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Lotta people without crippling depression in this thread apparently
posted to MetaFilter by showbiz_liz at 8:38 AM on November 27, 2020

I'm envious of those who find showers/baths luxurious and pleasurable. For me Getting Clean is just one more chore required of me to be part of human society; I've never derived any pleasure from it and I do it as rarely as I can get away with without being offensive to others.

For me the experience is basically: ugh ugh ugh ugh ugh ugh oh hey this is nice ugh ugh ugh ugh ugh. Everything on either end of actually being under the water is a total… [more]
posted to MetaFilter by showbiz_liz at 10:29 AM on November 27, 2020

Baths are great, but only if they are big enough to actually submerge. Unfortunately for bathing, I'm tall, so it is very rare to find a tub that is large enough for me to actually have a relaxing, warm time in.

We had a tub until I was maybe 12 and then not again until my late teens, and the first bath I took after the long break, I was SO DISAPPOINTED to realize that the days of being able to lie completely prone in the tub were over. If I'm ever… [more]
posted to MetaFilter by showbiz_liz at 10:34 AM on November 27, 2020

Yeah my hair looks its best one or two days after washing but it’s also thick and wavy. My mom has thin hair and can’t pull that off at all.
posted to MetaFilter by showbiz_liz at 2:49 PM on November 27, 2020

Is it not normal to have both canned and homemade cranberry sauce on the table? Because I always do that and it solves this dumb argument.
posted to MetaFilter by showbiz_liz at 7:35 AM on November 26, 2020

By the way, homemade cranberry sauce can be used to make a delicious quickbread with the texture of banana bread. It rules.

Maybe don’t do this if you’re one of the people who puts onions in yours though.
posted to MetaFilter by showbiz_liz at 7:19 PM on November 26, 2020

This is incredible and devastating and I've shared it around - thank you for posting it. I can't think of anything else to say except: fuck.
posted to MetaFilter by showbiz_liz at 5:08 PM on November 24, 2020

I love this. And it's fun to imagine them being forgotten and then rediscovered 1000 years from now - would anyone be able to guess the purpose of this mysterious undersea sculpture garden?

Also, grim lols at this ending line:

"We’d like someone to help our battle in defence of the sea. Do you know if any soccer player or influencer is available?"
posted to MetaFilter by showbiz_liz at 12:54 PM on November 24, 2020

As someone who very recently just finished the first book for the first time (and may stop there), I am here for this thread.

I just reread it last week, after reading it once in college. And yeah, I had forgotten that maybe the main driving force of the plot is that Paul really, really wants to stop the jihad he can see coming, but every step he thinks he's taking away from it actually just brings it closer. I haven't read any of the other books,… [more]
posted to MetaFilter by showbiz_liz at 12:26 PM on November 22, 2020

I saw a slice of this madness on a UK TV show and was like... how are these guys always talking shit about American processed food when they're going around eating hamclowns?
posted to MetaFilter by showbiz_liz at 12:00 PM on November 19, 2020

I think the lesson here is that children are maniacs. (The six-year-old I know seems to subsist almost entirely on mayonnaise sandwiches.)
posted to MetaFilter by showbiz_liz at 12:25 PM on November 19, 2020

I've only had head cheese once but I loved it. I had it served on crackers with sliced raw onion. You know when you get a rotisserie chicken from the store and put the leftovers in the fridge and this delicious meaty jello forms at the bottom? It's like that but mixed with tasty assorted meat bits.
posted to MetaFilter by showbiz_liz at 5:27 PM on November 19, 2020

No one has to have Thanksgiving. People famously hate Thanksgiving.

I love Thanksgiving. It's my favorite holiday after Christmas. I love the food, the warmth, the leisurely togetherness, the ritual, all of it. My birthday is always within a week of Thanksgiving, and I celebrated my 30th birthday by having family from all across the country come to my city where I hosted Thanksgiving dinner for 12. It's my best birthday memory. I would have done it… [more]
posted to MetaFilter by showbiz_liz at 10:21 AM on November 18, 2020

How do people prevent themselves from feeling hopeless about this?

For me it's a combination of 1. accepting my powerlessness to really change anything but my own actions, and 2. knowing that, whatever happens, this time next year will look radically different in ways I cannot possibly predict. That might not sound terribly hopeful or reassuring but for me it is, in a weird way. This state of affairs will not continue indefinitely.
posted to MetaFilter by showbiz_liz at 12:15 PM on November 18, 2020

it’s london, late november 1940, and a third of the population is furious, furious about how winston churchill, that damned socialist, that leftist, that friend of stalin is taking away their freedom to turn on their lights.

I keep seeing people sarcastically draw this comparison as if it didn't happen. It did.

Yet, while the popular myth about ‘Blitz spirit’ has encouraged the idea that all Britons pulled together… [more]
posted to MetaFilter by showbiz_liz at 8:47 AM on November 19, 2020

Oh wow I loved that. It took me ten turns, which felt just about right. By a few turns before that, I figured out what I needed to do, but it took a few more tries to get all the pieces in place. I managed to keep everyone alive that final time, which was a nice bonus.
posted to MetaFilter by showbiz_liz at 11:56 AM on November 18, 2020

Ohhh my god they're WAITING IN LINE FOR HOT DOGS

Like I know all the reasons this is Very Bad and these fat lil guys will be screwed once this guy dies or moves away but a large part of my brain is still going RACCOON FRIENDS!!

Hopefully someday I can live somewhere I can channel this unwise impulse toward making friends with crows, that seems less damaging.
posted to MetaFilter by showbiz_liz at 2:28 PM on November 16, 2020

The question is phrased passively, which is confusing, i.e., how many holes does a given object have. For some of the objects, like straw or rubber band, the answer is none; unless the question allows for how many holes does a given object create. Like, an unbroken, perfect rubber band doesn't have any holes in the thing itself, but it does create a hole within its shape.

This makes no sense. If a straw doesn't have a hole in it, what the hell DOES?… [more]
posted to MetaFilter by showbiz_liz at 3:57 PM on November 11, 2020

Seems to me that the "hole as divot" (hole dug in the ground) is a discontinuity that interrupts a 2-dimensional surface, while the "hole as tunnel" (hole in a donut) is a discontinuity that interrupts a 3-dimensional object. The two concepts of "hole" are actually the same concept, applied in different dimensional spaces.

So then the question is, what is a 4-dimensional hole?

The year 2020
posted to MetaFilter by showbiz_liz at 9:00 AM on November 12, 2020

I've always found that topology could potentially undermine the "you can colour any map with only four colours" argument.

I believe they actually solved the map coloring problem for a toroid before they solved it for a flat plane. A map on a toroid needs seven colors.
posted to MetaFilter by showbiz_liz at 11:39 AM on November 15, 2020

the difficult trick of making a chess film interesting to a general audience.

I don't know a good goddamn thing about chess and I loved it. And it did make me want to learn more, though I may not follow through on that, haha.

Am I right that the "trick" to chess is mainly being able to see the potential chains of moves further ahead than your opponent? It always seemed like once you get to a high enough level, it… [more]
posted to MetaFilter by showbiz_liz at 6:57 AM on November 5, 2020

It also depicts her growing into a young woman, including her starting to menstruate and having sex, but there's nothing explicit (it's like, two people making out and then showing them waking up the next morning). All the sexual relationships on the show are completely consensual.

I REALLY REALLY appreciated how they approached Beth's sexuality. She is shown to be curious about sex and interested in sex but it never, ever becomes about a specific… [more]
posted to MetaFilter by showbiz_liz at 8:59 AM on November 5, 2020

I think that was a joke about the board being flipped upside-down
posted to MetaFilter by showbiz_liz at 9:14 AM on November 5, 2020

I know nothing about chess, but am really in need of fresh tv shows to watch, so I am thinking about trying this. It just seems like sitting watching a show about someone playing chess would be only slightly more interesting to me than sitting watching people play in real life. So not very interesting at all. Are there plenty of other things happening on the show besides just chess games being played?

Oh yes. Chess functions for the main character as… [more]
posted to MetaFilter by showbiz_liz at 10:33 AM on November 5, 2020

I thought about it when I watched it at first, but I don't have anyone to play with in semi-lockdown - and I feel like anyone who plays online would cream me so thoroughly as to remove any interest. But it did pique my curiosity. I'll probably ask a certain friend who plays casually for a few games after this is over (whenever that is).

A few years ago I heard of a chess app where you're given a semi-random assortment of pieces, weighted to your experience level (so… [more]
posted to MetaFilter by showbiz_liz at 11:26 AM on November 15, 2020

I just happened to get a "verify your eligibility for jury duty" in NYC, and I had a brief moment of "WHAT IF" before realizing that my comment history here would almost certainly disqualify me from serving on a jury in a Trump trial.
posted to MetaFilter by showbiz_liz at 12:38 PM on November 13, 2020

You really think that the US will set a precedent of charging ex-presidents with crimes?

"The US"? I don't know. New York State? Sure. Why wouldn't they? Lots of people stand to gain politically from doing so. Cuomo for one.
posted to MetaFilter by showbiz_liz at 12:41 PM on November 13, 2020

She was my city council rep before she became the AG

Me too! I've been a bit envious of my friends in Queens who get to tell friends back home "I voted for AOC" - now maybe soon Tish James will be a household name and I'll get to say I voted for her way back when.
posted to MetaFilter by showbiz_liz at 1:43 PM on November 13, 2020

Is betting Allowed under the terms of service? Or is there a website we can go to for odds on different bits? I doubt he would see a prison cell after a criminal conviction but I would bet money on him paying big civil penalties as well as getting a plea bargain on a criminal indictment.

Predictit is that website, but I don't go there anymore after getting way too into it in 2016 and losing like $300. But I'm almost sure you can go there and bet money on this exact thing right now.
posted to MetaFilter by showbiz_liz at 10:07 AM on November 14, 2020

But corb, almost all the things you list there DO involve more staff. Just not more nursing staff specifically.
posted to MetaFilter by showbiz_liz at 9:48 AM on November 14, 2020

The impression I get is that the congressional Republicans won't fight all that hard for him now that it's clear he lost. In many ways it serves them better to obstruct the fuck out of a Biden presidency and then try to run someone who can actually be managed. Trump was never their choice, because Trump doesn't play by their rules. They worked with him to the extent possible during his administration and they loved what he let them get away with, but even they can see he's a… [more]
posted to MetaFilter by showbiz_liz at 11:30 AM on November 9, 2020

Asked (I think) why Georgia is so much delayed in being able to wrap up the vote count compared to other states, he said that, well, Georgia is in the same position in this process as Florida and Texas. They are also still counting absentee ballots. It’s just that the vote tallies in those states aren’t close, so all eyes are on GA right now. I thought that was good to put things into perspective.

New York State didn't even START counting its… [more]
posted to MetaFilter by showbiz_liz at 8:03 AM on November 11, 2020

Sounds like he thinks Cuomo is his likely opponent in 2024. (Aaaaaaaaaaaaa)

He has Cuomo to worry about sooner than that, potentially. (oh god oh please)
posted to MetaFilter by showbiz_liz at 1:46 PM on November 13, 2020

I just got permission to choose paint colors for my apartment, and you better believe there will not be any beige involved.

I do find that when people finally get the chance to put actual color on their walls, they often go too dark and too saturated and it looks cartoonish. But that's no reason to choose The Color Of Sadness for every single room.

FWIW my mom painted our house growing up beautifully, with each room leading into the next - warm… [more]
posted to MetaFilter by showbiz_liz at 1:39 PM on November 13, 2020

I do think us on the left are absolutely the worst at sloganeering. Then we use them as purity tests and all hell breaks loose. Like I get that we want radical change and we want it decades ago but the normies need to be frogs in a pot or they jump straight out.

Medicare for all should have been something like "Medicare as a safety net".
Defund police should have been something like "Communities not Violence".
Pack… [more]
posted to MetaFilter by showbiz_liz at 9:10 AM on November 10, 2020

I was on the phone with a friend when the cheering started - I’m in Bed-Stuy so it literally could not be more blue here and so I knew immediately what it had to be about.

They weren’t my guys in the primaries and I have my reservations about them but neither of them is a smug evil narcissist so, for today I’m just taking the win.
posted to MetaFilter by showbiz_liz at 11:57 AM on November 7, 2020

FOX News is just bailing on the loser and banking on continuing masses of financial support from the elites who are their actual masters. If they shed a few nutjobs it won’t show up on their bottom line, that’s not where the real money comes from.
posted to MetaFilter by showbiz_liz at 6:42 AM on November 6, 2020

Don’t forget Cuomo, who has risen as high as he can in NY and would love to make his national career by prosecuting the Trumps for whatever he can think of. I don’t like the guy personally but I’d sure rather he set his sights on that than on picking petty fights with the mayor of NYC.
posted to MetaFilter by showbiz_liz at 7:04 AM on November 6, 2020

Plus, it seems like "centrists" within the Democratic party are eager to blame the "left" for every electoral failing of theirs. Biden ran a centrist campaign the specifically disavowed the left. Chuck Schumer got every centrist Senate candidate he wanted. Yet, its still the left's fault. Was it the left's fault in 2010? In 2014? It's depressing. We desperately need aid and Covid relief from the federal government, but now it looks like we may not get it.… [more]
posted to MetaFilter by showbiz_liz at 7:47 AM on November 6, 2020

Oh man raccoons would be bad.
posted to MetaFilter by showbiz_liz at 6:12 AM on November 5, 2020

Who wears mink in this day and age?

Rich people?
posted to MetaFilter by showbiz_liz at 10:43 AM on November 5, 2020

The guy who ran Hillary Clinton's campaign went on to run the super PAC supporting Democrats in House elections. Why do these fucking people keep getting jobs?
posted to MetaFilter by showbiz_liz at 8:37 AM on November 5, 2020

I'd rather not go with the throw everyone out approach until I see evidence of gross incompetence.

And I'd rather they stop sticking with the same old top-down conservative "let's not be too hasty in discarding this failed approach" approach.
posted to MetaFilter by showbiz_liz at 8:54 AM on November 5, 2020

Are they basically saying that only Republican votes should be counted?

How is this still a surprise to literally anyone? Yes, Republicans will blatantly cheat at every possible opportunity, welcome to the year 2000.
posted to MetaFilter by showbiz_liz at 9:25 AM on November 5, 2020

too close to call

That phrase haunts my dreams lol
posted to MetaFilter by showbiz_liz at 5:06 PM on November 3, 2020

What are the sources of authoritarianism and white male hegemony in the US?

FOX News. FOX News. FOX News.

That, and leading Democrats openly mocking and abandoning the concept of a 50 state strategy for decades, leaving a vacuum for our enemies to fill.
posted to MetaFilter by showbiz_liz at 5:47 AM on November 4, 2020

These are kids who never grew up.

I reject this whole analogy because it implies this is just “how things are” and can never be changed. “What can you do, they’re just jerks!” That’s lazy defeatism.
posted to MetaFilter by showbiz_liz at 6:04 AM on November 4, 2020

These “true believers “ didn’t spawn out of nothing, they were converted. By an extraordinarily sophisticated propaganda network. It did not simply happen and it is not simply “because of the kind of person they are.” Our refusal or inability to deliver a similarly powerful counter-message is the problem. “They’re just dumb” is not the problem.
posted to MetaFilter by showbiz_liz at 6:14 AM on November 4, 2020

So an example that came up recently was a bunch of progressive ballot measures passing in states like Utah, where actual progressives are anathema. That shows that it isn’t the Democrats’ POLICIES that are unpopular, it’s THE DEMOCRATS even though they theoretically offer things most of the country wants. So why don’t people vote for them? Until the Democratic Party recognizes this as resulting from a massive failure of messaging on their own part, they will continue to struggle.
posted to MetaFilter by showbiz_liz at 6:20 AM on November 4, 2020

It's really tiring reading "we have to figure out how to make our rational arguments work better against people who make decisions based on authority and emotion" oh my god SO FUCKING TIRING.

Yeah, why bother making an emotional appeal to voters, that’s only for fascists apparently
posted to MetaFilter by showbiz_liz at 6:32 AM on November 4, 2020