Help, I’ve Fallen Into Euro Truck Simulator 2 and I Can’t Get Up
It’s serious, dudes. Like, I spent part of my afternoon looking up racing/driving game steering wheels, pedals, and gear shifts that I could use for ETS because I HAVE A PROBLEM.
I like these.
Logitech G 920 Driving Force Shifter
Logitech Driving Force Shifter
I’d go for it because I’m pretty sure I won’t be getting tired of ETS any time soon, but 1) expensive toys are expensive and 2) I’m not sure how well they’d work with a desk setup rather than a racing rig setup.
But I can dream, right?
Current mood:
Bye.
In This Blog Post: A Silly Blog Post
This picture has been my desktop background for a while, so I made a thing out of it.
DON’T TEX WITH MESSAS
Ha. I’ve walked over most of these.
The accessibility is really bad. That one in the featured picture is a death trap even if you’re fully able-bodied and have no issue going up and down stairs.
Look at the rust!
And this one. This one’s rough. I used to go over this one all the time when I took the “long way” into campus, looping up by Safeway and then heading in from there. But like 30% of its stairs are crumbling and unstable, and I’d rather not risk my leg on that nonsense, so I haven’t gone that way in a long while.
Edit: Hahaha, smile for the Google car, dude!
Men’s figure skating is the best Olympic event
Hey, it’s Winter Olympics time! That means it’s time to bring up this video again for any poor souls who haven’t seen it yet.
Johnny Weir is awesome.
Also, Plushenko. Because Plushenko.
Nnnnf.
OH, CANADA
Yesterday: 12+ inches of snow
Today: -33℉ temperatures
Fun Canadian winter is fun.
“Cold Weather Conditioning”
That’s what I’m going to start calling my winter walks, because holy balls it’s been cold out there.
But you know what? You get used to it. When you spend 4+ hours out in nonsense temperatures (negative Fahrenheits) you do adapt.
Ha, I remember when I thought 1℉ was obscenely cold. Now that’s a completely tolerable and relatively warm walking temperature!
My limit seems to be -22℉. That’s when the frostbite starts. Though I guess I was only out in that for about 45 minutes, so I suspect that slightly warmer temperatures are just as bad if I’m out in them for longer.
I GUESS WE’LL HAVE TO FIND OUT!
(You should all know by now that I have zero common sense.)
A SONG FOR THE SEASON
Oh, the weather outside is freezing
And the sun’s warmth is deceiving
And my only thought as I go
Is “FUCK I’M COLD, FUCK I’M COLD, FUCK I’M COLD”
This song brought to you by -12℉ wind chill and my poor decision-making skills.
Confession:
I feel like “Stranger Things” is overhyped. I watched the first season with Nate and I honestly didn’t see what the big deal was. Do people just like it because ZOMG 80s?
TreeLogic
So I was in the mail room at school printing some stuff, and I saw this guy:
How…how have I not noticed him before? He’s awesome. He looks cool and calm and all…until you zoom in.
Reduce, reuse, recycle…
…OR REGRET
Confused? Scared? Sad?
Watch this.
Your brain will thank you.
[I can’t remember what this was and it’s gone now, so sorry for the completely useless blog]
Claudia Gets Superficial Frostbite: A Canadian Winter Adventure Story
Alternate Title: Claudia Flirts with -25℉ Wind Chill for 45 Minutes and Thinks Nothing Will Go Wrong and Oh How Wrong It All Went
So it was cold today.
It’s been cold here for a bit now, but today felt extra cold because of the wind. Usually the wind is strongest in the morning (and as the sun is going down at night), then tapers off a bit during the middle of the day.
I can’t wait until the middle of the day to go walking because I teach at 3:00, so I usually leave as early as I can (around 9 AM) and do my walking then.
Which is what I did today.
Bad idea.
I always head west first on my walks, which is the direction the wind comes from like 97% of the time. I was fine for the first two miles or so, but the third mile happened to take place on the windiest, most exposed part of the river trail.
I start feeling really, really cold. That kind of cold where you kind of start to stumble around a lot and start to kind of lose a bit of rational thinking.
(I’ve felt it before a lot, haha.)
I also really have to pee, but luckily there’s a heated bathroom a little ways ahead, so I suck it up, push through the wind (which is blowing at me from about 2:00) and finally make it to the bathroom.
This bathroom has a mirror above the one sink. I happened to take a glance into this mirror and I noticed that the whole right side of my nose—the part that was getting the brunt of the wind—was white. Like, chalk white. Like it was starting to actually freeze.
So that was a bit disconcerting, especially considering it was a 2.5-mile walk back home in temperatures that weren’t going to get a whole lot warmer. But I had to get back somehow, so I stayed in the bathroom long enough for my skin to warm back up, then actually took my scarf out of my backpack and put it on (no, I wasn’t originally wearing it. Remember that I’m the smartest person in the world, here), and trekked back. It wasn’t nearly as bad as going out because the wind was at my back, but -25℉ windchill is -25℉ windchill no matter what, so it wasn’t like it was a pleasant walk or anything.
Finished my walk indoors at Anytime Fitness.
Party time in Calgary weather, yo.
The clouds are doin’ shit
Me: *takes a grand total of fewer than 25 pictures on a 7-day cruise to Alaska*
Me: *goes to Mount Rushmore for the first and probably only time and takes approximately 30 pictures*
Me: *sees a weird cloud formation. Takes 50+ pictures of it*
‘Tis truth.
But in my defense, it was a pretty weird cloud formation (these are the two good pictures, haha).
Edit: these are Kelvin-Helmholtz wave clouds, also known as billows or fluctus. They are very short-lived clouds (the ones I saw lasted less than five or so minutes) that form when two different layers of air—one moving faster than the other—meet horizontally.
Bus a Move
I have the utmost respect for bus drivers. They deal with less-than-polite people on a daily basis and have to drive a gigantic vehicle while making sure said gigantic vehicle doesn’t mow over cars/pedestrians/other hazards. And for bus drivers in cities like Calgary, they have to deal with lots of traffic, lots of highways, and, occasionally, really awful weather.
Bus drivers are cool.
But holy crap, the dude driving the bus today was Captain Herky Jerky whose sole mission in life was to terrify all of his passengers as we drove over the Bow. I thought we were going to go for a swim.
Sorry, my life isn’t super eventful right now. It’s pretty much all walking all the time.
Oh My God, Calgary
Calgary: home of the art that burns things, the giant blue ring that…exists?, and now this: the car-flipping rock.
You can’t make this stuff up.
And the Calgary subreddit is having all sorts of fun with it.
“Hazard in the streets, SageHillRock in the sheets.” Hahahaha.
Edit: When the fake Twitter account for the blue ring tweets about the fake Twitter account for the Sage Hill rock…
I love you, Calgary.
‘Phones
CRAP
CRAP CRAP CRAP
I should not be allowed in Best Buys.
Or, more specifically, I should not be allowed in the headphone section of Best Buys.
Because now I want these.
They’re so comfortable, dudes. And they also are great at noise cancelling. I was wearing them in the store and I felt like I was just in a huge auditorium where the only thing I could hear was the music.
But I already have like 30 headphones, so.
FIRST WORLD PROBLEMS.
Tattoo Idea!
HI!
You know what would be a good idea for a tattoo for me? A tiny little odometer on my leg somewhere (like down by my ankle, maybe at the base of my calf) that shows how many miles I’ve walked since [insert year here, maybe 2014]. Every December I could get it updated.
Of course, I’m no tattoo expert, so I don’t know how easy (or feasible) it would be to re-ink-over a tattoo every year to change its appearance, but it’s a cool idea regardless.
At least I think so.
Anyway.
Arctic Trekkin’
You know what weather is surprisingly enjoyable to walk in?
Heavily falling snow. Especially if it’s just a little below freezing.
I left to go walking this morning and it had just started snowing very lightly. But the further I went, the heavier the snow got. By the time I was in my last 3 miles of the walk, it was some serious snow action going on. It looked like a blizzard without the super heavy winds.
It was very fun.
Walking gives me a lot of time to think/zone off, and when the weather’s extreme like that, I like to just pretend that I’m an Antarctic explorer making my way through adverse conditions to get to my eventual destination.
That probably makes me sound like I’m in elementary school, but I don’t care. Pretending is fun.
So is snow.
WaWa?
Me: Okay, I am super busy but finally have some quality time to get some work done. So let’s concentrate and bust through this.
Brain: UPSIDE INSIDE OUT, LIVIN’ LA VIDA LOCA; SHE’LL PUSH AND PULL YOU DOWN, LIVIN’ LA VIDA LOCA
My life right now.
IT’S MY TOMBSTONE AND I’LL ROT IF I WANT TO
ghost: what would you like on your tombstone?
I shall not have a tombstone. I will be cremated. Part of my ashes will be scattered near Leibniz’ grave. If this does not happen I will HAUNT FOREVER
dracula: are you afraid of aging? or death?
Neither. Bring on the end, man.
nosferatu: what, as a child, did you imagine went bump in the night?
I don’t remember being afraid of much as a kid, though that might be inaccurate.
godzilla: what do you do when you are angry? are you ever destructive?
I’m not a pleasant person when I’m angry. And I’m angry quite often, so that’s not a fantastic combination. I try not to take it out on anyone but myself, though.
the blob: do you collect anything? if so, what & why?
I don’t collect anything specifically, but I do tend to amass trinkets/random nonsense I find cute/interesting/cool. Hence the trinket shelf.
zombie: when was the last time you trusted your gut? was it successful?
I’ve learned to always trust my gut based on past experience. The last time I did was when I was trying to decide between going to Carleton University versus U of C. Trusted my gut and chose U of C. Things couldn’t have worked out better.
mothra: what is something dangerous that attracts or fascinates you?
I’d totally do skydiving again. No question.
king kong: what are some questionable choices you’ve made lately?
Existing?
alien: what is your strangest feature?
The sheer ugliness of my body. It’s bad, yo.
cthulhu: do you like the ocean? why or why not?
The ocean’s great. Terrifying, but awesome.
nessie: have you ever felt invisible to people — the feeling of not existing?
Bah.
mutant spider: what is one of your biggest fears?
I don’t have any major ones, I don’t think.
golem: if you could make up an imaginary friend, what would they be like and why?
Not going to lie: it would be Leibniz. Just…Leibniz. Though he’d speak English so we could converse. I am being 100% honest here, so DON’T JUDGE ME.
sharktopus: what is something you’ve done that was ridiculous or a bad decision?
Going to University of Western Ontario, mainly because I very promptly failed at everything I wanted to do there and had to move back to Moscow. I’d had a bad feeling about going to Ontario before I even left, but didn’t listen to that feeling. Now I listen to those types of feelings.
robot: what is a habit you do without thinking?
Panic. That’s totally a habit, fight me.
Eigenblogger 