Hot and humid, probably. We did get a front that came through late in the day, and some wind with a little cooling, but IDK if it will really make a difference. All the rain missed me, and it was 101F in the driveway at 5pm… I think today will be similar. Forecast for the next couple days might have some rain in it.
That would be nice if we weren’t at the BOL for the long weekend.
I did get stuff done yesterday. All my scheduled pickups went well. I managed to get the kid where she needed to be on time. Picked her up too. She went to see an R rated movie with her girlfriend and regretted it. Too much realistic gore and she was really freaked out by the audience laughing at the gruesome deaths. Yeah kid, there are sick people in the world, and they get encouraged by the mass media. Desensitized to violence for years. It’s not an accident, it’s too pervasive.
Today I’m sleeping in a bit, then I will load up. W and the Ds will head up late morning, I’ve got a pickup on the way that I can’t do before afternoon. I’m hoping the solar install stuff gets here before my departure too.
I wouldn’t mind a little rain, if it happens overnight, but I don’t want to spent the whole weekend indoors. However, it’s not up to me, so I’ll just deal with it.
And I’ll be working to improve my situation. Like always. And probably stacking something.
‘Cuz you know that’s the right thing to do, right?
nick
The mafia is heavily involved in the vending machine industry. Cash isn’t going anywhere, but it has been a long time since I saw someone trying to flatten an old dollar bill to feed a machine.
The contactless payment methods are tracked and involve surcharges, Corporate America “wetting their beaks” in mafia terms. The vending machines at our hotel in Boston last Fall were still cash only, and the place served business travelers for MIT and the nearby Moderna (!) HQ.
The insurance industry is starting to cover the cutting edge MRI scan and genetic marker urinalysis as routine to keep patients out of biopsies, but the treatments for prostate cancer typically covered are still fairly primitive.
The MRI in particular has smashed the old “prostate cancer industrial complex” where the moment the PSA went above 2 and the jellyfinger felt something unusual the doctors started talking biopsy.
I can’t imagine any of the Chiefs of the military having a meeting to discuss putting tampon dispensers and ketchup packets in the bathrooms so trannies could fake their periods.
This was Obola’s plan all along to pussify the military. It worked. Now tRump and Hegseth will spend four years undoing it while the Dumbo’s try blocking it every step of the way.
During my company command my biggest grumble was providing soldiers to hand out towels at the gym all day, etc. What a waste. Can you imagine my First Sergeant coming in “Sir, we are running low on ketchup packets in the latrine!”
You forgot the unnecessary gynecological exams for those who had the “confirmation” surgery and want the complete experience.
The VA gets a lot of pressure to do those as covered care for all veterans who want one, but the system’s administration has balked at the cost.
So far.
930am and 89F in the driveway… sunny. mild breezes.
Coffee is dripping. W is still snoring. She was supposed to be picking up Xtra Kid and heading to the BOL about now. No point in rushing and having an accident because you are tired.
Time for me to get moving though. I woke up mostly naturally, but would have lazed in bed if the alarm hadn’t rung.
I guess I’ll poke the sleeping bears.
n
Yikes, got a 503 error. I haven’t applied updates that are waiting. I’ll do that when I get back in town. Site issues this weekend may not be addressed promptly because the host is taking the weekend too.
Visit Barbara if there are issues here, as I will be mostly offline.
Have patience.
Just in case…
n
Yes, this site is slow to respond this morning. Enjoy your weekend.
There were a number of companies involved in the development of clad coinage, but I don’t recall Bell Labs being part of the effort.
Several companies did development work on bonding dissimilar metals in the late 1950’s. The technology was very new when it was identified as a potential to replace silver in U.S. coinage. The three-layer cupro-nickel clad copper sandwich that was selected was produced by DuPont using explosive bonding to apply the force needed to fuse the metals. IIRC, Texas Instruments was also cited at the time as being a supplier of the strips from which the round planchets were stamped that became coins.
When the replacements were rolled out in 1965 they were quickly followed by reports of “FIDO” errors resulting from delamination. The stamping force required for the clad coins was much higher than the old silver coins a number of spectacular failures were produced when the layers separated. I recall one coin magazine cover photo that showed a multiple-coin disaster that was apparently the result of delamination, jamming, and multiple strikes as several planchets were fed into the mess. Before machine vision took over quality controls, human s passed a lot more of the wilder “freaks, irregulars, defects and oddities” that were evident coming out of a bag of coins from the mint. Modern inspection catches all of those, and errors that do get out are subtle and require a trained eye to identify.
As silver coins disappeared from circulation post-1965, my modest interest in coin collecting tapered off. Clad coins do not have the detail of silver, but have much higher resistance to wear. It’s not unusual to find quarters from the early years still circulating, but they are not collectable except to fill blue coin folders.
Site was very slow late yesterday and I got several timeouts/errors while trying to post.
https://townhall.com/tipsheet/saraharnold/2025/05/24/newsom-fumes-after-congress-repeals-californias-ev-mandate-n2657577
If Grusum wants to reduce air pollution in Cali, he can facilitate DHS and ICE doing their job capturing and expelling illegal aliens.
Finally, it looks like a relaxed week coming up. Maybe I shouldn’t say that, or I’ll jinx it?
Here, at least, they average around 3%. I already find that high from credit cards, but at least there you have some amount of protection from fraud. I’m pretty sure that is not the case by the newer contactless payment methods (Venmo in the US, Twint here).
Anyway, regarding coins, the penny in the US should have been abolished decades ago. Even when I last lived in the US, people often wouldn’t bother searching for a dropped penny. By now, nickels need to go too. Just round everything to the nearest 10 cents for cash purchases.
Respect for his decision. He has apparently been fighting this for a while now.
As for Biden, I feel sorry for the guy. I’ve felt sorry for him for years now, because he has just been the prop-up puppet for his wife and other power-hungry people. He hasn’t been mentally competent in a long time. Now we know that he has probably been forced to hide serious (and painful) symptoms for quite a while as well.
Truck is mostly loaded. My GI tract is mostly unloaded. Time to get ready to head out…
n
(TMI? who wants to start a multi hour road trip feeling “full”…?)
There’s no share like an overshare.
On the water since Friday at 6:00PM. The water is rough and the ship is experiencing a lot of movement, back and forth, side to side, and up down. I have the patch but the water is rough enough the patch may not cut it. I am going to spend most of the day lying in bed. This is going to be a long day.
I don’t feel sorry for Biden. He’s spent his entire adult life as a tool of corporate special interests based in Delaware, and he’s been well compensated for the effort.
Yeah, let’s not give them access to weapons systems.
https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-14745367/AI-expose-creator-expose-affair-turned-off.html
They already have a sense of self preservation. That is REALLY not good.
n
Known to police.
hmm.
n
Pinky is out on parole.
Not sure what part of this is a “shock move” . The prosecutors were grandstanding, it was politically motivated, they ignored the law, they left in disgrace, and they broke the law.
https://www.dailymail.co.uk/tvshowbiz/article-14745001/alec-baldwin-rust-shooting-scandal-update-shock-legal-move.html
n
Finishing up my cleanup of the NVR drive prior to departing… don’t want to run out of storage while out of town.
n
My work laptop recently started displaying ads on Yahoo! Finance for items I’ve browsed at Lands End and elsewhere recently on other systems at home.
Having been fired once for a violation of policy, I’m pretty strict about what I do with the work laptop which HR could consider to be a problem if they really picked nits.
The current designs incorporate recommendations from this paper and others from Bell Labs.
https://ia800600.us.archive.org/16/items/bstj45-4-493/bstj45-4-493.pdf
It is crazy to think about how much time and energy went into the evolution of the pay phone and the infrastructure to support the operation of the devices. Then they all seemed to vanish about 15 years ago as everyone started to get a smart phone.
This is a de facto devaluation of currency by a factor of 10, because the effective minimum price of anything is the smallest monetary token you can exchange for it. Yes, I know that using debit or credit cards (or even cheques) allows you to pay in 1c increments, but that’s not actually currency.
>>Site was very slow late yesterday and I got several timeouts/errors while trying to post.
CTRL-A / CTRL-C before you click the submit button is your friend. (I believe it’s CMD-A / CMD-C for all you SJ denizens.)
I would argue “de jure” instead of “de facto”.
The currency has been devalued by inflation already. Eliminating pennies and nickels would just be recognizing that fact in law.
To be completely fair, dimes should go away too. A penny from 100 years ago is equal to about 20 cents or less now.
>>He hasn’t been mentally competent in a long time. Now we know that he has probably been forced to hide serious (and painful) symptoms for quite a while as well.
Re Joe’s level(s) of competency, there are a number of variations in this neurological disease family that make it harder to pinpoint what meds are in play and the desired effects. As can be seen from any number of clips showing him “frozen,” this is not an exact science.
Nickel and dime slot machines.
Plus, the vending machine industry must maintain the illusion that all of the coins are still relevant to hide actual income.
The $1 coin went nowhere, but the casino industry keeps them in production.
@Greg Norton
The current designs incorporate recommendations from this paper and others from Bell Labs.
https://ia800600.us.archive.org/16/items/bstj45-4-493/bstj45-4-493.pdf
It is crazy to think about how much time and energy went into the evolution of the pay phone and the infrastructure to support the operation of the devices. Then they all seemed to vanish about 15 years ago as everyone started to get a smart phone.
The paper wasn’t published until 1966. Be interesting to know when the work was actually performed (note the single reference is dated 1962), and where Bell got the laminated disks that they tested.
Two Dozen Attorneys General Urge Congress to Adopt Constitutional Concealed Carry Reciprocity Act
https://bearingarms.com/camedwards/2025/05/22/two-dozen-attorneys-general-urge-congress-to-adopt-constitutional-concealed-carry-reciprocity-act-n1228691
Many of the blue states have more reasonable permitting laws, but would oppose simply because they are run by Democrats. I suspect there are ten states (New York, Illinois, California, Hawaii, Washington, Oregon, Massachusetts, Maine, Delaware, New Jersey) that would actively oppose.
When the Ice Cracks: Michael Mann’s Legal Defeat and the Climate of Accountability
https://pjmedia.com/david-manney/2025/05/24/when-the-ice-cracks-michael-manns-legal-defeat-and-the-climate-of-accountability-n4940123
MMFM’s fabricated data (yes, a red noise signal fed into his algorithm will produce a hockey stick output) was a main pillar of the global warming scam and caused economic damage that could be equated with the loss of millions of lives.
He will have no final resting place–widely scattering his ashes is the only thing that will keep his remains off a special visitor’s map on the internet.
>>Nickel and dime slot machines.
Good luck finding the penny / nickel / dime slots…if your local casino still has them.
https://twitchy.com/grateful-calvin/2025/05/24/can-we-trade-her-back-brittney-griner-caught-on-video-hurling-racist-slurs-at-caitlin-clark-n2413268
Funny how most of the “racist ”incidents turn out to be fabrications, and the evidence shows that the minorities are the most racist of the all.
Now the WNBA has a problem. They could investigate and suspend the offending player. Instead they will take no action against Grinder, or the next violation by a “black” player, and then they will make the fatal mistake of trying to enforce the rules against a “white” player, and the lawsuit will break the league.
POTUS addressed the 2025 graduating class of West Point:
https://redstate.com/beccalower/2025/05/24/trump-west-point-n2189554
Details don’t seem to be readily available. I suspect that “cast” is more accurate than “forged”, but it’s clear that the full story is worthy of much more detail. It’s a powerful act that draws on centuries of tales of weapons being reforged, gems being recut, and even incorporating parts of the WTC into the new building. There is potential here for a very powerful new tradition.
I would have included this hockey stick in the link above if I’ve seen it in time:
https://wattsupwiththat.com/2025/05/23/friday-funny-michael-manns-new-hockey-stick/
DOJ Can Dig Up Even More Evidence U.S. Taxpayers Funded Lab Creation Of Covid-19
https://thefederalist.com/2025/05/23/doj-can-dig-up-even-more-evidence-u-s-taxpayers-funded-lab-creation-of-covid-19/
https://www.thelibertybeacon.com/masked-nih-employees-storm-out-of-meeting-ask-agencys-role-in-covid/
A number of those employees were doubtless involved in the previous management’s efforts to destroy Dr. Bhattacharya.
My response would have been to pull passes and have every one of them out of the building pending results of an investigation into illegal acts. And make sure someone leaked the names.
I placed a two-item order with The Pizzling Stream May 14, using non-Prime “free” shipping.
Delivery was quoted as My 24-May 28.
It finally shipped today, and claims it will be delivered by 8PM tomorrow.
The shipping notice still shows sales tax as an “estimated” number.
What a bunch of dishonest putzes.
I should have followed my inclination Thursday: Cancelled the order and re-ordered using Prime–two separate orders. Only reason I didn’t was because I used a gift card that had been kicking around for years, and I didn’t want the hassle of tracking that.
The sea was rough. The wife went to the service center and got me some Dramamine which helped. There was a lot of people on the ship with seasickness. I never go to the point of spewing chucks.
The water is now fairly calm so every think is OK.
follow-up on earlier clad coinage discussion:
self-quoting: “IIRC, Texas Instruments was also cited at the time as being a supplier of the strips from which the round planchets were stamped that became coins”
https://www.emsclad.com/ems/#
I cannot find a good overall history of the technology development for U.S. clad coins. It includes Bell labs, Texas Instruments, DuPont, Hercules, and Olin. The exclusive supplier of clad strips to the U.S. mint since 1994 is a small company in Iowa that was founded in 1992.
One interesting bit that I found was that the metal waste left after the planchets are punched out of the strips is returned to the manufacturer where it is totally recycled into the strip-making process. It would be a fun calculation to make if the data were available, but if production were constant a rough estimate is that the cladding is more than 50% recycled material and could approach 100% depending on spacing between planchets.
@lpdbw, with tongue firmly in cheek:
“… would just be recognizing that fact in law.” Pretty sure that’s the actual definition of de jure.
Ah, time for bed. Shower first.
Got here early evening and it was stifling out. Had a nice chat with my buddy. His treatment and his wife’s are going well. Wife had a lumpectomy and biopsy of surrounding lymph nodes with good prognosis. He’s doing followup immunotherapy, whatever that entails. Every 2 weeks they take about an hour to infuse him with a big bag o stuff. He was in good spirits, but still doesn’t have his energy back.
Had a nice dinner, then played Rummicub with D1, W, and Xtra child.
Went down to the dock and had a tiny little fire while reading. Radio reception was noisy and low, but WRMI was playing some good stuff, when I could hear it. Bobby Caldwell “Fool for Love” was notable. Sky was clearer than it has been in months. Weather improved to 78F and windy for a while. The wind kept the bugs off, as did the smoke.
Time to clean up and hit the hay, for tomorrow is a busy day.
n