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[Method of Madness]

[chaospersonified]

(That's called "recidivism", by the way.)

RECIDIVISM. I knew the word, but only would have recognized it, if that makes any sense. I spent a few minutes trying to recall it, but was on my phone and using data at the time.

It's fucked up, is what it is. We teach  Pythagorean theorem, and that mitochondria are the powerhouse of the cell, but we don't teach that it's possible for people to change, that young people who fuck up once aren't doomed to a life of incarceration.

I hate the world. For a lot of reasons. I've named one here.

[Loki]

(That's called "recidivism", by the way.)

RECIDIVISM. I knew the word, but only would have recognized it, if that makes any sense.

That is called passive vocabulary.

[chaospersonified]

So I have a lead part in a musical, and we've thus-far had four (three and a half, really) music rehearsals to learn songs. Funny thing about whole-cast musical rehearsals, at least this one, the only songs that take the whole cast specifically do not include me, because, for example, everyone in town is singing about how I'm going to hell. It's my job not to sing and to be overwhelmed and a bit freaked out by everyone barking a musical number at my face about how I'm doomed and damned to hellfire because I can't read.

Other funny thing, we've been singing along to the Broadway cast performance, and today, at the end of small-group rehearsal (Where I actually do sing) I learned that the accompaniment music we'll be performing to is at a different tempo and uses different instruments, meaning the practice I've been doing to learn the cues for my songs was almost pointless.

I learned this because I was given a copy of the CD. The full accompanying tracklist to this two hour performance.

Seventy songs.
Unnamed.
Some of them we sing with, most of them are background music.

I am looking at this like a scavenger hunt to find which ones actually go to which songs when the music is almost entirely different.

[cesium133]

When I was talking to my mom last night, somehow we ended up talking about what she was watching on TV, and then she said, "the cable company... what's their name... uh, Compost."

Yeah, let's go with that. 

[Method of Madness]

I wouldn't be so mean to compost.

[Welu]

My mum and I have different senses of humour, but we do still make each other laugh a lot. So I was extra delighted with this exchange when Da was talking about being invited to an incredibly large wedding.

Da asked, "How do you even feed 5000 people?" Mum and I responded simultaneously, "Five loaves and two fish."

[Grognard]

ha. good ome

[Is it cold in here?]

Why is there so much difference between
"You're a sight for sore eyes!"
and
"You're a site for psoriasis!"
?

[Akima]

That made my skin crawl...

[chaospersonified]

That made my skin crawl...

I appreciate this.

[Caspian Sea Monster]

Apropos of little:  I'm a huge, huge fan of the Japanese singer/songwriter Reol, and my friend Harriet likes to constantly poke fun at me for this, saying I'm going to marry and/or kidnap her some day.  I feel like this says more about Harry's personality than mine.  But anyway, I turn 29 today (...oh god I turn 29 today) and Harry sent me this:



"That's the first time I've drawn more than a doodle since I left high school I HOPE YOU'RE HAPPY YOU MADE ME WEEB."

This is possibly the best birthday gift I have ever received, no joke.  This made my night.

To her mortal embarrassement, I translated it to Japanese and sent it to Reol on Twitter.  (Who knows if she'll actually see it, no one ever checks their notifications these days from what I can tell.)  When Harry saw the translated version she said "Oh my god, I'm a real mangaka now!  Wait, no, a REOL mangaka!"

Shame on you, lady.

</weeb_time>

[Method of Madness]

Awwwww. Also, weeb?

[Caspian Sea Monster]

Japanophile.

[Method of Madness]

Oh. I'd just never seen it shortened as such.

[Method of Madness]

So I happened to check my OKC account and the last person who visited me answered "which is bigger?" with the Earth. The other option was the sun

[SubaruStephen]

That's one of the "nope" questions for me, if she answered Earth (without a "LOL j/k" explanation), I immediately lose interest in her.

[Method of Madness]

I mean we already had a thirty-something percent match score, I was more checking out of curiosity. But yeah, no explanation. NOPE.

[Akima]

a REOL mangaka!

Well played!

Confession: I enjoy Baby Metal more than I probably should...

[LeeC]

I don't watch much Anime but I am currently musing at the idea of an Anime version of Night Court.

[Method of Madness]

So I heard a commercial the other day encouraging people to become eye donors (or maybe organ donors in general but the commercial focused on eyes), and it had relatives of dead people talking about how they "honored their wishes" of becoming eye donors. Which is all well and good, but does that imply that they had the option of not doing so? Like, if someone is an organ donor and dies, and their organs are healthy enough to be given to someone, can a relative actually stop that from happening? If so, what the actual fuck?

[Akima]

I don't know the laws and protocols in other countries, but in Australia your next-of-kin have to give their consent, or the organ or tissue donation will not proceed. I am a registered donor, and I have had "the discussion" with my family.

Obviously, there are serious questions about personal autonomy involved in giving someone else a veto over decisions made by a legally competent adult. In Australia, becoming a donor is an "opt in" process, requiring one to register in a national database. Personally, I believe that registration should be decisive, but at the moment, in Australia, it is not.

[Metope]

Another thing to consider: In case you die of a disease that makes you unable to be an organ donor, or at an advanced age, it's also a good idea to talk about wether you want to donate your body to science. Med schools all around the world are short on bodies, my brother told me they worked with bodies of people who died before he was born in his first and second year of studies.

[Masterpiece]

In Germany, according to a medical student friend, nobody donates bodies to science anymore because you actually still have to pay your own cremation fees.

[Method of Madness]

Wait, what? If you donate your body to science, why would you need to be cremated?

[explicit]

Wait, what? If you donate your body to science, why would you need to be cremated?

Disposal

[Method of Madness]

They make you pay for that up front?

[explicit]

I'm assuming that's dealt with by another entity. The family should still be getting those remains back or if there is no family the state deals with it (I think). The cremation is probably done by the people who normally do that, though I find it odd that that service couldn't be paid for by the hospital.

[Masterpiece]

I just checked and cremation costs between 250 and 800 Euros. Might be a tad too much for hospitals to cover, per body.

[Akima]

Wait, what? If you donate your body to science, why would you need to be cremated?

There will inevitably be "bits left over" if you organ-donate, and/or leave your body to science.

In Germany, according to a medical student friend, nobody donates bodies to science anymore because you actually still have to pay your own cremation fees.

Eh? Don't you (through pre-paid plan or insurance), or your family, normally have to pay your own funeral expenses anyway? It might be a worthwhile deal for hospitals etc. to offer funeral expenses to attract donations, but there would have to be a cap, because the funeral industry tends to "up sell" despite fancy coffins being ridiculous for cremations.

[Masterpiece]

Until 2004, you would recieve a payment of approximately 550 Euros upon death by the statutory health insurance. Since they don't have to anymore, the number of donations of bodies has rapidly decreased.

[Method of Madness]

I wonder how many other people know the entire Lord's Prayer because of that scene in Spider-Man.

[chaospersonified]

Huh. For most of the past year, I've been using my phone/tablet for internet-type things at home, because my laptop was, for some reason, unable to stay connected with any consistency. I couldn't check my email, even, without a hardline connection. A few months back, I bought an ethernet cable and ran it through my bathroom to the router, and it has been working. Recently, I updated to Windows 8, because I saw no reason to keep putting it off. I kept the cord plugged in because I saw no reason not to do that.

Today, I had to unplug the cord in order to clean my bathroom properly, and lo and behold, my laptop can suddenly go online through wi-fi.

Of course, by now, after being plugged in constantly for months and months, the battery life on the thing probably lasts less than 20 minutes, but still. I can replace a battery,

[Method of Madness]

Hooray!

Another miscellaneous musing: why is breakfast pronounced "breck fist" instead of "break fast"?

[chaospersonified]

Hooray!

Another miscellaneous musing: why is breakfast pronounced "breck fist" instead of "break fast"?

Well... Try pronouncing 'break fast' with a thick Scottish accent.

[cesium133]

When I filled out my income tax forms recently, I noticed for the use tax thing, Wisconsin doesn't have the option that Oklahoma has where if you didn't keep track of what you bought, you can just pay X% of your income*. Apparently Wisconsin actually expects you to have kept track of what you bought online and whether they charged you sales tax. Who the hell does that?


*I don't remember what X was, but for my grad-student salary, it came out to $10/year.

[explicit]

I find it strange that even as a business major they never taught us how to do our taxes. Even when we were doing balance sheets for corporations they always just gave us what the taxes were without explaining how they got that number.

[Method of Madness]

Who the hell does that?

Probably nobody. Amazon charges sales tax now, not sure about other major sites.

[Method of Madness]

I forget if I've brought this up, but why is / a forward slash and \ a back slash? It should totally be the other way around! When you write, you write from the top, so your pen goes forward when you write \ and back when you write /!

[Caspian Sea Monster]

Not all of us write from the top.  Never minding that I've been told my entire life that I write "incorrectly".

[pwhodges]

I forget if I've brought this up, but why is / a forward slash

Because it leans forwards in the direction of writing.

[Method of Madness]

I suppose.

[SubaruStephen]

Huh, interesting... randomly threw a disc from a pile into the Bluray player.

Valentines Day episode of Chuck season 2.


The Universe is making fun of me.

[chaospersonified]

Huh, interesting... randomly threw a disc from a pile into the Bluray player.

Valentines Day episode of Chuck season 2.


The Universe is making fun of me.

Well, on the plus side, you have blu-rays of Chuck.
Season 2, too, when it was still pretty great.
Maybe they're not blu-rays. Maybe your blu-ray player plays regular DVDs as well. Whatever. You still have hard copies of a pretty great show.

I'm amused by this anecdote. I really, really like the universe's sense of humor.

My own Valentine's Day story from today... Well, I typed it out, but it was really fucking depressing, so I'll spare you.

[Masterpiece]

Random Thought: My beard is fluffy. Today is a good day.

and I still don't understand why a retailer wouldn't list their price +sales tax, as a European I still find this weird.

[Method of Madness]

Yeah...neither do I. For online stores at least it makes sense, though, since sales tax varies by state.

[hedgie]

I totally understand his problem.  In EU countries, at least in my experience, VAT is included in the sticker price, and not something that one has to add on to.

[Is it cold in here?]

My dad just pointed out that the phrase "meteoric rise" is exactly backwards.

[Metope]

Ugh adding sales tax afterwards makes no sense to me. I'm so used to going to the store and adding everything in my head so I know how much I'll end up paying at the register, that's just not possible here in Seattle. I try to add roughly 10% to the end sum but I'm always wrong since the tax rate is different on different types of stuff. I really don't like to be surprised when I spend money, especially now that I don't have a job and need to plan and stick to a budget.

[chaospersonified]

Don't get me started on sales tax. If it was a standard thing, I could almost be okay with it; if I'm in the right mood I actually find it almost fun to figure out what the tax will be, but isn't even the same state-wide. I live in an area where it's 7%. If I drive 40 minutes to the closest Wal-Mart, I pay 9%. Now, I do live on a border of my state, but I'm not crossing a border here, the difference appears to be, so far as I can tell, that while the county I live in has less than 2k inhabitants, the one I'm driving to has over 30k.