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Self-check for cash codgers
For many years I made grocery trips as early as possible given bus schedule and daylight. Two years ago Safeway limited the hours of real checkout, so I switched to a later storetrip to stay in the real checkout. The later schedule was inconvenient in several ways: more traffic, more crowding on bus, more delays…
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Why I like Quora part 527894
Quora specializes in personal experience stories from insiders of all sorts. Nice example just now. Question: How do lock manufacturers insure that all keys are different? Answer: They can’t. I already knew this part, just from estimating the math. There are about 10 variable points on a key. If you have 3 different heights available…
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eCurling
Canadians have developed a new ice sport called Ringette. It’s a cross between hockey and curling, with a little ring instead of a big stone or puck, and with sticks to push the rings instead of brooms. The folks in the demo here are playing on a smooth tile floor like a school gym, which…
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Is Trump Ike?
Cynthia McKinney called this out. Trump is placing sanctions against two of the main ‘warlords’ in the Congo. DRC has been engaged in a deadly internal civil war for DECADES, and we’ve totally ignored it because we couldn’t use it as a proxy in our endless mindless attack on Russia. We hate Russia because Russia…
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Thanks to weather gods and weather bureau
Speaking of dissipating clouds, we’ve been getting BLESSEDLY NICE WEATHER for a couple weeks now, after a supercold and nasty month. Clear skies, lows around 30, highs in the 50s. Thanks, weather gods! The local weather bureau shows a neat animation of satellite views. You can see the broad snowcover on most of the western…
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Is Trump Harding?
Yesterday I focused on the government as a hugely complex product with lots of conflicting parts, good and trivial and massively evil. This reminds me of an earlier vow to let the dust settle before trying to judge what Trump is doing. Without a doubt Trump is throwing a lot of dust in many directions,…
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It’s all Duane Jones
When you favor or oppose an action for reasons that don’t align 100% with Team A or Team B, it’s much harder to maintain your own opinion. I had this trouble with bitcoin. I oppose it for solid experience-based reasons. I was a bookkeeper for years, so I know how real ledgers work. Bitcoin is…
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Go with the influencers
Random thought, might be a halfway good correlation, not definite. Persuasion includes sharing your customer’s interests whether you mean it or not. Repooflicans and Democrats are opposite in this area. If you want to know what youngsters are interested in, watch the influencers. Right now the influencers of both genders are completely traditional. Male influencers**…
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More vexillology
Following on Harper’s observations about Canada vs US in his discussion of flags. US bureaucracies and journalists and academics are responding to Trump’s cuts by protesting and petitioning. Canada is responding to Trump’s cuts by altering its behavior to SOLVE THE PROBLEM. The PROBLEM in both cases is too much dependence on US government and…
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How to do empathy
Journalists have zero empathy, can’t grasp the needs and desires of a reader who doesn’t belong to the same caste and clique. Here’s a beautiful example of understanding how a stranger thinks! Joke seen on Quora: Two statues, a male and female, stood in Central Park for 50 years. One day a genie came along…
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Vexillology
Another interesting interview from The Hub. They discuss the history of flags with Stephen Harper, former Canadian PM. I’ve never paid much attention to flags because I don’t understand the whole concept of teams. I don’t grasp saluting “my flag” or “my team” or “my country”. If the government is performing its functions well, I’ll…
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Elon vs FDR
Elon is cutting vast amounts of federal bureaucracy, or at least attempting to do it. He has no official role, so courts would be fully justified in rejecting all of his cuts. SYLLOGISM. FIRST PREMISE: We know that Elon will never cut war or tyranny, the only federal FUNCTIONS that need to be eliminated. He…
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Not just the religious pope
Comment seen on substack. = = = = = START QUOTE: Here’s a semi-annual reminder to all my Northern Hemisphere comrades (the North Wind People): we live under the tyranny of a calendar designed by a Mediterranean pope—a man who probably thought of “winter” as the time to bring a warmer linen shirt to the…
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Bad batch
Spokane News facebook page reported 14 drug overdoses in the last 12 hours. Must be an especially bad batch or perhaps EBT card time at end of month. [Later, we reached 20 in 24 hours. New record, I think! Congrats, city and state and federal dysgovernments!!!!] Interestingly, one commenter added this: If you watch closer,…
Polistra's Mill
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Polistra's Mill 