It was just too big for that. If it was, it’s not something that was commercially available here, but if someone had build something that size and flown it around, I couldn’t have been the only witness in all these years!

There’s one company I know that’s been building unmanned airships here, so I’ve thought could it have been one of those. But I think their test flights weren’t yet made in that year, and those are anyway too slow to disappear like that. And not things you’d fly at that place at that time either…

I saw UFO a couple years ago, and I have no idea what the fuck did I actually see. I’m still so baffled I always want to share this story:

I was walking my dog way past midnight, and saw some lights move steadily, hovering over the nearby highway I was walking towards, and thought, ah, a helicopter, how weird for one to fly so low and close to the road. Only after it had moved out of my sight (there was forest both sides and the path I was on was going under the highway) I suddenly realized it couldn’t have been a helicopter; there was no sound and at that distance it would have been LOUD. I saw nothing when I got to a higher place where I could see the highway in both directions. There were no other people around or even cars driving by, since it was so late.

I checked all flights in the area for that night, since maybe I had seen something fly far away and mistook it to be closer? But I found nothing, no planes or helicopters had been in the air in couple hours at that time. It was way too big to be some commercial type of drone that were around then (about a small helicopter sized), and a military drone sounds just unlikely considering the time and place (Finland, no military bases or border anywhere close, and we weren’t in the NATO yet either). It couldn’t have been a truck or something since it was clearly floating and a bit too high for that, and from that position and distance I would have heard the road rumble under the tires too.

I don’t think I was hallucinating, since that vision was so clear and lasted long enough for me to look away a few times, and I don’t have a history of visual hallucinations or anything. Too bad I didn’t film it, but I really didn’t realize something was weird until it was too late!

at least in my language (Slovene) and english steaks are defined by being a cut of meat.

My point was just that there’s so many languages in EU, and there’s bound to be other words that won’t really translate 1:1 like my pihvi example. Can something be sold as “bean steak” is a completely different discussion than can it be sold as “papupihvi”, yet they’re supposed to be treated the same with this regulation? It’s such a mess

What I’m interested in is - how is this supposed to work with all the different languages in all EU countries? For example in finnish “steak” and “patty” both translate as “pihvi”. On top of that words like “kasvispihvi” (vegetable steak/patty) have been in use since early 1900s. Why the hell should EU be able to affect our language to a degree of banning commonly used words everyone understands? Absolutely nobody would think kasvispihvi contains meat, and it’s absurd to even suggest that it couldn’t be used in marketing

Oh yeah no, I think I get it. I just thought I’d add one perspective to why weird names might be so appealing to transfolks even though it can cause more issues than calling yourself Jean or something

If you pick a name that is kinda weird… well it’s kinda weird.

As a transperson with a weird name; I picked mine because I have never fit in, and instead of causing a desire to fit in, it made angry (but that might be because I am autistic as well, who knows). Choosing an unique name was kind of a middle finger and a final stamp of refusing to conform, if that makes any sense. If I’m not accepted anyway then I sure as hell am going to do whatever the fuck I want with my name and identity

Sure the pieces of land don’t matter to but the ukrainians, but if Putin gains anything it’ll signal to his own that he won and that attacking works. At this point any security guarantees mean basically nothing since the west has shown such a weak response, and Putin will just challenge the promises the moment he has the opportunity. Seeing how USA and western Europe still don’t seem to fully understand the situation, it’s easy to believe Ukraine can’t trust any guarantees given unless it’s something like straight up joining NATO, which isn’t on the table.

If Putin gains parts of Ukraine, the war will not end. It means he succeeded in the war; that the west is weak. Which in turn means the war will “end” as in Russia will just regroup and build it’s war resources for a while - maybe some years, maybe more, maybe less - and then attack somewhere again. Why would they stop? Russian imperialism is not based on logic or reason; it was insane to attack Ukraine in the first place.

It is pointless to expect Putin to be somehow reasonable or actively want to stop warring. It is also completely pointless to believe whatever he or his lackeys say, they’ve lied from every step on the way and will continue to do so for their own benefit. It’s very likely the war will continue whatever the result in Ukraine is anyway, it can only be postponed now that Russia has again started on this damned path. If Putin gains land, they won and it’ll continue; if they don’t gain anything, Putin needs to attack again to prove it wasn’t a loss. I cannot believe people still seem to think you can somehow just reason with Russia

“Hey why don’t you use this tool you don’t need? It does the thing worse than you do and also fucks up the planet in the process!”