Gromnir

for national parks, we got those majestic redwood forests here in ca ... silly Gromnir, is another picture from our backyard. can see brick in bottom left corner which is our chimney. for walks we typical go to a nearby lake, but for the next month or so we gotta keep our dogs leashed at all times even if is no other people anywhere nearby. main reason for leashes is the abundance o' water fowl which is hatching and one o' our dogs will attack and swallow whole the fledglings if he gets the chance. is not a pretty sight when the dog gets ahold o' a bird. also, perhaps 'cause o' enduring drought conditions, rattlesnakes is extra prevalent this year, and our dogs is curious blind to snakes; will literal walk right over top o' 'em. doesn't make sense to us as the snakes (rattlesnakes, kingsnakes and others common in the area) is typical apparent to our non canine senses. even if the dogs can't see the snakes, you would assume they could smell 'em. have gotten lucky so far as has been a couple close calls. seeing as our dogs is preternatural snake dumb, am keeping 'em leashed. the dog who eats birds can seeming sense a silent and unmoving fledgling from fifty meters but will walk over a snake in his path seeming oblivious to the reptile. is weird. curious aside, rattlesnake hatchlings is as lethal as full grown snakes 'cause while they inject less venom than adult snakes, the dose is more concentrated. HA! Good Fun!

there is something wrong with the test syndrome? men have advantages when it comes to endurance. is exactly why lia thomas, a distance swimmer, is kicking the collective arses o' her competition in spite of taking performance inhibiting drugs. men got, on average, lower heart rate, increased heart size, more lung volume, and superior pulmonary function, not to mention advantageous body mass composition aspects. women are superior to men in numerous physical categories, but endurance ain't one o' 'em. is not a huge gap btw, but the study gd referenced by the marines revealed women's aerobic performance were 90% o' their male counterparts, which is not surprising given male physiological advantages. if the test is bad, fix it, but knee jerk to that solution might be telegraphing a bit. is numerous military roles and civilian jobs which require a degree and kind o' physical fitness which skews in favor o' male domination o' those occupations. so? doesn't make men better. makes men different, which as gd would note, should be obvious as 'posed to fodder for argument. is practical reasons to hire firepersons who is able to carry the average adult male outta a burning building. the weight o' the standard combat loadout is not subjective or gender based. if studies is showing that men in integrated units is needing to carry more 'cause women literal cannot pull their weight, change testing so that even more women get assigned to infantry roles is not the solution. hurl is correct that there is not many aspects o' modern society which demand a recognition o' gender differentiation, and am in complete agreement that pronouns is a non factor. in our experience if a colleague or student wanted to be referenced by a different pronoun than their birth and our enculturation would natural result, we made efforts to accommodate, 'cause were a non factor in our estimation. civilization were not gonna crumble 'cause a trans lawyer who were born phillip wanted to be addressed with feminine pronouns... though we did sometimes reflexive slip into reflexive "norms" w/o it being some kinda calculated insult. is tough to overcome five decades o' behaviour. regardless, if an individual put in the work and earned their seat at the firm's table or in the school's classroom, then the least we could do would be to speak to them in a way which made 'em more comfortable. but for those extreme limited set o' occupations and roles which men will dominate 'cause o' XY v. XX, fighting for equality has opposite of the desired result as such pointless battles convince many who is otherwise ambivalent that the defenders o' women equality is unreasonable. it's not always the test which is the problem. HA! Good Fun! ps btw, hurl's wife outlasting him could be less 'bout physical endurance and more 'bout mental toughness... 'cause counter-intuitive, women also do not benefit from an increased pain threshold many o' us assume exists and as already noted, men (on average) display superior aerobic qualities. "Epidemiologic and clinical findings clearly demonstrate that women are at increased risk for chronic pain and some evidence suggests that women may experience more severe clinical pain. Studies of experimentally induced pain have produced a very consistent pattern of results, with women exhibiting greater pain sensitivity, enhanced pain facilitation and reduced pain inhibition compared with men, though the magnitude of these sex differences varies across studies. In addition, some evidence suggests sex differences in responses to pharmacological and non-pharmacological pain treatments, though the findings differ depending on the specific treatment and perhaps on characteristics of the pain. Also, gender biases in pain treatment appear to exist, which are influenced by characteristics of both the patient and the provider."

fake news. until the cyber ninjas do a forensic review, am not buying the results, and even then the libs will cheat. you gotta read this zerohedge link... HA! Good Fun!

we got more than a couple annoying bugs in the base game post patch/dlc, so yeah, am gonna wait for at least the next patch. HA! Good Fun! ps there was a small update today which fixed more than is listed. example: the covenant of the inheritor was most assured not fixed in our game, but is now working as described, albeit with a null value addition to the item description.

for gd, is one novel which is kinda screaming for recognition: the time it never rained. from the goodreads blurb: To the ranchers and farmers of 1950s Texas, man's biggest enemy is one he can't control. With their entire livelihood pegged on the chance of a wet year or a dry year, drought has the ability to crush their whole enterprise, to determine who stands and who falls, and to take food out of the mouths of the workers and their families. To Charlie Flagg, an honest, decent, and cantankerous rancher, the drought of the early 1950s is a foe that he must fight on his own grounds. Refusing the questionable "help" of federal aid programs, Charlie and his family struggle to make the ranch survive until the time it rains again-if it ever rains again. the events o' the novel is based on the actual prolonged drought conditions o' the time, but am not able to say how authentic it were. is not one o' our favorites, but that ain't 'cause it is a bad novel. if you are expecting a whole lotta action, you will be disappointed, and from our pov, as a dyed-in-the-wool minimalist, the novel woulda' worked better as a short story as 'posed to a novel with a bit too much o' the typical western hard men doing hard work in a hard land schtick. nevertheless, if any western protagonist were meant to resonate with gd... HA! Good Fun!

the important question is, did you get the cat food and litter home to your feline? it's nice you weren't injured, but gotta keep focused on the important stuff. if after we received our driver's license and by law no longer needed an adult presence while piloting an automobile, we called and asked our father to go for a ride to get litter and chow for a cat, he woulda' hung up on us w/o saying a word, not that we ever woulda' asked for such. woulda been a weird ask from our pov. 'course am gonna assume driving in your part o' the world is not road warrior dangerous such that you would require a somebody to ride shotgun. steel self. shiny and chrome. ... truth is if we had requested same paternal companionship while we were still in the instruction permit age range (15-17+,) our father woulda' been just as likely to ignore our plea but as we were living with him at the time, is unlikely he woulda' received the petty and visceral pleasure o' terminating a phone call with us. HA! Good Fun!

you are preaching to the choir 'bout coddled millennials or whatever the newest generational label is. am, first and foremost an advocate o' personal responsibility, so the participation trophy mentality and those proclaiming it is more important to be morally right (subjective) than factually correct offends our sensibilities. 'course even Gromnir don't go so far as to suggest an entire generation is facing doom, though am suspecting every new generation needs face such hyperbolic prognostications. am also gonna observe how qanon and the maga movement undermines the notion that abandoning o' personal responsibility is somehow new or linked to wokeness. grievance and the need to blame libs, foreign nationals, minorities and intellectual elites for societal ills and personal misfortunes is sooooo 1920s-- hardly a new phenomenon and the yet we collective fail to recognize the groundhog day scenario for what it is. dunno, perhaps if the maga crowd had teachers who were a bit more woke, we wouldn't be facing events such as: but am similar not giving the educated libs an out neither as antifa, while hardly the threat imagined by a few boardies, is populated by young and educated liberal minded individuals who believe it is not only ok but is moral right to use violence to silence messages which they decide is wrong. regardless, while it is unlikely we accept any single source as definitive regarding what the mythic monolithic "academia" is trying to tell "us," we will make it part o' our further education... which is how is s'posed to work; more speech and not less. HA! Good Fun! ps am recommending the following: Strangers in the Land: Patterns of American Nativism, 1860-1925

doubt it. as we already noted, am in favour o' educators, by means o' pedagogy and curriculum, teaching their students 'bout the evils o' bigotry and prejudice while simultaneous modeling social behaviors related to those concepts... which as far as we can tell is wokeness from at least the 1960s through today. the fact young people take lessons learned to comical extremes is hardly an argument against educating. solution, if is needed, is more education and not censorship. am just not seeing how this is a real issue. if kids taking an otherwise good idea to comical extremes were a real problem we would need shut down all universities everywhere as there is nothing more foolish than the ordinary undergrad who after a few semesters believes they has unlocked the secrets o' the universe. regardless, insofar as to what is routinely being described as wokeness these days, am almost wholly unconvinced o' a problem. takes an extreme degree o' militant adherence and compulsion to some kinda imagined dogma for us to be moved to consider wokeness in education as an issue needing to be addressed. moreover, if the gop and others cannot define wokeness, the bad wokeness such that requires legislation or government interaction to curtail, with enough precision such that the s'posed good wokeness isn't also limited, then am most assured rejecting the current campaign to eliminate wokeness... bad wokeness. "If there be time to expose through discussion the falsehood and fallacies, to avert the evil by the processes of education, the remedy to be applied is more speech, not enforced silence."--Justice Louis Brandeis, Concurring, Whitney v. California, 274 U.S. 357 (1927) our signature is not just for show. HA! Good Fun!

is the way our grandma did it. however, am gonna note how when we were in poland, the locals used pork, and only pork, and they minced. mince pork shoulder is gonna tend to be on high fat end o' the spectrum. by comparison pork tenderloin is too lean. in our experience pork loin is a good option if you wanna try the mince route. use a food processor makes kinda ez to get mince. aside, while we suspect few is genuine curious, we noticed our orii link were useless as the jerks won't show you the shipping costs unless you have an account and are signed-in. No. of Refills Ordered S & H Fees 1 - 4 $6.25 5 - 10 $11.00 11 - 20 $18.50 21 - 30 $23.00 31 - 45 $33.00 46 - 60 $43.00 61 - 75 $53.00 final @ShadySands am gonna admit one o' our grandmothers used miracle whip frequent, and she were a far better cook than Gromnir is or is ever likely to be. she used miracle whip for those midwestern slaws and salads (e.g. cole slaw and potato salad) which tend to be a bit on the sweet side compared to variations found in other parts o' the US. ain't mere nostalgia neither nostalgia coloring our recollection as grandma were kinda a legend in our family as a peerless sorceress in the kitchen. am s'posing if the "heavy" attribute o' mayo bothers you, then miracle whip is a good substitute. ... am nevertheless more likely to thrust a fork into our eyeball than use miracle whip. HA! Good Fun!

more trump funny before disinfectant day expires am recalling our father, a couple years before he died, suffered a transient ischemic attack. while in the hospital post episode, dad were given the test trump describes as a prerequisite for being released. the fact a trump doctor had this test administered is what should raise questions, but the former guy talks 'bout it as if he received the fields medal or a nobel prize. HA! Good Fun!

is the crux o' the issue... if there is a real issue. am thinking "the point where "genuine value" gets left behind" is gonna be difficult to identify and highly subjective regardless. given the nebulous notion o' the complaint, am thinking educators should be given broad latitude and nothing save genuine egregious should be subject to correction. from a rational and reasonable pov, am not seeing as a real issue save for fact that what should be at worst eye-roll fodder has been weaponized. keep in mind, am thinking the white privilege stuff and the tendency to wanna decry every situation in which women or minorities do not achieve equal representation as deserving to be called racist is harmful. we want firefighters to be minimal capable o' certain feats o' endurance and strength regardless o' gender. reduce physical requirements just to get more women representation in a fire department with less than X% females is so not a win. regardless o' race, we want our doctor to have (better than) minimum qualifications, and if representation o' native americans is too low, we want the problem to be fixed before those native americans become doctors and not at the end o' the process. @Hurlsnot mentioned once how his students seeming saw racism in almost everything and am not sure this is a good trend, particular given how such has been used to polarize our society this last decade. like it or not, 'cause is a democratic republic, minorities need whites to bring 'bout positive changes and if a significant % o' whites increasing see any discussion o' race as adversarial, then change becomes less likely, yes? even so, the trend o' complaining o' wokeness annoys us more than a little, and perhaps more than hurlsnot students and their ubiquitous perception o' racism. we can work with students being taught to see racism in every phrase or image. however, once you censor and self censor education so that mention o' any race issue which could make students uncomfortable is exorcised (and that is the language being used by a few state laws) the opportunities for enlightenment become far more limited. HA! Good Fun!

we were physics at berkeley in late 80s, so not the same as engineering or cs. gut level demographics as am recalling: +80% male. o' the women in the program, almost 25% were foreign nationals, though am gonna note many o' those were working hard to find ways to stay in the US following graduation. in more concrete terms, our graduating class had 'bout 120 awarded a bs in physics. so if our demographic guestimates is correct, 18 woulda' been women who were not foreign nationals. sounds 'bout right. 'course keep in mind we went to a particular inclusive/hippie university... sorta. gotta be careful considering today's environment. refer to young women as "girls" may be seen reflexive as patronizing especial on a board like this where 'cause o' general anonymity most readers will not realize just how old is gorth and that your girls remark is likely a innocuous descriptor o' any woman under 30 (35?) with whom you may have crossed paths over the decades. HA! Good Fun! ps as for demographics, the real curiosity were african americans. the issue got special attention 'cause there were literal two african american students enrolled in undergrad physics during the three years we were enrolled. were a fair number o' latinos but had as many native americans as african americans. explanation were that all the african american students with grades to get into Cal were also getting scholarships for princeton and stanford, so...

y'know, the thing am kinda confused 'bout is the weird preoccupation with indoctrination/wokeness and schools. obvious people has been concerned 'bout school indoctrination since before most boardies were born, but we always just assumed such enculturation/socializing were a fundamental quality o' education. in the US, particular 'round the 1960s or so, there were a general and nationwide effort to help kids overcome the baggage o' bigotry they likely had been shouldering 'cause o' past generations o' reflexive and unconscious prejudices. schools were integrated and teachers were encouraged to create classroom environments where races and genders were treated equitable. am curious why so many sudden think educators teaching kids to avoid bigotry along with chemistry and english grammar is unnecessary or even harmful. am knowing have said this previous, but human brains don't fully develop until teens and as late as mid twenties, and one o' the last stages is the formation o' a personal sense o' moral responsibility and all the rationality and social navigation skills we assume adults should possess, but so few do. schools get as much if not more chances to help kids develop social and moral as does parents and it would be gross negligent if educators treated schools as a lord of the flies or survival game scenario where other than teaching subject mater and maintaining classroom order, teachers allowed kids to teach themselves social etiquette and differences 'tween right and wrong. humans is by nature predatory social creatures who group for protection and target the weak, 'cause doing so is a good approach to survival. 'course this means kids who is different, weak, or part o' a minority group is likely to be the target o' all those base and vulgar behaviors parents pretend only other kids engage. as far as we can tell, perceived complaints o' wokeness in schools is an overt resistance to teachers being reasonable and responsible. generations o' familial and cultural bigotry don't magic disappear if educators take a hands-off approach in schools, promoting a state of nature environment where kids, freed from the immediate supervision o' their parents, make up their own programs o' enculturation and socialization. we want teachers to not only teach subject matter but to model appropriate social behavior, yes? nevertheless, am getting how this happened. the current gop is 'bout grievance and outrage. working class whites is suffering right along with historical minority groups. those whites struggling to make ends meet are angry and rush limbaugh and steve bannon helped convince those whites that they is the real victims o' racial prejudice. the libs wanna save minorities by punishing whites, or somesuch. white privilege is a hard sell to those caucasians who can't find a decent factory job as did their father or has been in danger o' losing the family farm for decades. in 2022, every time a lib mentions race and in almost any context, the new reflexive reaction from working class whites is outrage, and professional whites is willing to be complicit. check reactions to the recent Justice Jackson confirmation hearings. lindsey graham, josh hawley and ted cruz were stoking anger and it failed with most Americans, but that don't mean they failed. those senators were only genuine speaking to those who need outrage. focusing on the Q favorite pedophile angle? point out a public defender defended terrorists? define womanhood? those avenues o' attack were not meant to resonate with white suburban woman, but the gop don't care. the gop needs the trump base to stay outraged, 'cause if they don't stay angry they is gonna realize those lib programs such as infrastructure spending and easing off the trade wars is benefiting them more than were than tax cuts for the rich. the gop is current beholden to maybe ⅓ o' their own party's voters and the recent (complete not surprise) reveals regarding mcconnell and mccarthy make it all too obvious that the gop politicians is all 'bout keeping the base happy regardless o' what they believe is right or good for the republic. inflation should be enough to sink democrats at the midterms, even if the inflation is at least as much the fault o' trump and his fed appointees as it is biden's spending spree. even so, 2022 republicans don't have a real platform other than outrage and grievance. fiscal responsibility went out the window during the trump years. resisting authoritarians abroad, a gop hallmark since nixon has been replaced by the trumpy bromance with putin, xi and their ilk. trade wars 'stead o' free trade? w/o anything real, the gop needs to keep every voter and the only reason a significant number o' working class voters have for choosing the gop instead o' the libs is anger at socialism (but not real socialism), wokeness (whatever wokeness is) and planned parenthood. regardless, am genuine not understanding why woke educators is bad. teachers modeling non bigoted behavior and informing students 'bout historical evils o' government embraced prejudice were good for better than five decades, no? to Gromnir, such educational practices and goals sound positive. so it goes. HA! Good Fun!

april 23, 2020. only two years? HA! Good Fun!

HA! Good Fun!

What to know about the latest student loan forgiveness waiver is gonna be a bit painful for those who defaulted somewhere along the ways, "Consumer advocates are disappointed in this exception because of the 4.4 million people who have been in repayment on their loans for more than 20 years, roughly half are in default. Advocates argue that these people need the most help and have experienced the most harm from a broken repayment system." am recognizing is political difficult to get support for a plan which subsidizes perceived deadbeats. heck, we got people on these boards getting all frothy 'cause o' school lunch programs, so imagine the pushback on student loans being forgiven if the the borrower defaulted at some point. that said, it would appear the folks most in need is gonna be the ones unable to avail themselves o' loan forgiveness. HA! Good Fun! ps am gonna admit we took a long time to repay our loans (didn't need undergrad or grad, but for law school we took max dollar amount possible) but the reason we stretched out repayment is 'cause, curious enough, all those student loan accounts helped our credit rating. we purposeful avoided consolidation, so instead o' having to manage a bunch o' credit cards we didn't want or need, we had a bunch o' different student loan accounts, which perhaps ironic bolstered our credit rating. 'course when we payed off our loans, we went from low 800s to 750ish almost overnight. didn't take us the 25 years to repay needed to avail self o' post grad/professional loan forgiveness, but am suspecting a few o' our contemporaries is still paying.

we almost never went to costco save for gasoline pre pandemic, but we bought a whole lotta fuel as we had a noteworthy daily commute, so the membership were worth it. with retirement and the pandemic, our fuel consumption dropped dramatic. however, during the worst spikes o' the pandemic we frequented costco with a certain amount o' regularity as our neighbors for whom we did shop always wanted costco specific groceries and supplies. not a complete loss as we discovered kirkland brand extra virgin olive oil and balsamic vinegar is excellent. am understanding costco prize for select brands o' booze is also excellent, but as we don't partake, that is less o' a draw. regardless, on a whim we bought a spice rack which claimed to provide free refills for five years... cost us $29.50. we assumed the quality would be dreck, but given how much spice/herbs we go through, for thirty bucks the gamble were negligible. there is negatives. refills is not complete free as there is a delivery charge which means it only makes sense to order refills in batches o' 4, 10, 20, 35, etc. for all intents and purposes, if am ordering 4, is a buy one and get three free deal. not a fan o' their garlic powder. terrible. also, takes 'bout five days to receive a shipment, so if you need tomorrow, is not gonna work. once we did receive oregeno when we had in fact ordered cayenne pepper, but a replacement were sent immediate after we made an email complaint. as one might expect, weight o' refills varies considerable depending on the herb/spice, but the refills appear designed to fill the 3oz (fluid) spice jars which come with the rack... save for bay leaves. am gonna admit am impressed with their bay leaves, but is no way the leaves they send via refills is fitting in a 3oz jar; would have nothing but leaf fragments, and indeed, in the original spice rack we got a jar full o' useless bay leaf scraps which were promptly replaced but only after we took a picture to prove the condition matched our complaint. annoyed. general quality exceeds mccormick or even morton & bassett, save for the aforementioned garlic powder which am wondering if it were nothing but cellulose filler. ordinarily when we use cayenne pepper in a recipe, we double the amount described. am not doubling cayenne with the orii stuff. sinus clearing, but in a good way. few complaints so far. our order history says am averaging four refills a month, so am spending $6.25 on "free" refills monthly. even so, it feels like a decent deal but only 'cause we use so much spice. am mentioning if anybody happens to see the spice rack go on sale at costco and they is curious. HA! Good Fun!

along with absence o' gore, the most oft offered explanations for why falling deaths o' villains is so common in disney movies is as you describe. as such the hero's hands remain clean while the villain falls to death due to pride/hubris/whatever. compare the aforementioned hunchback of notre dame climax from disney to source material or most film versions. in the novel, and not disney, quasimodo hurls frollo to his death. ff to 37:15 HA! Good Fun!

HA! Good Fun!

nothing really 'bout the 80s (or 90s) which set it apart. coulda' added jack nicholson's joker and sean bean from his bond film for 80s and 90s, but if we get 70s and 00s you are gonna have a similar list o' notables. however, am suspecting the obvious answer as to why is 'cause it is a common nightmare scenario. only 'bout a bazillion links, yes? show dramatic falling is a straight shot to the id or somesuch. director is gonna get an emotional response which resonates with many in spite o' fact nobody in the audience has actual experienced such a death themselves. HA! Good Fun!

1 2 and from 2000s there were no shortage o' such 3 ' course gollum goes out similar. we used death o' saruman in rotk 'cause is homage to christopher lee's death scene from sins of dracula (1970). peter jackson is a serious horror film nerd, so no accident. regardless, is a whole lotta disney films which do the villain falling to death starting from seven dwarfs and continuing through the decades and is no shortage o' imitators.... though admitted, pretty much every hunchback of notre dame film is gonna have such a scene, and there has been at least ten going back to 1911(?). HA! Good Fun! ps (edit): obvious king kong (33,76, 05) will be the most famous use o' the literal fall o' the antagonist, but we tend to not put kong in the villain role 'though "bad guys" works.

the real real slim shady HA! Good Fun!

puns, eh? well then, am gonna suggest nato may sweden the deal before they is finnished. and that effort at pun should last us another six months. HA! Good Fun!

another unfortunate and predictable side-effect o' the pandemic, other than inflation, has been the rise o' rat aggressiveness and even cannibalism. warning: the following clip may be too disturbing for sensitive viewers is exactly the kinda thing which shoulda' been anticipated, though perhaps some good may come from this if enough o' the filthy rodents destroy each other. HA! Good Fun!

gołąbki/cabbage rolls is kinda ubiquitous eastern european with all kinda small variations depending on region and the babushka from whom one learned the recipe, but is near universal delicious in spite o' simplicity. gonna admit we never use canned stewed tomatoes. have never made cabbage roll soup, but soup is not terribly hard and is having fundamental steps. if we were gonna make a cabbage roll soup, sans the rolls, we would likely do something similar to lc but replace the stewed tomatoes (though is a personal thing as we can't recall the last time we used stewed tomatoes) with whole tomatoes we hand crush to an extreme degree (in a non metallic bowl) or perhaps take a stick blender to the tomatoes and puree, add a bunch o' marjoram, black pepper and cooked rice to ingredients she already mentions. maybe add a bit o' stock. probable avoid the jalapeno. finish with the aforementioned sour cream and dill your significant other prefers. since is a soup, am gonna go more heavy on tomatoes and more stingy on rice and meat. anticipated steps: in a dutch oven sweat the onions in olive oil and/or butter then add garlic, salt and spices and cook for a minute. add in the cabbage and dehydrate to desired amount. meat(s), tomatoes, rice and stock goes in the pot, bring to near boil and then reduce to simmer and cook for thirty minutes to an hour. would also recommend adding a whole carrot, quartered. fish the carrot out at end o' cooking. is natural sugars in the carrot which is gonna cut the acidity o' the tomatoes w/o altering the flavour o' the soup. can always stick blender the soup if you want it smoother than what you got. serve with the sour cream and dill. am suspecting your wife and in-laws would enjoy the result, or perhaps they would wonder why you were too lazy to make cabbage rolls and as such the experiment would be an utter fail. if you are genuine curious, we could trial and error a bit and come up with a cabbage roll soup recipe with specific ingredients, quantities and steps... give us a month as am just finished with our easter feast for visiting family and am kinda cooked out and also lacking refrigerator space as is filled with leftovers. HA! Good Fun!