@Cerberus: Because we've had this discussion ...

It's about six minutes, and it specifically mentions your country.

@MattE.Эллен: So what is it with Wales? I've been through there a couple of times, both of them driving, gone from Chester to Anglesey on the first day of a bank holiday (bad idea), through the interior, Cardiff, Swansea, Pembrokeshire National Park, etc., and I thought it was all pretty rural but very lovely. So now I'm watching this show Hidden, and they depict Wales as some kind of British version of redneck Appalachia. So ... what's up with that?

I mean, I get the similarities, they are both rural, and there's a lot of mining and all that. Still ...

Ashworth brought down the gold-badge hammer on this question and I voted to reopen and, mirabile dictu, my gold badge resurrected it completely. I didn't know that was a thing.

@Robusto It is, but you can only do it once per question.

It's just like any other open/close vote in that regard. If you haven't cast an open vote yet, you may, just as if you haven't cast a close vote yet, you may. It just happens to be binding for gold badge holders when they do that to questions with their badge tag.

So for example, he can't reclose it again, nor could you reopen it again were it to become somehow closed. But you could instantly close it, since you haven't done that yet with that question.

The other magical superpower that gold badge holders possess is to freely edit the duplicates list.

But not enough of them take advantage of this.

Notice how you have a very special edit button on those.

It has to be a vote for-opening one that was closed for a duplicate, or closing one as a duplicate.

You don't get a binding vote to reopen if it was closed for a non-dup reason.

@Robusto politicians have signalled that they are not interested in a financial crisis on top of the pandemic

@JohanLarsson well I guess the point is whose financial crisis?

fair enough

but then again there are no winners in companies breaking

and chances are that as usual the poor get hurt the most

@JohanLarsson Hmph. I don't think we disagree on anything much. The new law apparently helps the rich cut in line in order to get loans. Now how many of those loans are for paying wages and how many are for a new yacht, shrug

@Robusto I don't know the show. I guess they're not going to show too much of the nice side of somewhere in a crime drama :D

@CowperKettle I lived in Boston for 27 years but I don't understand this at all.

@Robusto I've never been in Boston

So I do neither

@CowperKettle Wrong negative construction. Try "So I don't either."

@Robusto Thank you!

@Robusto Neither do I.

Or rather 'Neither do I'

Or better 'Me neither'

or 'Same here'

or 'Me too'

or 'Same'

or 'Huh'

Yeah, but "So I do neither" is clearly not among those.

or 'Oh'

Or a thumbs-up emoji.

or that meme with two spidermen pointing at each other

@Robusto thumbs up

I can't be bothered to go find some idiotic emoji editor or list.

My phone makes it easy, but not my laptop.

Hey...what if IPA were emoji...then it'd be easier on my phone.

but still a pain on my laptop.

Probably at work spaces.

@Robusto Oh sure.

@Mitch I always use my desktop if I can. And if I do use a laptop I prefer to use it through a KVM switch.

Howdy folks. I agree: full size keyboards, mice, and large monitors are required! down with notebooks!

I have a thunderbolt docking station for my notebook. And a fancy monitor that can act as a kvm switch (well, "usb+video + hdmi audio" switch)

@Mr.ShinyandNew安宇 Greetings!

I, too, agree.

I knew you'd agree, we are always in agreement.

Uhh no we're not!

You're right, of course.

That is true, I'm right that we always disagree.

I'm not sure how to respond to that. I appear to have been trapped.

So @Cerberus how have you been?

@Mr.ShinyandNew安宇 I felt the same way.

Nothing new here, how about you?

Working from home?

yeah

2020 has been a total shitshow

@Mr.ShinyandNew安宇 More importantly, we're all right!

I think we can all agree on that.

@Mr.ShinyandNew安宇 The past four years have been a shitshow.

@Mr.ShinyandNew安宇 Oh, dear, what happened?

@Robusto I can't disagree with that. But 2020 is worse.

The epidemic, or something else?

@Cerberus well, the year started with nearly all of Australia getting burned in a fire

@Mr.ShinyandNew安宇 It is the climax of the Trump Show, so it is definitely a shitshow extraordinaire.

But yeah, mainly the pandemic has ruined a lot of things.

For you personally?

yes.

I'm sorry to hear it.

For one thing, my father-in-law passed away.

Reasons for hope re: Covid-19.

@Mr.ShinyandNew安宇 Aww, sorry.

Were you close to him?

not really? He didn't speak English.

What language did he speak?

He was ~93 and in decline, but it was covid that did what cancer couldn't.

That sucks.

@Robusto Shanghainese, Mandarin, some local dialect or other... some Cantonese.

My mother-in-law will be 101 next month, and she's still going strong.

It must have been a difficult time for your wife.

@Mr.ShinyandNew安宇 Yeah, it's tempting to imagine that Chinese is a single language, but it's way more complicated than that.

I don't know if he would have survived the year anyway? We had just put him into a long term care home. But here in Ontario the pandemic has been mild in the general population but a nightmare in long-term-care homes.

Did he live in China?

@Robusto It's like having a language called "European"

@Mr.ShinyandNew安宇 Same here.

No, he was here in Toronto.

@Mr.ShinyandNew安宇 Heh, exactly.

Did your children see him often?

@Cerberus ~weekly.

Then it must be hard for them as well.

But they don't speak Chinese either, so...

He'd really been declining for years now. He spent most of his time napping. So in some ways it's like he died years ago? But he was actually improving in the LTC home.

They had him doing physio and more exercise etc. So it seemed like he was getting better, or at least not declining as quickly.

So anyway that was hard, but that was one thing that would have happened at some point.

Oh wow, @Mr.ShinyandNew安宇, hallow

@Gigili Hey, long time no see.

Then something else happened? Is it too hard to talk about?

But aside from that, the closure of schools has been annoying - basically wrote off 1/3 of the school year for my kids. And for one of them that's a problem.

Yeah, it's hard for some children.

And besides the schools, everything is closed/cancelled.

so it's the full spectrum of annoying, inconvenient, frustrating, small problems, big problems, deaths.

Some children we have been able to teach well enough online, but others just wouldn't show up.

Especially the ones who need it most.

(We're a special little department of the school.)

I don't want to get into my kid's problems but it's a long list.

I can imagine. I hope, with some extra time, this can be repaired eventually.

In my experience, children with a stable home will eventually recover, but of course each case is different.

yeah, we're still employed, still working, etc, so in that regard we're doing fine. lucky, even.

So am I.

I know only person who became seriously ill, though not ill enough for intensive care.

@Robusto uh...I hesitate to ask...what's a KVM switch?

It has been three months, and she is only now slowly going back to work.

@Mitch Keyboard/Video/Mouse interface for use between multiple computers. Basically it lets you control a laptop and a desktop without switching mouse, monitor, or keyboard.

@Robusto Oh.

but...

@Robusto Thanks for the bike video.

hm

I know several people who got ill, and personally know only one person who died, but also, I've been out of touch from a bunch of people so who knows if there are others I just haven't heard from yet.

@Cerberus I thought it was very considered and reasonable.

@Mr.ShinyandNew安宇 hey! glad to have you back. not so great your family thing.

About helmets: the one disadvantage I have heard of is that you stand a greater chance of torque damage to the brain with a helmet on.

But I'm willing to believe the advantages are greater (with respect to safety).

The only thing missing from the video was numbers.

@Cerberus Perhaps, but other kinds of damage are way more preventable through a helmet. I dunno.

I don't use a helmet when I go to the mailbox, but for everything else I do.

@Mr.ShinyandNew安宇 Several people who got ill: seriously, or like the flu? I know a few people who most probably got flu-like Corona symptoms.

@Robusto Yes, I am willing to believe that.

@Cerberus sick enough to miss work. not hospitalized.

I personally don't know anybody who has had the virus.

@Robusto That sounds like a shampoo commercial

@Mr.ShinyandNew安宇 OK that sounds flu-like.

Some of them probably also lost their sense of smell?

@Mitch Possibly. I am a child of the 20th century, after all.

One of them was sick for weeks, but because he works from home and doesn't know how to stop working, he was back at work in a few days.

Hmm.

@Cerberus not that I know of.

Two weeks is not unheard of if one has a serious flu. But four would be a more serious category, to my amateurish self.

@Mr.ShinyandNew安宇 Funny, I have heard about this from several people.

@Cerberus yeah, it's one of the known symptoms. I find that very scary. loss of sense of smell is usually a sign of a serious problem.

I don't know: I have always been told this happens with the common cold as well.

But perhaps it is a more complete loss with the new virus?

@Mr.ShinyandNew安宇 Yeah, same here, glad to have you back, sorry for your loss.

@Robusto What I also liked from the video was this: it is probably also wise to wear a helmet as a pedestrian, and in a car.

I didn't come here to drag all that stuff out. Actually my boss asked me for a sample of stackexchange chat because we were discussing UI.

They prevent some head injuries in those cases as well.

@Cerberus Interesting. I don't remember that part. Perhaps I had a lapse of attention.

@Mr.ShinyandNew安宇 I've never heard of a better excuse to be chatting on ELU during work time.

@Cerberus exactly. technically I'm supposed to be paying attention in a meeting but my presence here is purely ornamental.

@Robusto Of course I was avidly looking for arguments not to wear a helmet, because I'm not going to...

@Mr.ShinyandNew安宇 I'm sure you make a fine ornament.

@Cerberus Of course.

@Robusto So it would be interesting to hear an expert's speculation about the number of serious injuries preventable by wearing a helmet, comparing cyclists, pedestrians, and car drivers.

I believe one wears a full helmet when driving a racing car.

So I'm sure the video is right that it can prevent some injuries for ordinary cars.

@Mr.ShinyandNew安宇 Please note that I am an inseparable part of the UI, The one who makes it beautiful, eye-catching and whatnot.

Undeniably so.

@Cerberus so far I've said "hello" but someone talked over me.

@Gigili I was careful to note that in my description.

@Mr.ShinyandNew安宇 Story of my life.

Normally I have a lot more to say but this meeting involves three departments/vendors coordinating some data transfer and it doesn't really touch the front-end system I manage. so shrug

@Mr.ShinyandNew安宇 Encourage everyone to “take a step back”

You know, to get a 30,000 foot view of the issue

Also, go to the corner and lean against the wall. Take a deep, contemplative sigh.

When someone asks 'what?', just say that this has given us all a lot to think about.

@Mitch it's a zoom meeting and someone is sharing their screen so nobody knows I'm even there

Oh.

Goddammit

OK. Got one...

Ask the presenter to go back a slide.

They think they successfully got through a slide and everyone accepts it, but now there's doubt.

Haha.

That's monstrous.

Torturing both the presenter and the audience.

Destroy your enemies before they even realize they're enemies.

Make enemies of colleagues.

Ooh, nice.

Would be a shorter description of your strategy.

@Mr.ShinyandNew安宇 Is this the kind of chat banter that you're looking for?

@Mr.ShinyandNew安宇 My presence in meetings was always ornamental, and always as a grudging ornament.

I screenshot the chat that was here before, so go nuts now. Nobody's looking.

Nice!

Profanity! Trump is Great! Let's all Kick Puppies!

I hate meetings. The only thing worse than an in-person meeting is a teleconference like GoToMeeting. With fifteen people from India you've never met in person: "Hi this is Pradeesh", "Hi this is Srikanth", "Hi this is Manish" ... and they expect you'll know who it is when it's their turn and they talk their little talk.

I have a little talk.

I could talk at length about it.

Or not.

I choose not.

Haha, most of their names ends with 'ish'

@Mitch I want to see a SNL skit where Trump visits a first-grade class and some kid calls him fat and he rounds on the kid with "You're the one who's fat! And hey, guess what? I'm president, what are you? Just a sad little fat kid with no front teeth!"

That perfectly sums him up.

Oh, we've got a tornado and flooding alert for Toronto. Yay

We could use a flood here, hold the tornado, please.

We finally got rain but floods just mean the water is not where it needs to be

Nothing is where it needs to be

I am not where I need to be

None of us are where we're meant to be. We can only hope to get there eventually. But by then we may be used to where we are.

@Gigili maybe it's the place that's in the wrong place and it's not you.

I finally sorted all my Lego so it's where it needs to be. But all the shows this year are cancelled so that's a bummer.

Oh, I forgot the good news, we have a new pet. a Guinea pig.

@Robusto Avnish, Arvin, Manoj, oh definitely Manoj

Some are also names in Farsi, such as Arvin

Although if you asked me now the Persian Arvin is an asshole stereotype, like . . . Derek?

Too cultural for me to know

@Mitch the durian cat video has insufferable music

@M.A.R. The only Arvin I've heard of is ARVN.

Maybe you should post one of guinea pigs smelling durian

@M.A.R. I'm glad someone else said it. And WTF is durian anyway?

We don't have durian in this house.

I could post her eating celery. or cucumber. She eats so much celery she smells like celery.

@Robusto How would I know. The weirdest fruit I've seen is grapefruit. It seems to be mostly the butt of YouTube jokes

People like being fed fact nuggets. "The smelliest fruit" yadda yadda. It replaces a real current of information

@Mr.ShinyandNew安宇 Whenever I cut up celery my hands smell like celery for hours, even after I wash them.

Grapefruit is interesting though. I think you've heard of grapefruit interactions with some medications

@Robusto I never noticed that here with celery. Onion, yes. Jalepenos, yes.

This guinea pig is funny. She only likes the expensive celery.

@Mr.ShinyandNew安宇 Paint and ink

@Mr.ShinyandNew安宇 What's the difference? Fresher?

@M.A.R. sweeter, I think.

I don't know why but it's consistently good whereas the cheap stuff is not.

She also shows preference for certain cucumbers over others.

And she always eats the peel first.

Well, we have an idiom "the guy knows the way to his mouth"

We often use it when babies act picky for food

Or "the guy knows the how of his mouth". Weirder, but probably more accurate translation

well, that's certainly true of this piggy.

it's a bit weird though, having to buy the fancy celery for a small rodent.

I should call it a day. G'night!

good night

@Mr.ShinyandNew安宇 I can just hear him saying to himself, "Not the cheap celery, dude. My body is a temple."

@M.A.R. cya

yeah, and soon it will be a temple campus, the way she's growing. She's 25% heavier now than when we got her in March.

I don't know what her weight should be so I have no idea if we're overfeeding her or what.

@M.A.R. It's totally sufferable with the sound off.

She was a rescue - someone abandonned her at the pet store. So we don't know what age she is or anything about her past life.

@Robusto It's also known as jack fruit. Which if you don't know it, is no more helpful than knowing that jack fruit is known as durian.

> The first time I went to Thailand the hotel I stayed in had a sign by the elevator that said "No Mangosteens or Durians allowed in the rooms." I was upset to think that the hotel would not allow the ethnic minority Mangosteens and Durians the right to rent rooms in their hotel until I found out that they were fruits and not people

@Mitch Hey, suddenly I like this chat a lot better!

Say what.

Yo @Cerberus give me a TL;DR some time. I don't read stuff on the Internet. Kthxbai.

@RegDwigнt Yeah I'm not up to date either.

I suspect there won't be any new, nasty stuff in it.

But I'm not going to read it, on principle.

Well we still have time till September to totally forget about reading it.

Jinx, I guess.

Indeed.

I'll just click it if that's what it takes to get to the next screen, as always.

@Robusto yeah well. I did tell you to move to New Zealand. Or Norway or Switzerland.

Or Estonia, even.

@Cerberus uh. Nah. If there's a next screen, it's not worth the hassle. I'm already overburdened by the one screen.

There should always be just one screen at most.

Anyway, I must be off, so goodnight for now.

@RegDwigнt But you have so many tabs.

Sleep well.

@Mr.ShinyandNew安宇 That's nice.