A customer at the library asked me a question I wasn't prepared for.
Customer: Excuse me.
Customer: Why does this machine require flesh?
Me: ...what?
Customer: This machine.
Customer: I am touching it, but it does not work.
Customer: Is because... flesh?
At this point I was trying very hard to figure out whether I had accidentally wandered into a horror movie.
Then she held up her hands.
She was wearing gloves.
Me: Oh!
Me: The touchscreen.
Me: Right.
Me: Yeah, it probably can't detect your fingers through the gloves.
Customer: Ah.
Customer: Okay.
Customer: Sorry to bother.
Me: No, no.
Me: That's the best thing I've heard all week.
She laughed.
The machine worked.
And I thought that was the end of it.
It was not.
Now whenever one of our library computers stops working, someone inevitably says:
Staff: It requires flesh.
Staff: The machine must be fed.
Another staff member: Who's volunteering?
So thanks to one perfectly innocent question, our library now sounds like a cult every time the self-checkout freezes.
@thinkdefence@Sierra__Alpha There seems to be a breaking point across the country, on multiple fronts, that is under strain. A general election is in the air, god only knows how it will come about, but it seems it will soon.
@KarlTurnerMP Happens all the time!
We were flying to Tenerife one summer, when suddenly I felt weightless and could see the curvature of the Earth...
Turns out the wife bought us tickets on Blue Origin!
We made it to Tenerife eventually, so thought nothing of it.
With everything we are hearing right now about ticks this seems like good information to share.
“Here’s what I’ve learned after more ticks than I care to count.
First, whatever your uncle told you, forget it. No matches. No nail polish. No Vaseline. No soap on a cotton ball. All of those do the same terrible thing, they stress the tick out, and a stressed tick empties its gut back into the bite before letting go. Which, if you think about what that actually means for a second, is literally how Lyme and the rest get transmitted so you’re not speeding up its exit. You’re making it throw up into you.
Fine-tipped tweezers. Grip right where the mouthparts enter the skin, not the body, the head. Pull straight up, steady, no twisting, no jerking. It’ll feel like it’s resisting because it is, the mouthparts are barbed. Just keep the pressure on and it lets go in a few seconds. If a piece breaks off in the skin, leave it alone. Your body pushes splinters out. Digging around with a needle does more damage then the fragment ever would.
Clean it with alcohol or soap. Wash your hands.
Now here’s the part most people skip: don’t flush the tick.
Tape it to an index card. Clear packing tape right over the body, write the date and where on your body it was, and stick the card in a drawer. If you come down with anything weird in the next 30 days, rash, fever, joint pain, that flu-that-isn’t-flu feeling, that tick goes with you to the doctor. Some labs will test the tick itself, which is faster and often more reliable than waiting for antibodies to show up in your own blood. A dated tick taped to a card is one of the most useful things you can hand a doctor who’s trying to figure out what’s wrong with you.
The other thing worth saying out loud: if the tick was engorged when you pulled it, and you can’t swear it was off your body within 24 hours, call your doctor that same day. Don’t wait for a rash. Fewer than three out of four Lyme cases even produce the classic bullseye. A single preventive dose of doxycycline within 72 hours of a deer tick bite cuts the Lyme odds way down, and most docs in tick country will write that prescription without giving you a hard time, especially if you walk in with the tick taped to a card and a clear timeline.”
@exQUIZitely Another game that gave you the foundations of business and project management! Fantastic game - this is what should be pushed to children to play.
@exQUIZitely Just more time to spread your wings and establish your civ before all the inventions start coming in. Also farming and tool making etc pre dates 3000bc