Same here. (look what i am replying to, instead of going to sleep at 2:00 AM in the night!)
Every time I am on escalator going up, I "pull" the handrail (lean on it), and every time it moves slower then the stairs. This is 100% tested. Maybe the reason is that the handrail is not done to carry weight, so it will stop (quite easy, actually) if you pull it. I still didn't find yet in my life an escalator that has the stairs and handrail sync'd when going up.

[QUOTE=LaurV;500052]Ye all OCD people trying to "sort" al kind of thingies in "logic" and "expected" order... :razz:[/QUOTE][QUOTE=LaurV;500059][b]Every time[/b] I am on escalator going up, I "pull" the handrail (lean on it), and every time it moves slower then the stairs. This is 100% tested.[/QUOTE]Hehe, now who is Mr. OCD?

"[URL="https://www.bbc.com/news/stories-45879034"]I call my OCD Olivia[/URL]"

Walkway problem solved!
 

Coincidentally, there's [url=https://www.chicagotribune.com/news/columnists/ct-ohare-united-moving-walkway-getting-around-met-0921-20150920-column.html]this story[/url] about moving walkways at O'Hare Airport. I have a vague recollection about these things making people vertiginous or some such when they first went into use around 30 years ago.

[QUOTE=retina;500034]And of course for [strike]hysterical[/strike] historical reasons it can never be changed, ever. :sad:[/QUOTE]

But I suppose a new argument could be used to get it to produce the logical output. To me it would be much better to key
[CODE]date -logical[/CODE]
instead of
[QUOTE=Dr Sardonicus;499973]

date -j -f "%a %b %d %T %Z %Y" "`date`" "+%s"[/QUOTE]

[QUOTE=BudgieJane;500105]But I suppose a new argument could be used to get it to produce the logical output. To me it would be much better to key
[CODE]date -logical[/CODE][/QUOTE]To me it would be much better to key[code]date[/code]to produce the logical output.

If you want weird formats then you should be required to type weird commands. An eye for an eye.

[QUOTE=retina;500106]If you want weird formats then you should be required to type weird commands.[/QUOTE]

[CODE]$ alias date='date +"%Y.%m.%d_%H:%M %z"'
$ date
2018.11.11_13:48 -0400[/CODE]

And then it messes up all other options.[code]~ alias date='date +"%Y.%m.%d_%H:%M %z"'
~ date -Is
date: multiple output formats specified[/code]

[QUOTE=retina;500108]And then it messes up all other options.[/QUOTE]

Then alias it to something else, like perhaps "mydate".

Now workers could get MICRO-CHIPPED by their bosses
 

[url]https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-6377831/British-businesses-planning-microchip-employees-boost-security.html[/url]

Paraphrasing: "We don't trust our employees, so f:censored:k them, they'll have to have chips implanted or they can get lost."

Once you have lost trust you have lost everything. Might as well close shop and move away.

[QUOTE=retina;500150][url]https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-6377831/British-businesses-planning-microchip-employees-boost-security.html[/url]

Paraphrasing: "We don't trust our employees, so f:censored:k them, they'll have to have chips implanted or they can get lost."

Once you have lost trust you have lost everything. Might as well close shop and move away.[/QUOTE]This reminds me of the old [i]Star Trek[/i] episode [url=http://www.chakoteya.net/StarTrek/65.htm]For The World Is Hollow And I Have Touched The Sky[/url]:[quote]ORACLE: He must become one of the people, worship the creators, and agree to the insertion of the Instrument of Obedience.[/quote]

Pic of Late-afternoon sun in Marin county, CA
 

Pic I took today from near my place of late-day sun through smoky haze from the deadly Camp Fire near Chico, 150 miles away - my little Canon Elph doesn't do the blood-orange color justice, but properly conveys the apocalyptically bad air quality:

[QUOTE=ewmayer;500325]Pic I took today from near my place of late-day sun through smoky haze from the deadly Camp Fire near Chico, 150 miles away - my little Canon Elph doesn't do the blood-orange color justice, but properly conveys the apolitically bad air quality:[/QUOTE]
If the camera has exposure compensation, try reducing the exposure in steps, like -2/3, -1&1/3. You'll sacrifice the foreground to some extent, but you'll retain more color in the sun. Of course, unfiltered digital photography of the sun can be very bad for the sensor. That much smoke does lots of filtering and should protect it.

[QUOTE=ewmayer;500325]Pic I took today from near my place of late-day sun through smoky haze from the deadly Camp Fire near Chico, 150 miles away - my little Canon Elph doesn't do the blood-orange color justice, but properly conveys the apocalyptically bad air quality:[/QUOTE]Dang, I'm coughing just [i]looking[/i] at that picture!

In 1940-70s, [URL="https://www.kcet.org/shows/lost-la/las-smoggy-past-in-photos"]in LA[/URL] that would have been considered a good evening!

[QUOTE=Batalov;500369]In 1940-70s, [URL="https://www.kcet.org/shows/lost-la/las-smoggy-past-in-photos"]in LA[/URL] that would have been considered a good evening![/QUOTE]
Thanks for that. I had not know that peak was in the 40s. The bus promotion is hilarious, with mohair seats, forsooth. I did once see the horizontal clouds from the hills, while traveling with an aunt, uncle, and cousin in the early 70s. I also remember the LA air in the early 80s looking dirty yellowish at a distance of a block or two. :yucky::ick: (Chicago blocks, that is, 8 to the mile.)

[QUOTE=Dr Sardonicus;500350]Dang, I'm coughing just [I]looking[/I] at that picture![/QUOTE]
You have to come to Chiang Mai in March/April... :razz:

[QUOTE=LaurV;500485]You have to come to Chiang Mai in March/April... :razz:[/QUOTE]
Hmm, this should be educational... <google google>

Oh, boy, [b]ewmayer[/b] should get a kick out of this! According to the Wikipedia page on [url=https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chiang_Mai]Chiang Mai[/url], [quote]According to the Bangkok Post, corporations in the agricultural sector, not farmers, are the biggest contributors to smoke pollution. The main source of the fires is forested area being cleared to make room for new crops. The new crops to be planted after the smoke clears are not rice and vegetables to feed locals. A single crop is responsible: corn. "The true source of the haze...sits in the boardrooms of corporations eager to expand production and profits. A chart of Thailand's growth in world corn markets can be overlaid on a chart of the number of fires. It is no longer acceptable to scapegoat hill tribes and slash-and-burn agriculture for the severe health and economic damage caused by this annual pollution." These data have been ignored by the government. The end is not in sight, as the number of fires has increased every year for a decade, and data shows more pollution in late-February 2016 than in late-February 2015.[/quote]

Agri-biz is busy stripping tropical jungle all over the world. It is one of the substantial causes of greenhouse gas increase. It also threatens many endangered habitats and species.

Chiang Mai looks really beautiful.

'He's like Al Capone': turkey on the loose ruffles feathers in Rhode Island town
 

This is not your Thanksgiving turkey. This is the kind of bird that Ben Franklin wanted as the National Bird.
[QUOTE]At the beginning, the turkey was a mere curiosity.
It had arrived in the town of Johnston, [URL="https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/rhode-island"]Rhode Island[/URL], in May, along with two other birds, and taken up residence outside town hall.
Wild turkeys aren’t uncommon in this part of the world, but people thought it unusual when the birds were still hanging around days later. Locals quickly warmed to the new neighbors. People took photos, and someone even set up a Facebook [URL="https://www.facebook.com/johnstonturkey/"]page[/URL]. It was all good fun.
.....
Until the turkeys began meddling in the town’s administrative affairs.
“They were starting to interfere with the people coming in to pay their taxes and do their business,” said Joseph Polisena, Johnston’s mayor. “They were scaring people away.”
[/QUOTE]
[QUOTE]Through summer and now approaching winter, the turkey has brought traffic to a standstill with its brazen jaunts across the local highway. It has pinned people inside their vehicles with bouts of vicious pecking and repeatedly outwitted local officials.[/QUOTE]

[QUOTE=kladner;500733]This is not your Thanksgiving turkey. This is the kind of bird that Ben Franklin wanted as the National Bird.[/QUOTE]
It seems there had been three of them roaming the streets of Johnston, RI. Townspeople called the "Three Amigos." Two of them were caught and relocated in August.

Some years ago, there was a program on the PBS series [b]NATURE[/b] about a man who was given a bunch of wild-turkey eggs. He incubated them, and raised the chicks. He became their "mother" -- they imprinted on him. But, after they had reached adulthood and he had released them, all that went out the window. In fact, one of them [i]attacked[/i] him, and he killed it in self-defense!

A sister had previously told me about the wild turkeys roaming around her town. She said they were attacking passers-by. People were wary of them. The turkeys hung around town for some time. Naturally, I asked if they were wearing trench-coats and fedoras.

I had a theory that maybe people had been feeding them, and they got ornery when food wasn't forthcoming. But perhaps they simply go on the offensive against anything that looks like a possible threat when it gets too close.

They're big birds. They can (unlike domestic turkeys) fly pretty well, but they spend a lot of time on the ground, sauntering around, looking for food, and conserving energy. Between their beaks and their long legs and bony feet (plus, the males have daggers on the backs of their lower legs), I would not want to mess with them.

Geese, either wild or domestic, will attack just about anything they don't like having around. One town I drove through had a resident domestic goose that would come out onto the road and peck at car or truck tires when traffic was stopped.

I've also lived in places with large populations of Canada geese. They would blanket large grassy fields, eating the grass and leaving their poop all over. Since I liked walking across fields, I carried an umbrella, rain or shine. I had only to point it at the geese in my path, and open and close it repeatedly. Even in the most crowded of gatherings, the geese would give way, almost like the parting of the Red Sea. They didn't like it -- they would hiss and threaten to peck -- but they were scared of that umbrella, and stayed out of pecking range.

I have wondered whether this would work with wild turkeys, but haven't had occasion to try it.

Large fowl are generally cantankerous. So are chickens, but they are easier to intimidate.

A one-time beach neighbor had, at one time run a chicken farm to produce fertile eggs. The birds were in large enclosures running around. My neighbor said, "a ton of hens and one tired rooster." However, when she was tending to the chickens, the rooster would come up behind and hit her with both feet in the back of the knees. Their spurs were clipped, but she said they still packed a punch that could make her knees buckle.

Your umbrella technique is the same as my dog-savvy partner's sure-fire dog deterrent: pop open an umbrella in its face. Don't be foolish and try to use the umbrella as a weapon. It is shield and a baffle. :spot:

[QUOTE=kladner;500810] <snip>
Your umbrella technique is the same as my dog-savvy partner's sure-fire dog deterrent: pop open an umbrella in its face. Don't be foolish and try to use the umbrella as a weapon. It is shield and a baffle. :spot:[/QUOTE]
I can't take credit for it. Many years ago, my mom went on a tour of Historic Charleston. In some locations, the tour guides were ladies whose getups included parasols. Which, my Mom told me, they used to shoo away pesky Canada geese by pointing, opening-closing, and advancing toward the geese. That's how I learned of it.

I'm not sure why it works. Maybe the geese see it as a threat they can't handle, like a giant hawk swooping in for the kill.

I'd never heard of using it on dogs. I've generally been able to stop an attacking dog by facing it, yelling, and stomping toward it. That even worked on a psychotic German Shepherd that, without any provocation jumped the fence of its dog run and charged at me, growling and baring its teeth. I'd been walking by, minding my own business. I managed to stand it off -- looking for a brick or large rock all the while -- until its owner, roused by my yelling, came out and corralled the beast. Good thing, too, because I could [i]not[/i] turn my back on that dog and walk away. I tried, but as soon as I started to turn away, it came toward me.

The only dog I wasn't able to at least stand off was a pit bull that came out of its yard and ran out into the street as I cycled by. I braked, which usually stops dogs that want to chase. This dog just kept coming. I got off my bike and started yelling and advancing toward the dog. It kept coming. I prepared to use my bicycle as a shield and/or club. Just then, the owner showed up and called it back. I went on my way, but I was shaking a bit...

I know that a major municipal utility supplies their meter reader with umbrellas for just this reason. They call them dog stoppers. The umbrellas have a ball on the end (like a rubber bouncy ball or tennis ball).

[QUOTE=Uncwilly;500849]I know that a major municipal utility supplies their meter reader with umbrellas for just this reason. They call them dog stoppers. The umbrellas have a ball on the end (like a rubber bouncy ball or tennis ball).[/QUOTE]This is really cool! I had no idea. of course, meter readers seem to be going the way of firemen on trains. But there are no doubt plenty of other utility workers who need to deal with dogs...

It seems this is an effective deterrent against a wide range of animals. I do [i]not[/i] think, however, it would work against
[LIST][*]Mosquitos or other biting insects, arachnids or other creepy-crawlies
[*]Male deer, elk or moose during the rut
[*]Grizzly bears[/LIST]

[url]https://secure.raptorcs.com/content/BK1B01/intro.html[/url]

Details: [url]https://www.reddit.com/r/linux/comments/9zy8q1/openpower_mainboard_blackbird_cpu_999/[/url]

:mike:

[QUOTE=Xyzzy;500954][URL]https://secure.raptorcs.com/content/BK1B01/intro.html[/URL]

Details: [URL]https://www.reddit.com/r/linux/comments/9zy8q1/openpower_mainboard_blackbird_cpu_999/[/URL]

:mike:[/QUOTE]
:shock:

[url]https://longreads.com/2018/11/28/the-rising-tide-of-wrongful-convictions/[/url]

[code]telnet towel.blinkenlights.nl[/code]

Detained
 

From a North Eastern Episcopalian church creche.

[QUOTE=kladner;501840]From a North Eastern Episcopalian church creche.[/QUOTE]
Sadly, the creche might be behind a high fence to protect it from theft or vandalism.

Also sadly, the kids being detained at our border don't have their parents with them.

[QUOTE=Dr Sardonicus;501852]Sadly, the creche might be behind a high fence to protect it from theft or vandalism.

Also sadly, the kids being detained at our border don't have their parents with them.[/QUOTE]
I will try to relocate the stories. This church, and a Massachusetts Catholic church definitely intended these displays as commentary. The other showed baby Jesus in a cage, with the wise men behind a fence.
Different report, same church-
[url]https://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-44704580[/url]
[QUOTE]A US church has placed statues of baby Jesus, Mary and Joseph in a cage on its lawn to protest against the Trump administration's immigration policy.

The Episcopalian Christ Church Cathedral in Indiana, Indianapolis, put the display up on Monday night, saying the Biblical family were refugees too.[/QUOTE]
Boston area Catholic church display-
[url]https://www.miamiherald.com/news/nation-world/national/article222654095.html[/url]

[QUOTE=kladner;501871]I will try to relocate the stories. This church, and a Massachusetts Catholic church definitely intended these displays as commentary. The other showed baby Jesus in a cage, with the wise men behind a fence.
Different report, same church-
[url]https://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-44704580[/url]

Boston area Catholic church display-
[url]https://www.miamiherald.com/news/nation-world/national/article222654095.html[/url][/QUOTE]I believe the pic you posted is at Christ Church Cathedral in Indianapolis. The display went up on July 3. It was indeed intended as a commentary on [i]Il Duce[/i]'s "zero tolerance" immigration policy that gave rise to kiddie concentration camps.

Many evangelicals and other Christians are opposed to turning away refugees and asylum seekers, because they are, based on their religious beliefs, "all about helping the stranger." This is almost certainly from the "Sheep go to heaven, goats go to hell" passage in Matthew, Chapter 25. From the King James Version (my emphasis added):

[quote]31 When the Son of man shall come in his glory, and all the holy angels with him, then shall he sit upon the throne of his glory:
32 And before him shall be gathered all nations: and he shall separate them one from another, as a shepherd divideth his sheep from the goats:
33 And he shall set the sheep on his right hand, but the goats on the left.

34 Then shall the King say unto them on his right hand, Come, ye blessed of my Father, inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world:
35 For I was an hungred, and ye gave me meat: I was thirsty, and ye gave me drink: [b]I was a stranger, and ye took me in:[/b]
36 Naked, and ye clothed me: I was sick, and ye visited me: I was in prison, and ye came unto me.
37 Then shall the righteous answer him, saying, Lord, when saw we thee an hungred, and fed thee? or thirsty, and gave thee drink?
38 When saw we thee a stranger, and took thee in? or naked, and clothed thee?
39 Or when saw we thee sick, or in prison, and came unto thee?
40 And the King shall answer and say unto them, [b]Verily I say unto you, Inasmuch as ye have done it unto one of the least of these my brethren, ye have done it unto me.[/b]

41 Then shall he say also unto them on the left hand, Depart from me, ye cursed, into everlasting fire, prepared for the devil and his angels:
42 For I was an hungred, and ye gave me no meat: I was thirsty, and ye gave me no drink:
43 [b]I was a stranger, and ye took me not in:[/b] naked, and ye clothed me not: sick, and in prison, and ye visited me not.
44 Then shall they also answer him, saying, Lord, when saw we thee an hungred, or athirst, or a stranger, or naked, or sick, or in prison, and did not minister unto thee?
45 Then shall he answer them, saying, [b]Verily I say unto you, Inasmuch as ye did it not to one of the least of these, ye did it not to me.[/b]
46 And these shall go away into everlasting punishment: but the righteous into life eternal.[/quote]

There is also the parable of the Good Samaritan in the Book of Luke. Martin Luther King, Jr. spoke about this parable at length in his [url=https://www.americanrhetoric.com/speeches/mlkivebeentothemountaintop.htm]Mountaintop speech[/url], which he gave the evening before he was assassinated. The relevant portion begins with [i]Let us develop a kind of dangerous unselfishness.[/i]

Oops. I got confused about locations. The story I first saw was playing up the irony of such a reproach in Pence's home state.

[QUOTE=kladner;501905]Oops. I got confused about locations. The story I first saw was playing up the irony of such a reproach in Pence's home state.[/QUOTE]That "RTV6 ABC" logo in the pic is a dead giveaway. It doesn't take much searching to find out it's an Indianapolis TV station.

Still -- the fact it's Mike Pence's home state [i]is[/i] ironic. Perhaps more ironic (and distressing) is the likelihood that, had he not been picked as VP, his fellow Hoosiers would have voted him out as Indiana's governor.

[QUOTE=Dr Sardonicus;501878]Many evangelicals and other Christians are opposed to turning away refugees and asylum seekers, because they are, based on their religious beliefs, "all about helping the stranger." This is almost certainly from the "Sheep go to heaven, goats go to hell" passage in Matthew, Chapter 25. From the King James Version (my emphasis added):[/quote]
Oh, damn, hope my last name isn't prophetic. ;)

Actually, jokes aside, I googled the meaning, and it means good face or God's face, so I guess the first person to take the name was either thought of as good looking or trustworthy, maybe both.



[quote]There is also the parable of the Good Samaritan in the Book of Luke. Martin Luther King, Jr. spoke about this parable at length in his [url=https://www.americanrhetoric.com/speeches/mlkivebeentothemountaintop.htm]Mountaintop speech[/url], which he gave the evening before he was assassinated. The relevant portion begins with [i]Let us develop a kind of dangerous unselfishness.[/i][/QUOTE]
Yeah, this is what I advocate for, letting them in just so we can consider their pleas for help.

I voted for Trump, but I have no love for him. As president, I mean. As a Christian, I think it's appalling that other Christians are so willing to stand behind him and support him in so many things. He needs to be rebuked for his immoral behavior.

"What has four eyes but can't see?"

[SPOILER]Mississippi ... this question is asked almost at the beginning of the film https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0095647/ ... tells a thing or two about (some) Christians [/SPOILER]

SWMBO and I visited Laly's Bar in Puerto Naos yesterday. The official name is El Buccanero but everyone calls it Laly's Bar. She's been running it ever since we first went there >20 years ago.

Anyway, this was far too good an opportunity to pass up.

Excellent! Can't stop laughing...
This are "Things that make you go."
("Hmmm...")
:rofl:

Hey Paul, I’m glad the weather there is nicer than currently in Cambridge, maximum today is 6 degC. Tuesday morning was below zero whislt driving, today a bit warmer.

[YOUTUBE]9ea4XVLqXhM[/YOUTUBE]

Far out
 

[url]https://www.popularmechanics.com/space/solar-system/a25607727/most-distant-solar-system-object-dwarf-planet/[/url]

Did the media managers for the Putin's 2018 press conference sleep through the 80s?
This photo is hilarious ([SPOILER]ok, for the younger ones - look up 'apple 1984 commercial'[/SPOILER])

[QUOTE=Batalov;503544]Did the media managers for the Putin's 2018 press conference sleep through the 80s?[/QUOTE]
Maybe they hadn't been born yet.
[QUOTE]This photo is hilarious ([SPOILER]ok, for the younger ones - look up 'apple 1984 commercial'[/SPOILER])[/QUOTE]
Hmm. It looks like everyone in the [i]audience[/i] is sleeping through the press conference, though. I guess Putin has some work to do on his Cult of Personality.

In [u]The Gulag Archipelago[/u], Solzhenitsyn mentions an incident when Stalin gave a speech, and the applause after he was done went on and on. Five minutes. Ten minutes. Everyone's hands were getting sore, but everyone was afraid to be the [i]first[/i] one to stop applauding. But after ten minutes, one man finally was courageous enough to stop. Everyone else was then free to stop applauding. The brave man, however, was almost immediately dragged away by security agents.

It seems his sacrifice was not in vain, though. Some time after I read of this incident, I saw a film of Stalin giving a speech. After he was done, the audience gave him a standing ovation. After this had gone on for a while, an electric bell could be heard r-r-r-r-ringing. This was the signal that it was all right to stop applauding...

Haha, that is a funny story. In my country during the communism there was a photo circulating underground with ceausescu's speech at some world-leaders meeting, that meeting lasted few days and all leaders took it on stage to say something; on the day ceausescu was speaking there was no people in the hall, most probably nobody gave a sh!t at the time, about some east european unknown guy speaking, so only few guyz and galz here and there, leaders of other states that had nothing better to do, or their bodyguards or something... Now, our local newspapers could not publish a photo of the most loved son of the country speaking to an empty hall, so they doctored it, by pasting the hall full of people from the day before, when Carter (or was it Reagan? or Nixon?) was speaking. Or they cut and pasted ceausescu instead of the potus a day before, to show the stuffed hall. Or whatever. The result was that in the newspaper appeared a photo with one ceausescu speaking on the stage, and another ceausescu watching carefully in the audience - of course he was present on the day potus spoke! :rofl:

All internal photos always showed him talking to a room full of people who were eagerly listening or applauding, so who the hack would think about the fact that he could be in audience? Nobody ever even looked for it, haha.

This is a true story. They did huge efforts next days to collect (and burn) all the newspapers, but the hurt was done. Few clever people hidden few newspapers, or cut out photos, which were circulating underground (between close friends) in the eighties.

[QUOTE=LaurV;504096] <snip> Now, our local newspapers could not publish a photo of the most loved son of the country speaking to an empty hall, so they doctored it, by pasting the hall full of people from the day before, when Carter (or was it Reagan? or Nixon?) was speaking. Or they cut and pasted ceausescu instead of the potus a day before, to show the stuffed hall. Or whatever. The result was that in the newspaper appeared a photo with one ceausescu speaking on the stage, and another ceausescu watching carefully in the audience - of course he was present on the day potus spoke! :rofl:

All internal photos always showed him talking to a room full of people who were eagerly listening or applauding, so who the hack would think about the fact that he could be in audience? Nobody ever even looked for it, haha.

This is a true story. They did huge efforts next days to collect (and burn) all the newspapers, but the hurt was done. Few clever people hidden few newspapers, or cut out photos, which were circulating underground (between close friends) in the eighties.[/QUOTE]I'm surprised they didn't say the picture was proof positive that the man was superhuman, and could literally be in two places at once! I'm not sure how the folks responsible for the mistake fared, but my guess is, "not well."

I found an outline of [url=https://rolandia.eu/en/blog/history-of-romania/romania-under-nicolae-ceausescu-s-communist-regime]Romania under Nicolae Ceausescu's communist regime[/url].

One community that really wound up [i]under[/i] was the village of [url=https://www.boredpanda.com/geamana-village-sinking-industrial-waste-romania-amos-chapple/]Geamana[/url].

The story about trying to confiscate all the newspapers reminds me of a scene from the movie [i]Absence of Malice[/i] in which a young woman, finding the local paper has published a scandalous revelation about her (I think she'd had an abortion, but I'm not sure) was making a pathetic effort to gather up all the delivered papers on the neighbors' lawns.

It also reminds me of the Stalin era, when they were quite literally rewriting history -- sending agents with specially reprinted pages of books to replace the originals in libraries, etc.

I recall mentioning before that [i]Il Duce[/i]'s legal counsel tried (unsuccessfully) to coerce the publishers of [u]Fire and Fury[/u] to "cease and desist" from publication.

Here is [url=https://assets.documentcloud.org/documents/4343617/Read-Trump-lawyer-s-letter-to-Michael-Wolff-and.pdf]The actual cease-and-desist letter[/url]. It reminds me of someone threatening to shoot while brandishing an empty gun.

The publisher's legal counsel Elizabeth McNamara pointed this out in a [url=https://assets.documentcloud.org/documents/4345182/3986-1.pdf]formal response[/url]. Since this file is an image, I provide a text version, as found, e.g. [url=https://www.shelf-awareness.com/issue.html?issue=3160#m39028]here[/url]. I have bolded some of my favorite passages.

[quote]Dear Mr. Harder:

I write as counsel to Henry Holt and Company, Inc. ("Henry Holt") and Mr. Michael Wolff in response to your letter dated January 4, 2018, concerning your client, President Donald J. Trump. [b]Without identifying a single false statement[/b], your letter broadly challenges Mr. Wolff's book titled Fire and Fury: Inside the Trump White House published Friday, and an excerpt from the book published in a January 3, 2018 New York magazine article, as containing "false/baseless statements" about President Trump that give rise to a host of legal claims. As a result, you demand that my clients cease publication of the book and "issue a full and complete retraction and apology." My clients do not intend to cease publication, no such retraction will occur, and no apology is warranted.

As President Trump knows, Mr. Wolff was permitted extraordinary access to the Trump administration and campaign from May 2016 to this past October, and he conducted more than 200 interviews with President Trump, most members of his senior staff, and with many people they in turn talked to. These interviews served as the basis for the reporting in Mr. Wolff's book. We have no reason to doubt--and your letter provides no reason to change this conclusion--that Mr. Wolff's book is an accurate report on events of vital public importance. Mr. Trump is the President of the United States, with the "bully pulpit" at his disposal. To the extent he disputes any statement in the book, he has the largest platform in the world to challenge it. Generalized and abstract threats of libel do not provide any basis for President Trump's demand that Henry Holt and Mr. Wolff withdraw the book from public discourse. Though your letter provides a basic summary of New York libel law, tellingly, [b]it stops short of identifying a single statement in the book that is factually false or defamatory. [i]Instead, the letter appears to be designed to silence legitimate criticism. This is the antithesis of an actionable libel claim.[/i][/b]

Your letter does not resolve this key omission when it argues that actual malice can be proven because the book "admits in the Introduction that it contains untrue statements." It does no such thing. Instead, Mr. Wolff responsibly tells his readers his approach to confronting the well-established reality that many in this administration, most prominently the President, routinely traffic in verifiably false statements. Thus, Mr. Wolff explains how he attempted to reconcile conflicting accounts. Surely you are not contending that Mr. Wolff, in reporting on a falsehood told him by, e.g., a member of the administration, is therefore necessarily reporting that it is true.

To briefly address a few of the additional substantive claims identified in your letter, we note that you understandably cite to New York as the governing law, yet we were surprised to see that President Trump plans on asserting a claim for "false light invasion of privacy." As you are no doubt aware, New York does not recognize such a cause of action. Messenger ex rel. Messenger v. Guner + Jahr Printing and Pub., 94 N.Y.2d 436, 448 (2000); Hurwitz v. U.S., 884 F.2d 684, 685 (2d Cir. 1989). Not only is this claim meritless; it is non-existent. In any event, it is patently ridiculous to claim that the privacy of the President of the United States has been violated by a book reporting on his campaign and his actions in office.

Next, your letter focuses on alleged claims for tortious interference with contractual relations and inducement of breach of contract. Yet, as your client will no doubt appreciate, timing is everything when it comes to these claims. And there is no dispute that Mr. Bannon had already communicated with Mr. Wolff freely and voluntarily well before the "notice" you have provided. Mr. Bannon plainly needed no cajoling or inducement to speak candidly with Mr. Wolff. And an after-the-fact lawyer's letter putting my clients "on notice" does not put the genie back in the bottle, much less subject Henry Holt or Mr. Wolff to liability. The law treats sources like Mr. Bannon as adults, and it is Mr. Bannon's responsibility--not Henry Holt's or Mr. Wolff's--to honor any contractual obligations. Indeed, your attempt to use private contracts to act as a blanket restriction on members of the government speaking to the press is a perversion of contract law and a gross violation of the First Amendment. No court would support such an attempt to silence public servants and the press.

Nor are these the only clear infirmities with this threatened claim. For a tortious interference with contractual relations action to be sustained, President Trump must prove that Henry Holt and Mr. Wolff actively and intentionally procured the breach for the sole purpose of harming Mr. Trump, his family, or businesses. Jacobs v. Continuum Health Partners, Inc., 7 A.D.3d 312, 313, 776 N.Y.S.2d 279, 280 (1st Dep't 2004). This he cannot do. A reporter, like Mr. Wolff, "whose motive and conduct is intended to foster public awareness and debate cannot be found to have engaged in the wrongful or improper conduct required" to state such a claim. See, e.g., Huggins v. Povitch, No. 131164/94, 1996 WL 515498, at *9 (N.Y. Sup. Ct. Apr. 19, 1996). Put simply, the book's purpose is news reporting and nothing more.

Lastly, the majority of your letter--indeed, seven full pages--is devoted to instructing Henry Holt and Mr. Wolff in meticulous detail about their obligations to preserve documents that relate in any way to the book, the article, President Trump, his family members, their businesses, and his Presidential campaign. While my clients do not adopt or subscribe to your description of their legal obligations, Henry Holt and Mr. Wolff will comply with any and all document preservation obligations that the law imposes upon them. [b]At the same time, we must remind you that President Trump, in his personal and governmental capacity, must comply with the same legal obligations regarding himself, his family members, their businesses, the Trump campaign, and his administration, and must ensure all appropriate measures to preserve such documents are in place. This would include any and all documents pertaining to any of the matters about which the book reports. [i]Should you pursue litigation against Henry Holt or Mr. Wolff, we are quite confident that documents related to the contents of the book in the possession of President Trump, his family members, his businesses, his campaign, and his administration will prove particularly relevant to our defense.[/i][/b]

This letter is without waiver of any of Henry Holt's or Mr. Wolff's rights, remedies or defenses, all of which are expressly reserved.[/quote]

[url]https://www.popularmechanics.com/science/math/a25686417/amoeba-math/[/url]

It might bemuse you to read this [url=https://www.washingtonpost.com/lifestyle/magazine/jerry-falwell-jr-cant-imagine-trump-doing-anything-thats-not-good-for-the-country/2018/12/21/6affc4c4-f19e-11e8-80d0-f7e1948d55f4_story.html?noredirect=on]Extract of an interview with Jerry Falwell, Jr[/url].

Me, I was almost acting like the duck leaving the barber shop at the end of the [url=https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VS83HdpzxDU]AFLAC ad with Yogi Berra[/url]

My favorite quote from Falwell:

[quote]A poor person never gave anybody charity, not of any real volume.[/quote]

I guess the story told in Mark 12:41-44 and Luke 21:1-4 doesn't mean much to him...

[QUOTE=Xyzzy;504361][url]https://www.popularmechanics.com/science/math/a25686417/amoeba-math/[/url][/QUOTE]

See also PhysOrg link to the traveling-salesamoeba story on 12/22 in Science News thread.

[url=https://www.duffelblog.com/2019/01/california-national-guard-declassifies-bro-code-talkers/]California National Guard declassifies “Bro-Code Talkers”[/url] | Duffelblog

[QUOTE=Dr Sardonicus;504635]It might bemuse you to read this [URL="https://www.washingtonpost.com/lifestyle/magazine/jerry-falwell-jr-cant-imagine-trump-doing-anything-thats-not-good-for-the-country/2018/12/21/6affc4c4-f19e-11e8-80d0-f7e1948d55f4_story.html?noredirect=on"]Extract of an interview with Jerry Falwell, Jr[/URL].

Me, I was almost acting like the duck leaving the barber shop at the end of the [URL="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VS83HdpzxDU"]AFLAC ad with Yogi Berra[/URL]

My favorite quote from Falwell:

I guess the story told in Mark 12:41-44 and Luke 21:1-4 doesn't mean much to him...[/QUOTE]
What a horrible creature. I guess religious hucksterism must pay pretty well, since he's so firmly up Trump's patootie. Birds of a feather, and all that.

[QUOTE=kladner;505344]What a horrible creature[/QUOTE]
Thanks for the headups, so I won't waste my time reading it :)

[QUOTE=kladner;505344]What a horrible creature. I guess religious hucksterism must pay pretty well, since he's so firmly up Trump's patootie. Birds of a feather, and all that.[/QUOTE]
Perhaps the most telling part of the interview is this:

[b]Q:[/b] Is there anything President Trump could do that would endanger that support from you or other evangelical leaders?

[b]A:[/b] No.

[i]Il Duce[/i] did say he could go out on Fifth Avenue and shoot someone, and not lose any support. Not, apparently, from the evangelical leaders. This is a classic case of what is called "blind loyalty."

We now turn to the Good Book (KJV), the Book of Matthew, Chapter 15, verse 14:[quote]Let them alone: they be blind leaders of the blind. And if the blind lead the blind, both shall fall into the ditch.[/quote]

Actual Drug Dosage Instructions
 

I work for a local Health Company and just happened across the following dosage instructions recorded by a doctor:

[QUOTE]TAKE 1 CAPSULE AT ONCE UNTIL MEDICATION IS COMPLETED[/QUOTE]

and may I add: BUT DON"T CHOKE

[QUOTE]Doctor, doctor! Give my anti-greed pills and -- as many as possible![/QUOTE]:jokedrum:

Yeah, right!

[ATTACH]19626[/ATTACH]


(shameless copied from thaivisa.com)

[QUOTE=LaurV;505594]Yeah, right!

[ATTACH]19626[/ATTACH]


(shameless copied from thaivisa.com)[/QUOTE]Man, that could be turned into a [i]real[/i] punishment. Wow. I've heard for a long time that Thailand had a lot to offer along those lines. I never thought of that particular method of, ah, "filling the ranks."

I can see it now...

"How'd someone like you get into this uh, business?"

"I'm working off a shoplifting conviction."

[COLOR=LemonChiffon].[/COLOR]

[QUOTE=Dr Sardonicus;505606]"I'm working off a shoplifting conviction."[/QUOTE]
Haha, you should go to thaivisa and read the comments. Easy to find with a search by the phrase. Quite funny material to read, along the same lines you said. If you have nothing to do this weekend and whole next week...

@Serge: genial! :razz:

Brett Kavanaugh Offers to Pay for Wall by Recycling His Empties
 

[url]https://readersupportednews.org/opinion2/277-75/54397-brett-kavanaugh-offers-to-pay-for-wall-by-recycling-his-empties[/url]
[QUOTE]In a bid to end the government shutdown, Supreme Court Justice Brett Kavanaugh said on Thursday that he would recycle his empties to pay for a wall with Mexico.[/QUOTE]

The latest casualty of the California wildfires would seem to be shareholders in Pacific Gas & Electric: [url=https://ktla.com/2019/01/14/pge-facing-billions-in-claims-from-deadly-camp-fire-will-file-for-bankruptcy/]PG&E Will File for Bankruptcy[/url].

I wonder if the "suits" at PG&E unloaded their stock before making the announcement
:devil:

[QUOTE=Dr Sardonicus;505875]The latest casualty of the California wildfires would seem to be shareholders in Pacific Gas & Electric: [URL="https://ktla.com/2019/01/14/pge-facing-billions-in-claims-from-deadly-camp-fire-will-file-for-bankruptcy/"]PG&E Will File for Bankruptcy[/URL].

[U]I wonder if the "suits" at PG&E unloaded their stock before making the announcement[/U]
:devil:[/QUOTE]
I wonder if this means that PG&E unloads the decommissioning of the [URL="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Diablo_Canyon_Power_Plant"]Diablo Canyon[/URL] nukes on the tax payers. Of course, that seems to be who gets stuck with a lot of such cleanups, anyway.
[QUOTE]In June 2016, PG&E announced that it plans to close the two Diablo Canyon reactors in 2024 and 2025.[URL="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Diablo_Canyon_Power_Plant#cite_note-12"][12][/URL] Full decommissioning of the plant is estimated to take decades and [U]cost nearly 4 billion dollars.[/U][URL="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Diablo_Canyon_Power_Plant#cite_note-13"][13][/URL][/QUOTE]
One supposes that the real cost will be several times $4B. Such estimates are always [URL="https://duckduckgo.com/?q=aspirational&t=ffsb"]aspirational[/URL], to say the least.

[QUOTE=kladner;505886]One supposes that the real cost will be several times $4B. Such estimates are always [URL="https://duckduckgo.com/?q=aspirational&t=ffsb"]aspirational[/URL], to say the least.[/QUOTE]Several [url="https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/Sagan"]Sagans[/url] in other words.

[QUOTE=xilman;505897]Several [URL="https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/Sagan"]Sagans[/URL] in other words.[/QUOTE]
LOL! :lol: Exactly (more or less.) :razz:

[URL]https://www.pbs.org/video/decoding-watson-ua6jjx/[/URL]

Another interview, another scandal. Hmmmm....

[QUOTE=Batalov;505951][URL]https://www.pbs.org/video/decoding-watson-ua6jjx/[/URL]

Another interview, another scandal. Hmmmm....[/QUOTE]

Meanwhile, the Republicans are desperately pretending to be shocked -- [i][b]shocked![/b][/i] that Rep. Steve King (R-Iowa) wonders, [quote]White nationalist, white supremacist, Western civilization – how did that language become offensive?[/quote]And well he may wonder. The Republican party became the unofficial home of opposition to civil rights in 1964 when Strom Thurmond joined the party and the "solid South" (solidly Democratic) voted for the Republican Barry Goldwater, and became the official home of American racism in 1968, with Nixon's "Southern strategy." It has remained so ever since. Rep. King, James Watson, et al might be well advised to ponder the wisdom of the Good Book:

Mark 7 (KJV)
[quote]14 And when he had called all the people unto him, he said unto them, Hearken unto me every one of you, and understand:
15 There is nothing from without a man, that entering into him can defile him: but the things which come out of him, those are they that defile the man.
16 If any man have ears to hear, let him hear.

17 And when he was entered into the house from the people, his disciples asked him concerning the parable.
18 And he saith unto them, Are ye so without understanding also? Do ye not perceive, that whatsoever thing from without entereth into the man, it cannot defile him;
19 Because it entereth not into his heart, but into the belly, and goeth out into the draught, purging all meats?
20 And he said, That which cometh out of the man, that defileth the man.
21 For from within, out of the heart of men, proceed evil thoughts, adulteries, fornications, murders,
22 Thefts, covetousness, wickedness, deceit, lasciviousness, an evil eye, blasphemy, pride, foolishness:
23 All these evil things come from within, and defile the man.[/quote]

Re. wisdom of the Good Book, much depends on [url=https://www.bethinking.org/bible/old-testament-mass-killings]which parts of said book one is reading[/url]. we really need some kind of ranking system for level of bloodthirst by book, a sort of biblical smite-o-meter.

Ecclesiastes. (Starts on [SPOILER]page 666[/SPOILER] of the Russian edition.)
Never gets old.
'That which is crooked cannot be made straight: and that which is wanting cannot be numbered.'
'And I gave my heart to know wisdom, and to know madness and folly: I perceived that this also is vexation of spirit.'
'Is there any thing whereof it may be said, See, this is [I]new[/I]? it hath been already of old time, which was before us.'

File this incident under "Hmmmm... Some people!"
 

I just bought a new electric shaver.

Except, when I pulled it out of the box, I quickly learned it wasn't exactly new. The shave head popped off. It was broken, and wouldn't stay reattached when put in the right position. And, it had been [i]used[/i]. There was hair and dander in the area under the shave head, which had been exposed when the head popped off. Yuck.

It was apparent upon closer scrutiny that someone had peeled back some of the tape that held the box shut. Obviously they'd then taken the razor out of the box. My guess is, they'd gone to the restroom to shave, somehow managed to break the shaver, returned it to the box, then closed the box and resealed the tape.

The store will take it back, no problem.

I am flailing for adjectives to describe someone who would do something like that. I am also somewhat at a loss to name a fitting punishment. I am open to suggestions on either count.

I had once driven back to the store to get the right oil filter (as the first car was already bled and I reached for the filter and opened the box... isn't it good to have two cars?). There was a cheap wrong filter in the sealed box. I suspect just as much as you did above.

Of course they replaced it, but oh the humanity... Not to mention that my ride to the store and back and the time it took was way more expensive than the damned filter.

[QUOTE=Dr Sardonicus;506840]I just bought a new electric shaver.

Except, when I pulled it out of the box, I quickly learned it wasn't exactly new. The shave head popped off. It was broken, and wouldn't stay reattached when put in the right position. And, it had been [I]used[/I]. There was hair and dander in the area under the shave head, which had been exposed when the head popped off. Yuck.

It was apparent upon closer scrutiny that someone had peeled back some of the tape that held the box shut. Obviously they'd then taken the razor out of the box. My guess is, they'd gone to the restroom to shave, somehow managed to break the shaver, returned it to the box, then closed the box and resealed the tape.

The store will take it back, no problem.

I am flailing for adjectives to describe someone who would do something like that. I am also somewhat at a loss to name a fitting punishment. I am open to suggestions on either count.[/QUOTE]
Maybe you'll feel better about the whole thing if considering that possibly it was a broke homeless person trying to look good for a job lead. (Can't know the real story for sure, so why not make up a good one. He needed it. He didn't steal it, just "borrowed" it. And got the job, & things are looking up.)
I've seen some very strange things on the retail shelf or peg myself. An extreme case: a belt labeled for 36" waistlines, whose buckle was the longest part of it at 1.5". The tiny useless thing had been made in China, shipped across an ocean, hauled by truck or rail from the Pacific coast to Wisconsin, and put on a peg in a Menards along with normal usable length belts. (Why Menards, a building construction and repair supply store, is selling groceries and clothing is another puzzle entirely.)
Getting back to your question, maybe a fitting punishment would be working in retail. At the customer service/returns counter in a Menards.

Same thing happened to me when purchasing a hard drive from Walmart. When I got my still shrink wrapped brand new Western Digital hard drive home, I opened it to find a very old, very used Connor hard drive. Someone must have had a shrink wrapping machine at home.

Maybe they did that a number of times, because fortunately Walmart took it back no questions asked, almost like they had seen it many times before.

What is it with people?

Bingo! The store that I didn't want to name was indeed a W--mart.

[QUOTE=PhilF;506868]Same thing happened to me when purchasing a hard drive from Walmart. When I got my still shrink wrapped brand new Western Digital hard drive home, I opened it to find a very old, very used Connor hard drive. Someone must have had a shrink wrapping machine at home.

Maybe they did that a number of times, because fortunately Walmart took it back no questions asked, almost like they had seen it many times before.

What is it with people?[/QUOTE]
Maybe it was [b]MALL*WART[/b] employees living out the advertising slogan, [i]Save money. Live better.[/i] After all, legend has it they don't get paid much, so they might have to get, uh, [i]creative[/i] to make ends meet.

FWIW, I think the company slogan should be a quotation I saw posted on the wall at a Baskin-Robbins when I was a kid. It was (mistakenly) attributed to John Ruskin, and as best I can recall, ran as follows:[quote]There is nothing in this world that some man can not make a little worse and sell a little cheaper, and those who consider price alone are this man's lawful prey.[/quote]

"The bitterness of poor quality remains long after the sweetness of low price is forgotten”

:mike:

[QUOTE=Xyzzy;507167]"The bitterness of poor quality remains long after the sweetness of low price is forgotten”[/QUOTE]Like many other quotations, InternetLand attributes it to Benjamin Franklin. I doubt it. It doesn't sound right for the period. Nobody gave an actual source.

I did, however, find some very similar ones, with more modern origins.

"Quality is remembered long after the price is forgotten." -- Sir Henry Royce (apparently later adopted by Aldo Gucci, to whom this is also attributed)

I also found a very similar quotation, attributed to his famous business partner.

"Poor quality is remembered long after low prices are forgotten." -- Charles Rolls

I saw at least a [i]mention[/i] of when Royce said the above in a Wikiquotes page. Both quotations are also given [url=https://www.derbytelegraph.co.uk/news/derby-news/made-in-derby-rolls-royce-1589730]here[/url].

I used to shop at a stereo store in Kansas City called David Beatty Stereo (long since out of business).

There was a sign on the counter that said "Buy the best and cry once".

According to Google "This quote has been attributed to interior designer Miles Redd but the saying has been bandied about since the 1920’s"

Who you gonna believe, me or your lying eyes?
 

[i]Il Duce[/i] has claimed that his intel chiefs told him they were "totally misquoted" and "totally taken out of context" -- in their [i]public testimony[/i] that was [i]broadcast live[/i].

The line hasn't changed much over the years. Here's the [url=https://quoteinvestigator.com/2018/07/31/believe-eyes/]Quote Investigator[/url]'s take.

POWERFUL FULL AFTERBURN Departure 3x Su-22 Fitters Polish AF; Volkel 2013
 

[YOUTUBE]kF99RlzaPuU?t=377[/YOUTUBE] Watch the early couple of minutes if you get off on taxiing. The rest is the planes sitting there blowing heat waves until 6:30.

I am not sure what good the afterburner takeoff would do in real military action. If they spent all that time trundling about on the ground, they would have been fragged long before they lined up at the runway. This just seems like hotdogging.

Oh, yeah. Are those Su-22 [U]pipe[/U] 'Fitters?'

[QUOTE=kladner;507682]<snip>
I am not sure what good the afterburner takeoff would do in real military action. If they spent all that time trundling about on the ground, they would have been fragged long before they lined up at the runway. This just seems like hotdogging.
<snip>[/QUOTE]
That very question is discussed [url=https://aviation.stackexchange.com/questions/35851/why-do-military-jets-seem-to-always-take-off-using-the-afterburner]here[/url].

[QUOTE=Dr Sardonicus;507704]That very question is discussed [URL="https://aviation.stackexchange.com/questions/35851/why-do-military-jets-seem-to-always-take-off-using-the-afterburner"]here[/URL].[/QUOTE]
I still find it amazing that just about any word-combination-topic can pull up pertinent answers. Near-instant access to knowledge is a wonderful tool, and great privilege.

[QUOTE=kladner;507786]I still find it amazing that just about any word-combination-topic can pull up pertinent answers. Near-instant access to knowledge is a wonderful tool, and great privilege.[/QUOTE]
I used the search parameters

aftreburners takeoff

(yes, I mipsplepped "afterburners" but Google searched on the correctly-spelled word)

The first 7 hits were YouTube videos. The eighth was a Wikipedia article about afterburners. The ninth was the one I posted the link to.

I am reminded of something science historian James Burke said in "The Day the Universe Changed" (the episode "A Matter of Fact.") He said that the invention of printing "took away our memories." What he meant was, before printing, human knowledge was largely committed to peoples' brains. He described the sort of bizarre associations that might be used to solidify memories. When printing came along, it became possible to commit many facts to print, and people no longer relied as much on remembering things they could look up.

I mention this because, with the advent of the Internet and search engines, it's so easy to look things up, the tendency to commit things to memory is probably being eroded all the more.

Alas, the art of critical thinking seems also to have largely gone by the boards. Yes, there's a lot of information out there, but [i]mis[/i]information and delusions are also easy to come by. Without the ability to winnow the chaff from the wheat, the information is effectively useless.

Went out to buy cream today and have a question. Ordered by viscosity I found half-cream, single-cream, whipping-cream and double-cream. Why isn't the third in that list "sesqui-cream"? Makes much more sense to me than the canonical nomenclature.

[QUOTE=xilman;507852]Went out to buy cream today and have a question. Ordered by viscosity I found half-cream, single-cream, whipping-cream and double-cream. Why isn't the third in that list "sesqui-cream"? Makes much more sense to me than the canonical nomenclature.[/QUOTE]
According to the Wikipedia page on [url=https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cream]Cream[/url], in the UK the following are legally defined, with minimum milk fat content as indicated.

Sterilized half cream 12% (The entry for "Half cream" doesn't have a minimum milk fat content.

Cream or single cream 18%

Whipping cream 35%

Double cream 48%

So I'm not sure what the "half- single- double-" nomenclature refers to. It's obviously [i]not[/i] milk fat content! Perhaps it refers to whatever process is employed to separate the cream from the milk. Non-homogenized milk will separate if simply allowed to stand -- the fat will rise to the top.

I don't have viscosity tables handy, but by experience, the richer the cream (i.e. the higher the fat content), the thicker it is. I don't know precisely how viscosity varies with fat content.

BTW whole milk has a 3.5% milk fat content.

Also BTW -- my mom noticed right away that "ultra-pasteurized" whipping cream does not whip like the "ordinarily" pasteurized stuff had. But finding heavy or whipping cream that [i]hasn't[/i] been ultra-pasteurized seems less than easy.

Now that I'm on the wrong side of 50, as part of my latest physical my doctor prescribed a colon test. Thankfully she gave me option of the colonoscopy (more accurate but, erm, rather more invasive) and one of those home-poop-test (fecal occult blood test) kits, with the option of still doing the former should the latter indicate anything potentially worrisome.

And here I thought I was done filling out little ovals on standardized test forms. Ha, ha, feco-calligraphy with those little sample brushes lends new meaning to "Using a number 2 pencil". :)

[QUOTE=ewmayer;507859]And here I thought I was done filling out little ovals on standardized test forms. Ha, ha, feco-calligraphy with those little sample brushes lends new meaning to "Using a number 2 pencil". :)[/QUOTE]Did you hear about the constipated mathematician?
[SPOILER]He worked it out with a pencil.[/SPOILER]:poop:

[QUOTE=ewmayer;507859]And here I thought I was done filling out little ovals on standardized test forms. Ha, ha, feco-calligraphy with those little sample brushes lends new meaning to "Using a number 2 pencil". :)[/QUOTE]
The possibilities are endless, as [url=https://www.telegraph.co.uk/technology/mark-zuckerberg/11369144/Artist-paints-portrait-of-Mark-Zuckerberg-using-own-faeces.html]this article[/url] shows!

[QUOTE=Dr Sardonicus;507861]The possibilities are endless, as [url=https://www.telegraph.co.uk/technology/mark-zuckerberg/11369144/Artist-paints-portrait-of-Mark-Zuckerberg-using-own-faeces.html]this article[/url] shows![/QUOTE]

Mark Z., as in the founder of Fecabook?

[QUOTE=ewmayer;507882]Mark Z., as in the founder of Fecabook?[/QUOTE]Fecebook.

[url]https://thedailywtf.com/images/19/q1/e347/Pic-3.png[/url]

The following jumped off the screen, from the February 7 [i]On this day in history[/i]:[quote]In 1971, women in Switzerland gained the right to vote through a national referendum, 12 years after a previous attempt failed.[/quote]

Congress critters behaving badly...
 

I happened to notice the following in "On this day in history" for February 15:

[quote]In 1798, a feud between two members of the U.S. House of Representatives (meeting in Philadelphia) boiled over as Roger Griswold of Connecticut used a cane to attack Vermont's Matthew Lyon, who defended himself with a set of tongs. (Griswold was enraged over the House's refusal to expel Lyon for spitting tobacco juice in his face two weeks earlier; after the two men were separated, a motion to expel them both was defeated.)[/quote]
Rep. Lyon has two other distinctions: He is one of the very small group of those elected as US Representatives for more than one State (in his case Vermont and Kentucky).

He is also the first (and AFAIK only) US Representative to be re-elected while incarcerated. Perhaps the unjustness of the law under which he was imprisoned had something to do with it. Whether the nature of his offense has any relevance now is more than I can say.

According to [url=https://history.house.gov/Historical-Highlights/1800-1850/The-life-of-Representative-Matthew-Lyon-of-Vermont-and-Kentucky/]The Life of Representative Matthew Lyon of Vermont and Kentucky[/url],[quote] He participated in an infamous floor brawl with Representative Roger Griswold of Connecticut, and was eventually imprisoned for violating the Sedition Act in 1798, after accusing President John Adams of having "an unbounded thirst for ridiculous pomp." While he railed against the unpopular legislation from his jail cell, Vermont voters re-elected him.[/quote]

From The Intelligencer:
[QUOTE]Heartbreaking: The worst person you know just made a great point

Look, the only national emergency is that our president is an idiot.

—[URL="https://twitter.com/kylegriffin1/status/1096510735054716928"]Ann Coulter[/URL]

[/QUOTE]

[url]https://thispersondoesnotexist.com/[/url]

This [url=https://twitter.com/ByChipBrownlee/status/1097605378307706880]February 14, 2019 editorial[/url] in the Linden, Alabama [i]Democrat-Reporter[/i], which for some reason wasn't in their online edition, has [url=https://www.theplainsman.com/article/2019/02/auburn-journalism-advisory-council-moves-to-strip-award-from-editor-who-wrote-klan-editorial]raised a few eyebrows[/url]...

Charming
[url]https://qz.com/1553777/a-teenager-found-radioactive-material-in-the-grand-canyon-museum/[/url]

[QUOTE=firejuggler;508979]charming
[url]https://qz.com/1553777/a-teenager-found-radioactive-material-in-the-grand-canyon-museum/[/url][/QUOTE]
I wouldn't be too concerned about the amount of [i]radiation[/i] from a bucket of uranium ore: Uranium isn't all that radioactive -- [sup]238[/sup]U has a half-life of about 4.5 billion years, and [sup]235[/sup]U about 0.7 billion years. Both are alpha emitters. Your skin can stop alpha particles.

So, no problem, right? [i][b]WRONG![/b][/i] One of the buckets was [i]open[/i], because it was too full to get the lid on. This creates the possibility of having radioactive [i]dust[/i] floating around in the air. And while alpha emitters [i]outside the body[/i] aren't much cause for concern, getting small alpha-emitting particles [i]inside you[/i] is [i]definitely[/i] cause for concern. Small enough dust particles can be inhaled, and lodge in the lungs. In that situation, emitted alpha particles will almost certainly hit living cells, and could make them cancerous.

There is another possible hazard, namely radon gas -- a "hot" (short half life) alpha emitter. My guess is, in the situation here it probably wasn't [i]much[/i] of a hazard -- radon gas generally doesn't accumulate to dangerous levels except in underground locations in which the air is still.

[QUOTE=Dr Sardonicus;508983]There is another possible hazard, namely radon gas -- a "hot" (short half life) alpha emitter. My guess is, in the situation here it probably wasn't [i]much[/i] of a hazard -- radon gas generally doesn't accumulate to dangerous levels except in underground locations in which the air is still.[/QUOTE]Such as basements of houses built on granite. Very common in places like Cornwall.

Even then, the radiation dosage is comparable to having a medical X-ray once a year or so.