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Post by Rob Allen on May 6, 2023 12:40:14 GMT -5
They're making the same offer again! Send an email today for a free issue! Sorry it's so late in the day, but if you see this before Saturday is over, this offer is very worthwhile: To get an idea what the magazine is about, visit www.hoganmag.com/.
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Post by Icctrombone on May 7, 2023 6:23:22 GMT -5
I always miss FCBD because of work on Saturday, but this year I didn't really care. I have WAY too many comics that I haven't read yet. Seriously, I feel like a hoarder.
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Post by tartanphantom on May 7, 2023 21:13:00 GMT -5
I haven't seen a FCBD in years. One of my bands just finished the first weekend of the Tennessee Renaissance Festival earlier this evening, which is held every weekend in May. This is our 9th consecutive year to do this event, which has been going on for 37 years. Three more weekends to go.
It's great money but it's a downright slog by the end. First weekend is always the hardest, as the Festival is spread over several wooded, hilly acres and involves a lot of walking on packed gravel paths up and down several inclines throughout. Fortunately, the bulk of our performances are in one location, with minor walking and hauling of gear for a couple of others. However, the temps were in the low 80's, and the humidity was in the low 80's as well. Occasionally a breeze would waft away the humidity, but it wouldn't last.
Essentially I am there ALL day Saturday and Sunday, from about 830am to 7:00pm. Perform, wait... Perform, wait... etc ad nauseum. Like I said, good money, but the routine gets old, and I ain't getting any younger.
Then it's back to my regular day job bright and early Monday.
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Post by Deleted on May 8, 2023 7:26:36 GMT -5
No politics here, not a mention of a party or politician, but I do have a thought.
Years ago, the UK implemented an indoor smoking ban. Gone were smoking rooms in businesses and pubs. I don’t smoke, by the way.
But like so much seemingly good legislation, there have been unintended consequences. When I’m in town, shop after shop after shop is just employees smoking near the entrance/exit. You have to navigate through lots of smoke. At least prior to this legislation, employees were not smoking on the streets.
Puts me off going shopping at times. The city centre is the worst, at least every second shop - during busy times - has people smoking outside.
There were also other unintended consequences. I didn’t really like sitting among smoke in a pub, but I could tolerate it and have a chat with friends. Nowadays, if there are several smokers among you, I’m left at the table while they are off smoking 2-3 times an hour. As I rarely drink alcohol, a pub night out is nice for me, but it feels like you spend most of your time alone at the table while smoker friends are off having yet another cigarette.
Still, we have come a long way. Hard to believe there was once a UK where cafes, buses and cinemas allowed smoking (the top deck of a bus would allow smoking).
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Post by Cei-U! on May 8, 2023 7:42:46 GMT -5
Here in Tacoma, smoking in public--indoors or outdoors, tobacco or marijuana--is illegal. You can smoke in private residences and vehicles but nowhere else, so we don't have the "employees smoking around the entrances/exits" problem.
Cei-U! I summon my happy lungs!
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Post by impulse on May 8, 2023 10:23:17 GMT -5
It's nice not having to wash every article of clothing as well as shower, including hair washing, after a night out anymore. I remember smoking sections in restaurants I think as recently as the early 2000s. I don't miss the prevalence of indoor smoking.
In other news, I mentioned a while back I was considering liquidating the remnants of my TPB collection, which was the remnant of my comic book collection, in favor of going digital. I made the plunge and got the 9th gen (2021) 10.2" iPad, and I have to say, reading on that thing is pretty darn convenient. I like the Chunky app, but I also use Goodreader for some pesky X-MEN comics I bought on a CD ages ago. It's only reader I've found that removes the obnoxious MARVEL watermark right over the middle of literally every single page. I don't know what they were thinking.
Being able to easily read zoomed in and tap the side to have the app move you to the next panel pretty intelligently is very nice, especially as my eyes aren't getting any younger. Also an iPad is a lot easier to store and handle than longboxes and TPBs.
So far, so good!
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Post by Roquefort Raider on May 8, 2023 11:42:18 GMT -5
No politics here, not a mention of a party or politician, but I do have a thought. Years ago, the UK implemented an indoor smoking ban. Gone were smoking rooms in businesses and pubs. I don’t smoke, by the way. But like so much seemingly good legislation, there have been unintended consequences. When I’m in town, shop after shop after shop is just employees smoking near the entrance/exit. You have to navigate through lots of smoke. At least prior to this legislation, employees were not smoking on the streets. Puts me off going shopping at times. The city centre is the worst, at least every second shop - during busy times - has people smoking outside. Here it's hospitals. Lots of patients go outside to smoke, and the entrance of the building is lost in smog at times.
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Post by Slam_Bradley on May 8, 2023 12:07:50 GMT -5
No politics here, not a mention of a party or politician, but I do have a thought. Years ago, the UK implemented an indoor smoking ban. Gone were smoking rooms in businesses and pubs. I don’t smoke, by the way. But like so much seemingly good legislation, there have been unintended consequences. When I’m in town, shop after shop after shop is just employees smoking near the entrance/exit. You have to navigate through lots of smoke. At least prior to this legislation, employees were not smoking on the streets. Puts me off going shopping at times. The city centre is the worst, at least every second shop - during busy times - has people smoking outside. Here it's hospitals. Lots of patients go outside to smoke, and the entrance of the building is lost in smog at times. The hospitals here forbid smoking near the entrance.
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Post by Calidore on May 8, 2023 12:17:12 GMT -5
Chicago also banned indoor smoking years ago, and also mandated that those who go outside to smoke must be 15 feet away from the entrance.
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Post by Deleted on May 8, 2023 12:57:07 GMT -5
I was concerned my post might make me sound like a pious person or something. I mean, smoke if you wish to. I just wish that it could take place in buildings (I suspect fire safety legislation would be another reason not to). An office I worked in when I left school had a smoking room. Naturally, I never went in there. It did mean, though, that during lunch, you could chat with a colleague outside the building without having to navigate something akin to smog.
Also, there used to be a cafe I went to (inside a market). This was years ago. Then the indoor smoking ban came in. After that, I noticed that the proprietors (husband and wife) were smokers. I’d walk past the cafe and they’d both be smoking away. Gotta be honest, that put me off going in because the thought of them handling bread and other stuff put me off. I know that sounds absurd. But it did put me off.
Funniest example, though, was when a postman put some letters through my door, about 3 in total. They reeked of tobacco. A lot. I guess he might have been a chain smoker.
I live in an apartment. I do not have a garden. But all visitors (no exceptions) to my home are required to smoke outside, near the communal doors/bin shed. I don’t want that in my home.
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Post by impulse on May 8, 2023 15:13:48 GMT -5
My first job was at a grocery store, and one of the duties involved cleaning the breakrooms. There two, one of which was the smoking one. I recall the layer of yellow grime caked onto the walls in the smoking break room that wouldn't come off no matter how much spray or scrubbing you used.
I am not a smoker, and I'm not going to tell adults what to do, but that was a pretty powerful image.
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Post by codystarbuck on May 8, 2023 22:53:52 GMT -5
Chicago also banned indoor smoking years ago, and also mandated that those who go outside to smoke must be 15 feet away from the entrance. That's the Illinois law, enacted in 2008. Same thing downstate, which is a pleasure. We used to get the Sunday Chicago Tribune driven down to us, in Springfield, at Barnes & Noble (the city edition, not the statewide), on Saturday's and the driver who delivered them, must have chain-smoked the entire trip down. They would reek of tobacco!
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Post by codystarbuck on May 8, 2023 23:02:38 GMT -5
The really scary thing is the airship Hindenburg actually had a smoking lounge..... It was kept pressurized, so that leaking hydrogen could not enter and it had a double-door airlock. There was one electric lighter and a steward monitored the room to ensure no open flame was used and no smoking items left the room lit. The pressurization probably wasn't necessary, as any hydrogen leaks would move upward and the lounge was on bottom end of the airship, on the same level as the observation windows. However, the danger of fire was the real problem. You can see it in Robert Wise's film, Hindenburg, based on the conspiracy theories of sabotage causing the explosion and fire (debunked then and later). There is a crooked game of poker that goes on there and you see Ann Bancroft lighting an opium pipe with the lighter and she and others smoking. You can also hear the airlock opening and closing, at parts.
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Post by Deleted on May 9, 2023 3:27:06 GMT -5
We need to ban smoking in the home, in vehicles, outdoors, etc. Have a Smokatorium like in Judge Dredd, I say:
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Post by Cei-U! on May 9, 2023 10:22:12 GMT -5
If you ban smoking completely, all you do is incentivize criminals to supply tobacco products. Americans learned the hard way how well Prohibition works.
Cei-U! Put that in your pipe and... oops, I summon the poor choice of metaphor!
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