Notices by 🇳🇴 Thor — backup account (thorthenorseman@octodon.social), page 17

Dad's thoughts on the current geopolitical situation 1/5

In parts of Eastern Europe, they still live in the old way. The men wear sixpences, the women wear headscarves, and they farm with manual tools. For urbanites from the countries in question, this is probably an embarrassment. For outsiders, it's a form of time travel.

The Norwegian word for "tadpole" is "rumpetroll," which means "tail troll," but reads like "butt troll" to modern Norwegians, because "rumpe" in the sense of "tail" has gone out of use. Fun fact: A common misspelling of "rumpe" is "rompe."

Meanwhile, in Romania...

The Norwegian word for "tadpole" is "rumpetroll," which means "tail troll," but reads like "butt troll" to modern Norwegians, because "rumpe" in the sense of "tail" has gone out of use. Fun fact: A common misspelling of "rumpe" is "rompe."

If you speak Norwegian and you go to Romania, you will giggle a lot...

@sdm I'm finding the phrase "den store krigen" (the great war) in contemporary news articles. I always figured that was just a poetic translation of the English term, because I can't remember that term being used in history class...

@sdm Perhaps the interwar period name was that, or the Great War. In any case, there was a name. Still trying to figure out what it was called in MY language, which is the mystery here. I know only one name for that conflict in my own language, and that's "første verdenskrig" - the first world war.

@sdm Wikipedia lists multiple names for it. The English name is fine. It started out as the Great War, so we know that. What I'm more concerned with, and am struggling to find any information about, is what the Norwegian term for "the Great War" was in between WWI and WWII. There must've been a name for it before WWII...

Hmm, what was the Great War called in Norwegian before World War II came around and it was renamed to World War I? I can't find a term similar to the Great War on Norwegian Wikipedia or the Great Norwegian Encyclopaedia, and we didn't exactly name it World War I in the expectation that World War II was just around the corner. Leaving out the original name for this conflict seems like a rather large omission...

This board I'm routing is has moved beyond "it's tricky to route this elegantly but it can be done" and has entered "pepper it with vias until it works" territory. This is no longer a pleasing PCB to work with...

@SarcasmKid What the hell am I looking at...

Surface-mount components are much harder to route than through-hole components. You pretty much end up creating new holes in the board anyway to replace the missing ones.

Seeing other people's screenshots of Mastodon is a bit like seeing "your" couch in a photo of someone else's home, because you both shop at IKEA.

I think what I'm saying is that Mastodon feels personal. It has taken up permanent residence on my computer screen.

@drlabman I mention bottled water because it's a consistent product and tastes the same everywhere. Tap water is highly variable and depends on local conditions, so it's hard to discuss objectively. In my experience, tap water will often taste of metal or soil if the pipes are old.

@drlabman I mention bottled water because it's a consistent product and tastes the same everywhere. Tap water is highly variable and depends on local conditions, so it's hard to discuss objectively. In my experience, tap water will often taste of metal or soil of the pipes are old.

@drlabman I would agree with you if the drink in question was Diet Coke, which tastes like dish washing detergent. I have no such problems with Coke Zero, Pepsi Max, Fanta Exotic Zero and so on. Pepsi Max has a slight bitterness, but it's overpowered by the main flavours. In water, there is nothing but bitterness and metallicness. Water only really tastes like nothing to me if it's ice cold.

People on Hacker News are having trouble believing that there are people who don't like plain water.

I'm one of them.

Even purified bottled water has a sort of bitter taste to it that I don't like. If no other liquid is avaliable, I'll take iced water. If iced or refrigerated water isn't available, I'll drink it plain.

I usually get a bit dehydrated if I only have plain water. I'm marginally better if I have mineral water. I drink like a camel if I have diet soda with ice.

I drink less alcohol than most people you will meet, but about once or twice a year, I will have some stiff drinks, and every time I do so, the conclusion is that I really needed some stiff drinks. You could say that I put off having a drink until it is absolutely necessary for me to have one.

@SuperFloppies *Torvalds

Torvalds isn't young anymore, of course, so what I mean in his case is being hard-nosed.

@SuperFloppies He's young and hard-nosed. Not an uncommon trait in FLOSS benevolent dictator types. (See: Linus Thorvalds)