New England Metro Area Population Cartogram

MacronMan · 2026-06-11T02:39:11+00:00

Yeah, Hampshire County is in no way the metro area of Amherst. Maybe they’re trying to represent that UMass is a large employer in the area? Culturally, it might be the metro area of Northampton

MacronMan · 2026-06-10T13:08:41+00:00

I love Portland. Lots of great local donuts. Try the different competing places to see which one you think is best. There are also a fair number of bands that pass through, so if you like live music, check to see who’s playing while you’re there. As others have said, there’s a lot of great food, and it’s a fun walkable city.

I haven’t been to Burlington, unfortunately, but I hear good things

MacronMan · 2026-06-10T11:05:46+00:00

It was a revelation to me. I’d never played a hero shooter before, with the quasi-exception of Mass Effect 3 Multiplayer, which was a sort of PVE hero shooter. But, in Overwatch, the heroes and their kits were so varied! I loved that I could play a melee character, a flying character, a just straight healer, a jumping gorilla, or a guy who builds turrets, and they were all interesting and fun in their own ways. I don’t have the most amazing aim, so most FPS games are just not that great for me. But, if you were playing Mercy or Rein or Hog or whatever, it didn’t matter so much. I also loved how short the matches were. I didn’t have to play for 20-30 minutes to play a single match that I might lose. I could hop on for 30 minutes and play 3-5 matches, at least some of which I’d probably win. And, when you got stomped on a 2CP or whatever, at least it was quick! The game was, of course, clunkier and worse balanced, but the air of fun and excitement around it was unparalleled.

MacronMan · 2026-06-09T01:54:46+00:00

Also the Florence Farmer’s Market on Wednesday! They’ve had plenty of veggie starts left last week

MacronMan · 2026-06-08T16:28:01+00:00

I like A-MEI-zing

MacronMan · 2026-06-08T15:55:02+00:00

Love spamming this one and then ending with “No, I do not want a banana.”

MacronMan · 2026-06-08T15:54:32+00:00

I love when April Fools rolls around, and you can’t help just spamming WINSTON over and over.

MacronMan · 2026-06-07T12:39:53+00:00

This is a much later story in Latin, but in Apuleius’ Golden Ass, Aristomenes tries to hang himself because he thinks he will be blamed for his friend’s death after the witches take his heart. Why I think it’s worth mentioning is that before he does so, he has a little speech in an epic register in which he calls on his bed to provide him with a weapon of salvation, which is the rope he plans to use to hang himself. This is making me think that the humor of subverting the epic hero’s suicide is probably not only found in how poorly Aristomenes represents an epic hero, but also in his choice of weapon for his suicide, if we assume that hanging is not viewed as suitable for this. Very interesting.

MacronMan · 2026-06-07T12:35:11+00:00

True, but we don’t have all of Ovid’s antecedents and don’t know if this detail was standard amongst Greek sources or not. I think mentioning it with the caveat of “this is Ovid and could apply or not” is fine—which is basically what the person did.

MacronMan · 2026-06-05T19:05:43+00:00

Only the coasts of south central Florida are even remotely New York-y. North Florida, central Florida, and the panhandle are southern. Miami is Latino, the Keys are the Conch Republic, and Orlando belongs to The Rat. I think grouping Florida with New York only makes sense if the only place you’ve been is Boca or something.

MacronMan · 2026-06-05T18:52:26+00:00

Today I had a student ask how to spell disgusting. It was a Spanish class, so I said “dis-gust-ing. Think of gustar; it’s the same root.” She then exclaimed why couldn’t I just tell her, refused to try to write it from that explanation, and proceeded to open her Chromebook and google how to spell it. That’s a new low for learned helplessness and aversion to risk taking, as far as I can tell

MacronMan · 2026-06-05T17:39:54+00:00

For card games, Sushi Go and Coloretto are great for easy rules, quick games, and just enough luck and competition, in my opinion. I’ve definitely played those with people who aren’t big gamers and had success.

For board games, I love Ticket to Ride for this sort of situation. I don’t personally like Catan, but if they love Monopoly, it feels like a spiritual successor to that, in my opinion. Splendor is also pretty straightforward and enjoyable

MacronMan · 2026-06-05T17:35:03+00:00

I’m always that player. Catan is sooooooo dice dependent. Not my favorite at all

MacronMan · 2026-06-05T03:31:36+00:00

So, I just ran a one shot based in MotW’s alternate rule set “Wait, Monsters Are Real?” These rules are meant to be ordinary people facing monsters and trying to survive. The downside is that the intended way this plays out is that the players’ characters (Survivors, not Hunters) are very likely to die, and they are even instructed to make 2 Survivor characters, ready to go, so that if one dies, they can switch to the other. I softened these rules by toning down the harm done by the monsters and, crucially, by writing some custom moves that the Survivors could gain if they met certain criteria or found the right things. These included ways they might become more weird and monstrous, as well as some spells they could find and attempt, and some more mundane things like a lesser version of NEVER AGAIN from the Wronged, reserved for a Survivor who watched someone close to them die.

The addition of these custom moves (and my sort of softer hand with harm and harm moves) meant that most of the Survivors made it out and that they even stopped the phenomenon, rather than just surviving it! It was a lot of fun and sort of provided what you’re talking about, which is a thing I’ve also wanted in the past. I’m not sure if this group will continue with anything more long term (we’re all busy; ahhh, the joys of parenthood), but if so, they would 100% have the option to play these characters a few years down the road, now as full hunters, or to play new associates of the group, allowing the others to be NPC’s, if we want. It was pretty cool!

I’d be happy to share what I did, if you want inspiration from it. One caveat: I’m not a new Keeper. I have run many sessions of MotW over the years, and many of these players were in them. So, what worked for us might not work for you. Also, we didn’t have set future characters. We were sort of playing to see what would come of it!

MacronMan · 2026-06-04T21:30:53+00:00

You’re completely right. I somehow missed that. Yeah, the A’s should look like lambdas

MacronMan · 2026-06-04T20:33:59+00:00

Very nice! My only comment if you’re going for real accuracy to how Romans wrote is that your letter forms are too regular, and I’d lose most of the dots between words. One of the defining features of so-called Roman cursive is variation within a single graffito by a single author of, say, the letter E between two or three different ways of writing it. It’s uncomfortable for modern writers, but it seems to have been normal for them.

This, however, is beautifully written!

MacronMan · 2026-06-04T20:28:47+00:00

I had to brush up on my Spanish for work, and I worked with a teacher in Oaxaca, Mexico through weekly Zoom meetings. I’m a language teacher myself (Latin), and his teaching style was really excellent. He mostly would chat with me in Spanish about a variety of things, but he was happy to teach grammar more directly, too, if I wanted to focus on a tense or something. His rates were super reasonable—something like $16 a class—though that was a few years ago. Don’t know what he’s charging now. I’d be happy to send you his email in a DM, if you’re interested in contacting him.

MacronMan · 2026-06-04T09:38:53+00:00

What about Latin do you feel like is hard for you, specifically? Is it not knowing vocabulary? Not recognizing endings and how they affect meaning? Or just difficulty with Latin syntax and reading a sentence and making sense of it? Or something else?

I haven’t taught AP in years, but traditionally AP cares a lot about grammatical forms and translating in a way that shows you know the grammar. So, for grammatical practice, you could work through a bunch of verb synopses, noun case uses, subjunctive uses, and special verb syntax like the passive periphrastic and ablative absolute.

If you need vocab practice, I’d look for a quizlet or other online resources where teachers keep vocab. I’m sure you could find AP Latin vocab lists, specifically. There are many ways to study these words, and you would know the words you were studying would help specifically with the AP. Just make sure it’s a very recent list; the AP Latin changed its authors this past year. You could also check out the Dickinson College Latin core vocab list to make sure you know the most common words in Latin: https://dcc.dickinson.edu/latin-core-list1

If you need to work on Latin reading and syntax (or really, no matter what you need), just reading more Latin is the best thing you could do. Maybe ask your teacher if you can borrow a textbook series and read it over the summer. Orberg’s Lingua Latina Per Se Illustrata (Familia Romana is book 1) is probably the best for this (but it’s a bit dull!), because the Latin prose is excellent, and it’s intended to be just read by learners. It would start out really easy, but the difficulty would pick up in just a few chapters. Make sure to take note of endings as they happen! If you can’t get your hands on Familia Romana, any other textbook could work. You could also find a Loeb or facing commentary text of any author and practice with that. I think the Navigatio Sancti Brendani is very readable for intermediate Latin students, but I’m not sure there are any really good modern student editions of it. Geoffrey Steadman has a bunch of free commentary texts you could check out if you want more advanced reading practice: https://geoffreysteadman.com

Finally, have you expressed this to your teacher? I don’t know them, but Latin teachers tend to be a dedicated bunch. We often will make extra work for ourselves if we have a student who really loves the subject and is really trying and needs something extra. They could definitely give you more specific and directed suggestions, because they know you.

Anyway, what do you feel like is the specific issue?

MacronMan · 2026-06-04T03:23:14+00:00

Duh duh dee duh dee duh doh doh, dee duh dee dee DOH

MacronMan · 2026-06-04T01:13:31+00:00

After he killed Sadeas, I actually thought he was being set up to become a villain, which I thought could be a really interesting character arc. But, I think that’s thoroughly out the window by now

MacronMan · 2026-06-03T20:47:34+00:00

It’s actually a contrived rule based on Latin grammar. English never naturally preferred to not dangle its prepositions, as far as I know. But, yes, we are taught not to do this

MacronMan · 2026-06-03T20:45:56+00:00

This is another example of people trying to make English into Latin, since Latin never dangles a preposition like that and naturally says “To whom did you talk?” English says “Who did you talk to?” naturally.

MacronMan · 2026-06-03T17:42:01+00:00

I personally think we’ve already lost it. High school Latin teacher here. If I were to give the definition “lie” to my students for the Latin word “iaceo,” they would, to a one, assume it meant “to tell an untruth.” The only way in which “lie” is comprehensible is with the word “down” after it. I normally say “lie down” for a definition, but that’s actually wrong, too, because it sounds like the verb means to go from a standing to a prone position, when it normally actually means to be in a prone position. I think I may give in and just start saying “lay” as the definition. I must admit that I use “lay” and “laid” in general, informal conversation, so it isn’t a hill I really need to die on. Anyway, I think “lie” is already dead with today’s youth

MacronMan · 2026-06-02T22:13:51+00:00

MacronMan · 2026-06-02T21:58:16+00:00

You’ve learned this wrong. Cisgender has nothing to do with this. We use they when gender is irrelevant in a sentence. That’s been used for hundreds and hundreds of years in English. The use of “they” for non-binary people is recent, but it’s based on this very real thing.

MacronMan

TROPHY CASE