls: Longest Scarf Knitted in a Marathon - The New York Times (nytimes.com)

Edited October 13, 2023 by LongRider

[RhaenysBee]

Last week people came over to do heater maintenance. One day later I tried to turn on the heating, didn’t work. Since Monday, I’ve been calling every day, they promised me to come every day, never showed up. Today they don’t even answer the phone. So I’ve been trying to get someone else to come and make the heating work. One lady on the phone told me they don’t have fixed prices and the professional would be able to tell on site how much it costs. I asked her to give me a range or an estimate. She can’t do that either, they work with brand repair prices . I said ok can she be more specific because that doesn’t help me much because I can’t really get them out here blind and find out on the spot if I have to pay  $100 or $300. She told me to call someone else then. The next person was helpful but just for the house call wanted $150 excluding any work. So now a person is coming who will allegedly show up and turn my heater on for $130ish. That puts me at $200 for turning my heater on. That’s more than I’ll pay for gas bill during the entire 6-7 months of heating season. (For scale, the average monthly salary in this country is $1000) The nerve of these people… well. I suppose I won’t be getting a new vacuum or a sewing machine this month. This is the most Friday-13th Friday 13th I ever had. 

[RhaenysBee]

Update: the repair of my heating cost $300. Plus the $75 I paid last week. This is more money than I pay for heating in an entire fcking year. What an utter disgrace. 
the silver lining is that I ended up paying it to a decent repair person as opposed to the sketchy people last week. Aaaaaand that he did need to do repair work, not just push two buttons, so at least there was some added value. Still, total rip-off. 

Edited October 13, 2023 by RhaenysBee

[Sw33t Summ3r Ch1ld]

I'm collecting some of the pieces of jewelry from Lord of the Rings like the rings of Galadriel, Aragorn, Gandalf, and the One Ring to Rule Them All, and also Arwen's Evenstar. I've always been a fan of LOTR. Waiting on Galadriel's ring today to arrive in the mail. 

[Derfel Cadarn]

On holiday for couple days in St Andrews with in-laws. One evening in, and already my Israeli MIL has my five year old daughter saying oy-oy-oy! everytime a go-cart crashes on TV lol

[litechick]

On 10/14/2023 at 1:05 PM, Unicorn-Pegasus said:

I'm collecting some of the pieces of jewelry from Lord of the Rings like the rings of Galadriel, Aragorn, Gandalf, and the One Ring to Rule Them All, and also Arwen's Evenstar. I've always been a fan of LOTR. Waiting on Galadriel's ring today to arrive in the mail. 

Back when the movies/products were introduced, I went full-in buying a Balrog candle holder for one, an Arwen necklace for another, and a dwarven beer stein for someone else.  I can relate.  Enjoy!

There is a name for it...I have persistent problems with ear worms.  Every day I struggle to suppress various songs which torment me.  Recently I have been struggling to suppress Tears for Fears 'Every Body Wants to Rule the World' ;Willie Nelson 'Mommas Don't Let Your Babies Grow up to be Cowboys' and ' Davey!  Davey Crockett, King of the Wild Frontier.' 

It's worse because I don't know all the lyrics to these songs, just the ones which torment me.

Maybe there is a solution to this but I don't know what it is.