StatisticalOutlier
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Posts posted by StatisticalOutlier
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1 hour ago, GHScorpiosRule said:
the rental, I don't know if I mentioned up thread, was giving me "error" messages about how I hadn't turned off the engine, which, like, what? Of course I did, and about how the battery was "dead" which of course, it isn't. Then yesterday, I get a notification that the front left tire is low on pressure; so I went to the gas station and put in air to the amount it should be; but still that notification was there.
BMW: The Ultimate Driving Machine.
1 hour ago, GHScorpiosRule said:I swear, whenever I was at a stop light, I could feel the car "shifting" gears, as if I pulled the clutch and set in first, as the light turned green.
Some modern cars (including BMWs) have a thing where the engine turns off if you're sitting still for a certain amount of time. Maybe that's what you were feeling.
1 hour ago, GHScorpiosRule said:But, alas, I never learned to drive stick (which I forever am lamenting),
I learned to drive in an army jeep with a manual transmission, and am forever grateful. Thanks, Dad, even if it was embarrassing because you'd painted it orange to match the high school's colors. I still remember the first time I got behind the wheel of a car with an automatic transmission in Driver's Ed, and I didn't know how to make it go.
That said, I much prefer driving my automatic Subaru to the manual BMW. The Subaru is so slow that it's super easy to drive--just floor it whenever you take off from a stop and you'll be going an appropriate speed.
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2 hours ago, Mindthinkr said:
It might need to be painted to match your car’s color, but it’s better than no window or an unusable door.
The door is fine--there was just that one time that for some reason it wouldn't open. The reason it wouldn't work now would be because if we just covered the hole with plastic, it would have to be taped to the roof and body of the car because of the frameless window. With a "regular" window, you could just tape plastic in there around all four sides on the door and the door would work like regular.
We already checked junkyards. They appear to have some sort of network that tells you what's available nationwide. That's actually our only option at this point, but the problem with that is many of these cars are garage queens and don't get driven much and therefore don't get wrecked much. It doesn't sound there's a waiting list for parts, so I guess we'll have to just keep checking periodically, hoping somebody totals his beloved car.
Mr. Outlier found a place in England that makes polycarbonate windows for race cars, and it sounds like they can make one for this car. It won't be a good permanent solution because the plastic will get scratched as the window goes up and down (unlike glass), but at least it will keep the rain and snow and thieves out.
In the meantime, he's going to try to fashion a covering for the hole out of a piece of hardware-store plastic, although the actual window has a bend to it that he obviously can't duplicate (which is why the replacement has to be a driver's side window and can't be a passenger side window). And it will be attached on only two sides if we want to be able to open the door. Should be interesting.
All of which has made me wonder what the value of the car is now. I certainly wouldn't pay "normal" price for a car that doesn't have a driver's side window and the only way you can get one is if somebody totals his car and somehow doesn't break the driver's side window and you find out about it and snap it up before somebody else does.
I mean, what are we supposed to do? Total the car? That sounds crazy, but it's not particularly usable the way it is now.
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6 hours ago, Andromeda said:
I like the look of Bruges. I want to go there. So adorable!
I highly recommend the movie In Bruges.
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4 hours ago, GaT said:
I have a Toyota 86 (yeah I know, you never heard of it)
Au contraire! Mr. Outlier test drove one, and gunned it when exiting the dealership and got pulled over by a cop within two blocks. He wasn't even speeding--it just made a lot of noise.
4 hours ago, GaT said:& I don't have my front plates on the car.
Figures.
I'm currently less than enchanted with BMW because a tow truck guy who was supposed to be using his tool thing to get us into the car when we managed to lock TWO sets of keys in it shattered the driver's side window. It took a couple of weeks to track down a dealership that could order a window from Germany, but it turned out even though BMW's dealership system let them order it, they couldn't actually get it, and nobody can get it because BMW doesn't make that window any more.
We can't even tape plastic on there because it's a frameless window. Or, we could but then we wouldn't be able to open the door and would have to climb into the driver's seat from the passenger side, and I did that once a few years ago when the driver's door just wouldn't open when I finished pumping gas, and maneuvering across the passenger seat, over the console, and into the driver's seat is nothing I want to repeat.
Plus it's our only car--we live in an RV traveling and tow the BMW and leave the Subaru with a friend because I can't bear to part with it. I've come to realize that not having a driver's side window on your only car is just a wee bit inconvenient.
Side rant--WTF with the BMW letting the dealership order a window they can't actually get? And fuck Ebay, with its helpful automated car part matching system, which on its own inserts into listings that the Z3 window you're looking at will fit your M-Coupe WHEN IT WILL NOT. It's a great idea IF the data underlying it is correct. But as is so often the case, the underlying data isn't correct and you have no way of knowing that if you haven't spent hours researching these damn windows
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12 hours ago, EtheltoTillie said:
I know I would not have gotten the ticket in the Subaru.
Our household has one BMW and one Subaru station wagon. For a few years, the front license plate on the Subaru kept falling off and I was pulled over TWICE on rural highways for not having a front plate. While I see sports cars driving all over the place without front license plates, and you know they take it off on purpose.
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15 hours ago, dizzyd said:
Eating in church was sacrilegious
Maybe it depends on the menu. I've eaten many many communion hosts in church.
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On 8/9/2022 at 8:45 PM, Browncoat said:
I saw this today, and I really liked it a lot. The story was sweet and genuine (and I love that they were able to get Lesley Stahl and the 60 Minutes people involved!), and the animation was top-notch.
I noticed that when Marcel and Nan were looking at a computer screen, for example, you could see the screen reflected in their eyes.
On 8/9/2022 at 8:45 PM, Browncoat said:Marcel’s community in the end had some interesting members — it took me a second to realize that one of them was a tampon.
I was thinking about seeing this a second time, and your comment made me head to the theater because I had missed that and who knows what else. At one point, the tampon is sitting next to a smaller creature, and the tampon has its string going around the other creature like you do with an arm.
I came away from my second viewing realizing there wasn't a single false note in the entire movie.
And I went to Target on the way home and they were playing Peaceful, Easy Feeling on the Muzak and I thought, "I like Marcel's version better."
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On 8/10/2022 at 4:19 PM, ljenkins782 said:
I'd love to comment on this but the effing US Weekly site still won't load. That thing is so loaded with crap and popups that it's impossible to get to the article you might want to read.
This gal Kelsey is claiming she dated Nate from 2020 to 2021, and got messages from a gal named Laree who said she had been "romantically involved" with him at the same time. But what I find really surprising is that Kelsey said, “I cried for a guy who kept his kid a secret from me for 1.5 years when we were dating and I found out on reality TV."
So she didn't know he had a kid for the year and a half they were together, and found out when she was watching The Bachelorette?!
On 8/9/2022 at 7:52 PM, nlkm9 said:but what guy would want to date a girl who is willing to share screenshots and publicly humiliate her ex.
A guy who weighs that against dating a girl who won't figure out you have a child and other girlfriends?
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14 hours ago, mythoughtis said:
Binh thought she was lying about being a nurse.
I got the impression that she had lied on her application, saying she'd completed her BSN when she was actually one class short, and that's what she confessed to him and asked to keep a secret. It's not like she'd be able to keep her actual occupation, where she goes to work every day wearing scrubs, a secret from everyone.
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I got a mass email from the volunteer coordinator for a Denver nonprofit in the entertainment sector talking about the usual volunteer stuff, with this at the end: the casting director for MAFS called, saying they're holding auditions for the upcoming Denver edition and asking to help get the word out.
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On 8/10/2022 at 10:15 AM, annzeepark914 said:
Every November I send a check to Costco for membership fees. But I never think to go there, & it's less than 10 minutes away.
Why would you pay to keep a current Costco membership if you're not going to go there?
I'm thinking I have a very different relationship to money than most people.
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2 hours ago, chitowngirl said:
Mrs. Harris’ gown couture gown would have needed a LOT of adjusting to fit the fuller figured young starlet. They were nowhere near the same size and more material would be needed to take it out that much.
That was just one of several things I had to suspend disbelief on. One thing I did appreciate was that they said her suitcase was empty, and she took it just to have something to carry the dress back home in. It bugs me when people carry a full suitcase like it doesn't weigh anything.
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15 hours ago, ABay said:
The heat advisory that was supposed to expire tonight has been extended to tomorrow night. The temps will dip all the way down to the mid to high 80s later this week. Just kill me now.
That made me think of what I saw on the local weather last weekend--I think you'd approve of the descriptor for the purple level.
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Mr. Outlier is a proponent of non-linear time to handle the tussles over sunrise and sunset times. But I foresee implementation issues.
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On 8/3/2022 at 11:24 PM, Elizzikra said:
I really don't like him but I will give him credit for his smooth little hop onto the paddle board.
You forget he's a surfer, so a standup paddle board would feel like a stable barge to someone used to maneuvering a small surfboard (or windsurf board, in my case).
I have a friend whose maiden name is Haggard and she changed it to her husband's name with a quickness. I'd never even thought of her name as the adjective it was, but obviously she had.
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7 hours ago, Rinaldo said:
I've previously mentioned here an instance of a movie being aired with the audio description turned on
Lately, when I watch America's Funniest Home Videos on the over-the-air channel, the audio description is turned on and I have no way to control it. I actually can't watch the show because it's too annoying ("girl in bathing suit swings on a rope over water").
It happened in a theater, too, at the French documentary The Truffle Hunters. I kept hearing this talking and would turn around to death-glare whoever was talking, but I was the only one in the theater. I thought I was losing my mind. Plus, it was subtitled, so the audio description was almost entirely just reading the subtitles, at a volume you could hear but not really understand. I grabbed an employee and she said sorry, they can't control that. Argh.
However, I am happy to report that after a couple of months, my captions are back on on TCM. I had actually quit watching because I can't understand dialogue without them, and then the other night I was seeing if I could understand Eddie Mueller's introduction to that night's film noir and suddenly grokked: I see captions!
I did an online chat with DirecTV about the missing captions when they first disappeared (they were on on every other channel, but disappeared from TCM), and "Peter" assured me they would be back on within a week. Then again, one of the questions he asked was, "Are you experiencing a natural or personal disaster?" so I'm not sure he was the right person for the job. And sure enough, they didn't come back on
I found out that Dish subscribers lose TCM captions sometimes, but they have a setting they can change to get them back; apparently TCM sometimes starts sending the captions out as the wrong "type" or something. But I don't have that setting.
I emailed DirecTV's caption department (I wonder if captions warrant special attention because of the ADA) and actually got a reply, but still no captions, and when I followed up, they said I needed to upgrade my equipment. But that's what they always say. I'm still using standard definition (not HD) equipment and an HD dish won't work for my setup, so I'm just letting them whittle away at what channels I get until they turn off SD completely, which was supposed to happen like two years ago and still hasn't. So I assumed TCM captions were just part of the carnage, and I unhappily gave up watching any movies on TCM that were in English.
And then out of nowhere, bing! Captions. I was willing to forgo TCM over this and I guess when it became clear I meant business, the gods took me seriously and stopped my suffering. Just in time for Noir Alley to take a break, but I'm not complaining.
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I'll spoiler tag this because it's a discussion about the ending:
SpoilerI thought Franklin sent the letter and was working toward forgiving his dad. However, Mr. Outlier didn't see the movie but I told him about it, and he thinks Franklin catfished his dad, as revenge (enticing him to up-end his life by quitting his job and moving across the street). The look on Franklin's face as he stood in the window clearly indicates he's the one who wrote the letter, and now that I think about it, he looked kind of smugly satisfied.
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I gotta hand it to Patton Oswalt: He played a (surprisingly) dark character in Big Fan, but that's nothing compared to this. There was a trailer for a George Clooney and Julia Roberts movie before this, and I have no problem with them cashing a big paycheck for playing affable people and will probably go see it, but at the same time, I appreciate someone like Patton Oswalt, who's willing to play such a despicable character.
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22 hours ago, CrazyInAlabama said:
No garage.
I noticed that neither of the two decoy houses in Phoenix had a garage, or even a carport, but it wasn't mentioned in the episode at all. I normally hate the look of houses with converted garages because you can always tell they're converted garages, especially when they leave the driveway there, but both of these bordered on unobjectionable for me--especially the first one. I actually had to look twice to confirm there wasn't a carport or garage.
Too bad it's in Phoenix, where I think the lack of a garage or carport might be a deal-breaker for me unless I was going to be there only in the winter.
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Written and directed by Ryan, from The Office.
The movie is a fish-out-of-water story, but takes digs at the fish himself, in addition to Texans. I know a thing or two about West Texans, and their portrayal didn't bug me in the least.
The movie is also a commentary on current times, and actually made me do some thinking afterward and I fear the only way we're going to start coexisting with each other again is in the metaverse. Surprisingly deep thinking after a fun movie with some real laugh-out-loud moments for me.
BTW, Ashton Kutcher is excellent in this.
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12 hours ago, Hedgehog2022 said:
I had to spend two days there a few years ago due to flight cancellations because of a hurricane on the East Coast. We drove around and tried to find something, anything to do or look at and the only thing we thought looked kind of cool was the campus of the University of New Mexico.
People like to do the tramway ride.
In the UNM area, the streets are named after minerals(?), and if you're 20 years old and sufficiently stoned while driving around, it is HILARIOUS to refer to Lead Street as "pee-bee."
But other than that, it really is a grubby place.
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6 hours ago, BAForever said:
Was in Sante Fe recently. Beautiful landscaping was all over the place. Albuquerque isn't too far and should share the climate.
Santa Fe is at about 7,000 feet elevation, while Albuquerque is at 5,000 feet. The rule of thumb is a decrease of 3 degrees for each increase of 1,000 feet of elevation (I learned this from people who climb 14-ers in Colorado, so they can predict how cold it'll be at the top).
8 hours ago, CrazyInAlabama said:A friend of mine called the Southwest, E.T. country, for everything tan.
I have a friend who's always referred to Albuquerque as "Bedrock." I think it's a singularly unattractive place, as were the houses they looked at.
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8 hours ago, Andyourlittledog2 said:
She just has to officially file it as full custody against Xaveon (?)
It's X'Zayveon. Sadly, it's missing the K that would make it a perfect name.
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On 8/1/2022 at 9:52 AM, Charlie Baker said:
There was a tech goof on TCM's end--the short started immediately after the fade out of Raw Deal, then after it we get Eddie's outro telling us to stay tuned for the short.
They need to talk to whoever's manning the switches at TCM these days. In addition to this, on Sunday night's TCM Imports, they played Alicia Malone's introduction to Chronicle of a Summer before and after the movie.
House Hunters - General Discussion
in House Hunters
Vocal fry usually goes down in tone at the end. It's part of what makes it so annoying for me--the anxiety waiting for that dive. But HH Meghan made it worse by adding syllables and going up before going down, or down before going up--I can't remember.
I kept FFing it because all three were so annoying, but then I'd stop and check to see if they were still doing it, kind of like you do with a bad smell that you just can't stop sniffing.