Meh. To achieve peak Germany you need to sprinkle in some homeopathy and naturism.
Hyperreality
joined 2 years ago
You'd be surprised how many homeless people have hard science degrees or previously ran succesful businesses. Bad luck, ill health, medical bills, a family member who needs to be taken care of, (government) corruption, fraud, theft, builders didn't fix your roof right and you're stuck with the bill and negative equity, etc.
It is possible to commit no mistakes and still lose. That is not weakness, that is life.
The idea that hard work will set you free, a slogan that historically featured above many a concentration camp gate, is a comforting lie but a lie none the less.
For example:
https://www.dw.com/en/ufos-and-aliens-in-germany/a-58077707
However at least of the German UFO clubs seem to be perfectly reasonable:
In Germany, there seems to be an endless list of hobby clubs and nonprofit associations. The Association for UFO Research (GEP) is one of them. Their databank includes 140,000 entries, and 95% of them can be explained. Aside from satellites, strangely shaped balloons is one common answer, as well as weather phenomena and insects that zoom across photos. The remaining 5% "perhaps also have natural causes, which we just can't explain yet," Hans-Werner Peiniger, GEP's head, told DW. Members of Germany's UFO clubs — there are at least three — are not blind alien believers, Leipzig-based Fleischer said. They are rational, engineer types who use limited resources to analyze what curious sky watchers send them. The result, however, can be a great deal of information about what is happening above us. The really interesting cases "are a matter for the military," Fleischer said. "They control the skies and have instruments and radar."
As my Dutch grandfather often angrily said, the Dutch resistance gained most of its members in 1945.
But I think it was a useful lie at that point. Better to get on with things, rather than settle scores.
Also have an old netbook. I use it to run old games.
Mine's on windows 10, but yours probably still runs on XP which is no longer safe. So do a reset, make sure it can't connect to the internet(airport mode, disable wifi, firewall on lockdown), and google how to disable stuff/services to make it slightly speedier.
Gog has plenty of (free) older games. Don't pirate older games, they might connect to the internet, which is a security risk.
I've also had that experience, but it really depends on how well it's been narrated.
For example, Stephen Fry's version of Harry Potter (yes, I know, but it's really well read) it's immediately obvious who says what and he's well spoken. Unsurprising as he's also a good actor and that does matter.
Some audiobooks the narrator rambles, doesn't enunciate clearly, and doesn't make it obvious who said what.
They also have a lot of dramatisations on there. That means different actors read the different parts, sound effects, etc. It's basically like listening to a movie.
Let me know if you need help finding somewhere to begin. The BBC's been around for a while and they have A LOT of stuff on there, and it's only the tip of the iceberg as they regularly change it.
Hell, why not start with some Terry Pratchett. Mort. That's not on the BBC sounds site at the moment, but here it is on Archive.org:
https://archive.org/details/mort_20220604/01+Episode+One.mp3
https://archive.org/details/mort_20220604/02+Episode+Two.mp3
https://archive.org/details/mort_20220604/03+Episode+Three.mp3
https://archive.org/details/mort_20220604/04+Episode+Four.mp3
Or perhaps you want to show off. Here's a dramatisation of Dostoyevsky's The Brother's Karamazov:
https://www.bbc.co.uk/sounds/play/b00y9455
Stars at least one of the actors from their adaptation of Terry Pratchett's Mort, funnily enough.
I have dyslexia, ADHD (focus issues) and my eyes physically shake leading to me skipping over entire paragraphs unless there’s enough white space between the lines
I read A LOT. I have a couple of degrees.
Ignore snobbery. Listening to an audiobook is just as valid a way of enjoying a book as reading it. I suggest starting with something you think you might actually enjoy, maybe a genuine classic, not this overly long blogpost.
Listen to a chapter before you go to sleep. If people are snobs about audiobooks, don't mention you listened to it, just say you read it.
I recommend looking on the BBC sounds app/website: https://www.bbc.co.uk/sounds/
It's free.
There are a lot of them. I hope Ukrainians realise that this is partly why European leaders couldn't give them more and give it sooner. They're also busy fighting off Russian fifth columnists and trying to prevent them making significant gains in elections. Often the useful idiots who support them, aren't even aware they're helping the Russian cause or spreading Russian propaganda.
This is a sensitive subject, but that's partly changed thanks to drugs like Truvada and PrEP.
You can now have sex with someone who has HIV and still not contract it. People are having more unprotected sex, safe in the knowledge that they're on PrEP and they basically can't contract HIV anymore. Hell, AFAIK you can even take a large dose of PrEP or Truvada AFTER you've had risky sex. This is great news. Not having safe sex isn't. It's a problem in the gay community.
Important caveat: apparently people are also getting tested more often exactly because HIV is now far more treatable or preventable, which means doctors are diagnosing cases of syphilis which would otherwise have gone undetected (syphillis can often be asymptomatic until it starts causing serious damage):
https://www.cbsnews.com/news/syphilis-rates-gay-bisexual-men/
Almost all movies are made in the editing room. Always have been.
Basically this:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kuleshov_effect