Something that's always interested me
Jul. 15th, 2025 07:27 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
conulyis when an organization feels the urgent need to say something both in officialese and also everyday talk. I can think of three very relevant examples in NYC:
1. Every time you do your taxes or do almost anything that involves interacting with the state government, you'll have to pick your county, and if you live in Brooklyn or Staten Island that means they list the county with the coterminous borough in parentheses.
2. If you have a kid in school, every year they send you a form reminding you to fill out your Emergency Contact Card, and every year they include the phrase "Blue Card" right afterwards. Because that's what we all call it. Because they're blue.
3. And here's one I haven't thought about much since adolescence, but if a job is apt to hire teens then they will ask for their Employment Certification and then, inevitably, add "Working Papers" right afterwards, again, because that's what everybody calls them.
There must be other examples I'm missing, as well as non-NY examples. I sometimes wonder if it'd be easier for them to just cave to the inevitable and start listing the everyday term first and then list the "real" term afterwards.
1. Every time you do your taxes or do almost anything that involves interacting with the state government, you'll have to pick your county, and if you live in Brooklyn or Staten Island that means they list the county with the coterminous borough in parentheses.
2. If you have a kid in school, every year they send you a form reminding you to fill out your Emergency Contact Card, and every year they include the phrase "Blue Card" right afterwards. Because that's what we all call it. Because they're blue.
3. And here's one I haven't thought about much since adolescence, but if a job is apt to hire teens then they will ask for their Employment Certification and then, inevitably, add "Working Papers" right afterwards, again, because that's what everybody calls them.
There must be other examples I'm missing, as well as non-NY examples. I sometimes wonder if it'd be easier for them to just cave to the inevitable and start listing the everyday term first and then list the "real" term afterwards.
Star Trek: Strange New Worlds S3
Jul. 15th, 2025 07:16 pmdewlineI may have been premature in assuming that Season 3 will not be available on CTV Sci-Fi Channel.
I may have misunderstood. I just checked the PVR's "Guide" function to look ahead to Thursday night. I saw short blurbs for "Hegemony II" and "Wedding Bell Blues".
I'll know for sure on Thursday night, it seems.
I may have misunderstood. I just checked the PVR's "Guide" function to look ahead to Thursday night. I saw short blurbs for "Hegemony II" and "Wedding Bell Blues".
I'll know for sure on Thursday night, it seems.
14 minutes and 54 seconds
Jul. 15th, 2025 03:28 pmsusandennisI've been toying with the idea of getting Xfinity wifi service again. I had it from October 2023 until October 2024 for $50 but killed it with the austerity kick. So I've been on Timber Ridge free wifi only for the past 8 months. The free wifi here is pretty good but it has its ups and downs. Most often it's just long enough to make me reboot Alexa and reconnect the TV. It's irritating. Today, the wifi went out and then we got an email saying it was way out and indefinitely and taken the Timber Ridge business side down with it.
So I thought I would just get a hold of Xfinity and find out how much. I started with chat. But, I knew that wasn't going to work and, sure enough it didn't. He asked to connect me via phone to their specialist. Fine.
While I was waiting, I thought. Ok. If it's $50, I'll do it. If it's $80, nope.
I was soon talking to Marquita whose voice sounded like she just woke up from a nap and was ready for another one. I did not hold out any hope. But, I told her I wanted to find out how much internet would be. And I'll be damned if she didn't quietly and methodically do exactly what I wanted, with efficiency and no chit chat or up sell. $50 for a year or $65 for five years. $10 off for direct withdrawal from checking account. At my age, you don't fuck around with five year deals. Oh and that includes a modem and a free telephone with service. I said no thank you to all of that and gave her the Mac address of my modem and she hooked me up on the spot. Plugged it all in and I had internet. Way faster than the free stuff, too. From hello to thank you, goodbye was 14 minutes and 54 seconds. Incredible.
I hope I get a survey.
Meanwhile, my friends, Julie and Scott. When I saw their route, I DEMANDED they include Wall Drug and The Corn Palace in their itinerary. They did. Today. And my prize was this. It is cracking me up. Julie sent it and said that was a Walmart and she was pretty sure a dollar store so she cut the email short.
So I thought I would just get a hold of Xfinity and find out how much. I started with chat. But, I knew that wasn't going to work and, sure enough it didn't. He asked to connect me via phone to their specialist. Fine.
While I was waiting, I thought. Ok. If it's $50, I'll do it. If it's $80, nope.
I was soon talking to Marquita whose voice sounded like she just woke up from a nap and was ready for another one. I did not hold out any hope. But, I told her I wanted to find out how much internet would be. And I'll be damned if she didn't quietly and methodically do exactly what I wanted, with efficiency and no chit chat or up sell. $50 for a year or $65 for five years. $10 off for direct withdrawal from checking account. At my age, you don't fuck around with five year deals. Oh and that includes a modem and a free telephone with service. I said no thank you to all of that and gave her the Mac address of my modem and she hooked me up on the spot. Plugged it all in and I had internet. Way faster than the free stuff, too. From hello to thank you, goodbye was 14 minutes and 54 seconds. Incredible.
I hope I get a survey.
Meanwhile, my friends, Julie and Scott. When I saw their route, I DEMANDED they include Wall Drug and The Corn Palace in their itinerary. They did. Today. And my prize was this. It is cracking me up. Julie sent it and said that was a Walmart and she was pretty sure a dollar store so she cut the email short.
Feeling just slightly disingenuous
Jul. 15th, 2025 07:49 pmoursinHave been involved over the last day or so in the discovery and revelation of a hoohah over an esteemed bibliographer having copped to having fabricated a set of letters, of which the transcriptions appear on their website, with, true, a provenance note that might give one to be a tad cautious when citing.
But anyway, someone I know did actually cite something from one of these letters - fortunately not as a major pillar of an argument or anything like that - in their book which is only just published (and copy of which for review I finally received last week). And was informed by the perpetrator.
Cue kerfuffle. The ebook can be readily corrected but not the hardback copies.
But anyway, this led to me (particularly given subject and period) to think upon an instance I had encountered of learning - from the author no less - that a series of supposedly authentic Victorian erotic novels had been knocked up (perhaps that is not the phrase one should employ?) as remunerated hackwork for a paperback publisher in the 1990s.
A few of these are now accessible via the Internet Archive and I discover that they have introductions setting them up as Orfentik Discoveries of the writings of a Private Gents Club.
Anyway, I wrote this all up for my academic blog, and there has been discussion on bluesky about hoaxes and fakes and also I introduced the topic of people being misled by fictional pastiches that were not meant to mislead (or at least, like 'Cleone Knox''s work, have long been known to be made up).
(Ern Malley complicates this like whoa, since it has been claimed that the authors of the hoax actually produced SRS surrealist poetry whether they meant to or not.)
And as a scholar and an archivist I am against hoaxes and fakes and people inserting false documents into archives and so on -
- but I still have the occasional qualm that some naive reader will not read the disclosure of the real origin story right at the back of the volumes and think that the Journals of Mme C-, subsequently Lady B-, actually exist.
Tags:
Best Practices re: Bereavement
Jul. 15th, 2025 02:17 pmdewlineThese stories are about outlier cases, sure. That they happen at all? Still worth knowing about.
https://www.upworthy.com/bereavement-leave-for-new-hire
https://www.upworthy.com/bereavement-leave-for-new-hire
You'd think that Peter Jackson would have seen Jurassic Park...
Jul. 15th, 2025 12:59 pmbrithistorianColossal Biosciences is planning to bring back the giant moa, a 3m (10 foot) tall flightless bird that went extinct around 600 years ago, shortly after humans arrived in New Zealand. Peter Jackson is one of the major investors. Considering the difficulties the Australians had when dealing with emus, which are only 2/3 the size of the great moa, they really need to consider that there was probably very good reason that the early New Zealanders wiped them out.
(no subject)
Jul. 15th, 2025 01:08 pmmajuWell, I spent way more than my self-allocated 15 minutes today on clearing stuff away. I picked up my two tech recycling boxes at the post office this morning, then a bit later I started the process of packing up the various computers and cables to go into the boxes. First I had to scan a code (a separate one is included with each box) so I could print a UPS free delivery label, and before I could do that I had to put new ink into my printer. That took longer than it should have because I kept getting error messages from the printer ("Your device is busy" - huh?) when I tried to align the new ink cartridges. Eventually I got the printer working and printed the label for the first box, but I still have to attach the label and seal up the box, and then I have to go through the process again for the second box. It should go much more quickly the second time around though.
Yesterday in the late afternoon/early evening we had a dramatic thunderstorm with a lot of very heavy rain. (We had more than two inches in an hour or so.) The rain was so heavy that it washed some pieces of wood someone had put out for trash collection today some metres down to my car, where they stacked up against the front wheel. At least I assume that's why there were some random pieces of what looked like bed frame wedged against the front wheel of my car.
I went for a run this morning; the humidity at the time was around 95% so I was dripping with sweat after an hour of running.
LJ is *still* being weird for me, taking forever to load my friends feed.
Yesterday in the late afternoon/early evening we had a dramatic thunderstorm with a lot of very heavy rain. (We had more than two inches in an hour or so.) The rain was so heavy that it washed some pieces of wood someone had put out for trash collection today some metres down to my car, where they stacked up against the front wheel. At least I assume that's why there were some random pieces of what looked like bed frame wedged against the front wheel of my car.
I went for a run this morning; the humidity at the time was around 95% so I was dripping with sweat after an hour of running.
LJ is *still* being weird for me, taking forever to load my friends feed.
Tuesday
Jul. 15th, 2025 09:06 amsusandennisI've gotten into this annoying pattern of bad sleep on Mondays and Wednesdays and, sometimes, Fridays. The night before volleyball. Maybe it's because I sleep too late on the other days - usually it's only an hour longer if that. Or sleep too well. Last night was also interrupted by Hazel. John is back in the hospital and she'd forgotten to bring home the phone number and wanted to call him but also couldn't remember how to work the phone. Mainly she was just exhausted and frazzled and worried. I was in bed listening to my book when she came in. So we went back and I played her voice mail messages for her and found the number and we called John. And she seemed much more calm and settled when I left. Her son is coming over this morning. They cannot seem to control John's excess fluid retention. Hazel says he's peeing every 30 minutes but is still swollen up everywhere like a whale. Heart or kidneys, I'm sure and neither option is that good at 89.
We talked some last night and she said she understands that this may be it and she's prepared. That was comforting to hear. They've been together for 65 years.
Laundry is laundrying.
I watched most of the home run derby last night so I could see Mariner Cal Raleigh and his family participate. His dad did the pitching and his 15 year old brother did the catching. It was cute. And he won which was cool since no other catcher had ever won. That's it for baseball for me until Friday.
When they were here, my friend, Scott, used my phone number every time he was asked for one. It was just easier than saying no. For some reason, it tickled him to use it at Walmart to get the receipt. And now, every time they stop at Walmart, I get the receipt. They are buying some weird shit and not nearly enough Krispy Kremes but it is fun to track their trip which I am now dubbing the Walmart/Family Dollar Tour. He sent me a text yesterday that they had found HUGE Dollar Tree and he hadn't spied Julie in a long time. I told him it was 911 and not 111 for emergency if she never showed. They are off to Soux Falls today.
It's house cleaner day.
And I have an Amazon return plus I am perilously close to running out of mayo so a stop at Safeway is in order. I would wait until house cleaning time but I think I'll go when the clothes are done in hopes that it will be a little less hot.
We talked some last night and she said she understands that this may be it and she's prepared. That was comforting to hear. They've been together for 65 years.
Laundry is laundrying.
I watched most of the home run derby last night so I could see Mariner Cal Raleigh and his family participate. His dad did the pitching and his 15 year old brother did the catching. It was cute. And he won which was cool since no other catcher had ever won. That's it for baseball for me until Friday.
When they were here, my friend, Scott, used my phone number every time he was asked for one. It was just easier than saying no. For some reason, it tickled him to use it at Walmart to get the receipt. And now, every time they stop at Walmart, I get the receipt. They are buying some weird shit and not nearly enough Krispy Kremes but it is fun to track their trip which I am now dubbing the Walmart/Family Dollar Tour. He sent me a text yesterday that they had found HUGE Dollar Tree and he hadn't spied Julie in a long time. I told him it was 911 and not 111 for emergency if she never showed. They are off to Soux Falls today.
It's house cleaner day.
And I have an Amazon return plus I am perilously close to running out of mayo so a stop at Safeway is in order. I would wait until house cleaning time but I think I'll go when the clothes are done in hopes that it will be a little less hot.
Interesting Links for 15-07-2025
Jul. 15th, 2025 12:00 pmandrewducker- 1. To summarize the summary of the summary: people are a problem
- (tags:people comics ai doom communication )
- 2. How old are you in your head? (Mid 30s for me)
- (tags:age psychology )
- 3. Reddit will start verifying the age (but not the identity) of UK redditors
- (tags:uk age reddit regulation internet )
- 4. "Autism" is at least 4 different syndromes, each with distinct biological and genetic pathways.
- (tags:autism genetics )
Tags:
- age,
- ai,
- autism,
- comics,
- communication,
- doom,
- genetics,
- internet,
- links,
- people,
- psychology,
- reddit,
- regulation,
- uk
Pan And.....
Jul. 15th, 2025 10:14 ampoliphilo
This is an antique copy of a very popular classical statue known variously as Pan and Olympus and Pan and Daphnis. We know it was popular because we possess so many versions of it. From what I've seen, this version- at Petworth House- is one of the better ones.
Pan is teaching his protege Olympus or Daphnis to play the Pan pipes. The original was created c. 100 CE-and- on the basis of an inconclusive passage in Pliny- has been attributed to a sculptor called Heliodorus of Rhodes.
These days we treat antique statues as archaeology and- apart from cleaning them up- leave them pretty much as found- but the 18th century thought of them as art and had no qualms about making them as good as new. The Earl of Egremont's statue passed through the hands of a couple of Italian restorers before achieving its present form- and I'm not competent to say how much of it is original. One thing I do know is that Daphnis/Olympus was found without a head- and the one he now wears once belonged to a quite different statue. It's remarkable how well it fits.....
Computers, do computer things better!
Jul. 14th, 2025 09:00 pmbrithistorianI love YouTube Music — it's a great streaming system and gives me access to music that I could only have dreamed of when I was younger. But there's one thing about it — a small thing really, but still big enough that it bothers me: When you have a playlist, it should be a trivial thing for the software to add up the running times of all the songs in the playlist and give you a runtime for the playlist, and this works for shorter playlists, but once a playlist reaches 5 hours or more in length, the program gets lazy and anything over 5 hours is either "5+ hours" or "5 hours [XX] minutes," where [XX] isn't the actual number of minutes past 5 hours, instead the point after 5 hours where the software got lazy and decided to stop adding. Not a deal killer, not even that big of a deal, really, but it's annoying.
(no subject)
Jul. 14th, 2025 06:47 pmflemmingsSmoke from a not distant enough fire turned the morning sky apocalyptic. Might also have conduced to the knives in the throat sensation, though I've been having that off and on for a few weeks now. Not covid because it comes and goes, certainly allergies because I also have the itchy ears of prime allergy season. So stayed in until late afternoon when the worst of the mug was over, and then filled a bag with seedlets and stuff from the front walk. In spite of massage, back had conniptions at my daring to wear shoes. Have no idea what to do about this.
But I did rebook a dentist appt from Thursday to a week Thursday and immediately felt better, because this Thursday will definitely rain and next may not. If the weather's dry I might chance transiting to and from my dentist, but in any case I will not be trying to get taxis in the rain. I hope.
But I did rebook a dentist appt from Thursday to a week Thursday and immediately felt better, because this Thursday will definitely rain and next may not. If the weather's dry I might chance transiting to and from my dentist, but in any case I will not be trying to get taxis in the rain. I hope.
Friday Five Questions Cobbled Together and Randomly Answered
Jul. 14th, 2025 05:16 pmshadowkatGrabbing random questions from the Friday Five because I feel like answering random questions.
1. Have you ever been to summer camp?
Yes. But mainly day camps, which are very different than overnight camps and a lot more fun. Only over night camps were brief and in girl scouts, and when I was a kid (6-12) and each time, I had a parent along for the ride.
2. Have you ever made a s'more?
Many many times. Not so much now for various reasons.
3. Have you ever slept under the stars (no tent/tarp)?
Kind of? And I ended up going inside. I don't like bugs?
4. What type of bed do you have (queen, twin, bunk, etc.)?
Queen
5. If you could retroactively erase one TV show from the history of entertainment, which one would you choose?
Toss up between Fox News, and the Bachelor/Bachelorette. For more or less the same reasons.
6. Are you more like your mother or your father?
It's kind of 50/50?
7. If you could take a year-long vacation, what would you do?
Cruise around the world? Or maybe take various train journeys and boat journeys, and walking trips?
8. If you were a crayon, which color would you want to be?
Violet or Purple - a deep purple
9. Which color do you think you would be regardless of what you wanted?
Green
10. Would you rather be used and get blunt, broken and lose your wrapper, or not be used and stay pristine?
Used and get blunt, broken and lose the wrapper.
( the rest of the 37 seemingly random meme questions )
That cheered me up greatly. Thank you, Friday Five.
1. Have you ever been to summer camp?
Yes. But mainly day camps, which are very different than overnight camps and a lot more fun. Only over night camps were brief and in girl scouts, and when I was a kid (6-12) and each time, I had a parent along for the ride.
2. Have you ever made a s'more?
Many many times. Not so much now for various reasons.
3. Have you ever slept under the stars (no tent/tarp)?
Kind of? And I ended up going inside. I don't like bugs?
4. What type of bed do you have (queen, twin, bunk, etc.)?
Queen
5. If you could retroactively erase one TV show from the history of entertainment, which one would you choose?
Toss up between Fox News, and the Bachelor/Bachelorette. For more or less the same reasons.
6. Are you more like your mother or your father?
It's kind of 50/50?
7. If you could take a year-long vacation, what would you do?
Cruise around the world? Or maybe take various train journeys and boat journeys, and walking trips?
8. If you were a crayon, which color would you want to be?
Violet or Purple - a deep purple
9. Which color do you think you would be regardless of what you wanted?
Green
10. Would you rather be used and get blunt, broken and lose your wrapper, or not be used and stay pristine?
Used and get blunt, broken and lose the wrapper.
( the rest of the 37 seemingly random meme questions )
That cheered me up greatly. Thank you, Friday Five.
Today's five second mini-rant:
Jul. 16th, 2025 02:35 pmconulyNonstandard and informal are not synonyms. Dialectal and informal are not synonyms. Regional and informal are not synonyms. You can speak formally even if you're speaking a nonstandard regional dialect.
Everybody needs to stop saying that dialect words are, ipso facto, informal.
Edit: On a different note, omfg this dude.
*************************
( Read more... )
Everybody needs to stop saying that dialect words are, ipso facto, informal.
Edit: On a different note, omfg this dude.
( Read more... )
(no subject)
Jul. 14th, 2025 03:52 pmmajuI'm so over this weather. It's not that the daily temperatures are particularly high (by the standards of what I've lived through in Perth in the past), but combined with very high humidity day after day and particularly night after night, it's very oppressive. This morning I just couldn't muster up the motivation to go out for any exercise so I gave myself a rest day. I did do some cleaning around the house (dusting mainly) and will vacuum later in the week, and I also took some more stuff to Goodwill. I meant to pick up the mail on the way home because I know there's a parcel waiting for me at the post office, but I completely forgot and by the time I remembered I didn't feel like going out again. I know it's a package of mailing boxes for the electronics I plan to send off to the recycling place, and although I do want to get that done it's not really urgent at this point. I might collect it tomorrow.
Yesterday my daughter suggested I go up to Connecticut to spend some time with them in about a month, while the girls are still off school, but I told her, very regretfully, that I don't want to be there while the weather is still hot because I was so uncomfortable in the basement (and in fact in their whole house) last summer. I've decided to go at the end of August, hoping the weather will be starting to cool down a bit by then, or at least that the nights will be cooler. I'll stay into September, but I'm not sure how long I'll stay yet.
Yesterday my daughter suggested I go up to Connecticut to spend some time with them in about a month, while the girls are still off school, but I told her, very regretfully, that I don't want to be there while the weather is still hot because I was so uncomfortable in the basement (and in fact in their whole house) last summer. I've decided to go at the end of August, hoping the weather will be starting to cool down a bit by then, or at least that the nights will be cooler. I'll stay into September, but I'm not sure how long I'll stay yet.
365 Questions 2025
Jul. 14th, 2025 03:43 pmmaju10. Excluding romantic relationships, who do you love? My children and grandchildren.
11. What is your earliest childhood memory? I have a memory of being in a strange room, standing at one end of a cot (crib) to get away from something unpleasant at the other end. When I told my mother about this memory a few years ago, she said it was when I was about 18 months old. We were staying with relatives and I'd thrown up in my cot.
12. What book has had the greatest influence on your life? None in particular.
13. What three questions do you wish you knew the answers to? 1. I'm curious about this, but I'm not sure that I really want to know the answer: "What does it feel like to die?" 2. How would my life have turned out if I'd made different choices at a couple of points? 3. I don't think there is a 3.
14. What is the greatest peer pressure you’ve ever felt? Back when I was in my late teens and early twenties I felt very strongly that I had to do what other people expected of me in order to be accepted.
11. What is your earliest childhood memory? I have a memory of being in a strange room, standing at one end of a cot (crib) to get away from something unpleasant at the other end. When I told my mother about this memory a few years ago, she said it was when I was about 18 months old. We were staying with relatives and I'd thrown up in my cot.
12. What book has had the greatest influence on your life? None in particular.
13. What three questions do you wish you knew the answers to? 1. I'm curious about this, but I'm not sure that I really want to know the answer: "What does it feel like to die?" 2. How would my life have turned out if I'd made different choices at a couple of points? 3. I don't think there is a 3.
14. What is the greatest peer pressure you’ve ever felt? Back when I was in my late teens and early twenties I felt very strongly that I had to do what other people expected of me in order to be accepted.