What's up with you?

[Sock Puppet]

She said PROMISE. We can do that.

[JoeP]

True. We can do that.

[Stormlight]

[Ymir's blood]

We are finishing moving and I want to mention something I forgot to say before There was a ceramic airplane from Mexico that lisarea sent me years ago. It arrived in many pieces and I had promised to fix it. Well it has been not quite so many years that I did fix it and it has been on the mantel ever since

It has survived the move to the new place without incident.

[JoeP]

Ceramic, you say?

[lisarea]

If you don't know or remember what was happening in that thread, it will make no sense at all.

[Ymir's blood]

The new modem isn't working, the helpline tech couldn't fix it. Won't get a service tech until Thursday.

[lisarea]

Fuck, I hate that shit. We got really lucky that our internet fucked off RIGHT before the virus got here. We had like four techs in our house, some for hours, trying to fix our fucked up connection before we just quit and switched to the only other provider.

PS I am super-happy about the airplane. I got really proud knowing it's been on your mantel.

[Ymir's blood]

will always be a part of me but sometimes I just wander off from anywhere. I quit facebook long ago but if anyone is on Discord, I'm usually available there.

pea S: I think I did a pretty OK repair job.

[Ymir's blood]

AT&T can be a pain to deal with but the people can be pretty good. The local service tech stopped by saying he knew there was a self install scheduled yesterday and noticed we didn't have service. Ended up stopping a coworker passing by with a bucket truck and gave us a completely new phone service line and jack. Apparently the line had been cut multiple times by previous tenants and wouldn't have been worth using anyway.

[ceptimus]

I'd not heard the term, 'bucket truck', before - I had to look it up. In the UK, we normally call them, 'cherry pickers', which is equally stupid. I think the official name here is 'boom lift', but most people wouldn't know what you meant if you said that - 'cherry picker' is much more widely understood.

[Ymir's blood]

I've heard standalone lifts with a gondola on a scissor lift called cherry pickers.

[specious_reasons]

Go super fancy, slightly more generic term and call them "Aerial Work Platforms."

[SharonDee]

I've been bad, neglecting this place and all. I blame Facebook. I guess.

Anyway, after the pandemic knocked me out of a prospective position when my contract ended in February I was out of work for four months. I got a job last month with an outfit in North Carolina where I'm working from home. (Natch.) It's a great place with lots of wonderful people.

No one in my circle of family and friends has caught the virus so that's a good thing, since we all live in hot spots. Even BIL, pro-Trump to his core, insists that folks wear masks when out and about. That's quite the turnaround for him.

[viscousmemories]

Hey SharonDee! I can confirm that you have been bad and neglectful because even I have noticed your absence, and I am the definition of bad and neglectful.

[Ymir's blood]

library!

[lisarea]

Hahahahahaha!

I've been sadding a lot about the fact that we have not seen any shows or gone to any movies this summer or anything.

BUT THEN. Just this afternoon.

I opened one of the many many emails I get from our local film society, and it's about benefit concerts for them with one of the few local bands I really really want to see live but have not. It's a drive in concert in the parking lot of a largeish music venue, so it seems safe.

And the band is Itchy-O, one of the very few that seem like they could really pull off a drive-in show.

And we got tickets for TOMORROW NIGHT HAHAHAHAHAHA.

Meow Wolf presents Itchy-O 'From the Overflowing'...

[ShottleBop]

The aircon on our 2007 Prius went out, and Mrs. S took it in to be checked out, and it turns out it needs $3,800 worth of work (there are original belts and hoses and suspension struts that have never been replaced--in 180,000 miles etc.). The mechanic is reputable; we believe his suggestions are legit, but it's simply not worth putting that kind of money into the car. So we're looking at replacing it with another hybrid. We want the flexibility of a hatchback or small SUV; Mrs. S quite liked the Honda CRV hybrid we looked at this morning. (We looked at a Toyota RAV4 hybrid, as well; she liked the Honda better.) Anyone here used either the AAA or Costco car-buying service, before?

[lisarea]

Oh, man, that Itchy-O show was great. They did a really impressive job of adapting their show to an audience of people sitting in cars rather than standing there interacting with them in person.

I wish I had advice about the car thing, but the only experience I really have with car buying through those services is this family trauma.

[viscousmemories]

I sold a car to Carvana painlessly, and I've bought and sold from Carmax. There's definitely a cost to the convenience but it has been worth it for me.

[Ymir's blood]

[ShottleBop]

We had almost settled on a Honda CR-V hybrid, but we also test-drove a 2014 Lexus CT 300h, which gets 46 mpg or so--for half the price. But every time we went car shopping, Mrs. S got a terrible headache and had to go to bed early. This morning she told me that she doesn't want to buy a car right now; she wants to drive the Prius until we can't any more.

So we're not going to buy anything just now. But my concern is that Mrs. S is 71 and I'm 68, and old folks like us tend not to be able to afford cars once we retire. I'd like to buy a new(ish) car sometime in the next year or two, so that we can pay it off before I have to stop working.

[JoeP]

I don't know why they say Finnish is a difficult language.

oleskelulupahakemus muulla perusteella:
oleskella to stay, reside oleskelu a stay lupa licence, permit oleskelulupa residence permit hakea apply hakemus application muu other mulla in other perus foundation peruste grounds/basis perusteella on the grounds of oleskelulupahakemus muulla perusteella application for residence permit on other grounds

OLE_MUU for short because sometimes even Finns find phrases too long.

[LarsMac]

In my experience, understanding a language, and being able to actually speak it with any hope of being understood are two entirely different things.

[JoeP]

Oikeasti.