No no, I’m pretty sure that’s a Bienenstich.

I’m a gold candidate male, but even if I pass QA, I’ll probably still need a day 1 patch.

We’ve been living out of backpacks on the road for the last ten years, so it’s easy to keep track of your stuff… Only item in our bags that hasn’t changed is a zip-up flannel towel. It’s perfect for keeping your toiletries in order, light-weight and washable, doubles as a flannel on the rare occasions you need such a thing, and has Hello Kitty on it.

Since the bags themselves have been replaced, it’s the clear winner. 2nd place is a Tony the Tiger colour-changing spoon from a bag of Frosties in 2016.

16 might break it… 四四 makes no sense as 十十 makes no sense… you’d write 百 (100) instead.

And you get the same problem each time you go higher.

You’d need base 4 equivalents of 100 = 百, 1,000 = 千, 10,000 = 万, 100,000,000 = 億,.

Hmm, on the other hand you can have 十万 (100,000), so why not 四四 (16)? What’s 20, though…

In Arabic numerals base 2 has 0 and 1, and base 10 has 0 to 9, which is also 10 numeric symbols. Chinese has 10 numeric symbols for base 10, too, just a “10” symbol instead of a 0.

Spot on. Good example! And 十 is indeed just X on it’s side :D

In Chinese/Japanese, there’s 四 rocks in both base 10, and base 4. (8 rocks would be 二四 in base 4).

I think the concept of “base” is easier to understand when you include a numeral for the highest base (10 = 十, 20 =二十).

Of course, arabic numerals are more concise, using position to imply meaning (21 = 二十一).

Chuffed

Yes, very pleased or satisfied. Like, you’d be chuffed if you made a great pavlova, or parents got you a Megadrive for Chrissy.

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Pre-home internet I remember running a line-in to my soundblaster card from a clock radio and recording Tool’s Sober to my HDD.

The wav file took up a good chunk of the HDD. After a good amount of funking around with encoding it was barely comprehensible and still took up too much room. Was exciting and felt like a glimpse of the future.

This is Piaget’s conservation of volume test. I did this experiment at school (we went to the elementary school next door and ran tests on the kids). Most of the kids said the higher one held more liquid because it was ‘taller’, though some said the short one had more because it was ‘fatter’.

A further complication is that the aluminium is considerably thicker on the base and the top… so there’s more thin metal, and less thick metal.

I find usually when I can’t articulate something clearly, it’s because I haven’t thought about it/researched it well enough, and I should stop trying to contribute on that topic until I have a better understanding.

That’s why I often end up writing long comments, but don’t hit post. Not a waste of time though, as it helps me identify areas in which I’m more ignorant than I thought I was.

I think the downvotes come from a semantic disagreement, based on a strong or weak definition of the word ‘inherent’.

If they are built and maintained correctly. And meltdown isn’t the only problem that could occur.

I don’t have much faith in a corrupt, self-regulated industry, with strong yakuza ties, to do things 100% the correct way, especially given everything we know about the industry post 2011. Knowing how much local political power the company has, I know they could literally get away with murder, as no politician or police would want to be on their bad side.

Don’t get me wrong, the missile was still the biggest threat, but I do believe the power plant isn’t necessarily safe. An engineering and/or scientific understanding of a modern power plant doesn’t mean shit if you don’t consider the political and capitalist systems the that underpin their construction and maintenance.

We were in this scenario last year, when NK launched a missile towards Hokkaido, and we were on the west coast, just next to a nuclear reactor.

After getting the altert, we put on clothes, went downstairs to the sturdiest room, stuck on the TV to the NHK news, and waited. The missle plopped into the ocean off the coast, and we had tempura for lunch.

There’s really nothing you can do in these situations but stay calm and do the small, sensible things.

Many people saying ‘live for the now’, which is totally valid, but there’s an alternative as well, which is the path I followed - devise a concrete economic plan for your life (5 year plan, 3 year plan, etc), and track ALL your spending until you have a strong grasp on how you like to spend your cash.

It’s hard to make more money, so do everything you can to reduce spending in your life. No only will you increase how much can put away, but you’ll need less to sustain yourself when you reduce how much you earn, due to the cultivation of a spendthrift life.

It’s mostly supply and demand. In Tokyo and Osaka / satellite cities, prices are going up, everywhere else they are dirt cheap.

However, in urban areas prices still aren’t as crazy unaffordable as you may think, because Japan has a very narrow wage gap (everyone in Japan thinks they are middle class, and their not wrong compared to other countries).

Another thing that makes Japan different to other housing markets, and is affected by the laws, is earthquake concerns. What other countries would call ‘established’ dwellings, they call ‘second hand’. Laws are updated every ten years or so that mean newer dwellings are much safer than older ones. Knockdown/rebuild is so common that there is competitive prices, as there’s plenty of builders to choose from. The builders are also very efficient, and apart from safety law, regulations are low (you can build whatever you like, so long as it’s robust), so labour costs are much lower compared to other countries.

If you go on Suumo.jp you’ll find plenty of very affordable houses, even in good areas/good rail links, but it’s because they don’t expect anyone will live in the house as-is - the buyer will most likely “reform” it (massive rennovation) or replace.

The state of the Japanese housing market is due mostly to cultural/economic/low immigration. If you want a policy solution other high-income countries can use to solve housing issues, the state-capitalism solution of the Singapore HDB is the best model I’ve come across. Second would probably be Vienna’s focus on social housing.

the sole reason I stay in this cold dreary backwater of a country.

You do know you can get crumpets in any supermarket in sunny Queensland, yeah? You can even get Marmite (but why would you when Vegemite is superior).

I’ve only spent a couple months in France, but I agree from my experience. I think that foreigners that complain about the French being rude were just expecting special treatment, didn’t put in any effort themselves to be friendly, then shocked that the storekeeper/waiter wasn’t kissing their ass, even though they didn’t even manage to say ‘bonjour’.