thanks to some combination of HIPAA and medical liability laws, I wasn’t allowed to say anything about it, even if asked point blank

Are you sure that you understood that right? In every study I’ve helped out with, and when I’m dealing with patients, rule #1 is that the participant/patient has access to their information produced from the procedures and gets counseled by a doctor involved in the process if anything is found. There’s a neuroscience professor who famously recorded his own experience in the textbook he wrote, where he participated in an MRI study because his insurance wouldn’t approve an MRI. The tumor was found in the study, passed over to his healthcare team, and they were able to use it to get the surgery approved.

Nuclear-Spearman: Huuuun, where’s my atl-atl?!?

Honey: I put it away! Don’t you think about running off doing no nuclear-do!

Aye, the first time a blue jay tore the head off of a smaller bird in its nest was a real head turner for me.

Think of the children!

I’ll believe they’re thinking of the children when they use that phrase to make laws that agree with the environmental groups and governing bodies.

Iain M Banks was making transgender the norm before some current republican politicians were born. I can’t help but think that some of my ease with accepting them came from his amazing writing about a culture that could be anything they want, from child to adult, male to female, furry to electrons whizzing in hyperspace.

He was beautiful in his descriptions of food. I saved some of the pictures that came out of his recipe book.

Jesus, that dude shaped a lot of peoples worlds. I honestly don’t know if I was scared of the drain at the bottom of the public pool because of him, because I know that I didn’t read his short story until I was in college, but I wonder if it had already started spreading around in the secret and sly ways of the school hallways, before text messages were ever imagined.

Look, if a raccoon can get down my esophagus to the sphincter, he’s welcome to the acid bath.

No, and yes. You can start a brand new account on the first day of a league and be at par with everyone else. The vast majority of the game is accessible with no demands on you aside from time and skill. Every purchase you make is cosmetic only, simply changing the way some spells look or giving you a pet that follows you around and looks cool while doing nothing extra.

The one exception? Stash tabs. Tabs that specialize in holding certain items for you in your stash. Tabs that let you sell items to others with greater ease. It has gotten to the point where if you want to be best of the best, you should probably have the extra tabs. Why? Because at the endgame, you’ll need to start trading for items that make your build sing, or simply eke out the extra 15% damage that multiplies with other sources to make your dps soar into the millions, because PoE is all about finding something that you can push past where it was supposed to stop being good. Without those stash tabs, making cool items or easily trading with others is much more difficult.

Now, how much would it cost you to be ‘competitive’ with tabs? Probably $10 at most. For a game that I’ve played for over a decade and probably 1000-2000 hours at this point, I think the <$100 bucks I’ve thrown their way is worth it. I have friends who love the game and likely have 3k+ hours in it, and they’ve only spent $150 or so. I think that’s pretty reasonable for that much enjoyment.

Only some cereals are soups. Lucky charms in milk is a soup. Frosted Flakes in milk is not. A soup has to be a collection of different ingredients in a liquid medium.

Is Trix a soup? I have no clue.

/fight_me

I used to help people apply, and it was hellacious when there was animosity from one parent due to a divorce. It could really fuck things up for the poor kids.

This. So much of this. I can’t even convince family members to not go and socialize with dozens of others while they are sick! Five years ago, I would have bet my life’s savings and every appendage I have that I would get the correct answer if I asked someone whether illnesses spread through contact with or being near a sick person.

Meanwhile psychologists just name things as exactly blandly as they can. There’s a neat phenomenon where a relationship can immediately be viewed as deeper and more connected, merely by one of the individuals sharing deeply personal information. It even works at the very first interaction. In other words, if someone tends to overshare, or blurt out info about themselves, we measure their blirtasiousness and its effect on relationships. Not even kidding. I think the folks who came up with it were Scottish, which is why the blirt rather than blurt.

Not if it’s a whole pie.

…

That is a whole pie, right?

What are you talking about? I constantly explain the calculus of the flow rate in the push IV drug I’m giving by going through the (pi)r^2 * h of the syringe, with emphasis on the dh/dy. All my patients love hearing it. They constantly thank me as I finish giving them the dilaudid.

Well, if they were stinky I’d probably be upset. If their hands were sticky, I’d be upset. Repeat for the other social offenses. Otherwise, sure, go for it. We all need a case of mistaken identity in our lives.

But penguins are flightless bird?

That’s his point.

I actually had to downgrade proton for dragon’s dogma recently. Black screen on the 8+ versions.