Topicless thread

[PizzaDrill]

"Rule 41. Desu isn't funny. Seriously guys. It's worse than Chuck Norris jokes."

Another broken, But rules are to be broken every now and again!

Just don't post any rule 34 or rule 46 for the sake of teh internets

Some fag rewrote rule 41 apparently to be the exact opposite then.

[Xeon]

I broken 2 rules at once?. My internetz skillz must have gotten rusty. I need to drown myself in m0ar internetz to repent.....

*And apparently my English.... Must forget Inglish talk....*

[SleepyD]

Hmm, I did now know about the CalTech-MIT rivalry either (although I am quite familiar with Harvard v. MIT). Just seems that the current popular conception traces the beginnings of computers (or really PCs) to the Pacific Coast-- Apple and Silicon Valley would be the best examples, but there's Microsoft in the Pacific Northwest too.

It's a very nerdy rivalry, I must say. MIT is much more well known, since they tend more to the engineering side of things, while CalTech is generally known for their theoretical stuff. Feynman spent a lot of his later years out here doing his thing.

I've heard from other sources that Californians tend to be very socially-gregarious but perhaps not as loyal to their relationships, but not having any friends who belong to the typical CA youth culture I can't make this judgment either. ;P

I can't say my friends are "typical" Californians either, but there's certainly a strong influence there among some of them. The flip-flops, the shades, the general unkempt look, etc, etc I'm not sure what would be distinctly Californian, so I can't really say.

Speaking of influences, Valley girl speak has unfortunately permeated our lexicon.  I will say "like" on a number of occasions. (I don't say "Like, tooootallly~" though)
Also, surfer talk: "duuude" "chill out, man"  This I'm okay with.

I only catch this habit when I travel outside of Southern California and people make note of it.

New Englanders can be gregarious or cold depending on the region-- Bostonians and Eastern Mass-people are very, very talkative, engaging, curious and open, but when you get into the some small-town areas the locals can be suspicious of people outside their immediate social circles. The rural people and residents of tourist areas (like most of central NH, my region) are typically a little more relaxed toward outsiders.

NE is largely Caucasian, but it would be better thought of as a mix of English, Scottish, Irish and French (and French-Canadian, especially in NH and VT), and a large population of Portuguese and Italian (especially in coastal Mass and Rhode Island). There are a fair number of people who've had family here so long that they don't associate with any ethnicity and simply consider themselves... New Englanders.

When they say NE'ers are reserved, it doesn't so much mean that we're prudish... well, maybe just a hint (see: notable lack of nightlife our cities), but we're rather mindful of one anothers' beliefs and feelings and try not to be offensive. Ironically, it's not considered taboo to discuss such topics as religion or politics with strangers, but they are subjects that tend to be approached with sensibility and politeness.

NE I'd describe as being orderly, harmonious and pleasant with a healthy dose of mystery and a hint of melancholy. There are certainly more energetic areas and a lot of interesting places, but for the most part our main source of entertainment is one another-- our neighbors, friends, family. We live in "tough" environment and have learned to live with nature rather than try to overcome it.

If you like nonstop fun and excitement, NE isn't going to be your sort of place... but if you like being able to stop for a moment and enjoy life at a more relaxed pace, this is the place to be.

California is a place I really want to visit, though-- the culture seems fantastic to me, quite foreign, but like something I'd enjoy.

haha, well that doesn't sound too bad. I'm only talkative when I'm around people that bring up topics of interest. Engineering, science, anime, internet, weather(haha, it's interesting really! Not much variety over here. lol)... etc etc. Otherwise, I usually keep to myself.

"ZOMG LIGHTNING!!" "ZOMG SNOW!!" "ZOMG RAIN!!" (not that drizzly stuff we get here)<= me when I travel

Nature around here is a little more difficult to find unless you're familiar with the place or closer to the outskirts of town (a good 2 hour drive from the center of the city... without traffic). It is beautiful though, seeing something different after seeing nothing but palm trees for most of your life.  I don't know many that appreciate the nature we have here.  Stargazing in the desert is an awesome thing to do around here if you're willing to take the time and effort. And there is snow in the mountains nearby. Just not in LA proper.

Although if I did go to NE, I'd be taking pictures like mad. haha I'm sure the place has a completely different look than what's out here.

I feel that the energy out here is a little more relaxed and fun than the energy I see out in places like Boston or something. (having never been there, I can't say for sure)

California certainly isn't for everyone, but I have to say, at the very least, it's a fun place to visit for a little while.  

HAH. NE ROCKS. ALL THE REST OF YOU well i'm not gonna say anything mean cause you guys are nice :3

NE is cold. it has odd weather patterns, and bells is right on the money with the ethnicity thing. my town (southern NH, almost mass) is.....well......depends on which town. the town i ACTUALLY live in (windham) is full of stuck up little richie-rich types who feel they're better than everyone else even though this is just a hick town where the biggest attractions are the castle, cobbet's pond (gross lake), the lead singer of godsmack and the fact that we seem to be a stop on the drug-running trail. :\

salem, the town i consider my REAL hometown, is ALOT more down to earth. i have friends in both towns, but from my experience, the people seem friendlier in salem, maybe it's cause there are less richie-riches and more average joes. (this is conflicting with my high school experience, i'm trying to ignore that in the name of accuracy.) salem's attractions include: canobie lake park (amusement park, lots of fun rides but the price has skyrocketed in this economy ;__; ), canobie lake (no swimming, it's the town's water), victorian mini golf, rockingham park (race track), rockingham mall, shadow lake (yes swimming), and much else. :3

I think... I'll enjoy myself more in NE hanging with the friendly people and taking a crapton of pictures. XD;;
At least the rich snobs around here just avoid social contact with everyone else and not bother anyone. ...much. Unless they're young and stupid. *cough*

BTW, it's soda. Pop is a name for yah fatha, Coke is a brand-name, and fizzy drink'll just get yah weihd looks.

oh, and they call it "soda pop" in canada, here we call it "soda". (they also call ketchup "catsup" in canada, which is wrong cause the two are two different things.)

Yes! Soda ftw. *high fives*

I first encountered this when I heard my cousins from Missouri say pop, and I had an obviously confused look on my face. haha Never heard someone say "coke" as a word for soda til the internets, and fizzy drink is apparently something some say in the UK.  

COME TO OTACON EVERYBODY KTHXBAI

One day, friend. One day I will. I'm going to meet some of you one of these days! And it's going to be at an anime convention, most likely.

In response,
COME TO ANIME EXPO EVERYBODY!!

[Xeon]

We call Soda Coke or Cola *Not the brand*  here , so if u actually want Cola*Brand* u have to ask for Coco Cola specifically. Some people do call it fizzy drinks here, but that's just so that they can sound smart around the Tourist ;p.

Oh and for us Ketchup refers to both Ketchup and Soy Sauce *Kitch-up*.

Just noticed that Malaysia isn't listed in wikipedias article on soft drinks. Guess were bump in with the UK then ;o.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Soft_drink

[NejinOniwa]

Your wandering demon has returned, bringing glorious horn from the mountains of the north.

Also tire as hell due to walking over berg and berg and berg and through a damn CANYON yesterday and only sleeping 4 hours on that, so yeah. Signing off.

[stewartsage]

Round here we call it soda, but it differs across the state.

In other news I have made a significantly less spectacular return from my vacation.  Abbreviated version begins here since I have no blog; I subject you too it here, more pictures later:

This week was my own vacation to scenic Pocahontas County, WV.  What is in Pocahontas County you may ask?  Only the largest collection of steam mountain railroad engines (Shays, a Hiesler, and my personal favorite the Climax) at Cass Scenic Railroad and the National Radio Astronomy Observatory's Green Bank Telescope.

First of all, Cass was fantastic!  It was overcast with intermittent rain the entire four hour trip but that's not as bad as it sounds.  To be honest the weather didn't really matter all that much with the two steam locomotives pushing us up a 9% grade.  That day the Bald Knob (14 miles uphill, average grade 6%) run was powered by Shay No. 4 and Shay No. 5.  No.5 has been at Cass since the West Virginia Pulp & Paper Company began operating a railroad into the mountains to haul out pulp wood in the 1910's and has never left service for a long period of time.  

Thursday we went back to Cass for a tour of the railroad shops which we hadn't been able to take Tuesday because of time constraints.  It gave me the opportunity to actually see the Climax, No. 9, which has been in the process of restoration for about ten years now.  Then we toured the actual Town of Cass, one of the most complete company towns in extant.  As far as company town's go, Cass was better then most.  The management was reasonable and living conditions pretty good.  The town had electricity from the start, and workers had free lumber to build on to their houses if they want.  However the company would only buy them back for the original sale price.  The mill there turned out 40 carloads of finished lumber a day, but burned in 1972 and again in 1978 so not much is left that isn't metal.

Wednesday we went to the NRAO at Green Bank.  Normally I leave astronomy and space exploration (in the real world, present day) to my esteemed brother; there is one thing I thoroughly enjoy for some reason.  Radio astronomy.  They have a 1:1 model of the Jansky Antenna, with which Karl Jansky discovered that the Milky Way emits radio waves at Bell Labs.  I also discovered the life and career of Grote Reber, a Chicago radio engineer who was essentially the only radio astronomer in the world from 1937 into the post-World War Two era.  The man built a radio telescope in his backyard with parts from his ham radio and supplies from a hardware store.  He made a radio frequency map of the night sky, by hand and later with a chart machine, contributed to the increased interest in radio astronomy, and laid the ground work for the discovery of synchrotron radiation.  In short, I have a new hero in the scientific field.

Other then that, this is the place where SETI got it's start with the original 85 foot Howard Tatel Telescope and Project Ozma (and they came up with Drake's Equation), the groundwork for the VLA was done with the Green Bank Interferometer, the 140 foot equatorial radio telescope (my favorite), and of course the world's largest movable land structure: the GBT itself.  This thing is a monster, no two ways about it!  Unfortunately digital cameras interfere with the telescope operation, so I couldn't get any pictures with that.  There are standard film shots but it'll be a while before they get developed.

Oh yeah!  A fifteen year old high school girl discovered a pulsar a month ago!  I didn't get to do that sort of stuff in high school!  Someday at least I hope to get to use the little (relatively) 40 foot telescope available to amateurs.

Those are the highlights, there was some driving around to explore the countryside (where eight rivers start and none enter, you can't get cell service or use wireless internet because of the telescopes, and the nearest groceries are at the Dollar General).  Also took a short (ish) trip to the town where I go to college; not much has changed in three months but I did get a West Virginia State Trooper's jacket at Goodwill.

Pictures:

http://img337.imageshack.us/i/45atthetop.jpg/
Shay No. 4 and Shay No. 5 at the top of Bald Knob.

http://img411.imageshack.us/i/brakemenlovelace.jpg/
Brakeman Dale Lovelace leaning out to check the brakes on the trip back down.

http://img46.imageshack.us/i/casspresandhouses.jpg/
Part of Cass Presbyterian Church and examples of the two remaining styles of company house.

http://img821.imageshack.us/i/oldcasspowerhouseandeng.jpg/
Cass Lumber Mill powerhouse (right) and enginehouse (left)

http://img838.imageshack.us/i/cassshop.jpg/
Main Cass locomotive shop, boiler of Climax No. 9 to the right, Shay No. 2 (a Pacific) in the midst of major repairs.

http://img825.imageshack.us/i/hiesler.jpg/
Hiesler on the warm up track.

http://img571.imageshack.us/i/hardwork.jpg/
No. 4 and No. 5 pushing the Bald Knob train up Cass Mountain

http://img829.imageshack.us/i/takingonwater.jpg/
No. 5 taking on water.

http://img64.imageshack.us/i/no4onthewye.jpg/
No. 4 backed down the mountain and waiting for the train to pass on the wye bellow Bald Knob station.

http://img843.imageshack.us/i/no5.jpg/
No. 5 at the top.

http://img205.imageshack.us/i/topofbaldknob.jpg/
Bald Knob lookout

http://img237.imageshack.us/i/ourcar.jpg/
Our car.

http://img405.imageshack.us/i/rebertelescoep.jpg/
Grote Reber's radio telescope.

http://img840.imageshack.us/i/thegbt.jpg/
The Robert C. Byrd Green bank Telescope in all it's glory.  That thing never stays in the same position, almost every time we passed it was pointing a different direction.

http://img210.imageshack.us/i/45meternavytelescopefix.jpg/
A couple of the smaller telescopes from the viewing platform, the 45 meter fixed on the sun and the ex-Navy 120 foot.  40 meter out of sight bellow the trees.

http://img225.imageshack.us/i/loggerdiningcar.jpg/
Lumber camp dining car at Whittaker station.

http://img59.imageshack.us/i/300ftcollapsed.jpg/
Picture of the picture of the 300 foot telescope that collapsed in 1988.

http://img23.imageshack.us/i/faradaycage.jpg/
Faraday cage used in demonstrations at the science center.

http://img576.imageshack.us/i/gbtmodel.jpg/
Fully steerable model of the GBT at the science center, can be pointed to parts of the Milky Way hanging from the ceiling.

http://img839.imageshack.us/i/dollysodspanoramabearro.jpg/
Poorly assembled panorama of the National Forest part of Dolly Sods taken from Bear Rocks.

http://img821.imageshack.us/i/meatdollysods.jpg/
Me on top of some rocks.  I like to scramble about rocks, despite my fear of heights.  Further proof no good picture of me exists.

http://img20.imageshack.us/i/spruceknob3.jpg/
Looking towards USFS antenna from Spruce Knob.

http://img708.imageshack.us/i/spruceknobpanorama.jpg/
West from Spruce Knob lookout tower.

http://img529.imageshack.us/i/spruceknobsign.jpg/
Spruce Knob elevation sign


And finally, dear god I have a lot of stuff to catch up on/clean up the mess mini-tornado made.

[Cockleshell]

rule 34'd

and welcome back xeon. :3

o<o tentacle sensors activated

Woke up at a wee hour in the morning to the horrid stench of electrical smoke billowing out of my fan. Couldn't sleep for the next 5 and half hours, just drank about a liter of coffee, feels good man, everything smells like a broken computer right now, i can't sleep without my fan
SO HYPER LOL

[stewartsage]

Hm, could hyperness be channeled into jury rigging the fan?

[Chocofreak13]

@cockle: i meant to log off of here about half an hour ago due to stench of cigarette smoky dad. :\ hope ya computer gets fixed--i got a fan lying around if ya need it. ^^

@stew: looks nice. ^^ more than i been doin' lately, so bored. >___< and i too am slightly afraid of heights, yet love climbing around on rocks. go figure. :\
i'd like to play in the old burnt out power station :3
o__________o;; at collapsed telescope.
and WTF at the reber radioscope. that dude actually built that in his backyard!?

i have been terminally bored recently, so much so that i have a craving to sew. if i end up doing so, you may end up with pictures of me in a japanese lady's biker outfit, and the samui from spirited away (different colours of course).

boredom begets creation! if i'm not lazy!

[stewartsage]

I'm deathly afraid of man made heights.  Pretty much anything over ~2 stories is right out.

Yes.  In 1937.  In the throes of the Great Depression.  With no previous examples/plans to work from.

Sew Kari, sew!

[NejinOniwa]

The first GAAH CHILD PORN MANGO GAAH KILL IT WITH FIRE case has been called and guilty'd in sweden. The depression deepens, however.
1, The material wasn't exactly even lolicon stuff, just lacking in sizable chests which idiot swedish court couldn't realize was due to fact that the general japanese chest isn't quite as sizable as the general swedish one; 2, the defendant was Simon Lundström, the translator of like 50% of all available swedish mango; 3, shit is being APPLAUDED AS GOOD CALL among parts of the general populace. I mean, come on! Where's my outcry, damnit?

[Dr. Kraus]

So mango is about to die in Sweden eh? that sucks!

[NejinOniwa]

Not exactly, but the fact that shit government is trying to implement THOUGHTCRIME as a liable felony is a bit insane; and, to me as a Pirate Party member, very alarming.

[NejinOniwa]

HEY FAGS
POASTING FROM A DELTA
>:3

Let's see how long we can keep this up...

[Fedora-Tan]

Some fag rewrote rule 41 apparently to be the exact opposite then.

HEY FAGS
POASTING FROM A DELTA
>:3

Let's see how long we can keep this up...

;130  Please remember that this is supposed to be a forum where everyone and every way of thinking is accepted. Words like 'fags' are intolerant and while you may not use them a bad way, it cannot be tolerated on the forum.

Please kindly consider that i will have to ban anyone using such wordings from now. It is not necessary to use insulting words to have fun on a forum, i think.

Thanks for your understanding.

N.B. About the ban, i mean it, so just don't play with fire with that

N.B. 2 : Pizzadrill : You were already told to change your avatar for those reasons, so just change it else i change it myself  

Peace. And have a good week  ;010