Stranger things

[Nungali]

Australian desert dragon ;

 

Thorny Devils (    '   Moloch horridus  '   )    are really small  but a wonderful lizard .   You can put your hand under them , under the sand and scoop them up . They dont seem to mind  and dont move while you do it, or maybe just a bit . On your hand they just sit there, maybe cock their head to look at you .

 

It is illegeal to 'interfere' or touch them .... but I was with an indigenous elder and he instructed me to to do it as it was a desert sand 'roadway ' , so we moved them to safety . 

 

Curious little fellahs 

 

 

 

 

Edited December 8, 2025 by Nungali

[Mark Foote]

On 11/15/2025 at 4:08 PM, Taomeow said:

 

Not a snob.  I know exactly where you're coming from.  I think I think (sic) mostly in 2, but for most of the rest of the languages I've been exposed to, my mind created a common file titled "Foreign languages," dumped everything there indiscriminately, and when stuff from that file interferes with the 2 legit ones, it's not pretty.  Not with spelling (although shit happens of course) but with spoken words, especially proper names.  The thing is, if an English word is a borrowing from one of those other languages for which I know their proprietary pronunciation rules but not necessarily the English rendition thereof, I tend to stress and enunciate it the way it is stressed and enunciated in the language it came from.  Sometimes I really don't know that it's pronounced differently in English from its source language, and sometimes I just can't make myself mutilate it like that.  It physically hurts me to have to say Mo-di-GLI-ani or REmy MARtin or DesDEmona, let alone NAbokov.  And native speakers never tire of correcting me... 
 

I don't know why that made me laugh... 

 

"T'aint funny, McGee!"
 

 

 

Edited December 10, 2025 by Mark Foote

[zerostao]

December 19

[Nungali]

'Europe's Atlantis '  :

 

Doggerland , , a vast fertile country with hills, rivers , settlements  that existed during the ice age which gradually sank beneath the waves and was finished off by tsunami (  the Storegga event ) .

 

 

*  side note , see the blue 'lake' near  2 ; that and the water behind it , as the sea level rose , the valley between British Isles and Europe had all this water rushing down it and carving out the English Channel ....... a sight to behold ! 

 

 

 

 

https://medium.com/@tudorfinneran/doggerland-europes-atlantis-02d6a70e2507

Edited December 20, 2025 by Nungali

[Sanity Check]

 

[zerostao]

 

[Nungali]

    Not surprising  ( the woman part )  , that find is dated  a couple thousand years before Indo Europeans  swarmed through Europe .   

 

What it might have been like before this happened  :

 

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Old_Europe_(archaeology)

 

Which extended into Spain   ( see  sites ; Atapuerca  , Orce  and ' Bell Beaker ' culture ) 

 

 

 

 

.

Edited December 29, 2025 by Nungali

[Haribol]

 

[Nungali]

Happy New Year  !  ..... inside a dinosaur    ??? 

 

 

 

 

'' As New Year's Eve invitations go, the one received by 20 men in December 1853 was unusual.

Apart from the fact that presumably none of the attendees wanted to spend the turning of the year with any of their womenfolk, the location was specified as "in the mould of the Iguanodon at the Crystal Palace. "

 

https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/cx2pgwj19plo

 

.

Edited December 31, 2025 by Nungali

[steve]

Loved the series, including the finale!

Not sure what everyone else is talking about….

 

 

🙃

[Taomeow]

 

This is a koala's paw.  As you can see, it has not one but two opposable thumbs.  

 

Perhaps our problem, as a species, is not that we built our lifestyle around the fact of having the opposable thumb that allowed us to mess with things.  Perhaps the problem is we don't have two of them.  If we did, it would make climbing trees so easy and enjoyable that maybe we wouldn't ever get down and start messing with things on the ground.  

 

Edited Monday at 03:45 PM by Taomeow

[Sanity Check]

2 hours ago, Taomeow said:

 

This is a koala's paw.  As you can see, it has not one but two opposable thumbs.  

 

Perhaps our problem, as a species, is not that we built our lifestyle around the fact of having the opposable thumb that allowed us to mess with things.  Perhaps the problem is we don't have two of them.  If we did, it would make climbing trees so easy and enjoyable that maybe we wouldn't ever get down and start messing with things on the ground.  

 

 

 

 

 

This man has an inspirational story and says he may be evolving back into a monkey.

 

 

 

 

This man also has inspirational stories & may be trying to evolve to become more like a fish.

 

And so maybe there is hope for people to become more like koala bears if needed.

[Nungali]

 

[Nungali]

2 hours ago, Sanity Check said:

 

And so maybe there is hope for people to become more like koala bears if needed.

 

 

 

 

'' In your dreams .... ''

[Taomeow]

On 1/2/2026 at 8:21 PM, steve said:

Loved the series, including the finale!

Not sure what everyone else is talking about….

 

 

🙃

 

About stuff that strikes one as stranger than average.  Anything.  

 

I don't remember which season I stopped at but I loved the series at first and then it started jumping the shark with evil Russians, so I abandoned it.  Not saying there are no evil Russians, but the Hollywood version is invariably stranger than a normal evil Russian.  

[Taomeow]

3 hours ago, Sanity Check said:

This man has an inspirational story and says he may be evolving back into a monkey.

 

 

Have you ever watched "Altered states?"  It's a 1980 sci-fi/horror movie, which starts out as a great and unusual sci-fi and then devolves into a trite and unimaginative horror one.  But up to that unfortunate commercial plot twist, it's cool and even somewhat plausible.  

[steve]

45 minutes ago, Taomeow said:

 

About stuff that strikes one as stranger than average.  Anything.  

 

I don't remember which season I stopped at but I loved the series at first and then it started jumping the shark with evil Russians, so I abandoned it.  Not saying there are no evil Russians, but the Hollywood version is invariably stranger than a normal evil Russian.  

 

I loved the first season and the rest not as much but the overall effect worked for me, largely because of the nostalgia. The mall was silly, the evil Russians too caricatured. That said the Americans were far more evil. I mainly liked the fact that we enjoyed it as a family and my kids lived the series.

 

I also recently watched Life of Chuck and really enjoyed it.

 

Just teasing about the “other stuff.” Some of it is fun!

[Sanity Check]

50 minutes ago, Taomeow said:

 

Have you ever watched "Altered states?"  It's a 1980 sci-fi/horror movie, which starts out as a great and unusual sci-fi and then devolves into a trite and unimaginative horror one.  But up to that unfortunate commercial plot twist, it's cool and even somewhat plausible.  

 

 

*Reads the summary*

 

Shades of Flatliners with Kiefer Sutherland or Michael Crichton's book Travels?

[Taomeow]

10 minutes ago, Sanity Check said:

 

 

*Reads the summary*

 

Shades of Flatliners with Kiefer Sutherland or Michael Crichton's book Travels?

 

It wouldn't occur to me, but I don't remember either all that well.  Flatliners was about a memory of a trauma Kiefer Sutherland inflicted on someone else as I recall? -- the movie creator's dream of a remorseful perpetrator?  Alas, memories of trauma buried deep in the unconscious are usually uniquely personal and concern the trauma inflicted on us...  if we survive it that is.  Perpetrators, even those who are capable of remorse, seldom get traumatized on the unconscious level, hurting someone else doesn't rewire one's neurophysiology -- in most cases they either feel nothing in particular (no mirroring neurons operational, so they can't relate to the feelings of those they hurt) or actually enjoy it (10% of the population, aka the sociopaths).  But like I said, my memory of the movie is rather dim.  And from Travels I only remember that Crichton hated medicine and his father, both for a good reason.           

[Sanity Check]

38 minutes ago, Taomeow said:

 

It wouldn't occur to me, but I don't remember either all that well.  Flatliners was about a memory of a trauma Kiefer Sutherland inflicted on someone else as I recall? -- the movie creator's dream of a remorseful perpetrator?  Alas, memories of trauma buried deep in the unconscious are usually uniquely personal and concern the trauma inflicted on us...  if we survive it that is.  Perpetrators, even those who are capable of remorse, seldom get traumatized on the unconscious level, hurting someone else doesn't rewire one's neurophysiology -- in most cases they either feel nothing in particular (no mirroring neurons operational, so they can't relate to the feelings of those they hurt) or actually enjoy it (10% of the population, aka the sociopaths).  But like I said, my memory of the movie is rather dim.  And from Travels I only remember that Crichton hated medicine and his father, both for a good reason.           

 

 

The only thing I remember about Flatliners from the 1980s/1990s is its about medical students who flatline their hearts then resuscitate themselves in an attempt to give themselves near death experiences (NDE). 

 

The summary for altered states says "genetic memory" plays a role in the film. In the book Travels, Michael Crichton participates in hypnosis or meditation to make contact with his ancestors or former lives. He says he connected with a gladiator who lived in a past era. 

 

There could be a case for trauma being written to ones DNA. The same with famine and other conditional circumstances. To some extent our life choices also have an impact on DNA. But also remember that there were lengthy and comprehensive studies done on newborns addicted to crack. With the conclusion being that living in a negative environment being surrounded by negative people is more debilitating to human development than being born addicted to crack. In terms of nature versus nurture, it is possible that study proves nurture or choices matter more than DNA. 

Edited Monday at 11:27 PM by Sanity Check

[Cobie]

 

15 hours ago, Sanity Check said:

… living in a negative environment being surrounded by negative people …

 

Yes, Laozi thought so too.

 

On 12/07/2025 at 4:30 PM, Cobie said:

…

People that have no morals,

they were birthed only.

People that do have morals,

they were nurtured.  …