Other – Page 5 – Random Geek Child

Behold The Spoiled Children

Featuring Zuko and Arwen! (Zuko continues to be the grey one, Arwen is still white and black.)

Zuko, sitting on a dark grey-beige rug with his paws stretched before him in what would best be described as Child's Pose. He's near the edge of the rug, so the paler wooden floor is visible to the left and bottom of the picture, as well as the corner of a dark wooden shelving unit.

Arwen is curled up on a raised platform, with a paw over her tail and her nose nestled between paw and tail's tip.

Zuko is lying on his side on a raised platform, paws clutching a fluffy brown and white toy as he bites it. There's a "Cat Crossing" sign visible on the wall behind him.

Mushrooms

Apparently it’s that time of year again, when the shrooms magically appear in your lawn overnight. Here are some of my favorites!

A white-ish mushroom photographed from above, with grown in the center of the cap and a roundish shape featuring multiple sharp indents. Parts of smaller fellows are visible through the nicks and at the right edge, and to their right is a line of green-tinted bricks.

The most square mushroom I have ever seen. It's trying so hard to be a rectangle. Featuring a gradient of pale browns with white texture streaking in from the edges towards the center, which is the darkest part of the shroom. There's what looks to be the bottom of another mushroom belly-up beneath it, like the wannabe square won a wrestling match. Another victim is top-side up but looking pretty squished, poking out from under the top right quadrant. They're surrounded by grass and one lone fallen leaf, so pale it might at first glance be mistaken for more mushroom.

For personal reasons, I’ve decided to take a break from the longer written posts. Instead, my weekly updates are likely to consist of cute cats, pretty flowers, and whatever else I decide to photograph. Enjoy!

Arwen (white and black cat) and June (tortoiseshell) sitting side by side in a shallow carboard box that barely fits them both, looking out the window. Zuko (stripey grey) is walking behind them, nearly perpendicular to their arrangement.

Zuko (stripey grey) on the left, Arwen (white and black) on the right, each curled up in a shallow cardboard box next to a window.

Diane (black and white), curled up next to a large pile of yarn balls.

Cardiac Arrest: It’s The Best!

If that seems like a ludicrously terrible catchline, I’m doing something right! A couple months ago, I had a prompt to write an ad that deliberately employed at least 3 logical fallacies. I figured I might as well ride that train all the way to Station Absurdity, and this is the result:

Furthermore, we are proud to introduce the Cardiac Arrest deep-fried quadruple decker coconut butter burger, served completely encased in white chocolate! First of all, it's delicious! According to acclaimed astronaut Jessica Gonzalez, it's "the most incredibl[e] greasy thing [she's] ever consumed!" (The recommended maximum consumption is one serving per month; Greasivores Co. is not liable for any weight gain, heart conditions or death that may occur by disregarding this recommendation.) Cardiac Arrest: it's the best!

Strange Sentences

I’ve already posted about Duolingo in comparison to Rosetta Stone, but I’ve recently realized that a not-insignificant number of my screenshots are of Duo… more specifically, of the strange and amusing sentences their lessons are known to have. There were several that almost made this post, including “The fly is important,” (why, we are not told) and “She is making a drink out of beans.” I’m hoping they mean coffee. In the end, though, these are the ones I chose:

The assignment is to "Write this in German: 'The vegetable does not like vegetarians.'" The answer, "Das Gemüse mag keine Vegetarier," has been marked correct, and an orange bar at the top of the screen denotes 14 correct answers in a row.

A yellow bar at the top of the screen denotes 8 correct answers in a row. The assignment is to "Write this in English: 'Warum ist der Horrorfilm so langweilig?'" The answer, marked correct, is "Why is the horror movie so boring?"

An orange bar at the top of the screen denotes 15 correct answers in a row. The assignment is to "Translate this sentence: 'Warum haben Sie zweihundert Kartoffeln im Koffer?'" The answer, marked correct, is "Why do you have two hundred potatoes in the suitcase?"

There’s one more, which I picked less because it’s humorous, and more because it’s timely. I was pleasantly surprised to find it in my Hawaiian lessons!

An orange bar at the top of the screen denotes 12 correct answers in a row, and the lack of grey left to the bar indicates the end of the lesson. The assignment is to "Write this in English: 'He hana koʻikoʻi ka mālama i ka poʻe maʻi i kēia wā maʻi ahulau.'" The answer, confirmed as correct, is "Taking care of the sick is important in this time of pandemic."

Roses Are Red…

Except when they’re not. In other words, look! We have three different colors of roses in our yard now!

Many red roses, bunched together on the plant. Other clusters are visible in the background, darker because they're in the shade.

A single white rose, leafy plant behind it.

Five yellow roses, sprawled about on various offshoots of the plant. The plant itself is in a circle of mulch, edged with bricks, and beyond that is the lawn.

That’s really all I want to say this week. The flowers made me smile, and I hope they do the same for you!

Autumn

Is it now winter in the Northern Hemisphere? Yes. Am I in denial? Yes. It’s cold, and miserably snow-free, and we’re rewinding a couple weeks to bask in the pretty colors of fall again.

A line of bushes, all the leaves a deep red

Yellow and green leaves, backlit by the sun

Overflow MSI Pics

Ok, so we took a lot of pictures at MSI, but I could only fit so many into last week’s post without it being ridiculous. So now that I’ve got the excited rambling out of the way, here are some more photos!

Though the first one is actually a video of the Tesla coil activating; fair warning, it’s accompanied by a loud and obnoxious noise.