what affectionate nickname were you most often given by adults/family members as a kid??
bubbala
schmoopy
sweatheart
mija/mijo
habibi/habibti
honey
other (( say in the tags!! ))
See Resultscontinuing my "I'm really nosey here's a poll" arc.,,
some of the answers you're all putting in the tags are kind of unhinged. fascinating one could say. keep going.
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#''mate''Not just any paper maps, they had textbook sized atlases of the entire delivery area with each street meticulously mapped out.
These were insanely handy and a new edition came out just about every year to stay up to date on construction and road changes. I remember stocking my car with these for any of the cities I tended to travel to because they were the only way to actually get anywhere unless you wanted to call a friend and get very in depth instructions on how to get there.
AAA is now mostly known for roadside assistance, but at one time their primary business was MAPS.
For a few bucks a month you could become a Triple-A member and yeah, roadside assistance was one of the perks. BUT ALSO you could pick up the phone, call their 1-800 number, and tell the human operator who answered that you were planning a road trip.
They'd get your starting and destination address. Ask a few questions: what kinds of hotels you liked, preferred gas stations, any interest in touristy things?
Then in 7 to 10 days you'd get a thick package in the mail of carefully customized maps. Each map was the size of a paperback book cover, perfect for holding in the passenger's or driver's lap. Each was enumerated starting at #1 and ending at #whatever number of minimaps the trip required, with a hand-drawn highlighter path drawn on the map marking the route from one edge to another; entrance & exit points for that section of the route.
Motels, gas stations, and (if requested) tourist traps were indicated in color coded ink -- again, by hand. Sometimes detours were drawn in red marker, overriding the printed map because AAA kept up to date on road closures & regional disasters.
These maps were customized for your particular trip, and were invaluable since GPS did not exist. Unless you were familiar with the local region, the alternative was buying a map at the next gas station and guessing.
GPS is amazing and I wouldn't want to give up the ease & simplicity of Google Maps, but my god the old tech was miraculous too in its own way.
Refidex my beloved - that's the Aussie version, the big book of maps that got my ass everywhere until years after I got my first smartphone. It has a full index of street names in the back with a map and grid reference, so you could flip forward and easily find it.
I was told by a taxi driver that in the old days they had to basically memorise the Refidex to pass the Taxi Licence test, since they weren't allowed to use it during the test.
BUT searching for a picture of the 2023 Refidex led me to this!
Brisbane and environs in 1951! Fully digitised with machine readable text and high quality images! I can buy it for 19.50 - nay, I'm GONNA buy it for 19.50! (Although I wish it was $19.51).
Holy cow, they've also got 1926.
Yoink!
in the UK all London taxi drivers have to do 'The Knowledge’. It takes 3-4 years of study before being able to pass the test, and is considered one of the hardest driving exams in the world
The Knowledge was first introduced in 1865 but has changed little. Drivers must memorise all the roads and landmarks within a six-mile radius of Charing Cross, around 25,000 streets.
I read the OP and was like, I wonder how many notes before someone mentions The Knowledge.
London cabbies who hold The Knowledge experience changes to their brains that are explained in every Neurobiology for Babies course. It’s a wickedly difficult skill: rather than the pizza delivery people in the OP, starting in one defined zone (pizza place) and radiating out from there, a cabbie starts a route in any position and has to navigate across a partially-medieval city with no grid pattern, deranged place names, and not many bridges across a very large river. It would be useless to refer to a paper map, so cabbies were required to have all the Knowledge memorized. This means that the paths and optimized routes would have to be at the top of one’s brain, ready for instant access. As a result, the cabbies develop materially different brain regions as they study and use the Knowledge. They have detectable, measurable changes in their hippocampi, with an increase in grey matter forming in those who pass the Knowledge test and use it.
When asked to navigate a route between two points, they describe the mental process as instantaneous and explosive visuals: it sounds as if the map generates itself behind their eyes. (One potential tradeoff, though, is the decrease in associated brain matter in areas associated with other forms of memory.) After retiring, the brains of London cabbies would appear to return to “normal” - when not exercised, the brain region dedicated to holding the Knowledge seemingly rewires itself - which is exciting because it indicates that brains are still capable of rewiring and adaptation even in later life.
That’s all very interesting for neuroscientists, which is why it’s in all the textbooks and underpins a lot of our understanding of brain plasticity (adaptability) especially in old age. After all, it’s only ever adults who go through this process: babies rarely do a PhD in becoming a human Google Maps.
Some science-fiction series, like Dune, have explored the idea of no-longer-human navigators. still, it’s under-explored. Today, researchers are interested in seeing how London cabbie brains could help with Alzheimer’s research, or other progressive brain conditions that deteriorate the hippocampus.
Cute concluding sentence, sci-comm joke, rhetorical question intended to provoke reflection but mistaken in the comments for an actual question.
When I was a delivery driver (for Dominos even), it was after the wide-spread popularity of smart phones (and by extension, everybody having a map and a GPS in their pocket); but before I got a smartphone. I was living in my car at the time (WFH joke) and so the expense of a new phone (not just new but like NEW new) was a far off dream for another year and a half for me at that point.
And I am TERRIBLE at reading maps. (Or. Not reading them necessarily, but at orienting myself in them.) But while every other driver had a GPS, I was using physical books of maps like those above. And the only reason I even had those was because they were left in the car by the person I bought it off.
I got in trouble for being late a lot.
La Dame Blanche.
A banshee I did back in 2021/2022. It was supposed to be one small Valentine's day illustration but I never truly completed it. I told myself, why not share it!
Hey here’s that “You as a pokemon gym leader” thing that was a trend back in like 2019/2020 when I made this and has been sitting in my drafts since then because I got self conscious about it but if I put it in my queue it is future Gimly’s problem and so it’s like I never posted it at all.
Seeing a stalk of corn in cornfield on screen watching TV-
countrygirlsmakedocountrygirlsmakedocountrygirlsmakedo
-SHUT UP BRAIN
Which website did you first go to for the purpose of looking at memes, and how old are you? (whether you knew the word for it or not *viral videos, lolcats etc)
Funnyjunk
Ebaumsworld
YTMND
Youtube
4chan
9gag
here (tungl)
other (in tags :3)
had some thoughts about how memes and internet culture has changed so much since i was a kid, so i decided to run a lil poll. let's go.
If stickdeath counts, then that, ‘cause it was the 2nd website I ever went to
reblog this post to remind the person you reblogged it from that they’re valued and loved and seen
when you were a kid did people pretend to ask you out as a form of bullying
wtf no?
yes, once
yes, several times (same person)
yes several times (multiple different people)
some other thing i guess or maybe i just want to be nosy
