I'm three days away from leaving my family for four months. It's going to be hard but we're a lot better off than we were last time; my wife isn't in medical school and I don't have an apartment to take care of and we still have money left over from last year because living in Seattle is hella cheaper than living in LA. Last time 'round I came back every third weekend. Maybe this time every second. Still. It's going to be hard. Things on the birth center did not get completed in a timely fashion, of course. I'll be dealing with shit via remote. Today I have to order $700 worth of houseplants that will hopefully have somewhere to go when they're through production in 5 weeks. Tomorrow I meet with a company that wants to sell us $1500 worth of phones for $4k but how badly do I want to learn Avaya in the next five weeks? $2500 worth? Mmmmmmaybe. They're pure White People Problems, though. If we need to buy $4k worth of phones, we call up our loan officer and say "we need $4k worth of phones." We'll have to pay him back, sure, but we're already busy and the place doesn't have drywall yet. It's 14.9 miles from where I'm staying to where I'm working. I debated buying another motorcycle down there. I debated driving down. Then I decided fukkit and bought $1400 worth of hybrid bike, panniers, lights and safety equipment. I used to commute 14 miles a day via bicycle on another show; this one will be 30 miles a day. It'll be a better bike but it'll still be momentous. By the end of the summer I will have ridden that bike something like 2,000 miles. That's luxury right there: "I choose to commute via bicycle." I'm actually really looking forward to it. Had lunch with a friend yesterday. He's got three kidneys 'cuz the first two got shriveled down to grapes thanks to 30 years of poorly-managed Type 1 diabetes. The third one drastically increased his life expectancy... but now it's measured in single-digits years rather than single-digits months. We were talking about therapy and the like and he revealed that his undiagnosed ADHD was likely due to febrile seizures as a baby due to ingesting paint chips. Smartest kid in the school district, smartest school district in the nation and he's wearing a shirt with his name on the breast pocket. Shitty thing is now that he knows he's earned some adderal his renal system can't handle it. So here I am, melancholy that I'm leaving my family to go ride 20 centuries on a bicycle, while this poor dude only has a few years left and whose big "good" news is he can now point to the place where the bad man touched his future. Perspective. My neighbor died a few days ago. We called him "crazy Bob" because he'd be out in the back yard making weird noises and cussing at the dandelions. Nice guy. Aneurism. 67 years old. We were about to go halfsies on a stump grinder rental. Me? I finally have some decent fucking running shoes. I still don't wanna pay $4k for a phone system.
The uncle is in an ICU unit with a new heart. The operation was a mere five hours long, then wheeled to a room where they began exercising his lower body to get the new heart pumping. Twelve hours after the end of the operation, he was sitting up in the bed so they could check the sutures and look for leaks etc. For those of you who don't understand how amazing and full of wonders the world you live in can be, read that again. I wrote a long post about the parents' visit, saved a draft, came back and finished it only to lose it in my first computer crash in 3-4 years. I'll redo and post, eventually. Finally, life sucks for most of us. Sometimes in big ways, mostly in the little ways that we make into big piles of stupid. It gets better.
Adding under the comment. He is up and walking around, not 24 hours after a heart transplant. Up. And... walking. Research docs don't get enough love; they toil in the shadows and nobody knows they exist until something like this happens. Hopefully by the time I need this done they can grow a new heart out of my own stem cells.
May can eat a bag of dildos for all it's done to me and mine this year. And we have had nothing but shit weather so I cannot even go do out reach and have fun talking to people out in the great chat-room under the sky. All I got to do is hold it together for a week and this damn month is over.
Cloudy for my solar program earlier this month, cloudy for the Mercury Transit. Cloudy and rain for the nights around first quarter moon, when we go out most often. And cloudy and drizzle for the prime Mars viewing this week and early next. At one time the biggest and most expensive telescope in the world was located in Ireland. IRELAND I'm amazed they had any clear skies at all to look at stuff!How shit is "shit weather"?
The Irish rain never bothers me
Oh, yeah I suppose that's a hobbie that relies quite heavily on the weather. What sort of telescope(s) do you have? Also, I had NO idea about that awesome telescope, thanks for showing me. We have some clear days in the summer, but there are better places to build the world's biggest telescope.
I have a 14" Dobsonian, an 80mm refactor, a 5" Cass, a solar scope, a few pairs of binoculars including a 20x80 pair I use to intimidate the public these bad boys, and the club has a pair of 16" scopes that I am trying to get to use for some photography skill building. Fun story time. William Herschel was a composer who fell into astronomy and discovered Uranus, became the Royal Astronomer, and really created observational Astronomy. From Ireland and Wales. His son John was an amazing man in his own right. One of the things that John Herschel came up with is putting telescopes on mountains to get over as much air as possible. Before him, telescopes were built where the scientists lived, usually in cities with access to infrastructure. One of the reasons they build the big scopes in places like Chile is the desert there gets .01" of rain a decade and sits at 14,000 feet which is above roughly 80% of the water vapour in the air. You can do some of the neat infrared stuff there. The top of the volcanoes in Hawaii have a benefit that not only are they at 12,000+ feet but the ocean all around them makes for very still air. Then you can use lasers to wiggle the mirrors and cancel out the interference from the atmosphere. And to think, the idea of putting the big telescopes on mountains is just about 150 years old.What sort of telescope(s) do you have?
but there are better places to build the world's biggest telescope.
DONE. Project Replace All The Pipes In My House and Renovate The Bathroom is DONE!^ I slept in my bed, rather than on the couch. There is no dust, debris, or workmen in my house any more. I did the whole shit/shower/shave thing in my new bathroom this morning. It was blissful. I am at peace. Now I can focus on the wedding, which is just over a month away. The tuxedo has been ordered and should be here this week, so the tailor can do fitting and alterations for me. My shirt studs and cufflinks (same color as her dress) are on the way and should be here today. I have several Continental Ties that I can work from to build a pattern, so I can make my own tie. I have a small swatch of her dress fabric, so the button in the center of the tie will be a fabric covered button with her dress material on it. The wedding rings are being cast as I speak. We are expecting to do a food tasting with the caterer in the next two weeks or so. It's all coming together. And yesterday I completely dropped the ball at work on a major project and was (probably) almost fired. Which led to me driving some urgent process improvements, which made people want to invest further in me, so now I am going to be working a day or two a week from our tech offices (in another part of town) so I can sit with the geeks and suck up all their juicy juicy knowledge, and integrate it into my SalesOps role. (I'm really the only person in the sales org with a tech background, so it makes sense for me to glean the techie bits, and then write them out for Sales to use.) So I managed to turn almost getting fired into an increased amount of responsibility and influence. So yay me. And there is a light at the end of the tunnel. I can't wait until after the wedding, when the wife and I can just chill, be with each other, and just enjoy each others' company without all this other shizz clouding every waking thought. And, I can't wait to begin my relationship with my Wife. ^ footnote: Plumbing project is "done" for a certain definition of "done." Of course, the bathroom still has exposed drywall that I need to seal the joints, mud and tape, sand, and paint. Then I need to get the Western Red Cedar tongue-and-groove wood I am going to use to cover the walls and ceiling. Then I need to install all of this stuff. And a shower curtain. And curtain rod. And insulate around the bottom of the bath tub, then build a cabinet and shelves for things to go on, and mount switchplates, and the fan cover, and finish the trim around the door jamb. But, ya know, I can close the door and take a shit or a shower in privacy right now, as long as I don't splash around in the water too much. So yeah. The bathroom is "done."
I have a friend who has decided, it seems, to stop being my friend - responding to event invites, getting back to texts inquiring if he's okay, the like. You know how when something happens and you don't literally actually know why but you have one or two really strong theories? But the thing is those theories are disappointing and you don't want to believe them because you'd like to believe people are better than that? That is how I am feeling about this situation right now. As a result I am not trying very hard to dig any further.
I "got the message" this past week when this person failed to even respond to my 3rd invite (over the past 3-4 weeks). I decided, as a good friend, it was my due diligence to give him the benefit of the doubt and at least reach out to him and ask if he was ok - it could be remarkably self-centered for me to assume his silence was directed at me if shit in his life had hit the fan. Now that he has basically confirmed his actions by not bothering to respond to me at all, I am quite willing to let this friend go. It has been observed by multiples that his friendship seems to take energy from me and not pay dividends. I can say, yes, he has been a crappy friend lately, (past year, maybe, even) and that I am pretty OK letting him go. However my final proof basically came through yesterday/today and so it's impossible not to consider these events for a little bit, you know? I wonder, what his reasons are. Are they really what I think? Does he think that shutting me out quietly like this will incite an emotional reaction in me? Because frankly this is the best way to stop being friends IMHO; it is honest, it is clear-cut, I can take my hint. There is no drama. It is not like this person to not cause drama. Is there something that precipitated this which I'm not considering or aware of? I find it impossible not to spend some time pondering in this line. However...I have thought for a while he is not a friend who helps make my life more positive. That he has done more to prevent growth than help it. So I am copasetic to this ending. I do not think I am going to welcome him back in if he comes knocking six months down the road. I don't need friends who only want to be my friends sometimes.
At a certain age and in a certain romantic paradigm, such problems can also be caused by one party thinking the other party has spurned their advances. That the advancing party lacks the competence or confidence to make such advances clear and unequivocal rarely plays into it. It was bad when I was in my early '20s but having interacted with "you kids" via forums such as these over the past 20 years, I can say with no hesitation that the game has changed faster than the players can adapt. It happens. Someone's got a crush that they can't work up the nerve to tell so instead they go silent and pissy because their shyness morphs into antagonism. Dunno that's what's going on here, but it wouldn't be the first time.
Passed my last class ever last Friday, only to find out on Monday that the fellowship I'm applying to would require me take two more. But I've otherwise had an awesome set of post-class activities including a picnic, getting my hair braided like Daenerys, finally reading the 7th Harry Potter, climbing a ridiculously long 5'10a to the top of a warehouse, and finding out about more incest in my family tree.
Rock climbing level for top-roping It's hard to give a descriptive picture, but it's about the level when you stop having concave handholds and start having ones that you can only pinch to hold on to.
I lived close to this oddity for a few years. Ever heard of it? It looks really cool. 
Looking it up, that one is twice the height of what I did yesterday. Also that lead-only overhang looks insane. Give me a couple more years and maybe I'd be up for it. I'd imagine it'd be pretty satisfying to reach the top, assuming it doesn't take two hours to get there.
Well you got the important stuff taken care of....finishing Harry Potter.
Maaaaannn this was such an awesome weekend. I was so excited to finally see Radiohead live after being a fan for years and it totally lived up to my expectations. Because these were the first shows in the tour, every song was a surprise. As it turned out they played absolute killer setlists, both nights, with great songs from all albums. I felt like I got a best-of concert, it was amazing. They played classics like My Iron Lung and Street Spirit (thenewgreen!), Karma Police and Paranoid Android but also personal favourites like The Present Tense, Give Up the Ghost, How to Disappear Completely, Weird Fishes and even the fuckin' Daily Mail. Their songs mean a lot to me so hearing them in all their glory is something I'll hopefully never forget. brb getting a RH tat
You got to see them twice? So jelly. I checked their tour dates right after the album was released, and not only are there no shows not sold out, but the festivals where they're headlining are thousands of miles away. My sister and I were thinking of getting matching RH tats. In Rainbows was my high school album. Let me know what you were thinking. I loved these graphics found in the album artwork of The King Of Limbs, but hesitated mainly because TKOL wasn't my favorite album, so it felt wrong in a way.
It was sold out in minutes, so I got pretty darn lucky. In Rainbows is near impossible to do anything with because most artwork I know are just colorful artsy pictures. Maybe the houses? This one's just amazing: Personally I also really like the Atoms for Peace black and white art. The first one is on my Amok tour shirt:
I didn't take to Amok like I did other collaborations or albums by Radiohead. And I think that, while the urge lasted for several years, a band tattoo is not for me. A tattoo, and the reasons that go into getting one, are as personal a decision as one can make--at least to me. Some people don't really give a shit, like the 5 people getting a pizza place's logo tattooed on their body in exchange for a year's worth of free pizza. I do have an idea for a tattoo though, as rueful as that makes some of the older ones among us. But it's more of my own making than it is an homage to (an admittedly very important) group of artists.
I'm really surprised they played so many classics. It must have been just a killer show, and I love the new album. Probably my favorite since Kid A. I saw Radiohead, once, in 2001 touring with Amnesiac. It was pretty great even in a big dusty field. Thom screwed up the lyrics to something, maybe Paranoid Android. As someone who was a massive fan of a band and now isn't, just say no to band tats. I have none, and that's good (for me).
That's awesome veen! I'm glad you were able to see them. Did you end up going to both shows? What's the RH tat look like? Photos please. Congrats!
Yes, I went twice! The second time I went with a friend and an acquiantance. It's better when you can share the experience. The audio mix was also noticably better the second evening. (I'm not actually getting a tat - it's crossed my mind a lot this week but I'd probably regret it.)
Wise man.(I'm not actually getting a tat - it's crossed my mind a lot this week but I'd probably regret it.)
Ouhh missed the pubski! Flew for Hanoi to Singapore; 20h layover. Then to Tokyo:18h layover. Then to Chicago: 9h. After more than 2 days spent passing TSA, I'm waiting to board my last flight right now! I'll be home in 6ish hours!!! I don't know if you heard about the reports of people missing their flights because of TSA checks. The line was huuuuuge at O'Hare and the guy just let us through without the whole "take out your computer, take off the shoes" nonsense just to make the line go faster. Kinda reinforced the idea they are goddamn useless. Either you check because it's important or you don't at all, amirite?
I'm no longer jobless! And doing very similar work. Working for a small company, which I like. I've always felt uncomfortable having to interact with and get to know a lot of coworkers all at once. Working closely with two others who I actually like. I've known them both a little while now and I would actually consider them friends rather than coworkers. I'm already comfortable in the environment. This is exciting and terrifying. This is possibly more like a career move than just another job. On a more horrifying note. On my first day on the job I ended working out of the office on a clients property. I had brought my camera equipment in hopes to get started on a project at the office. I also ended up at the property for WAY longer than the hour or so I expected. And my camera got left in my mid 90s Honda (stupid easy to break into), and the car was unsupervised for hours and hours. No damage to the car, but the camera bag was lifted. Close to $1200 gone. Also more than half of that had been paid for and was owned by my girlfriend. The camera and lenses were registered on Lenstag, so if someone else tries to register them I'll be informed. Or if images matching the camera's SN show up online it could get noticed. The most likely thing to happen is they'll show up at a pawn shop in a bit. So an exciting and also disappointing couple of weeks.
I broke down and bought 1900-1909 indian head pennies. It's not like I am ever going to get those in change. However, I now have both the indian head and Lincoln 1909, and I am not sure which one should be in the 100 that I frame. Now I just have 21, 32 and 33 left and my 20th century penny project will be complete. Anyone have a penny from those years?
You live in Michigan, yeah? I hear Ann Arbor is kind of an artsy town. I bet you could probably find some pretty decent folk art and such there at reasonable prices. Probably not anything you could buy as a potential investment, but at least stuff good enough for decorating your house.
I disappeared for a long time! It's because my hands were so broken from typing. For the last 8 months I have been unable to type, and a few months ago I finally admitted that I may never type again, and I certainly won't be using my hands for anything anytime soon. I'm in constant pain, but this week I managed to dictate (in LaTeX!) my research proposal for the next year of my PhD. I hope I can actually go through with this. Programming used to bring me so much joy. Now I do it by speech, and the frustration of it makes me want to die sometimes.
For some odd reason in the blurry picture , I'm seeing a rabbit holding a swatizka.
I changed the brake pads on my car Monday night. Seemed to go smoothly, only took about an hour of work. But then when I gave it a test drive the front right caliper self-destructed and would release. The seals were rotten and it was all corroded and rusty. And by that point all the auto parts stores were closed. Luckily I did the job at my brother's house and he let my borrow his ancient terrible pickup truck to get to work Tuesday. So yesterday I called all the parts stores until I found one that could get the right calipers for me the same day, picked them up on my lunch break, and headed back to my brother's after work. I replaced both front calipers since the other looked bad too, but has a minor setback when one of the caliper mounting pins jammed in the mounting bracket and broke off, so I had to find a store with a mount bracket in stock halfway through the install. But I got it all back on and my brother lent a hand to flush all the brake fluid and bleed the new calipers. And we finished around 11. So this morning I was able to wake up too early and drive my own terrible car to work. It's slightly pathetic how much goes into a car worth so little, but oh well. I did recently discovered my car is still worth more than its weight in chicken shit, and that's comforting.
I once performed a similar comparison for my beater, and was pleased to see that it was cheaper than ground beef. $12,000.00 Space Shuttle 6,400.00 Gold 650.00 Lear jet 45 150.00 High-end bicycle 62.50 Segway 49.10 Maybach 30.00 Harley Davidson VSRC 24.00 USS Ronald Reagan 8.13 Hummer 2 3.57 Ford Focus 3.51 Skateboard 0.21 1993 Subaru Impreza 0.09 Shredded auto scrap Cost per pound
I feel your pain. I have spent far too much time hammering at frozen brakes. You didn't mention bloody knuckles and rust specks in your eyes. :) The first time I did a break job, I managed to suck a whole lot of air in before figuring out what I was doing. Good times.
(PS: (pre-script?) if you want to see more pictures from the trip, I'm on instagram as "brendantakesphotos") Ooh pretty things. Done with the UK leg of my trip, which was wonderful. The coast of Scotland was the most beautiful place I've been in my life. I went on a bird cruise up in North Berwick (30 mins north of Edinburgh), which was incredible. I was surrounded by thousands of birds at one point, and felt really small in a very good way. Just got to Italy last night, went to the Vatican today, which was...underwhelming. At least considering the line I had to wait in. Got hit on by a guy in the Sistine chapel, because why not. My friend is coming to do the rest of the trip with me tomorrow, which I am so excited for. I've been happy to have some solitude during this trip, but it's been right on the edge of isolation for the past few days. It will be nice to have a friend here. And also my Italian is shit, and he's fluent, so that will be pretty sweet Edit: oh yeah also my ex has come out as a lesbian, so there's that. She was Bi while we were dating, and I always kinda suspected it. If anything, it makes being her friend now a whole lot cleaner. I am really happy for her, and also feel weird about having dated someone who is now no longer interested in men for 4 years.
Sidenote: going to Vatican city as someone who grew up Roman Catholic, was super aggressively atheist in High School, and now has settled on "I feel weird calling myself Buddhist" was kind of jarring. I really loved seeing how much it meant to some people there though - a few people broke down in tears at points, and it was really powerful seeing their devotion. That being said, visiting the Vatican Museums made me want to start a second Protestant reformation. Holy shit, so much unnecessary opulence. I was as angry as I was awestruck. Also, look at this gnarly crucifix:
A girl in my year in the uni suffers from some sort of brain stem damage. Don't know what exactly is going on, but she's struggling with it. She's eighteen. Did my best to comfort her when she was struggling to hold back tears during the lecture. Seemed like the right thing to do. Nobody else did. Speaking my mind is surprisingly easy, given how much weight I was giving to not saying the "wrong thing". The week's getting only more pressing as exams and test come one after another and debts don't disappear on their own, but, surprisingly, I'm more resilient to stress than ever. Confidence comes from being in control of your own body and knowing that you can do more with it.
I got my glasses in and I'm so fucking stoked so I bought a good old self help book to unfuck myself and I really like it. However, the search for this book had me looking at others and I feel like you should have to have some sort of credentials to write a book that claims to help people live better. I mean there's a bunch written by celebrities and 80% of the relationship ones seem manipulative just by reading the title.
I'm starting to buy in to the idea that spending a year or two as a supervisor is a necessity to future aspirations of director of blah blah blah. And the fact that I have come around to that is terrifying to me. PS called the credit companies and they basically said fuck you, file a dispute, nothing we can do on the phone and nothing you can send in right now. So. Yay.
I wrote you a reply and it got lost. Why do you find it dispiriting to believe that it may be necessary to have management experience prior to achieving a role as director of a department or organization? Also, if you want, PM about the credit card dispute. It IS my speciality, you know.
I don't find it dispiriting! It's more an admission of what I currently want my life to plan to be and the culmination of 10 months of going back and forth on that. Acceptance and planning are terrifying, right?
I woke up this morning to find that my wife put my new car insurance slip on my keyboard. It really is the little things that you can do to show someone you love them. I'm about six or seven chapters into Ten Cent Plague now and it's a great read so far. I don't know if many here know much about comics, but Hadju spends almost a whole chapter talking about Charles Biro's and Bob Wood's Crime Does Not Pay. It hasn't happened yet in the book yet, but I'm wondering if Hadju is gonna bring up HISTORICAL SPOILER! Wood's Downfall. Maybe he doesn't cause in the grand scheme of things it didn't have a major impact on comics, but man, I feel like there's just an irony there that deserves at least a footnote. Overall though, it's a very good book, kind of hard to keep track of what's going on because so many people and so many events are mentioned and then not really brought up again. Still, it's a great, great book. I wanna do another antiques post from something from my collection for Hubski pretty soon, but I've been really busy as of late. I think I'm gonna ask for a day off work so I can focus on just that. I have something a bit different planned than my usual “Here's a thing guys! Check it out!” I know I'm not the best writer but I really like my antiques and they're fun to share.
It's more about the industry at large than individual players; I think he mentions how Wood went out but it wasn't an important thing. Hadju spends more time on what a bundle of bizarre Charles Moulton was... and how the latent sadomasochistic and homoerotic undertones of his work influenced comics the same way Rob Halford's gayboy leather chic influenced heavy metal. Prior to EC comics toning Wonder Woman down, Moulton's first instinct was black patent leather and fishnets. That is the comic book movie I wanna see.
Well shit. I'm about a third into the way of the book and I can honestly say I did not pick up on that. I feel silly now. He was a bit of a weird guy. Though in his defense, a lot of influencial people in history were downright weird by today's standards. Have you ever heard of a book called The League of Regrettable Superheroes? It's full of characters who are interesting for one reason or another.It's more about the industry at large than individual players.
Moulton
Mmmmyeah, I'm kind of okay with Moulton for being a polyamorous kink, but pretty much not okay for being the guy who saddled us with the polygraph. I oughtta check that book out.
It's a slip with your insurance information on it, showing that it is active and tied to the car that you're driving. You keep it in the glovebox of your car in case you get in an accident, that way you can easily exchange insurance information with any parties involved. As for why it's important? It just shows that she cares enough to help me keep on top of shit.
I'm really discouraged with work right now. My supervisor, who I normally like and work well with, has second guessed me a couple time recently. Not "let's talk through how you got that answer" but rather "ask someone else to look at that." One I did everything right, and he refuses to talk about why people were upset (when they initially thought I'd screwed up). Coincidentally, work put on a short presentation about how we use social media in the business. One was how human resources uses LinkedIn and Twitter to interact with candidates. So I followed a couple companies I like on LinkedIn. While I'm not quite ready to apply, I might as well stay in touch. It also might help show I'm interested in them as a company and not just a paycheck.
That would make sense, and I'll keep in mind the pressure management is seeing. It doesn't make it easier, but it might at least explain it. I'm torn on the idea of hunkering down. On the one hand, stability is good in a recession. On the other, is it good to get out of a situation that feels like it's spiraling before it gets bad? I don't know.
Spiced chai for me, extra milk and sugar. Work was stressful, the CEO wanted this new feature out in time for a demo which meant kind of having to rush things, but also worrying about technical debt. I think we pulled it off though. It's annoying to have requirements sprung upon us at the last minute but this only happens in the minority of cases. I've been playing badminton every week with a group from meetup dot com. They're really nice and there is a good variety of skill levels. The more experienced people help out the beginners. I've been cycling to work most days. It's so much cheaper than taking the tube and I feel happier during the day as a result. There is too much traffic for my liking but nobody goes that fast and the route is almost entirely covered by cycle paths. I have mostly been eating tofu instead of meat for dinner. This is a good thing, right? Low fat, better for the environment. Lapsang souchong really stinks out the cupboard. I had to wrap the box in a carrier bag. My dreams of a hubski meetup were granted by flac. It was really nice to meet you! If anyone else is passing by London I'd love to get a beer or lunch or whatever. When I inevitably tour America I'm gonna have to see a bunch of your faces.
So I read this and all I could think was "That's definitely me". Almost all of my social interaction consists of talking about something, rather than getting aquainted with people, and as soon as those conversations turn to more connection-forming topics I bail. I think to outside parties, I must seem like a hyperchondriac by now(esp. when linking a large sweeping, general article like that), but all my 'revelations', true or false have either directly or indirectly led to something that improves my quality of life, so it's all good. One interesting thing I noticed was that my 'advoidance' of forming connections shared some coincidences with the way I use social media; things like Reddit, large chat groups dictated, I rarely have 1-1 Twitter conversations or reply to reddit comments that deviate to personal themes(How did you x, What do you think of y etc.) As a result, I'm going to force myself to come here more often, and to have longer conversations in general.