Topic: The Chit-Chat Thread

When I got mine removed, the dentist only applied local anesthesia. No funny hallucinations for me.

On the brighter side, I also skipped the severe pain and balloon head phase, since it didn’t require any cutting or stitching.

I hope yours goes well!

@Tyranexx Lasik huh, how is that working out for you? I'd love to try it but I'm out of freebie organs, so glasses forever it is.

I see a certain post in a certain news comments thread was removed. GG, mods, GG.

@RedderRugfish If it continues to drop consistently the world might actually fix itself eventually, however those numbers you offer are suspect. It's no secret the industrial world has declined in birth rate, but the "developing" world has been breeting rapidly enough to double it's population every decade. I hadn't heard that magically slowed, but if it has that's only good news.

As for the industrial world, "crisis" due to population decline in overpopulated but prosperous countries is purely the result of Keynesian/Socialist Ponzi schemes cooked up in the mid 20th century that require an ever increasing number of workers to pay for each generation of elders, not because population decline in and of itself would be bad. They broke a realistic economic model with one that depends on unsustainable growing numbers forever and ever and then declare it a crisis when the obvious problem you could see coming from a thousand miles away actually happens. It's a "problem" but it's a problem manufactured by political morons that have been dead for a quarter century.

@Ryu_Niiyama Speaking of squeamishness about eyes, not all the money in the world could even get me to try contacts....let alone Lasik....

@NEStalgia Contacts creep me out...despite technically using one that is bigger than a quarter. However I'm slightly desperate to preserve my vision so Lasik sounds nice, but I'd be the one they mess up and then I gotta get a stick and a dog. ...I wonder if you can train a rabbit to be a seeing eye pet. Granted they are too quiet for the job...

Is it safe to go bunny?
seeing eye bunny stomps foot for no
I guess it is safe...
Ryu walks out in front of a bus

@Ryu_Niiyama That's funny, and surprising you'd be creeped out by contacts considering you pop the whole eye in and out like it's nothing and use it as a projectile!

But yeah, I hear you. If Murphy's law were to be used as jurisprudence in a court decision, I would be the cited precedent in the ruling. Apparently you may be a secondary precedent to reference...

A seeing eye bunny is still better than a seeing eye cat.

Is it safe to go kitteh?
Cat waits 42 seconds until the bus is too close to stop then tugs hard on the leash

@NEStalgia True but given that the way these things are made is they inject PLASTER into you head... and you have to look as straight as possible for like 2 hours while it sets (and while I have an allergic reaction) you get over the "it's in my head" squick quick (the process has since improved but still, plaster). But contacts...shudder That is why Hylia made so many stylish and wonderful frames. I'm not going to fight with my blink reflex for 20 mins to look cute.

Also, f cats.

@Ryu_Niiyama Pretty good overall so far. I'm recovering fine; Lasik has a relatively short recovery time in terms of eye healing. My vision is still fluctuating a little and will for a month or two yet (at least), but it's a short-term side effect. It'll take my vision longer than some to stabilize since my prescription was higher. I was roughly at a -6 in each eye (rounded), which is borderline severe myopia. I'm dealing with some dry eye, but that's another short-term issue that isn't helped much by my job or hobbies.

Unaided, I can see much better than I've been able to in years. It's so nice to not have to mess with smeary, limited glasses and mess with contact solution. I was used to contacts and liked them overall, but it does take some getting used to when you're repeatedly touching your own eye.

I Lol'd at the seeing eye bunny concept. While I love cats, they definitely wouldn't be the best seeing eye pet.

@NEStalgia Trust me, I did a LOT of research and talked to my fair share of people who had it done before deciding to do the procedure. I'd honestly repeat the experience - not that it was all sunshine and roses, particularly the rest of the day after it was done - but preferably not anytime soon. XD I kind of figured I'd be one of those one-off cases too, but so far I've been proven wrong.

@Tyranexx Good to hear! I wish you a safe and speedy recovery. I'm going to start training a herd of seeing eye bunnies you wait and see!

@Tyranexx good to hear that. For me, my only motto is if it ain't broke don't fix it, and if it's slightly broke, just try to scotch tape or and see how long it holds..... I'd descend into looking like whats his name with the red stapler in office space before anyone beams a phaser into my retina.

@Ryu_Niiyama RELEASE THE KITTEHS!!

I’m in favor of guide cats. Not just for visual impairments, though; for everything. Search and rescue, contraband sniffing, supports. Talk about a population cull.

@Ryu_Niiyama Thanks! I'll look forward to seeing that herd of cute, useful bunnehs! A friend of mine who loves rabbits would definitely love to see that!

@NEStalgia Ah, Milton? I'm familiar with some Office Space references, but unfortunately it's one of the movies I haven't seen yet. I'll make a note to look for it next time I'm out. From what I do know about it, the movie seems right up my alley. XD

In terms of my vision, I was to the point where I couldn't always safely wear contacts due to some allergens in the air at certain times of the year, plus I was starting to experience a couple of other issues related to long-term wear. I also absolutely HATE wearing glasses.

Basically, I was sick of messing with my eyes and decided to take the plunge. Before, I couldn't safely do much of anything without a visual aid. I could manage reading maybe, but only if my nose was a couple of inches from what I was reading. Things like driving? ...I like my no ticket record.

I bought myself a used 2013 Nissan Leaf yesterday. Going to be a nice first car.

I just found out that Pichu is Masuda's favourite Pokemon. No wonder he cut the National Dex: he likes crappy Pokemon. Not that I play it anyway...

@NorseGamerTommy Congrats on the first car. I’m assuming you don’t have a large commute? From what I understand, European nations have more charging stations, too.
I looked into converting one of my old vehicles into a hybrid, but it was too cost prohibitive. And I’ve never had a daily commute shorter than 20 miles each way. Rural America

Thanks!
Yeah, I won't use it for long travels. If I need to go somewhere far away, I'll just borrow my dad's car as long as it's possible. There are charging stations all around, so that shouldn't be too much of a problem.

https://www.npr.org/2019/04/02/709131281/electric-cars-hit-re...

Meanwhile, i still use my Polygon bike to go any place as long not too far from my house (10 - 20 km)
I cannot drive cars / motorcycle due to :
1. I still afraid with high speed riding. Riding with speed 40 kph is already pretty scary for me.
2. I still concern with gas pollutant from cars / motorcycles and i don't want to add another gas pollutant. Earth is already in crisis. Mountain bike all the way for me.

Man, 40kph is only less than 25 mph. That’s lower than the county road unposted for a neighborhood here (35mph/60kph). Our highest posted speed around town is 60m/100k on the bypass.

I bet it’s dense in Surabaya, ideal for bike travel. We have a lot of bike lane in my city, but it’s mostly vehicle travel. Top speed is 70 on the interstate highway, but you better be at 80 in the left lane.

Whoa, just wrapped what became an all consuming online hunt for a bed frame and headboard. First platform bed, lots to consider. It’s still a bit weird to me to spend considerable money on something online only to hope it’s not a piece of junk when it arrives, but I’m getting pretty decent at finding reasonably well made items. I’m hoping this is one of them.

@NEStalgia Sorry about your slimy meat and nutrition-less vegetables, but over here, all of it is pretty good quality. I do think some of it might be regional, though. There MUST be good food in the States too. I'm not going to believe it's all bad, but I do remember the food transport discussion we had with @bimmy-lee and a couple of others, so I can understand that fresh food isn't available everywhere.

But aside from all of that, and for me, minding my own diet is solely for my own health and sustainability, and I'm certainly not of a mind to force people into anything. You wanna keep eating a five pound T-Bone steak every damn day of the week? Be my guest. I do hope that the person who does, will also suffer the consequences, though...

The old saying that variety is the spice of life, is true in so many, many ways, and it certainly also counts in regards to keeping yourself fit and healthy. No man can live a healthy life either on meat or on plants alone. We can all fool ourselves into believing we can, but there's just too much evidence in favor of a varied, well-balanced diet, to ignore that fact.

And besides myself, I'd also wish that upon all my family and friends. I also want for them to have long, healthy lives, also partially out of egotism, because I want to keep them with me for as long as possible, but who wouldn't want that, for the people that they love?

As for Anti: When he goes off on his weird ramblings, then I simply dial out, but I do appreciate his artistic skills, even though I hate chibi stuff, so that takes away from it to some extent, but I've already learned a long time ago to look behind or through stuff, to be able to appreciate something in a more objective way, and see the positives in them. That's both a part of my upbringing and my professional training. I can sell any kind of ice cream, even though I may not like a particular flavor.

To end on a more positive note: I do believe I already mentioned it, but I absolutely agree on bringing down the Earth's population. But not in the Western world, or at least not mostly, seeing as (on average) we're usually not the ones who raise families with more than two kids. Of course, there are outliers, but the (wordlwide) average family in Western civilization only has 1.6 children, and I think we can also add most Asian countries to that.

P.S.

Wouldn't figure you to be one to be squeamish about contact lenses. I've been using contacts for almost 35 years now, and never had any problems with them. Well, not with my eyes, at least. The only problem I ever ran into, is losing some of them, while swimming, or while being on a trip, and not having any immediate replacements around. That got fixed, though, once I got my monthly lenses and holiday care packages...