This is just awesome - I remember slowing the tempo to this with Winamp years ago and getting something similar; couldn't listen to the kitschy/upbeat version again.

It's only sexist by those fishing to call it so: as you rightly mentioned, female and male bodies are built differently. Penises, vaginas, testicles, breasts, glands, reproductive systems, the list goes on. Of course it's feasible that brains could be different; when so much of the body is different across sexes and races, from a layman's perspective I'd say there's at least some differences.

I too am also slightly drunk so I hope that helps add to the cause haha.

While I understand your point about selection bias, at the end of the day, the action (a child being suspended for gasp using their imagination) occurred.

The shame is that common sense is not so common any more, and I seriously wonder wtf I'm to do later in life if-and-when I want kids, and this sort of shit is the norm, not the sporadic case of institutional stupidity.

I've never truly understood water cooling in computer setups, but my thought had always been that it doesn't utilise continually running water (ie like when having a shower), but by having water tanks filled, then pumping the water in/out/across the heatsinks; ergo, if the Utah data centre had a tank holding a few gigalitres, then they aren't reliant upon whether the mains is turned on of off, as they have the water already on site.

(Someone please correct me if I'm wrong)

Even if they shut the water off, it's not a stretch of the imagination that water tanks would be built, and water carrying helicopters are chartered to fly in the required h2o.

And thanks for a good long read to share!

I've often pondered what it would be like to literally go 'off-the-grid'; to renounce modern communications (social media, email, SMS etc), and just have an honest job, live in a cabin in the woods, and not be bombarded with constant streams of digital consciousness.

Then I realise how much there is yet to learn in what is a finite period of existence, and I can't ell but utilise the advancement mankind has made to further 'unlock' more of this knowledge. 50 years ago I would've had to be born into a filthy rich family in order to gala can't the worlds libraries and cities to learn, to read, to see, to experience. These days, I can learn more backstory and history, and then know I'll be interested going somewhere when I have the time and money.

Brilliant, this sounds right up my alley. I'll try and pick up a copy to watch during the silly season!

Confession: never saw The Dark Crystal, or Labyrinth for that matter.

Could someone provide a good synopsis of the story and themes? I'd prefer hearing it from people who enjoy it, over say IMDB or other website reviews.

Here be my two bookcases, don't be too scared by some of the themes/contents: mostly from Uni days haha.

Oh nice! Never knowing Big Boy, was it some sort of a chain-diner-restaurant?

Cheers! That this-is-a-community feeling is very much alive :)

Thanks mate! It was a bit annoying not being able to be around as much as usual, but I figured it was better to give 110% than half-arsed three-word answers. All should be back-to-normal now!

Baker; best known for Alien Beef Jerky, and a spot where Hunter S. Thompson gets caught in during 'Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas'.

I'd also like to take a brief moment to apologise for my lack of activity recently. I've been caught up quitting my job after being headhunted to a new organisation and role. Both being public service, you can imagine the nightmare and phone calls/emails and shite I had to wade through. I couldn't bring myself to last weeks photo gig because it was themed work, and it was sitting in a beach house 50m from surf and sand, staring at a laptop and unresponsive printer/scanner I lugged on holidays with me.

But! Everything's sorted, enough gas bagging from me, I shall resume photos, discussions, and Interesting Beer Weekly Thread come Monday.

King's Canyon, Northern Territory.

I'm glad you mentioned the point about speeding through passages; I'm reading a pdf copy as well and admit I did skim-read some passages, not only because of thinking they were 'unnecessary', but also because I do struggle a bit with his style of writing, and I don't think the proper clarity of it comes through a pdf copy either.

Long story short, I need to read it properly.

Phwoar, nice methodology and interpretation - Love it!

Doing fantastic, I'm on almost a week off work, my better half came home from work in China, and there's yummy beers to be had tonight. Speaking of beers, amazing to be mentioned in the newsletter! Thanks!!

Well, I've off found a beer goes well with spicy food, and I am rather partial to both as well; will report back if I mix the two together.

On that note, I've found Kingfisher Lager goes great with Indian (vindaloo, lamb gosht), but I'd rarely drink it without the food.

Well there's nothing wrong with that, I'm certainly no expert either! But that's part of the point behind this thread: Tasting notes, appreciations, reviews, and of course, liquified education.

Never heard of the Cēsu in your photo, it looks great in the glass though! How would you describe it to drink? Heaviness, bitterness, first taste, aftertaste?

Thanks for the encouragement, more than happy to follow suit running this until it's established better, then passing the torch so others can add their input. I'll start a shoutout on Week 2 with everybody mentioned here!

As for level of adventurous with beer selection, widely encouraged but not mandatory, I think it'd be great if someone reviews an 'everyday beer' (saw it in a grog shop yesterday, thought it was a beautiful term) that's leads to others walking past it in store and going, "You know what? I'll give it a go: So-and-so made it sound alright".

Looking forward to your selections and notes!

Oh definitely worth a try, if only for the experience. Speaking of Rogue, my housemate picked up the Chipotle and on other recently and said they were great; yesterday I picked up a Dead Man Ale to try. Apparently it goes great with spicy food, so I may have to wrangle up some good Thai or something. What a shame haha.

You and me both on being newly-minted to Hop goodness: There's a beer specialist beer work who has 400+ beers from Aus/NZ and around the world; a great number of dry and wet hopped beers; my housemate and another mate are planning to go when we have ridiculous money to spend and stock up.

I recently tried a Sierra Nevada Season Harvest (if I remember right), and good grief was it a hopped wonder to bestow. Not so great at $14 a bottle but, that's Oz for you.

I love a good Duvel, Chimay, Gulden Draak or Kwak, so I'll have to track this tasty souding number down somehow!

While there would be arguments regarding having only a limited number of people on a TS (and above) project (such as OXCART), you limit the potential of information being leaked, and reduce the amount of tracing required if it is leaked. Using your example, 4 people (SR-71) is a lot easier to maintain confidentiality with vs 2500 (B2); otherwise there's an inceease risk of a repeating of the Thomas Cavanaugh or Noshir Gowadia affairs.

No matter your stance on drones, they are the current trend and will be for some time, I imagine. From a cost and risk-assessment basis, they are a lot more appeasing than pilot-based aircraft. I've not had a crack at playing with consumer-level drones or remote control helicopers yet, the extremely limited flight time (5-10mins) kinda puts me off.

That said, it will only be a matter of the time until the consumer grade ones weigh less, have further ranges etc. It will be even more intriguing when they start operating in autonomous union, too.

Bargain !

Haven't heard of that book before, thanks! I think I'll be adding that to the Xmas wish list. Such amazing designs and almost unfathomable to think they were done with ingenuity and slide rules. As awesome as some of today's more modern tech and design is, my mind is not boggled/amazed by designs such as the SR-71 and how there was no computer power to fall back upon. Not to discredit the use of such tech, but it's more amazing that they designed and built them successfully without the aid of CAD or other modernised computer modelling/testing tech.

Cheers, it was a pretty eerie place to be, especially entering the isolation cells and seeing what it would be like stuck inside. Not fun, is the least I can see.

I agree with your point on people having the right to be somewhere, of course they do, and that applies for pretty much anywhere and everywhere. However, and without getting into a massive rant, common courtesy would be nice sometimes. If people don't see you, then that's fair enough; can't hold it against them for not knowing. It's frustrating when there are people who see you're lining up a shot, and then just continue walking into it. After waiting to take this, it was probably all over in 10-15 seconds.

It's like taking a photo of a couple, and then having someone walk right between you and the couple as if it's no big deal.

Anywho, photo was achieved, end rant haha.

Oh man, thank you for linking that, may just get me some more authentic SR-71 blueprints!

Alcatraz. D-Block. Isolation.

This shot two attempts and damn near half an hour to take, purely because of people wandering in from the entrance (to the left of the shot, not visible), seeing I was trying to get a shot, and continuing to aimlessly wander into frame. Same with the door at the other end, but not as bad.

There was another photographer who came in and stood near where I was, we were both going for similar shots. Probably spent 15mins in silent recognition and empathy with one another as people would see us, both lining up and then having to drop camera as they meandered in the way.

Eventually, a moment came, and the bursting sound of two cameras was over in a matter of seconds. We looked at each other, silently smiled and nodded, and parted ways.

Ah, suppose I should open my eyes and look harder sometimes, I scrolled halfway down on phone, didn't see the description; cheers.

After reading through the description, and as flagamuffin said above, I really hope there is a second side to this.

OftenBen asked above for a non-insane, non-corrupt version of why this would be passed. I, by no means, am in anyway even remotely knowledgable on economics, but, I can imagine that a lobbying group with the gift of the gab would be able to utilise said skills, combined with the 'Baffle 'em with bullshit' methodology (use big words, jargon, scary graphs), then combine it with a fear-mongering if action isn't taken:

"If we don't repeal it, it'll cause another crises, and it'll be worse than 2008!"

Couple that with an appeal to a partisan and opposition mentality:

"Well see, Obama and the Democrats brought in this legislation, and it'll cripple America when the next crash hits. Repeal/bring in this law, and the Republicans will be the saviours for averting it".

Note: The last point is easily swapped around, depending which Party/President is in power.

That's my attempt to rationalise it, without bringing in confirmed/suspected corruption and other issues.

I'll finish with a rather apt quote from former VP Dan Quayle regarding banking dilemmas:

"Bank failures are caused by depositors who don't deposit enough money to cover losses due to mismanagement"

You're not wrong: I have an airgapped computer, nothing critical or sus, mainly just for writing and work, on a computer that is less privy to pinging, attacks, malware etc, and while the badBIOS seems to be something utilised towards high-value persons, you can imagine the damage that could happen if it spreads in the wild, and begins attacking indiscriminately.