The Off Topic Topic

[Sheilbh]

It comes with two two-bedroom cottages for putting visitors in. One of the few good features 

Literally the dream. Able to be a gracious host, also physically separated from visitors.

[FunkMonk]

So the cicadas are out and about now where I live. Imagine seeing hundreds of the rather large red-eyes bugs everywhere you walk and a constant high-pitched humming every minute of every day. 

[Syt]

New supermarket 15 minutes walking distance from me in the former Bank Austria headquarters.









More images: https://presse.spar.at/news-schlemmen-im-historischen-kassensaal?id=133938&menueid=778&l=deutsch

[Zanza]

Nice! 

[Valmy]

Man that is one fancy grocery store.

[Admiral Yi]

That is not a very efficient use of prime real estate.  So much wasted floor space.

[Jacob]

[DGuller]

 

[crazy canuck]

Fuck Off

[Malthus]

So the cicadas are out and about now where I live. Imagine seeing hundreds of the rather large red-eyes bugs everywhere you walk and a constant high-pitched humming every minute of every day. 

Every time I hear the cicadas, I am reminded of the horrifying Greek origin myth.

Story goes like this:

The goddess of dawn fell in love with a mortal man. They were very happy together. Only one problem weighed on her mind: he was a mortal, so bound to die.

So she went to Zeus, king of the gods, and asked for a favour. He agreed, on the condition she only ever ask for one favour - she asked that Zeus make the man immortal.

Unfortunately, she forgot to ask that he also not age ... so as the years went by, he got older, and older. The goddess still cared for him, but could do nothing as he became an old man, then withered into a living skeleton ... and still he kept getting older.

At first, he begged her to get Zeus to make him young. But she could not. As time went on, he begged her to be allowed the sweet release of death. That too was impossible.

Finally, he withered so much, he transformed into a cicada. His begging and pleading became a dull droning - the call of the cicada. Still begging, pleading to die - and being denied.

[crazy canuck]

That is horrific!

[Razgovory]

Every time I hear Cicadas I think of that nightmarish summer where the 17 year brood, the 5 year brood and the annual brood all came up at the same time.  They covered every surface outside my home.  During the day there was so many on the walls of my house I couldn't' see the brickwork.  At night the ground appeared to crawl and every stepped crushed a dozen of them.  There were so many Cicadas that the weight of them brought down tree branches.  There was no way to drown out the sound they made.  You couldn't hear the television or the radio or anything.  Just the horrible drone.  I could even hear them with headphones on while playing the music as loud as possible.

[Sheilbh]

Stagnation

Edit: I think I've mentioned it before but I also always notice this watching films and TV shows from all over. There is a point - my theory is it's the mid 2000s and the introduction of smartphones - where there's just more of a flattening of aesthetics - things start to look the same/come from the same palate and we are still living in that moment. I think it's really striking if you then watch, say Goldeneye v For Your Eyes Only or any film from 2000 v a film from 1986. The difference is just so much more stark and diverse (UK looks different from the US etc) compared to now v 2008.

[grumbler]

2021 is as far


from 1969 as 1969 is


from 1917

[Jacob]

That's something alright.