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01:27
> #Worldle #223 1/6 (100%)
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https://worldle.teuteuf.fr
02:03
@Mitch well, a lot of teenagers can be incels these days. So I was thinking, maybe 18 or 20 or something like that
Nice
And Palin was Trump's hand-picked candidate.
Maybe there's hope for this country after all.
@Cerberus oh, these things happen from time to time, for two possible reasons: 1) Not all people in power are unreasonable, and they can sometimes exercise that power to make uncharacteristically reasonable decisions. This isn't China. Or 2) Incompetence or negligence, which is more common than you think
@M.A.R. I'm not sure why you think it is either of those?
Why wouldn't it be normal for an Iranian official to agree to an interview by a journalist?
02:07
I mean, if in China they're like Big Brother to the outer party members, here they're like Big Brother to the proles. Well, that's a pretty flawed analogy, but you get what I mean
Nothing wholly surprising is said.
Yes, I know Iran is quite different from China.
The Chinese government is a control freak.
@Cerberus because a crazy number are xenophobes, especially censors and people with similar jobs
@Cerberus on paper, we're supposed to be bigger control freaks I think. But that has never been the case, except maybe for the initial months of the revolution
@M.A.R. Right, and they have no reason to agree.
But I don't find it hugely surprising that some officials should.
@M.A.R. Or perhaps the months after Khomeini seized power and the other revolutionary groups were sidelined/repressed?
I remember he had terrible tribunals that executed many.
Oh yeah, I meant that
"Initial months of victory"
Right.
Bleak days.
02:12
People were definitely frenzied, the sort of mob who would invade a foreign embassy with proverbial pitchforks
The problem is the world thinks Iran is stuck in that frenzy mode, because both the Iranian government and their enemies like that picture
@FaheemMitha I'm almost scared to say it. W-w-worrrrk
@M.A.R. I don't know what world that is.
But many people are capable of a nuanced view and know quite a bit more about the country.
Maybe I spoke too soon.
This numbskull wants people to pull their children out of a kindergarten class because the teacher has prismatic hearts on the wall.
Because, you know, anything that shows a color spectrum must be gay.
Look at this woman! Does she deserve this kind of treatment for trying to bring love and knowledge to little children?
@Robusto Looks like satire...
02:28
@Cerberus I suppose that's a possibility. But if you have to ask yourself if it's satire, maybe the world has gotten just a bit too terrible.
Some people have got a bit too close to satire...
When satire and reality are indistinguishable they collapse into a black hole.
And ... the verdict is in. This is NOT satire.
Look who this guy is.
Alas.
He is the Maine Chapter Head of "No Left Turn in Maine" ...
I really wish it was satire.
rofl
02:44
> I lost three fingers on my right hand, so
l asked my doctor if I would still be able
to write with it.

He said: "Maybe, but I wouldn't count
On it."
@Robusto Maybe he did not know that this person was a child molester? You can't always check who you're talking to over Skype
03:07
Robot in the Research Institute of Extra-hard materials, Kiev, 1970s
Word of the day: whimbrel
03:30
Google Lens does a great job at translating Russian posts into English
@Robusto I looked up, he committed molestation by fondling a child in 1995 offenderradar.com/offender-details/…
Maybe he has repented in the 27 years that have passed.
Yekaterinburg's former mayor Roizman also spent 2 years in jail for theft and fraud.
Word of the day: fume extractor
 
1 hour later…
04:53
What do you call a person who is recording the race times in a run? A race timer?
The guy with the stopwatch?
Found it. A timekeeper
 
1 hour later…
06:05
@M.A.R. If you meant work, you could just have said that in the first place. Seriously.
07:01
@M.A.R. That's actually kind of clever.
@Mitch On that topic there was an interesting article in the Guardian (I think) recently, about how Denmark had a discriminatory law against non-white immigrants. Something about classifying buildings as ghettos if they had enough non-white people. Which makes it possible to then demolish them. Obviously, I'm simplifying, but that was the general tenor of the article.
This isn't the article, but it's along those lines.
 
3 hours later…
09:49
Wordle 439 4/6

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10:18
Wordle 439 4/6

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I wonder why my fourth guess (a wild one) was accepted. It doesn't seem to be a well-established English word...
 
2 hours later…
11:54
Frank Russell Capra (born Francesco Rosario Capra; May 18, 1897 – September 3, 1991) was an Italian-born American film director, producer and writer who became the creative force behind some of the major award-winning films of the 1930s and 1940s. Born in Italy and raised in Los Angeles from the age of five, his rags-to-riches story has led film historians such as Ian Freer to consider him the "American Dream personified".Capra became one of America's most influential directors during the 1930s, winning three Academy Awards for Best Director from six nominations, along with three other Oscar wins...
> In his later years, Capra became a self-described pacifist and was very critical of the Vietnam War.
> He married Lucille Warner in 1932, with whom he had a daughter and three sons, one of whom, Johnny, died at age 3 following a tonsillectomy.
I remember my parents telling of tonsillectomy being quite popular in their lifetime
A cure-all.
Never thought it was so dangerous.
12:17
> Death during tonsillectomy tends to be rare. A 2019 study put the US mortality rate at 1 death per 18,000 surgeries.
> Rates of mortality related to pediatric tonsillectomy, reported at 1 in 55 000,1 have been estimated from various sources including physician survey, malpractice claims, and database reviews. jamanetwork.com/journals/jamaotolaryngology/article-abstract/…
12:38
Anthony van Diemen (also Antonie, Antonio, Anton, Antonius) (1593 – 19 April 1645) was a Dutch colonial governor. == Early life == He was born in Culemborg in the Netherlands, the son of Meeus Anthonisz van Diemen and Christina Hoevenaar. In 1616, he moved to Amsterdam, in hope of improving his fortune as a merchant; in this he failed and was declared bankrupt. After a year he became a servant of the Dutch East India Company and sailed to Batavia, Dutch East Indies (Jakarta), capital of the Dutch East Indies. On the voyage out, the East Indiaman Mauritius inadvertently put in on unknown coast of...
> If you were coming in the fall,
I'd brush the summer by
With half a smile and half a spurn,
As housewives do a fly.

If only centuries delayed,
I'd count them on my hand,
Subtracting till my fingers dropped
Into Van Diemen's land.
> Cold wind of autumn, blowing loud
At dawn, a fortnight overdue,
Jostling the doors, and tearing through
My bedroom to rejoin the cloud,
I know—for I can hear the hiss
And scrape of leaves along the floor—
How may boughs, lashed bare by this,
Will rake the cluttered sky once more.
Edna St. Vincent Millay's poem about autumn turned into a Persian song.
12:55
@CowperKettle But who would molest a child in the first place? I wouldn't trust such a person, especially with matters pertaining to early education.
#Worldle #223 1/6 (100%)
🟩🟩🟩🟩🟩🎉
https://worldle.teuteuf.fr
🌎 Sept 1, 2022 🌍
🔥 1 | Avg. Guesses: 6.72
⬜🟥🟥🟥🟩 = 5

#globle
@M.A.R. Looks like Universe Pro is the best bargain, despite its cost.
Wordle 439 5/6

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Yes, a person who has done that should abstain from speaking out on the topic of early education.
13:31
🌎 Sept 1, 2022 🌍
🔥 4 | Avg. Guesses: 8.2
🟥🟥🟩 = 3

#globle
#Worldle #223 1/6 (100%)
🟩🟩🟩🟩🟩🎉
https://worldle.teuteuf.fr
13:47
New project idea: Edit Finnegans Wake by going through it and inserting "[sic]" at every odd spelling, punctuation, or wording.
#Worldle #223 X/6 (98%)
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https://worldle.teuteuf.fr
I usually buy memory modules named after this country's capital
> If you challenge [cable news viewers'] assumptions or suggest that their avatars in the culture war are wrong or losing, they may leave for competitors who offer more complete protection from harsh realities.
@CowperKettle My wife and I honeymooned there and have a framed picture of that map hanging on a wall in our house. ^_^
14:05
@Robusto Oh, this is great
We acquire maps of every country we've visited and frame them. Most are in my office.
Frame the joint, the golden rule
Case the joint
Verb: case the joint (third-person singular simple present cases the joint, present participle casing the joint, simple past and past participle cased the joint)
  1. (idiomatic, slang, criminology) To thoroughly observe or examine a place, in order to familiarize oneself with its workings in preparation for criminal activity, often robbery.
  2. (idiomatic, slang) To thoroughly observe or examine a place, without any nefarious motive or intent.
I only was to Majorka, besides Russia
@CowperKettle Is that the same as Mallorca?
@Robusto Ah, yes
I forgot its spelling
I remember there's also the Minorca
Major & Minor
Yup.
They are among the Balearic Islands of Spain.
14:11
I even remember the place's name, Magaluf
It was not a good trip for me, I had keratoconus developing, but it was not diagnosed yet. I remember feeling bad from deteriorating vision and not knowing what was wrong with me.
And being depressed.
Keratoconus is hell when it's progressing.
What are the symptoms?
You wish you had no eyes.
@Robusto Straight lines become blurry, your eye constantly tries to bring them into focus, but if it focuses on the vertical lines, then the horizontal ones become blurry.
Ouch.
And you end up, in the evening, they an extremely tired eye.
And if you go somewhere with a lot of glintzy small details, like small lamps, you want to just close the eye.
It's horrible.
And it slowly gets worse.
And in the morning you see better, and in the evening, you see much worse, from all the tightening of the eye muscle.
Because the eye tries to focus, to no avail.
When my left eye deteriorated, I was seeing pulsating irregular shapes instead of lamps.
Pulsating, because the cornea had gotten too thin.
Geezis.
14:18
And they had ridges on them, because the cornea got scarred, when I attempted to fit a specialized keratoconus contact lens, a hard lens.
"You were unlucky, and you now also have scars on the cornea".
Are they better now?
That will buff out (when you get your transplant).
@Robusto It's like heaven compared with what it was.
Good.
But I have strong astigmatim in the left eye, I cannot read this text now with my left eye. Only the right one.
I can read with the left eye if I take off the glasses and move quite close to the screen.
But in that case, I cannot read with my right eye.
They are tuned to different distances, so to speak.
I have an astigmatism, but nowhere near as drastic as that.
14:20
I'm so happy they recently managed to create a corneal graft out of pig cells.
I've read the news, and I can feel the technique might spread quickly
That will save a lot of eyes.
Because there's no shortage of pig cells, unlike human corneas.
I'm glad for you.
I was to the doctor today, and he said I was very lucky. He said that usually, 25 years after a graft, people get their second graft.
Because the first graft deteriorates.
That was news for me. I thought that it was impossible to re-graft the cornea.
I remember reading 12 years back that the second graft gets a stronger rejection.
Maybe they managed to come up with some new anti-rejection protocol.
You never know.
The human eye was thought to have immune privilege, like the fetus has.
But in the recent years, immune cells were discovered in the cornea.
So it's a mystery why the first grafts survive, without being rejected.
I think gene editing shows promise for curing many chronic aberrations.
14:27
nods
Ramón Castroviejo Briones (1904–1987) was a Spanish and American eye surgeon remembered for his achievements in corneal transplantation. == Biography == Born in Logroño, Spain he received his medical education at the University of Madrid. He graduated in 1927 and worked at the Chicago Eye, Ear, Nose and Throat Hospital and the Mayo Clinic before, in 1931, he came to Columbia Presbyterian Medical Center in New York. He became the director of Ophthalmology at St. Vincent's Hospital before he opened his own hospital when he bought the Hammond House. After his retirement he moved to Madrid where he...
I wrote this Wiki article about the guy who invented corneal transplantation.
There were some very, very lucky cases before, but he really turned it into a regular surgery.
Vladimir Petrovich Filatov (Russian: Владимир Филaтoв, 15 [O.S. 27] February 1875 in Mikhaylovka, Penza Governorate, Russian Empire – 30 October 1956 in Odessa, Ukrainian SSR) was a Russian Empire and Soviet ophthalmologist and surgeon best known for his development of tissue therapy. He introduced the tube flap grafting method, corneal transplantation and preservation of grafts from cadaver eyes. He founded the Institute of Eye Diseases & Tissue Therapy in Odessa, Soviet Union (today Ukraine). Filatov is also credited for restoring Vasily Zaytsev's sight when he suffered an injury to his eyes...
And in the USSR, Filatov did the same, and just in the same period, in the 1930s and 1940s.
I think that in the 1940s, corneal transplantation was a Russian roulette. Because: no dexamethasone.
Dexamethasone has really saved my right eye several times.
I don't know how they dealt with rejection back then. Besides prayer, what could you do without corticosteroids.
@Robusto The existence of Palin, who presented purely as a personality, as a national politician sort of paved the way for Trump.
So I blame Seth Meyers -and- McCain's VP team for accelerating the decline of Western Civilization.
Also Putin
Cripes just add in the Republican delegates in 2016, those guys were idiots.
@Mitch You're just going to let Boris Johnson off scot-free?
@Robusto Oh.
I'm being parochial
Yeah throw Boris Johnson in
in the flames that is
14:39
Roger Ailes is already there.
I mean I don't know enough about Xi, he seems like a nice enough guy.
Moti and Erdogan?
Orban and Bolsonaro?
Look here I was just talking about the US and now you got me talking about things I know even less about.
I will only talk about things I know very little about from now on, and leave out the things I know extremely little about.
@Mitch They'd none of 'em be missed.
Also ebikes are awesome
Ugh.
have you ridden one?
They like give you superpowers
you can go up hills by just pedaling normally, not even trying
14:43
Nope. I can already beat ebikes in most speed tests on my acoustic motorcycle.
I mean maybe you could complain about having to pedal at all.
What's the point of cycling without exercise?
@Robusto weren't you guys talking about how dangerous ebikes are because old people are too confident on these speedy disaster attractors?
> At full power, some e-bikes can go as fast as 49cc mopeds (20–30 miles an hour), tempting riders into joining actual traffic. But then, at that speed, an e-bike on a trail or a sidewalk poses a greater risk to its rider, to fellow cyclists, and to pedestrians.
@Robusto The scenery?
@Robusto Yeah they should max out the speed on those things.
14:45
@Mitch I said nothing about old people. I mentioned novice cyclists going faster than they had earned a right to.
@Robusto Old people, novices, people who have only slightly less physical dexterity than I do, they should all need training
You are a contrarian by nature and inclination.
@Robusto What's the electronic motorcycle market looking like these days?
I have no idea.
They should add big bass speakers to though with recordings going 'vroom vroom'
@Robusto I have never been like that and don't want to be.
14:48
Oh, I thought you came here for abuse.
cripes wrong room I was looking for an argument
Some people don't get Monty Python. Do they just like fart jokes or people falling over or something?
Who knows? At their best, Python were unassailably brilliant.
Their best being The Life of Brian, I think.
Yes. Also Meaning of Life underrated (or I just don't see much reference to it).
@Mitch I was disappointed by that one. Also with Holy Grail, believe it or not. Those didn't seem like their finest efforts.
Compared with the elegance and wit of Brian, they seemed sophomoric. Frat-boy humor.
OK, maybe not that bad. Not frat-boy bad.
15:23
@Robusto When I had enough money, I thought of buying an e-bike.
They can be handy. For instance, in the winter you can really plow the snow, while others get bogged down
Once we rode across the Shartash lake in the winter, and we were exhausted half-way, while an old man on an e-bike made whoops around us.
The thick snow was really tough to ride through
@FaheemMitha Copenhagen has better city biking experience than Amsterdam -or- Utrecht
So they're not -always- awful
@CowperKettle yeah, because they have electric push, they can have knobbier tires (which would be very annoying for a bike being used like @Robusto).
I have a set of tires with studs, but they are heavy.
When I take them off in Spring, I can feel the bike has gotten easy to ride
I can't recall any good poem about the bicycle
@Robusto There's even gene therapy with the carrier injected into the brain
Eladocagene exuparvovec is an experimental gene therapy product for the treatment of aromatic L‑amino acid decarboxylase (AADC) deficiency. It infuses the gene encoding for the human AADC enzyme into the putamen region of the brain. The subsequent expression of AADC results in dopamine production and, as a result, development of motor function in patients with AADC deficiency.The most common side effects include initial insomnia, irritability and dyskinesia.As of May 2022, eladocagene exuparvovec is recommended for approval by the European Commission. == Society and culture == Eladocagene...
It was approved on 2 August 2022, this date might be seen as a major step in the future, when other neurological and psychiatric diseases will be treated similarly.
Why not treat rare monogenic cases of autism by injecting gene vectors, or rare monogenic cases of schizohprenia
In the publication about Eladocagene exuparvovec, there are actual videos of children being unable to function properly, and then, with gene therapy, regaining function.
16:36
@Mitch I don't think that Denmark is awful at all. It's probably quite nice. My point (and the articles point) is just that the Danes are racist Which perhaps isn't surprising, but it's not part of their global image, afaik.
I suspect that Western Europe, at least, is broadly quite racist.
But my personal experience of Western Europe would fit on a postage stamp. It's all hearsay.
@CowperKettle Yeah, this just felt heavy-handed to me.
@CowperKettle I read about one some years ago that involved a retrovirus. It apparently had been tested on chimps successfully.
Apr 4, 2011 at 15:13, by Robusto
Supposedly we will have a cure for color-blindness fairly soon, using gene-splicing and retrovirus therapy.
I guess it didn't pan out, since I read about it more than 10 years ago.
16:56
Maybe it's not too pressing
Not too urgent
I would think there would be a huge demand for it. In this country alone there are probably 7.5 million sufferers of deuteranopia.
5% of male population (300/2 million) = 7.5 million.
@Mitch One of my bikes has such tires. It's called a "mountain" bike.
Deuter is the coolest brand of backpacks
At least for locals
Really? I thought it was Osprey. ^_^
Probably in Russia people are poorer and only know Deuter ))
That's what I use when I'm riding my mountain bike.
17:04
When I was choosing a backpack, I remember noticing that a Deuter model was really thoroughly designed. But it was expensive.
I use the Osprey Raptor 14. It is wonderful. Everything is well thought-out and convenient, in addition to being ample.
It has a 3-liter reservoir for hydration. Excellent.
@CowperKettle I looked at the Deuter packs and they seem excellent. I don't see any cycling offerings, though.
@CowperKettle That's the one. Mine's black.
17:15
I usually pick red, to be as visible as possible. And attach a couple of small blinking lights on it.
Deuter cycling packs don't tell you what their water reservoir capacity is, apparently. Unless I missed it.
As many blinking lights as possible on the back of the bicycle, to stay alive.
Yeah, not strictly necessary on mountain trails.
Is there a danger of snakes in your area?
Several days ago, a man was bitten by a snake in Yekaterinburg, and died.
A very rare case.
Local snakes don't usually cause death.
Ticks are more dangerous here, usually, and bears/wolves, if you venture into the woods.
@CowperKettle Yep. The diamondback rattlesnake frequents this area.
There is an area called Snake Hill, in fact.
17:28
Can you take an antidote along? In a syringe?
It has a pretty steep climb, 8% in spots. One day I was climbing it and I saw what looked like a dirty piece of rope that had fallen off a truck. When I got up close to it, it moved.
A bear that's also a tick, now that'd be horrible
@CowperKettle I don't know. I've never heard of that.
It will tickle you to death, this bear
But typically bikes are going fast enough where you're not going to be in too much danger. Also your profile would be confusing to a snake. It might strike at a tire, or part of the frame.
Most of what we see here are bull snakes, which have adapted to look like rattlers, except for the tail. From a distance you might not be sure, but up close if you don't see a rattle you don't need to worry. Bull snakes are pretty harmless.
17:38
> The history of medicine is full of interesting stories about the discovery of illnesses. The saga of Angelman's syndrome is one such story. It was purely by chance that nearly thirty years ago (circa 1964). .. when on holiday in Italy I happened to see an oil painting in the Castelvecchio Museum in Verona called ... a Boy with a Puppet.
> The boy's laughing face and the fact that my patients exhibited jerky movements gave me the idea of writing an article about the three children with a title of Puppet Children.
Sixty years after discovery, a therapy
@CowperKettle If I had to make a choice between a bite from a tick and a bite from a bear...
holds out hand and cringes in fear
18:23
I think there are many things I would not choose to get bitten by. Including, at this point in my life, a love bug.
I'd prefer to be bitten by a love bug than run over by one
If there is ever such a forced choice in life
Man arrives at pearly gates after long painful illness. St Peter asks " Would you rather have people spread a terrible lie about you or have people spread terrible but true tales about you?"
The man replies "That's easy. Say whatever the hell you want.", and while brushing past St Peter to rush in to heaven, he pushes him off the cloud.
The end.
Short story for the day.
18:53
@Mitch my takeaway from that story is how can a guy be both Peter and Simon at the same time? Maybe he had multiple personalities
Pushes him off the cloud? I thought Peter had the power to allow or ban a person from Heaven
Simon?
Word of the day: a Roland for an Oliver
Noun: a Roland for an Oliver (plural Rolands for Olivers)
  1. (idiomatic) Equal measure; measure for measure; adequate response.
19:21
> It seems a harsh and frankly hopeless errand to try to keep literature away from young people because you fear they will be exposed to ideas and opinions and experiences you may not share.
 
3 hours later…
22:06
@M.A.R. Yeah that always had me wondering too. Is it his last name? But Simon is a first name, and also nobody else seemed to have a last name. Does he think he's special? Could his parents not make up their mind?
 
1 hour later…
23:31
@Mitch Looks like B. Kliban.
23:45

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