What's one positive/neutral thing that's happened today?

There were two jigsaw puzzles in my bday package this year. One was a 3D wooden one, a type I’d seen but never done before. It was pretty fun, but soooo many little pieces (I even broke one :weary: ).

And yes, the gears work :stuck_out_tongue:

17 Likes

We went for a drive for the first time today (My wife drove for obvious reasons). I cannot tell you how much of a palpable relief it was knowing the juggling and stress of trying to make no car work was finally over. We got an oil change and had some coffee (I had hot cocoa). It was pretty uneventful. And it was glorious. So so so appreciative that chapter is officially over.

Also, our elderly cat wasn’t eating well and I sought advice on the Off-topics channel of the Neo-Interactives Discord (lots of cat peeps there). Churu was suggested, and we tried it. And it worked! It got her through that spell and she’s eating her normal food regularly again. Here she is hardcore napping:

19 Likes

Is there a special German word for that feeling you get when some household item you’ve been putting up with for years because it didn’t make sense to buy a new one finally and decidedly breaks and you’re totally justified to spend money on a new one that just works better because it’s new and you can select one with the specific features that will make your life easier?

6 Likes

In Japan, there’s wabi-sabi, something like appreciation for things imperfect. So, I wouldn’t be able to appreciate something like that.

If the old thing was good enough, replacing it with the same old thing is good enough. If the old thing wasn’t good enough, why didn’t you replace it earlier?

That said, the only constant is change. As long as things progress well, that’s enough.

Personally, I’d be very suspicious about newer things. Currently, there this scandal about refrigerator, of all things. :roll_eyes:

2 Likes

Had my mother’s potato patties/pie for dinner today. Sorry, no photos this time.

Also, finished reviewing all entries for Seedcomp. I will probably be doing Spring Thing reviews next, but this is pending other stuff on schedule (including Welcome to Hellwaters).

Edit: Thank you again Manon and Pinkunz for organizing this!

6 Likes

Kaufbegründung

(That’s “purchase” and “rationale” smushed together, but I’m just making stuff up…)

5 Likes

Hey, that’s how the Germans do it too, I’m given to understand.

I feel like one could even go so far as to call it Kaufbegrundungsfreude (happiness at having a rationale for purchasing).

6 Likes

Yep, Germans love combining words together to make one longer word.

2 Likes

Yeah, we do! :slight_smile:

But there’s no word for what @HanonO described. Maybe Rechtfertigung (justification)or pehaps guter Grund (=good reason). [Well, maybe another German comes up with a word and I am like "Oh yes, THAT word.]

4 Likes

Google Translate:

Kaufbegründung - Reason for purchase
Kaufbegrundungsfreude - Pleasure to purchase
:+1:

I also created my own Frankenstein word which probably isn’t right: Rechtfertigungauslösen - “trigger justification”

TL;DR: way too much stupid detail about a dumb thing

So it’s not even a big purchase. It’s a spray mop. I’ve had the old one for like 3-4 years and it’s main use is mopping the kitchen floor. When I’m closed in my room working at home or away, I confine my elderly cat to the kitchen using a baby-gate. This is because he often has unique and novel ideas about where exactly the litter box is and it’s easier to mop the floor than to scrub carpet in the rest of my apartment. Also, he and the younger girl cat sometimes get into scrapes and bully each other when I’m not paying attention, and he will retaliate by grudge-eating all her food and then she goes all smackity ninja! if I don’t keep tabs on them.

A spray-mop is basically a long pole with a flat part you velcro a machine-washable microfiber pad onto, and there’s a small reservoir you fill with cleaning solution and a trigger used to spray solution on the floor while mopping so you don’t have to drag out a bucket and a more unwieldy mop for a quick mess.

Its designated understudy spray mop has been sitting in the “saved items” section of my cart waiting for a time when I could toss it in with other things I wanted to buy. Every time I considered adding it to another purchase, I would be like “I don’t need to spend $20, the old one works fine, it’s not a big deal. [save for later]”

Last night the trigger-housing broke and the spray mechanism is coming apart. I literally walked to the computer with it in my hand, brought up the website, moved it to my cart and hit “buy now” which is when I experienced concentrated freude at the efficiency and pre-preparedness on my part - I didn’t buy it early which would give me two operational mops simultaneously; a favorite and a grudge backup that will stand in the corner that I won’t throw away because it still works.

So the new one, besides being new, comes with five swappable mop pads. It also comes with two window washing pads - you can fill the tank with window cleaner and it can spray when held up vertically and extend for reach so you can spray and clean your windows with the same device. It also includes an adhesive wall mounted holder so you can hang it up for easy access!

I just thought it was funny that I had this unusual sense of victory when it happened - like when you plan for disaster but are so prepared. I’ve looked at this fire extinguisher in the corner every single day wondering and now there’s a grease fire! Huzzah! [extinguishes blaze professionally]

I experienced this another time years ago. I had an iPhone 5c whose front microphone was not working so I couldn’t take advantage of voice commands. Everything else worked perfectly and that phone refused to die which I guess is a testament to why I use the iPhone. That changed when a friend was in a jam with no money and needed an emergency replacement phone so I was able to pass it down and get a new one (well-researched and within budget) - I just needed an excuse to pull the trigger!

3 Likes

Sorry but Google is wrong. Pleasure to purchase is Kauffreude.

But what about othe languages than English and German. French for example? Or Turkish (which concatanates words massivly.

1 Like

déclencheur justifié ?

French to my knowledge doesn’t smush words so much as make beautiful phrases you subtly mumble while gazing out the window with a glass of wine :slight_smile:

5 Likes

Yup. Why merge together words to mean things when you could write pages to describe them instead :stuck_out_tongue:

4 Likes


I conquered a mountain today (went on a hike).

15 Likes

My girlfriend in college was an opera student and we had hilarious conversations about the languages she had to pseudo-learn to sing. I decided that French is notable as the language “where you can have a fourteen-letter word with one syllable.”

She toured France with the concert choir and one of the places they visited was a location called Rouen. According to her, it was pronounced like the guttural exhalation someone produces when they settle a bit unexpectedly into a chair: hwohnh. Hearing them discuss the trip was like, “Oh yeah, we rode the bus out of HWOHNH and the scenery was superb…”

5 Likes

OMG IF IDEA: the text is only written in phonetics :joy:

6 Likes

This always amused me:

Ladle Rat Rotten Hut

Wants pawn term, dare worsted ladle gull hoe lift wetter murder inner ladle cordage, honor itch offer lodge, dock, florist. Disk ladle gull orphan worry putty ladle rat cluck wetter ladle rat hut, an fur disk raisin pimple colder Ladle Rat Rotten Hut.

Wan moaning, Ladle Rat Rotten Hut’s murder colder inset, “Ladle Rat Rotten Hut, heresy ladle basking winsome burden barter an shirker cockles. Tick disk ladle basking tutor cordage offer groin-murder hoe lifts honor udder site offer florist Shaker lake! Dun stopper laundry wrote! Dun stopper peck floors! Dun daily-doily inner florist, an yonder nor sorghum-stenches, dun stopper torque wet strainers!”

“Hoe-cake, murder,” resplendent Ladle Rat Rotten Hut, an tickle ladle basking an stuttered oft. Honor wrote tutor cordage offer groin-murder, Ladle Rat Rotten Hut! Ladle Rat Rotten Hut mitten anomalous woof.

“Wail, wail, wail!” set disk wicket woof, “Evanescent Ladle Rat Rotten Hut! Wares are putty ladle gull goring wizard ladle basking?”

Armor goring tumor groin-murder’s,” reprisal ladle gull. “Grammar’s seeking bet. Armor ticking arson burden barter an shirker cockles.”

“O hoe! Heifer gnats woke,” setter wicket woof, butter taught tomb shelf, “Oil tickle shirt court tutor cordage offer groin-murder. Oil ketchup wetter letter, an den-O bore!”

Soda wicket woof tucker shirt court, an whinney retched a cordage offer groin-murder, picked inner windrow, an sore debtor pore oil worming worse lion inner bet. En inner flesh, disk abdominal woof lipped honor pore oil worming, an garbled erupt. Den disk ratchet ammonol pot honor groin-murder’s nut cup and gnat-gun, any curdled ope inner bet.

Inner ladle wile, Ladle Rat Rotten Hut a raft attar cordage, an ranker dough ball. “Comb ink, sweat hard,” setter wicket woof, disgracing is verse. Ladle Rat Rotten Hut entity bet-rum an stud buyer groin-murder’s bet.

“O Grammar!” crater ladle gull historically, “Water bag icer gut! A nervous sausage bag ice!”

“Battered luck chew whiff, sweat hard,” setter bloat-Thursday woof, wetter wicket small honors phase.

“O Grammar!” crater ladle gull historically, “Water bag noise! A nervous sore suture anomalous prognosis!”

“Battered small your whiff, doling,” whiskered dole woof, ants mouse worse waddling.

“O Grammar, water bag mouser gut! A nervous sore suture bag mouse!”

Daze worry on-forger-nut ladle gull’s lest warts. Oil offer sodden, caking offer carvers an sprinkling otter bet, disk hoard-horded woof lipped own pore Ladle Rat Rotten Hut an garbled erupt.

Mural: Yonder nor sorghum-stenches shut ladle gulls stopper torque wet strainers.

Howard L. Chace, Anguish Languish

8 Likes

My theory is Rennes called dibs on the reasonable pronunciation for that combination of letters, so Rouen had to scramble and make something up.

3 Likes

What the heck is this? Edit I got it. Because I understood the last sentence.

1 Like

It was very weird reading this and partway through suddenly starting to actually understand it!

4 Likes