And it's been driving me batshit that the loudest advocate for forcing Terry to keep living on my reading list is a same-sex marriage advocate. Has no idea that she's hoping for some of those rights she's fighting for will be eroded if this goes too far.

I find it oddly comforting when people aren't playing with the obvious team, on every political position. It frustrates me when, for example, all the pro-lifers are on one side and all the pro-choicers are on the other side of an issue like this.

It makes me wonder how many of the people out there agitating (I mean people who are literally involved in an issue like this, one way or another, not just people weighing in, during a convo.) is paying attention to particulars. I was delighted to come across some evangelical people taking the position that people in a PVS are no longer living, because they're no longer living imago deus, even though I don't happen to believe humans have a right (from the religious pov that is) to make such a judgment.

My sense of body is such that in controlled movements, I can be very precise. 90 degree angles of joint, flat back, etc -- personal trainer's dream, since I don't need to be nagged about form. Give me a mirror, and the procedure is even quicker.

In motion, it gets more complicated, naturally. But I don't need to look at my body in any given pose at the end of motion to tell what it's doing.

There are times (like with jumping spinning kicks) that I swear it must have worked, since I tried so damned hard, but I do realise that I'm not getting any reports from below the neck to substantiate what my brain is insisting.

It used to be awful. I blanked out when I sparred. I wouldn't be able to take anything into the ring/roda that hadn't been ground into me at the level of reflex. I'd step in, step forward, and not remember anything until I was stepping out again. People would give me feedback, but to no end. Lost time, in parcels two minutes across.

I don't know what broke me of that, but I'm damned glad it's gone.

Yeah, babe...well, she had restricted sensation, which I don't, but I was sort of hoping for a superpower, or a way to win bets. So that's where the feeling came from, as far as she was concerned.

The way my mind works, if you said:

""When you do this technique, pivot your back foot." Then I do the technique and say "See how my heel is pointing towards the window? Pivot like that."

I need a synonym. "When I say 'pivot', I mean put all your weight on your toes and turn." Or 'put all your weight on your heel and turn".

Seriously. I don't necessarily know what "pivot" means in a given context. Sometimes you really do need to say "No, no, your OTHER left!"

I need a synonym. "When I say 'pivot', I mean put all your weight on your toes and turn." Or 'put all your weight on your heel and turn".

Do you need a synonym after you've actually pivoted? Or are you able to say "these noises -- this motion -- this end position" and work from there?

I'm not caring where their weight is. If we can agree on a start position (already established) and an end position (which I'm repeatedly demonstrating, including using their own limbs) -- if they can work out how to get from one to the other without pivoting, I'd be fascinated to see it.

Or are you able to say "these noises -- this motion -- this end position" and work from there?

No. I really, really can't do that. I don't get how to get from point A to point B. I need to know "Throw your weight on the ball of your right foot, bend your knee, kick your free foot forward, jump, and turn." "Rotate and jump to the right, landing on your right foot" will leave me staring like a moo-cow.

I'm not trying to be difficult; I am explaining why I'm a difficult student in physical things. I really do need the intermediate stages explained.

Actually, yeah. That makes sense, what Betsy is describing. Another aspect of the "can't park a car in 500 feet square" problem I have is that it's very easy for me to mix up things like mirror images. Those quizzes where they ask you, "If you rotated this object 180d, what would it look like?" -- I always fail those, because too many of the options seem plausible.

This is also why I suck so hard at geometry.

I think if I'm allowed to, e.g., touch the pivoting part, or move in slow motion in exact parallel with the picoting part, I'm better at wrapping my head around what is actually happening. A lot of the time, when I look at maps, I don't re-position the map; I just look at it sideways.

I really do need the intermediate stages explained.

Even when I've moved you from start to end myself? Also, can't you tell you haven't done it?

If someone says "I don't get what you're asking," I'm all over that. Fuck, there's simple stuff I don't get myself. But I get that I don't get it. Your moo-cowness seems to imply you know you're lost.

But when someone looks me in the eye and agrees they've just moved from point A to point B when they've not only been to point B before, but are visibly still at point A? I don't know how to map that process and correct it effectively.

I CONSTANTLY bump my appendages into walls because I'm walking and I don't realize that my hip/shoulder/hand is about to be in the same space as the doorframe/doorknob/etc.

I do this too. It's like I forget I have a body attached to the rest of what makes me me.

Oh, god. I do this, too. But I always blamed it on the fact that I'm really bad at thinking spatially. I suck at Tetris and I have shitty depth perception. Add those together, and I walk into doorframes about 10 times a day. (Plus, my subconscious does not understand how much space I take up in the world. My subconscious thinks I'm a size 6, and navigates accordingly.)

This is in'eresting, at least to astronomy geeks like me: Spring is coming earlier than you think

Why Americans start new season on March 20, not 21

I found this the most interesting:

The current seasonal lengths for the Northern Hemisphere are:

• Winter 88.994 days
• Spring 92.758 days
• Summer 93.651 days
• Autumn 89.842 days

As you can see, the warm seasons, spring and summer, combined are 7.573 days longer than the colder seasons, fall and winter (good news for warm weather admirers).

However, spring is currently being reduced by approximately one minute per year and winter by about one-half minute per year. Summer is gaining the minute lost from spring, and autumn is gaining the half-minute lost from winter. Winter is the shortest astronomical season, and with its seasonal duration continuing to decrease, it is expected to attain its minimum value — 88.71 days — by about the year 3500.