I’ve read Project Hail Mary - that was great fun, and went to interesting places I wasn’t expecting.

11/22/63 is one I’ve been wanting to read. Will definitely do so at some point next year!

What did you think of Neuromancer? I finished that not too long ago.

Wow that’s a lot! Do you have any particular favourites of the ones you read?

Well I hope you’re able to slow down the pace a bit (assuming that’s what you want)!

Ah thanks for clarifying. Would you not say that reading it slower would be the more enjoyable method? If you’re after escapism, wouldn’t it be better to engage yourself fully in the plot? At least for me, I find escapism works best when I’m fully immersed in the story’s world and characters. What you’ve described sounds more akin to someone skimming a research paper.

Out of interest, what do you mean ‘you don’t read too closely’?

Biblically accurate machine guns

There’s a German term for nostalgia for a place you’ve never been, fernweh. Perhaps that has some connection?

Path of the Wind from My Neighbour Totoro gives me a similar feeling.

~It makes you happy~

So if I’m understanding this correctly, they did a extremely high resolution CT scan, but it’s not possible to determine the letters from that. However by using other fragments of scroll as a ground truth, you can train a model to pick up on subtle differences in the fibres where there has been ink. That’s very cool!

I ended up getting a Safari fountain pen and wow! It’s so smooth. Way better than any I’ve used in the past. I’ve been writing stuff for the hell of it just to try it out. I’m so used to pressing down with some force whilst using a ballpoint (especially the first time you use it each day) so this makes a nice change.

Thinking back to when we were made to use them at school, we were told that the nib would wear down to fit our writing style… which I think was nonsense. Pretty sure I used to use more pressure than was necessary back then, to try and get the pen to ‘mould’ faster. If I’d been taught to use them correctly maybe I’d have enjoyed it more back then.

I think that’s the bug they put in Neo in the first Matrix film

Whoa, some amazing paint jobs! The detail is insane

So I think it’s a crab apple tree :)

I’ll have a look at the tree later and get back to you!

Yeah, they changed too much unnecessarily whilst keeping the rest of the game identical. The addition of first person shooting really broke it in some ways because the original game wasn’t designed that way. I think they’d need to redesign it from the ground up to make the more modern mechanics work properly. Something like RE2 Remake.

You could be right! I should add that this was found in the UK, Midlands. Looks like it has a purple-y interior where it has been split/eaten in the middle

Thanks for the info. I didn’t realise fountain pens worked using capillary action. When I was younger we had to use fountain pens in school for a few years and I remember them being slightly frustrating. But nowadays I don’t need to write nearly as much/whilst under pressure, so I could see a fountain pen being quite nice. Plus, I’m pretty sure the ones I used were cheap and scratchy; if the brand you mentioned is good quality I might give one a go.

So dumb question - what exactly is it about that pen that sets it apart from your standard ballpoint?

Thanks for this perspective. I wonder if a lot of this isn’t so much an issue with attention span, but more a reluctance to put the work in?

That said, it does sound like it’s the environment itself that’s causing it. If the schools are encouraging ‘brain breaks’, I assume there’s good reason behind it? Does that improve learning/retention?

Yes the karma system here is way better! It definitely reduces the hive mind mentality.

I don’t think we need any kind of algorithm though. That would only serve to make the popular stuff more popular and the niche stuff gets buried. Maybe if I could personally filter out communities that I’m not interested in?