Random thoughts... - by Tocky
DuatDweller on 5/7/2025 at 10:40
Happy 4th of July America, and I was playing some old game and one of my side kicks said to me "watch your ass!", and I though why and am I fat or something?
Azaran on 5/7/2025 at 14:40
Quote Posted by DuatDweller
Happy 4th of July America, and I was playing some old game and one of my side kicks said to me "watch your ass!", and I though why and am I fat or something?
RIP to all the fingers lost yesterday
Azaran on 29/7/2025 at 15:02
Property developers have too much power, and get away with every crime under the sun because politicians protect them (and have investments with their companies). There's been a lot of mysterious fires in old heritage properties, and almost invariably afterward, developers acquire the site and build modern condos on it. And most of the time those fires never get properly investigated, probably on purpose.
In my city, one guy bought an old heritage building that had tenants and he couldn't evict them. He also wanted to do renovations that violated heritage laws. At first he harassed them. Then not long after, some guys set fire to the building and seven people died. Yet (
https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/montreal/old-montreal-fire-suspects-arrested-1.7350289) another building in the area owned by him was also torched afterward, and a mother and daughter living there died as a result.
They eventually caught a couple guys who were responsible, but the owner is still out and about. He probably called up some mafia\gang to have it done, and they sent those guys there, so he's not directly linked to it.
Although part of me thinks the cops know it was him and got it out of the suspects, but were told from above not to go after him.
Our mayor is a total simp for developers, and has been letting them have free rein for the last decade or more, so wouldn't surprise me if she ordered law enforcement to look the other way on a lot of these things.
Nicker on 29/7/2025 at 16:13
That's dreadful.
Something similar but non-murderous happened here, except the fire department saved the facade and the developers were forced to incorporate it into the new building.
Azaran on 29/7/2025 at 16:45
The best one was the UK developers who were f(
https://www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/2021/mar/21/rising-from-the-rubble-london-pub-rebuilt-brick-by-brick-after-bulldozing) orced to rebuild an old pub they had bulldozed. Brick by brick.
Quote:
But the Carlton’s story did not follow the usual plot, where the developer presents the fait accompli to the local authority and
pays a fine before pressing ahead with the redevelopment and counting their profits.
Instead, after a dogged six-year campaign by locals, the Carlton Tavern will reopen next month – lockdown permitting – after the developers were ordered to rebuild the pub “brick by brick”, a ruling that pub campaigners say has set an extraordinary precedent.
And that's the usual problem here too. If developers violate laws, they usually just pay a fine (which is the equivalent of a couple bucks for you or me). It's basically paying for a license to break the law.
Our mayor made a big hooplah about making developers build a percentage of affordable housing. But the consequence to not do so is just a small fine. So developers are just paying out the
fees fines, and building expensive "luxury" condos
Necrohowl on 16/8/2025 at 22:56
I remember this place had a thread for how voting for Starmer was a good idea, now it seems it's quite obviously not so, but instead of being "I told you so", I just know for a fact on how nihilistic Britain's "democracy" really is, because both parties are just disgusting money-sniffers finding everyway to make their life richer while the poor get it worse.
Fuck this pathetic fake "Democracy", I'm glad I got out of Britain back in the 90's.
DuatDweller on 17/8/2025 at 08:50
I take comfort in knowing that my cat STEALS my bed place some nights.
:nono:
R Soul on 17/8/2025 at 22:11
When websites ask you to prove you're a human, imagine if they asked for webcam access and then made you go through the Voight-Kampff test.
Tocky on 21/8/2025 at 02:04
Over a decade ago I received a cutting from an aunts muscadine vine I had admired and promptly planted it on returning home. I cut a spade slice in the earth ten feet from my grapes, stuck it into the earth, watered it, then forgot about it. There was already an arbor frame where a failed grape had been so I didn't think much of it. It grew like wildfire. It covered it's arbor then into a plum tree the other side. Unfortunately it also reached backward and took over the grape arbor where the last of my dads vines were and wiped them out before I really paid attention.
It ran riot. It ran into the tree next to my shed and covered all the lower branches. Muscadines are everywhere. I bring in a bucket every day now. I should cut it back but I'm curious how big it will get. Nothing stops it. Nothing is as strong as it is. It dominates. The muscadines are deep purple and taste epic but sadly there is no trace of those wonderful tasting grapes. I've never run across any that taste quite the same. And since I left the old vine at my parents to my brothers care he let those be taken over by a wild variety that produce no actual grapes and it has perished as well. No unique flavor of childhood. No ineffable sweetness. A variety gone from the earth and a last memory of a thing my father tended now nevermore.
And then I was taking a leak behind a thicket of thorn vines near the woods out back and noticed grapes hanging from a privet tree bent over from the weight of it's vine. Could it be? The deep pink was the same. I tasted one. Ambrosia. It was. They had grown of their own accord from a bramble of shiny leaved thorn vines I had let go because they were picturesque. I must have stood there sometime in the past and spit seeds into the woods. Against all odds they had sprouted and fought all the grasses and tree roots and shade of vines and oaks and won through to produce fruit. Do you know how hard it is to beat a privet at growing? I spent all day clearing and separating it from all the other vines and cutting the tangle of privet limbs and built it an arbor. While doing so I discovered other grape vines. I will take care of them as well. They could not have picked a more difficult place to grow but this time I will not fail.
