Random Thoughts That Don't Deserve Their Own Thread Go Here

[Suicane75]

Hollywood Shuffle is on TV and I look up to see the credits and notice that Dom Irrera is credited as Dom Jack Irrera. Kind of blew my mind. That's all.

[NobodyHere]

f(*(& the tip of the piece that went into my headphone broke off so I can only listen to one side.

Does anyone have any recommendations on good headphones?

[mckerney]

Originally Posted by NobodyHere

f(*(& the tip of the piece that went into my headphone broke off so I can only listen to one side.

Does anyone have any recommendations on good headphones?

I have a pair of Sennheiser HD 598 and think those are pretty great.

[stevew]

Originally Posted by NobodyHere

f(*(& the tip of the piece that went into my headphone broke off so I can only listen to one side.

Does anyone have any recommendations on good headphones?

These are pretty great

[Easy Mac]

Eating at a Buffalo Wild Wings in Greenville SC. Standing room only, at least 95% are watching Barcelona-Madrid exclusively. Cheering, singing, chanting. The place erupted when Messi came on.

They've been predicting it for 30 years, but I think soccer finally happened, especially since at least 1/2 the crowd is kids.

[Wolfpack]

Originally Posted by Easy Mac

Eating at a Buffalo Wild Wings in Greenville SC. Standing room only, at least 95% are watching Barcelona-Madrid exclusively. Cheering, singing, chanting. The place erupted when Messi came on.

They've been predicting it for 30 years, but I think soccer finally happened, especially since at least 1/2 the crowd is kids.

Probably true, but I'm sure it also helped that Clemson and South Carolina were both in uninteresting matchups today (even if South Carolina did astonishingly lose to The Citadel) which may have thinned the crowd interested in college football.

[Dutch]

I am a sucker for advertisements that say something like, "You won't believe what happens next" or "This guy wanted the Eifel Tower photoshopped under his finger" and every time...every time...I realize that no matter how many bazillion megabits per second my connection has, I can't load the pages fast enough to enjoy the upcoming article or slideshow. At work it's called, "Death by PowerPoint"....on the internet it's called "You are a sucker for clicking on this".

[Barkeep49]

Originally Posted by Easy Mac

Eating at a Buffalo Wild Wings in Greenville SC...

I won't eat at BWW anymore because they serve Pepsi products and since I want spicy stuff I need soda to cool down the burning. I actually miss the place and wish I could find a good substitute (the best wing places I've found have no sports tie-ins).

[Dutch]

I won't avoid a restaurant because of what kind of Coke's they have. I'll normally get water or iced tea now anyway...but if I want a Coke, it normally goes like this....

Me: "I'd like a Diet Coke."
Waiter/Waitress: "Is Diet Pepsi okay?"
Me: "It's...okay."

(Off-topic..but whatever...) Or back in the day in Mississippi as a kid...

Me: "I'd like a Coke."
Waiter/Waitress: "Okay, what kind?"
Me: "Mello Yellow, please."

[Suicane75]

Okay, I feel like I'm losing my mind. I'm on my 2nd new TV in a week and I'm seeing those effing lines on the right side of the screen again. WTF.

[stevew]

You probably have interference from other devices. Plug it in somewhere else

[Suicane75]

That doesn't sound right. It's not like static, and I have no where else to plug it in where it wont be near anything. The only other thing plugged in is the cable box and It's not like I can separate the two.

[stevew]

Are you using an SD box?

All I'm saying is do you get the same lines on both cable and on the smart features? Trying to isolate variables

[Suicane75]

I don't see it when using the smart features. Watching the Cal/Stanford replay on WatchESPN and I'm not seeing it. Hmm.

[Suicane75]

I do have the TV plugged directly into the cable box because that's just the way the cable guy set it up when he installed the cable and I had my old CRTV. And yeah, it's SD Box. I'll try plugging the TV straight into the outlet instead of the box.

[stevew]

Ok, if it's not on the smart TV, then its probably cause of the SD box and you need to get an HD box

[CU Tiger]

You aren't talking about the picture box bars are you?

[CraigSca]

post pics?

[Suicane75]

No, not the picture box bars. I'll try and take a pic but I'm not sure they're bright enough to even be noticeable. They're extremely faint, but once you see em it becomes distracting.

[QuikSand]

Somewhere along the line, during my lifetime, the core concept of a "Frosted Mini Wheat" shifted. And I don't know how this presumably bloodless coup happened.

Growing up, I am 100% sure they were in a red box. And about two inches long. That was mini compared to the (ridiculous) original product "shredded wheat" that was a biscuit about 4" x 3".

Along came (I think) "Bite Size Frosted Mini Wheats" in an orange box. Roughly half the size of the true and proper FMW. Fine. I had no real interest, but fine.

Than...somewhere along the way, this got insidious. The novelty bite-size portion became popular. As did the insipid orange box. It won out, I suppose, in some Darwinian conflict that passed right beneath our (my) perception.

And it appears now that the transition is at least virtually complete. I haven't seen the red box in years, and the orange box no longer carries the stigma-laden "bit size" qualifier. No, indeed. But adding injury to insult, they now have the affront to place the word "Original" on the orange box, presumably to separate this generally good-hearted white-frosted product from their other devil-spawned pink (labeled "strawberry" in some kind of sick joke) and other dreadful laboratory-brewed color/flavor variations on the otherwise perfectly respectable theme.

With that, I confess. I have general respect for corporate America, and don't want to see tyrannical government or asshat protestors take over things that are rightfully the domain of shareholders and captains of industry.

But I would have voted no on all this, had there been an opportunity.

[digamma]

I can't argue with anything you've written there, QS. All I can offer you is an invitation to join me and other Trader Joe's brand "frosted mini wheat" buyers. We get a blue box.

[TCY Junkie]

I won't eat the bite size crap. Walmart does not carry the Red box but I have been able to get it at brookshire brothers in the last year. Never knew this was an issue.

[TCY Junkie]

Just checked their website and all I see is small crap. Thanks for ruining my holiday

[britrock88]

Rough stuff. Nearly as rough as not having a TJ's within 7 hours (thanks for that salt in the wound, digamma).

[stevew]

Is Aldis basically trader Joes?

[ISiddiqui]

Kind of. Trader Joe's has more interesting prepared food choices, but generally the same concept.

[cartman]

Originally Posted by stevew

Is Aldis basically trader Joes?

There are two Aldi companies from Germany, run by brothers after a family split. One (Aldi Nord) runs Trader Joe's, and the other (Aldi Sud) runs the Aldi branded US stores.

[stevew]

Ok. That's what I thought. Aldi's is hit or miss. Sometimes you get lucky on their store brand stuff. Our's is also white trash AF, you see wild shit there.

[Draft Dodger]

wow, Quik, I had no idea.

it looks like somewhere along the line they changed the original to "Big Bites", which would have been enough for me to stop eating them entirely. I actually can go either way on this, but I understand your loss. And it looks like it's official:
https://community.kelloggs.com/kello...eats-big-bites

meanwhile, while researching this, I came across this abomination:

In 2011, Kelloggs introduced Frosted Mini-Wheats with Fruit in the Middle, which features strawberries and blueberries in the center.

what sort of animal would put fruit in the middle of mini wheats?

[ISiddiqui]

They are actually really good, FWIW.

[Buccaneer]

Since I had switched over to fruit smoothies, I stopped eating cereal - except one: Kellogg's frosted mini-wheats that come in the double sized orange box from costco.

But I wonder if it has changed? Maybe it's like a lot of things, I recall it tasting differently.

[QuikSand]

so, perhaps the wrong thread for the mini wheats discussion, then

[Buccaneer]

I have a question. I have a Samsung smart tv and a Sony BluRay in the bedroom that I use for Amazon prime and YouTube. I use the BluRay to connect to the wireless but some evenings, the performance sucks (excessive buffering and crashes) but some evenings no problems. Should I use the wireless on the tv instead? Or is there another improvement I can make?

[Barkeep49]

Originally Posted by Buccaneer

I have a question. I have a Samsung smart tv and a Sony BluRay in the bedroom that I use for Amazon prime and YouTube. I use the BluRay to connect to the wireless but some evenings, the performance sucks (excessive buffering and crashes) but some evenings no problems. Should I use the wireless on the tv instead? Or is there another improvement I can make?

Feels like trying the smart tv is a low investment experiment...

[stevew]

Originally Posted by Buccaneer

I have a question. I have a Samsung smart tv and a Sony BluRay in the bedroom that I use for Amazon prime and YouTube. I use the BluRay to connect to the wireless but some evenings, the performance sucks (excessive buffering and crashes) but some evenings no problems. Should I use the wireless on the tv instead? Or is there another improvement I can make?

Yes, I'm not sure if it still applies but Sony devices had some weird thing with how they handled apps in the past(thinking Netflix primarily) and my Netflix performance on my Sony smart tv was straight up garbage.

Basically the device connects to the Sony servers, then to Netflix, and then you finally get the content.

[Draft Dodger]

what word would one use to describe horseradish? or wasabi? I used "spicy" today, but that seems kind of inaccurate

[PilotMan]

Originally Posted by Draft Dodger

what word would one use to describe horseradish? or wasabi? I used "spicy" today, but that seems kind of inaccurate

Eye watering/Nostril cleansing.

[stevew]

Originally Posted by Draft Dodger

what word would one use to describe horseradish? or wasabi? I used "spicy" today, but that seems kind of inaccurate

Intense and unique.

[JonInMiddleGA]

Originally Posted by stevew

Is Aldis basically trader Joes?

I'd put Aldi's closer to being one of the old-school warehouse foods places, deep discount & zero frills. TJ's is closer to something like Freshmarket/ WholeFoods/Earthfare.

There's really nothing foodwise at TJs that's really cheap (altho their prepared foods are generally reasonable) and they do some of the expensive niche stuff. Aldi's is pretty much cheap or at least average on everything.

And yes, as mentioned, their housebrand stuff is really hit or miss. Their knockoff sweets (think faux-Oreos for example) are pretty much awful across the board but their knockoff candy bars (faux-3 Musketeers, Snickers, etc) are fine. Their store brand bakery stuff is fine ... but their produce often runs just slightly better than what you'd find in the Capital Wastelands.

[timmae]

Can a 13 year old be labeled an activist? Weird stuff happening in Chicago man..

[stevew]

Every year Deer kill more people than Isis did in Paris and cause 1 billion dollars in property damage.

Since 911 deer have basically done the equivalent of the 911 death toll and probably doubled the financial damages of the events.

But we won't hunt them to virtual extinction cause the hunters won't have anything to shoot at.

Kind of fucked up priorities we have as a nation

[Suicane75]

Round em up and ship them to Syria.

[Easy Mac]

My 6 year old beat me at Monopoly Junior. She finished with more money than the bank and owning all the properties after i had to sell them to stay alive. She then won not because I owed her money, but because i went to jail and couldn't pay $1 to get out. Quite humbling.

[Dutch]

Originally Posted by stevew

Every year Deer kill more people than Isis did in Paris and cause 1 billion dollars in property damage.

Since 911 deer have basically done the equivalent of the 911 death toll and probably doubled the financial damages of the events.

But we won't hunt them to virtual extinction cause the hunters won't have anything to shoot at.

Kind of fucked up priorities we have as a nation

Deer have also killed more people than the Patriot Act.

[AlexB]

So delivery companies must have started taking on anyone for seasonal work.

Had three parcels left in my back garden today as I was out: the only slight mistakes they made was that they were addressed to someone else who lives on a different street and in a house with a different number...

[Buccaneer]

I need help wrapping my head around the college admissions process. My son has been accepted to four disparate universities here in the West. He does not have a preference now and it will likely come down to finances. We have the initial scholarship offer from each and so the costs (tuition/r&b/fees) range from $15k to $32k. I also know that fafsa.gov opens up Jan 1.

So, what's the process now? We got an acceptance card from each to fill out and send with a deposit. It seems that should be done asap, particularly to get into preferred student housing, but there is no way to know whether it will be feasible to go to college A or B, etc. until after all of the scholarhips, grants and aids process have been completed sometime in the Spring. Do we chose one college and then work on its gap or do we play it all out and see which one ends up with the lowest cost sometime in April?

[bob]

Line up someone to buy your kidney. Then for sophomore year, your wife's kidney.

[JonInMiddleGA]

Originally Posted by Buccaneer

I need help wrapping my head around the college admissions process. My son has been accepted to four disparate universities here in the West. He does not have a preference now and it will likely come down to finances. We have the initial scholarship offer from each and so the costs (tuition/r&b/fees) range from $15k to $32k. I also know that fafsa.gov opens up Jan 1.

So, what's the process now? We got an acceptance card from each to fill out and send with a deposit. It seems that should be done asap, particularly to get into preferred student housing, but there is no way to know whether it will be feasible to go to college A or B, etc. until after all of the scholarhips, grants and aids process have been completed sometime in the Spring. Do we chose one college and then work on its gap or do we play it all out and see which one ends up with the lowest cost sometime in April?

We're right in the middle of this. We're keeping deposits & such to a bare minimum (only his #1 choice most likely) until it all plays out.

At this point for us it's mostly about finding ways to leverage offers B, C and D and E in order to maximize the final offer from choice A and maybe B. (and choice A is only A if he gets into their honors program, which we won't know for a while yet)

[Buccaneer]

Originally Posted by JonInMiddleGA

We're right in the middle of this. We're keeping deposits & such to a bare minimum (only his #1 choice most likely) until it all plays out.

At this point for us it's mostly about finding ways to leverage offers B, C and D and E in order to maximize the final offer from choice A and maybe B. (and choice A is only A if he gets into their honors program, which we won't know for a while yet)

Final offer meaning emailing the admissions office asking for more scholarships and grants?

On the deposit, is it binding? I know it's not refundable but that goes with checking the box saying he will attend.

[JonInMiddleGA]

Originally Posted by Buccaneer

Final offer meaning emailing the admissions office asking for more scholarships and grants?

Yeah, I mean we've still got until next fall (technically) for him to get the one more point on the ACT that would make the existing offer PLUS another automatic scholarship for that score = full ride. Obviously we have to decide before then but there's still a LOT of stuff twisting in the wind here. And that's before we even get into all the various independent scholarship (Scouts, DAR, etc) AND the still outstanding school-specific ones at each school. Some of those don't even have application deadlines until Jan 1, much less decisions.

Right now everything we've seen in terms of firm scholarship offers are just the if-a-certain-benchmark-then-X stuff. I think we have 5 of those so far, mostly all right around half of total, most being 100% waivers of out-of-state tuition (or the equivalent of that in total dollars).

On the deposit, is it binding? I know it's not refundable but that goes with checking the box saying he will attend.

The way you've phrased that sounds unusual to me (and I doublechecked with my wife, queen of this crap in our house). Non-refundable is standard BUT "will attend" is not something we've typically seen as part of the housing stuff. I STRONGLY recommend digging through every bit of the fine print you have for that particular school, look closely at exactly what application process was used. That phrasing sounds like it's part of "early decision" rather than just "early application", and some of the former CAN be legally binding.

It's a helluva mess, for pretty much everyone ... if that's any faint consolation.