what I have learned today.

[clarion]

Yes, since I thought they had a knife ban.  I may be wrong.

[T42]

I did not know that.  I think you're right, though: I just looked for "carbon steel kitchen knife" and drew a blank. Plenty of ceramic ones, which are presumably no good in a fight. And plenty on ebay France and Amazon UK.

Well, well.

[clarion]

Yeah.  I recognise, of course, that a Swann Morton No.10A is never going to be the most effective in a shanking, but the traditional choice of bovver boys was always a Stanley...

[citoyen]

According to the woman on Radio 5 just now, "on days like this [ie snowy ones], your computer screen is red hot". In case you're wondering why this might be, she went on to explain that it's because you're looking at so many different online weather reports, traffic news, flight info etc.

So today I have learned that looking at lots of different websites in a short space of time can cause your monitor to overheat. Well I nevah!

[T42]

Yeah.  I recognise, of course, that a Swann Morton No.10A is never going to be the most effective in a shanking, but the traditional choice of bovver boys was always a Stanley...

I wonder if there was a surge in sales of "box cutters" after 9/11.

[Beardy]

We've been doing SCIENCE, and have discovered that the standby mode on barakta's hearing aids drops the average current consumption from 1.33mA to 1.24mA.  This is why the official switching-off procedure is to leave the battery compartment hanging open for ease of pingfuckiting and eventual ingestion of the cell by small children and other animals.

Ah, but those little hearing aid batteries use air¹ as an electrolyte and have a quite appalling self discharge rate once the holes have been opened by the removal of the sticky label. To a user such as myself who will only put my hearing aids in when I'm interacting with someone², the fact that the batteries go flat just as quickly while not being used is most irksome³.

1. Well oxygen actually
2. I have my reasons, and they are not all associated with me being a grumpy bugger who'd rather not talk to people.
3. And the Yorkshire in me gets very upset.

[nicknack]

]Ah, but those little hearing aid batteries use air¹ as an electrolyte and have a quite appalling self discharge rate once the holes have been opened by the removal of the sticky label. To a user such as myself who will only put my hearing aids in when I'm interacting with someone², the fact that the batteries go flat just as quickly while not being used is most irksome³.

Well, that's what I've learned today.
Yes, it is most irksome.
Ta.

[David Martin]

Can you not use a squirt of inert gas and a sealed box to keep them in? Or is it once triggered, that is it?

[barakta]

I think once triggered that's it as the reaction starts...

I reckon the self-discharge from opening of CP44 (675) Zinc Air batteries is about 22-23 days

[Mr Larrington]

I did not know that.  I think you're right, though: I just looked for "carbon steel kitchen knife" and drew a blank. Plenty of ceramic ones, which are presumably no good in a fight. And plenty on ebay France and Amazon UK.

ISTR hearing that the London Bridge attackers used ceramic knives from a well-known low-cost German horriblemarket for their knifecriming murders.

[rogerzilla]

Orson Welles' last gig as director was the "Follow The Bear" advert for Hofmeister lager, featuring a blokey bear, George, in a pork-pie hat 

It's also an example of nominative determinism, which makes it even better.

[Kim]

We've been doing SCIENCE, and have discovered that the standby mode on barakta's hearing aids drops the average current consumption from 1.33mA to 1.24mA.  This is why the official switching-off procedure is to leave the battery compartment hanging open for ease of pingfuckiting and eventual ingestion of the cell by small children and other animals.

Ah, but those little hearing aid batteries use air¹ as an electrolyte and have a quite appalling self discharge rate once the holes have been opened by the removal of the sticky label.

Yes.  It's hard to put a figure on it, as it depends somewhat on temperature and humidity (AUIU it's accumulation of water that depletes the electrolyte), but it's something of the order of 0.5mA for these 675 cells.  That's a fair chunk of the current draw of these aids, and not far off the quiescent^[1] current of the (analogue) BAHA Classic.

To a user such as myself who will only put my hearing aids in when I'm interacting with someone

I've got no time for the "you should wear your hearing aids at all times except when you're in the shower" audiology propaganda.  Sure, you've got to put the effort in to get used to hearing with them, and many people don't.  But unless you're trying to drown out tinnitus there's no point in giving yourself fatigue just to hear traffic noise / other people's half phone calls / computer fans / bad acoustics / seagull fights / etc. if you don't need to.  Especially if it involves earmoulds.  There's simply no point in the system where audiologists nag their patients with unrealistic textbook goals and deaf people feel compelled to lie^[2] about how much they're using them.   


_{[1] The two digital models we have to hand draw a flat rate of 1.3mA or so, regardless of what they're doing (apart from the Ponto's afore-mentioned standby mode), but the Classic would pull 0.7mA quiecent, and then up to the same again depending on what it was amplifying.
[2] It seems that some modern digital aids will tell tales to the programming software about how much they've been used.}

[T42]

The music in Jean de Florette is based on Verdi's La forza del destino, which I have never seen or listened to. But will.

[rogerzilla]

The music in Jean de Florette is based on Verdi's La forza del destino, which I have never seen or listened to. But will.

I thought it was based on a lager advert 

[T42]

That would be a UK cultural reference? 

[Cudzoziemiec]

That a grebo is not just a greasy biker who beats up small children, but a West African language. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Grebo_language

[JennyB]

I've got no time for the "you should wear your hearing aids at all times except when you're in the shower" audiology propaganda.  Sure, you've got to put the effort in to get used to hearing with them, and many people don't.  But unless you're trying to drown out tinnitus there's no point in giving yourself fatigue just to hear traffic noise / other people's half phone calls / computer fans / bad acoustics / seagull fights / etc. if you don't need to.  Especially if it involves earmoulds.  There's simply no point in the system where audiologists nag their patients with unrealistic textbook goals and deaf people feel compelled to lie^[2] about how much they're using them.   
]

Have you ever tried the low-tech alternative?

[Kim]

Have you ever tried the low-tech alternative?

When I first learned that the gain of a BAHA is measured in square metres (because it's converting pressure to force), it occurred to me that it would represent the area of a functionally equivalent passive 'eardrum'.

Sadly this sort of information's been hard to get hold of since Cochlear took over, but I remember it being significantly bigger than a head...  Wonderful things, transistors.

[clarion]

That the Clangers are subtitled

[T42]

Kinda like getting an OBE instead of a K?

[barakta]

That sheep are claustrophobic.

[LittleWheelsandBig]

That sheep are claustrophobic.

Not too surprising, seeing what happens to some of them.
https://youtu.be/wA184Vs4Zeg

[Cudzoziemiec]

That one of the brothels on Stokes Croft, a street with a somewhat mixed reputation, has been there since at least 1986.

https://www.bristolpost.co.uk/news/history/changing-face-stokes-croft-over-1281180
I'd assumed they'd moved in there following the police clearing up street prostitution in the nearby St Paul's. (Should this be in NSFW?!)

[mllePB]

That there was a period of just 3 giddy weeks of English history between the last Viking invasion being successfully defeated and the first Norman invasion being successful.

Maybe everyone who did English history already knew this, but I'm just catching up on the Dark ages at the mo.

[David Martin]

The Normans were Vikings invading from France, having been there a few generations. Hence Northmen (attacking from the south)