Josh Ritter’s Kathleen performance from Live at the Iveagh Gardens has far and away subsumed the studio version for me. The original track is fine, I guess, but there’s some kind of alchemy in that live performance that takes it from a kinda sleepy singer/songwriter ballad to a roots rock revival jam. Or something like that. Idk, I’m certainly no music critic, but I know which version I prefer.

What’s going on in the upper right of the motel building? I see a laundry room, but is that a mail room next to it? With all the packages and the location’s “seedy” nature, makes me think some of the guests or employees might be operating a small scale distribution center of some kind…

I love this running gag.

You’re the one suggesting that your lack of attraction to these character models is an objective flaw. Which is, of course, semantically silly, if nothing else. Not finding a character (or person) attractive for whatever reason is your business. Taking to the forum and yelling about androgyny being objectively unattractive (in an online space which I’d wager has a disproportionate representation of trans and NB individuals) is an interesting choice.

That’s an incredibly evocative simile that ultimately still has me unsure of whether it’s good or bad.

Grew up in Nebraska. It’s a point of really lame civic pride among the population that paid attention in elementary school social studies.

For some reason, I had it in my head that Maine also operated a unicameral, however that appears to not be the case. They tried to adopt it in 2009, but the measure failed. So, I’m not 100% sure what factoid I’m misremembering, but I know there is some strange kinship between Maine and Nebraska local politics.

Have no fear, Pedantic Man is here!

Almost every state has a House and a Senate. Nebraska (as well as the Virgin Islands and Guam, if you want to include territorial legislatures) operates a unicameral, technically non-partisan (as in, party affiliation isnt “officially” acknowledged), legislature.

You’re welcome, citizen! Pedantic Man, up, up, and away!

3/10, do not recommend

Review complete, the next 19 minutes will be spent processing existential dread.

this ONE thing is for him

I’m a homm2 guy myself ( shout out fheroes2 engine ), but I can’t sympathize with you on that front. Much like some folks’ relationship with Civ, I’m constantly in a “one more turn” loop when I play, to the point that I won’t boot it up if it’s after a certain time haha

Whether or not I factor in tax is entirely dependent on the size of the purchase I’m making. For the vast majority of purchases I make on a daily basis, I don’t think about it at all. 7% of $2.99 is negligible to me. However, if I’m making a large purchase, or if it’s a purchase which I know is subject to additional taxes beyond the sales tax, then I might consider it. 7% of $2.99 may be negligible, but 7% of $29,999 is a significant amount all by its lonesome.

For most people, I’d imagine this is most common when it comes to purchasing vehicles, as those tend to carry large prices and special taxes which results in a significant increase in price. For example, I purchased a new vehicle a couple years ago for MSRP, but wound up paying several thousand dollars more than that due to various taxes and the registration fees. I didn’t know exactly how much those surcharges would be (though I easily could have calculated them by visiting my state’s Department of Motor Vehicles website and plugging a figure or two into their calculator) but I had a ball park idea which I could budget around. Also, I’m pretty sure the dealership I bought from provided an estimated total purchase price which included the fees for the locality it was located in. Unfortunately, most of that was irrelevant to me, as I had traveled from another state to purchase this vehicle, which illustrates the minor frustrations that an all-inclusive price tag would introduce in America.

Like, I don’t think you’re wrong for thinking it’s odd, and yes, there are ways to fix it, but it’s just such a non-issue (not to mention America’s “touchy” relationship with taxation meaning these attempts to “fix” things would rapidly become politicized) that no one cares to do anything about it. As someone else said, we intuitively learn what the rough tax rate will be for our common purchases and just factor that in.

Yes, I also really struggled with his writing style. It felt like he was layering in additional degrees of obfuscation by creating meta-characters and framing his philosophical points in the form of fictionalized conversations from this road trip he took. Like, bud, you’re already talking about abstracted concepts like Platonic Good. Do we REALLY need more abstraction?

To which Prisig, author of the most (financially) successful book on philosophy in America, would say, “Evidently, yes.”

At least Thoreau came by his difficult to parse writing style honestly, being a product of the 19th century and all.

Could very well be. Similarly to Walden, I read it for school, and did not much care for it. One of the few concrete points I remember being discussed was a comparison between a character that rides a rickety old bike, but knows how to keep it running, and the character who rides a new bike, but relies on mechanics when things do inevitably break on it. That sort of rumination on a man who can fix things being happier than a man who can’t is basically the entire premise of Walden.

Furthermore, in refreshing my memory of what subjects Prisig touched upon, I see/vaguely remember his attempts to reconcile rational empiricism with intuitive understanding, which is also very Thoreau.

However, as I’ve said, I didn’t particularly enjoy my brush with either text, and it’s been 15+ years since I last looked through either. So, it’s entirely possible that they are actually philosophical polar opposites and my C- in Philosophy 101 was well earned.

This comes from the introduction to “Walden, or, Life in the Woods”, in which the author gets fed up with modern (1840s) society and fucks off to the woods of Massachusetts for a little over 2 years. During this time he attempted to be fully self-reliant, building his residence from the ground up and eating only what he could hunt or gather. It is emblematic of the American transcendentalism movement, which emphasized connection with nature, self-reliance, and intuitive knowledge of truth. It was, in essence, the Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance of its day, if you’re aware of that book.

I read it in high school and I did not think much of it at that time. I think, perhaps, it would find more fertile ground in my thoughts now, were I to revisit it. Certainly in the decades since first reading it, I’ve become more sympathetic to the idea of pissing off to the woods and minding my own business until I expire.

This retrospective/review may be of interest to you if the series holds nostalgia value.

https://lemmy.world/c/okbuddyrosalyn

Get in on the ground floor, buddy.

For some reason I always figured CCP was an independent outfit, based on how they’ve handled EVE over the years. I know there were some rumblings about the business model a few years back, but, by and large, everything seems to be done with a fairly hands off ethos.

FATAL, now roll an anal circumference saving throw.

I didn’t even realize that there was another strike ongoing until yesterday, when I watched this Maggie Robertson (Vampire Dommy Mommy from RE8) interview. She even mentions that word wasn’t really out there about it at the time of the interview. Glad to hear it resolved enough that the union was willing to end the strike.

Link to the interview, if you’re curious. She’s very funny.