scottyboy

It's not the one HateEvent had made is it? I remember a whole thread on the process of getting it made, no? HateEvent bought and sold high-end guitars quite a bit and posted about a couple of other customs from bigger companies (IIRC), but being able to go to Glasgow (?) and check up on the process personally would be something different. /Cool story. Just curious if that is indeed the co-incidence; timeline and unusualness of the guitar make it seem possible.

"Blackface for geeks" was one I heard...

Morgan Tsvangirai http://www.bbc.com/news/world-africa-43066175 Just when things were looking up for Zimbabwe.

Just reread a book called The Minotaur Takes a Cigarette Break by Steven Sherrill. Grabbed it out of a box when the bag for life - that's the meme on this forum, right? - had cause to dig into said boxes which hold most of my books. The premise is that the Minotaur ("M" to his friends) was/is real, and wasn't killed by that guy who used a bit of thread or whatever it was. Being immortal, he's still around 5000 years later, way mellowed/worn out a bit since his labyrinth days, and at the time of the novel works as a chef and lives in a trailer park in North Carolina. A lot of it reads like a novel-length Raymond Carver story, except the protagonist happens to be half-bull. Though he does turn the prose dial away from Carver-like minimalism as the novel goes on. Thought it was good but not quite great when I first read it; loved it second time. I have a lot of time for the "death of the author" way of reading (or watching, etc.) fiction, but both times I wondered what he was trying to get across with the Minotaur thing, and both times I read it differently. First time I assumed the Minotaur was kind of a Brian from Family Guy gimmick and basically a metaphor and an excuse for some one liners ("The Minotaur is not a Christian. Not then, not now"; after some crude remarks from his friends about a passing girl "There's was indeed a time when the Minotaur would have devoured her. Literally."). But no, second time round, methinks it's definitely a real bull-man walking around the novel (although still a metaphor for something). People have mentioned Murakami quite a bit. If you like some everyday themes explored in a surreal way (and if my rereading of Norwegian Wood is anything to go by, a GOOD way), give this one a go. In Googling it I saw a sequel came out in 2016 (this original one is from 2000). I'll pick that up when I can.

As an interesting aside, Palestine (which I didn't know until now had a national team) made the quarters (Israel plays in Europe groups/comps, no? Can't think why). Their attendances were in the 100-200, think they just broke 200 in a group stage match against Japan (tournament is hosted in China). Came out of the groups stages by beating North Korea (World Cup pedigree again) on goal difference. And Thailand, who usually edge maybe second in SE Asia, just head of Vietnam and just behind Malaysia, as far I follow this stuff, who gained no points. Lost to that Qatar team though... Eyebrow-raising. Australia's (and yeah it's U23 but) team crashed out in 3rd in Vietnam's group (topped by the S. Koreans). Maybe switching from the Oceania (with it's 1 spot contingent on winning a play-off against the just-missed-out S. American team) wasn't a great idea (considering right after they did it New Zealand qualified from the same set-up); or erm, got where I was going with this: Australia's up-and-comings might send them back to obscurity regardless of which continent they've rigged to play in.

I can't multi-quote, but: some of the Qatari team had an international look about it (as would an England, French, Brazil etc. team). Brazil exports footballers all over the place: some in the Vietnamese leagues; and some African footballers have gotten Vietnamese citizenship to maybe sorta hopefully play for the national team, but looks like all born and bred Vietnamese players are playing for team atm. Eh, where was I going with this... yeah they might try something like that, but it'll be more like USA's teams of late, or Scotland poaching English players who have a Scottish granny being a thing for a bit (dunno about now). Not sure that they could field any Brazilian capped player regardless of citizenship: them's (still) the rules, no? I dunno why I spent 3 lines typing a serious response to that joke, so here's my much VERY serious business riposte: because they've been declared persona non grata in the gulf and are worried about the Saudis, the Qataris have just increased their military aircraft sevenfold. Expensive. Probably ate up the budget for buying the Brazilian team. (I should get some kind of analyst job or at least a football journalist gig or a I'd settle for a podcast, just for this bit of punditry alone). Fuck, that is a TLDR bad joke and a pointless point I've just written up there... For the real request for an explanation: It's in the Vietnamese news (no one follows U21, let alone UWhatever, in the UK... but any Vietnam team in a football tournament, Vietnam's watching and going nuts if they win again/ go further than Thailand or Malaysia, etc. I've seen it Asia-based English media and/or really hardcore nerd football sites/blogs/twitter feeds. It's of interest to them and maybe some others because of the Qatar World Cup angle (auto-qualified as hosts and will play in 2022, assuming there's no derailment due to corruption, using and abusing basically indentured labour, the heat or pain in the arse laws/social norms, etc). Regards Vietnam: Asia's big, and an ASEAN/Southeast Asian team, none of which is competitive outside of Southeast Asia, getting into the final in a competition where Japan and South Korea (and maybe North Korea now and again) are the only countries that make a splash at, say, the World Cup, is... uh, interesting. Since the I read all the above mentioned, Uzbekistan knocked out South Korea (also put out Japan, the champs, in the quarters). So that's an unusual (best I got...) final, even if it U23. That's probably also TLDR but hey. Also, the pictures of Saigon alone (wasn't lying about the buses...) must've been great click-bait.

Wouldn't normally be of interest (except to all the people here dancing on the roofs of public buses in the middle of intersection traffic jams here. Including the bus staff...), but since most of Qatar's U23 team will be part of its World Cup squad in 4 years... Qatar's U23 team just lost to Vietnam, on penalties. Haven't watched much football in years, but the highlights looked like Sunday league to me. Qatar's keeper gave away a free kick inside the penalty box; not sure I've ever seen that in a pro game before. Qatar's first goal was from a (seemingly to me) dive-gotten penalty and the second a goalmouth crapfest; Vietnam scored after the defence lost possession outside the box; second was a pretty good finish. 4 years away (and for these guys to become something not a million miles away from world class...), but methinks the karmic schadenfreude at FIFA/Qatar will probably be realised.

So who did hit 50 in 2017, then? I didn't hit 10 (9, believe); hellish year at work, mainly.

George Weah is now president(-elect) of Liberia. (was going to post this somewhere in politics and current affairs but didn't want to start a thread).

I read Norwegian Wood when I was 16 or 17, declared it Best Book Ever and immediately read it again. The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle was one of the books I did my advanced higher "dissertation" on. The latest books at the time I was more indifferent to, and when Kafka on the Shore (the one with some transgenderal theme? Spellcheck is telling me that's not a word but whatever), which came out a couple of years after I'd read all his books back to back, definitely so. I wondered if his style had changed I and I just didn't like it; or if my tastes had changed. I reread Norwegian Wood a couple of years ago, and it was shit, holy christ. Can't understand why I thought it was so great; probably something to do (having been 16-17 when I did) with it about being 18 and having to decide between two women, one of whom the guy is having to practically fight off, whilst she is begging him to at least think about her when he's having a wank. Did I mention, christ on a bike. I seem to have remembered it as a book about a time and a place, but there's no sense of Tokyo given off; and the guy makes a point of saying all the crazy university shut ins were lame, doesn't care, not saying nothing about it. All the 19-21 year old young Asian ladies I was working with (what?) when I was re-reading it, loved it. Dunno why. I think I only finished it because of the 50-book challenge thing we had on here. Never bothered to pick up (probably have to do it with a forklift, mind) IQ84, or reread anything else (everything else is Weird, while Norwegian Wood is the straight-faced one; maybe I'd still like the others, but doubtful). Round my neck of the woods one can even easily buy the first couple that he disowned and suppressed (not sure if the publishers changed their minds or its easily grabbed via the net these days), which I would have gone nuts for (uh, say a bit more than...) 10 years ago. But nah. /coolstoryaboutabookInolongerlike

https://www.sporcle.com/games/SporcleEXP/in-memoriam-2017 Posted one of these last year: 50 celebrities who died in 2017. I was able to name 6...

Only thing I'd maybe suggest (and merely suggest) is upping the number of picks. Presently and until now the only way to seriously win was to google and pick terminally ill people, which appears to be Bigsby's strategy (according to the Harbinger of Death, I mean Bibsby, himself no less) or picking guys who have picked a conventional war with the US and actively used modern media propaganda to get famous (me; I mean this has been my strategy the last 2 years, not that I am in Daesh...). This means maybe a couple of huge points bags to win (I did need I think Lee Kwan Yew and/or King of Thailand to help last year; if I sneak it this year, poor Mao will have been a crucial help). Looks like it's going to get more competitive: most people used to pick people they disliked and were known to probably have a few years left (say Thatcher or Philip), combined with some random irrational, hilarious choice (like Cera, or whoever). Amy Winehouse (though people had their reasons there) is probably the only big, young, points scorer for more than 1 person. I looked at death pool sites after the first year or two, but there were just the same few people at the top getting points for a lot of people (according to data that got sent in, or whatever). Minimising the bar for "celebrity" (regardless of what broonbreed thinks) was a good idea IMO; by what ca_gere said, sounds like other competitions have done so too. Anyway, the point: I hypothesise that if (*if*) the FB group brings more people, people are taking it more seriously (as ca_gere seems to be) and doing research and really strategising much, the teams are going to look more similar. This might make it a closer run; but which perversely might make it duller (similar teams). If you had teams of 30-50 (50, excessive IMO, but possible it seems; say 35), people would run out of good bets, and would thus have to start throwing in longer punts, or people they just detest (as was earlier the norm). So assuming every terminally ill oldie and celebrity drone bulls-eye gets got, and every front runner scores the same because they all picked them, the winner will be decided by the wild cards (the more participants, and the more choices, the higher the odds that someone gets it). Lowering the number of picks and forcing unique picks (as the draft mode seems to imply), I'm not too keen on. Lowering the number of picks will result in fewer scores ("take yer best orgasm..." No. no. Erm..).for each person, making it less compelling. I also like Lemonade's system of anonymous entries published a couple of weeks into the new year; it stops pilfering (the original intention) and means if one gets a unique pick, it was really earned. I like the current set-up tbh, maybe just with a few tweaks and tightening up.

Top of the Pops ever pay anyone (individual person) $5m for an appearance?

Oooofft. Early start here in Poland, thanks for asking. I think I'll just post this now: worried everyone's getting hammered for new year already..... All right, like I said: Lemonade’s chosen source of record, Wikipedia, now has biographies of dead people for 3 of my Daesh team members. And, no, I have not just created this situation right now to win (if that were possible, I’d wait until 23.59 GMT tomorrow to do it! Knowing a fair bit about how Wikipedia works, I know this tactic not to be possible in practice). Like I said a post or two above, I’d noted the updates previously, on separate occasions, for each separate article/person, but waited on it, in case it turned out to be a social media cyberwarefare-fest. Or something. This hasn’t been the case: they have stayed dead according to wiki, with no cyber-jihadists or whoever changing the articles. Most ignominiously dead is Ayad al-Jumaili, because Daesh itself provided the most definitive confirmation that he’d been killed (from there, NBC, then Wiki). He was, however, the guy whose age was unknown. Lemonade has a new headache here: this guy is certainly, verifiably dead as any Dodo. But points band is unknown; I already said that taking a very conservative stance would result in minimal points difference. On the other hand: the possibility of someone dying at an unknown age I don’t think was covered in the stated rules either way. Lemonade puts the effort in to run the game, so I definitely respect his call, whichever way. An update to the rules, I think, could be made on the back of this guy’s case. Next year, we have a concurrent FB group; Bigsby might invite his friends; “friends” is what I’m getting at—probably the death pool equivalent of the Cobra Kai! We’ll need something like the Dungeons and Dragons rule book to cover everything and try and keep it a level field… The other two guys are Khalimov and al-Shimali. Wiki currently has them as dead (and again not because I changed their articles to say such 2m ago; and assuming Bigsby or whoever didn’t change their articles after he read the above two paragraphs, to report them as alive and fighting fit…) They both fall (fell) into the 30s-40s bracket. Assuming Wiki has it right, they were both killed in the same Russian airstrike. Probably showing off a vast bunker-buster bomb: people who follow news might recall that Trump’s forces destroyed a Taliban tunnel network (and killed dozens of fighters while at it) using a so-called “MOAB”— “Mother of All Bombs”—see what they did there? If one digs a bit, there are anecdotes (though some expert ones, included) that this was an attempt by Russia to remind people that they have everything the US has, and can/will do anything the US can. The Russians are basically the source behind these claimed killings: if Russian military intelligence is being honest, I’d say it’s very reliable (Russia doesn't disagree with NATO on issues like Daesh or Somali pirates, e.g., so why lie? On questions like blackmailing Trump or manipulating US elections… not so much). If one looks at where Wiki takes/took its info from: umpteen major media outlets repeated the claims with caveats like “Russia claims…” or “….reportedly...”. But if one is just concerned about what a wiki page says, provided people aren’t fighting over it day-by-day, week-by-week, would it matter? In the case of Khalimov, there is an analyst with a phd who describes him as dead with no ifs, buts or maybes, whose writing is referenced in the Wiki page. Not quite the same with al-Shimali, but same airstrike (claimed); and I think more important for Lemonade, same conclusion made by Wiki: dead. I have a point in there that using Wikipedia as a go-to source, or definitely as an ultimate arbiter, is putting the cart before horse. But anyway, I’ll elaborate if anyone cares why. Oh, by the way… (limited) reports of Daesh head honcho being captured or killed in the last few days. He’s on my team this year, will stay on it next year (assuming no dramatic confirmation in the next couple of days). What if he’s (although not exclusive to him, necessarily, ofc) confirmed dead in 2018, but that he actually died in Dec 2017 (say). How would points get awarded in that sort of situation?

Was wondering when the top 10s were going to start. I like that Soda Jerk just broke all sanity with a "top 18", while worrying whether he would break decorum if he stretched it to a top 19; I think I may just say what the hell and post a top 12 (e.g.) and to hell with narrowing it down to 10.

I read it in a day when I was 16, I'm pretty sure. Like Lemonade, I thought it as all right, but didn't get much from it. I do vaguely remember picking it up years later and getting lost in the prose (same with American Psycho and probably a few more) for several pages before remember I had something to do and tearing myself away, bu that's about it.

Michael I of Romania died earlier this month... a whopping 8 points for me? Pity he couldn't have made it 'til Christmas day. Some exciting developments on my Daesh guys too, but I'm going to wait until the 31st (or maybe the 30th, while everyone's still sober). Partly to see if I can win it in dramatic fashion; partly because reports of these guys deaths can go back and forth (though, one guy I'm pretty sure is down according to Lemonade's standards, at least).

A Farewell to Arms; For Whom the Bell Tolls; and The Old Man and the Sea were my favourite Hemingway books back in the day. I reread the Old Man and the Sea a year or two ago and it was still great. The guy is known for his (really influential) ultra-plain style and The Old Man and the Sea is the apex of that (one of his last books; and it reflects the thoughts of a fisherman who probably can't even read). For Whom the Bell Tolls might be more to your liking: simple style, again, but I think the syntax is supposed to reflect the Spanish the characters would really be speaking, which makes the prose a bit quirkier than other Hemingway novels. Plus it's about fighting fascists. A Farewell to Arms is about being a stretcher bearer to Italians fighting German imperialists. I didn't like all his stuff (normal for a novelist, though). Didn't like Fiesta; can't even remember the basic premise.

Lunchtime in Poland, and the military has taken over Harare, Zimbabwe. It's being called a coup. Mugabe might be in for it...

First gig in Aberdeen (not ever, though), pretty sure was Mick Jones's (of The Clash fame) band (which Wiki tells me must've been Carbon/Silicon) at the Lemon Tree in late 2004, maybe 2005. Small crowd, pretty cool; though people kept calling for Clash songs, especially Train in Vain, which got irritating as it became clear they weren't going to do any Clash stuff (apparently they broke into an impromptu Clash riff during a jam-y part of one of their own tracks, which I didn't catch). The Needles opened, so that was the first band I actually saw.

Wolf of Wall street drugs.

If it's the thing I'm thinking of (called "pods") it's to get a faux-espresso coffee fast and cheaper (and without the mess of any other coffee). Gets in a machine that blasts/drips through it, and afterwards you throw the bag away, rather scooping out a load of particles.

Checked up on my Daesh guys: Not sure how Lemonade feels, as his Wiki page is still for a living person; but the Times has reported Khalimov as dead. https://www.thetimes.co.uk/edition/world/isis-minister-of-war-is-killed-by-allied-airstrike-in-mosul-wwtdp388x Not to sound sore, but Wikipedia is I think the only site still reporting al-Jumaili (the guy I couldn't get points for previously) using the word "is". Aside from the news outlets, Google says he died in 2017.

Also, my joker died a few weeks ago: http://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-40378443 very bad karma one for me...

http://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-china-40597514