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Pat

#2022 Zealand

I just asked an acquaintance of mine who lives in New Zealand to go up a nearby hill during the sunrise and hold his hands up and make shadow puppets to see if I could see them on the moon from the US as the eclipse waned.

Didn’t work.

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Pat

I just filled up my electric car... It cost me $1.67, that's $1.67 total cost of electicity to completely fill it up. :ablobblewobble:

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Pat


- - - -
woke adj - 1. aware of racism; antiracist; 2. also, aware of injustice
- - - -
Origin: mid-20th century slang among the black community;
past participle of WAKE

Someone who is woke is antiracist.

Someone who is antiwoke is racist.

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Pat

Retro SciFi of the Week…

Contact (1997)

Why can’t more science fiction be like this? There are no goofy monsters or extra-terrestrials that evolved to look like English-speaking humans. No space battles modeled after 20th century warfare. No space aliens that want to colonized Earth.

Contact is a realistic portrayal of what a first contact might look like. It’s very well written and produced, and the acting is world class. The film took a hit from some reviewers when it debuted because of who the filmmakers were (the writer, Carl Sagan was an atheist (or agnostic) and the lead actor, Jodie Foster is lesbian), so keep that in mind if you look up ratings/reviews of the film.

One of the questions asked by this film is whether an extra-terrestrial species could provide us with information that would cause us to destroy ourselves. You don’t want miss this one.

(image commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Arecibo_Observatory_Aerial_View.jpg, CC-BY-4.0)

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Pat

Let me get this straight…

Texas says life begins at conception, so, now the legal drinking age in Texas is 20 years, 3 months?

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Pat

Oh, BTW, good morning fedi...

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Pat

If you’re not a cynical misanthrope by now, you’re not paying attention.

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Pat

spoiler (the answer) 

- - - - - - - - Spoiler - - - - - -

The correct answer to the poll…

The most effective way to prevent the infection and spread of COVID-19 is by properly wearing a NIOSH-approved respirator when you are near other people or breathe air that may possibly be contaminated.

- N95 respirator > 95% efficient at stopping virus particles
- P100 respirator > 99.97% efficient at stopping virus particles
- FDA-approved vaccines ~ 50% two weeks after injection; 40% or less after 4 months, at preventing infection
- best cloth masks or surgical masks ~50-60% efficient at stopping virus particles
- typical cloth mask < 30% efficient
- hand-washing - not effective

N95 and P100 are NIOSH ratings for respirators
NIOSH (National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health)

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Pat

.gov

Which is the most effective way to prevent the infection and spread of COVID-19?
(besides complete isolation, of course)

4 people · May 15, 2022, 02:38
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Pat

Lexa Doig played the titular role in the TV series Andromeda (2000-2005).

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Pat

(given current evernts, I'll run this poll again)

Is it more important to follow the law, or to follow what the Supreme Court says?

3 people · May 09, 2022, 22:59
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Pat

I think it's time to overturn Marbury v. Madison.

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Pat

Pat Wrote a Poem...

53616c746564

5f5f07e3420c7230b00b04be1f4aecfa744
ba17578fb4b6276b5d6adad3e5ea2ee8ae043a415a77
89a3a0fee7550d004c96f45f
e1ccdc6ea7a211633f6065aa251f968ac69bac4632c71db73eadca839565b154
89664c1470d328370b6a6
cda6d2bf787c1bd898fd8012394cfa666d352202
55c77f3d5aa9085b44ca36a06fda2f1e05ea171856c2ae340f761b77ba9
570472952a2238d7a855815d5d05407e374e7a2b78b669efdd061fdfa6eb60ad3bf48ceddef09200324b9

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Pat

Well, some of them got it, but since there is generally no requirement for reporters and family to report positive tests, we'll never know for sure how many people caught COVID-19 at the event or how sick they got.

(Note: The CEO of CBS is probably required to disclose a positive because his health directly effects the value of that publicly traded company.)

nytimes.com/2022/05/06/world/g

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Pat

We'll never know because no one will report it.

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Pat

.gov


- - -
The truth is…

In the US in March 2022, there were 2450 people who had died from COVID-19 and came back to life again.
- - -

Cumulative deaths from COVID-19:
2022/3/12 11:15 p.m. - 967,552
2022/3/14 11:35 p.m. - 965,102
- - -
Source: Johns Hopkins Coronavirus Resource Center; coronavirus.jhu.edu/map.html
- - -
= A statement that is logically or literally true (or partly true), but seems to imply something that isn’t true or is just plain weird. (for rhetoric, logic or propaganda studies… or just for fun)

(Image CC-by-nc-nd-3.0; by Sylvenne, www.deviantart.com)

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Pat

Retro SciFi of the Week…

The Time Machine (1960)

This is the first film adaptation of the H. G. Wells novel. Although the story isn’t the first time-travel story ever written, it’s the first one to include a device that allows one to travel forward or backward to arbitrarily selected points in time.

After six decades, the film has held up well and is still entertaining in it’s own right. The special effects are pretty good even by today’s standards. They won an Academy Award when the film debuted.

Other film adaptations were made in 1978 and 2002, but they deviated more substantially from the book.

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Pat boosted
Pat

Is it more important to follow the law, or to follow what the Supreme Court says?

1 person · Feb 11, 2022, 23:57
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Pat

We began using fire about 1.7 million years ago…
- -
Some people still use fire to power their putt-putt cars.
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Everybody else drives an electric car.
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(Actually, Fred Flintstone’s car used the flywheel effect to run his car. The energy came from brontosaurus burgers. Primitive.)
Fair use image.

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Pat



How many people at the White House Correspondents' Dinner superspreader event will become infected with COVID-19?

5 people · Apr 30, 2022, 22:11
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