Obligatory caution that that can backfire if the recipient insists that the debtor counts the pennies. Or if the creditor refuses the pennies entirely, which is legal in some jurisdictions. (e.g. in the UK, pennies and 2p coins are legal tender up to amounts of only 20 pence. Anything beyond that is left to the discretion of the recipient.)

Well, no, but in a sense, I kind of was. The ovum already existed and had for <mother’s age at the time> years, but the exact sperm did not. I came along too much later for that to have been possible. But my DNA was all there. Just not assembled in the right order yet.

Alternatively, if you believe in reincarnation, I still might have been. I have at least one relative who was there who didn’t make it to my birth. Maybe I’m one of them come back.

If that was a conscious choice, that may have been a mistake, but that’s another story.

The site malfunctioned for me because of the NoScript browser extension, so for a second I thought I’d somehow become colour-blind.

Once I sorted that problem, it loaded the example images properly and they all look different to me, confirming that I’m not colour-blind.

You mean, right-click and save-as the images that are built into the site before uploading them somewhere else? That seems unnecessary. Anyone could grab those from the site themselves. Or use the site.

The site malfunctioned for me because of the NoScript browser extension, so for a second I thought I’d somehow become colour-blind.

Once I sorted that problem, it loaded the example images properly and they all look different to me, confirming that I’m not colour-blind.

Oh man, I was freaking out for a second after clicking one of the simulations and seeing no difference from the regular image. Then I thought to check whether NoScript had blocked scripts from the site. Yeah. So, it hadn’t loaded the simulated image and I was seeing the original.

This. The modern mathematical symbols, at least in their current use, are no older than 550 years. Heck, the numerals we use are about as old as that. The Arabic world had a head start with early versions of those numerals, but even then, those are only twice as old as the oldest mathematical symbols still in use.

Prior to that, people wrote things out in words, or, as you suggest, invented their own symbologies and shorthands.

I have a book around here somewhere that shows how Diophantus wrote a particular polynomial equation and it’s all Greek letters, some with macrons (overlines), some superscripts that don’t mean what we’d use superscripts to mean, and one large upturned capital psi in the middle of it. Mind-boggling.

And they’d be more mystified by our notation than we are by theirs because at least we (or some of us) know what Greek letters and numerals are. They’d have no such head start.

Information paradox detected. You’ll somehow die and your own advanced biology will become the trigger you went there to seek.

My kettle boils a mug’s worth of water in less than a minute, and it takes me longer than that for even a brief toilet visit and washing of hands. I have learned not to switch the kettle on until I get back from the bathroom, otherwise I’ll be boiling the water twice.

Important factors: 1) Britain has 230V mains power so electric kettles can boil water incredibly quickly, 2) The stereotype about Brits and tea is true in my case. I get through three to six mugs of the stuff per day. 3) Hot tea must be made with boiling water. Power isn’t cheap and re-boiling the water adds up over time.

In principle, I’m all for that. In practice, I’m on a shoestring budget and when serviceable toilet paper can be had for half the price of a bamboo roll, I have to take the cheaper option.

I like to use the plastic wrappers that toilet rolls are sold in for waste bin liners. I don’t know about other places, or even manufacturers, but the ones I buy come in a wrapper that doesn’t have any holes except the one I tear to get at the rolls in the first place. All I need to do is widen that a bit once the rolls have run out and it’s ready for any bin or bucket I might be using.

I’m also using an old shredder bin as a waste bin because the shredder part died. Decided I might as well hang on to the lower part. Perfectly usable receptacle.

It’s rubbish, but that only makes it more apt!

(The following is from my, possibly faulty, personal observation. Take it as you will.)

Clowns are at least 80% mime. If you can convey a message - often a funny one - with only exaggerated actions and facial expressions, I’d say you’re well on your way to clowning. They almost never talk and there’s a definite shared white face-paint thing going on.

The main talkers seem to be the ones that do kids’ birthday parties or ones in “senior” positions in a troupe where it would be funny to imitate a bossy person. They might otherwise allow a shout or mock cry of pain, but rarely use words when they do.

The other 20% is brightly coloured, ill-fitting (usually oversized) clothing, a bigger emphasis on slapstick, and props that make noise.

I’ve seen mimes perform cheap magic tricks, so that’s not exclusive to clowns, but I’d say that was more of a clown thing as well.

There’s a whole continuum from mimes to clowns to magicians and back again now that I think about it. Teller of Penn and Teller fits somewhere around the “back again” part. And Harpo Marx was basically a clown without the face-paint.

That this happened around April Fools’ makes me think that someone forgot to instruct it not to partake in any activities associated with that date. The fact it chose The Simpsons’ address in its (feigned?) confusion is a dead giveaway (to me) that it was trying to be funny.

Or rather, imitating people being funny without any understanding of how to do that properly.

Its explanation afterwards reads like a poor imitation of someone pretending to not know that there was a joke going on.

It could be owned by an entity called Sutton Snax. That probably isn’t what they’re going for, but it could be read that way.

Now, x-apostrophe might be (more?) correct in that instance but it’s far more forgivable than any interpretation as a plural.

You’d definitely find dry little black rice-grain-like droppings on all surfaces if you had mice, especially in rooms that have food, and more will appear if you clean them away. Also, little sticky splotches that are easy to mistake for drink spillages, because they pee everywhere too.

I managed to get rid of mine, but I occasionally still find evidence they were here in out of the way corners that I forgot about.

Brave mice - because I’m sure some will have that trait - and those infected with toxoplasmosis won’t care about cats.

Good luck.

I’m one of those people with a low tolerance for depressing reality. I’m on medication for depression and anxiety, for what good they do me. Wires and chips in the brain is a step too far.

The reason I’m in the state I’m in is that I suffered a work-stress related breakdown, but the cracks have always been there. As you might imagine I am not ready to be forced back into work which I will find unbearable. Combine that with body horror and you might be able to understand my reaction and stance to this.

I’m one of those people with a low tolerance for depressing reality. I’m on medication for depression and anxiety, for what good they do me. Wires and chips in the brain is a step too far.

The reason I’m in the state I’m in is that I suffered a work-stress related breakdown, but the cracks have always been there. As you might imagine I am not ready to be forced back into work which I will find unbearable. Combine that with body horror and you might be able to understand my reaction and stance to this.

How about cultivating a world that is less depressing before jamming wires into people’s skulls to “fix” a problem that might not originate there?

Oh no, that won’t do, the people who have low tolerance for depressing reality have to be turned into drones for the corporate machine just like everyone else. If we can turn off the emotions that derive from a sense of self-preservation, they’ll be more willing workers for the constant grind.

In before employers require that their applicants must have one of these implants. People without will not be hired.

By the 24th century we won’t be Star Trek’s Federation, we’ll be an unholy hybrid of the Ferengi and the Borg.

I reckon I’ve been pretty lucky. The handful I’ve attended haven’t been that bad.

The “worst” one, at least from my perspective, was probably a relative’s where I was an usher and messed up something with the church seating. The guests sorted that one out themselves when they thought I wasn’t looking. The wedding itself went without further problems, but that minor mess-up on my part will always stick with me.

The next “worst” was the one where the reception / after-party had a DJ who cranked the music volume another notch every 10 minutes. The venue had a literal decibel meter on the wall, and I think he had made it his goal to max that sucker out. I’ve been in clubs where the music is so loud you can’t hear your own voice when you’re talking (shouting) to someone else and this went well beyond that.

By contrast, the ceremony itself had been very demure and pleasant, in an English country manor house no less, and were it not for that DJ, it might have qualified as the best.

The best one was probably when I was a kid. I don’t have any memories of the church ceremony, which has to mean I was bored out of my mind, but must have behaved myself and there were no problems of any sort. I vaguely remember the reception in a function room at a hotel and there was nothing of note there that I remember either, except exploring the hotel. Weather was good. Must have been perfect.

“Mum” is a shortening of “mummy” (or similar) which almost certainly came before “mother” (or its ancestor words) as a word for one’s primary female caregiver if not also birth giver, on account of it being baby-talk that ancient parents naturally took to be a name bestowed by the child.

In languages descended from Proto-Indo-European, the -t(h)er suffix is a familial grammatical particle that has long since ceased being productive, and remains frozen in all daughter languages. Speaking of which, the -ter of “daughter” is the same particle.

That “mum”, at least phonetically, is also an abbreviation of “ma’am” is a coincidence caused by dropping so many sounds from the original “ma dame” that it reverts to, well, mumbling, which isn’t far off baby talk, all things considered.

FWIW, there are places in the world where “Mam” is a name given to mothers by their children, which is also rooted in baby-talk and also has no connection to the other pronunciation of “ma’am”.

Nowhere. If this was a video game I would have quit playing a long time ago.