Stuff That Really 'Grinds My Gears...'

I still like his book reviews and recommendations… his tech hyperbole is just eyeroll inducing at best.

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Yes, but how bad it the DRM on that juice? We should be promoting free juiceware for all!

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Like today’s headline, which just made me laugh out loud. I think he knows he’s doing it: “Intel declared war on general purpose computing and lost, so now all our computers are broken”

But yes, his book and media recommendations are often terrific.

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People in my workplace who leave their dishes in the kitchen sink for days on end as though someone else is going to do them for them.

I don’t care what you do at home. At home, I am a massive fucking slob. But I have the decency to keep a shared kitchen neat.

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‘Factoid’.

The term seems to be in the middle of a ‘literal<->figurative’ transformation, where the new use is ‘factlet’ or ‘mini-fact’, but where the original use is basically ‘an untruth’ (especially one which is commonly taken as fact, but is still untrue) (Yes - ‘fake news’!)

Now I’m firmly towards the Descriptivist end of the scale, but whereas the literal and figurative versions of ‘literal’ are usually obvious from context, which version of ‘factoid’ is being used inherently isn’t. (Is that perticular ‘factoid’ an actual, genuine, fact - or an untruth that looks like/or gets mistaken for a genuine fact?)
Critical and non-obvious.

So yeah. ‘Factoid’. Grrr.

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I consider it to mean something which may be true, but most likely requires some context to be of much use, eg a snippet from a clinical study or something.

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Which isn’t far from the new use, and in another (five? ten?) years it may be safe.

But right now, if someone’s using the old definition, then, that factoid is being presented as plausible, but known as wrong.

(Sure, I know things people say as ‘fact’ should be checked out, but the starting point matters - which position are they proposing - the idea that the statement is right, or the statement that it is wrong.)

(:Smiles ruefully emoticon:) And to be sure, I’m not kvetching at you - just grinding my gears™.

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┬─┬ ノ( ゜-゜ノ)

I help where I can.

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I tend to hold my phone in my left hand and scroll with my left thumb. I get to the last comment on a thread, go to look at what unread threads are linked at the bottom of the page and then BAM:

Every. Single. Time. :persevere:

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For me, its that card slots (ATMs, train barriers, etc) are always on the right. :rage:

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This post is going to be pure whininess. Don’t say I didn’t warn you.

My spine is pretty messed up. There’s the deformed vertebrae which weren’t spotted on an x-ray until well into adulthood (but explained a whooole lot of weird stuff from Phys Ed class in school). There’s the minor scoliosis (again, not taken seriously until well into adulthood). Then there’s the arthritis and soft tissue damage from being in one of several cars a drunk driver hit.

Most days I’m fine. I just can’t do things like run or jog. But then there are days like this. My lower back is more crooked than usual, so I’m walking with a slight limp – noticeable enough that a kind woman held the door open for me twice at the subway entrance (and I was nowhere near the doors when she noticed me). I’m grateful and mortified.

I’m not in enough pain to need painkillers or anything. It’s just things are pulling that shouldn’t be, and things are arranged sub-optimally. A couple of bones crunched into a new position as I was writing this. I just hope it’s better than the old position.

Wah.

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Tried an osteopath?

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Oh, I get straightened out on the regular – I’d be in much worse shape otherwise – but shit happens. The humidity level’s been up around here, which means arthritis inflammation etc.

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It’s not the spelling.


Fucking irreplaceable helium being fucking wasted on stupid floaty balloons.

Our descendants will fucking hate us.

Hydrogen or GTFO.

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Sure doesn’t sound whiny from here.
People helping is a good thing, I think. Doesn’t mean you’re ‘obvious’ either - some people are just more attentive than others. :slight_smile:

[ETClarify: Helping, as in genuine good-faith attempts to assist, anyway.]

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A few years ago I funded a kickstarter to help a group of science girls to put a probe into the stratosphere. There was a bit of panic with the helium:

We have hit a wall that is taking a some time to solve. There is a national shortage of Helium and it is almost impossible acquire some at the moment as helium sales are being rationed and prioritized. We have about 3/4 of the amount we need and may have enough on Wednesday of this week. So, long story short, we may launch this weekend or next at this point. Everything else is coming along very well. I’ll post an update today or tomorrow with more detail.

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I hold doors for anybody. My philosophy is that I already expended the energy opening it, so now (literally in a lot of cases), I am just leaning. You could be a pro-athlete and if I saw you on approach, I would hold the door. It’s an easy courtesy and it always surprises me when some people don’t. *

  • Exceptions apply, such as if it’s stormy and holding the door lets in wind and rain, creating a hazard.
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I behave the same, for similar reasons, so I can respect that. :slight_smile:

(Actually, one additional: It is a show of simple respect to wait holding a door, so there are one or two people I wouldn’t wait for. But only one or two. Maybe three.)

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I started to consciously do this around when I was 14 and started looking like the 80’s goth industrial whatever I was. I really made an extra effort when it was someone that looked older or conservative. I figured I should take the opportunity to plant a little seed of an idea that those kids dressed all in black might be weird but they know their manners.

The memory is a bit hazy but I think the idea struck me when I noticed more than once that the jocks and cheerleaders in my town didn’t bother to hold doors open and there was an incident where a jock let a door slam shut in the face of an elderly person. I thought to myself I can do better than them and maybe offset the ludicrous notion that that they were the good kids and I was the bad kid (based on clothes and not behavior).

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Perhaps sushi in China wasn’t a good idea. The night before a date. Which is being held in the morning. (Whose idea was that anyway?)

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