I used one previously. Unfortunately, it just trained me to lie very still when I woke up.

It’s better used as a training aid. It’s ok to turn your phone off, if you wake up to find yourself standing in the kitchen/corridor feeling confused. You’re still out of bed.

That’s when you move on to the barcode scanner. Just stick it in the kitchen and you have to get up.

For those that struggle, the android app “alarm clock Xtreme” is excellent. You can set tasks you have to do before snoozing. Both maths questions and having to scan a barcode or tag are options.

Combined with the “sonic bomb” alarm clock, it’s an extremely effective combination. (For both you and all your neighbours within a few 100m)

I’m not going to knock her putting them to good use! It’s done well by her so far. 👍

Some places do electricity costs in 30 minute periods. If you know cost will spike when everyone gets home, and the sun sets, then running early makes sense. Other times, holding off for an hour might be more useful.

Just most sources of power. Photovoltaic, wind and hydro aren’t steam based.

Data rot is a serious problem.

I suspect that our time period will end up as an information dark age to future historians.

I can’t see it as anything but white and gold. However, other photos clearly show it is black and blue.

Interestingly, if I’m scrolling past, my brain will sometimes perceive it as black and blue for a fraction of a second. I can normally flip optical illusions at will. This one jams me in the wrong viewing mode.

There are a bunch of characteristics that, while fairly arbitrary, can’t be changed once they are locked in. The mappings from RNA to proteins are a good example. Changing it is instantly lethal to the cell involved. Others include the chirality of amino acids, and the choice of bases for DNA.

If we look at the entire tree of life, we see no deviations in these deep characteristics. This implies that they were fixed before we all split. There might have been alternative variations in the past, but none have survived to the modern day (that we have identified).

This goes double of eucaryotes (basically everything other than bacteria). The design is so unique that convergent evolution is highly unlikely to stumble into the exact same layout from 2 sources.

The ones at mine are just openings in the walls, with a sign above them.

If I know what I’m after, I can be in and out of IKEA in about 15 minutes. You can bypass the showroom entirely, and go directly to the market hall. There’s generally enough cross through routes to cut past 50% plus. The only downside is the lack of maps, you have to sort of memorise the layout first to not skip past what you’re looking for.

Thermal imaging requires specialised organs. The difference between optical and thermal wavelengths is too extreme for a single organ to cover. Long wavelength IR is also quite low resolution for visual purposes.

Snakes have evolved the capability, but it’s not common.

It’s also worth noting that it wasn’t the hydrogen that caused the fire. The Hindenburg had an aluminium skin. It began having degradation issues, so they painted it. The paint was iron oxide based. Aluminium and iron oxide are the 2 main ingredients in thermite.

Analysis of the video shows that it was the skin burning off. It would have gone up almost as badly, even if filled with helium.

Fixed. 👍

I remember when my first was born. 2 different parts of my brain had opposing thoughts.

1 part was thinking “This is the cutest, most beautiful thing ever. I must protect and nurture them at all costs.”

The other part was thinking “My god newborn babies are ugly!”

I can easily see cognitive dissonance pushes most people to the first thought. It’s you being hacked by hormones, an effect that is disturbingly powerful.

I was also caught out by how much my (male) hormones were affected, even pre birth. It both disturbed and amused my wife.

Baked beans are definitely a VERY British thing, along with fry up in general.

Scotch eggs are Scottish in origin, I believe. I bundle them in with British, though a good chunk of Scotland would disagree. Definitely good, either way. Kippers and haggis are also Scottish/northern England traditionally.

As for Greggs… I personally consider them an example of how British food got screwed over by mass production. I’ve been disappointed most times I’ve brought from them. I know a lot of people swear by them however.

As for Yorkshire pudding. It’s a case of a good one is absolutely amazing, while an average one is just meh. It also needs a good gravy to dip it in. Hence why it goes so well with a roast.

Most of the more obvious ones are intended as travel food. Wrap something tasty, nutritious, or expensive in a semi disposable, edible wrapper. It’s a basic stable of most of mankind. England tended to use pastry or batter for this. Battered fish and burgers are other examples. Other as regions might use leaves for the same job.

If it was in a good state, you could eat it. If it wasn’t, then you could still eat the good bit inside. The crust of a Cornish pasty is intended to be thrown away. Coal miners could take them down the mine, and eat them without washing their hands.

Other dishes are a thing. They tended to be more family orientated however. The recipes wandered over time, with less stable traditional dishes. Bangers and mash, or a ploughman’s would fall into this sort of category.

There’s 3 sort of sections to British food.

• Old staples, things like stews, pies, roasts etc. We exported most of these, with the empire. They are also shared a lot with Europe, making them even more ubiquitous.

• Local specialities. Local traditional dishes, e.g. Yorkshire puddings, Cornish pasties, or Eccles cakes. These were town or region specific. Some have spread, others are still hyper local.

• Imported. Mostly from the empire days. We tended to “discover” spices and flavours. When they came back, they were often reimagined. E.g. the curry was a Scottish invention, using Indian spices. We mostly dump all the related dishes under a label of the country we stole the flavours from. E.g. Chinese food tastes nothing like what they eat in China.

Basically, there is a lot of really good British food about. We also set the baseline for a lot of the comparisons, making us look bland by comparison. The London restaurant industry also does a complete number on tourists, making us look even worse.

As much as I would love Linux native builds of games, this also makes a lot of sense. I consider it a completely acceptable solution to the problem.