Jamie123

Forget "gender fluidity" - we're now getting into the realms of "age fluidity". On TV this morning there was a 69 year-old man who just lost a court battle to identify as a 49-year old. This is an earlier interview with the same guy on YouTube:

I love those books - "That Hideous Strength" gets panned a lot (including by Lewis fans) but I love it. It's one of those books ("Lord of the Rings" is another) I can just pick up, open at random and disappear into.

You're right - the planets do wander (that is actually what the Greek πλανήτης (planetes) means), as does the Moon. But Venus - nor even the Moon - would not have moved much in the hour-or-so between me seeing them at the bus stop and looking for them in daylight from the car park here at my work. The relative positions of the Earth, Moon, Sun and Venus would not have changed appreciably in that period - what would have changed is the Earth had rotated so as to make the sun visible. Now that I know roughly where Venus is relative to the Moon (which should hold true for a few days at least) maybe I'll try getting the telescope out and looking for it. Oddly enough, "Lucifer" is Latin for "light bearer" and does not appear in the Hebrew scriptures at all. It was the common name for Venus at the time St. Jerome translated the Bible into Latin, and it's been passed on into the KJV and certain other English versions. Construing "Light Bringer Son of the Morning" (in Hebrew) from Isiah 14 as an allusion to the morning star, Jerome substituted the term most familiar to him. There's even debate about whether this is even a reference to Satan at all.

"You might as well be naughty!!"

I've been told from childhood that you can see Venus in full daylight if you know exactly where to look. I even had an astronomy program once that had a "daylight" option which, when you clicked it still showed Venus. Well I've never been able to see it despite trying many times. All that happens is that a bunch of squiggly things start dancing in my eyes. This morning I was waiting for the bus to work. It was twilight - too bright to see any of the stars but Venus stood out amazingly bright, just to the left of the Moon. I thought "Just remember where it is relative to the Moon, and you'll easily be able to see it when it's brighter." Well it's full daylight now and I just went outside to look for Venus. I can't see any sign of it - despite looking exactly in the spot where I know it is. It seems incredible that something that seemed so bright and clear has just faded in the daylight. (I feel there ought to be a spiritual lesson there.) The squiggly things were back in force though, taunting me as usual. Just for interest sake, has anyone else had any success seeing Venus in daytime?

I was thinking more of this: Interesting to see what's in the background: "My Brain", "Large Cabbage" and what looks like the formula for standard deviation. It would also be interesting to know what the "50 Weirdest Bible Stories" are... (I can think of some pretty weird ones without even trying!)

Depends what people: BMW drivers: "The New Expanded French-English Dictionary" (in 20 volumes, including the 50-page introduction by Professor Slytherin Dullman). People who throw empty beer cans and chip packets on the sidewalk 20 feet from a litter bin: "Economic History of Belarus 1841-1901" by Martin Drudge and Elliot Rubblethorn. Dog-lovers who not only hate cats, but give cat-lovers a hard time: "Mr. Tiddles Likes His Supper" by Dame Harriet Kitticute. Dr. Richard "Atheism Plus" Carrier Ph.D.: "Professor Bumble-Brain's Big Bumper Book of the Bible".

Reminds me of this old classic:

Heresy??? I'll report you to the Brigadier if you're not careful!

I showed that last one to my wife, who is now accusing me of "destroying her idol" - like I'm to blame!!! I'm taking our 13-year-old daughter to Comic Con this coming weekend, and I've been given a severe warning NOT to dress up as Wonder Woman - or else she will "NOT want to be seen with you!" Kids, hey?? She (my daughter) even said I looked like "an idiot" last weekend when I wore a grass skirt to my wife's Hawaiian 50th birthday party. (Like that wasn't the point!) And she flatly refused to wear the grass skirt I'd bought for her! Believe it or not, this is the same daughter who - a few years ago - was happy to join in with my 1980s-Weetabix-commercial-reenactments down the supermarket cereal aisle! ("If you know what's good for you, you do!!") Kids lose all sense of fun when they hit their teens!

For a long time I've been voicing the opinion (till everyone's sick of hearing me) that a female Doctor Who makes as much sense as a male Wonder Woman. Now that he/she's arrived I'm a little more sanguine: Jodie Whittaker is certainly the sort of woman a transsexual Doctor Who might choose to be. (There's definitely something of Tom Baker about her!) But there's something else that's bothering me. Who (excuse the pun) died on 22 November 1963? J.F. Kennedy you'll tell me, shot (as any fule kno) by aliens on the Grassy Knoll. Yes - but who else? Well Aldous Huxley - author of Brave New World died that same day. As did C.S. Lewis who invented the wardrobe. And the very next day, on 23 November 1963, the very first episode of Doctor Who was broadcast. William Hartnell playing Doctor Who and Carole Ann Ford his granddaughter Susan. All three famous men missed being Whovians by 1 day! This useless information is brought to you free of charge (and without guarantee) courtesy of the "The Best Doctor Who was Jon Pertwee (and Mary Tamm was way better (and sexier) Romana than Lala Ward) Society".

A lot of Americans come to the UK expecting to be faced with distances in kilometers and speeds in km/h and - having wasted days researching these things - are astonished to learn that we use miles here, same as they do. Furthermore we measure people's heights in feet (not metres) weight in pounds (except at the doctors clinic where it is in kg) and milk and beer in pints. About the only things we do use metric for are temperature (degrees C) and fuel (litres). It's worth noting though that a British pint is not the same as a US pint - it's slightly more.

Interesting! Classylady and Mirkwood are both more-or-less what I had expected. Pam, Neurotypical and Estradling: I've so long associated them with their avatars that its hard to say. The real surprise is Just_A_Guy - don't ask me why, but somehow I never imagined he'd be the only man at the table with a jacket and tie!

...I am officially scarred for life.

I spoke too soon...

Hmmm...I can't usually be bothered to go hunting through menus - I just want to write my code. I just looked up this business of using int as the return type for main(). Someone on one BBS gave a very stern warning that you must NEVER EVER EVER use "void main()" otherwise (presumably) you'll get eaten by grizzly bears. Well I've used C and C++ for over 20 years and I've never had so much as a bear cub nibble my toes. Strange...

I'm definitely the first type. Also I like while statements to be on their own line, below the closing } of the block. Also I hate the way the new MS Visual Studio inserts spaces for you. I like to decide myself where spaces go. For comments I vastly prefer // to /* ... */. (I only ever use the latter to "comment out" code blocks temporarily.) I dislike the way most C++ textbooks tell you to give main() an integer return value, and include a totally pointless return 0; at the last line. (I daresay a dozen people will give me twenty good reasons why this is done, but none of you are going to persuade me to give up using void main();)

The other day on "Good Morning Britain" they were talking about Trump's meeting with Kim (Kardashian that is, not Jong Un) and someone asked Piers Morgan who his favourite Kardashian was. I can't remember what his answer was, but all I can say is this: I miss the old Kardashians - back when they used the proper spelling "Cardassian" - and they stomped around Deep Space 9 pulling faces at the Bajorans and being surly and generally quite cool. Nowadays they have silly names like Kim and Kloie and they go around balancing wine glasses on their butts. They have definitely gone downhill! So my favourite Kardashian? Dukat, no contest! He was cool!

LOL that only makes me think of Sonny and Cher!

Reservoir?

And you can't forget these guys... and... Then again...maybe you can!

It's a long time since I last saw someone kneel to pray in church, though the priests still always say "let us sit or kneel" when intercessions are coming up. And most churches do still have kneeling cushions provided! HASSOCKS!! No, it's true, see for yourself...

I can't remember if I've ever mentioned this before, but I think 7 of 9 is Toyah Battersby from "Coronation Street" assimilated into the Borg continuum. (Or was it Q who had a continuum? Well...whatever the Borg had in place of a continuum. She's Toyah as a Borg is essentially what I'm saying.) My theory: in 2018 the Borg undertook an exploratory mission to Earth where they visited Weatherfield, Manchester, England, kidnapped the landlady of the "Rover's Return" pub, Borgified her, and then took her to the Gamma quadrant (or whatever) where she did Borgy-type stuff for several hundred years until the USS Voyager came along. Don't believe me? Well here's Toyah... And here's 7 of 9... Case closed!

I believe that was what I thought when I saw the movie, but you're right it doesn't make sense - If they had come along to see how the whales were doing and say "hi", vapourizing the ocean they live in is a strange way of going about it.