Randomness XVII: The Madness of the Quorum

[Green Eyed Monster 39183]

7 minutes ago, strawhat said:

 

Ah, so that's why olde New York was once New Amsterdam.

 

But why did Constantinople get the works?

Ask the Ottoman Empire.

GEM

[Mad Jack 49133]

3 hours ago, ManvsMini said:

 

Can never have too many bases. Granted, that may explain why I have a shoebox full of them, but still... bases.

 

 

 

[Crowley 106523]

1 hour ago, strawhat said:

 

Ah, so that's why olde New York was once New Amsterdam.

 

But why did Constantinople get the works?

That's nobody's business but the Turks!

[ManvsMini 16002]

27 minutes ago, Crowley said:

1 hour ago, strawhat said:

 

Ah, so that's why olde New York was once New Amsterdam.

 

But why did Constantinople get the works?

That's nobody's business but the Turks!

 

Can anybody hear those song lyrics without thinking of the music video Tiny Toons did for that song in the 90s (assuming you were of an age to watch that cartoon)?

 

I also think of the first role I saw Nikolaj Coster-Waldau (Jaime Jannister) in when I hear New Amsterdam: a short-lived TV series aptly named New Amsterdam. He played a 300+ year-old Dutch colonist who was killed fighting the English, then cursed/blessed with immortality by the native tribes. Wasn't bad, but wasn't different enough from other police procedural shows back in 2008.

[Werkrobotwerk 27558]

4 minutes ago, ManvsMini said:

 

Can anybody hear those song lyrics without thinking of the music video Tiny Toons did for that song in the 90s (assuming you were of an age to watch that cartoon)?

 

I also think of the first role I saw Nikolaj Coster-Waldau (Jaime Jannister) in when I hear New Amsterdam: a short-lived TV series aptly named New Amsterdam. He played a 300+ year-old Dutch colonist who was killed fighting the English, then cursed/blessed with immortality by the native tribes. Wasn't bad, but wasn't different enough from other police procedural shows back in 2008.

I mostly think of boring class trips to one of the colonial dutch farm houses in the next town over. 

 

Those were much less fun than the trip to the old forge with all it's dropped cannon balls. 

[ratsmitglied 5265]

I may have been busy

 

(the enclosure is new...the gardens were already there)

Edited February 20 by ratsmitglied

[sumbloke 7194]

Came across a new YouTube channel today - Duplessy & the Violins of the World. It's an ensemble consisting of guitar, Chinese erhu, Mongolian horsehair and Swedish nyckelharpa. Very nice combination. 

 

We came across it because SWMBO had a random thought - "I wonder if there's a Chinese orchestra version of The Good, the Bad and the Ugly..."

[Lord of the Dish Pit 23619]

Agents of M.E.O.W.

While I appreciate the sentiment behind the gesture, leaving me dead mice on the porch is not necessary,  I have plenty of food. 

[CaptainPete 4416]

6 hours ago, ManvsMini said:

 

Can anybody hear those song lyrics without thinking of the music video Tiny Toons did for that song in the 90s (assuming you were of an age to watch that cartoon)?

I remember watching that episode and it was one of the most surreal experiences of my life (at the time). Those Might Be Giants were popular with my friends in high school.

 

Today's Picture:

 

[sumbloke 7194]

5 hours ago, sumbloke said:

Came across a new YouTube channel today - Duplessy & the Violins of the World. It's an ensemble consisting of guitar, Chinese erhu, Mongolian horsehair and Swedish nyckelharpa. Very nice combination. 

 

We came across it because SWMBO had a random thought - "I wonder if there's a Chinese orchestra version of The Good, the Bad and the Ugly..."

https://youtu.be/AZdsp3t46m4

 

And a collaboration they did with some Australian Aborigines: https://youtu.be/nwN_bxoj1Fw

[ManvsMini 16002]

Timeline Trivia for Feb. 20th:

• 1816 – Rossini's opera The Barber of Seville premiered at the Teatro Argentina in Rome.

• 1877 – Tchaikovsky's ballet Swan Lake received its premiere at the Bolshoi Theatre in Moscow.

[haldir 46081]

[Cranky Dog 31960]

13 hours ago, MusicalFeline said:

Anyone from "Getting to Know You" already knows this, but you can now Rickroll people in 4K, 60fps.

 

The fact that technology can do that utterly floors me, just sayin'.

Now it looks "too" good.

 

What amazes me is that the remastered version now looks like an amateur's Tik Tok video.

[Pegazus 40072]

Tax rant incoming!

 

Did taxes yesterday afternoon. And then until 11pm. TurboTax had some weird errors that took me a long time to fix. Deleted everything and restarted twice. Then come to review time and it would just hang. Clearing cache and cookies didn’t work, and obviously restarting didn’t. When it brought in last years stuff, it decided to not delete some 1099-NEC forms that I told it to delete. Finally found out that it was these forms when I managed to get it to work the state taxes. 


Then, late last night, I got to the final form portion. Line 4a was blank but Line 4b was massive (2 inheritances this last year). Then Line 5a was massive and Line 5b was small. So it has to be an error give all the hell I’d been put through in the afternoon. Software is putting numbers in wrong places. Lines 1-3 worked that way. Foreshadowing! Got a specialist on a call, and she couldn’t see the form and suggested I delete the 1099-R forms that I felt were leading to the problem and try again. Politely said thanks and I won’t repeat what I was saying inside. Debated whether to start over or just hit File.

 

Instead, I decided to read the instructions. No, not TurboTax’s. The IRS instructions for Line 4a. Three minutes. That’s all it took to have an answer. Perfectly normal to have that line blank. Grr. 
 

But taxes are done and efile has accepted the Federal ones. That final tax number was horrifically high this year, due to getting the family money. Probably could have rolled it all over into IRAs and starved the government coffers a bit. But that money is out working in corporate America now and making sure lil’ children graduate with no college loans, so it works for me. But I had to do the math. It’s a complete distortion as I didn’t work for most of this year’s “income”, but I wound up paying $45 per hour in taxes. That’s 3 times what I paid the year before. That’s a lot.

[haldir 46081]

6 minutes ago, Pegazus said:

Tax rant incoming!

 

 

  Hide contents

 

 

Did taxes yesterday afternoon. And then until 11pm. TurboTax had some weird errors that took me a long time to fix. Deleted everything and restarted twice. Then come to review time and it would just hang. Clearing cache and cookies didn’t work, and obviously restarting didn’t. When it brought in last years stuff, it decided to not delete some 1099-NEC forms that I told it to delete. Finally found out that it was these forms when I managed to get it to work the state taxes. 


Then, late last night, I got to the final form portion. Line 4a was blank but Line 4b was massive (2 inheritances this last year). Then Line 5a was massive and Line 5b was small. So it has to be an error give all the hell I’d been put through in the afternoon. Software is putting numbers in wrong places. Lines 1-3 worked that way. Foreshadowing! Got a specialist on a call, and she couldn’t see the form and suggested I delete the 1099-R forms that I felt were leading to the problem and try again. Politely said thanks and I won’t repeat what I was saying inside. Debated whether to start over or just hit File.

 

Instead, I decided to read the instructions. No, not TurboTax’s. The IRS instructions for Line 4a. Three minutes. That’s all it took to have an answer. Perfectly normal to have that line blank. Grr. 
 

But taxes are done and efile has accepted the Federal ones. That final tax number was horrifically high this year, due to getting the family money. Probably could have rolled it all over into IRAs and starved the government coffers a bit. But that money is out working in corporate America now and making sure lil’ children graduate with no college loans, so it works for me. But I had to do the math. It’s a complete distortion as I didn’t work for most of this year’s “income”, but I wound up paying $45 per hour in taxes. That’s 3 times what I paid the year before. That’s a lot.
 

 

 

 

Yah we went up to pay for the tax prep yesterday. Finding out we are only getting back like 300 bucks & having to pay OR state tax, made the trip sooooo worthwile....

 

So no new 3d printer or extra funds toward ReaperCon trip with this year's "rebate".

 

Thou, I did ask my wife about last year returns as we haven't cashed the checks yet & found out we need to definitely cash the Federal one as it's expires the 28th of this month...YIKES!!

 

Off to get ready for the game today. I need to clean up the game table, as I've got 2 weeks worth of model stuff on it + gather up stuff not miniatures for the game as well.