Speedy's Cafe - General Chat about anything you like!

[Artemis]

5 hours ago, Pamela said:

Okay, so, chocolate-covered pretzels are vegan, right? :)

Is it milk chocolate? 

 

[Pamela]

2 hours ago, Artemis said:

Is it milk chocolate? 

 

Yep. I usually prefer dark, but when it's covering pretzels, I like the milk.

[Carol the Dabbler]

On 9/26/2020 at 6:44 PM, Carol the Dabbler said:

I thought I'll get rid of those stupid apps that I never use -- but the best I can do is deactivate them, which is presumably no help with the space issue.  I am thinking of deactivating the news feed, though, mostly because their symbol is the same shape as my text-message alert symbol, which I DO care about.

Well, I finally got around to deactivating that accursed newsfeed -- what a relief!  At about the same time (not sure if it was before or after) my camera stopped working, said it needed a reboot.  So I powered down and rebooted, and the camera works fine again.  But guess what else is back?

Worst part is, the newsfeed now says if I deactivate it, some of the other apps may no longer work properly.  I'm pretty sure it did NOT say that when I deactivated it before.  Not sure what to think at this point -- was deactivating it what clobbered my camera?  Do I dare try deactivating it again?  Grumble, grumble.

I wonder if DuckDuckGo sells cell phones?

 

[Fantasy Lover]

God I hate everything, my country is going into lockdown again. And I don't know if I'm going back to work on Monday or not, because my work isn't listed as nonessential yet but but I'm 90% sure it will be considering I work in a second hand store, I'll know more this weekend. I also don't know whether my internship will be postponed or cancelled, i know more about it next week. On top of that my mom has corona, she has mild symptoms for now, I hope it stays that way. On the bright side I can spend the second lockdown with my girlfriend so there's that.

 

 

 

 

[Fantasy Lover]

Update: as expected I can't go to work temporarily, my internship isn't cancelled though, and my mother is recovering.

[Carol the Dabbler]

Glad to hear your mother's getting better!  And I see that your kitty is still beautiful. 

 

[Arcadia]

On 11/4/2020 at 5:35 AM, Fantasy Lover said:

Update: as expected I can't go to work temporarily, my internship isn't cancelled though, and my mother is recovering.

Two out of three is great!

[Carol the Dabbler]

I've just learned that Alex Trebek passed on earlier today.    

[link to his Wikipedia page]

 

[Arcadia]

Wahhh, I just heard that myself a little while ago. Inevitable, but still sad. 

[Carol the Dabbler]

Isn't it odd how positively you can respond to somebody you've never met?  He seemed like such a truly decent fellow.

 

[Carol the Dabbler]

I saw a rainbow about 2:45 this afternoon, not that it's particularly unusual to see a rainbow around here.  But I'm used to seeing them in the east or west, or somewhat south of that.  This one was stretched very precisely across the northeastern quadrant of the sky.  I don't recall ever seeing one that far north before, and I don't think it had ever even occurred to me that it was possible.

In order for a rainbow to be visible, the sun has to be less than 42 degrees above the horizon (I looked up the actual number here, where there's lots of info on rainbows).  Around here in summer (when I'm most likely to be outside and noticing the rainbows), the sun is that low only in the early morning and late afternoon, when it's in the northern half of the sky, putting any rainbows in the southern half.  But it's November now, and the sun is relatively low even at noon.  In fact, according to this website (and assuming I typed in my latitude and longitude correctly), the sun is below 42 degrees elevation even at noon from mid-October till early March, meaning there could even be a rainbow due north.  Apparently I've been looking in the wrong place for cool-season rainbows!

If you don't know your latitude and longitude, you can get it from Google Maps -- and now I'm trying to remember how.  (Time to go to bed, Carol!)

 

[Van Buren Supernova]

Yes Carol!  sweet dreams about those 42 degree suns and rainbows. 

Please do me a favor, include John with his perfect gelled hair riding down the rainbow curve. It remains perfect, but why?? Why?? Why is that? And why does he have that hair?

And that is how the sweet dream turns into nightmare. Night night!

[Carol the Dabbler]

10 minutes ago, Van Buren Supernova said:

John with his perfect gelled hair [....].  It remains perfect, but why?? Why?? Why is that? And why does he have that hair?

But -- didn't we decide that wasn't really John?  It was his evil twin Pierre?

 

[Arcadia]

On 11/16/2020 at 3:05 AM, Carol the Dabbler said:

But -- didn't we decide that wasn't really John?  It was his evil twin Pierre?

 

Yes. But how is that less of a nightmare???

[Carol the Dabbler]

5 hours ago, Arcadia said:

But how is that less of a nightmare???

Not much less, I guess -- but at least we know the real John still has normal hair -- wherever he is.

 

[Van Buren Supernova]

I'd like to see an episode of Sherlock and Mycroft dealing with evil Pierre! 

He could be the next big villain. Step aside, Magnussen, go scrub that fireplace with Hydrogen Peroxide or something, and Moriarty, go take care of your back comb, we have found better villain!

[Carol the Dabbler]

2 hours ago, Van Buren Supernova said:

I'd like to see an episode of Sherlock and Mycroft dealing with evil Pierre! 

Didn't we already see that in Series 3?  Oh, wait a minute, that wasn't Sherlock either, was it?  It was his dim-witted twin -- what's his name?  Ah, here it is -- Simon!

 

 

 

[Carol the Dabbler]

Happy Thanksgiving Day to my fellow Americans!  And Happy Fourth Thursday of November to everyone else!

 

[kimber8ada]

Thanks, Carol! Hope everyone has a great day!

 

[HerlockSholmes]

Happy Thanksgiving Day to all👍🇱🇷

[Carol the Dabbler]

We took Alex's old computer (the one he uses for gaming) to the repair place today, and had to wait for a while, so I was "people watching" out of the corner of my eye.  I was surprised by how old some of the clients were.  There was one lady that I took to be about 90, who walked in with her laptop on the shelf of her rolling walker.  And a man who appeared to be in his 80s.  They both sounded just as knowledgeable about their computers as typical people half their age.

So the cliche about older folks being afraid of computers or incompetent with them is apparently now passe, which makes sense.  After all, that 90-year-old was in her mid-60's when the internet kicked in, and may have been using computers at her workplace well before that.

 

[Artemis]

I wouldn't say it's entirely passe (though I've never liked the stereotype to begin with).  I interact with many people who are confused by their computers/internet or would rather not use them at all, and most of them are people older than 55.  In fact just today I was helping a coworker use Google and open his Gmail, and he's in his mid-60's.  But computer illiteracy in that demographic is definitely shrinking, and I think it's due to the entrenchment of social media.  Their families are on Facebook, and they don't want to miss out on photos of their grandkids and such.  They've sort of been forced to adapt to computer use in order to stay connected.  Everything else happens on Twitter, and if you're not there you might feel out of the loop, especially if you're interested in staying up to date on the latest sociopolitical madness.  (I'm not on Twitter and I don't care about what I might be missing, but that's me.  FOMO is common.)  Smartphones probably play a role too, as landlines fall out of use.  They're sort of like mini computers, so learning to use one of those can serve as an introduction to a larger computer, or vice-versa.

It used to be possible to avoid computer use entirely, without a hitch; but that is becoming harder and harder to do with the move towards "paperless".  Right now there are still options for people who don't want to go paperless, but one day I think there won't be.  Maybe not soon, but one day.

I wonder what the next big tech breakthrough is going to be, and if I will live to see it.  Is it still going to be smartphones and laptops a century from now, or will they have been replaced by something yet to be realized?  Tech was changing fast in the 20th century, but it's been a tad stagnant in the 21st.  We are fitting more stuff into smaller gadgets, but that's about it.  I've heard whispers of near-future possibilities, but none that have come to fruition yet.

 

[Carol the Dabbler]

2 hours ago, Artemis said:

I interact with many people who are confused by their computers/internet or would rather not use them at all, and most of them are people older than 55.  In fact just today I was helping a coworker use Google and open his Gmail, and he's in his mid-60's.  But computer illiteracy in that demographic is definitely shrinking, and I think it's due to the entrenchment of social media.

That's presumably part of it -- but also, today's 55-year-olds were in their early 30's at the dawn of the internet age.  So part of the reason that the 55-and-up demographic is more computer literate today than in the past is simply that they first encountered computers at a younger age.

Unfortunately, though, the internet (and software in general) keeps changing, which I suspect is part of the remaining confusion.  Taking myself as an example, I think that many people who are old enough to be comfortable with who they are, don't really see the point of learning new routines simply in order to do what they could do just fine (or better!) with the old routines.  I still mourn the loss of WordPerfect.

2 hours ago, Artemis said:

it's been a tad stagnant in the 21st.  We are fitting more stuff into smaller gadgets, but that's about it.

Isn't that pretty much the story of the 20th century as well?  Once photography, electrical circuits, the telephone, vacuum tubes, radio, and the earliest computers were invented, we had the basis of the internet and today's smart phones.  Since then, it's been just details.

 

[Artemis]

33 minutes ago, Carol the Dabbler said:

Isn't that pretty much the story of the 20th century as well?

Mmmm, I wouldn't say so.  I see your point, but a vacuum tube, in my opinion, is a much different invention than a television, even though it's one of the building blocks of a television.  A flatscreen HD television, on the other hand, is still a television.  That's not a new invention, it's the same invention with newer tech.

A lot of innovation came out of the 20th century, in my view.  Television, satellites, home computers, the internet were just a few of the major ones.  We haven't really invented much this century yet, we've just put the programming into smaller packages.  TV's are flatter and in HD now, but they're still TV's.  Computers can sit on your lap, or in your hand, but they're still computers.  Cell phones have increased functionality (much increased), but they're still cell phones.  Movies can be streamed, but they're still movies.  They're not new inventions.  Since I was born we've gone from records to cassettes to CD's to digital files.  Those are all just different ways of storing and playing music, but they're also inventions.  But all that's really changed since the emergence of the digital file is size.  Size of the file, size of the data chip, size of the device used to run it, etc.  It's all still digital. 

Not that I necessarily want it to keep changing.  Honestly it was a pain (an expensive pain) to have to replace all my music and movies so they would be compatible with newer formats every half decade, lol.  I was only musing: Is there going to be anything beyond digital, or is this it?  And data storage aside, what's our next advancement going to be?  Will there be more Star-Trekian inventions like replicators, transporters, holodecks, hyperspeed, etc.?  Something we can't even imagine existing yet?  Or have we pretty much reached the limit of what we can do?

I don't have an answer, I was just thinking out loud.

1 hour ago, Carol the Dabbler said:

I think that many people who are old enough to be comfortable with who they are, don't really see the point of learning new routines simply in order to do what they could do just fine (or better!) with the old routines.  I still mourn the loss of WordPerfect.

Ditto to that.  I'm an "If it ain't broke don't fix it" kind of person, and it seems like they are constantly "fixing" things that were fine to begin with.  I like familiarity and I hate having to relearn things for the sake of supposed "progress".  There is a point, though, and the point is so that you don't get so far behind the learning curve that you can no longer function in a changing world.  It's probably easier for a retiree not to bother with it all, if they'd rather stay in their ways; but if you're an employee, you don't always get a choice.

 

[Pamela]

8 hours ago, Carol the Dabbler said:

I think that many people who are old enough to be comfortable with who they are, don't really see the point of learning new routines simply in order to do what they could do just fine (or better!) with the old routines.  I still mourn the loss of WordPerfect.

I'm also on board with that. I'm 67. The only computer I have (or want) is a desktop at home, no laptop. I have a landline (yep!) and a cell phone, but it's a flip-phone (i.e. stupidphone), and believe it or not, I like it. I don't want or need a smartphone.

I agree WordPerfect was wonderful, until I got the hang of Word. Word took the "coding" out of my hands and all I had to do is literally say what I wanted. Hmm, was that good or bad?