Piggy’s description:
We could share factoids we’ve read, advice from personal experience, observations about the world, what-have-you. Everyone learns something new every day, and I’d like a place to share.
Continued from v. 2011.2.
Patience, Please
This site is under reconstruction and will look strange for a while. We regret the inconvenience.
Today I learned that you can buy those big parachutes (from everyone’s favorite day of gym class) online, and they’re not really all that expensive. It’s taking all my strength to resist the urge to purchase one or twelve.
I also learned that it feels really distinguished and intelligent to attend a colloquium and take notes on a legal pad. I feel like I’ve joined some ephemeral society of People Who’ve Attended Colloquiums. Tonight’s presentation focused on the sustainability of food production in relation to economic, political, and ecological pressures, and it’s part of a series of lectures about water and global security. It wasn’t as dry as it sounds?
I just realized that last sentence was a pun.
If you’re handy with a sewing machine you can buy ripstop nylon in bulk and make your own patterns! If it’s silicone coated it can also function as a impermeable tent fly! You might notice that those giant inflatable lawn ornaments are nothing more than ripstop bags with fans attached! If you were so artistically inclined you could try sewing together your own giant inflatable sculptures!
I may have been thinking about this for some time now.
Can anyone attend colloquiums? Does it cost money?
If a bit of my hair is dangling in front of my eyes, I can watch it twitch slightly with each heartbeat.
Yesterday I leaned that sideburns were named for a General Burnsides in the Civil War. Google his photo and you will discover why.
*does so*
I learned that listening to Loreena McKennitt’s “Dante’s Prayer” while watching silent public domain footage of the Apollo 1 crew in training is not the best idea.
That 6 pairs of Portal earrings is too many to make in one night.
Slotted spoons don’t hold much soup, but can, in fact, catch potatoes.
A few days ago, I finally ‘watched’ Into the Woods (read: listened to the soundtrack while reading the script), and I finally get the reference! Yay!
I learned to show up to the first session of a class more than five minutes before it’s supposed to start if I don’t want to be stuck sitting in the back of the room on a radiator.
So today I learned that I bought paper towels instead of the toilet paper I wanted last time I went shopping. I really need to read labels more carefully.
This is extremely awkward, but tissues work better than paper towels, if you don’t have toilet paper… You might want to use them…CAKE WHY AM I GIVING BATHROOM ADVICE OVER THE INTERNET I SHOULD REALLY STOP NOWWe lifted a roll of toilet paper from the public bathrooms and are making do with that.That… really isn’t a good idea… Could you at least return what’s left after buying new toilet paper, maybe?
We took it from one of the other dorm bathrooms…I really don’t see why it’s a problem.
Did you ask permission?
Biblio, I really don’t think that this is as big a deal as you’re thinking. Toilet paper is there to be used, and especially in college dorms, it gets gone through and replaced really often.
From who?
Whoever would have used it/spent their money replacing it?
we use cuts up bits of cloth…..
EEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEWWWWWWWWWWWWWW
there i said it for you
I have a friend who’s mom on multiple brought home pork roasts, and then have to give them to their neighbors since their family didn’t eat pork.
Today I learned that I really had better get up when my alarm goes off, because that extra five minutes will turn into an extra hour and half and make you miss class.
Today I learned how microbiologists/geneticists/etc actually tell how they know a bacterium has picked up the right plasmid for genetic engineering. They make it so the gene splices itself into the middle of another gene called lacZ, which processes galactose. If the new gene isn’t present, lacZ is active, and colonies containing it will turn blue from this specially modified galactose sugar present in the bacterial culture plates. If the gene is present and spliced right into the middle of lacZ, it disrupts its function and the bacteria are unable to process the the sugar and do not turn blue. /genetics is cool
Also, 70% of the American public have methicillin-resistant Staph aureus bacteria on their skin right now. Have fun thinking about that.
Today I learned that there is a baffling number of regulatory commison for dealing wiht nucelar everything.I really doon’t want to go intot eh alphabet soup list right now, but in my head I have, “DoD, DoE, DoT (PHMSA), NRC, IAEA, PATRAM” going through my head. This Environmental Studies project is going to be a lot of work. But I was laughing in class over how much information I found just on the topic of transporting nuclear waste.
And finally…today I decided that I really was going to enjoy my classes this semester, horrible schedule or no. They’re too interesting not to.
Okay. If anyone needs me, I shall be in the bathroom, obsessively showering.
Good idea–kill off the weak ones so the strong ones can interbreed and become stronger.
Today, I learned that even computer programmers have sacred cows.
Literal or figurative?
The ones I heard of were figurative. Although Dell has some association with cows, so maybe there are a few literal ones too.
Today I learned that it’s much easier to make barrel organ pipes if one uses as temporary clamps rubber bands chosen and purchased for the job rather than those found at the bottom of a drawer.
I do hope this information is of use to someone.
Today I learned that it is very possible to spill the same drink three times on yourself, within a period of less than ten minutes.
Today I learned that even when one says Schrodinger’s cat is a THOUGHT experiment while explaining it in chemistry, half the of class still feels sorry for the cat.
Put this way: when I explained it to some friends in chemistry class, accidentally omitting that it was a thought experiment or at least not mentioning it, the first reaction was: “A cat in a box with radioactive substance?! Sounds awesome.” What worries you more?
I really don’t know…
Sometimes when people comment on how I seem to have gotten over my parents’ divorce and all that other rubbish fairly well, I feel very tempted to introduce them to my friends and some of the classmates I often spend time with…
“Him- oh, we call him Light because there’s such a strong resemblance when he’s mad- that homicidal redhead?- oh, that’s my BF, she’s working on her people skills because she wants to be a mentalist and manipulate & con people and shoot them in shopping malls and oh, that’s M. sleeping under that table looking possessed, don’t worry about him, he’s so well-adjusted- this is N., don’t interrupt her when she’s trying to beat someone’s high score, she has issues with her mom, kids, authority and just about anything except cats- just don’t talk to V., what he says never really makes sense to anyone but him so okay, let’s find some normal people- oh, this is J., he’s writing a 60 page treatise on how bodies decompose…”
Let’s just say that we have three different homerooms in my year: the ones that “should all be on medication”, the “pariahs without a cause” and “suck-ups- wait, who are you again?”. Guess which one I’m in. This is what happens when schools get too selective.
Don’t get me wrong… I like my classmates. They’re just slightly detached from normality.
I DON’T HOLD WITH CRUELTY TO CATS.
IS SOMETHING WRONG, ALBERT?
Today I learned that people look at you oddly if you tell them that they are “pavos, senexes, pestises, and furcifers all rolled up into one!” And yes, I am aware that I did not use correct puralization, nor word order.
Diane Duane has written Sherlock Holmes/Doctor Who crossover fic. It’s on her website. It’s brilliant. Just when I thought it wasn’t possible to love her any more than I already did…
(I seriously love her books; I actually think I’d rather be one of her wizards than go to Hogwarts.)
I admit, I too would have foregone a Hogwarts owl to see “In Life’s name, and for Life’s sake…” show up in a library book.
…me too.
BUT I NEVER KNEW THAT.
I appreciate her even more now.
Me, too, definitely! I would LOVE Hogwarts, of course, but it has its drawbacks: It doesn’t do anything about bullying; the workload is incredible; I wouldn’t be able to see my parents for a year; the house-elves would have to do extra work because I’m vegan (and was when I was eleven, too); I could pretty much never be alone except at night and in the bathroom; I’d have ethical issues with certain potions (and of course Snape would fail me for it because he’s Snape, and he’d also take so many House points from me it would hurt not just because of that but also because sometimes I say things that I don’t think are rude, but authority figures disagree, and I often can’t even figure out why they feel that way, and Snape would never believe me if I told him I didn’t mean it that way); I’d also have ethical issues in Transfiguration, although McGonagall would probably give me alternative assignments; I’d always be late to my classes because I have no sense of direction…
What do you have ethical issues with in Potions and Transfiguration? The other things in your comment (except the bit about being vegan) sound like some of the same problems I’d have. Also, I think I’d still want to go to Muggle college afterwards, and I probably wouldn’t be able to.
Some potions just don’t seem necessary, like the Babbling Beverage. Others have purposes that can be fulfilled by spells just as easily. In those cases, it seems wasteful to bother brewing potions because plants and usually animals have to die to be ingredients. (I don’t think potion ingredients can be Transfigured; I can explain why if you’d like). I know we need to practice learning to brew potions in order to be skilled enough to brew the really necessary ones, but there are so many potions in existence that there have to be some potions on the right level that are either really necessary or only require really common, simple ingredients.
In Transfiguration, my objections to assignments would be similar to Remus’s in Against the Moon. I don’t know if I would specifically object to turning a mouse into a snuffbox as long as it got turned back (It depends on whether it’s painful or frightening, which can easily be ascertained by doing it to oneself, which I’m sure has already been done, so really I can just ask Professor McGonagall about what those experiments have shown, and if she doesn’t know, I’d look in the library, and if that didn’t work, I’d have her try it on me–and if she seemed to think it was too dangerous, I wouldn’t do it to the mouse), but 5th-year students performed irreversible Vanishing Spells on live animals. That, in my opinion, is worse than killing them, because if Potterverse!animals have souls (which I think is quite plausible; snakes can be talked to, after all, and we know that souls at least exist in the Potterverse), their souls get Vanished, which means that if they go to an afterlife in the Potterverse, Vanishing them prevents them from getting there, and even if they don’t have access to an afterlife or souls, they can’t be eaten or decay, produce nutrients for decomposers, and turn into fertile soil for plants or be Transfigured into something useful or be used in potions! I’m surprised it isn’t Unforgivable to Vanish a person, actually. And unless you plan to Vanish a living animal at some point after Hogwarts, which has no practical application except killing another person without going to Azkaban for life (which Hogwarts shouldn’t be encouraging anyway), there isn’t even any reason to bother teaching it.
I think that if you wanted to go to a Muggle college, you should be able to make up a story about being ‘homeschooled’, but you would have to read high school textbooks and so on first so as not to be hopelessly behind.
I’m not sure if I’d go to a Muggle college. I wouldn’t need to, since I’d want to work in the wizarding world, but Muggle techniques could be very useful my career (magizoology). I’d have to see…
I always assumed Vanishing couldn’t be done on humans.
Maybe, but I’m not sure why that would be, since it can be done on other animals.
I actually haven’t read any of her writing before.
I think I may need to now, that was amazing.
Random, but: I love your avatar.
I learned you really should wash your hands in between toughing someone ese’s guina pig and tougchinh your guinea pigs.
And it’s definitely a good thing that guinea pig lice won’t infest humans.
*touching
Double typo fail. >.<
I learned, or perhaps re-established, that one can be plagued for days by uncomfortable emotions after bungling a speech at a family friend’s dinner table. It made so much sense in my head, but when I spoke things were out of order and I don’t even know if the bottom line was coherent. AAAAHHHH! This is why I like writing so much more. You can edit.
I learned that the first few chapters of “The Autobiography of Malcolm X” are very intense.
Today I learned that it’s hard to find public trash cans in Japan because of a deadly cult from the mid-1990s.
The ones who put the poison gas in the subway because they thought the world would end in 2000?
Yes. Hey, they were more proactive than most cults–they weren’t going to sit around and wait for the world to end. They were ready to make it end. With Ebola and military helicopters and lots of chemical weapons. The response to remove trash cans from public places is pretty similar to the U.S.’s response to make everyone take off their shoes before getting on planes. It doesn’t actually do much, but it makes people feel better.
That’s why I will definitely try to avoid riding the T next term until we get back from December break.
It makes me feel worse. Especially since US Airport security scares me in the first place. I mean, are they all as unfriendly as in JFK? Am I the only one that they freak out?
JFK is actually one of the more unfriendly ones I’ve been to. At San Jose they smile and tell you exactly why you can’t take peanut butter on a plane (“Apparently this looks to our sensors like C-4 plastic explosives! I just think that’s the coolest thing, although I’m sorry, but that means you can’t take it on the plane.”)
In New Zealand they have drug-sniffing beagles that you can pet, and free tea in the waiting area.
I live in the US and airport security makes me uncomfortable. I’m always afraid I’ll beep and be dragged off to jail.
Same here!
The airport in London was much better than any of the ones that I’ve been to in the U.S. Everyone was so friendly and polite, and it didn’t hurt that I have a huge thing for British accents.
Isn’t it interesting that the airports that seem the friendliest (San Jose, New Zealand, and London) are located in or around areas that depend significantly on tourism (San Francisco, New Zealand/Australia, and, well, London)?
Hmm… London and Nice were definitely friendly. I can’t really judge Vienna, obviously, because I know the culture and I’m marked as Viennese, (educated) middle class the second I open my mouth.
by that logic you would think LAX would be great but LOL NOPE
Orlando International is pretty good. However, Gabreski on Long Island is the most relaxing.
Wait no, I meant MacArthur. I’ve never flown out of Gabreski.
Very true!
I don’t know if security questions everybody at Logan intensely, or just the ones to say they’re going to DC, or just the ones who say they’re going to NASA…
The people at Reagan seem nice though, although maybe they were nicer because almost nobody else was at the checkpoint, it was dark outside, I looked slightly afraid, and, as we’ve established, all TSA people think I look several years younger than I am.
Just saying, completely impartially, that Hong Kong has by far the best airport in the world. You know, just saying.
I love all the little cafes in the Hong Kong airport, but I got completely lost in all the different levels and escalators. Singapore, Kuala Lumpur, and Auckland are the nicest I’ve encountered.
Maybe I’m just used to it because I’ve been so many times. I really love it. There’s just something about airports…perhaps the feeling of anticipation right before you go on holiday contributes to it. I like airports even when I’m on my way home, though, so it’s not the entire reason.
Yeah, New Yorkers have a reputation for being unfriendly. JFK specifically reminds me of a few examples Malcolm Gladwell writes about in Outliers; pilots from other cultures have tragically had trouble communicating with air traffic controllers. The gruffness New Yorkers speak with only exacerbates already problematic cultural differences, if I recall correctly a Korean plane ran out of fuel because the pilot was too polite to demand a landing, and the New Yorker air traffic controller didn’t sense any panic.
Sorry!
Maybe it’s just that I’m a native New Yorker, but I don’t think I’ve ever had more trouble at JFK or LGA than I’ve had at any other airport. My mother was even pulled aside once for carrying razor blades and cadmium pigments (art supplies, smh), but no trouble came of it. I think large international airports are less friendly regardless of location, but coupled with New Yorker brusqueness I can see how we’re especially frightening.
I hope none of you think either Vendy or I are unfriendly.
Definitely not
Today I learned that the ‘b’ and ‘n’ keys on my keyboard will work only if there is yogurt on them. I’ve been having to copy-and-paste all my b’s and n’s thus far, so a yogurty keyboard is a small price to pay.
Today I realized that the Song “Castle on a Cloud,” which my mom has on CD, is from Les Mis. I feel like I should have made that connection before today.
I learned that I shouldn’t read MLK’s writings in public, as people will look at me if I start crying, either out of their beauty, their heartwarmingness, or out of thinking about what Dr. King and his supporters endured.
I learned that one of the few things duct tape cannot do is hold my bike together.
I learned this while riding it. This was not a fun experience.
A small acoustic amplifier will gain twenty pounds when the person who has to carry it is tired.
Large sharp blades are very fun. So are large amounts of fire. Not that it took me until today to realize that.
Today I learned that it’s quite difficult to do push-ups or crunches while listening to Monty Python.
Same problem with listening to Wait Wait Don’t Tell Me while jogging.
Laden or unladen pushups?
As someone whose all-time consecutive pushup record is a whopping six- please don’t ever tell my PE teacher that there is such a thing as a laden pushup.
African or European?
My record for nonstop, no-break is around 50, I think. I’ve never really counted. I did do 300 crunches in a row once, though.
I talk to myself whenever I play dodgeball in PE.
Other people don’t?
Before I had the option of doing off-campus PE, I never played dodgeball. I just hid in a corner. No-one noticed me, so I didn’t get hit, and I didn’t have to throw a ball at anyone! It was one of my favorite parts of gym class.
I would too, but we actually get graded on whether or not we participate. My favorite part of PE was definitely today, when because of a very rare set of circumstances I walked around the football field reading Les Mis.
The highest point in Pennsylvania is lower than the lowest point in Colorado.
That reminds me: the highest point in the Netherlands is in the Caribbean.
You know those little candy hearts that get strewn across the ground on Valentine’s Day and taste like chalk? You can grind them up and use them as makeup.
Hint: If your candy can double as a cosmetic, don’t eat it.
They’re made from the same stuff as Necco wafers.
THOSE ARE SOOOOO GOOD
My left pant leg gets more soaked than my right pant leg when it rains.
Clams and insects can’t have identical twins, but sea urchins can.
When the science teacher says “Million-dollar prizes”, he means “Herbal tea bags”.
I technically learned this a few days ago, but:
As soon as one person realizes you are wearing a velvet shirt, everyone within a 10-foot radius will go out of their way to pet your arm.
You can get kicked out of an airport for singing Robert’s “Fighting Uruk-hai” song.
Now there’s a statement that cries out for video.
At least one online thesaurus lists “science” and “art” as antonyms. This makes me sad.
A couple years ago I wrote a poem about how science and art/creativity are really the same thing!
Science and art are different (not opposites, just different), but creativity is essential in both of them. I’m taking an honors seminar this semester called “Creativity in the Arts and Sciences”. Each week, two professors who are particularly distinguished in their field talk about their experiences, and I’m noticing that biologists and historians and painters all have a lot of similarities in their creative processes. The things they create are very different, but inspiration strikes everyone in the same sorts of ways, and you have to respond to it in the same way too (i.e., with a lot of hard work).
That sounds like a fascinating class. I’d love to hear more about it.
Have any of you read Biophilia by Edward O. Wilson (entomologist, founder of sociobiology, Pulitzer prize winning author, conservation advocate, Harvard professor)? For the most part, the book is about the idea that humans have an innate love of living beings, but quite a lot of the book is devoted to comparing/contrasting science and art. It’s really fascinating. He agrees with the general consensus here that the original creative processes are the same, and it starts to diverge only when they get a particular end result in mind. He says that the ideal scientist “thinks like a poet, works like a clerk*, and writes like a journalist,” whereas the ideal poet thinks, works, and writes like a poet. He talks about the similarities between the original processes and explains how the differences that develop are due to the different purposes of science and art–but it’s like using one method for different purposes. It’s an excellent book.
*Here I have no idea what he’s talking about. A clerk? I know that used to mean scholar; could that be what he meant? It was written in the eighties, but I had thought that use of the word had already died out by then; maybe not.
“Works like a clerk” means the scientist is well organized and careful to keep good records.
I’m not sure what he means by “works like a poet.” What that phrase suggests to most people would not get a poet very far. All the successful ones I’ve known worked with great diligence and perseverance. Not quite like a clerk, however; I’d probably say something on the lines of “works like an artisan.”
I once met a scientist who was kind enough to tell me that he and I were in the same business. I said, “except that I don’t have to keep detailed records of my experiments.” (Though, truth be told, I often wish I did.)
When you get down to it, how far would either get without the other?
That’s quite saddening.
It’s Alan Turing Year.
Jamie has white paws. I mean, we knew he had red merle, but it took three weeks and two baths, days of brushing and some experiments with the furminator to ascertain that he’s definitely not grey. Animal protection services and shelters need more funding.
Counting the prequels, there are a total of thirteen instances of hands being severed from bodies in Star Wars. Thank you, Hank Green!
If you let your parents watch the same sitcoms you do, you should be prepared to be nicknamed “Sheldon” for the rest of the foreseeable future.
I think that is Rainbow*Storm’s Law.
I learned that if you let your parents read webcomics over your shoulder, they will become enamored with the webcomics and quietly giggle while staring at their phones for the rest of the evening.
My parents occasionally call me “Amy.”
There isn’t a mysterious crack in your bedroom wall, is there? Have you counted the number of doors in your house recently?
No way, I have a friend who calls me Sheldon! For the same reason!
You really are my blogsister. One day I shall hunt you down in real life and we will sing “Soft Kitty” together.
I share my birthday with Marc Cohn.
Also, using the ability to outrun Daleks as motivation to exercise is highly effective.
When they’re levitating or… gliding, or whatever you would call it?
I’d imagine that there would be a significant difference.
Levitating, I’d imagine. They don’t seem capable of terribly great speed when they’re just gliding, and they’ve been shown flying pretty quickly. Also, if they’re levitating, they have the advantage of height and you’d want to get away faster anyway.
Wait. Daleks can levitate?
They E-LEV-ATE.
What does a Dalek do if it’s a lightbulb? IL-LUM-IN-ATE.
Keiffer and I made up about seven hundred and sixteen of these jokes, despite the fact that exactly zero of them are actually funny.
Yep.
Goodness. (The only Dalek serial I’ve seen so far is “The Daleks,” wherein Daleks can only glide, and then only on metal surfaces.)
(Technically I learned these facts yesterday night, yesterday, and last night, but bear with me anyway)
Fact: I am able to function on 2 hours of sleep
Fact: I didn’t say anything about the quality of the functioning
Fact: When I have two hours of sleep, for the rest of the day I feel like a really terrible migraine headache has been ground up and spread over the rest of the day.
Fact: Everybody looks the same in a sleeping bag
Fact: Sleep feels really good when the only other sleep you got in the last 48 hours was yesterday from 2:30 – 4 AM. Like, really, REALLY good.
People from South Carolina find it funny if you can’t tell cherry blossoms from magnolias.
Erdős–Bacon numbers.
How about GAPA numbers? If you’ve met one of us in person, your GAPA number is 1. If you’ve met someone who has met one of us in person, your number is 2. And so on. (No adjustment for having met more than one of us.)
Interesting. Happy to say that my GAPA number is 1. Although part of what makes the ErdÅ‘s–Bacon number so intriguing is that it’s made up of two components, so in order to have a low number you have to be connected to both the ErdÅ‘s side (mathematics) and the Bacon side (film industry), which doesn’t happen all too often. If we could add another factor into the MuseBlog version, perhaps? What could it be?
Other Musebloggers! I don’t know how that system would work elegantly; it’s not just counting down degrees of separation from a central point but also counting an increasing number of connections. A good method would show two numbers counting the same direction, or just one number. If I’ve met 5 MBers and a GAPA, that could equal 5,1. Dividing the first by the second would give me a number of 5, which works… but isn’t as cool as it could be, and doesn’t work in all cases?
Anyone else have any ideas for functions that give good results?
I learned that there is a quiz that thinks I’m a dalek. Also, the other day I learned that I can get extra credit in biology for writing stuff about interesting things I read in Muse and National Geographic.
My mother is unreasonably fond of the song “I Gotta Feeling” by the Black Eyed Peas.
BA BA BA BA BA BA BA BA
BUM BUM BUM BUM BUM BUM BUM BUM
I GOTTA FEELING
World’s most boring trombone part.
I think the Kingdom Hearts Overture could challenge that. The trombones have about seventy measures of quarter note, triplets, quarter note, triplets.
Really? *squids*
One day we shall rise and revolt against all those arrangers and composers… they shall rue the day they gave us boring parts…Can we forbid composers from writing those marches that are just 789467 quarter notes in a row?I will aid in your quest!
For years, the horns have been oppressed by the burden off-beats. Now is the time for revolution!
THAT TONIGHT’S GONNA BE A GOOD NIGHT
THAT TONIGHT’S GONNA BE A GOOOD NIGHT
Just seeing the title of that song makes me want to scream; did the songwriter really not know that “Gotta” is short for “Got to?” “I got to feeling?” Really? Of course, it isn’t even correct to say, “I got a feeling” unless you mean “I acquired a feeling,” but at least then it’s evident what you mean! This wasn’t even a grammatical error; it was an accidental misspelling of an extremely common 2 words!
You have to remember, the Black Eyed Peas are the lyrical geniuses who came up with “I’m so 3008, you’re so 2000 and late”.
Perhaps she has fond memories of it? I always remembering hanging out with my newfound friends and going to my first parties when the sond was popular, so I “like” it because it reminds me of something else entirely.
Just like the way “21 guns” was playing on the radio when my parents told myself and my sister that they were divorcing- I like the song, but it puts me in a bad mood.
I like it because it reminds me of the LCROSS mission.
As long as you seem like you’re joking, you can get away with telling people that you’re a 19-year-old who believes something from a sci-fi book written for 5th graders could be real.
Neil Tyson actually said “He had some trouble with his gravity so he invented calulus…” instead of “We’ve got a badass over here”.
So, this wasn’t something I learned today, but this weekend I learned how to take a screenshot of my computer. Now I feel so technologically competent.
PC:
ALT-PRINT SCREEN
CTRL-V into paint. Save As .jpg or .png.
Mac:
…I think it’s Command-Shift-3?
On a Mac, Command-shift-3 screenshots your entire screen and saves it as a picture to your desktop, command-control-shift-3 does the same but doesn’t save it, only copies it so you can paste it somewhere. Command-shift-4 lets you select the area of your screen you want to save as a picture to desktop, command-control-shift-4 does that but for the copying thing again. But anyway, I think FantasyFan knows how to do it on her computer since she posted about learning how to do it.
Yeah, I learned about the command-shift-4 thing.
I had a teacher who had some sort of screenshot in a lecture…
The problem was that there was a tab in the background, of the browser, called, “How to take a screenshot.”
Oops.
Hey, it means that your teacher bothered to learn how to do something new!
Our school laptops have a thing called a snipping tool. You can select any part of the screen you like and save it directly. U jelly?
My laptop has a snipping tool!
Hot chocolate powder doesn’t stick to marshmallow fluff or peanut butter. It just sorts of sits there until you bite into it, where it explodes in a cloud of dust.
I NEED TO TRY THIS NOW
I want some!
HST can mean something other than “Hubble Space Telescope”.
SMD can mean something other than “Science Mission Directorate”.
LIES
I learned that “Mahna Mahna” was made famous by the Muppets. I had never known where it was from before.
I thought it was Sesame Street.
8 O
It was on Sesame Street before, but the version on the Muppet Show was what made it well-known. I think. It’s Muppets either way, though!
SudoRandom convinced a band teacher to let us play that in band once. The saxophone part was awesome.
Mahna Mahna
Do doo be-do-do
Mahna Mahna
Do do-do do
Mahna Mahna
Do doo be-do-do be-do-do be-do-do be-do-do-doodle do do do-doo do!
I learned that I can sing higher than I thought possible.
Not that it sounds pretty or anything…
I learned that when your golden retriever tries to play with your 13 year old cat, it makes for some good entertainment. Of course, until my dad makes the cat go outside because of the “racket.”
I learned that it is incredibly hard to type when you are sitting on the couch and then your 85-pound golden retriever thinks he’s a lap dog and sits in your lap and swats at you with his paws when you don’t pet him.
Actually, it’s hard to do anything when he does that.
(sorry for the run-on sentence.)
A 13-pound cat has much the same effect.
Even a 5-pound cat.
Eek, I can imagine…
I leaned that 50% of the United States population has the Toxoplasma gondii parasite living in them right now.
I’ll bet I do. I grew up with cats, and my personality is definitely toxoplasmic.
someday we will crush the dog loversno
no no no no
do not bring this back
LIES!!!
I think I may carry that parasite. I would have gotten it in middle school. During sixth grade, I volunteered in a cat shelter. One particular not-very-clean cat arrived one day and scratched me when I helped take it out of the transport crate. I got ringworm, and thought that was the end of it, but a while later my personality started changing subtly. At first I put it down to being a teenager, but the specific changes just happen to be exactly the ones associated with T. gondii infections in girls…
I don’t know for sure of course.
The TSA classifies matzah balls as a “liquid, gel, and/or aerosol.”
That is… what
Today I learned that if you are walking around in Middletown with someone who is wearing a very short skirt, the toothless man leaning against the wall will look at her and yell “SHE’S GOT LE-EGS” in the style of ZZ Top.
Oh god. Eeeehhhh :U
I laughed so hard. It was so unexpected and hilarious, and my friend took it very well. That’s just Middletown. I had one guy come up to me and start ranting about Obama. It’s…it’s a strange town. I’m rather glad I just go there occasionally and don’t have to live there.
If your formerly stuck tuning slide is newly lubricated, then you will feel compelled to slide it up and down all through the director’s lecture in band class until it accidentially comes loose and clatters to the floor making lots of noise.
I have read Les Miz before.
In Chinese.
With pictures.
It’s Les Mis.
Agh, sorry.
(The Chinese translated to “a tragic world”)
It’s alright!
I don’t speak French, but I’ve heard that it means “The Miserable Ones,” and in general, direct translations from French to English are more reliable than ones from French to Chinese to English. They have the same idea, though.
Actually, according to the internet, both “Les Mis” and “Les Miz” are acceptable abbreviations.
What did the pictures look like?
Today I learned that the devil made the dryer, but everything else God made.
Intriguing, would you mind telling me how you found that out? And why the dryer isa devil made?
Oh dear, my obscure musical theatre reference this time seems to have gone without understanding. I apologize.
This post was a reference to the musical “Caroline, or Change,” although it’s not a particularly clever reference of any sort, its pretty much an adopted line quote. The musical totally deserves a listen though. It’s pretty excellent and the harmonies and music are beautiful (and the lyrics are Tony Kushner, so they’re also pretty great).
/theatregeek
You should never try to tell your anime-fan friends about Yuri’s Night. >.<
They’re mad the name is taken, or they misunderstood what it meant?
I just hope it isn’t the former, since he didn’t exactly pick that name (I assume), and it was probably around before the show (whatever it is).
It is not a show, it is a… genre. Google it if you’re interested, but don’t turn images on.
Oh… I thought it was a character from a show, actually. I don’t think I will look it up, because whatever site I click on might have images.
Don’t. For your own sake.
I will explain what yuri is in the least horrid way I know possible, you don’t want to knowplease don’t read any further.
Yuri is the love/relationship between women. So basically intimate stuff.
whenever I see that word in the description of any anime show, I just leave it…
There is nothing inherently wrong with female/female relationships/love/intimacy.
While you may not want to be surprised by it, or you may not prefer it for yourself, that doesn’t mean it’s evil and you should avoid /knowing what it is/.
As a person who has been in a female/female relationship, I am horrified that you think works of fiction which portray events which could plausibly have occurred in my life are awful just because they portray those events.
No one’s saying that it’s wrong. It’s the fact that most people on the internet focus on the intimate parts of the relationship, usually in graphic detail. R*S is trying to keep young people from accidentally looking at pornography, not from reading about non-heterosexual couples.
Yes, there is a huge difference between fiction portraying female/female relationships (which I do not at all mind reading) and fiction that goes into exquisite detail with illustrations about physical intimacy in adult relationships no matter what sex(es) its occupants belong to (which, as a middle-schooler, I really would rather not read). I don’t think anyone is saying it’s wrong to read or write about female/female relationships or to be in one, certainly not more so than male relationships. They just predicted, accurately, that I probably would not enjoy seeing pictures of and perhaps not even reading about physical intimacy in said relationships. When Rainbow said, “Don’t. For your own sake,” she meant that I would regret it afterward, not that it would corrupt my immortal soul.
Maybe you did understand what was being said, but you still object because you don’t think there should be a stigma around sex at all, that people shouldn’t pretend it doesn’t exist to young people as they currently do, that we should all just accept it as a fact of life? I can understand this point of view, and I’m not sure I even necessarily disagree with it. However, I can’t help the fact that I’ve been taught from early childhood that anything to do with it was to be avoided, never thought about, disturbing, and that all that conditioned me from an early age to be uncomfortable in matters related to it, especially with illustrations. I’m sure I’ll get over it when I’m older, like everyone else does; it’s already started to; there are definitely things I read now that would have disturbed me when I was younger. Actually, there are things I read now that did disturb me when I was younger; it wasn’t and isn’t unheard of for me to start a book, fall in love with it, reach a part that’s too explicit for me, and save it to finish in a few years. I never think that the author shouldn’t put it in the book; I just don’t particularly enjoy reading about it. Watching it isn’t likely to be any better. Just… try to understand that no-onehere is saying female/female relationships are immoral.
Guys, I’m really sorry, I didn’t mean to start this whole thing. There’s nothing wrong with female/female relationships in themselves, and I’m sure that’s what Areohawk meant too. I’m sorry. Can we talk about human spaceflight now?
…what they said.
Ouch. I have done the exact same thing before.
Gagarin is always the first thing I think of when I see “Yuri”, so I’ve gotten confused, too, especially as there’s a game called “Yuri’s Revenge” that’s apparently somewhat popular.
An interesting holiday.
A couple of days ago Kai mentioned it and that was what occured to me, then I read it in the events here and remembered.
Music on the Internet created by the Internet users is really good if you know where to look.
Indeed.
Today I learned that if I visit MB on my 3DS, it censors out every picture of bunnies. This includes the “idea” smiley. I think my 3DS may be trying to protect me.
Today I learned that scientists can’t figure out why things like bicycles and motorcycles balance so well.
Really? That seems like a strange hole in what we know about the world.
I know, it’s fantastic. And weird.
Quite. They’ve ruled out gyroscopic effects, and the most plausible theory I’ve read has to do with the fact that if a bike starts leaning one way, its center of gravity shifts that way and pulls the rest of the bike with it, self-correcting the lean, and it does a bunch of these little self-corrections this way and that and it all averages out to balance. But that’s just a theory, and it has a few problems.
Wow.
I spent some time looking at the Wikipedia entry on the subject, and I’m amazed by the complexity. There’s a lot going on at the same time! I guess it’s no wonder that they don’t understand everything yet.
Today I learned that humans evolved for no purpose but to get cats out of tubas.
But if humans hadn’t evolved, there would be no tubas from which to extract cats.
The world must be a brilliant place if that sentence can exist.
Clearly, we are here for two purposes: to make music, and to look after our fellow creatures. (My cats think I should skip the music and devote my life to looking after them.)
So the reason for our existence is to create and to care.
An excellent summation.
Or to feed, water, groom, entertain, and provide warmth for cats, if the two under my roof had the vote (and each would no doubt add that it’s not strictly necessary to spend much time on the other one).
Perhaps you could entertain them with tuba music? That way, you can fulfill your other purpose while keeping them happy.
My orchestra teacher once extracted a live possum from a tuba. True story.
*Okay, he and his wife say it’s a true story. I wasn’t there. I was there the day he chased two pigeons out of the cello closet, though
It’s not that hard to believe. I had to chase a young possum out of my old house once. Turned out there was a hole in the kitchen floor back behind the sink just big enough for a smallish critter to squeeze through. It reminded me of piglet.
None of the friendly neighborhood possums have gotten into our house yet, but last night I found one pawing at the window in an alarmingly forward manner, as if to say, “I’ll be there soon.”
And HOW exactly did you learn this?
My friend told me.
I thought it worth noting that I mentioned this in band today when we interacted with a cat during a fire drill. The cat started at our band director and walked all the way over to the tuba player before we went back inside. Then the tuba player recounted a true tale of having to get a cat out of his tuba.
If you want to feel tall when you’re not, just go to an elementary school playground.
Here at college I’m taller than a good number of people for the first time in my life. It’s an incredible feeling.
I have honestly never been taller than anyone in my grade. Unless you count being AS TALL as someone. Its pretty exciting! Especially when I wear taller shoes (like converse) and I am taller!
The Third Wave. One of the more frightening things I’ve ever read/heard about.
I really liked that book, mostly for personal reasons. I suppose I’ve been confronted with the whole topic a lot, having Austrian grandparents. The Nazis weren’t just some monsters from a war movie- they were real and the atrocities they committed are unforgivable, but they were also people not so unlike us which is why it’s so important to know and learn about what happened so that it can never happen again. Somehow, a lot of people fail to mention the banality of evil, the Milgram experiment, the Stanford prison experiment, etc… when they talk about the Holocaust, which sort of defies the point. Don’t get me wrong, I’m not trying to justify or excuse anything here, it just annoys me that media usually uses the Nazis as a symbol for evil incarnate (okay, in many ways, they- at least the higher members of the party/military etc- were) and no-one really bothers to think about the whys so much. What I mean is that “your average Joe” back then who, depending on his/her age, would have been part of some form of pro-Hitler organization or at least publicly claim to be, didn’t just disappear in 1945. They had kids, and grandkids and great-grandkids, who all tiptoe awkwardly around the question “Why didn’t you hide any Jews in your basement?”. That’s another reason why I resent the Holocaust being written off as “oh, Germans were just too authoritarian” or “oh, Austrians turn into psychopaths when they get rejected from college” or “well, they were all just evil”. I’m sure there were plenty of factors about the culture and life back then that didn’t help, but they were still people not unlike us who, for the most part, probably didn’t fully comprehend what they were doing or what was going on (Not that this excuses or justifies anything, and of course, this doesn’t apply to higher Nazi officials or those who actively supported the cause before the regime came into power). Ahrg, this all came out wrong. What I’m saying is, I hate when people (especially the well-off type living in a stable democracy) try to claim that the Holocaust only happened because Germans are/were uniquely dysfunctional and that they would’ve obviously handled in a morally impeccable fashion if they had been in the given situation.
Did anyone else think of Animal Farm upon reading ‘stable democracy?’
I’m sorry you have to deal with that.
I learned that as much as some of my friends would be honored to appear in my fanfiction, there are “certain legal and ethical issues” that prevent government officials from being able to agree to appear as characters in works of fiction.
It’s okay, though, because I’ll still be depicting their agency positively, even with fictional employees.
You shouldn’t read Neil Gaiman stories while eating. Seriously, don’t be fooled by Good Omens or “The Doctor’s Wife”, the man has a disturbing mind when not contained by a PG-rated show or a mostly-comedic co-writer.
That’s what I love about Neil Gaiman – he can go from utterly sweet to absolutely horrifying and back in the blink of an eye.
^^^ THIS THIS THIS THIS THIS. ^^^
I am in total agreement.
Which one were you reading? (SFTDP) I bet it was something like “Keepsakes and Treasures” or “Snow, Glass, Apples.”
“Snow, Glass, Apples” and the “Fragile Things” anthology.
Today I learned that if anybody who ever lived in New Zealand talks about it, it makes me really want to move there.
That was not supposed to be a reply!
(Oh, and SFTDP.)
Sorrrrrry.
Except… certain aspects. *reaches for chainsaw*
All flutes have rolled tone holes. I was really surprised because at first I thought it was just a rather controversial quirk for an instrument to have, but apparently that’s just for saxophones.
Apparently, stanfordrejects . com links directly to berkeley . edu
(Are those links allowed?)
*tries* *is amazed* That… That is hilarious and wonderful.
Not if you’re a Berkeley student who actually got rejected from Stanford…
I found it a bit unkind too, even though I’m not one.
Sorry–I suppose that’s true. And I suppose it must be even worse for someone who got rejected from both schools.
Yeah, that would be worse.
well… today i learned how to make muffins!
SFTDP
today i learned that i can’t do anything right
*sigh*
for example:
i washed my hair last night and today it is a dirtball
i went to pet my cat and he bit me
i played my guitar and the string popped in my face
mom is petting me more than usual
i woke up with the cat on my face
“Catface! The new and improved version of Facepalm!”
Sucks to hear that you’re having a bad day, Catwoman. If you want to complain more and receive a plethora of squids, head over to the Rants & Plaints thread, ‘kay?
Also, today I learned that places tend to close down at the most inappropriate times. *sigh*
Today I learned that using chopsticks makes eating gyros much easier.
Wait… What? How is that even possible? Did you eat each part separately or… It’s difficult for me to imagine eating a gyro with chopsticks…
The gyros from the place I usually go to have a very, very high meat/onion/tomato to pita ratio, and so I’m left with basically no choice but to eat most of it with a fork before even thinking about folding it into something resembling a sandwich. But today I discovered that chopsticks are a lot more suited to the task than a fork is.
My science teacher does, in fact, know about the parasitic properties of mistletoe. He just couldn’t understand my lisp.
Also, pressing random buttons will only get you so far in Mario Super Smash Bros, especially when playing against two guys who practice the game together all the time.
If you put the trombone section in alphabetical order by last name, you get our reverse chair order. Of course, there are only three of us.
Apparently staying up super late and watching retro cartoons on YouTube is a good way to cheer oneself up. Also, if one wants to get the Complete Sherlock Holmes out from the library, one should not, under any circumstances, get the Annotated version unless one has a small shopping cart on hand to carry it home in.
Which is why I read my Sherlock Holmes stories on a Kindle.
That’s why I read Cosmos in the library over the course of a month.
You know, that’s a great idea. I need to do that with Cousteau’s The Ocean World. (I’d do it with Cosmos, too, but I’m sure my school library lacks it.
Today I learned that the Founding Fathers didn’t want to let Ben Franklin write the Declaration of Independence because they were afraid he would put in some subtle jokes and satire without them realizing it, and so they asked the less talented Jefferson to write it instead.
“Get Jefferson to do it. He couldn’t tell a joke to save his life.”
That sounds plausible.
I hate Thomas Jefferson…
Why?
♫ But, Mr. Adams, but, Mr. Adams:
the things I write are only light extemporanea;
I won’t put politics on paper; it’s a mania!
So I refuse to use the pen in Pennsylvania.
PENNSYLVANIA
PENNSYLVANIA
REFUSE
TO USE
THE PENNNNNN ♫
Tyler from Twilight (the valiant hero who almost hit Bella with a van) has the full name Tyler Crowley.
Team Tyler’s van FOREVER!
Team Bella’s truck!
In our advanced jazz combo, the director has the perception that the flautist (Agent Hippie) is quiet and polite.
Heh, heh.
Once again, I don’t know why I chose the name Agent Hippie.
Remember, it used to be Agent WarriorHippie.
A few days ago I realized that I am no longer afraid of my parents’ disapproval.
In 2007, Switzerland accidentally invaded Lichtenstein when 170 Swiss soldiers crossed the border by mistake while training.
If that had happened in the Balkans, it would have touched off a five-year-long war.
Burning hair smells the same as burning peanuts does.
It’s really funny to look at the bottom of a Wikipedia and notice that its 2 tags are “Phylogenetics” and “Elvis Presley”, even if it makes sense. (By the way, if anyone can guess what this article would be about, they get virtual cookies).
(It’s Elvis taxa, by the way).
The Beach Boys are the only people who can make breaking the land speed record in a rocket car sound sedate.
I was named after both Caroline Bingley and Pope John Paul II.
Beatlesrockr successfully got “flamablamablous” into the Urban Dictionary.
*looks up* Yes! That’s awesome!
Wow, that’s flammy!
Um… Wait…
“Be the leaf on the wind; you only leaf once” is an Avatar meme, not a Firefly meme.
There exists such a thing as magnetic nail polish.
I’ve heard about nail polish that changes color when exposed to UV light (or the sun), but magnetic nail polish is totally new to me. Weird…
What StickyKeys does.
Be incredibly annoying, or something else?
It lets you type pressing only one key at a time, like pressing shift, letting go, pressing ‘t,’ and getting a capital letter.
The good news is that the Animal Welfare Institute’s Compassion Index (which has information about recent legislative events that might affect animal welfare and advice on what you can do about them) has a link to Schoolhouse Rock’s I’m Just a Bill song–and that there is an excellent rationality parody of said song about a zombie bill.
The bad news is that the WWII bombing of Nagasai probably drove the last representative species of the entire class Mesotardigrada extinct.
Today I learned that academic conferences are exhausting. Especially when the speakers switch between English and Spanish so often that you lose all sense of which language they’re speaking in.
There’s a Mythbusters episode about exploding trousers.
I remember watching that!
Muse wrote about exploding trousers once! That was before I subscribed, but I heard about it.
Today I learned that I still think of Daekie as Witchneko. (And that I am in fact no good at keeping up with her current name at all; I looked it up in Who’s Who to find that the name I thought was current is actually three names old.)
Same here! Except that although I thought of her as Witchneko, Thief of Light was the name I thought was current.
So we were one name apart in the names we thought were current. And Thief is short for Thief of Light anyway.
Well, yes, but… are you saying Thief is her current name? I assumed it was Daekie because that’s what you called her. Or is that her real name?
Today I learned that there exists a Fairly OddParents wiki.
I don’t know how to feel about this.
Rule ???:
If something exists, there is a wiki about it.
And if it’s a hobby, probably a magazine, too.
Wait… There’s a wiki about tardigrades, and I haven’t heard about it?? Not to mention me–or do I only exist in my imagination?
Don’t feel too bad. I don’t really exist either.
Squid have three hearts.
So what you’re saying is that one squid is equal to 1.5 Time Lords?
I hope not, because that means I’ve dissected 1.5 Time Lords.
I’ll never be let into the TARDIS now!
So do cuttlefish, apparently. Yay!
Today-well technically several days ago-I learned I should start with the ninth Doctor.
Now the only reason I have left for not watching it is pure simple laziness.
When you start watching, I would love to see reaction posts in Geeky TV Shows!
As Deputy Administrator of the National Atmospheric and Oceanographic Administration (NOAA), former astronaut Kathryn Sullivan is first in line to succeed the NOAA Administrator, Dr. Jane Lubchenco, in the event of Dr. Lubchenco’s death or resignation.
The NOAA Administrator is fifth in line to succeed the Secretary of Commerce, Rebecca Blank, who is in turn tenth in line to succeed the President.
Therefore, Dr. Sullivan is first in line to be fifth in line to be tenth in line to be President of the United States.
I read the Secretary of Commerce’s name as “Rebecca Black.” Needless to say, I was confused.
It is a bad idea to drop cesium into water.
(A really bad idea.)
(An incredibly bad idea.)
(Where can I get my hands on some cesium?)
Sodium is just as
goodbad.Do not eat bittersweet cooking chocolate.
Seriously.
Don’t.
If you have to walk two blocks to a bus stop through the six-thirty a.m. frost, it is an excellent idea to carry a reusable bottle of your favorite hot tea.
“Water Bears for Obama/Biden” merchandise exists. And (unlike some ‘water bear’ merchandise out there) it really is talking about that kind of water bear.
The difference between venom and poison is that poison is ingested or transmitted through touch while venom is injected.
This means that back in July when describing what how my six-year-old self would have begged for a plush Komodo Dragon, I should have said “But Mom, Doug can protect me from night monsters with his venom bite!” not “with his poison bite”, which is what I said.
When lava freezes and forms basalt deposits, the trace amounts of iron crystals all freeze in the direction of the magnetic north pole. This means that you can take a millions of years old chunk of basalt and use it to calculate where the magnetic north pole was at the time it formed.
I almost applied to an REU where I would have been measuring this!
Instead I applied to one where instead they are taking zircons/quartz crystals from basaltic lava flows and using photoluminescence data to determine when the eruptions happened.
(It is unlikely I will get it, but I can hope)
It is a really bad idea to confuse nail polish remover for mouthwash.
You poor, unfortunate soul.
I did that with shampoo once.
Did you call Poison Control?
This almost happened. No poisonous chemicals ingested.
I didn’t learn this today, but Hitler was apparently a huge fan of Disney’s Pinocchio and Snow White, to the extent where, when people went through his things after he died, they found fanart signed with his initials.
It’s on the Internet, and it’s actually quite good.
THE MORE YOU KNOW
Zac Efron played young Simon on Firefly. It was his first major role.
If you don’t have a panic closet, panic bathtubs are also very good. Ensure that you have fuzzy socks and a laptop with you.
I gather that panic bathtubs do not contain water.
No, one tries to keep one’s fuzzy socks dry at all times.
Not to mention laptops.
Space is so caking huge that light from the Andromeda galaxy takes 2.5 million years to reach our eyes.
And Andromeda is the galaxy next door.
Surinam toad hatch their eggs on their mother’s back. The eggs implant on their mother’s back and holes form around them and then they hatch out of the holes. It looks totally gross.
You should totally search for pictures of it. I found out about it from an informative page about trypophobia. My first reaction was “Ewww.” My second reaction was, “I want to dissect one”.High heels were originally made for butchers.
There is an anime version of The Sound of Music.
…Okay, technically, it’s an anime adaptation of the book The von Trapp Family Singers, which also inspired The Sound of Music. But… yeah.
I wonder if it’s any good.
Maybe we should have a new thread?
Good idea.