EL_Loco

Humans can be so different, it's fascinating and awesome. I'm quite the opposite. Where I wanted to talk to people from around the world and have some interesting conversations about everything, the fact that they are mostly "Hello, I'm calling from x, using radio y, and your signal is z. 73" is a big let down for me. I somewhat like the technical sid of it, but just calling to say "Hello, x, y, z, bye." ends up feeling like a waste of time to me (in the sense that I could be using this time for other, more interesting things. I still find it somewhat interesting though). But, if you enjoy the technical aspect of it, then I think it's fine, you can focus more on cw, or the digital modes where the contacts are automated.

edit: I know there are ragchews all the time, but it's still mostly about equipment.

I don't hate on Google, but the user highlighted some feature on Google Maps that are not desirable, and clearly knows more about map apps than me, so why not ask him what he uses? Google provides great value, I agree, but sometimes there's better stuff out there.

What do you use instead of Google Maps? I don't know enough about alternatives to choose one.

Brazilian here. I'm 100% for combating and arresting illegal miners, loggers and farmers, but I also know how big the rainforest is, how long the borders are, and how little personnel there is to do the work. Most people don't have a sense of how vast that region is: the brazilian part of the Amazon rainforest is about half the area of the U.S. Now look up how many soldiers and federal police officers are working there. It's daunting, feels like the drug war, only fifty times worse, because there's no solution anywhere close to something like legalization.

Carreta Furacão on Hacker News' front page... caralho!

From a pretty good essay written by someone who lived through the original "psychedelics will expand your mind" era of the 60s and 70s:

"“Enlightenment in a pill,” many have pointed out, is a quintessentially American concept. Who’s got time for all that prayer and study and meditation and practice when there’s an easier, faster way?

But there isn’t. Therein lies the great danger of LSD and its dopey cousin, marijuana. By offering a simulacrum of spiritual and intellectual growth – a very convincing simulacrum at times – it takes you everywhere except where you need to be, which is doing the long, hard work of learning to live."

I resonate with what he says because, like the author mentions later on, I also have many friends who went deep into the psychedelics journey while claiming it was 'freeing their minds', 'enlightening' them, or whatever other concept they liked to use, only to end up, a decade or two later, in either a regular struggling life like so many others, or a downright bad place. I'm probably wrong to generalize, as I'm sure it can help many, but the drugs still can't substitute the individual's effort and struggle to grow, and overcome, and the learning of how to live a meaningful life.

>Are you saying this isn't a clever use of loopholes

No, she's saying that a clever use of loopholes doesn't exclude you from being an asshole.

I know what you mean. A lot of people in my country just say 'fuck it' to property rights and steal shit by threat of violence. A lot of people here also say 'fuck it' to human rights and it's even wilder the crazy stuff they do. And then those 'asshole' hackers come here and defend these rights. Oh, the audacity.

I had the same thought. The gothic church one, for example. Why wouldn't I just write "A pink gothic church in the sunset" instead of writing "A gothic church" and then having to do the extra steps to turn the word "church" into pink? Of course, I'm very ignorant of the uses of such tech, so there's probably some usefulness in this.

First thing I thought when I looked at the pictures: "Looks like the first iBook" The "clamshell" iBook was launched in 1999, and the orange one looks like if this car was a laptop.

I have to agree here. I'm all for different architectural styles, so they can embody the local environment, culture, history. Yet that style is the embodiment of an idea more than anything. I know it is linked to a zeitgeist of somewhere in the not distant past, and to ideas of funcionalism, maybe minimalism etc but I fail to see local/regional culture there. I fail to see any interaction with nature there. Looking at it... oh man, does it look hideous to me. Maybe it's because I lived for many years in Brasília, the most car centric city I've ever been to, the butt of many jokes to people who went to live there. "The city with no street corners." Also no sidewalks, a city where blocks have names such as "Entertainment Sector South", "Hotel Sector North", etc. Ugh...

But... hey, I have some friends who still live there and enjoy it. I know people who really enjoy life there, so that's why I'm all for different architectural/urbanism styles. Too bad I also know some people who would love to move from there but can't. Life is complicated.

Taut Line Hitch is a little different from Midshipman's Hitch. Midshipman's grips a little better and is recommended. However, Like the other reply to your answer, for me the best of them is the Adjustable Grip Hitch. I teach knots to boy scouts, and know lots of them. After using the Adjustable, I don't use the Taut Line or Midshipman's anymore.