Pastelbat @pastelbat@awoo.space

The Romans were constantly at each other's throats, and the rich Patrician class using near-constant foreign wars as an excuse to plaster over economic inequality, class divides & representation (hello, modern parallels) was as much a reason for early expansion as advantages in infrastructure/military- let alone 'character'.

So yeah, I have no time for "So brave, much solidarity, never back down! (except for..)"

(Or worse, whig history attributing their dominance to ~Democracy Magic~)

I agree w/ the general sentiment that Roman history is overdone but also it's rlly hard to talk about anything happened later in Europe (or the USA govt system) w/o a solid grounding in the culture they mythologised & used as a template.

Also it's most often done patchily + rlly badly in school, so stuff that fills in the blanks/talks about historicity of source material.. Is useful.

(That said, hmu with any decent podcasts you know of that cover other eras/cultures & I will be a happy bat)

I'd rate Patrick Wyman's Fall of Rome podcast higher, but also note that it focuses on the last 3 centuries, rather than going from Kingdom -> Republic -> Empire, which is a lot longer a period to cover in any sort of depth (like. 1000 years or so, much of it with little recorded evidence to go on)

So.. A better podcast but also with a very different focus.

I'm liking this podcast: http://thehistoryofrome.typepad.com/the_history_of_rome/

It's not perfect (the host occasionally falls into the same idealizing of the 'Roman character' that he criticizes primary sources for, and.. I have 0 time for that stuff, doubly so from modern historians =_=) but not to the point of buying into blatant-legends or skimming over downturns, cultural schisms/failings & defeats.

Overall its a good "each episode's a quick-overview of a topic/period" kinda podcast imo, if you ignore those parts.

I've been trying to find podcasts but like

A lot of them the host bursts into advertising without any.. Explicit demarcation of the border? Just suddenly dude's talking about trail bars or mattresses. It's like a nasty whiplash combo of breaking the fourth wall and snapping you out of it.

"Oh this person can just turn on enthusiasm for anything, & I'd been believing them.." is a stark reminder that there's trust involved in the speaker/audience dynamic & that trust can be misused

I would "toss and turn for horus" brain but like, idk why he'd want me to not get any sleep, and what would I get out of the deal anyway

I wish I had more control over my focus, she says, not taking her ADD meds because she wants to sleep earlier than the night before, where she also tried this, and tossed and turned for hours

I am so fuzzy today

I'm just going on long rambly tangents on Discord at anyone who'll listen

About animation frame-holds and the size of different bats not making any sense and Roman Moray Eel farms and god knows what next

@extinctsnakes@mastodon.social the 'big cloud' brands tend to run thick, too; they have wider barrels (so that + the higher temp means you inhale more at once)

So generally if something's big & bulky it's probably for showing off like that, with a high voltage core and large diameter inhalation. tube- Pen sized ones will have less emmissions simply by not having that hi-voltage & wide-diameter breathing tube capacity

@extinctsnakes@mastodon.social generally not holding down the button so long/not taking deep inhalations will result in less visible vapor, also

Like, those guys with the huge clouds have v. high temperature cores, and inhale a lot at once

So just taking shallow pulls is gonna help a lot too