That's not it, at least not in my case, not this time. Or at least I have absolutely no other symptoms despite finding it hard to get out of bed. It's not even that I oversleep or that I'm tired, it's just hard to get out of bed. Guess it's either the cold or that the sun is still not out when I wake up.

If anything I feel mentally better than I have in ages. Which is kind of a weird feeling. I wasn't used to that anymore XD

Oh! Yes, that definitely is different, then!

Huh. Well, good for you for feeling mentally better, that's always something to celebrate. Whatever the reason (or apparent lack thereof).




I am finally getting around to updating some of the really old threads I hadn't touched in ages, but am starting to doubt the info I'm collecting.

Are there really only 3 possible rare materials to be found in the High Plains?
What about the air-color diamond? (There's a diamond color for each element, right? Shouldn't we find the air-equivalent one in the High Plains?)
Just off the top of my head.
It seems the distribution pattern is not readily apparent.

I mean, I work nights so I don't really eat breakfast either. Instead, I eat a small meal late at night after dinner.

I hate getting out of bed when it's cold. The covers and cats are so cozy and I haaate being cold. Fortunately, it will be a warm Christmas this year. Or maybe I should say it will be hot? In the 80's, I think.

Here the temperatures are pretty normal for the season. But then again Tokyo's winter is pretty sunny so whether or not you feel cold is mostly due to the wind.
Starting Sunday we should see freezing temperatures.

I would always need a snack after getting out of my closing shifts at the restaurant I worked at. I don't miss that lifestyle at all.

Akili Li wrote:Oh! Yes, that definitely is different, then!

Huh. Well, good for you for feeling mentally better, that's always something to celebrate. Whatever the reason (or apparent lack thereof).

To be fair after being discharged from the hospital in September I had a pretty bad bout of depression. It lasted a month and since then I'm in a very good mood and very motivated. Last time it happened was right before the start of the pandemic. Which was a very bad timing to be motivated to job search because I'm in the tourism sector XD
(Granted it still is bad timing but at least now I know it's hard because back then I didn't think I'd see my new shiny part-time job disappear before I even did the training.)

Kuuki wrote: To be fair after being discharged from the hospital in September I had a pretty bad bout of depression. It lasted a month and since then I'm in a very good mood and very motivated. Last time it happened was right before the start of the pandemic. Which was a very bad timing to be motivated to job search because I'm in the tourism sector XD
(Granted it still is bad timing but at least now I know it's hard because back then I didn't think I'd see my new shiny part-time job disappear before I even did the training.)

((Side note: I keep accidentally hitting "trade" instead of "quote". Sorry about the weird trade notification that generated!))

So when Covid hit I started to wonder about alternative forms of "tourism" that can be done with our current technology.
Like if a group interested in, say, the hidden stone city of Petra wanted to hire a guide to go somewhere, wearing a camera that livestreamed to them. And then they'd ask the guide to turn this way or that or go explore that building or zoom in for a closeup of some feature....
What would the rates be? Is that a thing that would really happen? Does it happen already?

What about hooking up a livestream like that into a VR-headset for the "tourists" at home who can't go in person? Is that technologically feasible? What would be required to set it up?

You made me remember those idle ponderings with your comment on tourism industry. >.<

And of course, benefit of doing it "live" is that for instance a guide could scoop up a vial of sand from Petra and mail it to anyone who paid for the privilege, so they could have a "souvenir", or something similar.

It does happen already. I see a few people doing guided "tours" with their phones since I live in a pretty touristic part of the city. I've seen people doing shopping for people while live streaming to their clients as well.
No idea what the rates are though, probably depends. And I think some people do it on Twitch so some definitely do it for "free".

And I know of a Japanese company that offered virtual tours that included a souvenir from the area that would be shipped to you at a later date. There's even a tour bus company that used its bus to make a huge labyrinth for people instead of using them to, you know, drive.

They also did weddings that way. They ship the food to the people "invited" and then livestreamed the ceremony.

(And I'm pretty sure you shouldn't bring back sand from Petra. Looks like the kind of thing that you'd be kindly asked not to do.)

Aha! You did know!
Wow, already happening -I definitely as born into a sci-fi age. That is so neat.

A bus as a labyrinth sounds so ridiculously clever and creative and amazing that I really want to see it now. Is that a virtual labyrinth or a "limited person at a time", in-person labyrinth?
Have you done it?
Or just heard about it?
Seriously it sounds amazingly clever.

Last time I was in Petra was back in 1999, and they sold vials of Petra sand there.... it gets blown in by the winds, and they have to dig out certain of the rooms again because they get buried. So they have to remove sand anyhow to make them visible once more, and then they just bottle up that sand and sell it.
Probably they don't want just anyone scooping up sand from anywhere, though.

It's not a bus as a labyrinth, but they literarily moved their busses in the parking lot to create a giant labyrinth.
It was a limited event and the tickets were sold out in a few hours so I didn't have the chance to check it out but it sounded so awesome.

Have never gone to Petra sadly but maybe one day.
At least I hope so. There are so many places I want to visit once this whole mess is all over.

Kuuki wrote:It's not a bus as a labyrinth, but they literarily moved their busses in the parking lot to create a giant labyrinth.
It was a limited event and the tickets were sold out in a few hours so I didn't have the chance to check it out but it sounded so awesome.

Have never gone to Petra sadly but maybe one day.
At least I hope so. There are so many places I want to visit once this whole mess is all over.

Okay that makes way more sense. I'm a little disappointed, since I was imagining the interior of the bus done up in crazy labyrinth style like a mobile 3-D spelunking exploration event or something, but still sounds like a fun take on a maze.
With tickets selling so fast I'm surprised they didn't turn it into a regular event. Must have been a lot of work, though.
Good practice for the drivers, I guess, to get all those buses into place so precisely!

Maybe someday. Petra has lasted an awfully long time, so it's probably not going to disappear any time soon. Likely it'll still be there for you to visit, after. My own "want to visit" list keeps getting longer and longer, it seems like. Even when I go traveling and get to cross some of the places off the list, it seems like every trip I hear about somewhere else that's also amazing and it just grows.

If I get to come back as a ghost after I die, I'm definitely doing the tourist thing for a while!

That seems kinda small to me.
But yeah they were praising the driver's skills on TV. I don't think it was anything more than a PR stunt because it renders their parking lot absolutely unusable and space like this is hard to come by. Probably not worth the investment.
But it looked very interesting.

I actually did a world tour as our honeymoon so I have crossed a few places off my bucket list (including Easter Island) and we did have a layover in Jordania so we did talk about going to Petra. It'll probably come someday.
Except husband tends to choose his destinations depending on whether or not you can dive so it'll be hard to drag him there.