The Off Topic Topic

[grumbler]

The tree would be white if this was supposed to be Aragorn.  I think that this is Feanor presenting the plans for the creation of the Silmarils (thus the golden tree).

Look at Teddy Roosevelt on the right side.  He obviously understands that Feanor's plan is just going to attract Ungoliant.

[Syt]

This sounds like hell. 

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Clive_Wearing

On 27 March 1985, Wearing, then an acknowledged expert in early music at the height of his career with BBC Radio 3, contracted herpesviral encephalitis, a herpes simplex virus that attacked his central nervous system. Since this point, he has been unable to store new memories. He has also been unable to associate memories effectively, or to control his emotions, exhibiting unstable moods.

Wearing developed a profound case of total amnesia as a result of his illness. Because of damage to the hippocampus, an area required to transfer memories from short-term to long-term memory, he is completely unable to form lasting new memories – his memory only lasts between 7 and 30 seconds. He spends every day "waking up" every 20 seconds, "restarting" his consciousness once the time span of his short term memory elapses (about 30 seconds). During this time, he repeatedly questions why he has not seen a doctor, as he constantly believes he has only recently awoken from a comatose state. If engaged in discussion, Wearing is able to provide answers to questions, but cannot stay in the flow of conversation for longer than a few sentences and is angered if asked about his current situation.

Wearing remembers little of his life before 1985; he knows, for example, that he has children from an earlier marriage, but cannot remember their names. His love for his second wife, Deborah, whom he married the year prior to his illness, is undiminished. He greets her joyously every time they meet, either believing he has not seen her in years or that they have never met before, even though she may have just left the room momentarily. When he goes out dining with his wife, he can remember the name of the food (e.g. chicken); however he cannot link it with taste, as he forgets what food he is eating by the time it has reached his mouth.

In a diary provided by his caretakers, Wearing was encouraged to record his thoughts. Page after page was filled with entries similar to the following:

8:31 AM: Now I am really, completely awake.
9:06 AM: Now I am perfectly, overwhelmingly awake.
9:34 AM: Now I am superlatively, actually awake.

Earlier entries were usually crossed out, since he forgot having made an entry within minutes and dismissed the writings: he did not know how the entries were made or by whom, although he did recognise his own writing. Wishing to record "waking up for the first time", he still wrote diary entries in 2007, more than two decades after he started them.

Wearing can learn new practices and even a very few facts—not from episodic memory or encoding, but by acquiring new procedural memories through repetition. For example, having watched a certain video recording multiple times on successive days, he never had any memory of ever seeing the video or knowing the contents, but he was able to anticipate certain parts of the content without remembering how he learned them.

Despite having no memory of specific musical pieces when mentioned by name and an extremely limited recall of his previous musical knowledge, Wearing remains capable of playing complex piano and organ pieces, sight-reading, and conducting a choir.

In a 2005 documentary, Wearing was interviewed about the experience of his condition:

- You're the first human beings I've seen, the three of you. Two men and one lady. The first....people I've seen since I've been ill. No difference between day and night. No thoughts at all. No dreams. Day and night, the same – blank. Precisely like death.
- Is it very hard?
- No. It's exactly the same as being dead, which is not difficult, is it? To be dead is easy. You don't do anything at all. You can't do anything, when you are dead. It's been the same. Exactly.
- Do you miss your old life?
- Yes. But I've never been conscious to think that. So I've never been bored or upset. I've never been anything at all, it's exactly the same as death. No dreams even. Day and night, the same.
- When you miss your old life, you say "yes, I miss my old life", what do you miss?
- The fact that I was a musician. And in love.

[Sheilbh]

God that is awful

Slightly relevant MacMillan quip. In 1963 when Alec Douglas-Home was taking over as PM from MacMillan, Home asked if he had any advice. MacMillan replied: "My dear boy, as long as you do not invade Afghanistan you will be absolutely fine."

[Josquius]

Flicking through the channels 50 (30? 300? some number) first dates was on. That Adam Sandler film with a similar premise only its a day for the woman there.
It does indeed seem like hell.


In other news. Apple fans suck.
Discussing with my sister what to get my dad for his birthday she mentions he needs a new phone case. So I say amongst other stuff I'll get him one, what phone does he have.
Her answer?
"A7".
OK. An A7. Not the most super common but findable enough.
.....but its too big.
He doesn't have an A7. He has an iphone 7. Bloody sister just assumes everyone thinks in iphone terms

[Sheilbh]

What and why is "cash buyers only"?

[crazy canuck]

Is the kid pointing out the establishment clause?

[The Minsky Moment]

Looks like the second half of article 1 section 5 or the first half of article 1 section 6.

[Tonitrus]

Looks like the second half of article 1 section 5 or the first half of article 1 section 6.

I went and pulled up a high-res of the page...and agree, deep in Section 6. 

Section. 6.
The Senators and Representatives shall receive a Compensation for their Services, to be ascertained by Law, and paid out of the Treasury of the United States. They shall in all Cases, except Treason, Felony and Breach of the Peace, be privileged from Arrest during their Attendance at the Session of their respective Houses, and in going to and returning from the same; and for any Speech or Debate in either House, they shall not be questioned in any other Place.

[Caliga]

I assume that's a king of Gondor in the center, based on the robe?

Also I just noticed Darth Sidious in the painting (far right, centerish).

[The Minsky Moment]

I assume that's a king of Gondor in the center, based on the robe?

Also I just noticed Darth Sidious in the painting (far right, centerish).

it's Satan with his minions - Hollywood, the news media, a lawyer, a biology teacher with Darwin's Origin of Species, and a pregnant woman.

[PDH]

Nice that Franklin is sporting a goatee - it helps him connect with the youths.

[Neil]

I assume that's a king of Gondor in the center, based on the robe?

Also I just noticed Darth Sidious in the painting (far right, centerish).

it's Satan with his minions - Hollywood, the news media, a lawyer, a biology teacher with Darwin's Origin of Species, and a pregnant woman.

And the judge.  The kind of people who would paint pictures of Jesus holding up the Constitution like some kind of Ten Commandments generally despise the judiciary.  In addition to all the social decisions run through the courts, there's always a smug judge standing over them every time they blow up a federal building.

[Sheilbh]

Looked up the book the black guy bottom left is holding and good lord this is niche:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Five_Thousand_Year_Leap

[Syt]

The judge is probably a Supreme Court Judge. Scattered in front of him are several Supreme Court decisions. Also, does the guy to the right of what's supposed to be Reagan look like Stephen Miller?

[Sheilbh]

The judge is probably a Supreme Court Judge. Scattered in front of him are several Supreme Court decisions. Also, does the guy to the right of what's supposed to be Reagan look like Stephen Miller?

Stephen Miller/Stanley Tucci.