180 Comments

Cute things, as curated by DBDers on social media:

https://twitter.com/herdyshepherd1/status/1255825917026471936 "Spent the last hour judging the online sheep show

And I have to tell you that the young handlers under 8 class was the cutest thing I have ever seen"

https://www.instagram.com/p/B_wn312D5eq/?utm_source=ig_web_copy_link branch manager

https://twitter.com/hughweber/status/1256731692611571712?s=20 "Emerson, my 11 year old, is on a bit of a wild ride with the

@USPS

and our local mail carrier, Doug.

And, I think there’s a deeper message to it all.

First, the backstory..."

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Covering All the Bases: How Taiwan Opened Its Baseball Season Amid COVID-19

https://thediplomat.com/2020/04/covering-all-the-bases-how-taiwan-opened-its-baseball-season-amid-covid-19/

With its morale-boosting first pitch on April 12 and a combined 33 home runs through the first 11 games, Taiwan’s major baseball league smoothly concluded its opening week of the new season amid the COVID-19 outbreak. Even with zero fans in attendance due to regulations designed to combat the virus’ spread, the island’s Chinese Professional Baseball League (CPBL) has attracted unprecedented attention from baseball fans across the globe. The 31-year-old sports league is getting a boost to its visibility and reputation while filling a void left by canceled and postponed matches worldwide.

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Interesting!

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Campfire = Lair

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Saturday night, Saturday night, the week all starts on Saturday night!

p.s. Lair is cancelled for 2020. I wasn't going to be able to make it, but still sad to hear.

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not napalm in the morning

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What?, But it smells like Victory!

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Go Bears.

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Freshly baked bread...

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Shattuck Avenue

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very different than when I was at Cal. As is Telegraph.

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A project that you're currently doing but otherwise wouldn't have done if it wasn't for CV19

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Filing, I hate filing.

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Finished my 3rd 1000 piece puzzle.

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Wentworth puzzles from the U.K. = awesome. Pricey, but worth it.

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I went with a US company with a similar product, peacefulwoodenpuzzles.com. Got a custom puzzle made, very nice. That one was slightly under 1000 pieces, something like 879 maybe, but close enough. Weird shapes called for a different strategy.

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Also doing Duolingo lessons on most days

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We've done a 500, a 750, and a 1000 over the last few weeks. The 500 was annoying though because it was missing 2 piece.

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Yes. I'll leave it at that lest I be accused by Oui We of grandstanding.

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His woman is SIP with him.

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That's not the Sugar Sculls is it?

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Me too. This last puzzle was this one.

https://www.amazon.com/Educa-Kids-Pasta-Puzzle-1000-Piece/dp/B00SFH1OP0#ace-g8881249860

A lot of pieces fit together even in wrong places. A lot of the pasta is similar color and shapes. So you really have to rely on texture of the pasta/wood, shades/hues, and shape of pieces - rather than obviously unique features. Very satisfying. I'm still in the phase after you finish it, but your heart is not ready to break it up.

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For two of them at least one piece was missing. Not sure if they came that way, or maybe the dog ate them.

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This is my all time favorite puzzle of sodas of the world.

https://www.amazon.com/Soft-Cans-Panoramic-Puzzle-Piece/dp/B000J00XJY/ref=sr_1_23?dchild=1&keywords=puzzle+2000&qid=1588621431&sr=8-23

It took so long to finish that I gained familiarity with all the obscure sodas. I still get a little giddy inside when I see one of them in the wild.

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Brittany Spears accidentally burned down her home-gym. Have you caused anything to accidentally catch on fire (besides food)?

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I was making hand pulled noodles (like you get at Xi'an Famous Foods) last night and I lit the noodles on fire (because you pour a ladle of oil over them. But didn't panic - just waited three seconds and they self-extinguished.

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It's Britney, bitch.

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I sat in paint thinner once when I was probably 13 and trying to strip the paint of a BMX frame. Nothing actually caught on fire, but it felt like my butt cheeks were burning off for a good hour.

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I don't know why, but it's seared into my brain that her name is spelled "Britney" rather than the standard iteration "Brittany".

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"Brittany" is standard to you? I feel like I grew up with more "Britney"s.

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Brittany is standard to me

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I think of spaniels or France when I see "Brittany." More France than not.

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It's ok to admit you have a thing for her.

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I was more of Aguilera fan at the time, but my 12yo self would have happily held Britney's hand too

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I was also (and continue to be) more of an Aguilera fan.

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It would indeed by okay. Alas, my fixation is with orthography and not has-been teen pop sensations of dubious mental condition.

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Hiring managers of the DBD: What do you think of cover letters?

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My company's recruiting team screens all applicants before we're allowed to consider them.

If I receive something directly (e.g., by way of an introductory email) it needs to be succinct with zero grammar or spelling errors, and zero typos, especially my name which is often misspelled because they chose the wrong variation. Resumes: two pages MAX.

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In general, I think a cover letter is necessary - but it will only hurt you rather than help you. I am throwing it away if there is a typo or a grammar mistake on it -- or if it shows that you don't know what the company does or what the role is. It takes all of 20 seconds to see if a resume is in the right ballpark or not anyways, so a cover letter is not going to sway my opinion positively.

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If you're sending it straight to me, I need a cover letter and it needs to have no grammatical errors or typos. I don't really care that much what it says as long as it's not presumptuous. Rarely will you send it straight to me, though, so then it's a matter for the folks in recruiting.

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usually by the time I see a resume someone has already screened the candidate, so I have no opinion on the subject.

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The Last Dance

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I don't take much interest in basketball - nor did I at the time - but I might watch anyway just because of the extent to which people have been raving about the series.

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First 4 episodes were really good. I'll be watching yesterday's episode once I finish Last Week Tonight.

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I'm thoroughly enjoying the series, but good lord the ESPN app is awful. I've been casting it to my tv and it has been trying my patience. It doesn't let you skip ahead or go back and it frequently interrupts whatever you're watching to autoplay some other video (which makes it impossible to get back to where you were thanks to the inability to skip ahead). And it will also autoplay another video if you wake the phone from sleep while it's casting. It's incredible that in 2020 a company with as much money as ESPN can produce an app that is so awful at playing video.

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I tried using the app but didn't like it either. I just ended up <spoiler>downloading</spoiler> it.

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I know the Internet already has the first 8, if not all 10 episodes out already. But the version that I saw available had an ESPN watermark. Knowing how it all ends, I guess I have been patient to watch the legit broadcasts/streams of this show.

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The last one isn't done (the director was on Bill Simmons' podcast - he doesn't expect episode 10 to be finished until the day before it airs. They're editing it over 7 different people's home set-ups right now)

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this is great stuff. only 1.5 episodes in, but so many memories of watching amazing basketball in the 90's. i wasnt even rooting for the Bulls.

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For me it was the 80s. Bird and Magic going head to head.

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o/

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And I was a Bird fan and my best friend was a Magic fan.

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I was (still am) a Lakers fan due to my wife being one.

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similarly, I am a Dodgers fan and he is a Giants fan.

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Mercedes

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I learned to drive a stick in my Dad's 1967 MBz 230 sedan. Three on a tree. The ultimate test was driving in SF, going up Taylor to California and hoping to make it through the green.

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I drive an 07 CLK 550 convertible. Love it unreservedly. It's been an absolute champ and is so zoomy and fun to drive. Just ignore than sub-10MPG driving around town...

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I loved my 06 c230 until it started to fall apart. Super fun, zippy little compact sedan with a six speed manual. Then a rod blew through the block. . .

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I loved my '04 S500. Have an SUV now, though.

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I'm not liking the dual-screen dash that's showing up across all their models (https://www.mbusa.com/content/dam/mb-nafta/us/myco/my20/e/sedan/gallery/non-amg/gallery-class-page/2020-E-SEDAN-GAL-006-FI-DR.jpg). I greatly prefer having an analogue tachometer. At least it no longer has that "eh, we just taped an iPad to the dash" look.

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Is that not an analogue tach over on the left (or the right of the left, you know what I mean)?

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Pretty sure that's a digital tachometer that is meant to mimic the appearance of an analog one.

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I like the 80s ones.

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late 60s to mod 80s were a solid period. I wouldn't say no to a restomod from that era like this: https://www.mechatronik.de/en/verkauf/vehicles-on-offer/mb-m-coupe-55-en/

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One of my tenants has one of those, but not in that condition. Has German auto club badges.

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well at €470,000, that's not wholly surprising

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Youza!

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For that price, I'd better be irresistible behind the wheel

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The late 60's SLs are gorgeous

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Today in the 'rona

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When I look at the data, it looks like we're on a plateau. Which means we're not "past the peak". Other countries like Germany and New Zealand look very much past the peak.

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My sister was able to reschedule her surgery. But she has to have a virus test two days before. The surgery is to take place at the Mayo Clinic, about an hour from where she lives. When doing the scheduling the clinic was working with her to set up the test and the closest place to take the test was three hours away. So she's going up to Mayo to do the test before going back up for the surgery. So much for widespread tests available.

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"Alright, give me Ham on Five. . . Hold the Mayo"

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FL dude dresses up as the grim reaper and goes to the beach

https://twitter.com/DWUhlfelderLaw/status/1252794978037833729

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Someone needs to do this in Huntington Beach.

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Blood donation

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I did it every semester I was at Cal.

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I don't know if they ever backed off the Mad Cow restrictions but between that and the blood pressure meds coursing around my system, I've not been a donor.

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I donate but need to go more often. I’m a universal donor, and also a baby donor, so whenever I’m eligible I get emails and calls. I got an email today asking to schedule a donation.

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I'm also O- but stopped being CMV negative in the last 10 years. Made me sad.

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You donate...babies?

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Sperm more likely.

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I donate double reds every few months. I tried platelets when the double red machine was busted last time. 3+ hours of sitting there with two tubes in your arm instead of one? no thanks. I had to stop about 10 min early since my bladder was so close to exploding.

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I would be amenable to doing it, but even submitting a couple of vials for standard blood tests makes me feel faint for some reason.

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I think my problem is just a general aversion to needles. When I was at the embassy in Copenhagen I had to get a gamma globulin shot before going to Asia. The doc who gave me the shot came back in the afternoon, supposedly to give me a receipt for my reimbursement but he also asked how I was doing because he said he could see a reaction from me after the shot. I've just got a psychological thing about needles.

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I'm not a fan of needles (due to a debacle with novocain and my toes) but oddly I don't mind getting my blood drawn.

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I'm generally okay with needles. I mean, it's not fun, but I have no trouble with vaccinations. It's getting my blood drawn that does it.

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samsies

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I suppose that's possible, but I'm not particularly squeamish otherwise. I think it's the low blood pressure thing.

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Same. I feel kinda bad that I don't donate, though.

Do you happen to have really low blood pressure? I do, and I wonder if that has anything to do with it..

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OMG yes, I do! I bet it does. That actually makes sense.

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I wonder if I have the same issue, I get very light headed any time I get blood drawn

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I also get lightheaded during blood draws (and have fainted several times over the years). I always ask to have them take blood while I'm reclining so that I can avoid the worst of it.

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One option is to maybe do double red. They take it out, separate the red blood cells from the plasma, and then pump the plasma back in. Maybe since you don't lose much volume it wouldn't be as bad.

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Bad smell

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patchouli (sorry hippies)

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Burning tobacco (whether cig, cigar or pipe). Fish. Weed. Guerlain Shalimar.

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sour milk. Yesterday's raw chicken.

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Maybe it's because of my love for fermented food (cheese and stinky tofu), I'm kind of okay with that moldy smell in small proportion. However, once any smell exceeds a certain level, whether it's perfume or "foul" smell, that's what would bother me.

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Skunk spray

I'm not talking about the smell you get passing a roadkill skunk where you go "hmm is someone smoking a joint nearby?" I'm talking direct to the face or more likely direct to your dogs face skunk spray. It happened in Santa Cruz to our big dog and the night before self-isolation in LA to our little dog (and a little to me as I tried to pull her dumb, barking ass away from the rodent). It's a combination of burning tires, rotten musk and an unidentifiable sour funk that permeates everything it touches, is extremely difficult to wash and make you nauseous and choke at first whiff.

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too true; skunk is the worst! our American Shelter Dog got skunked in the backyard one night. We smelled it right away so shut all the windows and left her outside overnight until we could tolerate the stench enough to clean her up the next morning. Then we saw that she actually killed it (yikes!). That required a call to animal control to pick it up, then two week's quarantine for the mutt until the county confirmed that the skunk was not rabid.

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On a similar note, I saw an adult (possibly the backyard culprit) and four baby skunks cross our road the other day (at a safe distance) and boy were they cute.

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When I was in high school cross country, we'd run at a local park. There were always some trees whose odor I hated. Never pinned down exactly which trees they were.

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"We made trees and shrubs. We helped make all this... but did we get a thimble full of credit for it? No! All we got was the sack. Just for creating the Pink Bunkadoo... Beautiful trees that was. Og designed it. 600 feet high, bright red, and smelled terrible."

Randall - Time Bandits

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Tree of Heaven? As the weather warmed on a hot day in the backyard, those things smelled bad. I cut them all down with a chainsaw.

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https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ailanthus_altissima

There a lot of them on the Peninsula. Whomever planted them before my residency I want to punch in the mouth.

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Rose water. Not roses, but rose water or any concentrated generic rose smell. That smell reminds me of that old hag who used to baby-sit me when my mom was a working single mom. She was a chain smoker of Pall Mall cigarettes and would cover up the smell with a generous bath of rose water. She didn't want to baby sit me, rather would force me to either watch tv or have a forced nap, nose facing the couch cushions - whereupon I would imagine different creatures in the swirls, whorls, and patterns in the mid-century classic fabric. She was a bitch to me and my brother.

It also doesn't help that some baiju is rose-water flavored. Having a rose-water come out of every pore and breath in the middle of nowhere China is one of the worst hangovers of my life.

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I haven't had rose water baijiu, but the normal stuff is so fucking awful I can't imagine it being made any worse with rose water flavor.

I will say that some Indian/Middle-Eastern desserts use rose syrup, and I do like rose syrup with milk. Haven't had that in ages, though. Rooh-Afza, this is the stuff:

https://www.amazon.com/Hamdard-Sharbat-Syrup-fl-oz-Packaging/dp/B00D7D1FHY

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Good smell

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Warm asphalt when the rain first hits it - although this may be more of an association.

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The air after it rains.

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Petrichor is caused by emissions from microbes :) https://www.bbc.com/news/science-environment-44904298

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Honeysuckle. Sandalwood. Chocolate cake baking. Calvin Klein Eternity for Men. :-)

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Oh yeah, I like some perfumes too. Call me old fashioned but I really like Chanel No. 5.

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trees warming up or cooling off. I have a very clear memory of driving along Bear Creek Road from 17 to Boulder Creek as the sun was reaching the redwoods and other trees, and burbling along in a mustang GT with the windows down... and every summer, when I'm en route to see the missus in Vermont I usually drive the stretch from Manchester Center to Rockingham, across the Green Mountains effectively, with the windows down so I can catch the distinctive smells of the pine trees as they start to cool off as the angle of the sun changes. Lovely.

Also a big fan of the smell of cold salty air off the north sea. I'm sure any cold salt water would do, but it reminds me of coming out of my aunt and uncle's house in [village redacted] east of Edinburgh and standing on the dunes looking at the water.

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Freshly baked bread. Steak on the grill. Dark Chocolate.

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Weirdly, the first puff (and only the first puff) of tobacco at a distance of 10 feet; and of course so many great wines & whiskies.

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The lilacs in bloom in the yard. One of the best smells of spring.

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A wood-burning fireplace.

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eh, true to a point, and then oppressive past that point.

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Freshly mown grass.

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Smells I like: sandalwood, that dryer vent smell of fresh laundry, lavender essential oil, garlic and onions sauteing in a pan, pipe tobacco, diesel exhaust (though I don't try to smell it because it's carcinogenic of course), the roadway right after it rains

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That said, I don't have a very powerful sense of smell and am not particularly scent-driven.

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We have jasmine bushes growing just outside of our breakfast nook windows. We keep the windows open when they bloom during a short, glorious period during summer. Also, I love the smell of gardenias.

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Jasmine at my house is fragrant right now, perfume-like.

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Jasmine at my parents' house peaks in June.

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Our jasmine plant next to the front door finally died early this spring. It was such a pleasant smell every time you'd step outside. We've replaced it with a lavender plant.

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OUR CRUMBLING DEMOCRACY

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We are basically a failed state.

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If you can’t beat em... I’ve been thinking that Hilary would have handled CVD19 better, partly because Bill was a fan of Cobra Event, a bioterrorism novel that I also recommend. Why not go full on conspiracy theory! The Clintons use their Chinese connections to push out a pandemic to take down the Republicans.

So many holes in this, but nevertheless I bet it could get traction,

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Great...Trump's next tweet will be the Clintons getting the Chinese to create the virus...

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You heard it here first.

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Trump reads W4C!!

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Seems fair as we've been fairly supportive of small hands since Goff.

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pqtm

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Pompeo promotes unproven conspiracy theory, citing that there's "enormous evidence" that the virus came from a Chinese lab - citing "experts". In other news, a hungover man claimed someone else puked on the front of his shirt.

https://abcnews.go.com/Politics/pompeo-enormous-evidence-unproven-theory-coronavirus-lab/story?id=70472857

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jesus fucking christ, its like some of these fucking idiots are hell bent on being as stupid as possible

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It's just misdirection.

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I know that but its so frustrating the long term damage these fucktards are willing to create to cover their total and complete incompetence. Its exhausting that people fall for this shit and I dearly wish for the ability to forcibly sterilize that entire voting base. Because, based on the last couple of years, that action is totally justified.

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Keep in mind, that is the exact same point of view those on the other side have. This is the what happens when extremism is met with counter-extremism, where any form of cooperation or collaboration is the LAST thing the extremists on either edge will accept.

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i think there is a difference between having conservative or liberal values and what is going on here under Trump. I have no problem with people who think about issues differently than i do on things like abortion, immigration, gun rights, taxes, same sex rights, etc. They're wrong but ok whatevs. My issue is the shameless corruption, hypocrisy and lying that seems to have become the norm and is accepted. The Republican establishment has bought into the theory of "we have to lie, cheat and steal in order to remain relevant" and its shocking to me that dont see through it. Be conservative all you want but dont accept what is happening today because Trump really doesnt give a shit about you

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We're already in a position where any form of cooperation or collaboration with Republicans is essentially off the table. Were you alive between 2008-2016?

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PRO

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Okay, obviously the guy had a great and long career, but . . . it's a good thing he had that undefeated Dolphins team back in the 70s (that also went back-to-back the next year), because otherwise there are a lot of big playoff disappointments on his resume.

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Classic game: Dolphins vs. Chargers. 1982 AFC Divisional Playoffs

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With the Hook and Ladder (or lateral)!

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Right. Muncie rushed for 120 yards, a great performance from Kellen Winslow and Charlie Joiner, and contributions from Joe Rose (formerly a Cal tight end) and Ed White.

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CAL

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John Kasser also passed away over the weekend

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Go Bears!

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