The Grand Cafe

I was recently browsing things to see in South Africa and came across the pic below. How much better than the drab concrete coloured cooling towers dotted around Britain! It has the effect of braking up the shape as well as making is more interesting. Roll on more like this! (And this is from someone who has very little appreciation of visual art.)

image

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True itā€™s also brings a bit of attention to areas that generally donā€™t get any.

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Thereā€™s a nice swing-bridge between them to, for the adventurous.

Or the really quick. :grin:

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It could be a ā€œhair raisingā€ experience. More power than twin 555ā€™s

Tall as a couple Statement amps

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Imho it draws attention to the structure, one mans art is anotherā€™s graffiti
ā€¦oops cue debate on ā€œwhat is art?ā€

Not unlike the wind turbines in the landscape debate.

What I consider to be beautiful engineering (a form of art) and a sign of progress, others consider them a blight on the landscape. Yet will accept humongous concrete towers in the landscape.

You just canā€™t please all the plebs all of the time. :slight_smile: I include myself as a pleb by the way.

I dislike wind turbines. They are a blot on the landscape.

Itā€™s the sheer number of them and the fact that they are primarily located within an otherwise beautiful landscape.

Iā€™m not yet clear about off-shore wind turbines. Hazard to shipping or probably just a restriction ?

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Any users of Amazon Alexa here? Our new dishwasher supports Alexa and I need a loudspeaker in the kitchen. Considering the Amazon Echo Plus.

Is Mrs Ardbeg 10y okay?

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She is. But we disagree on how the dishwasher should be packed. I hope Alexa listens better to me.

I have a rule. If Mrs Mike critiques how I do it, she does it!

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I actually like doing the dishes et cetera. I normally do the laundry & dishes here.

Oh and silly discussions about packing the dishwasher are a great starting point for improving a relation. Its that what gives value. I think we still grow in our relation after about 20 years.

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You donā€™t mind then Amazon listening to everything you say in your house?

I see Spotify have managed to get a patent through to listen to everything in your house in order to better recommend music for you to listen to (article in this months HiFi Choice). It listens for words, accent, attitude (for example, are you angry), sex, &c. to best decide on suggestions!

So wife and I were talking about this and she came up with what about when youā€™re giving out credit card information over the phone? Do these various eaves dropping devices magically switch off? I was paying for something over the phone last week and the person on the other end said they had to turn off the call recording whilst I read the card details out. Amazon and now Spotify apparently donā€™t have to do this?

but then how will Amazon know when to tell you to load the dishwasher so that it can switch it on at the normal time? or tell you when to eat, or tell you when to get home from work, or tell you to go to work and not take a detour to the coffee shop and be late?

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What does Alexa offer that an on/off switch and maybe also pressing one of 2 or 3 programme buttons doesnā€™t? Does it shout out increasingly loudly in the middle of the night: ā€œIā€™m finished!ā€ or, ā€œI donā€™t need to be turned on anymore!ā€?

Does it really listen for sounds of sex to decide on music suggestions?!

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It can sing ā€˜Soft Kitty, cute Kitty, little ball of furā€™ for me! Both the dishwasher and my wife donā€™t :slight_smile:

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I do mind that, but on the other hand, we have at least 6 phones in the house, over 10 pcā€™s, a bunch of tablets so there are mics around all over the place already.

Iā€™ve been involved in advanced security a number of years back and I realize that security and privacy are non existent. Alexa opens the gates to hell for sure, but so does Siri et cetera. Iā€™d like to know more about it.

Until now, I found one safe haven, and that is this forum. It does not seem to share anything.

My sister visited our place ~5 years ago (and many times after by the way) and based on changing ads I knew that she was pregnant.

Anyhow, it is a consideration for sure but blocking it in my house is pointless given the teenagers around which seem to share a lot already.

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