grams88 Blog

[grams88]

Hi everyone

I thought I would do a blog as I notice others are doing a similar thing.

Going back to when I done a bungee jump I remember thinking to myself what are you crazy. I remember around christmas time my brother got us a Guinness world records book which I found quite magical in a way. It was interesting all the different world records people had, I was thinking to myself that it would be cool having a record myself but anyway that's probably around the time that I started to think about doing a bungee jump.

It was a great day out, I remember looking forward to giving it a go. I prepared myself by looking at youtube videos of others doing a bungee jump and I was trying imagine in that same scenario. When you are about to jump they tell you that you should not look down and you should try not to think about it too much as that is when the worry starts to set in.

It was an achievement I'm quite proud of and the amount of confidence you get when you have achieved it.

Funny thing that happened the months coming up to the bungee jump was a story came up in the news about a lady who done a bungee jump at the Victoria falls ended up getting injured when her cord snapped, she ended up in the water fighting for her life. This is certainly one thing you have to keep in mind is that there are risks associated with the extreme sport. Before I booked myself up for the bungee jump I sent the team an e-mail asking what there safety record was as I was worried if something was to go wrong. They sent an e-mail back to myself saying that they had an 100% safety record. Maybe when you think about it there are more chances that you could get killed driving to the bungee site rather than the bungee itself but anyway I have not looked too much into that aspect of it.

grams88

[Simon]

Nice! I've never tried bungee jumping. Righteous to try something new from time to time, something outside the comfort zone.

Bungee jumping is probably very safe.

We fall prey to availability bias: It's easy to picture bungee cords snapping or planes crashing, especially when plane crashes make the news. But the easy availability of such mental imagery doesn't make disasters more likely.

-- Simon

[grams88]

Thanks for the reply, I think you are right Simon that Bungee jumping is probably very safe. I felt a lot more comfortable when the e-mail came back saying that they have a 100% safety record, I hope I have not tempted fate by saying that but there we go. The feeling after doing the bungee jump is quite good, you feel that you have achieved something.

[Nessy]

That's quite a story grams88! I also think it's important to try something new once in a while to step out of your comfort zone. I think it's too easy to think about everything that could go wrong when you try something out of your comfort zone and it stops the person from trying and sometimes they try it, have a bad experience, and it affects their ability to try something new again in the future. Despite that I think it's always good to prepare for the worst so you can focus on the best which you did by emailing the people about their safety record.

[grams88]

Thanks Nessy, that sure was right out my comfort zone. Still can't believe I done it.

This might actually be related to the last topic I was talking about in relation to doing things you would love to do but you keep putting it off. The bungee jump one did seem to me like something out the blue. I think it is a really good thing to have goals even if those goals sound ridiculous.

The goals or things you want to do in life that you would really enjoy. Maybe myself I'm actually wanting to get back into basketball as that was something I done quite well at, might not be so good now at the age of 30 but you never know. I think getting involved in a sport can only benefit us. We kind of don't want to leave it too late but then again what is too late.

What goals can I put down, I would probably try and not make the list too big as I feel it would more of a doing just for the sake of doing it, not really enjoying it at all. Visiting the places or place where they created lemmings might actually be a goal for a lot of us here,  I had to get that one in there.

I would love to hear what goals you have in mind. Some examples might be learning to ride a bike or getting on a gameshow. Others might be thinking of something such as completing a video game that means a lot to you or programming a video game. Visiting places will probably be a popular one, I would love to visit my old college building, urban exploratioin can be quite fun if that is something you fancy. Writing a book tends to be a very popular one as well.

grams88

[mobius]

awesome accomplishment gramps That takes courage I don't have atm lol. Those kind of things are great for building your courage and self esteem too.

Travel is a big goal I have. I want to see a lot of different places in the world, like Europe, maybe some Castles, The pyramids in Egypt, maybe the great wall of China, Tibet, mount Everest, (just see it, not climb it ) Hawaii...

We fall prey to availability bias: It's easy to picture bungee cords snapping or planes crashing, especially when plane crashes make the news. But the easy availability of such mental imagery doesn't make disasters more likely.

This is a very good point that many people fail to realize. The opposite is unfortunately also true: A catastrophe (such as death) that is difficult or unpleasant to imagine doesn't it make it any less likely. People in my society tend to prioritize the least important things and neglect important ones, at the cost of their happiness. Sorry for getting on a soap box suddenly.

[grams88]

Thanks for you kind words Mobius, I noticed you changed your avatar picture, I like it.  I still have the old Colour Clash avatar the atari st game (Colour Clash)

The pyramids of Egypt would be amazing to see, it's been there for so long and probably has stood the test of time.

My gran has a rat problem me thinks, she has noticed a small hole on the wall where there might be some rats living, I hope not. There's a device my dad was looking at on the internet, I think it plays this sound that rats, mice totally hate but it is okay around dogs, cats and other animals. I'm not too keen on the traps that kill the mouse or rat, I know there can be pests that we are probably best to kill, I'm thinking more like the wasps as they can hurt us big time.

Anyway I love this birthday paradox

Say we were to pick 23 people at random, there is more of a 50% chance that two of them will share the same birthday as you. It's a really interesting because they tend to say that it makes the brain hurt this paradox, I think it is the way it is worked out so to say.

https://betterexplained.com/articles/understanding-the-birthday-paradox/

It makes you think next time you are in a room with 23 people or around that number. Lets say you pick 80 people at random there is a (99.98%) chance of at least two of them having the same birthday.

I feel that it does hurt the brain the maths.

grams88

[grams88]

Hi everyone

Sorry I should be getting back into the lemmings pack I created but at the moment I'm taking things a bit more easier due to my mental health. I have ocd and part of that that makes it ocd is that I can't handle the thoughts well that we humans all get. I've been doing not too bad compared to where I was a five or six years ago, I wasn't too well. No one should ever feel frightened about themselves.

Anyway lets focus on something else. I was looking into something about Joint enterprise crime and what this really is is that you can be charge by not doing the crime itself but more of a you knew or helped in someway that eventually led to the crime itself. Usually in court you can never really be charged with association itself but anything that you did that led to the crime could get you in trouble. There's a case going on in the news at the moment, I won't go into massive detail but one of the accused didn't commit the murder herself but did encourage the victim to go to this meeting which led to the murder of the victim. The withholding of information is always a big one, if you are keeping secrets about a really important aspect of a crime that could get you in trouble.

Dreams like forum member Mobius I have a big interest in dreams as well. I feel that dreams can tell us a lot about our character, I know a lot people might think that dreams are random, maybe so but I feel that you can get some answers so to say. The person that knows you the best is got to be yourself and when analysing dreams you might be able to discover things.

Right okay just right off the top of my head, I tend to get the dream where I'm playing basketball and each time I go to score a basket I can't throw the ball for some reason. Maybe this is telling me that It is me that is stopping me from playing basketball, I should just go and do it for real.

grams88

[Simon]

pick 23 people at random, there is more of a 50% chance that two of them will share the same birthday as you

Is really: That two of them share their birthday, not necessarily with you. (= If we scatter 23 people uniformly at random across 365 days, the chance is higher than 50 % that at least one day gets hit by at least two people.)

For comparing only with our own birthday, I ran the numbers for fun. You need 613 people (other than you) to have at least 50 % chance that at least two of them share your birthday. With only 22 people (other than you), it's 5.8 % that at least one person shares your birthday, and 0.17 % that at least two people share your birthday.

-- Simon

[grams88]

Hi everyone

I did a little mistake in my last post, Simon got it spot on, not necessarily with you. Interesting information there as well, thanks Simon. 

Todays topic video games.

I've been trying my list of games, most of the games on my list are quite old ones. One I have been playing lately is supaplex, a sort of boulder dash game where you have to collect certain objects before you can complete the level. Has anyone completed that game by any chance or got very close to completing it. I feel that would be some accomplishment.

There was a game called marble skies available on steem, I managed to complete this one a couple of years ago but when I come to play this game again, the whole game looks different and the levels have been redesigned making it 100 times easier. I played this back when the levels were really hard but now it looks like different levels and there are save points making a lot of the levels easier. Maybe the people creating it thought it was a bit on the hard side. I have to admit the game does feel a bit better, maybe a bit easier.

grams88

[grams88]

Hope all is well

I'm in a funny mood at the moment, I might as well talk about a lot random stuff.

I might maybe talk about prank phone calls, I thought I would grow out of listening to the prank calls but it is the complete opposite I love them at the age of 30. The reason I love them is there are so many different ways of going about a prank call, i'e you have your sound boards of famous actors, (etc) where you play the soundboard down the phone. I like it when they have a conversation while at the same time the actual conversation itself is a prank so to say.

Separate topic, when it comes to a job interview, I tend to think of things differently, instead of it being a one way conversation, lets make it a two way conversation, you are asking questions during the process as well and you are trying to find out as much as you can about the job.  A job can be tricky to get in this day and age, I think it could even be harder because of robots and stuff in the future. Soon it will be robots that serve people at the checkouts, we are getting closer to that sort of thing I feel.

The apophis asteroid which was discovered in 2004 will probably make a close pass by the earth around 2029, don't worry there's a tiny tiny tiny chance that it will hit earth but that is so tiny that it is not even worth thinking of. After the asteroid passes in 2029 it is going to come back around in 2036. I don't know if this will be closer to the earth than the 2029 one. It would be interesting looking at it in the sky at night, that would be cool.

If it did hit the earth that would be bad but the chances are so low it's not even worth thinking about.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/99942_Apophis

It's an interesting read.

Is it okay to post this. Don't worry they are talking about a new method of execution.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lfsMMVgIToA 

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

It's fake don't worry, I hate the death penalty

[grams88]

How are we doing everyone?

I would like to inspire any of us who is wanting to write maybe write an e-book, well I've wrote a few small e-books and did get one e-book published from a mental health charity, not too sure if it is in paperback form as well but it's in e-book form at the moment. It was about my mental health condition which is ocd, harm ocd. It sounds horrible and it is horrible to have.

I think everyone has a story to tell, the e-book or kindle world is very popular and competitive, I notice people are always wanting to make loads of money from it. I would say this is the wrong way to think of it, only a small percent of people would probably make a living from writing. Try not to treat it as a competitive thing instead do it if it is something you would enjoy doing.

In the UK we have the BBC and there's a website called the writers room and they look for scripts from people, I guess you could write a script or come up with a TV show idea, I know that's probably a long shot but you never know if you don't try. The BBC itself is has it's TV channel and is one of the main ones in the UK. They tend to say that the BBC is left leaning in the way they go about the political issues, what do you guys think? Just like they say with fox news being a bit on the right wing side of politics.

What a game (Chuck's challenge) is an interesting puzzle game I recently completed and those last level puzzles can be a bit of a nightmare. Does anyone know if round the wheel has any more youtube videos of him playing chuck's challenge, he seemed to have stopped midway through the game and I couldn't really find any more videos about it from him.

grams88

[grams88]

Hi everyone

I forgot to mention this a long time ago, I found another lemmings related thing I've got to share. I got my dad the IT crowd show a British show Dvd boxset which is a show with a lot of funny moments in it. On the DVD it shows off a few different games , I think it shows mortel kombat and also lemmings. They were blowing up parts of the land to get to places.

It shows you that lemmings is still a big part of history

http://www.dvdrental.co.uk/blog/2008/11/20/it-crowd-out-now.html

[grams88]

How are we doing?

Goodness me we are all getting older, I find it an interesting concept in itself A lot of older people do have very interesting stories to tell even more so when it comes down to things such as fighting for your country. My gran used to help with making the weapons during World War 2, I think a lot of the ladies during the war had other jobs such as making the weapons or helping out with other things. My Gran the other day injured her leg so having to be careful with things, she did take a bad injury a couple of years ago with a pitch fork right into her foot which sounds really horrible. She has a wet room which is the whole bathroom is technically the shower room, it's a really good thing for older or people with disabilities to go for. She tends to say that a lot of people get surprised when she tells them her real age, 96 years young I always like to think of it as.

At the volunteering there are a lot over 70 year olds who are volunteering and helping out with the organisation, a lady who volunteers the same day as myself is 88 and she's a nice lady. I enjoy talking to her about different things, I tend to mention that Christmas is getting closing and as soon as I say that she tells me to shut up and don't mention Christmas, its kind of funny.

I enjoyed my birthday recently, I've got a mini USB fan which cools me down when I'm on the computer. By the way you might be surprised with who you share a birthday with, myself I share a birthday with Princess Anne who celebrated her birthday on the 15th as well as myself. She will be coming up for her 70th birthday next year, touch wood.

Talking to people in general is always a good thing, a lot of lonely people in the world and they might not talk to people too much and the loneliness sets in, it can be quite sad. I always think it is a good thing to maybe say hi to the person in the street or talk to people you meet at the till when you are doing your shopping. A little conversation can go a long way and can sometimes act as a boost to someone else who might not be feeling too good themselves. I know I'm not too well myself and I do have  to take life at a slower pace which is nothing to be ashamed of.

Thanks for reading

grams88

[mobius]

Some really good thoughts there grams88.

Two of my grandparents lived into their 90s. And they didn't even get into too bad shape until their last few years. They outlived both of their parents.

I have to work on talking to others; it's very difficult for me.