The Sphinx's Lair

bobble

4:00 PM

better than most riddles here!

Sciborg

Thanks <3

When hexomino said it was clever my heart pretty much exploded

matt

boom

Voldemort's Wrath

< .. / /* ./. 3

matt

what is that cursed emoticon

Sciborg

I love some of your early puzzles too Bobble, you had some really clever Around the Bends.

Voldemort's Wrath

4:02 PM

@matt exploded heart

Sciborg

fwoosh

Voldemort's Wrath

kersploosh

matt

TNG warp engine sounds

Sciborg

Hey, North is here :)

matt

oh uh hey North :)

bobble

4:07 PM

'borg, have you made progress on the Very Queer Connect Wall idea?

Sciborg

I have the category ideas planned, just have to sit down and make it :)

Tried to make it funny and avoid making it depressing, one of my original category ideas had to do with Stonewall and that might be too heavy for a Puzzling site.

bobble

on another note... how much sleep did you get last night?

Sciborg

Basically none, what of it? :p

matt

sleep

Sciborg

no

matt

4:11 PM

yes

Sciborg

I'll sleep when there is no work to do or puzzles to make dangit

bobble

How about when you're dead?

Sciborg

Then too

matt

you're not wrong but you're not right either /s

Sciborg

I'm too old for this goshdarn "going to sleep at a reasonable time" stuff

How has class been going for you guys?

matt

4:18 PM

~~bien~~ good so far

Sciborg

muy bien

bobble

I have learned that Economics is the Science of Scarcity

matt

what

Sciborg

Pretty accurate description of Economics.

Deusovi

@bobble i am very glad that my first puzzles are not on this site anywhere

bobble

4:22 PM

I left mine up :) It's not even my lowest-scoring puzzle!

matt

hey deus!

Deusovi

(hello!)

Sciborg

The Mod has arrived :D

matt

has your mod hammer been doing stuff?

Deusovi

not recently!

matt

4:23 PM

ah good(?)

Sciborg

I'd say that's a good thing

GentlePurpleRain

Hello, everyone!

Deusovi

oh hey! nice to see you around

GentlePurpleRain

Yeah, I lurk every once in a while, but don't often chat.

Sciborg

Two Mods have been summoned!

matt

4:25 PM

hey gentlepurplerain! (what can we call you? gpr?)

GentlePurpleRain

Mod fight!

bobble

MOD FIGHT!

Sciborg

The only logical solution here is blood sport

matt

whips out phaser

bobble

hit each other with your hammers!

Deusovi

4:25 PM

mod fight!

GentlePurpleRain

@matt Sure, GPR, or Gentle or whatever. I'm not picky.

Sciborg

MOD FIGHT

Deusovi

@Sciborg that's my usual solution to most problems. turns out to be surprisingly effective

matt

MOD FIGHT

Sciborg

Blood sport solves most problems

GentlePurpleRain

4:26 PM

slaps Deusovi with a wet noodle

bobble

> Whenever I had a problem I'd throw a molotov cocktail at it and, BOOM! Right away I'd have a whole different problem

Sciborg

announcer voice "GPR strikes the first blow, a GLANCING blow with a wet noodle! Will Deusovi retaliate???"

Gareth McCaughan

teleports in and stuns both GPR and Deusovi with phaser

bobble

3 MODS

Sciborg

"OH MY GOD a THIRD moderator has joined the ring!"

GentlePurpleRain

4:27 PM

Aaaaaaarghh.....!

Sciborg

"Folks this is a HISTORIC DAY in our sport"

Deusovi

oh no, my only weakness! physical injury of any form!

11

matt

@GarethMcCaughan did you take my phaser

this is just awesome (who agrees?)

GentlePurpleRain

Gareth is the obvious winner. He wins the privilege of handling all flags from now on. :P

Sciborg

You fools, the Three-Mod Showdown has no winner :p

bobble

4:29 PM

how about the spectators?

Sciborg

Bobblecrowns, all of them

Although given the COVID situation, it's probably just cutouts

Prince North Læraðr

What is going on

matt

exactly

Sciborg

A mod fight to the death, obviously

bobble

6 mins ago, by Sciborg

MOD FIGHT

Deusovi

4:32 PM

mod fight, apparently

Prince North Læraðr

This is hilarious

Funnier than the election at least. So stressful to watch

Sciborg

Yeah, I'd take Mod Death Fight over turning on the news at the moment

Deusovi

would highly recommend not watching it - it won't change the result and it'll only stress you out

Prince North Læraðr

@Deusovi It's so addicting though

matt

hey lelouch! just having a MOD FIGHT apparently

Sciborg

4:33 PM

I've been deliberately blocking news sites on my browser today

Prince North Læraðr

Lol

GentlePurpleRain

I don't know why your elections take so long to process. Here in Canada, we usually have everything wrapped up by about 10 p.m., and the new government determined.

matt

it all has to do with time zones and counting

Sciborg

@GentlePurpleRain It takes longer because we all need time to purchase drinks and throw things at our televisions.

GentlePurpleRain

We have just as many time zones.

bobble

4:35 PM

Some states were prevented by law from counting mail-in ballots before the polls closed

Prince North Læraðr

@GentlePurpleRain We have a dumb system called the "electoral college" system

matt

@Sciborg hopefully without breaking them

@PrinceNorthLæraðr tbh it's quite redundant

GentlePurpleRain

Yeah, the electoral college thing is pretty dumb.

Prince North Læraðr

@matt It's very polarizing because most states have a few densely packed urban cities and a bunch of smaller counties spread throughout the state

matt

agreed

Lelouch

4:37 PM

@matt lol what's that

GentlePurpleRain

Also, we don't elect our prime minister directly. The leader of whichever party has a majority in the House becomes the prime minister. (Technically, the house votes among themselves, but that's how it always turns out.)

Prince North Læraðr

The dumbest thing about the electoral college system though is that depending on where you live, you have more voting power.

matt

@Lelouch i dont even know

Prince North Læraðr

As a person in California, I have the least amount of voting influence on who gets to be president

matt

whereas NV has only 6 electoral college votes

it's just so dumb

bobble

4:38 PM

California has a bunch of ballot propositions, though

Prince North Læraðr

@matt No, but it's the distribution of the electoral college votes to population

Ankoganit

Hi @Lelouch !

Prince North Læraðr

Every state gets House Rep+Senate+One extra ballot

Lelouch

@Ankoganit Hi!

Prince North Læraðr

That +1 ballot throws everything off

The Trouble with the Electoral College

►

Deusovi

4:39 PM

the electoral college, first-past-the-post, and political incentives to disenfranchise as many people as possible

Prince North Læraðr

^video explains it better

Deusovi

so many fascinating problems with the us election system

Prince North Læraðr

It worked okay when the country was smaller I think

But the fear of "mobocracy" just doesn't apply anymore

Deusovi

eh when the country was smaller there were still problems

the three-fifths compromise is the biggest example

bobble

only white men voting, for example

Deusovi

4:41 PM

(or at least the one that comes to mind most easily)

Prince North Læraðr

@Deusovi Very true

Deusovi

and of course there's the more direct issue of who is allowed to vote, right

Prince North Læraðr

Even now, the number of minorities who vote have been much lower, I think

GentlePurpleRain

I think the U.S. is unique among countries in the amount of autonomy given to its states. That's part of the reason for the electoral college system in the first place.

Deusovi

true! for a long time, the country was seen as a coalition of 50 smaller units more than one larger one (hence the name)

"The United States" was taken as a plural rather than a singular noun for a while, in fact

io9.gizmodo.com/…

after the civil war there was a transition though

msh210

4:43 PM

@Deusovi similar to the now-EU in some ways

bobble

my <expletive> <expletive> tics are acting up again. probably due to election anxiety ><

Deusovi

understandable! probably not the best thing to focus on in here for too long

Prince North Læraðr

Also, the winner-takes-all system is also stupid. Since votes are determined per state, a Democrat in Alabama is going to skew their state results as much as a Republican in New York: virtually nothing.

Right

Deusovi

twitter.com/StrangeAnimaIs/status/1323716074446225408

please enjoy this very small cuttlefish

Prince North Læraðr

Can't see it :P

On my school laptop, blocks twitter

bobble

4:45 PM

It is very small!

Sciborg

Thank you for the small cuttlefish baby

Awwww

@bobble :(

@bobble my anxiety stimmy weirdness has been nuts in general this week, my boss pointed out in a Zoom call how much I was cracking my knuckles (my hand stim).

matt

4:46 PM

(PSA: Zoom is rather insecure)

GentlePurpleRain

So how big is that cuttlefish egg? Is it super magnified?

bobble

My first period class (Econ) is spending the start just talking about the election ><

Sciborg

I think the rocks are for scale, so likely super magnified

Deusovi

a quick search appears to say that cuttlefish eggs are approximately 3/4 of an inch (about 20mm)

Sciborg

Smol baby

I would die for her

GentlePurpleRain

4:49 PM

Does anyone ever play Contact around here any more?

(Based on the state of the chat room, I would guess not...)

Deusovi

i believe it's migrated to the code golf gaming Discord server

Prince North Læraðr

Oh I would love to play contact

Sciborg

What is Contact?

bobble

^^

Prince North Læraðr

It's a game! Y'all should learn

GentlePurpleRain

4:50 PM

@Deusovi Ah, makes sense.

Deusovi

it's a word-guessing game where one person (the defender) is thinking of a secret word, and everyone else (the attackers) have to try to give clues to words that might be the secret word

the trick is that if you can give a clue that another attacker gets, but the defender doesn't get, the defender is forced to give you a letter of their word. so the challenge is in finding a clue that will slip past the defender

Prince North Læraðr

Codename is my personal favorite though

matt

so like twenty questions but harder

Sciborg

This sounds a bit confusing, I'll have to look up examples

Prince North Læraðr

But Contact is really fun

Deusovi

4:52 PM

it's a lot easier to understand once you watch it played

Prince North Læraðr

12

A: What are these chatrooms with names like 'Codenames', 'Contact', and 'Spyfall'? What are they for?

Contact Overview Contact requires at least three people, one person to create a word and at least two people to guess it. The word creator thinks of a word and gives the guessers the first letter. The guessers' objective at any stage is to get the word creator to give them the next letter of th...

GentlePurpleRain

@Sciborg There are a lot of examples in the chat room I linked above.

Prince North Læraðr

I'm in the room, if anyone is down to play

bobble

I have school. Don't you?

matt

@bobble ghghghgghg

Prince North Læraðr

4:53 PM

@bobble Kind of

Sciborg

I have to work, but I can watch you guys play :(

matt

forget i said anything

Prince North Læraðr

I don't really have school during Wednesdays

Also, c'est my birthday!

Sciborg

Today?? Happy Birthday!

matt

happy birthday!!

bobble

4:54 PM

15 hours ago, by bobble

Birthday tree hug!

Sciborg

Happy birthday to you, happy birthday to you, happy birthday dear North, happy birthday to you :D

Ankoganit

Happy birthday!

Prince North Læraðr

@bobble That cursed image :p

bobble

MY ENTIRE ECON CLASS SO FAR IS ELECTION TALK

gahhhhhhhhhhh

Ankoganit

Ouch

Prince North Læraðr

4:58 PM

@bobble Yikes

Deusovi

honestly if possible i might just leave class

bobble

He's recording the call - if I leave, I would be marked as absent

Deusovi

even though you were already there?

bobble

yeah :(

Deusovi

what about just muting the video and doing something else

bobble

4:59 PM

Plus I think we're eventually going to get to actual econ, and I can't miss that

matt

@Deusovi ah yes "multitasking"

bobble

5:16 PM

Econ is now debating the local ballot measures & elections

matt

i imagine a grrr is coming soon?

bobble

I'm all grrr-ed out

matt

that's a rarity *hands grrr powers*

bobble

now teacher is talking to us about parenting techniques and how our homes are all communist police states

matt

what the <expletive>

John Dvorak

5:25 PM

then what's the point of pocket money?

bobble

manipulation, apparently

matt

and like parenting techniques??? wtf is up with that?

bobble

Stiv try my puzzle please!! — Prince Deepthinker 47 mins ago

As a reply to a comment by Stiv on someone else's post

Seriously? That's not the point of comments

matt

prince south dæpðinkr

2

Prince North Læraðr

5:50 PM

Please

bobble

6:52 PM

(update later: the entire econ class was election talk. should've listen to Deus)

Prince North Læraðr

Ahahaha, so one of my friends was like:

"Every time Biden faced the camera to address the audience in the debates, it looked like he was selling something for an advertisement"

I started DYING

bobble

please don't die

Sciborg

It's okay, I got this takes out watering can

Prince North Læraðr

Trees live for a pretty long time so, no worries there

Refreshing!

"My fellow Americans, would you like to have as sparkly of teeth as I do? Try Colgate!"

Sciborg

sprinkles you with Miracle-Gro

Prince North Læraðr

6:54 PM

Haha

bobble

'borg, are you supposed to be working?

Sciborg

I'm pretty much done for the day, I finished all my coding tasks so I'm just hangin out.

Prince North Læraðr

Ooh, join us in Contact!

bobble

I am debating over which of my science-history book to reread next. The choices are: cancer book, genetics book, vaccine book, elements book, or immunology book. Anyone have an opinion?

Prince North Læraðr

@bobble Oooooh immunology

bobble

6:59 PM

(the one I just finished re-reading was autism book. I have a lot of science history books)

Sciborg

Were you reading the autism one for a class or out of curiosity?

bobble

curiosity. I can handle the subject if it's dry and academic.

I own all of these books, by the way. Bought them with birthday money for the most part.

Sciborg

I like to read neurology and brain stuff in general, it's really fascinating. Autism in the brain in particular is super interesting.

bobble

right now, seems like there is one vote for immunology book. going once, going twice...

Prince North Læraðr

Immunology is super cool bc it's like warfare but inside your body

Sciborg

7:02 PM

Immunology is awesome.

bobble

It has a bunch of Dr. Fauci in it, too, since he led some HIV research.

Prince North Læraðr

Ooh Fauci

bobble

I got the immunology book out, it wins the prize of being read next

Sciborg

I think Contact is too complex for me.

Prince North Læraðr

@Sciborg It's honestly not that bad

Sciborg

7:11 PM

I obviously don't get it, lol. I'll just watch you play.

matt

7:23 PM

@bobble suddenly i want to watch more cutthroat kitchen

@Sciborg neither do i

Sciborg

I'm sort of vaguely getting it now, but I'm completely crap at it

matt

i'm still confused as heck

Sciborg

7:37 PM

well, i thought i understood and now clearly I don't lol

The rules for when you can contact and/or guess are so confusing?

Too many messages for my brain 😖

Prince North Læraðr

Yeah it's really fast pace

Sciborg

I'm literally incapable of processing that much information, I think bobble and I aren't equipped for this game. Back to Among Us for me :p

Nice slow game where I can connect wires and meander around, that's my jam.

@bobble are you okay? I just noticed your messages.

bobble

I think I'm in the later stages of the panic attack

John Dvorak

Don't you kinda need to keep more information to vote responsibly in Among Us? In Codenames you just pick whichever of 25 words are most synonymous to whatever was the last word your SM said.

Sciborg

It's not the amount of information necessarily, it's the fast deluge of high amounts of information.

Among Us is fine because I can remember where people were and it's a slow-moving, deliberative game.

Prince North Læraðr

7:46 PM

Hehe, just because people can;t type as fast on Among Us?

It was blue, it was red, it was yellow, no, yellow was with blue, that makes it red, no i saw red coming out, i vented to security, I'm sus

Sciborg

Lol

John Dvorak

Trust me. Codenames on Discord move .... very... slow...

Prince North Læraðr

I wanna play codenames in the chatroom

I miss playing codenames :(

John Dvorak

@PrinceNorthLæraðr discord.gg/5dYjShJ83d

Prince North Læraðr

@JohnDvorak I'm not really on discord much

John Dvorak

7:49 PM

now you'd be

Voldemort's Wrath

Happy birthday @PrinceNorthLæraðr!!!

Prince North Læraðr

@Voldemort'sWrath Thanks

@JohnDvorak No I don't use discord much bc circumstances

John Dvorak

willing to specify?

Sciborg

What is the server you're inviting us to?

John Dvorak

CGCC gaming

Sciborg

7:52 PM

Code Golf server?

John Dvorak

yes

Sciborg

Ah, okay. I forgot Puzzling and Code Golf share a server when it comes to gaming

bobble

panic attack has subsided, now I'm just dealing with all the mucus build-up from crying

Sciborg

Are you okay? :(

bobble

I don't have to pay attention in class at least (we have work time for a project I finished yesterday)

John Dvorak

7:55 PM

Does Puzzling have a Discord server of their own?

Sciborg

No, but I think we should :p

If anybody made one, I would join that one

John Dvorak

Why not use the CGCC or CGCC gaming server?

Sciborg

because i'm shy

Lukas Rotter

This test says I have over 130 iq... I highly doubt that...well maybe the most of humanity are imbeciles. — Prince Deepthinker 4 hours ago

Sciborg

Ah yes, Deepthinker, always so modest and reasonable.

Prince North Læraðr

8:02 PM

Okay, that's enough

No need to post every single one of Deepthinker's comments in the chat

Lukas Rotter

It's pretty entertaining

Prince North Læraðr

@JohnDvorak School laptop blocks discord, phone not so great with discord

@LukasRotter It's getting kind of mean

bobble

talking about IQ is one of my smaller triggers, which I could normally handle except I'm just off a panic attack. me leaving for a bit.

Sciborg

I mean, he's been pretty mean to some of us.

That's not to justify bad-mouthing him or anything, and admittedly we could stop doing that, but it's not undeserved to poke fun.

Prince North Læraðr

@Sciborg Well, poking fun would be against the Be Nice Policy here

Deusovi

8:06 PM

I've deleted the relevant comment; if there are any other issues you have with comments, please flag them.

Sciborg

I guess we could lay off on that, sorry. I didn't mean to contribute.

Prince North Læraðr

I'm not saying I like them, but you know, I just don't think it's appropriate here in this public chatroom

Sciborg

That's fair. Sorry.

Gareth McCaughan

@bobble Glad you're feeling better now. Contact can be pretty overwhelming, especially for a beginner!

Sciborg

I tried my best to keep up but it's too fast for me :p

Prince North Læraðr

8:09 PM

I find it so funny that in virtually every poll tracker I've seen, they just put CA and NY as blue without even finishing tallying the votes

They just know

Gareth McCaughan

Well, it's not like there's much doubt.

Deusovi

i understand that there's a lot going on but i think it would be best to keep election talk out of here for a variety of reasons

3

Prince North Læraðr

True

Puzzles!

I need some new ideas for another connect wall

I was thinking another Pokemon one, but couldn't think of a clever one without getting overly technical

bobble

college pennants is a free idea from me

Prince North Læraðr

Like "X group of Pokemons learn a move upon evolution"

"X group of Pokemon used to have a signature move", etc

Especially that latter one felt way too niche

College Pennants. Hm

matt

8:13 PM

@bobble *another virtual hug, as many as you want*

Sciborg

(sorry again, north.)

Prince North Læraðr

@Sciborg Ah, it's okay

Sciborg

Have I ever told you that you're my favorite tree?

Prince North Læraðr

Hmph. How many trees have you told that too?

:P

Sciborg

There are a lot of trees in the running, but you edge them all out :p

Prince North Læraðr

8:15 PM

Haha

Sciborg

Top 10 Trees, at least.

The Giving Tree and Yggdrasil are close second and third.

matt

@Sciborg not unlike how you are my favorite gentleperson :D

Sciborg

@matt <3

matt

<3

Sciborg

And @bobble you're my favorite sentient crown.

bobble

8:18 PM

(note: if you really want to talk politics. Politics.SE has a dedicated election chatroom)

Prince North Læraðr

Nah

matt

@Sciborg ditto

bobble

but which bobblie is your favorite?

John Dvorak

pass

matt

@bobble you. *infinite virtual hugs*

Sciborg

8:19 PM

My bobblie is pretty awesome, not gonna lie. But I think you win.

matt

BREAKING NEWS: @bobble Voted Favorite Bobblecrown of 2020

bobble

I'd like to thank Sciborg, for giving me fancy hats that I used to ~~bribe~~ convince people to vote for me

Sciborg

I accept your thanks but I am also terrified.

matt

of what?

Sciborg

Did you tell bobblies to hide inside the hats so they could suck out your voters' puzzle juice? Is this all a giant conspiracy?? What if - gets chloroformed

bobble

8:24 PM

quietly Sciborg has found us out, bobblies, time to remove the threat

Sciborg

distant screaming

matt

BREAKING NEWS: @bobble Kills Innocent Gentleperson

Sciborg

Matt, no! You'll be next!

bobble

I didn't. Some bobblies that are definitely not connected to me in any way did the deed.

Sciborg