More Esoteric than I Thought

by | Nov 8, 2021 | Open Post, Travel | 479 comments

The other day, I was surprised to learn that my colleague M did not know that the numbers of the interstate highway system have meaning.  He then brought it up in a zoom meeting.  Of about 10 people, most my age or older, only one other person besides M and myself knew what the numbers mean.

For the record – an odd number (I95, I29) means the highway runs north south.  An even number (I94, I80) means the highway runs east west.  If the first number of a three-digit number is even (I494, I695) it indicates a loop around a city.  An odd first number (I395) means a spur into the center of a city.

I thought this was common knowledge, but it is apparently more esoteric than I thought.  What is something you thought was common knowledge, but turned out not to be?

About The Author

Tulip

Tulip

She is mythical.

479 Comments

  1. Yusef drives a Kia

    Somethings missing……. Turns out I was wrong.

  2. creech

    That there was a dimes worth of difference between the Republicans and Democrats?

  3. Not Adahn

    I have a millennial friend who didn’t know any Rubbish references. She went to Sarah Lawrence.

    I dated a raised atheist in high school who didn’t understand biblical references beyond Adam and Eve. I had to explain the Noah’s Ark.

    I convinced someone else that Spam was an animal. I offered to prove it by showing her the taxidermied one that my dad had shot.

    • Not Adahn

      Rubiyat. Not rubbish. Fucking illiterate cretin autocorrect.

      • Count Potato

        I have no idea what Rubiyat is. First time I’ve seen the word.

      • Ted S.

        The Rubaiyat of Omar Khayyam. A loaf of bread, a jug of wine, and thou.

        Omar Khayyam liked the shaver so much he bought the company.

      • Fatty Bolger

        I know what it is, but only because I worked in a bookstore.

    • Animal

      I dated a raised atheist in high school who didn’t understand biblical references beyond Adam and Eve. I had to explain the Noah’s Ark.

      It’s probably not surprising that this is often the case.

      I don’t know as I was a “raised” atheist, although my father was an atheist and my Mom a kind-of-sort-of Thomas Jefferson-style Deist. I’ve always considered myself an atheist and remain so, but since knowledge is good, I’ve read four or five different versions of the Bible. I’ve also read most of the Qu’Ran, and the Book of Mormon is on my to-read list.

      I like to be able to discuss these things intelligently, and that means reading them.

      • Count Potato

        You read the entire Bible four times?

      • Animal

        Different versions, but yeah. They aren’t all the same.

      • Fatty Bolger

        Yes, I’ve found myself explaining biblical references to staunch Christians, and I’m also an atheist. I’m pretty sure I’ve read more of the Bible than most of the Christians in this country. (Not 4-5 times over though. Wow.)

      • Animal

        I find the differences in the versions interesting. I keep two in my desk reference book shelf, right here at arm’s length: A King James and a New Revised Standard. Also a Qu’Ran, as mentioned, and a rather bog-eared copy of The Golden Bough.

      • Fatty Bolger

        It is interesting. I’ve searched for phrases before, and found sites like Biblehub that show results from multiple versions.

      • trshmnstr the terrible

        I guarantee you have. It’s sad how few bother to crack open the book they profess to be the inerrant word of God. This is why I wholly believe the church is about to have a massive cleansing. Folks with an inch of dust on top of their Bibles aren’t going to stick with the faith when the culture goes explicitly anti-christian.

      • Gustave Lytton

        the Book of Mormon is on my to-read list

        Book a room at any Marriott property and open the drawer

      • grrizzly

        I bought mine at the flagship Mormon bookstore in Temple Square in Salt Lake City. Bizarrely, the shop clerks were confused as if nobody ever bought it there.

      • Gustave Lytton

        They used to give them out free in the 80’s on request via phone, if my memory serves me.

  4. ignoreLander

    You know those road reflector dots? The ones that mark the lane dividers and the shoulder boundaries and are usually white or yellow? Yeah, the colors have meaning. If you see a blue one, it means a fire hydrant at the side of the road. I was told that when I was a little kid by a fireman, and grew up thinking everyone knew that. Turns out it’s pretty ESOTERIC.

    By the way, if you see red dots on the road, get the hell off of it because you’re going the wrong direction.

    • Ozymandias

      I will confess I only learned the blue dot thing about 7 years ago. I’ve told everyone I know – not a single person so far knew about the fire hydrants. Once you’re told, it seems so obvious.

      • trshmnstr the terrible

        Yep. I remember seeing them and not really thinking about the purpose. Now it makes sense.

    • UnCivilServant

      I have never seen a road reflector off of a highway.

      /pothole country

      • rhywun

        Yeah, I have no idea what this is. Fire hydrants along the interstate?!

    • DEG

      There are few road reflectors here in New England because they won’t survive the winters.

      • trshmnstr the terrible

        Ours were embedded in the asphalt so the plows wouldn’t tear them up in Indiana. Here in Texas, they just glue them onto the concrete.

    • LCDR_Fish

      I think that may vary by state/county – not a general nationwide DOT thing – but I suppose I could be wrong.

      I remember reading about “cats eyes” on a standardized test segment decades ago, but I don’t think I’ve ever actually seen one of those special “cats eyes” that supposedly act as reflectors but retract into the road if/when you drive over them.

  5. rhywun

    I learned a long time ago, like by the age of 8 or 9, that a lot of the stuff I thought was “common knowledge” is anything but. It turned out that most kids did not, in fact, have their nose buried in dictionaries, encyclopedias, and atlases during their free time.

  6. Animal

    What is something you thought was common knowledge, but turned out not to be?

    In spite of the appellation “Seward’s Folly,” when the United States purchased Russian Alaska in 1867, the idea apparently had the approval of a majority of Americans.

    a. Haycox, Stephen (1990). “Haycox, Stephen. “Truth and Expectation: Myth in Alaska History”. Northern Review. 6. Retrieved August 31, 2015.
    b. Welch, Richard E., Jr. (1958). “American Public Opinion and the Purchase of Russian America”. American Slavic and East European Review. 17 (4): 481–94. doi:10.2307/3001132. JSTOR 3001132.
    c. Howard I. Kushner, “‘Seward’s Folly’?: American Commerce in Russian America and the Alaska Purchase”. California Historical Quarterly (1975): 4–26. JSTOR 25157541.
    d. “Biographer calls Seward’s Folly a myth”. The Seward Phoenix LOG. April 3, 2014. Archived from the original on June 22, 2017. Retrieved August 31, 2015.
    e. Professor Preston Jones (Featured Speaker) (July 9, 2015). Founding of Anchorage, Alaska (Adobe Flash). CSPAN. Retrieved December 22, 2017.

    • hayeksplosives

      “And I can see Russia from my house!” Was never spoken by Sarah Palin, just by Tina Fey, but a majority of Democrats think Sarah said it.

      • Animal

        My prog buddy believed that. After I insisted, he finally went and looked into it – and admitted he’d been wrong.

        As I recall the actual Palin quote referred to the fact that there are places in Alaska (out in the Aleutians) where you can see the Russian coast.

      • DEG

        He admitted he was wrong? Wow. That is impressive.

      • Animal

        Yeah, he’s a prog, but not totally immune to logic.

      • creech

        But it was “so what?” Even her real statement was foolish as that didn’t make her any kind of expert on foreign affairs. She did have two nice personalities, however.

      • DEG

        Palin did say you can see Russia from Alaska. Which is true: Look up the Diomedes Islands.

  7. Draw Me Like One of Your Tulpae, Jack

    The word “meander” comes from the Menderes River

  8. Trigger Hippie

    ‘An odd first number (I395) means a spur into the center of a city.’

    Was aware of all the others but never really considered this one. Which is funny given that I just used one of those roads for that very purpose about three hours ago.

    • Ozymandias

      #MeToo
      #…Exceptthe3hoursagopart

    • juris imprudent

      I-81 is direction fluid – seriously. I-805 is more a parallel than a loop, though it does connect with I-5 twice.

  9. Trigger Hippie

    ‘What is something you thought was common knowledge, but turned out not to be?’

    The names of the Oceans? Your own home state’s capital?

    • rhywun

      Your Congresscritter? Your senators?

      I can forgive those.

  10. Mojeaux

    And exit numbers correspond to the mile markers at the side of the road. Numbers go down as you travel west, up as you travel east. I was teaching my son all this while we were driving a fur pieceto Ikea.

    • dbleagle

      The NJ Turnpike would like to have a word with youz.

      • Mojeaux

        Yeah, I heard NY and NJ got told by the feds to renumber their exits.

      • rhywun

        Oh, not this again.

      • Tundra

        Your Rangers are kicking the shit out of FLA.

      • rhywun

        They sure are ?

    • DEG

      NH does not use miles for exit numbers.

      NY also does not.

      MA only made the conversion recently. A year ago I think.

      As dbleagle says, the NJ Turnpike still does not use miles for exit numbers. Same for the Garden State Parkway. I think New Jersey is converting other highways over to use miles.

      PA does not use exit numbers on non-interstate highways, or at least no non-interstate highway that I’ve driven on. Interstates in PA use mileage based exit numbers.

      • Mojeaux

        Well.

        Never mind.

      • Sensei

        Parkway DOES use miles.

      • DEG

        It uses miles? I thought it didn’t?

        I was on it last month, and it didn’t look like they did. I was on the northern stretch from the NY line to the NJ Turnpike.

      • DEG

        Shit. I looked it up. It’s been like that for a while and I never noticed.

      • Sensei

        Yup. Some extensions might not, but the GSP proper does.

  11. dbleagle

    Aside from things that are kinda esoteric like professions, sailing, mountaineering, shooting, etc with their own languages a few bits that I would think would be common knowledge but aren’t are:
    The names and order of the planets from the Sun.
    The Moon doesn’t have a “dark side”. (And as an aside for our North American Glibs. The night of 18/19 Nov will feature a lunar eclipse.)
    That many prominent churches in Europe are built on the sites of pagan temples. Some like the the Pantheon are simply recycled pagan temples, and others like in Syracuse just filled in between still visible columns.
    That US money until fairly recently was tied to silver and gold and actually was made (or could be exchanged for) silver or gold.

    • Count Potato

      “The Moon doesn’t have a “dark side”. ”

      Pink Floyd lied to me!

      • The Bearded Hobbit

        Nope. Lyrics:

        “There is no dark side of the moon. As a matter of fact, it’s all dark”

  12. Tundra

    I had no idea. Thanks, Tulip!

    I thought it common knowledge that delegating power to sociopaths, delivering your children to them, handing them your guns and outsourcing your personal health was fucking retarded.

    • Suthenboy

      Give this man a gold star

  13. Gustave Lytton

    Flip up the occupancy flap on the outside of airplane lavs to access the lock/unlock slide. Like when you need to urgently puke and the FAs haven’t unlocked the lavs yet.

  14. Ozymandias

    I think there’s a TON of knowledge that falls into the Esoteric category, even though it’s touted as being “common” knowledge by the speaker. I think there are all kinds of variations of these “common knowledge” schisms, too. Three examples that immediately come to my mind are (a) regional, (b) class, and (c) time/age differences.
    For example, I grew up almost exclusively East Coast, blue collar, 1970s, so there are things that I just assumed everyone must know. i.e. The shit I saw and interacted with. I had a close friend who grew up firmly middle class – probably closer to upper middle class – on the west coast in the 60s.
    Many, many times we had these moments of “how the fuck don’t you know that?” with each other and I was always struck by the class, regional, and slight distance in ages (10 years).
    These distinctions made each of our sets of our “common knowledge” rather “uncommon” in odd and interesting ways.
    I suppose in thinking about it now, politics also seems to be one of these ways/filters in which our “common knowledge” is just our own biases dressed up to be universal.

    • Tundra

      I would say the bulk of knowledge falls into that category.

  15. UnCivilServant

    Not sure if it counts, but I have expertise blindness. Everything computer related seems to straightforward and common that I expect everyone knows it and anyone could do my job.

    Then I find myself talking someone through their own job because they can’t figure it out.

  16. Draw Me Like One of Your Tulpae, Jack

    I found a couple people who would try to pull the protective cap (the one under the real cap) on a new stick of deodorant with their hands and/or teeth, rather than just dial the deodorant up to pop the protective cap off.

    Also some folks who would wipe their fogged bathroom mirror, or wait for it to dry, or do some complicated cleaning/coating process before showering, rather than taking a hot blow dryer to it to create a clear spot.

    • trshmnstr the terrible

      The first one just blew my mind. I’ve never had issue just pulling it off, but I’d have been stuck if there was a tough one.

      • rhywun

        Yeah, I assume that’s what the handle is for.

        The other method seems cave-man to me.

      • UnCivilServant

        I suspect it might be there so people don’t try to use the stick with the cap on and complain when they still stink.

    • UnCivilServant

      Applying the hairdryer doesn’t seem like it would save any time or effort. I have ample towels and they absorb the condensation in one swipe.

      • Draw Me Like One of Your Tulpae, Jack

        Blow dryer takes seconds, and results in a much clearer mirror than wiping, in my experience. My towels always leave some moisture and lint behind, and it sometimes fogs up again after wiping, depending on how much humidity remains in the bathroom. If you blow dry your mirror, the fog doesn’t recur

      • UnCivilServant

        How long are you in the shower? I suspect efficiency versus leasure may be a factor, as well as preferred water temp.

        I just want to scrub and go rather than hang around in the water.

      • rhywun

        Also, I’m not sure if I’ve ever owned a hair dryer. If I did, I was decades ago.

      • UnCivilServant

        I got one for putting up winterizing plastic sheeting on my windows.

        I’ve also used it for bending plasticard.

        I’ve never used it as a hair dryer.

      • rhywun

        Yeah, the winterizing might be the last time.

        Nobody does that in NYC so that would have placed me upstate so pre-1995 or so.

      • Fourscore

        Hair dryers are for thawing out frozen pipes

      • Mojeaux

        I do not have a blow dryer, and I have very rarely used one in my entire life. My hair is and always has been dry as well-aged straw and only getting dryer as it gets whiter.

      • Draw Me Like One of Your Tulpae, Jack

        I almost always let me hair air dry now, and have some fairly intensive conditioning routines since the greys and perimenopause crept in.

      • Draw Me Like One of Your Tulpae, Jack

        Talk like a pirate day?

      • l0b0t

        I have a longish beard to straighten and, if I’m feeling fancy, a pompadour to up style; the blow dryer (and a selection of brushes) is a necessity.

    • kinnath

      wipe their fogged bathroom mirror

      That’s why the toilet, sink, and shower are in three separate rooms.

      • UnCivilServant

        That makes no sense. That is an even worse setup than occassionally having to deal with mirror fog.

      • kinnath

        The master suite has a large sink. To the right of the sink is the small room with the toilet and a privacy door. To the left of the sink is the bath area with a large soaking tub and a walk-in shower. This allow two adults to get ready for work in the morning without interfering with each other.

      • Draw Me Like One of Your Tulpae, Jack

        Well, look at Mr. Richy Rich Fancy Pants over here!

      • kinnath

        Damn right!

      • kinnath

        The master suite has a central hall with the sink one end and the walk-in closet at the other with doors leading to the bedroom, bath, and water closet.

        It is decadent. 😉

      • rhywun

        My house in SF had a toilet in one room and the sink and bath in another. Or maybe the sink and toilet were together and the bath in another room, I don’t remember. It was sort of practical with four twenty-somethings sharing the place.

    • Ozymandias

      That’s some funny shit, trashy.
      The Bee really is awesome.

      • creech

        Damnation; this is discrimination against us pince nez wearers.

      • rhywun

        I love that song.

      • Bobarian LMD

        Me too. That version has some skips in it though.

  17. Bobarian LMD

    Additional fact: The interstate numbers go up South2North; West2East.

    • DEG

      There’s an exception: I-99. If there are others, I can’t think of them off the top of my head.

      • rhywun

        It’s an exception because of the megalomaniac who got it designated that way as a sort of vanity project; I don’t remember his name.

      • DEG

        Bud Shuster. “Building Our Future” as his campaign ads during the time I lived in Central PA used to say.

        Part of I-99 is named after him.

        He resigned from Congress about a month after being elected in part because Republican term limits on committee chairmanships meant he’d lose his committee chairmanship. I have a vague memory of hearing around central PA that Shuster thought the Republican leadership would make an exception for him.

      • Gustave Lytton

        I82 which also runs north-south geographically.

    • Ted S.

      This was done to be the opposite of the US Routes that proceeded them.

      There was also a conscious decision not to have an I-50 or an I-60 so as not to clash with US-50 or US-60.

      • rhywun

        There was also a conscious decision not to have an I-50 or an I-60 so as not to clash with US-50 or US-60.

        Huh. I did not know that!

      • creech

        Is there an I-69? Seems if there is, the roadsigns might be stolen for dorm room decorations.

      • DrOtto

        There is and it was designated by Bill Clinton. It’s the old US 59 that runs through Texas. It’s a work in progress.

  18. hayeksplosives

    The arrow next to the icon of a gas pump on your car’s dashboard tells you whether the fueling port is on the right or left.

    • UnCivilServant

      If the car has the arrow. The rental I had this past road trip did not have that feature.

      • hayeksplosives

        That is plain evil.

      • UnCivilServant

        I know. By the end of the trip I was remembering that it was on the driver’s side (opposite of my normal car) But early on, it took a few moments. The first few times we did try to find the arrow.

    • Ozymandias

      Another thing that I seem to learn, then forget, then relearn, then forget…

    • Mojeaux

      That is not universal. Found that out after I found out about this “fact”.

  19. Count Potato

    From where is the picture for the afternoon links?

    • Bobarian LMD

      Cheesecake movie called Gwendoline.

      I think I saw it in a theater… Tawney Kitaen boobs but terrible.

      • Count Potato

        Oh, OK, it was posted here by SF, but I couldn’t finish it.

  20. trshmnstr the terrible

    You can fold the tab over on a can of soda and put a straw through it.

    Bottles and cans and stuff are concave on the bottom not to rip you off, but to make sure only the outside rim is touching the ground so that they don’t tip over so easily.

    When you tie your shoes, if you pass the lace under the loop instead of over the loop right before making the final loop, the knot will be straight and less prone to untying.

    • rhywun

      My mom always made a big deal out of that. She scoffed at parents who taught their children how to tie their shoes wrong.

  21. Mojeaux

    So I watch a lot of DIY mommy vids with “life hacks”. I don’t know how they gather all these “life hacks” that I thought were common knowledge OR things I figured out myself after a second of thinking about it OR they do shit that I have to ask, “WTF would you do that?”

  22. The Bearded Hobbit

    Also, the routes that end in “0” were designed to be coast-to-coast and the ones ending in “5” were supposed to be border-to-border. This is actually consistent with the older US Highways system.

    To avoid confusion the Interstate numbers are different from the US Highways numbers in that the former are larger from south to north and west to east, opposite of the US Highway numbers. To avoid confusion between the two systems there is no I-50 or I-60 as they would cover the range of US-50 and US-60.

    In reality few of the highways actually fulfill the original intent. I-10 and I-90 are actually coast to coast and I-80 is close. I-5 does it, along with I-75 and I-95.

    As part of our retirement plans were want to travel the length of many US highways from end-to-end. One of my favorite roads is US-50 across Nevada. We’d also like to do US-6, US-1, US-85, and more.

  23. hayeksplosives

    “Wherefore” means “why?”, not “where?”

    So when Juliet asks “Wherefore art thou Romeo?”, she’s not saying “Where all the Montague dudes at?”; she’s asking “Why did you have to be ROMEO, from that family that my family hates!!”

    • Animal

      Ugh. Shakespeare’s worst. Two emo teenagers with a suicide pact.

      • hayeksplosives

        He knew his audience. He needed a “Twilight” hit, and that’s why he made them 14-15 years old.

        His best heroes and heroines were all older, wiser and more worldly.

      • Ozymandias

        Et tu, Animal?
        J/K, but you think that’s his worst? I would agree it is not his best, but IMO (warning, Brit Lit major with emphasis on 1600s!) it isn’t close to being “the worst” of the lot.
        Also, speaking of Esoteric knowledge, count me firmly in the camp of Shake-spear was definitely NOT the guy named “Shakespeare.” It was a pen-name and understand by his contemporaries to be a nom de plume. I’m all in on Edward de Vere, the 17th Earl of Oxford, as being the author. Beyond a Reasonable Doubt… (BARD)

      • Ozymandias

        “understood” not “understand” – yeesh.

      • Animal

        Et tu, Animal?

        Et me, buddy.

      • Ozymandias

        Lol. Nice.

      • Trigger Hippie

        ‘I’m all in on Edward de Vere, the 17th Earl of Oxford, as being the author. Beyond a Reasonable Doubt… (BARD)’

        I’ve read a few pieces about that theory in the past and always considered it at least plausible. A movie I watched several years ago touches on the subject:

        https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anonymous_(2011_film)

        While I found the melodrama a bit heavy handed, I enjoyed the film overall.

      • cavalier973

        Based on stuff Mark Twain wrote about Shakespeare.

    • rhywun

      German still has the whole inventory of “where”/”there” + preposition in common usage; most of them went extinct in English. Or they make you sound like a lawyer.

      • one true athena

        German still has cases, too. Fuck that noise. The printing press came too soon for them – should’ve waited another 100 years to finish simplifying the nouns, just like English.

      • rhywun

        Yeah but the tradeoff is that word order is much freer in German.

    • UnCivilServant

      “Safe and effective”

    • The coolest vaccine-free BEAM in the world™

      And yeah, I know it’s possibly bull, but it’s still interesting to see it start to get wider play in alt-media.

      (I’m very familiar with Guillain-Barre, as my SU’s Dad had it when we first married back in the mid-90s; guy spent four months in a medically-induced coma while the docs fought to keep him alive — he couldn’t even breathe without assistance.)

      • LCDR_Fish

        That is interesting – I know back in the day it was the big warning for the flu shot (when I was in HR helping cover flu shots for UNC-CH in 2003) – particularly for shots that had eggs in them – seems like something that would have shown up a lot sooner…or repetitively.

    • The Bearded Hobbit

      Good. Hope the SOB dies painfully.

      Swiss, see my response in the last thread. The death of the enemy is always welcomed.

    • Ozymandias

      If this is true, that’s as epic a piece of karmic ass-poke as I can think of.

    • DrOtto

      Normally, I don’t wish I’ll on anyone; however, I’m willing to make an exception in this case.

      • DrOtto

        ill not I’ll dammit!

    • kinnath

      Survived recall, killed by vaccine.

      Seems fitting.

      • juris imprudent

        The karma.

    • Drake

      Maybe his injury will save others.

      • Sensei

        If it saves just one life…

    • KSuellington

      Something is absolutely going on with that greasy fuckhead. The whole skipping the climate shindig was a major red flag. He not only hasn’t made any public appearances but hasn’t done any interviews or anything in the past two weeks. I wouldn’t be surprised in the least if he had a bad reaction to the vax. My money is on Bell’s Palsy and he is hoping to ride it out and pretend it never happened. If I believed in karmic justice, I would say he was richly deserving of it.

    • westernsloper

      I hope it is true. Fuck him and and the rest of the tyrants.

  24. Count Potato

    I think general food and agriculture knowledge. While I probably know more than the average person, I’ve met people who did not know milk was from cows, or that ham and bacon were from the same animal.

    • hayeksplosives

      Did you dispatch those people quickly and painlessly, for the good of mankind?

      Because that level of ignorance is…sheesh.

      • Count Potato

        Well, no.

        As I probably should have written, “I definitely know more than the average person.” Nobody is perfect.

    • The coolest vaccine-free BEAM in the world™

      I’ve met people who did not know milk was from cows, or that ham and bacon were from the same animal.

      Homer Simpson comes to mind: Magical Animal

      • dbleagle

        Wait! I thought that chocolate milk came from brown cows and strawberry milk from bald cows.

        My bad.

    • The Bearded Hobbit

      “Some *magical animal!*

  25. Sensei

    That most residential construction in the US has the ability to provide 240V.

    People seem to think you need a special service and you don’t.

    • The coolest vaccine-free BEAM in the world™

      “But if you want more than 100 Amps, well . . . {sucks air in through teeth} . . . that’ll cost ya.”  /every effing contractor I’ve ever talked to

      • Sensei

        So in the crazy north if you generate with nuclear or fossil fuels do you still call it “hydro”?

      • UnCivilServant

        It’s still using water for the steam that drives the turbines…

      • rhywun

        My governor shut down the nuclear power plant that feeds a quarter of NYC’s energy supply.

        They are doing this stuff for a reason, and it’s not out of the goodness of their hearts.

      • Count Potato

        They can’t even use CO2 as an excuse for that.

      • Suthenboy

        No shit. I saw that last night.
        A little over a year ago we were energy independent. Now we are in the middle of an artificially induced energy crisis, begging for foreign oil and they are shutting down pipelines. It is deliberate, calculated and meant to fuck over the country and its citizens.
        Congratulations to every dunce that voted democrat. You are getting what you voted for, good and hard. The shame is that the rest of us are getting it also.
        I am for rescending universal suffrage.

    • Yusef drives a Kia

      Residential service Is 240v, by default, as to amp draw, a 200 amp panel will reguire larger wiring, weatherhead, etc. but not as insanely expensive as you may think.

      • The coolest vaccine-free BEAM in the world™

        Had a conversion done to 200 Amps once back in Calgary.

        It wasn’t cheap. But then, building a death-ray never is . . .

        I’d like to get the same thing here, but our service is underground, so the local powerco (EPCOR) would have to fart around in the pull-pits along the street, and during the winter that’s even uglier than in the spring, summer and fall.

      • Yusef drives a Kia

        That makes it tougher, and pricier, have you considered load balancing what you have? depending on needs, it can be a good option.

      • The Bearded Hobbit

        My folks house built back in the 50’s had a 60A panel (4 breakers). Our house, built in the 80’s has a 200A box. I hear that modern installations are 250 or 300A.

        240V is and has been the standard since there have been standards. Ranges and dryers have been 240V for, like, forever. Don’t have one but I think that modern A/C units are 240V. My hot tub is 240.

      • DEG

        Don’t have one but I think that modern A/C units are 240V.

        I think the AC unit I had put in two years ago is 240V.

      • slumbrew

        We had the condo’s service upgraded last summer – each unit only had 60 amps – and it wasn’t really that bad.

  26. mikey

    The exit # tabs on the top of the exit signs (Main St 2 mi) are on the same side of the sign as the exit is on the highway – if it is a left-hand exit the tab is on the left side of its sign.

    • Tundra

      That’s a good one

      Healey tucked away yet?

      • mikey

        Not yet. It’s back up in the air. The front wheel bearings are loose. They’re pre loaded and I guess I didn’t heave everything fully seated when fitting the shims. I’m still at the this shim is too big, and this shim is too small stage. They’re are real pain to put in.
        The weather’s been so nice, I’ve been spending the time on the mountain bike.
        I sent you an email with a link to some pictures. Did you get it?

      • Tundra

        I got it and responded. Did you banish me to SPAM?

        I showed my wife. She has no fuck to give about cars and even she said “Wow! That’s beautiful!”

        So good job!

      • mikey

        Yeah, you’re just where Jimbo would say you belonged – in my spam folder.
        Funny, since you just responded to my email with no Subject change.

    • The Bearded Hobbit

      Last I checked (and I don’t check often) Commiefornia’s exits were numbered but were in the process of converting to mile markers.

  27. Yusef drives a Kia

    I convinced a few people that Nauga’s were real,

  28. KSuellington

    We have owned many chickens over the last decade and I am surprised by the number of people who ask if you need to have a rooster in order to get eggs. That seems really basic biology to me.

    • UnCivilServant

      There are a lot of people who think supermarket eggs are fertilized and can grow into chickens rather than being the mensruations of a fowl.

      • KSuellington

        Absolutely. I’ve had a couple people ask what we do with all the chicks and I say we don’t have a rooster. After a puzzled look, I say, “well when daddy rooster loves mommy hen a lot sometimes he gives her a special seed to make baby chickens.”

      • UnCivilServant

        The saddest one was an ‘ethical chef’ on a cooking show who said she wanted to use every part of the egg “because a baby chicken gave its life…”

        I headdesked at that.

      • KSuellington

        Hahaha! That is some deep stupid there. Hilarious.

    • Count Potato

      How else is Baretta supposed to get information?

    • Fatty Bolger

      Thanks, looks interesting.

  29. mikey

    What are those holes on the prongs of electric plugs for? I keep seeing click-bait articles claiming to answer this question, but I refuse to click on principle.

    • UnCivilServant

      I always figured it was for a slight bump inside the socket to hold the prong in place like a latch but not beyond the ability to be intentionally removed.

    • Sensei

      They are permitted, but not required. If they are used they have to be as specified.

      They are designed for ease of assembly during the manufacture of the plug.

      • mikey

        Thx. Never would have come up with that.

    • The Bearded Hobbit

      My understanding, based upon years of training in Lockout/Tagout (LOTO) is that you are able to insert a device through the holes and apply a lock to it to make the device safe for maintenance. In my 40+ years of working on electrical devices I have never seen this option being used.

  30. hayeksplosives

    The QWERTYUIOP keyboard is so arranged NOT to make the most often used keys conveniently located toward the center where the most dexterous fingers are, but instead deliberately scatters the most common letters out over the board. This is because early typewriters had a separate lever for each letter and tended to tangle up if adjacent letters were pressed too quickly.

    Now the mechanical limitations are no longer relevant, but here we are with QWERTY!!

    • kinnath

      It was intended to slow down the typists.

      • UnCivilServant

        The average typist sees no benefit from any particular configuration.

        And the decline of longhand transcription and secretarial pools has reduced the need to cater to professional typists, so familiarity is more valuable than pure top speed.

      • kinnath

        It didn’t stop the average lady in the secretarial pool from hitting 100 wpm.

      • straffinrun

        RPM ?

      • Mojeaux

        120 wpm says hi.

      • kinnath

        Above average, as always.

      • Ownbestenemy

        Like Mary Poppins

      • Mojeaux

        Practically perfect in every way.

      • The Bearded Hobbit

        I was a communications tech in the AF and we used teletype machines. Their speed was controlled mechanically by the support motor. There were many times that I could type faster than the machine could keep up.

      • rhywun

        I’ve heard the touted superiority of Dvorak was overrated but could never be bothered to investigate.

      • Yusef drives a Kia

        Correct

    • kinnath

      I learned to type on a manual way back in high school when Richard Nixon was president.

    • cyto

      Dvorak raises his hand

    • DEG

      Probably not

      The popular theory states that Sholes had to redesign the keyboard in response to the mechanical failings of early typewriters, which were slightly different from the models most often seen in thrift stores and flea markets. The type bars connecting the key and the letter plate hung in a cycle beneath the paper. If a user quickly typed a succession of letters whose type bars were near each other, the delicate machinery would get jammed. So, it is said, Sholes redesigned the arrangement to separate the most common sequences of letters like “th” or “he”. In theory then, the QWERTY system should maximize the separation of common letter pairings. This theory could be easily debunked for the simple reason that “er” is the fourth most common letter pairing in the English language. However, one of the typewriter prototypes had a slightly different keyboard that was only changed at the last minute. If it had been put into production this article would have been about the QWE.TY keyboard:

      And later in the article:

      While it can’t be argued that deal with Remington helped popularize the QWERTY system, its development as a response to mechanical error, has been questioned by Kyoto University Researchers Koichi Yasuoka and Motoko Yasuoka. In a 2011 paper, the researchers tracked the evolution of the typewriter keyboard alongside a record of its early professional users. They conclude that the mechanics of the typewriter did not influence the keyboard design. Rather, the QWERTY system emerged as a result of how the first typewriters were being used. Early adopters and beta-testers included telegraph operators who needed to quickly transcribe messages. However, the operators found the alphabetical arrangement to be confusing and inefficient for translating morse code. The Kyoto paper suggests that the typewriter keyboard evolved over several years as a direct result of input provided by these telegraph operators.

      • rhywun

        I was just going to quibble that this theory seems too “just so” to me.

        And there it is.

        It’s a sort of corollary to tonight’s premise: a lot of the stuff we think we know is just flat-out wrong.

    • Ownbestenemy

      ATC uses an ABC keyboard. It is weird but they are just as quick on it as someone who can really type

    • Akira

      I remember reading somewhere that the first keyboard was simply in alphabetical order (from left to right, top row to bottom) but they started switching letters around for ease of typing as well as some other sketchy reasons (e.g. moving some letters to the top row so that the word “typewriter” could be typed on one row as a marketing gimmick). There are still some relics of this, such as JKL being together.

  31. cyto

    Barnes law is doing a breakdown of rittenhouse case on viva law..

    Says their polling showed a random jury in Kenosha would be 65% believe he is guilty from day 1. (becomes relevant in a minute)

    Test jury showed that people who are left politically tend to think he is guilty because “he should not have been there”. Barnes believes these are the jurors the prosecution is targeting. Says they tended to ignore any other facts as irrelevant… Because he never should have been there.

    Says the jury selection was very fast with little analysis… So likely a random jury. Meaning one that leans left and 65% already judged him guilty.

    So.

    He thinks this case is still likely for a mistrial (hung jury) or a split/compromise verdict. All because the test jurors they presented the case to tended to stick to their preconception very hard.

    Barnes said there should be a directed verdict…. But they are extremely rare and he doesn’t think the judge in this case is going to go that way. Says judge seems to be motivated to show off his community and demonstrate how his community can handle this case.

    • straffinrun

      That “He shouldn’t have been there” is such a ludicrous statement from a legal standpoint. IIRC, you could be a felon who stole a gun and then still use it legally in self defense (gun charges aside).

      • cyto

        As I understand it, the prosecution has put on witnesses that conclusively prove self defense for all three shootings…. Plus you have video which does the same.

        Case should never have been brought…. Therefore legal theory might not be the controlling factor.

      • Ownbestenemy

        All the “right” sites are clapping. I cheer for the dude who was honest. He did his job on the stand.

      • straffinrun

        The prosecution put up an expert DNA witness to prove that the dead guy didn’t grab Kyle’s weapon. The defense showed her a picture of the dead guy unmistakably pulling on the weapon. She’s like “uh, yeah. Guess he did grab the weapon.” One of the most absurd things I’ve seen in a trial.

      • Sensei

        That’s up there with the OJ glove.

      • EvilSheldon

        Hell, *I* don’t think Rittenhouse should have been there. Anyone who wanders into a riot in a different city to ‘help defend businesses’ has got to be lacking a normal chromosome count. But that’s not a relevant question to the matter of self-defense – one is entitled to defend themselves anyplace that they’re legally entitled to be.

    • l0b0t

      I was enraptured by the trial today. The guy who got shot in the bicep, the prosecution’s star witness, did not do well today. I was wondering why the defense wasn’t objecting to several things but then they just got the witness to demolish his own testimony (and sink his 2 civil suits) during cross examination.

      • straffinrun

        He was the one that was armed? (So to speak)

      • trshmnstr the terrible

        I saw a rather NSFW image of him with the caption “schrodinger’s arm”

      • straffinrun

        Nice.

      • Drake

        Wouldn’t a competent Prosecutor have a good idea how he would answer these questions (and keep him off the stand)?

        Perry Mason “ah ha” shit rarely happens in real life.

      • trshmnstr the terrible

        The alternative is to play videos of the incidents on the big screen in front of the jury on repeat.

        I’m sure they thought they could portray an innocent victim.

    • Suthenboy

      She shouldn’t have worn such a short skirt?
      Sounds legit.

  32. straffinrun

    Esoteric. 90% of the streets in Tokyo aren’t even named.

    • UnCivilServant

      So how do you give directions?

      • straffinrun

        Turn at landmark.

      • Sensei

        You the newsstand next to the train station? Well turn at the ramen shop on the corner…

    • Sensei

      Hence why GPS was big in Japan long before many other places.

      I’ve never been so lost walking…

      • UnCivilServant

        How would you tell the GPS your desination? I’m not sure most of these places are going to be able to provide longitude and lattitude data.

      • straffinrun

        Address。

      • UnCivilServant

        If the street doesn’t have a name, how do you have an address?

        Note – even ‘1st st’ is a name.

      • straffinrun

        Address Japanese style:

        City name
        Subdivision of city name (called “cho” 町)
        Three sets of numbers indicates building

      • Mojeaux

        What’s the subdivision’s building numbering system?

      • Sensei

        Mojeaux, NYC does similar. For example World Trade has its own zip codes.

      • straffinrun

        No idea how they got those numbers.

      • UnCivilServant

        Little Known Fact – Zip Codes are assigned by the volume of mail a geographic area recieves, not the amount of space it occupies. So a large building with a lot of incoming mail would justify its own zip code.

      • Sensei

        I’m hearing that in Cliff Clavin’s voice.

      • rhywun

        Don’t get me started on all the esoterica I know about ZIP codes.

      • straffinrun

        Kanji is a zip code.

      • Count Potato

        “Your mama has her own zip code.”

      • Rat on a train

        My wife’s village in the Philippines is like that. When we mail things we just give
        NAME
        BARANGAY, MUNICIPALITY
        POSTCODE PROVINCE

      • Sensei

        By closest landmark.

    • Draw Me Like One of Your Tulpae, Jack

      I learned that from Dave Barry

    • rhywun

      I’ve read tourist guidebook accounts of that and simply can’t wrap my head around it.

    • Not Adahn

      Same with South Africa, unless Bono’s been lying all these years.

  33. Ownbestenemy

    Starting tomorrow I’m out of compliance. Doesn’t change anything at this point…but feels rebellious.

    • Tundra

      Fuck yes.

      Rebel Rebel

      • Ownbestenemy

        Think final count is just me and another in my group. Peer managers have 1 or 2. That is just Vegas technical group. AT is rumored a bit more. Any reduction in their manpower is going to be felt first by even more OT and then by controllers not wanting to work 60-80 week in, week out as they get pushed to their regulated times on position.

    • Tulip

      You rebel, you! ?

      Seriously, good for you.

      • Ownbestenemy

        Scary at times but first deadline has passed. Next is Nov 22…when they start discipline but as much as I am at peace now, I will drop my canned letter of “fuck you” before I turn in my badge.

      • Yusef drives a Kia

        Stand your ground Brother, we won’t lose this war,

    • straffinrun

      Welcome to the “ Out of Compliance Club.” I’ve been a lifelong member.

  34. Yusef drives a Kia

    De orbit begins now,

    • Ownbestenemy

      Turn and burn and splash down safely is all I hope all the time.

      • Yusef drives a Kia

        Making the final Draco burn, should be fine, Lord willing,

    • Yusef drives a Kia

      and they are landing at night, I hope they get some good video,

      • cyto

        Should be a good show for south alabama, Georgia and north Florida. Not sure if Texas and Mississippi and Louisiana can see it or not.

        Brief show. But cool, nonetheless.

      • Yusef drives a Kia

        They reuse the fricking parachutes! that’s QC

  35. cyto

    Talking vaccines and genetic manipulation to create viral proteins or protein segments, I learned that not everyone knows that eukaryotes Glycosylate proteins in the Golgi complex….. So proteins made in bacteria will have different immunological properties even if they have the same amino acid sequence.

    Freaking basic science…. Sheesh. Apparently a lot of people don’t pay attention in science or something.

    • rhywun

      *blank stare*

      • cyto

        Yeah, that was the exact reaction. How did you know??

    • UnCivilServant

      I can follow some of that, but I can say that it was not covered in any classes I took.

      • Mojeaux

        ^^^That.

      • Ownbestenemy

        What you didn’t learn that while diagramming basic cells?

      • Mojeaux

        Dude, give me a sentence, I can probably diagram it (although my grade in English 4xx [diagramming sentences] would belie it), but no. I do not diagram cells.

      • Ownbestenemy

        I have no idea what I was even saying lol. I just wanted to be part of it.

    • trshmnstr the terrible

      I had to look up glycosylate. I almost went into biology, but didn’t want to take organic chem.

    • Gender Traitor

      As I’ve mentioned before, my elementary school science education was sacrificed on the altar of “desegregation.” Turned me off, so I took the bare minimum required in HS & college.

    • Ownbestenemy

      #2 would be cute without those….sometimes it’s just too much.

      • creech

        I’m sorry, a lot of them do border on the grotesque.

  36. The Late P Brooks

    Test jury showed that people who are left politically tend to think he is guilty because “he should not have been there”. Barnes believes these are the jurors the prosecution is targeting. Says they tended to ignore any other facts as irrelevant… Because he never should have been there.

    Marching orders have been issued. VIGILANTISM is on trial. If there is no guilty verdict, the streets will run red with the blood of innocents.

  37. straffinrun

    Little known fact: When Japanese people are perplexed, they cock their heads like a dog looking at Joe Biden sniffing a little girl.

    • Ownbestenemy

      Leg up or squat?

    • Sensei

      へぇー

    • rhywun

      I must be turning Japanese.

      • Tundra

        You really think so?

      • Ownbestenemy

        Would get interesting if he showed up on a Mexican radio.

      • Ownbestenemy

        What if he walked 500 miles for millions of peaches while dealing with the devil inside? I would say it was a manic Monday.

      • Yusef drives a Kia

        Bad after worse, great work OBE

      • Chafed

        I miss The Smithereens.

      • Yusef drives a Kia

        Getting Nippy?

  38. straffinrun

    There is nothing more esoteric than acerbic flotsam and jetsam.

    • Tundra

      Uh, what about Space Jizz?

      • Ownbestenemy

        Would give true pearl necklaces

  39. J. Frank Parnell

    I learned a long time ago, like by the age of 8 or 9, that a lot of the stuff I thought was “common knowledge” is anything but.

    I distinctly remember in 4th grade being the only kid in class who knew there were 50 states. Every other kid insisted there were 52, except for one kid who thought there were 54.

    • Trigger Hippie

      You went to school with Obama?

      • rhywun

        LOL!

      • J. Frank Parnell

        *chuckles sensibly*

    • Ownbestenemy

      We learned all 50 via song, in alphabetical order, in which I passed down to my kids for the states in the 4th grade. Capitals were next up but the teacher got a staph infection and was out for the year.

  40. Trigger Hippie

    *hits bowl*

    Articles like this make me miss Derptologist…

    He dubbed me his Fifth Knight of the Derp Table for sharing a tidbit about Luxembourg, dentures, and double landlocked nations.

  41. Gender Traitor

    OT: Tulip (and anyone else interested) – I got called away for dinner and a couple of episodes of Blackadder, but I’ve posted a PDF of my zucchini brownie recipe in the forum.

    • Count Potato

      “zucchini”

  42. straffinrun

    Little known fact: Chiming into conversations with irrelevant bits of trivial information because you’re unable to add anything of substance to the discussion gets you all the pussy.

    • Ownbestenemy

      Cliff? Is that you?

      • straffinrun

        He didn’t live with his mom because of her casseroles.

    • Trigger Hippie

      ‘Chiming into conversations with irrelevant bits of trivial information because you’re unable to add anything of substance to the discussion…’

      It’s like you completely missed the point of the freaking article.

      • straffinrun

        Not at all. That was my irrelevant point.

      • Trigger Hippie

        Sorry. My comment came off way more aggressive than I meant it to be…

        Was just being glib.

    • cyto

      That is my only move

  43. Gender Traitor

    Not necessarily “common” knowledge, but someone I would expect someone in this profession to know: In high school, I had to select and read any John Steinbeck book for my English class, and a librarian at the first library I visited (not my usual location) had never heard of him.

    My boss often calls me “a font of useless knowledge,” but darned if I can think of anything right now.

    • Ownbestenemy

      I cannot stand useless knowledge. I don’t knock people that have it. Just annoys me in conversations. Though straff is correct, it gets all the ladies.

      • straffinrun

        I learned everything I needed to know in kindergarten. Like 5 year olds are hot.

      • Ownbestenemy

        Its where I was turned off from being a doctor.

      • Draw Me Like One of Your Tulpae, Jack

        Oh, boy. You and I should never have a conversation.

      • Ownbestenemy

        Heh..we’ve held it down a few times..though Zoom is a hot mess. Im a get to the point type of person.

      • Tulip

        Good story ‘Sloper

      • straffinrun

        Let’s hear some of your pillow talk.

      • Draw Me Like One of Your Tulpae, Jack

        You think I can remember that far back?

      • straffinrun

        ?

      • Ownbestenemy

        Damn I was that bad?

    • Tulip

      The Richard Jury series by Martha Grimes has a character that claims that knowing one esoteric thing makes everyone assume you are smart and an expert.

      • straffinrun

        I didn’t know that.

      • EvilSheldon

        That’s pretty much how I get away with it.

  44. Ownbestenemy

    For the record – an odd number (I95, I29) means the highway runs north south. An even number (I94, I80) means the highway runs east west.

    Unless in California, specifically Southern California. Where you go east/west on I-91 for the majority of its length.

    • J. Frank Parnell

      91 isn’t an Interstate

      • Ownbestenemy

        Thats right…state route? Like 39?

      • J. Frank Parnell

        Yeah, SR

      • rhywun

        Yeah, quizzical head-tilt cuz I-91 is in New England.

      • Ownbestenemy

        Still stands…it runs east/west. go away!

      • Yusef drives a Kia

        Yeah! leave the 91 alone! it’s already a mess,

      • Ownbestenemy

        When it is clear…from Inland Empire to beach cities in 25 minutes…..otherwise its a 5 hour pain in the ass.

      • Yusef drives a Kia

        I grew up in the IE, I watched it grow and then turn into the mess it is now, sad it happened but I’m glad I’m out, never again!
        /maybe a visit

      • slumbrew

        Cali quirk – it’s always “the X” – the 5, the 91, etc.

        East coast it’s just the number – 93, 128, 95, etc.

      • Ownbestenemy

        Yeah, you East coasters are odd.

      • rhywun

        Ackchually, it’s “route” + number.

        “Root” if you’re downstate, “rout” if you’re upstate.

      • KSuellington

        Only SoCal people do the “the” thing before freeways. Us NorCal folks don’t typically use the definite article before a freeway.

      • Ownbestenemy

        Only SoCal people do the “the” thing before freeways. Us NorCal folks don’t typically use the definite article before a freeway.

        It is weird. I would never say “take the Azusa Blvd* to the Hollenbeck street”, but it just feels natural to add the definite article to a highway. Go figure.

        *But I would say “Take the 39 (Azusa Blvd) to Hollenbeck Street”

        So weird.

      • slumbrew

        AFAIK, the definite article comes from the “freeway” thing “the 5 freeway” becomes just “the 5”. Whereas “I-95” becomes just “95”.

        rhywun: ‘route’ gets dropped here – unless it’s a single digit. So ’93’, but ‘route 2’.

      • l0b0t

        Hey, KSuellington! Firstly, thank you for the video of the wholesomely adorable Irish rowers. Second, an unnecessary article prefacing a highway number was a very annoying tell that totally broke my suspension of belief while watching Big Love. Chloe Sevigny constantly called roads in Utah “The XXX.”

    • Chafed

      Let’s give I-15 credit for running northeast.

  45. J. Frank Parnell

    Two years ago around Halloween time I was talking to someone in their late 20s about Frankenstein. This person had never heard of the book or any of the movies and had no idea about any of the story.

    • Ownbestenemy

      He was a real monster.

      • Ownbestenemy

        For the life of me, I am shocked people have never heard of the book.

      • Yusef drives a Kia

        I know adults who don’t know Lucy, Sad, my Daughter loves Lucy,

      • Ownbestenemy

        Written by a woman, disguised as a man would be perfect for today’s climate but nah.

  46. Yusef drives a Kia

    Elon does it again! We’ll go to Mars, and then The Belt…….

  47. Tulip

    Another good YouTube series (BBC) is “If Walls Could Talk”. The history of the bedroom, the bathroom, the living room, and the kitchen. Well done!

  48. Ownbestenemy

    Success! Landed

  49. straffinrun

    Little known fact: because of its configuration, you never have to change the batteries in your smoke detector。

    • Yusef drives a Kia

      So what’s the beeping coming from my detector in the back bedroom?

      • straffinrun

        Tinnitis. Leave the gas range on and get some sleep. You’ll feel great in the morning.

      • Yusef drives a Kia

        Fun fact, early ovens used CO gas, so sticking your head in the oven worked, with methane, not so much,

      • straffinrun

        Sticking your head in a Dutch oven?

      • Yusef drives a Kia

        Well that’s just dumb,

      • straffinrun

        I’m good between the sheets.

  50. The Late P Brooks

    Stop hatin’, haters

    “Last week Governor Newsom worked in the Capitol with staff on urgent issues including COVID-19 vaccines for kids, boosters, ports, the forthcoming state budget and California’s continued economic recovery,” Lopez said. “He will have public events this week related to the economy and vaccines.”

    In response to the growing speculation (fueled largely by a lack of transparency on the part of Newsom’s office), Newsom’s wife Jennifer Siebel Newsom, tweeted over the weekend, “It’s funny how certain folks can’t handle truth. When someone cancels something, maybe they’re just in the office working; maybe in their free time they’re at home with their family, at their kids’ sports matches, or dining out with their wife. Please stop hating and get a life.”

    ——-

    Because Newsom received his COVID-19 booster shot in his last public appearance, some more conspiratorial-minded individuals on social media have used the governor’s absence to cast doubt on the safety of boosters. Twenty-one million Americans have received booster shots to date and there is broad consensus among health experts that boosters are safe and effective, with side effects similar to the second dose of the mRNA vaccines.

    Safe and effective, and don’t think it isn’t.

    • straffinrun

      The most generous explanation you can give these fucks: We’re forcing you to do something because it’s good for you.

      • Q Continuum

        Pfizer’s pockets aren’t gonna line themselves!

    • rhywun

      OFFS.

    • Chafed

      His wife piping up tells me he isn’t away on a family matter. I don’t know what’s wrong but it isn’t his family m

      • trshmnstr the terrible

        I’m hearing GBS as a possible diagnosis, but it’s rumor from “a source” at this point.

  51. The Late P Brooks

    Peasants in revolt

    Other speakers extolled home-schooling to avoid vaccinations for children and touted the anti-parasitic medication ivermectin, despite the lack of scientific evidence that the drug treats or prevents COVID-19.

    Some speeches were peppered with conspiratorial and apocalyptic language, warning that if people got the shot, their freedoms would be stripped away.

    “We are fighting a communist takeover of our nation,” said Beverly Hills physician Simone Gold, founder of America’s Frontline Doctors, who has spread misinformation about COVID-19 and advocated unproven treatments, including hydroxychloroquine and ivermectin.

    Gold — who participated in the Jan. 6 insurrection and is awaiting trial on charges of violent entry and disorderly conduct — urged protesters not to comply with employee vaccination mandates for the sake of their souls.

    “If you bow to your employer, if you take a knee to your employer, the scar of your surrender will not fade,” she said. “Your belief in yourself will diminish, will weaken. This is actually their goal, to create a world where humans believe that they need overlords to think for them.”

    What a bunch of paranoid nuts, pretending they are being oppressed by the very loving and beneficent government which wants nothing more than to protect them.

    • straffinrun

      They went from “horse dewormer” to “anti parasitic” and still whiff on the point. They really can’t help themselves.

    • Q Continuum

      “lack of scientific evidence” “spread misinformation” “unproven treatments” “Jan. 6 insurrection”

      such trustworthy, so lack of bias

      These hacks really are just stenographers for the ruling class. It’s pathetic.

    • Akira

      advocated unproven treatments, including hydroxychloroquine and ivermectin.

      Those two drugs have more evidence on their side than masks, lockdowns, and distancing.

  52. Draw Me Like One of Your Tulpae, Jack

    I just realized why the Bicycle Casino is called the Bicycle Casino.

    Because a “bicycle” is an A-5 straight in poker.

    • Ownbestenemy

      That is a straight observation.

    • straffinrun

      Why is it called a full boat?

      • Ownbestenemy

        A full boat should be a favorite of LGBTQ+…it can be kings and queens and jacks and nobodies as long as you have the right mix

  53. Ownbestenemy

    I was going to go into work…but decided..nah, I will work form home. I am unclean.

    • straffinrun

      Not your case, but I really don’t understand how all these people not going to work are getting money. They stopped sending you all cash, right?

      • Ownbestenemy

        States are still handing out cash…

      • Yusef drives a Kia

        I didn’t notice that, but the food stamps are great! more prepping!

      • straffinrun

        Gotta keep up aggregate demand despite having lower production. Sounds like a good way to get inflation.

      • Chafed

        You can kiss that job at the Federal Reserve goodbye m

      • Gustave Lytton

        Not enough Bobs to audit and stop the paychecks.

  54. Ownbestenemy

    Yusef. I bet we crossed circles at some point. I may be younger but many skate scenes and punk scenes I went to in SoCal

    • Yusef drives a Kia

      i wouldn’t doubt it a bit, too many of the same haunts, and skating, I ran with the Serna Skate Club for a long while, know any of them/

      • Ownbestenemy

        Group aversion from a young age…so wouldn’t know any clubs. Brother took me to all the haunts and BIL skated with Tony, Alba, and lot at Pipeline.

      • Yusef drives a Kia

        I grew up with Salba and Malba, we were the Badland Boys.Gaheimer Doug Job, all good fun,

  55. The Late P Brooks

    Porkbarrelling over the cliff

    After their devastating losses in Virginia and near miss in New Jersey last week, some expected that Democrats in D.C. would pump the brakes on their ambitious agenda, which some blamed for alienating independent voters. Instead, they took a different read of the situation – that Americans were tired of inaction and debate on Capitol Hill and instead wanted Democrats to pass legislation aimed at helping people.

    House Democrats, at the explicit demand of Biden, plowed through what appeared to be irreconcilable differences on their reconciliation spending bill and finally passed the long-delayed bipartisan infrastructure bill, which according to the USA Today-Suffolk poll is supported by Americans 61% to 32%.

    “The American people have made clear one overwhelming thing, I think – and I really mean it – all the talk about the elections and what do they mean and everything: They want us to deliver,” Biden said Saturday after the infrastructure bill passed.

    They’re just not hitting it hard enough. Socialism is what America wants, whether they know it or not.

    • rhywun

      supported by Americans 61% to 32%

      I remember when belittling voting against your own self-interest was the new hotness.

  56. The Late P Brooks

    Gotta keep up aggregate demand despite having lower production. Sounds like a good way to get inflation.

    Demand creates supply. Presto! Anything you want, and plenty you don’t. Right out of the magic hat.

  57. Ownbestenemy

    I is drunkin. That is all, nothing more, nothing less.

    • Yusef drives a Kia

      Hundreds my ass! I call several thousand, and Good on them!
      Tall cans OBE

      • Ownbestenemy

        Tall Cans!…maybe can…I can’t tell.

  58. Timeloose

    Common knowledge.
    TANSTAAFL

    One I just learned is how to tie boots so they don’t rub the back of your heel so much.

    • hayeksplosives

      Will you please show or describe the bootlace technique?

  59. Akira

    – A ton of people aren’t aware that this state (and many others) are “employment at will” states where an employer can fire you for any reason or no reason unless you can prove that it was discriminatory against a “protected class”.

    – I’ve encountered a surprising number of people in my life who had literally never heard of the Japanese-American internment.

    – Foil and cling wraps usually have tabs on the side of the box that you push in to keep the roll in place.

    • Gustave Lytton

      Reynolds’ cheap ass glue and thin cardboard means half the time the box breaks or crushes when pushing in the tabs.

    • one true athena

      I’ve mentioned this before I think, so sorry if it’s a repetition, but re: internment (and education more broadly). So I grew up in NM and I remember reading “Farewell to Manzanar” iirc in elementary school, maybe 6th grade, so we learned about it then. My son (now a senior and having gone to private schools in Los Angeles), had never heard of the camps until we drove past Manzanar after middle school. My spouse and I were shocked. Some of that is perhaps not putting it all together, because we’d taken him to the Japanese-American Museum before that but we apparently presumed a lot more context than he’d actually been given in school.

      So all this nonsense about “omg the kids won’t learn about slavery if we destroy CRT” is just such bullshit. They’re not teaching history anyway.

      • Ownbestenemy

        Or….just love one another. Doesn’t mean we must get along or be friends, its just that we know they are a person. What they hell is so hard about that?

      • Akira

        So all this nonsense about “omg the kids won’t learn about slavery if we destroy CRT” is just such bullshit. They’re not teaching history anyway.

        Exactly. I don’t recall my K-12 curriculum ever mentioning the Japanese-American internment. When I was in 8th grade, I mentioned that my Dad was in one of those camps, and a bunch of other kids shouted that I was making things up and that never happened. The teacher had to interpose and tell them that that was in fact a real thing.

        And yes, the CRT people are totally strawmanning when they say that opponents are “trying to erase history” or other nonsense. Nobody is saying that we should stop teaching about slavery or that slavery never happened. Most of them are disagreeing with some or all of the following propositions:
        – Slavery is the defining feature of early American history
        – Slavery was endemic and more severe in the United States
        – Slavery is the primary reason for the current wealth and prosperity of the United States (well until the government COVID response destroyed it, anyway)
        – White people today bear guilt for slavery and have to apologize and atone for it

      • Ownbestenemy

        I got an extensive knowledge of Japanese inerment from 4-12 years old in Cali. I am sure that has changed.

      • Suthenboy

        I am not surprised it isn’t taught much. We cant have our children knowing that the sainted FDR was a monster.
        The left is forever trying to censor or rewrite history to distance themselves from their own past.

        How many people think the NAZIs were right wing fanatics? Yeah, the National Socialist German Workers’ Party is a real right-wing bunch. You cant get more right wing than that.
        I cant tell you how many people have gone apoplectic when I tell them that. “Who? Whuh? Huh? That is….What?”
        They didn’t know how to respond. Damned Kool-aid guzzlers.

  60. Suthenboy

    Recently a friend of the wife asked me a question. I told her I did not know the answer.

    “But Suthenboy, I thought you know everything!”

    Me – ” I do, just not all at the same time.”

    Half of the people at the table started laughing, the other half just got puzzled looks on their faces. Good grief.

  61. Scruffy Nerfherder

    Practical knowledge seems limited to how to use a cell phone these days.

    I actually watched an employee try to pressure wash a concrete deck going uphill last week.

    • Suthenboy

      During the time I spent in Bolivia/Peru and parts of Brazil I saw people doing things that you only hear about here in jokes every day. I asked around ‘what the hell is wrong with these people?’

      Answer: There is no protein in their diets. During their developmental years they eat almost exclusively carbohydrates so their brain development is retarded. Most of them never meet more than 100 people in their lifetime, never travel more than about 10 miles from the spot where they were born and dont spend a single minute sitting in a classroom.
      I am sure our so called ruling class are green with envy.

      • l0b0t

        Sounds like you’re describing Brooklyn.

      • Festus

        I’ve seen this on the Rez. Lots of F.A.S. too. How many generations of imbeciles was that supposed to be again?

    • Tres Cool

      That reminded me that last week as I was going into work, one of the employees was walking out. He said, “tell so-and-so (his supervisor) that I forgot my phone. Im going to run home and get it.”
      That got me thinking that 25 years ago, I cant imagine telling my boss I need to leave work to get my cell phone. He response likely would have been “why the fuck do you need a phone at work? We have them here.”

      • l0b0t

        25 years ago? Wouldn’t it be in a suitcase or hardwired into the car?

      • UnCivilServant

        No, 25 years ago are the bulky x-files cell phones.

      • Festus

        They were bricks but only the richest people had them. Just use an orphan to carry them around for you, just like Seinfeld!

      • Sean

        Nah. I had one 95/96, and I definitely wasn’t rich.

        Still have the same cell #.

    • l0b0t

      Good morning, sir. Did you get the bottom of the workplace computer troubles?

      • UnCivilServant

        We knew what it was last week.

        This week we have to fill out paperwork for the upper management.

        I still haven’t had a weekend and it’s starting to wear me out. Especially when yesterday was yet another thirteen hour day.

      • Gender Traitor

        ANOTHER long day?? What for THIS time?

      • UnCivilServant

        Fixing corrupted database indexes.

      • Not Adahn

        Maybe term limits on database indexes would help with that. Or getting rid of Dark Money(tm).

      • Ghostpatzer

        I mostly work with Vertica these days. Vertica does not have indexes, but it does have a structure called a projection. Truly a technology for our times.

      • rhywun

        Funny, I’ve been working on indexes the last couple days.

        The tables I am concerned with have a different set of existing indexes in each environment – turns out developers were just slapping on an index whenever they felt like it wherever they were.

  62. Tres Cool

    suh’ fam
    whats goody

    • Gender Traitor

      Good morning, homey, U, l0, Suthen, & Scruffy!

      After a hectic day yesterday posting the current payroll AND starting to prep for the year-end round of pay raises, today MIGHT be a less hectic day at work.

      • Tres Cool

        sup’ fellow Township-ite

        How YOU doin’ ?

      • Gender Traitor

        Good, thanks! Supposedly it’s a “virtual vacation” week with my boss off, but I suspect I’ll hear from him at some point, since year-end stuff is starting to heat up.

    • Ghostpatzer

      Mornin’, all. Production release today, will be a long day. Long and slow, plenty of time to Glib while watching water boil.

  63. Stinky Wizzleteats

    “Trump Hints At Biden Rematch: “You Think I Kid, But I’m…Not”
    https://www.zerohedge.com/political/trump-hints-biden-rematch-you-think-i-kid-imnot

    Noooo…for God’s sake, if you want to feel important just lay your imprimatur upon DeSantis and/or Paul and be done with it. Either one of them, especially DeSantis, could and would mop the floor with any representative of the current administration.

    • Suthenboy

      If the last vote were clean and straight Trump wiped the floor with Biden’s ass. No one believes Biden won on the up and up. No one with a brain, anyway.
      Of course the trouble is getting a clean and straight election.
      DeSantis would be ok with me. I am not sure Paul, an admirable, honest and moral man, would have the balls to yank us back out of the Paris Accords, reopen drilling and get u s back to energy independence, cut the fuck out of taxes and bring more companies back to the US, give a double middle finger to the left, etc.
      He seems a little bit on the side of compromise. I dont want someone to compromise with evil, I want someone to kick those fucking commie shitbird’s asses.
      Mind you, I would take Paul in a second.

      • Stinky Wizzleteats

        Trump’s the least bad of the recent presidents IMHO but his time should be in the past. Put simply, he went so easy on the various concentrations of power that he was either in on it or he grossly underestimated its scope, arguably to the level of incompetence. His biggest fault, though, might be that he’s a consummate attention whore who could cause the loss of an easily winnable election. There’s nothing wrong with the role of kingmaker.

      • Suthenboy

        Agreed. I was frustrated that he didnt shit-can more people than he did. So many people in DC need to be in a different line of work that he could have done most good if he spent his entire time in office just taking out the trash.

    • Ghostpatzer

      Agreed WRT DeSantis. His presser on vax mandates was impressive.

  64. Festus

    Esoteric Knowledge – Don’t pipe off at your fellow Glib for holding different beliefs from yours because you had a long, tiring night and then wake up the next day and feel bad about your flippant statement. That was out of line, Trashy.

    • Festus

      Everyone says “never apologize” but I can bend that rule today.

      • UnCivilServant

        I say only appologise when two criteria are met – you are genuinely remorseful, and the recipient will accept the appology.

        The ‘never appologise’ advice is for dealing with people who will simply see it as weakness andredouble the attack.

      • Festus

        Yup, hence the sincerity.

    • l0b0t

      While I’ll never be onboard with the metaphysics, interacting with the devout and sincere folk here (and a couple others in my life) has really caused me to reevaluate my formerly held contempt for religious folk. That, and online atheism is such a sewer. Trashy’s Psalms of the day are nice; I see them as generally good advice for everyone.

      • Festus

        I was being flippant, glib if you will… and I sounded like an asshole.

      • Suthenboy

        I am a lazy SOB. I have wanted for some time to look at the ideas that christianity popularized that shaped our culture and gave birth to the enlightenment.
        Ex: All men are equal in the eyes of the Lord.
        Result: That idea meant the birth of rule of law, that all men are equal in the eyes of the law. That idea and even its half-assed practice is unique in the world.
        There are a lot of other ideas like that but I need help in cataloging and analyzing them.

    • trshmnstr the terrible

      No worries, man. I get it, and I’ve said things I regret here, too.

      • Gender Traitor

        Gang hug! ?

      • Tres Cool

        Social distancing !

      • Festus

        Thanks, Friend!

  65. Festus

    Bonus E.K. – there are tabs on the ends of foil and plastic wrap packaging that you punch in before trying to pull the product. Rolls out like a charm.

    • Festus

      *reads above* Goddammit!

    • Festus

      So being 13 is a “thing” now?

    • Ghostpatzer

      “Doctors put the rise in the condition, known as priapism, down to misuse of drugs such as Viagra as well as illegal ones such as cocaine.”

      Um, cocaine is not the problem here. So I hear.

      • Festus

        Yeah, that’s not how Cocaine works. Jumping around like a feral monkey? Sure. Doing the porn-star? Not so much. All that Coke does is make you want to do more Coke even if it means squirrelling yourself away with a bunch of guys to do more cocaine.

      • rhywun

        All that Coke does is make you want to do more Coke

        Yeah, no kidding.

      • Scruffy Nerfherder
      • Tres Cool

        Im my limited experience, tended to turn things into a taffy-pull.

  66. l0b0t

    This showed up in my video forums, if anyone wants it, please let me know.

    “The Infinity Saga (Fan-Edit) (50 Hours of Marvel Movies Chronologically Cut) (1080p) [94.6 GB]

    This is a FanEdit by Bryon Patrick:
    This cut contains everything in the Marvel Cinematic Universe timeline from Iron Man (2008) to Endgame (2019). For instance, the whole thing opens with the Dark Elves from Thor Dark World because that happened thousands of years ago. Then it progresses through the timeline by year in universe. There’s a lot of fun cutting around in Phase 1 between Iron Man, Thor and Hulk and in Phase 3 with Civil War and some Spidey stuff, just for example. It has been updated to include key scenes from the D+ shows and Black Widow (2021).

    Every Marvel One Shot is included. There’s also deleted, alternate, and extended scenes from almost every movie. There are also scenes only from the Phase 1 and 2 box sets and the Infinity Saga box set. There’s also extra Marvel content like Team Thor and other random bonus content. There are so many great deleted scenes that feature cool character moments but were cut for time. Well that isn’t an issue here. There are some deleted scenes that have some unfinished VFX, but it shouldn’t be anything that will take you out the experience too much. I like to think of this as an alternate timeline version of the MCU. I hope to put in something even the most hardcore MCU fans haven’t seen.

    This was made with longs nights and a lot of love, so please enjoy.”

    • Festus

      Doesn’t Grandad teach how to tie flies, anymore?

      • l0b0t

        Oh man… I can hear him now – “Turn off that idiot box and go outside; it’s still daylight!”

      • UnCivilServant

        That’s only useful if you plan to wade out into the water and flick them at the surface.

        Fly fishing is the worst of all worlds when it comes to fishing. You can’t even relax while you wait for the fish to bite.

      • l0b0t

        Fishing was about finding dinner when I was growing up; consequently, it will always be a chore to me. The only fishing that I truly enjoy, involves being strapped into a chair on the back of a motorboat.

      • Ghostpatzer

        Fishing in the Hudson circa 1960 was not recommended. But I do enjoy motorboating.

      • Tres Cool

        So does our Q, too

      • Stinky Wizzleteats

        Well at least it’s not fifty chronologically cut hours of hardcore pornography.

      • Festus

        Oooh, Oooh, Oooh oh fuck yeah! Where have we seen this before?

    • rhywun

      50 hours of Marvel sounds like something to torture your enemies with.

      • Not Adahn

        Just wait for the chronological cut of the LotR, with die-by-side comparison of shots from the Jackson and Rankin versions of The Hobbit.

    • Festus

      Author has obviously never went “there”.

      • Tres Cool

        Nerds. Prolly never in their life.

    • Scruffy Nerfherder

      So we could have Bruce Campbell?

  67. Ghostpatzer

    I was wondering about that NH plate I saw on the GS Parkway. DEG was about 10 minutes from me, apparently.

  68. Not Adahn

    Today…

    Boss is out (yay!) so I get to fill in for his meetings (boo!) which keeps me at my desk so I don’t have to wear a mask (yay!) but keeps me out of the lab where one of my VPD tools is broken (boo!) but I know how to fix it without much trouble (yay!) but it’s needed nownownow for super-priority wafers from Essex Junction (boo!)

    • Tres Cool

      Isnt Essex Junction just down the road from Grinder’s Switch ?

      • Not Adahn

        Don’t know, never been. I’ve been to the East Fishkill site a few times. I loved it, but then again I love antiques. They were still using a plug-into-the-wall desk calculator I shit you not.

      • Tres Cool

        Seems you’ve not seen HeeHaw or know the genius of Minnie Pearl.

      • Not Adahn

        Not since it was originally on network TV.

      • Festus

        That was fucking dark and something that I never wanted to know.

    • Draw Me Like One of Your Tulpae, Jack

      My Pa used to manage some shit up there in Essex Junction when it was IBM.

    • UnCivilServant

      Well, it’s obvious to anyone who saw the videos back before the trial that even indicting him was purely political.

    • Festus

      The best part was the prosecutor slapping his hand through his forehead.

    • Suthenboy

      The jury has been tainted by exculpatory evidence. Uh huh. Sounds legit.

    • Festus

      Not even gonna look. I get a weird, tingly feeling in my lower extremities whenever heights are involved. Funny that, I wanted above all else to be a pilot when I was a tad.

      • Suthenboy

        As you get older your inner ear doesn’t work as well as it once did. Even a little bit of loss of balance will destroy your confidence and you naturally develop a fear of heights. It is very common to lose your confidence like that.
        Also, you dont bounce like you once did. Fall now and you dont hop up, dust yourself off and keep going. Now it is ‘crack, crunch, scream’ and you have to lay and wait for someone to pick you up.
        Gettin’ old is fun.

      • Festus

        I can still mostly roll out thanks to my coaches. Most weekends I bear a “Tres” bruise or two.

    • Tres Cool

      Oh, Id do that in a minute.

    • Suthenboy

      Driving too damned fast. So many people dont believe it is real, that it can happen to them.
      I have seen so many people mangled, killed and dismembered on the road who believed that. This knuckle head had a bus full of children for fuck’s sake.

      • Festus

        Happens up here every November.

    • Festus

      I’ve seen that movie a few times – https://youtu.be/uf43Jp-mvAU?t=75 It’s one of the best flicks that I’ve ever seen. Better than the book.