« first day (3831 days earlier)      last day (1084 days later) » 

CowperKettle
CowperKettle
2:37 AM
Astronauts watching a movie in orbit
One is at a 90 degree inclination relative to the screen
> For the first time, Lyme disease-carrying ticks — typically associated with woodlands in New England and other forested regions of the U.S. — have been found in abundance near beaches in Northern California, new research shows. medscape.com/viewarticle/950796
Lyme disease is quite unpleasant, can last for years and years. At least its repercussions.
 
Mitch
Mitch
@CowperKettle But if discovered early is easily treatable with antibiotics.
 
Cerberus
Cerberus
2:53 AM
Not always.
I think you can never be 100% sure, and it can resurface years later?
 
CowperKettle
CowperKettle
My friend's brother has some knock-on side effects, and it has been about 10 years since infection.
Yes, if treated promptly the prognosis is excellent, that's why I have antibiotics handy ))
I took several tablets back in 2017 just in case after a bite.
 
Cerberus
Cerberus
Hmm but taking antibiotics unnecessarily also has negative effects.
 
CowperKettle
CowperKettle
Yes.
But in a pinch it must be okay. For instance, if you're in the woods during a long trip, it's better to down some antibiotics after a tick bite than to risk burdeninng your friends (if you suddenly fall ill)
 
Cerberus
Cerberus
3:10 AM
Suddenly falling ill from Lyme's: does that happen?
Here, we just watch the bite; if it heals normally, like a small mosquito bite, and if you pulled out the tick quickly (within 24 hours), chances of being infected are low enough that we don't do anything.
 
CowperKettle
CowperKettle
Maybe you're right. I should read up on this
I pulled out the tick within 10 minutes
Still it managed to give me tick-borne encephalitis
 
Cerberus
Cerberus
That is another matter!
When you're at serious risk, you should take antibiotics (but apparently the ones you took worked against Lyme's but not against encephalitis?).
 
 
2 hours later…
CowperKettle
CowperKettle
5:15 AM
 
CowperKettle
CowperKettle
6:01 AM
@Cerberus I would love to have "green belts" of zero population in Europe, to preserve wildlife. Why not make such belts, moving people somewhere else..
That will enable dying species to resurge.
Like in the Chernobyl plant area, where a lot of species have used the absence of man to resurge.
 
CowperKettle
CowperKettle
6:30 AM
Wired reports that “an NFT sale on Ethereum can result in the consumption of as much as 8.7 megawatt-hours of electricity, more than twice what an average British household consumes in one year”.
 
 
5 hours later…
RegDwigнt
RegDwigнt
11:52 AM
@Cerberus thank you. I've now cast my votes with that in mind.
@Robusto some poetry for you to mark the date.
> Far down memory lane I go dusk after dawn,
every night I keep restlessly coping
with implacable dreams of red birds in white snow,
in pristinely white fields scarlet robins.

An irradiant noon glares upon Raven Heights,
where the winter is deaf from the gunfire,
where on soil fiercely riven, on snow bluish white
rounds of robins alight and respire.

Heavy blasts from the frontline resound over hills,
notifiers pay visits to mothers.
All around Raven Heights fallen soldiers lie still,
and a red flock them silently covers.
— Mikhail Dudin (1916–1993), translation mine.
Put to music in 1984 by Y. Antonov. I have the sheet music on my channel:
https://musescore.com/user/27897310/scores/6759156
 
CowperKettle
CowperKettle
Two years for a graffiti. Fascism is alive and well, and Russia is funding it.
Two years in penal colony. And Putin has transferred billions of USD to Lukashenko, out of our pockets.
The complete victory over fascism will happen when Putin and his henchmen are led into the Hall of Justice in the Hague, to be sued for their numerous crimes.
 
CowperKettle
CowperKettle
12:45 PM
Word of the day: levirate marriage
Etymology: From Latin lēvir (“husband's brother, brother-in-law”) (from Proto-Indo-European *dayh₂wḗr (“one's brother-in-law”)) + -ate
Compare Russian dever' (brother-in-law), it has even retained the initial d of the PIE word.
 
 
2 hours later…
Cerberus
Cerberus
2:25 PM
@CowperKettle What do green belts have to do with suburbs?
Many countries do have non-radical green belts, where few people live and they are trying to make natural habitats (no land west of Poland is originally wild land any more).
 
CowperKettle
CowperKettle
@Cerberus Nothing, it was just an idea that occurred to me
I'm all for living in skyscrapers, provided that this would free up land for parks.
Instead they build more and more residential high-rises, not clearing up the areas for parks but just pressing more and more people in the same territory.
At least here.
Maybe it's better to have a huge high-rise surrounded by a huge common park instead of many cookie-cutter suburban houses with tiny green patches.
 
Cerberus
Cerberus
@RegDwigнt Good!
@CowperKettle I think it is better to have the kind of houses that people actually want to live in and that are economically/environmentally solid.
I do not think tall, ugly buildings are the answer to that.
Even in Holland, only about 7% of the land is occupied by buildings and streets and such.
So there is absolutely no need for tall buildings if you want to have lots of wild land.
About 2/3 of the country is agriculture, 25% 'wild'.
 
CowperKettle
CowperKettle
 
CowperKettle
CowperKettle
2:54 PM
Word of the day: coaptation
I remember coming across PubMed articles about health hazards of it.
 
Cerberus
Cerberus
In what kinds of food is it used?
 
CowperKettle
CowperKettle
3:10 PM
Studies suggest that consumers are more likely to buy and eat foods that are brighter or more vibrant in colour, as they look fresher. TiO2 also adds texture to foods and is often used as an anti-caking agent.

E171 is often used to give a natural whiteness and opacity to foods, such as ice cream and the icing on cakes, helping to create great-looking food.
 
Cerberus
Cerberus
3:23 PM
Hmm interesting.
 
CowperKettle
CowperKettle
3:53 PM
Mistakes Were Made (but Not by Me)
Mistakes Were Made (but Not by Me) is a non-fiction book by social psychologists Carol Tavris and Elliot Aronson, first published in 2007. It deals with cognitive dissonance, confirmation bias and other cognitive biases, using these psychological theories to illustrate how the perpetrators (and victims) of hurtful acts justify and rationalize their behavior. It describes a positive feedback loop of action and self-deception by which slight differences between people's attitudes become polarized. == Topics and people mentioned == The doomsday cult described in When Prophecy Fails The MMR vaccine...
Interesting book. I hope the claims have been double-checked by somebody.
I heard about this research years ago, but still listening to the book is very interesting.
 
CowperKettle
CowperKettle
4:21 PM
Hitler used to wax poetic at how he loves the Brits and the British Empire. In his mind, he fought the Jews that "took Britain hostage", not Britain itself. Same with Putin and Ukraine. He "fights the USA" there.
But the quoted article still demonizes Putin a bit.
The extent is not as grim.
 
M.A.R.
M.A.R.
4:37 PM
@CowperKettle it's a pro-government site?
 
 
4 hours later…
CowperKettle
CowperKettle
8:42 PM
@M.A.R. It's some think tank.
And the author is "Robert Pszczel is currently a Senior Fellow at the Casimir Pulaski Foundation in Poland. A former Polish diplomat and NATO official, he headed the NATO Information Office in Moscow until 2015."
 
M.A.R.
M.A.R.
Polish
Pszczel can only be Polish
How on Earth do they pronounce that
 
CowperKettle
CowperKettle
Maybe "Pshel"? ))
/pʂt͡ʂɛl/
 
 
1 hour later…
Cerberus
Cerberus
9:51 PM
@CowperKettle Social psychology...not the field with the best reputation.
 

« first day (3831 days earlier)      last day (1084 days later) »