The Guardian for this meeting was Bruce Mowbray. The comments are by Bruce Mowbray.

stevenaia Michinaga: hi Bruce, Riddle
Bruce Mowbray: Heya, Riddle.
Riddle Sideways: hi All
Bruce Mowbray: Heya, Steve.
Riddle Sideways: hi Qt
stevenaia Michinaga: hi QT
Bruce Mowbray: Heya, Qt!
Qt Core: Hi all!
Bruce Mowbray: Amazing! On most weeks no one shows up. And now THREE at once!
Bruce Mowbray: Yikes!
Qt Core: :-)
stevenaia Michinaga: :)
Bruce Mowbray: So, what's up?
stevenaia Michinaga: I'm off to see a movie shortly
Bruce Mowbray: Great... May I ask which one?
stevenaia Michinaga: "Arrival" ? anyone see it?
Bruce Mowbray: Ahhh!
Bruce Mowbray: I want to see that.
Qt Core: started hopping around this morning at 9am stopped just at 5pm, no energy for something heavier than some typing ;-)
stevenaia Michinaga: come back and 7 and I will tell you all about it :)
Bruce Mowbray: Eos recommended it at Thursday's meeting.
stevenaia Michinaga: great
Bruce Mowbray ponders "hopping around."
stevenaia Michinaga: there's a bunny nearby to help you understand
Bruce Mowbray: ha ha!
Riddle Sideways: bunbun is over yonder
Qt Core: aka running from chores to chores from shop to shop and so on
Riddle Sideways: ah
Riddle Sideways: went to movie "Dr. Strange" Thursday
Bruce Mowbray: What is the theme of "Arrival," do you know yet?
Riddle Sideways: saw the previews and now can't remember
Bruce Mowbray loves Benedict Cumberbatch.
stevenaia Michinaga: aliens and trying to understand them via a linguist, Amy Adams
Qt Core: i've read on the bbc sites that it is about aliens and linguistics
Bruce Mowbray: Eos mentioned something remarkable about the language in "Arrival."
Bruce Mowbray: yes, linguistics.
stevenaia Michinaga: rare for a linguist to be a star in the movies,
Riddle Sideways: laughs
Bruce Mowbray: Linguists will be quite important if/when aliens actually arrive...
Riddle Sideways: Super Linguist
Bruce Mowbray: as will psychologists and anthropologists.
stevenaia Michinaga: similar to adream researchers in the movie Inception
Bruce Mowbray: ahhh!
stevenaia Michinaga: their moment of fame as a profession
Bruce Mowbray: I find it almost miraculous that we have language... and all that it brings.

--BELL--

stevenaia Michinaga: Of course we all have language I find it more amazing that we understand each other
Qt Core: don't know if psychologists and anthropologist may help with aliens... those two studies humans...
Riddle Sideways: brb, go get lunch
Bruce Mowbray ponders getting lunch...
stevenaia Michinaga: wonders of telepath will be understandable communication w/o language
Bruce Mowbray ponders telepathy.
Qt Core: then will we solve the age old question, do we think before or after language?
stevenaia Michinaga: all aliens do it
Bruce Mowbray: [Does pondering count as violating the "drop"?]
stevenaia Michinaga: yes, Bruce, but if you don't ponder...
Bruce Mowbray: Perhaps we "think" before, during, and after speaking -- or, hopefully 'during.'
Qt Core: often after ;-)
Bruce Mowbray: Perhaps thinking is no longer in vogue.
Qt Core: even after speaking...
Bruce Mowbray: Just talk talk talking.
Bruce Mowbray: Post-thought, as it were.
Bruce Mowbray: May I ask a thought-experiment question?
Qt Core: sure
Bruce Mowbray: This morning at a RL meeting....
Bruce Mowbray: ty, Qt.
Bruce Mowbray: I asked this question:
Bruce Mowbray: If I wore a t-shirt with an upside down American flag on it,
Bruce Mowbray: would any of you be offended?
Bruce Mowbray: (My typist just ordered one of those, btw.)
stevenaia Michinaga: personally, no, it would be an accurate message
Bruce Mowbray: The upside down American flag is a signal of "dire distress."
Bruce Mowbray: please say more, Steve.
Qt Core: does having a flag that won't change upside down count ?
stevenaia Michinaga: america in dire distress
Bruce Mowbray: Yes, in dire distress... that would be the message of the shirt.
stevenaia Michinaga: so I wouldn't be offended
Bruce Mowbray: But would you (or anyone be offended by that?)
Bruce Mowbray: kk, ty.
Bruce Mowbray: The responses at this morning's meeting in rl were interesting.
stevenaia Michinaga: anyone may be, hard to answer for "them"
stevenaia Michinaga: did you wear the shirt, or pose the question?

[Sorry, I didn't see Steve's question here.  I did NOT wear the shirt, only asked the question.]

Riddle Sideways: back
Bruce Mowbray: One said, "I honor you, therefore I would honor whatever you chose to wear."
Bruce Mowbray: Another, a woman of 82, said she would be offended.
stevenaia Michinaga: free speech, after all
Bruce Mowbray: Everyone else replied something like, you should be wearing something FAR MORE OFFENSIVE than that!
Bruce Mowbray: So, I just thought I'd ask.
Bruce Mowbray ponders whether we still have free speech.
Bruce Mowbray: (which also means, free lying, I suppose.)
stevenaia Michinaga: I believe slightly less than half the voting public would be offended
Bruce Mowbray: Do Twitter and Facebook have free speech?
Bruce Mowbray: Hmmm, slightly less than half the voting public.
Bruce Mowbray: France's election will be ....??? tomorrow?
Bruce Mowbray: Will the "movement" continue.... the one that supposedly started with Brexit?
Bruce Mowbray: and then.... Germany after that.
stevenaia Michinaga: France looking to leave the EU?
Qt Core: march 2017
stevenaia Michinaga: voting, rather
Bruce Mowbray: Well, maybe,... I was thinking of LePen... right wing...
 Qt Core: tomorrow they'll choose the candidate for the right wing party
Bruce Mowbray: ahhh! That's it. TY, Qt.
Qt Core: then there is LePen for the even more right wing
Bruce Mowbray: So, could they be voting for LePen tomorrow...?
stevenaia Michinaga: time to go, see you tonight for a movie summary
Bruce Mowbray: Bye for now, Steve.
Bruce Mowbray: Enjoy the movie.
Riddle Sideways: ok, bye
Bruce Mowbray makes note to be at Steve's session tonight.
Qt Core: no, she has her own party, the party voting tomorrow is the still right wing but a little less then hers
Bruce Mowbray: ahhh. Sounds complicated.
Qt Core: not much, left/right/far right, three bigger party
Riddle Sideways: the radio tried to explain it this morning, but it was before coffee
Bruce Mowbray: Americans really have only two viable parties.
Bruce Mowbray: Yes, I was also listening to NPR, Riddle.
Bruce Mowbray: National Public Radio.
Qt Core: we simplified our party system a lot, we got to less than 10 now ;-)
Bruce Mowbray: omg! TEN!
Riddle Sideways: image 10
Qt Core: but 3/4 are the ruling ones to which several of the other allies to
Riddle Sideways: well there were 5-6 on the ballot

--BELL--

Bruce Mowbray: So that would tend to divide up the vote...
Bruce Mowbray: Yes, 5 or 6 on the America ballot -- but only two viable ones.
Bruce Mowbray: by which I mean, ones who had any chance of winning.
Riddle Sideways: oh well, Politics is so strange
Bruce Mowbray dies from laughing....
Riddle Sideways: hopefully the next 4 years here will be just as funny
Bruce Mowbray: "Strange" - yet somehow capable of making great changes in our lives.
Qt Core: speaking about movies... i think i'm still uded to old style venues, i just checked a nearby theatre i like and tomorrow they show "only" 22 different movies there
Bruce Mowbray: 22 different movies in one theater!?
Bruce Mowbray: Wow.
Qt Core: and one of those in normal/3d/original language version
Bruce Mowbray: I can't even remember the last movie I saw in a theater... probably AVATAR,
Bruce Mowbray: because I wanted to see the 3D effects.
Riddle Sideways: wow, ours shows 16, but some are duplicates
Riddle Sideways: at different times
Bruce Mowbray: Hmmm.
Riddle Sideways: or 3d or 2d
Bruce Mowbray: Part of my situation is that the nearest theater is so far away...
Bruce Mowbray: Nearest 3D theater is 50 miles away.
Riddle Sideways: wow
Bruce Mowbray usually downloads movies from Internet...
Qt Core: counting different times there are more than 80 projections
Bruce Mowbray: Yeppers, we're pretty rural out here.
Bruce Mowbray: Amazing, Qt.
Riddle Sideways: about 20 miles here
Bruce Mowbray nods.
Bruce Mowbray: Taking in a movie is a special event for my typist...
Riddle Sideways: yes, has to be a special 3d with big sound
Qt Core: the fun thing is that there is another theatre at less than a km from that one too
Bruce Mowbray: Wow.
Qt Core: but it has far worse seats ;-)
Bruce Mowbray: Cinema is a national tradition in Italy, apparently.
Riddle Sideways: Our I-max theatre is about 2 miles from the 16 one
Bruce Mowbray prefers cinema to American football.... which is our national tradition.
Bruce Mowbray: Nearest I-Max to me is in Dayton --- over 60 miles away.
Qt Core: i think i have to go see Dr Strange *thinking about tomorrow afternoon) and fantastic animals and where to find them in a couple weeks
Riddle Sideways: Bruce, did you get caught up in baseball this year?
Bruce Mowbray: I want to see FANTASTIC ANIMALS -- loves Eddie Redmayne.
Bruce Mowbray: OH YES!
Bruce Mowbray: Did I EVER get caught up in it!
Riddle Sideways: Dr. Strange has great 3D effects
Bruce Mowbray: GO CUBBIES!
Qt Core: my sister is pestering me since at least an year (almost daily) about that movie (and rogue one too)
Bruce Mowbray: I hope you can take your sister to see Fantastic Animals, Qt.
Riddle Sideways: the new JK Rowlings one just opened
Bruce Mowbray: It is in 3D, too.
Qt Core: i risk my own life if i don't ;-)
Bruce Mowbray: Fantastic Animals is the new Rowlings one.
Riddle Sideways: Beasts
Bruce Mowbray: Yes, Fantastic BEASTS, sry.
Qt Core: i think i'll pass on 3d, -- my not so perfect vision makes a waste of the money spent on it and i get a little headache
Bruce Mowbray: ahhh.
Bruce Mowbray: My typist keeps trying to push the images away, or duck them.
Riddle Sideways: hahaha
Riddle Sideways: yes, those blades come very close
Qt Core: the headache is mostly at not knowing if the scene i'm seeing is or isn't 3d became and stop being 3d and the aforementioned waste of money ;-)
Bruce Mowbray nods.
Bruce Mowbray: Your brain is probably trying to make sense of several different things in conflict with each other. -- visual conflicts.

--BELL--

Bruce Mowbray: 3D, of course, is an illusion.
Bruce Mowbray: coming from a flat surface.
Qt Core: as sometimes my eyes have issues with real 3d the fake one is double troubling ;-)
Bruce Mowbray: and your brain probably is trying to figure that out...
Bruce Mowbray remembers seeing the fronds of ferns flying by him in the theater when he saw AVATAR.
Riddle Sideways: maybe the tricks they play with the lens are being added to by your brain knowing it should make 3d out of what should be a 2d
Bruce Mowbray: So, mere "depth" is not actually 3D -- I mean, we have depth in Second Life, but in the theater it's a whole different thing.
Riddle Sideways: the VR glasses are very tricky too
Bruce Mowbray: Concentration - all by itself - can provoke headaches, too.
Riddle Sideways: best to sit down with those
Bruce Mowbray: I get headaches if I concentrate on a mantra too hard - during meditation.
Bruce Mowbray: Better to be as light as possible with them.
Riddle Sideways: yet, can get rid of a headache by saying mantra
Bruce Mowbray: Yes, saying the mantra very lightly.
Qt Core: i always thought i was blessed with lack of headache, not even after a full day in front of a monitor, not even the old black and green ones
Bruce Mowbray: Also, mandalas can be used for relief of headaches.
Bruce Mowbray: Hmmm. I get eye strain in front of monitors, but not headaches.
Qt Core: not even that, sure they tire, the worst i get, if i read English all day is a little pain in the areas just behind my ears
Bruce Mowbray: I guess the "magic" of cinema is how deeply it can immerse us in the illusions.
Bruce Mowbray: Interesting, Qt.
Riddle Sideways: true
Bruce Mowbray: Perhaps that is a language-processing area of the brain.
Qt Core: yes and i overheat it ;-)
Bruce Mowbray: I've been thinking a lot about the limbic system recently...
Bruce Mowbray: Fight, Flight, Freeze, Feed, and ... Mate.
Bruce Mowbray: very very primitive centers.
Riddle Sideways: could see that area overheating :)
Bruce Mowbray: Anyone who can control those areas of another's brain... well, pretty much can control the other person, it seems.
Bruce Mowbray: Appeal to "lower angels of our nature," so to speak.
Bruce Mowbray wishes his typist were fluent in more than one language.
Qt Core: and so it is the target of most advertising (for whatever, from products to presidents)
Bruce Mowbray feels culturally deprived.
Bruce Mowbray: Yeppers.
Bruce Mowbray: Have you noticed how many commercials feature percussion instruments?
Bruce Mowbray: Hurts my ears, actually.
Bruce Mowbray: But the "lower" brain is probably excited by that noise.
Riddle Sideways: have sang along with the background music
Bruce Mowbray: Also, in radio --- segues between various things... usually percussion.
Qt Core: many songs/music pieces become famous and go to be known as "insert product name here" ad song
Riddle Sideways: local station KPIG plays pic sequels between segments
Bruce Mowbray: Alas, time for me to be scraping up something to placate my FEED-ing brain areas.
Qt Core: and i need sleep
Bruce Mowbray: Bye for now, good people.
Bruce Mowbray: Pleasant dreams.
Riddle Sideways: by All
Riddle Sideways: and thanks
Qt Core: bye Bruce
Qt Core: bye Riddle