I’ve been thinking of getting a motorcycle, and Harley has no entry level bikes So new riders try a Honda or Kawasaki when young and broke and build brand loyalty to that, I’m sure.

Not surprising Harley is dying. All their stuff is so expensive you never get to figure out if it’s good or if they’re coasting on reputation while quality goes to shit or something.

Duality exists. He might have been awesome in a way they saw, even if his loud pipes were annoying to you.

Don’t know if he was, only that you got a limited view of this person, and it seems cruel to degenerate how other people mourn.

Because most people run on their personal experiences, and don’t do great when they have to think very far ahead or extrapolate and make connections.

If you’re lucky enough to be born into a conservative home that’s not bugshit crazy, and you’re lucky enough to not be TOO smart, neurodivergent, gay/lesbian/trans/etc. then you’ve probably never seen the full ugly face of conservatism because you were treated nicely.

Lots of conservatives will treat you perfectly politely…if they get to know you, and as long as you look white and clean-cut enough. As long as you give the right social signifiers, basically.

Most of my ex-conservative friends group was driven away from conservative family because we were abused in some obvious fashion, were gay/lesbian/trans, were neurodivergent, etc. We were different in ways that, ultimately, after a lot of pain, forced us to cut ties with family. (It was never our first choice though.)

But a woman who was lucky to be born into a family that treats her halfway decently won’t experience that sort of ugliness until an emergency happens and it’s leopards-eating-faces time.

And it’s VERY hard to rock the boat BEFORE something bad happens to you, when you know rocking it will have really bad consequences immediately. People don’t like to be shunned or kicked out of families, so if they’re not treated TOO badly they’ll toe the line and conform out of fear of the unknown and fear of losing everything they have and know.

“That look tasteful” is the hard part, haha.

I turn myself inside out in so many ways and places to “be a good person” that when I’m McSuburb land and someone’s letting their nasty rotten fruit fall onto the ground from a branch hanging over onto the public sidewalk to rot on the ground with wasps and flies, I’m going to take some.

I value myself, a real living human being, AT LEAST as much as the vermin feasting on people’s fallen fruit.

Am I going to denude the whole tree? No, I’m not an asshole. But if you’re letting rats and flies and maggots eat it and it’s getting all over my shoes as I walk past…I’m going to rate myself at least as worthy as a maggot.

If the homeowner was truly bothered they’d trim the tree to keep it out of public spaces.

I used to do that sometimes. But I did on purpose, and I resent nowadays due to inflation that in order to get the old “adult meal” price I HAVE to choose a kid’s meal.

I notice in the final panels where White Chain says, basically, to accept the wheel turning, there are petals on the tree.

Symbolically, that would support my suspicion that Angels can be grouped in terms of tree parts or stages (Root Knight, Thorn Knight, Petal Knight). Note that flowers, petals, beget fruit. And White Chain has been trending towards change, womanhood, she was holding a baby in a panel in a maternal way…

She might be the first…uh…“Fruit Knight”. But probably named something else. Plum Knight? Given plums, not apples, are the holy fruit in this universe? Would go well with purple, too. Or maybe Seed Knight.

It’s a veiled rape threat, the kind that is worded ambiguously enough that it flies under the radar for many but terrifies those who’ve experienced similar scenarios with creepy, weird, abusive men.

I’m curious about two things. Will nesting birds or animals find this material tasty or good to gnaw on?

I always ask that ever since I learned vehicles using a more organic plastic for wiring harnesses suffer from shorts due to animals like mice nibbling the plastic because it smells tasty.

I remember as a kid, I was mystified by this other girl on the block who could do this. I didn’t understand why anyone would care. A car is a car?

Eventually I realized it’s because she was super into external social status signs. She wasn’t a gearhead, so she hadn’t picked it up the way guys do bonding over technical stats of whatever, but she was hyper-sensitive to social status, so she picked it up along with anything else related to fashion. And cars can be considered fashion, right up there with makeup and having the right purse.

Random addition to your post…

There’s early/limited studies suggesting the drug valproate, which is used for bipolar and epilepsy sometimes, can re-open the perfect pitch acquisition capabilities of the human brain even if the individual is no longer an infant and has aged past the language acquisition stage of childhood development.

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3848041/

Different use of it in an 8 year old girl with language regression: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC11230735/

Acting, literally. Playing a character to entertain. Some characters are villains.

I think this is why random wrestling dudes sometimes successfully slide into Hollywood acting careers.

The thing that makes me cackle about this movie, as a Fandom!Old, is that it’s basically written as the crackiest crack-ship you could ever find on AO3.

And yet…it’s had one of the biggest box-offices ever.

This brings me no end of glee.

Roberts send bob pics, not dick pics.

I suspect if we visit Robert A Heinlein’s grave, his spinning will provide limitless energy.

Doesn’t help you now I’m sure, but I’ve found gently banging around the rim or lid of a jar on the concrete outside usually loosens the seal enough to open the jar.

(Outside on concrete because I don’t want to dent anything inside.)

That’s how you end up washing your earphones

I finally realized this guy’s name reminds me of some in house menswear brand at Sears or K-Mart or some other department store that suffered and wheezed and whimpered before going out of business.

Weirdly enough, the only game I tried to play that didn’t run was this random Indy game. Didn’t even have fancy graphics, it was one step up from macromedia flash games

The AAA games I’ve played are fine on Linux. Baulders Gate, No Mans Sky, Fallout 76, Cyberpunk 2077, Crusader Kings III.

Without laws letting child workers maintain their own bank account in their own name without parents being co owners allowed to drain it at any time, children working become money pinatas for abusive parents.

I say this as someone who would have benefitted from being independent earlier. My uncle did have me work at 14, and when I went to the bank I found he had stolen every penny, and because I was a minor I had no legal recourse to get it back.

A few years later the courts emancipated me, but it didn’t return the money he had stolen. Mind you, he was not working at the time himself and he got a few hundred from the state a month to care for me, and he spent what he stole on computer parts so he could game.

Children working only is in the child’s benefit if there are ironclad laws allowing them to keep their money, and right now there is not.