Best posts made by GreenFlashlight

@arkandel said in Good TV:

What the hell, they had never seen Clark without glasses on their whole lives?

I haven't seen the TV show, so I don't know if this applies, but in most Superman stories, it's not the glasses. Clark stands differently, talks differently, acts differently. They just don't look like the same person through pure body language. My favorite scene in the 1978 movie is just after Superman's date with Lois when Clark is about to confess, then turns back and collapses back into Clark, slouching into a servile posture, picking up a nervous stammer in his voice, never looking Lois in the eye; all done in a single camera shot so it all rides on Christopher Reeves's acting. Fantastic scene, and it's my permanent canon as to why people don't recognize the extremely recognizable guy.

@silverfox Go ahead, jump and clap. We're not watching. At least, not since you covered your webcam's lens with tape.

Today I learned about excited delirium, a supposed medical condition in which a person suddenly gains superhuman strength, becomes imperious to pain, and then dies for absolutely no reason. I say "supposed" because general medical consensus is pretty damn sure it does not exist, and it's not included in the DSM. There are medical organizations who are proponents of it, however, including the National Association of Medical Examiners and the American College of Emergency Physicians, both of whom work intimately with police officers.

Now take a wild guess who is most likely to claim a person died of excited delirium rather than, oh, I don't know, a two hundred pound man kneeling on the back of the decedent's neck for nine minutes.

@ortallus said in Real World Peeves, Disgruntlement, and Irks.:

I honestly don't know much about anarcho-syndacalist, but wouldn't anarchy, technically, be the extreme far far far FAR right? Absolutely no governmental regulation?

No, anarchy isn't about no government regulation. It's about power structures being arranged horizontally rather than vertically because vertical power creates hierarchies that are inherently exploitative. Most anarchists I've been exposed to want a democratic government, but a directly democratic one instead of a representative one and one in which any official can be removed from power at any moment by a simple vote.

I was at the gym yesterday doing some exercises to rebuild my knee. One of them was to just stand on my left leg, right leg as close to my chest as I could get it, and hold the balance for 45 seconds at a time. I lifted my right knee to my chest, grabbed it because something about the countertension or maybe the posture helps my balance, and I stared at the dumbbell rack in front of me, focusing on the 40-pounders. I tried not to let my gaze wander to the right to the ones that are five pounds heavier than that, because I dislike that number these days. Just focus. Focus on the 40. Think about how it's been used so much the white stenciled numbers are kind of fading.*

Think about your foot. Feel how your weight is shifting from blade to arch. You aren't seeing anything any more, you're just feeling now. Pivot on your heel just a little bit to point your toes more outward. There. It's better balanced but also uncomfortable. You were born with your feet badly turned inward.** You think you remember the leg braces you had to wear as a baby but you don't, you're just confusing your memories with scenes from Forrest Gump. It's weird that you do that. Remember how you're sure you almost fell off Niagara Falls because you saw that happen to a kid in a movie?***

Am I still holding onto my right knee? I am. Ugh, I hate how squidgy it is. At least it's shaven. I can't wait to be able to shave my left leg again with something more precise than hair clippers. If someone could read my thoughts, they'd probably be grossed out that I'd even mention my hairy leg. You can't even show a hairy leg on a commercial for women's razors--

"You can put your foot down," said my trainer. I snapped out of it and put my foot down.

"Where do you go when you're doing that? Do you focus on one thing, or try to take your mind off of it?" he asked, sounding genuinely curious.

"Sort of," I said, because it's sort of both and sometimes I just talk like a meme. "The only way I know how to focus is to distract myself from focusing, then distract myself from my distractions. Does that make any sense?"

"Have you ever been diagnosed with ADD?" he asked.

"No, but it wouldn't surprise me," I said.

*I'm wobbling. Stop thinking about vision. Start thinking about another sense. Change your inner monologue.
**You've stopped wobbling. Don't notice that you noticed it, or you'll draw attention and start wobbling again. Keep free associating.
***You're wobbling. Change tracks.[1]

[1] Shit, I shouldn't have thought about falling while trying to keep my balance. That was dumb.

@aria I am squeeing at what a goodboi your pupper is. Hims loves you so much.

I give MVP to Richard E. Grant because just imagine being seventy years old and wearing that costume with a giant fan blowing in your face and no one to play off of on an empty sound stage, having to use nothing but body language to try to evoke the act of conjuration his character pulled off. I am slightly disappointed they didn't manage to work Bill Nighy into the plot somewhere but he's probably got a contract to do some MCU role later down the line, like voicing the Living Tribunal or some damn thing.

Also, ***SFW but TMI***

I work in direct patient care. Have for twenty years. That means I stopped wearing my rings nineteen years ago. They trap germs and they feel gross with all the handwashing I do, holding all that water between the metal and my flesh. It's not just in my professional life, either. I'll break one out for a special occasion, but I've just fallen out of the habit of wearing jewelry on my fingers.

So why the fuck did I just find a ring out in my yard? I didn't wear it out there. I haven't worn it in more than a year. How did it get out there? No one else could have thrown it out there, so it must have been me, but when, and how?

This is going to bug the shit out of me.

@cobalt oooooo nooooooo, i have fallen over with my tummer exposed and cant get up, i sure hope no one comes along while i am helpless and wubs my belly

@kestrel said in The Dog Thread:

I feel like I'm accompanied by this beacon of sunlight who spreads joy everywhere she goes, putting smiles on people's faces and brightening people's day. A teenage girl once stopped me to say, 'Can I pet your dog? Please I've had a really shitty day.' Just ... this dog is such a source of goodness. I love her so much. A perfect being.

Seven years ago, I was on break at work, sitting in my car in the parking lot with the windows down and my arm hanging out the door because it was a little too warm not to want fresh air on my skin, you know? And then something furry headbutted my palm, so I looked down and it was a dog. Some lovely goodboi came up out of nowhere and just stuck his head into my palm for a stroke. Seven years ago, and I still remember how happy it made me.

Dogs are so great.

I am in the ER for dehydration from a gastric bug. I'll be fine, but the nurse wants a urine sample from me and I'm trying so hard not to say to her, "I love your optimism but I need you to temper your expectations."

@arkandel Dunno. I no longer give a shit about Jared Leto after his behavior on the set of Suicide Squad, and will not watch his movies.

@aria I suppose I was arguing with my own conscience rather than you, because while I genuinely do see and mostly agree with the idea that relying on Alec Baldwin to possess knowledge outside of his profession is a recipe for tragedy, I was raised with an almost superstitious fear of guns that leads me to think an actor who's going to be playing with them like they're toys should make time to learn how these murder-engines work. I'm not saying everyone should go through a Keanu-level Quantico training regime, but, like, mandatory safety training or something with a written test at the end, you know?

Seeing a look I'm obsessed with on a college kid and wanting so much to try it, but every time I think about the logistics of it I remember I'm in my forties.

Sigh.

The artist is Jonathon Harris. The title of the piece is "Critical Race Theory."

@mietze said in Model Policies?:

Is there any reason to have an OOC room where people can "talk out loud?" The more time I spend on games that do not have them the more I'm convinced that they have little purpose other than being yet another thing that is a drain on the game.

I like OOC rooms where I can talk to people because it allows me to engage in pleasantries* before asking about finding scenes and planning what the scene should be with my potential partner.

*not that anyone actually responds to pleasantries, which hurts my feelings, and is probably a net argument against an OOC room in which people can talk, but whatever, I have my rituals and I must follow them

@Atomic said in A fully OC supers MU:

Yeah, I loved playing on them, so I'm thinking of standing one up.

I'm strongly considering an Academy style game where the PCs are students. I have a lot of world and lore already built. I love to run scenes, build stories, and do long plots.

I'm partial to the Mutants and Masterminds system for MU resolution, though I am reading a few other supers rulesets right now, because total dork.

How does that bounce off of people?

Brutal honesty? I'm interested in the idea of an OC only game, but when you tie that to a game system that requires a financial investment from me, I find myself wondering why I shouldn't just take my OC ideas to a game I don't have to pony up for a book for. I think a strong enough sales pitch could convince me to cough up the sixty dollar investment, but as it stands, "I'm thinking of doing this, probably in a school for supers" isn't selling me.

@Arkandel said in Good or New Movies Review:

Look, there's a reason the Thrawn books were wildly acclaimed among the fanbase. Not everything in the EU was (a whole lot of it was uninspired shit) but the spirit of the original movies was perfectly captured in them, and the tale was incredibly enjoyable because of it.

I love the first three Thrawn books, but when you set aside how well-written they are, in spirit, they're fanfic filled with Zahn's trademark political intrigue, eidetic memory characters, devoted retainer characters, and logic puzzles with slightly inductive answers. I don't think it's fair to say they weren't leaving his mark on the property, especially since at least one of the characters has been folded into the rebooted franchise.

I am generally cold enough not to care if a dead person was racist or whatever, but my hackles go up a little bit when people try to separate art from artist. Every painting is a self-portrait, and I don't think it's appropriate to compartmentalize the neat space squid stuff from the name he gave his cat. Trying to do so feels to me like an admission of the problem: otherwise, you wouldn't need to try to divorce them.