The No Topic Thread

[Mo Mason]

I wish I could find a beard and moustache dye that looks natural.  I started going gray at 26 and now at 45 I have a full-on Santa Claus beard.  A few weeks ago at work I mentioned my age and a coworker said "Oh my god, you're 45?  I thought you were in your 60s."  

Any recommendations?  And no, I can't shave it off.  I've got a weak chin and an odd-shaped face ... I need my facial hair intact in an attempt to sculpt a non-existent jawline.  lol

[+ Vegas_Millennial]

13 minutes ago, Mo Mason said:

I wish I could find a beard and moustache dye that looks natural.  I started going gray at 26 and now at 45 I have a full-on Santa Claus beard.  A few weeks ago at work I mentioned my age and a coworker said "Oh my god, you're 45?  I thought you were in your 60s."  

Any recommendations?  And no, I can't shave it off.  I've got a weak chin and an odd-shaped face ... I need my facial hair intact in an attempt to sculpt a non-existent jawline.  lol

When people remark that I have a lot of gray in my beard for my age, I reply: "That's not gray hair, it's cum stains".

I hope that helps!

[Mo Mason]

"It's not gray hair, it's cum stains."  It doesn't help me too much.  Is that supposed to be helpful to the ones who point out the gray hair?  🤨

[mike carey]

I think this is an interesting perspective. Australia isn't on the opposite side of the world from the US but it's close. Apart from that direct comparison, the map illustrates that the centre of Australia's continental mass is closer to the equator than that of the US.

[+ azdr0710]

3 hours ago, mike carey said:

I think this is an interesting perspective. Australia isn't on the opposite side of the world from the US but it's close. Apart from that direct comparison, the map illustrates that the centre of Australia's continental mass is closer to the equator than that of the US.

good thing I didn't finish digging that hole to China as a kid.......I would've drowned in the southern Indian Ocean

love this map stuff

[mike carey]

1 hour ago, azdr0710 said:

good thing I didn't finish digging that hole to China as a kid.......I would've drowned in the southern Indian Ocean

love this map stuff

I hadn't noticed before, there's a small orange blob on the 49th parallel in southern Alberta or Saskatchewan and a dot to its north east. Those are Kerguelen Islands and Heard Island respectively, sub-antarctic islands, in the case of Heard Island known more recently as the home of penguins and not much else apart from glaciers and a 2,745m active volcano. And the subject of some recent notoriety. And please no comments about the weather sounding just like the prairie provinces or Montana.

[TonyDown]

I grew up in a house with three levels, including a walk out basement.

Since moving to the West Coast, it's been all 1-story homes, no basement.

I don't miss stairs at home.

 

 

 

Edited April 6 by TonyDown

[+ poolboy48220]

13 hours ago, TonyDown said:

I grew up in a house with three levels, including a walk out basement.

Since moving to the West Coast, it's been all 1-story homes, no basement.

I don't miss stairs at home.

 

 

 

I grew up with a house with no basement, just a crawlspace, unusual in my neighborhood. Furnace filters were changed in the crawlspace. 

[Luv2play]

17 hours ago, TonyDown said:

I grew up in a house with three levels, including a walk out basement.

Since moving to the West Coast, it's been all 1-story homes, no basement.

I don't miss stairs at home.

 

 

 

That took me on a trip down memory lane. Thanks.

[+ Charlie]

9 hours ago, poolboy48220 said:

I grew up with a house with no basement, just a crawlspace, unusual in my neighborhood. Furnace filters were changed in the crawlspace. 

My last house back East was a three story town house plus a full basement; in California my houses have been only one story and no basement. I don't miss the stairs, but I do miss the basements as convenient places for storing things.

[+ APPLE1]

8 hours ago, Charlie said:

I don't miss the stairs, but I do miss the basements as convenient places for storing things.

I feel like the older I get, the basement and attic and the associated stairs have become a bit of place to hide crap I don't think about, need, and should have just thrown out a long time ago. 

[BSR]

We use

2 hours ago, APPLE1 said:

I feel like the older I get, the basement and attic and the associated stairs have become a bit of place to hide crap I don't think about, need, and should have just thrown out a long time ago. 

How much stuff gets put into storage but never gets taken out?  Recalling the storage room of our basement growing up, I think some boxes sat in there untouched for decades until my parents sold the house.  That storage room should have been called the “stuff I don’t feel comfortable throwing out” room.

[wsc]

In 2024, I moved out of the apartment I'd lived in for 25 years. I had two storage spaces in the basement filled with boxes and an assortment of mementos - read that as junk, such as a plastic machine my mother used for breathing exercises after lung surgery in 1991 (WTF?). When I went through it all for the move, I was jarred to realize I hadn't set eyes on most of it for at least twenty years, and had to ask why do I still have this? Well, now I don't. And the irony is that in the next twenty years I'll see it as often as in the last twenty years.

I am trying to become a reformed pack rat.

[+ Charlie]

3 hours ago, wsc said:

In 2024, I moved out of the apartment I'd lived in for 25 years. I had two storage spaces in the basement filled with boxes and an assortment of mementos - read that as junk, such as a plastic machine my mother used for breathing exercises after lung surgery in 1991 (WTF?). When I went through it all for the move, I was jarred to realize I hadn't set eyes on most of it for at least twenty years, and had to ask why do I still have this? Well, now I don't. And the irony is that in the next twenty years I'll see it as often as in the last twenty years.

I am trying to become a reformed pack rat.

I have almost always had an attic or a basement in which I store the things I don't use but can't bring myself to throw away. Now that I have neither space, I find that my two-car garage is overflowing with the stuff, so I can barely squeeze in my one car. I keep telling myself that I need to go through it and throw things away, but every time I start, I find things that I forgot I had, and can't bring myself to just discard it: do I really need to keep my late spouse's old architectural projects for a house I haven't owned in years? what about snow shovels (in Palm Springs)?.

[mike carey]

4 minutes ago, Charlie said:

what about snow shovels (in Palm Springs)?

You can't be too careful.

[Nue2thegame]

On 4/7/2026 at 8:11 AM, wsc said:

In 2024, I moved out of the apartment I'd lived in for 25 years. I had two storage spaces in the basement filled with boxes and an assortment of mementos - read that as junk, such as a plastic machine my mother used for breathing exercises after lung surgery in 1991 (WTF?). When I went through it all for the move, I was jarred to realize I hadn't set eyes on most of it for at least twenty years, and had to ask why do I still have this? Well, now I don't. And the irony is that in the next twenty years I'll see it as often as in the last twenty years.

I am trying to become a reformed pack rat.

Haven’t moved recently but I’m suffering the same issues. My day of reckoning will come some day…. or it will be the family’s to deal with. The most compelling reason for me to abandon my pack rat ways is that I can no longer remember what I’ve already bought. Discovering recently acquired tools, clothes and other junk that I’d previously bought 5, 10, 20 years is exasperating. My mantra is “it’s not worth keeping if I can no longer remember that I have it”.

[wsc]

1 hour ago, Nue2thegame said:

Haven’t moved recently but I’m suffering the same issues. My day of reckoning will come some day…. or it will be the family’s to deal with. The most compelling reason for me to abandon my pack rat ways is that I can no longer remember what I’ve already bought. Discovering recently acquired tools, clothes and other junk that I’d previously bought 5, 10, 20 years is exasperating. My mantra is “it’s not worth keeping if I can no longer remember that I have it”.

Hilarious - and the more so because it's true!

My problem is sometimes not that I forget I have it but have forgotten where I put it. Talk about exasperating!

[+ Just Sayin]

I note that Margareta Magnusson died on March 12; she is the author of "The Gentle Art of Swedish Death Cleaning" written in 2017; it is one of the few books that I have read twice; she recommended that you sort out photographs last and that you get rid of all but one of your dildos!

[MikeBiDude]

Just now, Just Sayin said:

I note that Margareta Magnusson died on March 12; she is the author of "The Gentle Art of Swedish Death Cleaning" written in 2017; it is one of the few books that I have read twice; she recommended that you sort out photographs last and that you get rid of all but one of your dildos!

Reading it now! Sorry to hear of her passing.

[wsc]

28 minutes ago, Just Sayin said:

I note that Margareta Magnusson died on March 12; she is the author of "The Gentle Art of Swedish Death Cleaning" written in 2017; it is one of the few books that I have read twice; she recommended that you sort out photographs last and that you get rid of all but one of your dildos!

I can see getting rid of photos of loved ones, but parting company with the dildos -albeit save one- is a bridge too far!

[+ poolboy48220]

Keeping on this topic, I just read that one of my favorite science ficiton authors, John Varley, died late last year. No followup to the Gaea trilogy 😢