Topic: The Chit-Chat Thread

I can say I have never seen an episode of game of thrones. Not even like, more than just a few minutes of one..

You all should be ashamed of yourselves.

I've never watched Game of Thrones. Or Rick and Morty.

Come to think of it I only watch Doctor Who...

I was invited to a GoT watch party...once. On the condition that I wouldn’t riff on it. That lasted 10 minutes. They should have known better! My personal favorite snap was “So, this is like Robin Hood, only if everyone was Prince John, right?”

Hiya...!
Boa noite!
I was in the way to go back to home with my bicycle from City of Tomorrow Mall after playing Dance Dance Revolution Ace while keep listening to this song.

@Tyranexx You two are seriously starting to sound like poster children for Whole Foods. Hope you make six figures!

I seriously have no idea how you guys find all that time for food. If I did that my day would be come home from work: do food. Eat at 9:00pm. Go to sleep. And nothing else. I'd rather just try to survive solely on Doritos and Dew than that existence. And I love to cook! Just wish I had the time. Technically I always wanted to be a chef when I was a kid....so it's a (or another) hobby on the list. Just...no time And you need a more idle hobby like gaming, music etc to unwind rather than productive hobbies unless you want to twist heads off people randomly during the work day. If I were to cook like that, there would be no gaming (ever!)

On Pizza Hut: Wait, you still have dine-in pizza hut locations with buffets and such?! Wow, I thought they closed that entire part of the company! Most of them vanished here, 20-25 years ago. There was one about an hour and a half away that closed maybe 10 years ago. That's the last one I ever saw. All pizza huts are little 4x6 waiting areas that fit maybe 4 people at once and a kitchen in small shopping strips. Pick-up/delivery only.

I think you still missed out on the true glory days of Pizza Hut. By the time Book-It and buffets started the slide already started. Back in the real glory days, it was a pizza arguably more desirable than quality independent places. It was just that good. You have to go back to the 80's for that. It was just plain awesome in the 80's. By the early to mid 90's the slump already started. It was still a better product than the barely edible prefab frozen garbage they serve now, by far, but it was nothing like the 80's glory days. It's just that the last 10 or 12 years has seen it slide from "a shadow of it's former self" to "barely edible pizza shaped object that may or may not be worse than DiGiorno." Funny thing was I didn't even notice it until it hit bottom. Back in the day....it was amazing. We're talking around they time that Pizza Hut was the only place to play SMB3 - in an arcade cabinet. And actually even that was the tail end of the good era.

@bimmy-lee This guy gets it^^ You nailed the description perfectly! See, you returned just in time for the great Pizza Hut conversation! It's weird, about a week ago, I woke up, and suddenly had the taste and texture in my mind of the old days. I hadn't thought of it in probably 20 years.....somehow there it was, the REAL Pizza Hut in my mind, and I remembered for the first time in ages precisely how different it is now. You nailed it. The soft sponge bred, the drenching of oil in the thick pan (they were actually "pan pizzas" back then rather than "self rising slightly thicker crust than NY style" they serve today. The pitchers. The atmosphere and dim lighting. And do you remember the garlic bread? Texas Toast style slabs, smothered in melted, browned cheese...I can't remember what knid of cheese...and then you could add unlimited Parmesan from the shaker...which I did....

How dismal that in the modern world such a glorious monument to fast food has sunk to re-heated flash-frozen garbage of the lowest possible quality to squeeze out every single last penny of value. It's kind of a metaphor of the US as a whole, or maybe even the whole of Western society as a whole....the slow descent from quality to minimum value at maximum cost for maximum investor return.

You nailed everything @NEStalgia .
(1)Most people can't afford Whole Foods me included.
(2)Pizza Hut pizza/Fast Food used to be so good but now Blah. Heck even Little Caesars used to be good 25+ years ago when it was buy 1 get 1 for which the saying Pizza, Pizza comes from.
(3)These publicly traded company's are screwing us for more profits as they can't find anymore ways to save money for their stock holders without lowering the quality and charging more.

I remember when all this used to be orange groves.

You live in disneyland?

You live in orangeland?

My kids have a Little Golden Book Classics re print of Disney’s Little Man of Disneyland from 1955. It’s a bizarre adverstory about a heroic leprechaun named Patrick Begorrah who lived in those orange groves and, at first, attempted to protect them from development; that is until Mickey, Donald, and Goofy flew him to HQ in a helicopter and cut him in on the plan. Ultimately, he decided to just live in Disneyland, and one night, under cover of darkness, chose his secret home. And that’s where he stays to this day. True story.

@NEStalgia - Oh man, that garlic bread made all non Texas toast variety garlic bread a no go for me. It ruined me. I watched them make it once. They hit it with a squeeze bottle of liquid butter before AND after the oven. By the time they served it, it had reached a point of super saturation, and the butter was just pooling on the serving plate. You nailed it on the crunchy, cheesy crust top too. They went coast to coast with the cheese inside those deep dish pans. So good. I had a whole other love affair at Pizza Hut too. The ranch dressing at the salad bar. I basically made ranch and Bacos soup with a light sprinkle of greens. Follow that with a free personal pan pizza (thanks Reggie), and a plate so full of chocolate pudding it was hard to carry back to the table, and you really had something special.

Nope, I live in landland.

My truck backfired this morning and scared the tailgating driver behind me. It was a good one, too. I’m talking a full cylinder at least.
Gonna have to get plugs and wires on the way home. Might have to throw a loveseat in the bed, become an Uber driver, and my the truck earn its money back 😂

@HobbitGamer - Do you have an engine light on for a converter? Backfiring is typically more of an exhale problem than an inhale.

And here is your new reply, if that ever happens again:

"No, I'm a girl, I just like pink. Now hand me my medium-baked steak"...
(here's hoping you actually like the color pink, otherwise, that'll fall flat on its face amongst friends and families, although you could still use it regardless, as a snappy comeback... )

If it actually works, you can thank me later...

Aww... NESsie want a blanky?

Man, you must not have been paying attention, probably skimmed over it all, once you read about actual, healthy and tasty food...

We both mentioned only having cooking days with fresh ingredients a couple of times a month, or at most 2 days a week, and for the rest of the week, you eat what you made earlier, and if you make 4 to 5 different dishes, you'll always have enough variety in your meals. And in between, you eat the odd pizza, or a burger and fries, or whatever else floats your boat, but solely living on that, will make sure that you won't be living all that much longer, or that you might become one of the latest contestants in the new season of Obese...

And most of my meals take all of half an hour tops to prepare, so you come home from work (5pm), stop by the super market on the way, arrive at around 5.45pm - 6pm, prepare a meal, dinner at around 6.30pm. Even easier if
I can just get a pre-made portion out of the freezer...

@Octane No, WE live in Orange land. You should be ashamed of yourself, not realizing that...

@bimmy-lee Nope, no CEL at all. Aaaaand I don't have a cat. (Not my fault, a previous owner)
It only did a single shot, and after I went full open. I've been replacing factory and/or old things (it's a 99 Dakota 4x2 3.9) and I think I'm down to general tune up and possibly fuel pump. But it's only acting up when the motor temp is cold, like first 10 minutes of running; Will shut off (i e not sputter down), but can be started back up. Will stumble and miss while driving. Can force a backfire at the exhaust tip (not tb or or manifold!), smells a little rich. Once the block is warm, no problems exist.

Items in the ignition/intake system less than a year old (because they died from age, or on the way out);
-PCM, TPS, IAC, PCV, Ambient Air sensor (don't ask), battery, alternator, crankcase breather hose (replaced with mopar breather filter), starter rebuilt, muffler, upstream O2
Items not related but less than two years old;
-driveshaft, u-joints, idle tensioner, idler pully, rebuilt brake knuckles

It's gotta be plugs/wires/cap/rotor at this point.

@HobbitGamer - Seems like that’s the ticket then. If it’s been running rich, those items could be fouled. Maybe buy all three items, but keep the wires in the box and try the plugs and C&R first (unless their OG). The original owner probably burned up the cat, and that process fouled up your spark & fuel delivery/regulation. The PCM probably freaked out because it looked for that O2 sensor in the missing cat for too long. I’ve worked in a couple service depts, so I actually know about the ambient air sensor. Every time I sold one, I had the distinct feeling the customer thought I was lying to them until it was replaced and the engine ran well again. It sounds like a made up part name.

@ThanosReXXX Well, my kitchen doesn't allow for portions big enough to last days most of the time unless it's a ham or a roast or something. Think Japanese kitchen. About 3ft of counter....and that's it. Enough for a rice cooker and a microwave. After that you're using the floor for prep space (which I do... ) I used to do a ton of cooking and baking, but I have no idea how I had the patience to deal with that. Youth was a wonderful thing I'd have things to trip over lined all over the floor.....

Now groceries....you're really too used to the EU way of life A trip to the food store here is going to kill well more than an hour of your day. It's going to take 15 minutes just to wait at the 3 traffic lights just to get to the store, and that's if you're near one (I happen to be.) Then another 15 minutes at the 3 lights out. back. Then your half hour of shopping min, plus 10-15 minutes in line waiting for price checks and coupon issues. For a lot of folk, the nearest food store is going to be Walmart at least 30 minutes away (each way.) If I stop at the store on the way home, I'd get home maybe 6:30, if I'm lucky. 7:00 if they decided to remodel one of the 6 times a year they remodel and you can find nothing in the store. And we're not including construction. 60% of the year there's only one lane in and out anyway while the utilities are digging AGAIN. I generally just stock up on 7-10 days of groceries at a time. No way I'm going more than once a week. That's pure torture. And that's for the NEAREST store of which I have on atypically close. Oh, add another 5 minutes finding a parking space and almost getting hit a dozen times. And hopefully you won't need a raincheck for a sale item they conveniently don't have but will gladly offer you store brand instead..... that's another 20 minutes while they "check the stock room" at their own pace.

If I were rich I'd at minimum just subscribe to Blue Apron where they ship you a cardboard box filled with ingredients to make one Yuppie-fied meal for exorbitant prices.

@bimmy-lee Oh, those wires definitely gotta go. They very well could be the stocks, since NGK was the factory supplier. I'm on the same wavelength as you about the cascading failures. Initially it was just the occasional downstream O2 light, then this year is when the PCM lost its mind and gave up trying. I can get all the parts for $71, NGK mid-level too. Oh, and I need an air box gasket. the one on there developed a tear when i changed the edelbrock filter

I liked trying to explain to the parts person at NAPA that I needed the ambient temp sensor, not the intake temp sensor. I didn't even have an ambient plugged in... The truck is an absolute beast, though. I love the smaller design days, and I got it for like $2k. It's got 182k on it, but runs like a champ until recently. It almost makes up for not havin' my '00 cherokee sport

@NEStalgia Ah, yeah... we also got those over here. One of them is suitably called "Hello Fresh", and it offers a subscription that you can stop or cancel at any time, for example if you go on a holiday, in which case you obviously wouldn't want boxes of fresh food being delivered to your door...

So, that three feet of counter space, does that include the sink and the stove, or are they separate?
I'll have to admit that I have a rather long counter, with a double sink, which is about 7 to 8 feet, and beside that on the left, is a fridge, and on the right a four-burner gas cooker. And on top of the fridge, I've placed a combi-microwave, which also acts as a normal grill or oven, so I've got all that I need to prepare any kind of meal.

If I were you, that combi-microwave would be my first purchase. You can get good, decently healthy meals for about 5 to 10 bucks, that you can just pop in the microwave. Tons of variety, ready in next to no time...

And yeah, I do tend to forget that distances are a thing over there, but in my mind, I'm nearly always talking to city slickers, and seeing as in America, everything is always bigger, better, faster, more available, I'd expect there to be dozens of supermarkets or malls within a half hour's driving distance.

Over here, I really do drive by several super markets/grocery stores on my way home, from the center of the city to where I live, so I can choose which one I want to go to, depending on prices, some shops having certain food items that others don't have, and so on.

On a side note: not that it'll actually have any effect on me, but I do have to wonder exactly how old you want ME to feel, if you're already complaining about youth being a wonderful thing in a retrospective kinda way. I don't feel old at all, and although grocery shopping can be a real chore, and isn't exactly on my list of favorite things to do,
I do like making sure that I'll have a couple of decent meals for the coming month, and I like good food, so it's more or less a necessary evil, and I also like cooking, so even after a hard day at work, I'll still find pleasure in cooking up a nice dinner for myself, knowing that I will enjoy eating it even more.

And if you've got a four-burner cooker, then you can make the same recipes I make. Three feet is all it takes to put a cutting board on. The meat you buy should already be cut up, so that can go into the stir-frying pan or wok straight away, and then the only thing you need space for, is your vegetables of choice. Or not even that, if you also buy these in ready made packages. So, basically, all you need is a good fridge, a good gas cooker, and a wok...

@ReaderRagfish Dunno, but far as I'm concerned, it suits this thread just fine, seeing as chit-chat is about everyday life and its goings-on, which definitely also includes food...

And besides, we gotta prevent that this is going to be a thread were people predominantly talk about dance games, games actually meant for children but played by adults, and falling asleep while playing them...