Topic: The Chit-Chat Thread

Well, I wouldn't fancy doing anything complicated, @WoomyNNYes .... But 3 of the cheapest haircuts here covers the cost of a pair of clippers that should last for a lot more than that

I got a Roomba. It’s very pleasant, I hate vacuuming after the cat hair tumbleweed and sandy dog prints. I named it Rosie.

One day I want an automower.

And a Mr. Handy.

@HobbitGamer Speaking of robotic vacuum cleaners:

@Heavyarms55 Funnily enough, I sometimes do sneeze near windows, though there is a caveat; they have to be open.

In my state (IL), they've just suspended in-school learning for the rest of the 2019-2020 school year. The teachers kind of figured it was coming, but it's a personal bummer for a lot of them. Mom especially. She completely understands the situation, but this group of first graders is one of her best classes ever. She was firing up for the end-of-year fun stuff that all of these kids have earned (field trip, ice cream party, etc.), and they won't be able to do any of it. More than that though, she worries that a few of them will fall behind on their assignments and won't "get" something. She's checking in with them when she can.

@ThanosReXXX That does not sound like a fun experience. I definitely would've opted for the sedation. The worst my head has went through so far is wisdom teeth removal. The anesthesia nap was amazing, but waking up really sucked lol.

I didn't think of a vampire joke! XD In terms of behavior and habits, I admittedly fit the vampire trope more. Or at least I used to before I began making an effort to exercise outdoors on nicer days.

@HobbitGamer Do I detect a The Jetsons reference?

I've had the same set of clippers for 20 years, probably costing £20-30 around 2000. Never had anyone but me cut my hair since. Going to the hairdresser was a very uncomfortable experience for me in my teens.

@Tyranexx You're talking complete sedation, then. That's not available for all procedures here, unless you're willing to pay for it, or go to a specialist of your own choosing. I simply got referred by my own GP, and that's insured over here, so no extra cost, hence only basic sedation. Afterwards, they sat me down in the waiting room area, to somewhat recuperate, because I was feeling kinda woozy. Probably also because the sedation hadn't worn off yet, and I have a sneaking suspicion that it started to take effect later than it was supposed to, hence me still experiencing some pain when they made the hole for the drain. But I have a pretty large pain threshold, so it was more the inconvenience of it then a really agonizing feeling.

The sensation of the whole "breaking glass inside my head" feeling was almost otherworldly. I never even realized that we could experience sensations like that. Probably also the reason why it's still so vivid in my memory. It was one of those "once in a lifetime" moments. Well, at least: I hope so...

As for the vampire joke: one other reason that dawned on me is because of your house of horrors side-job/hobby. Kinda like kicking in an open door, as they would say here. 1+1=2 and all that...

On a side note: made a new dish today. I bought some ingredients for an Asian style dish yesterday, but I also forgot some stuff and I'm trying to limit my visits to the super market, so I had to improvise a bit with green beans and onions and so on, but I think it still worked out relatively fine. It tasted good enough anyway, so I guess it's still worthy of a proud display on the Chit-Chat forum:

@ThanosReXXX looks good to me. Now i want Chinese

@NintendoByNature Thanks, I'll have to write up the recipe for myself anyway, now that I know that it actually tastes good, so I'll share that later. It can be whipped up in little under half an hour, so even after a hard working day, it isn't a dish that you need to slave over a stove over, which is generally what I try to prevent with practically any and all dishes that I make.

@Heavyarms55 So, I've been digging through my photo archive, but over the last 6 to 8 years, I've made a LOT of photos, and the only ones displaying a rainbow on my current smart phone are these, which I've collected in a small album for your browsing pleasure:
https://postimg.cc/gallery/rTP6HTW
I called them "Cloudy rainbow", because they aren't the best pictures and it was somewhat overcast, but it still shows that you actually CAN take pictures of rainbows with a smart phone, and even zoom in on them.

As for that pro trick that I was telling you about earlier, changing the ISO value of the camera, so you can take better pictures either during the day or at night, here is an example of standard and pro settings in a night time situation.

DISCLAIMER: the two pictures were made on a moving ferry boat, so the perspective between the two is slightly different, and they aren't of the best quality, but they still serve the purpose of my example, so here goes:

On the left, there's the standard camera setting, ISO 100, and on the right, I've changed the setting to ISO 200. As you can clearly see, the lights are less washed out, you can see more colors AND more detail. So, even though you lose some light and other details, like the windows and reflections on the water, you gain a LOT of detail and colors, so depending on what you want to achieve with a picture, you have to apply the ISO setting accordingly, in order to succeed.

If you find all this interesting, or like to take pictures, then just play around with it. You can even set the ISO value to 400 or higher, which can yield quite interesting results at night, albeit also more grainy (edit: basically, the rule is the higher the ISO value, the larger the grain, so for best results, don't make pictures on a moving vehicle, like I did. Or use a stand, so you can lock the camera in place), so in that case, you'd better play around with shutter speed and put the phone on a stand of some sorts.

But ISO 200 is a good place to start. As a final example in this post, I'd like to show you another little album which I appropriately nicknamed 5.20am, because that is the time that these photos were taken, a couple of years ago:
https://postimg.cc/gallery/c85P8rK
As you can see, the colors are rather nice, if you tamper with that ISO setting.

And that's just on a smart phone. Imagine what results you could get with a professional camera...

Anyway, I think (hope) I gave you enough food for thought now, but if you have any questions, you'll know where to find me. And I'm also pretty sure that where you currently live, there should be plenty of material for some REALLY interesting photos, so I'm actually kind of curious now...

In these times of stress, is anybody interested in seeing a C-SPAN prank call clip from 2015? I was watching Washington Journal one day and some guy decided to say something immature It's clearly not highbrow comdey. But the way he said it amused me. I dont think it's politically polarizing. It's unlisted on my youtube channel, but I can past the link if anyone is wants to see it.

@ThanosReXXX Yo Rex, that dish looks tight AF!

@WoomyNNYes Thanks! If I keep gathering fans and admirers, I may have to start a cooking/baking thread of some sorts...

@ThanosReXXX sweet. Good stuff. Aisan food is among my favorite. So a recipe that's short and sweet is always welcome.

@ThanosReXXX Both of my siblings went through the same procedure at different points, but they woke up during their procedures. I slept through the whole thing. I was sent to snoozeland via an IV in the arm. Not sure if they had theirs administered the same way.

I don't remember much about waking up and what happened immediately afterwards other than there's a reason a staff member walks with you to the vehicle taking you home; the world was spinning and kind of...sideways. I also kept asking my poor mother the same question over and over again on the way home. I don't recall what that question was now. Just the thought process of "Did I ask that? I'll ask again just to be sure." I snoozed on and off for the rest of that day.

I'm not sure I ever wanna experience the "breaking glass" feeling. I can handle mild pain pretty well, but major pain that ebbs and flows with your heartbeat...hoo boy. I've dealt with a couple of decent sprains, dropping glassware on my right big toe, a knee hyperextension, and something else I won't mention. I hope to never experience pain worse than those sensations.

Funny but understandable that you'd make the haunted house connection. XD In my five seasons of working there, I don't think we've ever had a vampire. We've had your evil clowns, mad doctors, zombies, psychopaths, crazy freaks, chainsaw wielding maniacs...but no vampires.

I've just had supper, but that image has me craving some Asian food! It's been awhile since I've had any. I hope it was as tasty as it looks!

@Tyranexx Yeah, it's bittersweet for a lot of the students for sure. We've had to cancel or harshly scale back all sorts of things. Several major school trips have been effectively cancelled. They call it postponement, but when you're that age, postponing something until the following year has to just feel like it being cancelled until next.

For me, I'm just glad I can stay home when there's nothing to do now. I might have mentioned this already but I've been more or less just sitting at the computer reading the news and chatting on this site because there was nothing going on. But basically every time a coworker would get up from their desk I would be like "Is there anything I can help you with!?" Which there usually wasn't. Finally one of them yesterday said there's nothing left for any of us until the 27th. And that will just be printing out another batch of homework that the teachers will then send to the students and then a staff meeting on the 30th and then nothing again until May 7th...

@ThanosReXXX Those are some real nice photos dude! Do you do that professionally? Or just a fairly serious hobby?

@NintendoByNature I agree, Asian food is often amazing. I have an open bias in favor of Japanese food. Sushi, karaage, Japanese style ramens and gyoza, white rice, sashimi, yakitori, yakiniku, curry-rice, onigiri...

@Heavyarms55 i should've clarified as they're all vastly different. Japanese is my favorite as well. Followed by Thai I would say.

@Heavyarms55 One highlight for my mom and those kids is their yearly field trip to a children's museum about an hour away from the school. It's a really cool hands-on place that allows kids to interact with what they're learning. I've heard a few things have changed since I last went there many years ago, but truth be told I'd probably interact with some of the exhibits too. XD

I can't speak for all kids, but I absolutely loved field trips when I was in school. They were almost always fun in some way, plus I've always liked traveling (well, to an extent) and enjoyed getting out of school for the day.

I'd also be going nuts if I were in your position with nothing to do at work. I don't mind some lulls in activity to catch my breath and give my brain a break, but I also like to feel like I'm accomplishing something. Sitting around trying to think of what to do next would get old after awhile. I've been working from home, and thankfully our work backlog is such that I'm still being kept quite busy. There are less requests pouring in, so I've been able to make some headway.

Working from home has its positives and negatives. On one hand, I'm interrupted less and only have about a three second commute. On the other, sometimes face-to-face group conversations are more beneficial in my line of work. Plus, I'm now surrounded by more things I both need and want to do instead....

@Tyranexx School trips are a massive deal over here. There's a reason they tend to be a trope in anime. While I'm sure not every single kid likes it, they tend to be the major event kids will talk about for months or even years later. The big one for our students is going to Tokyo for about a week. Or another one to Osaka for a few days. But obviously that's not a good idea right now, seeing as those are two of the bigger hotspots of the virus right now in Japan.

@NintendoByNature I don't have much experience with Thai. But the few meals I have had, I remember liking.

@ThanosReXXX @Tyranexx Roombooooo!!
Yep, Jetsons. But I got something built in IFTTT that goes like this and it works;

“Hey Google, send Codsworth to scavenge”
(Roomba leaves dock and begins to clean”
Response from kitchen hub display; “Ok, but another settlement needs your help.”

If it gets full in a cycle, I get a text message saying “Codsworth is over encumbered “

Happy Earth Day everyone! And no, I'm no vegan zealot, but I do like to keep the Earth in one piece, and I do mind the environment, so I'm all for celebrating the Earth and all the wonderful places, plants and animals that it contains, as well as some of the humans...

@Heavyarms55 Thanks! I'm assuming you're talking about the 5.20am album photos? I'm quite happy with those, anyway. The rainbow pictures are kinda meh, but they were the only ones I had, for now.

To answer your question: I'd say fairly serious hobby and then some. Half a lifetime ago, when I was in my twenties, I did the whole photography course thing, through home studying. I had books, a camera, study material and assignments, and although that time-consuming hobby has kind of faded away, much like my painting and drawing hobby, part of it still remains, so sometimes I still draw or tinker with images, such as that Thanos comic that I posted over a month ago, and because of the always available and present smart phone,
I now always have a camera with me wherever I go, so when I see something interesting or funny, then I will more often than not take a picture of it.

Funny story about those 5.20am pictures: guess what a "decidedly younger than me" person once asked me about them? I'll put the answer behind anti-spoiler bars, so you can think of an answer first, and then check to see if you were right.

Just goes to show you how little the average person knows about all the interesting little features of a smart phone camera, huh?

Sneak peek of my Ice Skate Boxer sketch for 2021...

@bimmy-lee
What do you think about my Axel ?

@ThanosReXXX To be fair, I'm sure there are bunch of things I don't know about my smartphone, including the camera features. I at best, tolerate, touch screen only devices. I lose patience with them pretty quick if I have to mess with any settings or options menus, or to type out a message longer than a sentence or two. I really miss the full keyboard with direction buttons sliding phone I had in high school a decade ago.

Why does no one make a smartphone like that? It should still have the touch screen, but the sliding keyboard with physical buttons too... I guess I'm just "old".