Topic: The Chit-Chat Thread

My iPhone plan is 6GB data a month 35 dollars unlimited talk and text. Total wireless.

@klingki That... I totally understand. I live in Japan and get a lot of spam ads that I just ignore.

@Heavyarms55 I didn't see the joke when you first posted it. In hindsight, it's okay. I'm not really a Push Square fan, so anything written about it sooner causes annoyance than laughter in me, but that's just personal, and you having to add "this is sarcasm", while that was already blatantly obvious, except for a couple of denser individuals, already ruined the entire comment, if you ask me.

Next time, just close your comment by adding "/s" at the end of it, which (in case you don't know) is shorthand for "end sarcasm". Might help to enlighten certain individuals...

Sorry to hear about your work issues. Having to work under increasingly stricter safety measures is always annoying. The boomer comment, though...

On a side note: I don't know if these are still any good in your particular situation, but you could also look into using proxy servers at work, to still get access to sites that are blocked.

Here's a couple of examples and some info:
https://www.free-proxy.com/
https://www.hidemyass.com/proxy
https://www.lifewire.com/free-anonymous-web-proxy-servers-818058

@rjejr Well, I'm sorry to disappoint you, because either I don't get it/see it, or I simply never saw the movie that you think this Morbius trailer might remind me of. But I am curious now, so please do tell.

@Tyranexx I forgot all about how you already changed your name as well. What was it again?

@ThanosReXXX I mostly added the sarcasm thing because I didn't want more people replying with issues. There are enough fights going on in the comments as it is... In hindsight I shouldn't have bothered trying to make a joke online in 2020 in the first place...

As for the work stuff, my cowork and I were experimenting and we discovered that the work system is self updating based on an algorithm. So I don't expect there to be much, if any, way around it. And I'm not going to go so far as to download programs to try breaking their security. Frankly if they want me to do things for classes now that I can't do on the equipment provided in the time frame they ask, I'm just gonna tell them "No" and to pass it up the food chain. Maybe eventually whatever out of touch boomer in the BOE who made this dumb choice will get the idea - when they start getting complaint after complaint and parents showing up to the PTA meetings and ask why every class is now just plain textbook and black and white, no picture prints. Sucks for the kids, but it's out of my hands for the most part.

I'll still be bringing my own laptop to class when I can, and showing things that way. But only when I make time to prepare things myself, at home. Or when I feel like burning data off of my mobile hotspot at work.

@Heavyarms55 The proxy server solution isn't something you download or install. It's simply an anonymous gateway in which you can type the original address of the site you want to go to, and neither side can trace it, so your local firewall won't know, and the site you visited won't know either. It's pretty much online invisibility, and what can't be seen, can't be prevented either.

Back in the day, when I was still working as an employee in an office, we used proxy server sites all the time, to access sites that the system admin had blocked or locked out. Worked like a charm every time. Sometimes a bit slow, but it worked nonetheless. However, it's obviously up to you. I just thought I'd offer a suggestion, it's not like you're obligated to use it, I just wanted to help by proposing a possible and quite simple remedy to your predicament.

@ThanosReXXX Not a movie, tv show. The girl in the hospital bed looks like she could even be the same girl.

@rjejr American Horror Story then? Not that I've seen any of that after the second season, when I lost interest, but that's the first thing that comes to mind. I don't have a frame of reference concerning the scenes in the trailer and any series, though. So, you'd have to kindly provide a bit more of an explanation...

@ThanosReXXX Since I know you're a guy who likes visual stuff over reading, see if this trailer jogs your memory. It looks like it's shot on the same sets by the same people. Eerily similar if you ask me.

@ThanosReXXX If you are interested here he is at the semi-final!

Lastly I need to put clay on his stand and few brushes of liquid clay here and there. And after that it is the painting!

@Heavyarms55 Not a boomer, and I also want to go back to the '60s. I can't imagine why anyone wouldn't....we replaced inconvenient systems of life that worked with convenient systems that don't work at all, make us vulnerable to the irreparable destruction of our ability to exist, or both, at the same time!

On one hand I want to say "I love how schools & corporations are equally moronic worldwide!" On the other hand, honestly, it just makes sense. Letting people use their own data storage on internal machines is asking for trouble. Thinking "computer security can be trusted" is kind of 90's retro. Assuming "there is no such thing as computer security" is really the way of the future.

I deal with lots of secure environments and industries that won't be named. The very notion of letting personal data storage inside would lead to riotous laughter. The joy of the internet. It's encouraged us to build stronger virtual prisons....for ourselves while inviting the Barbarians through the gate! And we declare it "better."

@NEStalgia
I prefer 90's era when almost everything was really epic memorable.
The golden age of Western music (both from America and Europe), the fresh ideas from video games, the iconic 90's toys such as Tazos / Flippo, the memorable some of 90's cartoon that we will never get again on this era.

"I wish that I could turn back the clock.
Bring the wheels of time to a stop.
Back to the days when life was so much better." (Turn back the clock - Johnny Hates Jazz)

@rjejr So, you couldn't just say: "No, not American Horror Story, but The Passage. You know, that highly interesting looking new series that wasn't able to gain enough interest among American viewers, so it was canned after only one season"?

But all kidding aside, you definitely have a point there. I never even saw that trailer. I just jumped into the series, once Fox EU started broadcasting it here.

@Zuljaras Looking good. And yeah, I'm interested. I do prefer to see final results, to see how things end up, but I can always appreciate a "making of" journal...

The 90's the golden age of Western music? WHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAAA!!!!!
Oh, boy. What's next, I wonder...

@Anti-Matter I'd take the 90's as well! Maybe too much like today in some regards, but anything pre-smartphone pre "Web 2.0"/modern internet, I'd gladly take. I was an early adopter and promoter of the computer-driven world back then.....I regret that. I was blinded by the good and missed the looming bad...though, to be fair, what we had then mostly was good, it wasn't until the mid '00s that it started being twisted into what we now have. At least visibly. I'm a proponent of computers, I suppose, but not the internet which I would love to delete from existence, despite that it would mean we would not have our little community here. This is a nice oasis in the morass of the internet, but I'd gladly leave it behind to get some semblance of a properly functioning real world back.

From a US perspective though, I'm not sure I'd rate the 90's as particularly special. It has it's memorable pop culture and such for those that lived during that decade, as every decade does, and of course it's defined by the technological changes during the time that lead to the changes later, but I'd otherwise lump the 90's in with the present in terms of the era it takes place in. I'd say the major turning point eras where you could say you were in a very different era would be (going backward) today through the 90's. The 80's through the 50's. The 40's through the 20's. The 1910's through the mid 1800's. Those "brackets" of time, if you will have very clearly different overall societies between them that the decades in between them aren't as distinct between, without as sharp a transition between way of life. Though, we may have already crossed into a new one. The past 5 years or so seem as though we're in a massively different world than just 6 or 8 years ago.

@ThanosReXXX I never saw the trailer either, I just watched it b/c you suggested it, but once the Morbius trailer showed what looks to be that same girl in a bed, thought I doubt it she'd be too old now, and then the guy in a cave getting his power, which makes him sick, then better, then he's locked up in a lab, well it all looked a little bit TOO similar.

I know Morbius from back in the 80's when I was reading Spiderman comic books so I understand he's a vampire, and maybe The Passage did rip-off of Morbius first, but the Morbius trailer just has that same look. At least now I don't have to watch it, already seen it.

@ThanosReXXX
90's era was a golden era of Western music in my opinion.
Let's say Hero by Mariah Carey, Baby One More Time by Britney Spears, I Do by 98 Degree, Everybody by Backsreet Back Boys, Butterfly by Smile.dk, Dub-I-Dub by Me & My, Nights in Heaven Days in Hell by Missing Hearts, No Limit by 2 Unlimited, The Hampster Dance, We Like to Party by Vengaboys, Beauty & the Beast by Celine Dion and Peabo Bryson, Take a Bow by Madonna, etc.
A lot of 90's era music are really good to listen than nowadays music by LMFAO, Pitbull, Ke$ha, Nicki Minaj, etc.

Just you wait until we finally get some tangible research results on how 5G affects the world and our brains...

@rjejr Well, don't have to see it...
Objectively speaking, we obviously don't HAVE to see any movie or series at all, but personally, I haven't skipped a Marvel movie yet, regardless of whether or not it was made by Sony...

Funny coincidence that we've actually had the exact same first encounter with Morbius. Then again: anyone who read Spider-Man comics back in those days would have shared that experience right along with us, so for many of our peers, this might just be a bit of a memory lane movie, if they handle it right. Letho does have what it takes to nail a performance, although I didn't like his version of the Joker, so I hope he does this one a bit more justice.

@Anti-Matter Yeah... I'm obviously not surprised by your answer, because you're SO predictable.

I really feel like saying: "When the HELL are you FINALLY going to understand that your personal taste in just about every aspect of life is VERY limited and in no way representative of ACTUAL facts and figures?"

And besides that, it's just your personal opinion, so that too clearly shows it's no fact either.

Of course, the 80's and the 90's obviously didn't have bad music only, but most of what you listed, if not all of it, is highly disposable, and definitely doesn't define the era it came from. And THAT is how you define if a certain age of music, or any kind of entertainment, was a golden age. It also has to be something that's influential, setting standards and so on, and none of those songs were.

Go back to the 50's, 60's and 70's and you'll find hundreds of songs and dozens of artists who were all highly influential, even in such a way that they've LITERALLY defined many of today's music genres.

Ugh. My throat has been kind of scratchy for the last day or so, and I've been coughing a little. So far those are my only symptoms, but I think it's safe to say that I may be getting sick. That, or our weird weather is starting to do a number on my immune system.

@ThanosReXXX When I first signed up here, I started out with just Trinexx as my originally intended username was taken. Then at one point I combined it with Tyranitar (one of my favorite Pokemon, though in retrospect Tyrantrum could also fit) to create the lovely word soup you'll see attached to this post. I commonly also use a 'X' in a lot of my online usernames as well.

I also briefly changed it to Blitzenexx the holiday season before last just to be more festive.

Not I! Nope, nope nope! My parents and grandparents gave me enough horror stories from that time period to last me into eternity. I'll take American cruelty when it is at least somewhat tempered by the law and social disdain.

@Tyranexx Ah yes, Blitzenexx. That's the one I vaguely remembered and tried to recall.

@ThanosReXXX I wasn't overly fond of that username long-term TBH. I wanted to do something else this past Christmas season, but I couldn't think of anything that quite fit. Before I knew it, it was halfway through December and too late at that point; I didn't want to be locked into a festive name for the next 90 days! XD