Random talk thread: It just keeps happening

[Momo]

25 - 35 is about what our summers are like here. I dont like our summers, 30 ish isnt the hottest but it's enough to bother me

[Freyj]

Plano, Texas [suburb on the north side of Dallas] has been going crazy with Asian businesses the past couple of years. Tons of restaurants, even grocery stores like H-Mart, Jusgo, and Mitsuwa Marketplace, and a major Japanese bookstore chain [Kinokuniya] put down two locations. I try to get down there at least once or twice a month [it's about 70 miles south of where I live] to check out something new. Joe and I hit up this ramen shop the other day and then got some after-dinner dessert at a place called Kung Fu Tea that has some pretty great Taiwan-inspired teas [I had some winter melon milk green tea with bubbles and it was gooood]. Wish they could put some of that stuff closer to where I live, but having spent my entire life living in the armpit of nowhere, an hour-long drive isn't really that big of a deal.

Also, it makes me super-envious that a slime appears lives right in the middle of all that.

Durant? My wife graduated HS from Durant iirc.

[Great Rumbler]

Durant? My wife graduated HS from Durant iirc.

I live way out in the sticks, but Durant was where I went to university.

[Raist]

London is a sauna right now. Plz send halp.

Hot in London is like 14 degrees Celsius isnt it?

It's ~30˚C these days. With 70-80% humidity 

[Momo]

London is a sauna right now. Plz send halp.

Hot in London is like 14 degrees Celsius isnt it?

It's ~30˚C these days. With 70-80% humidity 

It's pretty rainy and London here currently, but then again it's winter in the cape of storms. Never expected you guys to get close to our summers though. RIP pomland.

[toku]

baby oil is really good at removing tape residue from surfaces

[brawndolicious]

In California, every day this week is going to get above 100F/40C. I'm a very cheap man but I actually turned on the AC for the first time in years last night.

[Valkyrie]

40C? Holy shit. When I was in Tunisia in Africa it was 40C. We had to stay indoor to basically not die of a heatstoke. It gets around 34C during August in Tokyo. Sometimes it's humid as well, kinda unbearable. I personally prefer too hot to too cold though. Norwegian winters are pretty fucking cold though.

[I'm a Puppy!]

In Sactown yesterday it got to 107.

[etiolate]

Yes, it sucks here right now. Started laying mulch today at noon. It's hotter than satan's ass cavity out there.

[Freyj]

Durant? My wife graduated HS from Durant iirc.

I live way out in the sticks, but Durant was where I went to university.

It's all the sticks to me in this state.

[Great Rumbler]

You're not kidding, man.

But I literally live outside of a town that has a population of less than 150, soo...

[Valkyrie]

150? Sounds like high potential of incest.

[Raist]

In Sactown yesterday it got to 107.

Pls use real units.

[I'm a Puppy!]

In Sactown yesterday it got to 107.

Pls use real units.

42 for you godless, freedom haters.

[Madrun Badrun]

107 sounds hotter

[Momo]

winter >>>> summer

[Madrun Badrun]

Seriously, when I become God-Emperor I plan to wage a thousand year war on the sun and, when I win, my people will create great cities under the surface and evolve into mole people.   

[Raist]

In Sactown yesterday it got to 107.

Pls use real units.

42 for you godless, freedom haters.

It's always 42.

Also:




That's right. You're in the losers team with Myanmar and Liberia.

The brits, as usual, just want to pretend they're special.

[Mupepe]

What about India and Singapore?  My counterparts there along with real estate leases always provide area in square feet. 

[I'm a Puppy!]

I'll admit the metric system is superior for everything...other than temperature for non-scientific purposes. Fahrenheit is a much better way to measure how a temperature feels.

[Raist]

What about India and Singapore?  My counterparts there along with real estate leases always provide area in square feet.

Dunno about Singapore. India adopted the metric system shortly after they got their independence.

Freedom = metric.


edit: well, same for Singapore apparently.

I'll admit the metric system is superior for everything...other than temperature for non-scientific purposes. Fahrenheit is a much better way to measure how a temperature feels.

Ehh, that's just because you're used to it. If you tell me it's 25˚F I have no idea if that's supposed to be OK or cold  or freezing without taking a second calculating the conversion.

Conversely the water state reference points for metric (0 = freezing, 100 = boiling) make it really obvious

[etiolate]

Fahrenheit is supreme.


IT'S 100 DEGREES >>> IT IS 37 DEGREES

[brawndolicious]

British use stones for weight, miles for distance, and Celsius for temperature yet everybody thinks Americans are self centered. We just don't like to use decimal points because we're lazy, that's all.

I work in an industry that uses liters, acre-feet, and gallons so stop your whining.

[Madrun Badrun]

I keep watching superfat vs superskinny and in the later seasons they send the fat one over to the states to talk to an even fatter person and they always make them state their weight but its a UK show so it goes like 'Hi, I'm Billy-bob and I weight 42 stones' and it sounds so silly coming from an american.   

[CatsCatsCats]

Clearly the more spread out degrees of Fahrenheit make more useful to interpret local weather temperatures. Metric is better for anything requiring calculations across the board, obviously

[Madrun Badrun]

No, we just need more precise thermostats reporting to the hundredth of a degree.  Weather reporting are only an average anyways highly dependent on very local conditions, so don't need a lot of precision. I.e. don't try to defend Fahrenheit in anyway.  It's gross. 

[Beezy]

winter >>>> summer

If you're white or fat, sure.

[Rufus]

Clearly the more spread out degrees of Fahrenheit make more useful to interpret local weather temperatures. Metric is better for anything requiring calculations across the board, obviously

Americans claim to be able to differentiate between 75 and 77 Fahrenheit (or similarly granular measurements), but I'm not so sure about that...

[Mupepe]

Clearly the more spread out degrees of Fahrenheit make more useful to interpret local weather temperatures. Metric is better for anything requiring calculations across the board, obviously

Americans claim to be able to differentiate between 75 and 77 Fahrenheit (or similarly granular measurements), but I'm not so sure about that...

75 is ok sleeping temperature. 77 has me kicking off the covers and pissed off. We can tell.

[Rufus]

I remain sceptical.

[Atramental]

I don't fall asleep as fast if the room temp is above 65 °F.

[Madrun Badrun]

cause 66 and up is working temperature

[Rufus]

I don't fall asleep as fast if the room temp is above 65 °F.

But would you be able to discern 65F from 66F? 

I ask this because I don't think I'd be able to reliably tell the difference between 24C and 25C. Those translate to 75F and 77F.

That's not even counting things like humidity and wind speed, which can affect subjectively felt temperatures by a lot.

[Madrun Badrun]

I'm not american but my old place had a stat in Fahrenheit and I could tell the difference, but I consider myself heat sensitive, i.e. a hot pansy. 

[Momo]

Fahrenheit is a much harder sell than Celsius, as mentioned it's easy for day to day because 0 is freezing and 100 is boiling (in relation to water) so we can all sort of picture that. It's not immediately evident what 45 F space bucks is in relation to well known temps like the aforementioned. 

[etiolate]

Well that's sort of the difference. Celsius is good for measuring state of water. Fahrenheit is good for relating human experience with heat. If it's boiling water you're in as a human being then you're more concerned about the ogres cooking you than its Fahrenheit conversion.

[chronovore]

40C? Holy shit. When I was in Tunisia in Africa it was 40C. We had to stay indoor to basically not die of a heatstoke. It gets around 34C during August in Tokyo. Sometimes it's humid as well, kinda unbearable. I personally prefer too hot to too cold though. Norwegian winters are pretty fucking cold though.

Los Angeles' version of 40ºc and Tokyo's version feel entirely different, due to humidity. I've been in 47ºc (117ºf) in Vegas, and it was WAY more comfortable than 40ºc in Japan.

[Madrun Badrun]

ya, I can do 40 in Saskatchewan with no humidity but can't do 30 in Toronto

[Madrun Badrun]

Live in a country where even the weather is oppressive SMH

[toku]

I live in florida, y'all don't even know humidity. I was born in it, molded by it. I didn't see dry heat until I was already a man. The humidity betrays you because they belong to me.

[Mupepe]

I thought Florida and East Texas humidity were bad until I went to Costa Rica. Fuck that.

[CatsCatsCats]

The average annual humidity in Oregon is like 80%, I dry up like a worm on hot pavement when I leave my little temperate rainforest

[chronovore]

I live in a very humid part of Saudi and it's torture come July. 45-55C(sometimes up to 60) with humidity 

HOW ARE YOU ALIVE?

[Valkyrie]

I live in a very humid part of Saudi and it's torture come July. 45-55C(sometimes up to 60) with humidity 

HOW ARE YOU ALIVE?

I'm not.

How do you deal with stuff like going to work, going outside etc? What the fuck.

[chronovore]

I just expect to sweat and tan on my way to wherever I'm going.

I don't tan, I only burn. And sweat, it runs from me in rivers here in summer. I hate it here, and I have NO IDEA what I'd do in your situation. Immigrate to Greenland, breh.

[Brehvolution]

I just expect to sweat and tan on my way to wherever I'm going.

I always wondered how you were so tan.   

[CatsCatsCats]

Mmmmm Greek food with olives

[chronovore]

olives are pretty tasty

and im talking about shitty supermarket olives

i wonder how good proper quality olives taste like

There are plenty of supermarkets which have bulk olives; they'll let you taste several IIRC.

[VomKriege]

Any students of ancient history here?

I feel like I wanna learn some stuff about ancient empires and stuff but I get the feeling not enough is known with great certainty and that makes the whole endeavor of learning about this stuff seem kinda pointless. I'm interested how people lived their lives, day to day, what the culture was like, what the music sounded like, what they ate, smoked, etc. I'm not interested in some bullshit about this or that general invading this or that hellhole which seems to be what ancient history books are about.

There's plenty of that stuff for sure. Scientific books will point out the parts where things must be inferred (for instance private religion in Rome is not well understood, while we have a lot of stuff for public life). A lot of History in academics is really about ground level, practical issues.
Medieval Europe, Roman, Greeks, Egyptians, Judea/Israël all had a lot of coverage in Western studies. Any serious book discussing the historicity (or lack thereof) of the Bible or Jesus will draw heavily from archeology and literary analysis to try to build a faithful framework of how people actually lived.

In that vein you can try The Bible Unearthed maybe though it's archeology focused. It discuss how villages were organized in the Bronze age for instance.

[Raist]

Book of the Dead (Egypt) is pretty cool.

[Madrun Badrun]

Chicken and waffles is a thing?

[Joe Molotov]

Chicken and waffles is a thing?

Yes

[Madrun Badrun]

Is it a breakfast thing? 

[Bebpo]

Anyone here know anything about buying houses?

[CatsCatsCats]

Anyone here know anything about buying houses?

Well, I've done it twice, but I wouldn't say I'm an expert

[FatalT]

Chicken and waffles is a thing?

It's such a thing that Lay's Potato Chips made it a flavor:

[Mupepe]

Anyone here know anything about buying houses?

I've bought my own home, and I do real estate for work (though mostly commercial). I've also taken the licensing courses for Texas Real Estate but was too lazy to go get my license. I can try to help if you have questions.

[Bebpo]

Anyone here know anything about buying houses?

Well, I've done it twice, but I wouldn't say I'm an expert

Anyone here know anything about buying houses?

I've bought my own home, and I do real estate for work (though mostly commercial). I've also taken the licensing courses for Texas Real Estate but was too lazy to go get my license. I can try to help if you have questions.

Thanks guys. I'm being told real estate is still a good investment right now, but idk prices are so high I feel like if I buy something now it'll be near the top of the bubble and it'd make more sense to wait for the next crash and pick up a house as things are falling while in the meantime investing in short term low-risk stuff for 3-6 years until that happens.

I don't really need a house, but all the condos in my group are selling super fast for a lot of money and I'm in the middle of fixing my place up in case I want to sell. I took a look at houses in the area but nothing really caught my eye. Also I'm a little concerned about upping my mortgage payments (my mortgage is really low right now on my condo) because even an extra 2k a month means 24k (plus higher property taxes/insurance/utilities, so more like 30k) less a year to have in pocket for necessities and enjoyment of life seems like a big lifestyle hit just to invest. I'm not really feeling home buying and just wanted to hear some pro-home buying thoughts from home owners.

[brawndolicious]

If you're already building equity on a property, I'd think it would be wise to wait until there's a dip in the market. Especially as LA has a housing scarcity, I imagine waiting a few years will cause supply to catch up a bit and it'll be cheaper.

I might be biased since I'm hoping the market goes down again.