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Was thinking about constructions of R and how all of the standard ones (Cauchy, Dedekind) kinda suck. From a topologists perspective. But it turns out that R is the unique connected, locally connected, second countable, regular space in which every point is separating. So that's something ig.

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and this is why baseball is the best sport (see also: these baseball sidequests)

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So, I did another one. The 2025 F1 Season Beginner's Guide. Genuinely honoured that a few people requested it and sorry for all the mistakes I've missed. Please enjoy the many recycled jokes from last year and the 2025 exclusive slide "Paddock Pets".

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Silly phone, you're not detecting an analog audio accessory, you're detecting soup, from the bowl of soup I dropped you in.

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i really like this image

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The communities tumblr recommends to me continue to baffle and amaze

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Rating the Western Protestant names of Easter Related days

Palm Sunday. 6/10 Kinda cool. Immediately reminds you of waving fake palm leaves as a child in front of a very tired looking congregation. More days should be named after plants.

??? Monday and ??? Tuesday. 0/10. Do these even have names. Why not. Jesus never took a day off, neither should the calendars.

Spy Wednesday. 10/10. Hell yeah. Need I say more?

Maundy Thursday. 9/10. A complete monopoly on the word "maundy". Genuinely think that word only refers to this specific day of the year. A power play. However suspiciously similar to "Monday", and being more similar to a Monday (the second worst day of the week) is the last thing Thursday (already the worst day of the week) needs.

Good Friday. 1/10. Skull Friday was right there. Death Friday. Black Sky Friday. The only thing this achieves is getting primary school children to ask "why is it good if jesus was unalived". And then instead of being told to say merk like a mid-noughties grime artist, they get lectured about how we no longer have to kill lambs. Which noone was gonna fucking be doing anyway. Stupid day, stupid name.

Holy Saturday. 3/10. Every Saturday is holy when I'm there. Because I'm thinking about Jesus. Of course.

Easter Sunday. 4/10. Eh, they didn't really have a choice on this one, so I can't dock too many points. But still, surely there's a more creative option. Resurrection Sunday would be better I suppose, since that doesn't happen every Sunday. Although possibly more Sundays than just one, I can't remember if we know the day of the week that Lazarus was raised on.

Easter Monday. 1/10. A repeated word? Do better. We should steal Bright Monday from the Greeks. Although it has rained on every Easter Monday I remember which sucks bc it's a day off. So maybe we shouldn't jinx it any more than we already do.

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i hated that "all men think about is the Roman empire" meme bc like, literally all of the Latinists I know are women who talk about Roman senators like they're members of a boy band.

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i admire your combination of patience and firmness when fielding questions from the peanut gallery, but i do still also find it hilarious when randoms will pop into your askbox at 11am on a tuesday asking you shit like “is existence ontologically prior to essence?” as if you’re about to clear the whole mess up.

I was talking with a colleague the other day, who is an educator, and they were like "wow you've really refined your pedagogy" and I said "imagine trying to explain 14th century religious hermeneutics to a theater of 80,000 Philomena Cunks who hate you and are racist. Talking to actual experts feels like taking off the Rock Lee leg weights."

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recently ive been in a machine-unlearning situation. in the new chappell roan song i keep mishearing "the stalls of the bar" or something as "the stars and bars" like the combinatorial method for counting partitions. what do you make of this

I hadn't listened to the new song but that interpretation seems pretty self-evident

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didnt realize this was an ad at first so i just assumed that was somebody's advice. no1 art tip... hunt monsters...

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the happiest consequence of the release of sotr is that when the cast some young attractive 20-something to play haymitch and I say haymitch is the hottest character in thg I can point to the age appropriate conventionally attractive guy and still be thinking of zaddy harrelson

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mutuals i tell everybody you are my friends you just dont know it

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described this to the gf over shabbos who said i need to make it before someone else does. i present my masterpiece: I am salary man

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wondering about the audition process to cast emile the goat. did they get the goat with the biggest wettest eyes. did they get the goat who could bleat the sweetest and saddest. the goat who could stand the cutest. the goat who could look into the gun the most innocently. did the goats called back have to do a chemistry test with gwendoline christie. many such questions. anyway that little goat has such a promising career ahead. what a performance.

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I need to confess something—my last post presented a deceptively idyllic vision of my hike in the snow. I only posted photos from the tranquil walk home at dusk and neglected to mention that I (once again) got lost in a featureless expanse of snow and briefly became convinced I would never find the road again and would have to dig a little den like an Arctic fox to spend the night.

You see, there's this place where Pandolf really loves to go for a walk on snowy days—it's on top of this plateau here:

^ see the fence in the middle, that curves to the left? Nothing bad can happen as long as you follow it. There are lots of landmarks in this direction, like trees, more fences, and a couple of houses.

In the other direction, however, lies The Nothing.

Here's a photo of Pandolf (eagerly) standing near the edge of The Nothing:

Characteristics of The Nothing: it is vast, and white, and becomes more and more featureless the farther you go into it—

—and Pandolf really, really loves it.

Even when he falls into a surprise hole where the snow is suddenly three times as deep (another characteristic of The Nothing), he'll just push himself out in one great powerful jump and keep frolicking.

Or he'll remain in the spot where the snow is deeper and try his best to bury his entire self into it.

He sometimes gets crazy eyes in The Nothing.

We always start this walk with such good resolutions.

We're definitely staying close to the fence this time! With all the lovely landmarks on the left!

And then, inevitably,

Further notes from my studies: • The Nothing has some small plants and rocks, but using them as landmarks is foolish, as they will eventually disappear. • No matter how many foot-, paw-, and dog-headprints you leave and how deep they are, they will disappear before you are able to retrace your steps, probably because The Nothing is always so windy.

Pandolf thinks this is a great characteristic of The Nothing, as it means he never runs out of immaculate snow to dive into.

The wind and the resulting snow mist are the really treacherous things about this place. These photos were taken in roughly the same spot, a couple of hours apart. In the first one, the fence on the left is clearly visible; in the second one, it has started to melt into The Nothing.

There's always a moment when I end up standing in the middle of, well, nothing, with indistinguishable whiteness in every direction, under my feet, above my head, left, right, and I start thinking about writing poignant farewell messages in my Notes app for my family to find at some point in the future.

One last interesting thing about The Nothing is the way Pandolf reacts when I finally find my bearings again and start walking faster, determined to get back to the safety of the road before it gets dark.

Pandolf then just

It's very different than the playful, energetic way in which he normally buries his head in the snow. This second type of burying is clearly a form of protest—if I continue walking away Pan will reluctantly follow me for 20 or so metres, then flatten himself to the ground again, in the same despondent way.

Hypothesis #1: He is trying to play dead like a possum, hoping I will go "well, I can't lug a dead dog all the way home, I'd better leave him here." And then he'll stay with The Nothing forever.

Hypothesis #2: He is trying to lay as flat as possible so as to become all but invisible against the snow. It's unclear if he knows he is the wrong colour for this.

Hypothesis #3: He is trying to commune with The Nothing, burying words of devotion and friendship deep into the snow and promising to return soon.

Conclusion: I'm sorry, I know that's a very long post, but seeing as each of these photos depicts perfect felicity on Earth, I find it hard to delete any. I also like how I intended this post to be about my long disoriented trek through the snow, wondering if I was going to find the fence or the road again before dark—and then I got distracted by how happy Pandolf was. Which is exactly how I end up getting lost in The Nothing every single time!!

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He should be at the Adventurer's Guild.