@AndyD said in 25 years into the century: Superb, the photos and article. If I can pick one photo that fascinates, the tsunami wave at Fukushima is an amazing snap. I was on a plane headed to Beijing when that happened, chaperoning a group of 20 high school students. When we landed we headed to the Olympic park straight from the airport. My first memory of being in China was a crowd of people huddled around the massive screens outside the Bird’s Nest and Water Cube, watching the news unfold. Our guide, who we met when he picked us up at the airport, was trying to navigate listening to the news story to figure out what was happening and translate it for 20 high school students without scaring them half to death. It was unnerving to be so cut off from the news with such a major event happening.

A reprieve. https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/c70lw7w89epo

It's in the '50's at night with no heating. I can't wait for the '40's. / Snark Actually, I'm making moves to get out of this dump.

@Steve-Miller said in Anybody doing wild New Year's Eve stuff?: Remember tinsel? I remember finding it in the cats poop. Sometimes he’d walk away from the litter box with a poopy piece of tinsel hanging out his rear end. Prolly good for them that we stopped using it.

Went to a friend’s house for their traditional new Years meal - Bavarian style sauerkraut and roast pork. Sauerkraut, and fermented foods in general , are having a moment, but it’s a pretty assertive flavor and hard to incorporate in the day to day menu. This stuff is different - I could eat it every day. I recommend omitting the caraway seeds.

Rat

@Bernard said in Had a screw loose…. (A piano thread…): Wow! I'm glad for you that the problem was pinpointed so quickly. He diagnosed it at the last tuning (summer IIRC) and of course now that he’s fixed it, it’s dealt that he was right. I don't recall seeing (or paying attention to) the back action. Same. I don’t think I even knew it was back there, and when people talk about “the action” on a grand piano, they’re generally only focused on the part that connects the keys to the hammers. But of course, that doesn’t control the dampers.

Given the wide variety of planets in our own solar system and some even stranger moons, there seems to be alot to learn about even our solar neighborhood, let alone the flocks of exoplanets now being found. I really hope we don't curtail our exploration of the universe. If the USA is short-sighted, then at least there are other nations and entities in the search for more knowledge. Big Al

This one is one of my favorites. I never learned it all the way - but I still like to muddle through it. So beautiful.

NPR on the topic: https://www.npr.org/2025/12/26/nx-s1-5649395/public-domain-2026-copyright-betty-boop-pluto

Absolutely disgraceful.

Those who forget the past...

Thanks all!

Finally got around to making crumpets. I thought about trying to do DIY rings from tuna cans but today's cans are don't lend themselves to being made into a ring. The old ones were a open cylinder with a sealing lid on the top and one on the bottom. You could remove both and get a serviceable ring. The body and the bottom of the new cans are a single piece and only the top lid can be easily removed. Picked these up at a thrift shop: [image: 20251230_171152.jpg] Interesting little beggars. Like English muffins, they are cooked in a skillet but the batter is more like pancake batter than a dough, hence the need for a ring. The leavening agent is baking powder (or soda, depending on the recipe). I think my baking powder is old and has lost its oomph. I didn't get the numerous bubbles one expects in a crumpet. Still, they were pretty tasty and not bad for my first attempt: [image: 20251230_171135.jpg] eta: This King Arthur recipe looks better than the one I used. https://www.kingarthurbaking.com/blog/2020/03/23/sourdough-crumpets Will try it out for round 2 of crumpets.

Someone on the overnight thread (that I frequent) posted this video last night as a point of possible interest to the members. Turns out, it's not Sir David Attenborough at all, it's AI posing as him. A fake! It pisses me off that this is allowed. Meanwhile, the "creators" (thieves, imo) rake in ad revenue for themselves and YT. Link to video

Thanks for the link to that video, @wtg. I did have that option enabled, but while I was on that page I noticed at the bottom of the screen it said I'd opted to never save passwords for google and earthlink. I don't remember doing that, but I deleted both sites and it appears that might have been responsible because I use my Google account to log into Disqus. Ok then, I'm on Brave for another trial run! eta, it didn't last long. It continues to log me out of Disqus if I so much as refresh the page or open a new tab. Ugh. eta, I might be on another trial run. If I turn off fingerprinting for that specific website, it seems to behave.