Gorth

The number that really matters is how is the median household income doing compared to living expenses. That's what gives you a stable society and avoids social unrest (and also a good metric for measuring a country's poverty levels). The top 1% getting richer just inflates the GDP without improving the quality of life of anyone (and I mean literally anyone as they wont get any improvement of quality of life out of it). That being said, I haven't read the link yet, so not sure if it covers the subject.

I did. To be fair, getting to his position in the environment he's in, it's not unreasonable to assume a modicum of cunning and intelligence. Not a whataboutif, but a similar example of the principle, Saddam Hussein. Ruthless, uncharming, universally hated, but he stayed in power until he got bombed out of his palace and even then, it took months to finally dispose of him. You don't cling that hard to power and life itself without some degree of cognitive abilities, no matter how twisted they may be. Libya's Gadaffi? Same thing etc. @a few others who brought up the subject Not sure who anyone sees supporting the Russian attack here (too many posts to trawl through and see if I can find any to be honest). Not spending all your time condemning Russia is not the same as agreeing. Echo chambers never did anyone any favours and bringing to anyones attention, that "The West" is corrupt, rotten to the core and would do the same thing without batting an eyelid (if it resulted in a net positive on the geopolitical balance sheet) isn't the same as saying Russia did anything morally defensible, it's just saying that the soap box it's proclaimed from may be a bit rickety and frayed at the corners. It sometimes feel’s harder to constantly say the other guy sucks when your own is no paragon of virtue in geopolitics. Introspection and self criticism isn't always a bad thing. In fact, you can have cake and eat it too in this situation.

While in Melbourne, I stayed at a place that had Amazon prime. Watched a number of episodes of something called Vox Machina. Wasn't bad. Was actually quite nice at times. Too much profanity and too little nudity though (I would say, obviously more for a US than a Japanese audience )

England

My own recording from Friday night... yes, sucky phone quality. But I don't think there was any pro-shot from Friday night to be found anywhere. No, I did not even try to record anything from Phantom of The Opera on the Saturday night, but I'm sure I can find clips on youtube from official sources for that one. Got back to Brisbane a few hours ago. Edit: that last visit she mentions... my friend and I were there too at that concert and expected to them to back soon

Saltwater freezes too. Ever tried running around on top of frozen sea water at the beach? Did that as a kid sometimes. It’s weirdly elastic to walk on compared to fresh water ice. tl;dr; salt only lowers the freezing point by seven degrees Celsius or so

I grew up with dd/mm/yy because year 2000 was a myth and years were double digits For data purposes yyyy/mm/de makes sense because of lexicographical sorting of the fields is more efficient

Yeah, the proverbial needle in the haystack They do risk a fine of up to $1000 for careless handling of highly radioactive Caesium 13something. Even littering can incur harsher penalties

Australian morning TV... not always for kids

Not so much done today as going to do the next few days. Flying to Melbourne Thursday morning to meet up with my friend and hang out for a few days. Meeting an old colleague Thursday evening for some movies and Chinese food (he's Taiwanese and knows all the good places). Watching Halestorm concert Friday night, watching Phantom of the Opera on Saturday night and hopefully getting time for a bit of shopping in between. As well as a lunch at some point in something called 'The Danish House'. No idea what it is, but curiosity got the better of me. We saw Halestorm in 2019. It was great. Had to wait for Covid to settle down and the concert scene to pick up down under though. Her suggestion... none of us have seen Phantom of the Opera before, but we were both keen to see it.

ME is weird... ME1 had the most fun combat, ME2 the most fun companions and ME3 the most fun DLC (I had a blast joining the party on the Citadel)

Heh, Project "Sweet Potato" No idea what these guys normally do/did, but those trailers looked like a fun game (I liked the humour)

I don't get 80% of those references and I'm sure the remaining 20% doesn't apply. I suck at being Gen X

Good thing we live in a capitalist world, where employee hard work and initiative is rewarded, so we get a constant supply of cheap, high quality games... /sarcasm

Is there such a thing as a will wallet saving throw?

"Mac Walters, lead writer on Mass Effect 2 and 3 as well as creative director on Mass Effect: Andromeda"... do you *really* want that on your resume (not as bad as having Anthem on it, I know)?

Just before the weekend, it was 34C (92F-93F) here.... and raining. Greenhouses got nothing on Queensland

Rio Tinto in the headlines again... this time not for blowing up 40000 year old sacred places, but for misplacing radioactive cargo. Oops?... https://www.abc.net.au/news/2023-01-28/radioactive-capsule-search-perth-to-pilbara-/101902914 It's only 6mmx8mm or so, but will give you burns on distances of a meter and acute radiation sickness if put in your pocket. Kids... don't pick up shiny rocks offered by uncle Tinto, it's not good for you

The French strike back... https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-64436973 The AP stylebook Twitter account had recommended writers avoid using "the" in phrases like "the disabled, the poor and the French". It said this could be dehumanising. The French embassy responded by briefly changing its name to the "Embassy of Frenchness in the United States". Way to go French Embassy

https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-64401190 I know, this was tempting to put in the Ukraine War thread... but it's about politics, not military engagements and events from the frontlines At the time of typing this, 11 officials have either resigned or been sacked as Kyiv tries to tackle government corruption. It's led to some politicians in the US calling for aid to Ukraine to be restricted. President Volodymyr Zelensky is trying to quickly restore public faith, but the allegations are serious, and the timing is bad. Ever since its independence in 1991, Ukraine has had a problem rampant corruption in all layers of society. Mr Yurchyshyn believes there's no better time to expose ministerial wrongdoing, even with Western help being put at risk. "Western partners understand we have two wars," he says. "The first is against Russia, then there's our internal war for the future of Ukraine." Edit: I wonder how much that influenced Germany's hesitancy in providing aid? They are notoriously stingy when they suspect aid gets monetized and pocketed by corrupt middlemen

England...

It's quite possible it was the move that killed swtor for good, as any and all resources got shifted from the mmo to the Anthem project, putting all the proverbial eggs in the last basket (just before it hit the floor). Edit: Up to about end of 2021, swtor was still figuring on top ten mmo lists of most played games. The last 12 months it has shined with its complete absence from such lists.

Something you're not telling us?...

You're talking about people who eat surströmming (insert long list of health hazards and adverse effects to your sanity)

Ah... prices. I had a friend from the local Games Workshop store visiting me (to play some Kill Team). He took a few looks at my miniature collection, some of which dates back to the late 80's. I could see the drool building up Lets just say I have a rather comprehensive collection of things you can't even buy on ebay for thousands of dollars. Things that were common in the early 90's are suddenly worth $100+ per miniature (when I had it shipped over from Europe, I had my collection insured for $100k+). Sometimes it's fun to hang on to things for decades after everyone else got rid of their stuff. @Azdeus Mate, 40 is still young and green.... wait until you become a frail old (and grumpy) man like me