This is one of those points that’s been really bothering me lately. Seriously, pick an industry, and then think about who actually does the work. Farmers, Teachers, Nurses, Construction workers, Musicians, Machinists… The folks doing the work are poorer than they’ve ever been, and yet somehow those services cost more than ever. Where is the money going?

Remember that any advice your parent’s give you is a minimum of 20 years past the ‘best by’ date.

I’m going to say Magic the Gathering, which is practically two games in one. I’m talking about Commander in particular, but this applies to pretty much any format under the Magic umbrella.

The first game is building the deck. That appeals to my geek-core, you’re searching through literal decades of cards trying to find combos that are interesting, unique, fun, powerful, or all the above.

The second game is actually playing with other nerds. That’s a social game, which is something I didn’t realize I also enjoy. Nice thing about Magic is it definitely attracts a certain type. The type I want to be friends with. =)

When I was in college, I blew almost my entire savings buying a new Playstation and the latest copy of Street Fighter. The practical side of me immediately started second guessing myself for ‘wasting’ all my money. So I started tracking how many hours I spent playing it.

By the time I graduated, it worked out to something like costing me 10 center per hour of playtime. I reached the point where I probably needed to start adding in the cost of electricity. Although the initial buy in price is high, gaming is an amazingly cost effective entertainment. (Not sure this holds true anymore with subscription games charging a monthly fee, but it was solid when you owned them)

You might check out Free Guy. It’s about a video game NPC who comes to life in a Grand Theft Auto themed universe.

I’m always amazed how much this story changes every time I check in on it.

The first rendition I heard, he was selling his land to a company that was going to build a mall. That was going to be a big boon for his automotive & welding shop, as it would bring a lot of new business to the area. As the sale was nearing completion, the buyer revealed they weren’t actually going to build a mall, instead they were building a concrete plant. That would have the opposite result for Heemeyer’s business, so he balked and increased the price. The buyer decided to play hardball and instead used the city council to put pressure on him, which they did by cutting his sewage lines & declaring his property uninhabitable.

That’s a very different story than what was posted above. And it’s fascinating how slowly the narrative has changed. The ‘build a mall’ portion disappeared first. Then the sewage lines were never there, he was always supposed to build a septic tank. The latest addition I see is now he has firearms as well and is shooting at power transformers. I wonder what will be adapted in the next cycle.

I do the online dating thing. I live in the bible belt, so there’s lots of Conservatives, lots of Christians, & of course often both. It used to be super-rare to see “No MAGA” in a woman’s dating profile, simply because there aren’t that many liberals around. But maybe a year or so ago it started showing up on moderate profiles. Then on Christian profiles. Now I’m even seeing “No MAGA” on Conservative + Christian profiles. It’s one of the most common phrases I see, right up there with ‘dog-mom’, ‘passport stamps’ and ‘no hookups’. It’s like America is finally realizing what a scam MAGA has been.

I do two meals a day.

Brunch Most common, probably 2-3x a week: Bacon, egg & cheese biscuit, yogurt with fruit. Next most common: Protein shake, Fruit, Almonds

Supper Most common: Something high protein I can mean prep in advance. Chilli, Beans with pork, Rotiserie Chicken. All combined with a side of greens. Latest addition: Bowl of homemade peanut butter, banana, coffee.

Biggest difference was at the doctor’s office:

Fat me: Doctor, I’ve been shot!
Doctor: Have you tried losing weight? That’s clearly the problem.

Thin me: Doctor, I’ve been shot!
Doctor: Well your bloodwork looks great, nothing to do here.

I got banned for visiting my mother. No really. I decided to log on from her house, and the anti-bot bot noticed I was using a different IP address and flagged me for being a bot. Did the little dance to confirm I’m a real person, which resulted in a permanent ban. Thanks Reddit!

Stories like this always remind me of the Peter’s parking deck at GA Tech. The couple that donated the land wanted it to be a park, so that the students would have a green place to play and relax. Once Tech had the land, they put a parking deck there instead. But they put a basketball court on the top level so that they technically met the letter of the law.

In fairness, as a student I needed that parking deck way more than I needed the park.

Ever play with a pair of binoculars or an old camera where you had to manually turn knobs in order to focus on something in the distance? That’s the ‘focal point’. This is what LASIK changes. So, if you can currently see stuff up close but not far away, LASIK can move your focal point to make it easier to see things clearly at a different distance.

What LASIK does not change is how wide your focus range is. That’s controlled by your eye muscles and how flexible your cornea is. As you get older, that range gets narrower and narrower.

Using myself as an example, My LASIK set my focal point at around arm’s length. So I can see my computer monitor no problem. I had my surgery around 25, and for years I didn’t need glasses at all. When I reached my 40s, I realized I was having trouble reading very small print, and things very far away were a bit blurry. So I now keep a pair of distance seeing glasses in the car for when I’m driving, and I also have a couple of pairs of readers lying around the house. I still walk around without glasses, but there are times when I need to pull out a pair.

Peanut Butter. Put a big dob on a plate and hand me a spoon.

Like, I’m at the point where I’ve acquired a Vitamix so I can make my own. Which is even more dangerous, as now I can also control the sugar and add flavorings. A nice dash of brown sugar or a hint of Vanilla really make it pop.

I’m kinda surprised we can’t do this by simply insulating the center-most half of the pot’s bottom. When heated on a burner, this would make the outsides hotter than the core, which ought to cause our soup to rise along the sides of the pot and then roll back to the center, forming a nice current that auto-stirs.

I suspect the reason we don’t do this is that eventually, even insulated, the center would still reach equilibrium & we’d lose our circulation. In order to keep this going, we’d need to change the burners, not the pots. We’d need to design burners to be hot on the outside but cooled at the center.

Back when I was really into fighting games, I made a set for myself. They were awesome for fighting games, but not usable for any other games. Pretty much every other game at the time (late 90s) wanted the analog functionality from the joysticks, which a fighting game stick doesn’t have (or didn’t anyway, I admit I have not kept current).

I would add, at the time it was possible to find an arcade supply store and buy commercial parts direct. I don’t think those sources exist anymore.

Kenny from South Park?

I agree, we need to stop chasing a moving target. Instead, minimum wage needs to be adjusted every year to account for inflation.

Fun fact, the maximum amount you can donate to your congressmen is increased every year to account for inflation. So, we already have the formulas in place.

Yes. Although they’ve gone to shit, I still encourage using contractor rating sites like Angie’s, Yelp, Google, or those mailers that come around once a year. Get three quotes from high rated companies. Make a point to listen to the perceived pain points from each of them, as each of them will point out different issues. Circle back with the first quotes to ensure they have a plan to address everything. Ask about insurance, ask about cleanup. Expect to pay more for good quality.

I should add, I do all the small & medium stuff myself. So the only contractors I deal with are here for ‘big’ jobs. That might be your issue - a small project isn’t going to fill a whole day, so the best contractors aren’t going to look at it.

Even this doesn’t guarantee great contractors FYI. I had some windows replaced, in my opinion they did a subpar job for the price. Will probably hold up for 10 years, but it will need to be redone at some point.

Reheat pizza by placing a few drops of water in a frying pan & cover. Gives the bottom the slightest bit of crunch & the steam reheats the rest evenly.

Canned soup + a bouillon cube + extra of that one thing that you like (pasta, rice, meat, veggie).

You can use frozen strawberries instead of ice in many drinks. Doesn’t water the drink down, and you get a sweet treat at the end.

Folks often ask me how I manage to keep my old cars looking & running so great. I’d love to say it’s because I do all the maintenance, and of course that helps. But the real answer is because I keep them in a garage. It really is that simple. It blows my fucking mind that America is so car-centric on every other aspect except having housing with enough garage space.