The hybrids have very strange electrical issues. Some will put you on the side of the road waiting for a tow truck.
I suspect that the new EREVs will have the same issues.
The EREVs do not have any mechanical connection between the engine and the wheels. The scheme reeks of desperation on the part of the manufacturers who have a pipeline full of crippled vehicles intended for the 50 MPG CAFE requirement.
Dodge is being kept alive on Durango sales, a design which dates back to 2011 and in the pipeline from the mid-2000s.
I’ve seen a number of “new” Durangos lately, including one in the lot at work, which is really surprising.
The EREVs do not have any mechanical connection between the engine and the wheels. The scheme reeks of desperation on the part of the manufacturers who have a pipeline full of crippled vehicles intended for the 50 MPG CAFE requirement.
Wasn’t Ford going to offer what is essentially a generator for the Lightning, installed in the bed and resembling a large tool box?
HOW THE F does a HIGH SCHOOL football booster org have enough money that she could steal $400K? They must have still been funding stuff and a non-zero bank account… That’s a crazy amount for a club to have.
On Hybrids. Can I say that my 4.5 yr old full Hybrid Honda Jazz (fit?) is a wonderful drive. The drive train is amazing, providing an electric car driving experience with the benefit of underlying petrol (gasoline) based power. I believe all Honda full Hybrids use variants of the same drive train technology – highly recommended.
HOW THE F does a HIGH SCHOOL football booster org have enough money that she could steal $400K? They must have still been funding stuff and a non-zero bank account… That’s a crazy amount for a club to have.
That number isn’t uncommon for a competitive band program that makes a trip to the Bands of America event in Indianapolis every other year. In addition to travel expenses, booster clubs cover the expenses of commissioning a program, building props, and purchasing costumes/uniforms for competition.
Our Booster budget was in that range when our kids were in high school with most of the money coming from concession sales at football games and a weird arrangement with a local “charity” Bingo room.
I‘m not saying I’m thrilled with the situation, but most band directors our age have the soundtrack from “Mr. Holland’s Opus” running through their heads, and they sell boosters on the concept of competitive band increasing their kids’ chances of admission to Fancy Lad U,
@gavin, which Rangers do you have, and have you done a bed swap or rear axle swap?
I have a Gen1(4l 5spd) and a Gen3, (3l 5spd 4×4) which I purchased intending to do a rear axle swap on my ‘94 B4000. I didn’t proceed because I found evidence the issue was the (auto) transmission in the ‘94. As for a bed swap, I didn’t swap it, but I pulled the bed off the ‘94 I think 3 times for access, it’s not that hard and only requires an engine crane and some ratchet straps rated for the weight. If you’re doing it on a hard surface, it’s easy to pull the bed away. In my dirt driveway, it was easier to roll the vehicle out from underneath. In any event, I would call that an easy job; disconnect the taillight wiring, unbolt the fuel neck, remove the 6 large Torx bolts holding it down and lift with the engine crane or what have you.
Once the box is off, unbolt/disconnect the springs, shocks, and brake lines and cables, jack up the frame. Pro Tip: have all the parts on hand. I constantly find I’ve missed getting fluids and gaskets for jobs, requiring Yet Another Parts Run™.
I think the easiest way to do the rear seal would be continue with disassembly, ie use a crib to lift the cab off the frame, and set it down on the back where the box isn’t, then you have access to pull the transmission and flywheel. Of course, this all presupposes you can do such things in your yard without official displeasure coming your way. I have that luxury; YMMV.
America is going to have to relearn retail. someone says around here, but also online.
I am down to my last two lightweight cotton Stafford pocket tees, nice for our humid fall weather.
So I went to buy a few replacements online. I even have the item number, so it would be easy, right? After half an hour I am going to admit defeat for this morning.
Even the manufacturer’s page just has an Amazon link that defaults to general tee-shirts. No, I don’t want a pocketless microfiber wife-beater by some offshore no-name…
My Honda Jazz Hybrid use is mainly daily, a number of 3 to 5 mile trips, with occasional 20 mile and approximately monthly 3 to 6 hour journeys. The Honda Hybrid system I feel is optimised to urban traffic, relatively low speed with lots of stop starts; in such use, the energy recovery through the hybrid system delivers very good fuel consumption and the electric drive delivers almost one pedal driving. I find it very comfortable on longer trips, but as these are high speed, the fuel economy benefits are much reduced (nearly all the energy is used overcoming air friction, so low drag is more important than hybrid).
I am down to my last two lightweight cotton Stafford pocket tees, nice for our humid fall weather.
So I went to buy a few replacements online. I even have the item number, so it would be easy, right? After half an hour I am going to admit defeat for this morning.
Stafford was a JC Penney brand.
Penny’s will have to be rebuilt along with Sears, but I doubt that either corporate entity operating under those names will be able to accomplish the task.
I‘m not saying I’m thrilled with the situation, but most band directors our age have the soundtrack from “Mr. Holland’s Opus” running through their heads, and they sell boosters on the concept of competitive band increasing their kids’ chances of admission to Fancy Lad U,
Even the “right” state schools are competitive anymore.
I noticed that the University of Florida no longer has the crazy GPA math which caused my sister to flunk out 30 years ago.
Gainesville must be relying on admissions requirements and Bright Futures to limit their numbers. I don’t keep up.
All right. Now I’m feeling a bit better. I have to get my sleep time more regulated… and regular.
———
This anniversary is always hard for me because I get so angry. And being exposed to the normal idiocy (it was a controlled demolition/fire can’t melt steel being the two most common) just makes my anger worse because the fucknuts divert attention from the real issues, thus playing right into the plans of any hidden puppetmasters.
———
OFD thought I had PTSD from being there in NJ 8 miles from Ground Zero, but I never thought so, just anger and irrational feelings, and it’s been 25 years and I can almost think about it without my eyes watering, so that couldn’t be right. I don’t want to feel less.
———-
I’ve been thinking, we left Vietnam in defeat and a couple years later we get the Arab Oil Embargo and the fall of Iran. We left Afghanistan in defeat– what’s coming from that?
What show of weakness got us 9-11? I am starting to think these guys sit around going “Look, they are just a dog with it’s tail between its legs, an old tired lion showing its throat… NOW is the time to strike!””Now is the time to defeat the great satan!”
@OldGuy: Thanks, but I did try that … one non-pocket Stafford and a mixed passel of others. Hanes are utterly unreliable, size-wise, I’ve given up on theim completely.
If I’m ever down by the mall I will walk in and see. But almost everything is locked up so it is a PITA.
the normal idiocy (it was a controlled demolition/fire can’t melt steel
During my 2nd attempt at uni, another student told me “my dad has a CD with the evidence on it that it was a setup.” With a straight face. Without being able to explain what that evidence might be, or how her dad would have been on the distribution list, or why, if “everyone knows” she couldn’t bring it for our perusal due to “security.” I guess you might call that my personal wakeup about leftist idiocy.
In 2001 I worked in network management. I was on the phone to a client in Tower 7 when Tower 2 fell, and there was a palpable horror in his voice when he said “… it’s falling …” that has never left me. Then for about 3 weeks, we had daily reminders when network equipment in the basements ran out of power and dropped off the net.
And for some reason, I keep thinking of the quote attributed to Mahatma Ghandi; ““What do I think of Western civilization? I think it would be a very good idea.”
India gave the world suttee and Thugism, Islam gave us child brides and 9/11, China gave us opium and contaminated baby food. I don’t think Eastern civilization qualifies to teach us anything.
Then for about 3 weeks, we had daily reminders when network equipment in the basements ran out of power and dropped off the net.
— the pager archives are a very tough read, both technically, because of the way the messages are presented, and emotionally because some of them are people’s last words of love, and some are just too late.
One of the things that struck me as I read thru them is the slow and then cascading failures of infrastructure spelled out one automated pager message at a time. Systems start to go offline, network links drop, trouble tickets that will never be resolved are automatically generated. There was a lot of critical tech infrastructure in and under the buildings.
Meanwhile the German Chancellor is doubling down on his politics, and claiming that ejecting illegal migrants is “ethnic cleansing”.
Heresy! Heresy I say! A politician saying something true?
I can think of four kinds of “ethnic cleansing”. 1 – Deport them. Ship them home. 2 – Enforce the law. “Sorry mate, we have eye witnesses and video of you stabbing the deceased in the neck. Come this way to the gallows.” 3 – Mass graves ala Stalin or whatever Pol Pot did. 4 – Civil War when the natives decide the government is worthless.
#1 is best. Send them home.
#2 will make the rest behave or self deport.
#4 is really bad for the government. Because when the invaders are done with, guess who is next?
And…. I don’t recall ever hearing of any voting to open the borders and to import the aliens.
It’s the time of the year!!!! It has been pushing 100f for a few weeks now. Pretty much no rain at all, not enough to make the grass grow anyway.
Right now it is 82f outside and fairly sunny and it’s raining enough to make puddles. Decent size rain drops with enough sunlight to make it look like diamonds falling from the sky.
Almost feels cold outside. Kind of humid but that’s ok.
Yeah, that’s literally the Eastern world in a nutshell. The West also had a class system, until several countries reformed under the banner of egalitarianism (the French gave us that much, then forgot it was supposed to include people outside Paris). Now the elites are trying to reestablish formal, legal classism in the erstwhile free world. People who already accept a class system are better allies, hence the importation of the third world.
Today I continued with the half ton repairs. The brake cable is now in and appears to be working fine. Next is probably wheel hubs, to eliminate low speed ABS activity and a set code for the left front wheel speed sensor.
I keep thinking of the quote attributed to Mahatma Ghandi; ““What do I think of Western civilization? I think it would be a very good idea.”
Mohandas (not Mahatma; that’s a title of respect which that scumbag did not deserve) Gandhi regularly slept with twelve-year-old girls “to test his willpower”. I feel no inclination to care what he says about anything; it’s like a fat woman with a pierced septum telling me what a real man is.
India currently has more slaves than any other nation according to the 2023 Global Slavery Index. (Not the highest rate of slavery; India’s high total comes from a medium percentage of a high population.) On that basis, as well, I am not interested in anything that any Indian has to say on any matter of culture or morality.
And then there’s the open defecation. And the rape gangs. And the failure to comprehend the concept of hygiene when it comes to food preparation.
“(WND)—The lone holdout juror on the Lindsay Clancy murder trial, a trial that ended in a mistrial because of the inability of the jury to be unanimous, was a black man.”
“That detail about the case appeared during an interview by CBS talk show entertainer Gayle King and one of the jurors.”
“Devlin said the age range was from 20s to 70-ish, there were nine women and three men, and all were white except the holdout.”
““All right, I’m very fascinated by the holdout juror learning that he’s a black man today. Can you just tell me his age? I’m very curious,” she said. Upon learning that he was in his 30s, King was astonished once again. “Oh, younger,” she added.”
Tonight’s movie was going to be Disney animated slop called Finding Nemo or an old James Cagney movie called Something to Sing About.
I went with the Cagney movie. Pretty darn good movie, too. Black and white. The focus was a bit fuzzy like the lens was dusty. Pretty great transfer from whatever to DVD.
Great audio…. like 5.1 surround and pumped into just left and right channels. Absolutely zero audio warbling like you hear in some old movies.
All I have is the UPC. 94933 20873 How that works on Big River is unknown.
Today, just before I found out the Clancy trial holdout juror was black, I changed my mind on the verdict.
Sure, I agree with him that she deserves to go to jail for the murder of her kids, but I finally read enough about Massachusetts law to realize the other 11 jurors got the law right.
Mass. law says that by default, crazy people can commit murder without punishment. There is a tiny exception to that, but the burden of proof is on the State to present enough evidence that the crazy person knew what they were doing was wrong. Additionally, that they were incapable of resisting the urge. Both of them. Evidence beyond any reasonable doubt.
So the jurors had to read her mind and beyond any reasonable doubt decide she knew, for certain, what she was doing was wrong, and also, for certain, that she couldn’t help herself.
If the Mass. legislature doesn’t rewrite that law to match the other 49 states, they’re stupid and crazy.
There’s just one problem with that… They are stupid and crazy.
As much as I like Summer and do not like Winter, because I’m fond of feeling my toes, I’m getting real tired of the daily high being 100 to 105f and no clouds for most of the last month.
And no breeze makes it miserable. That’s most of my complaint. No breeze.
The morning lows are 77f . Too warm and too humid to open the house.
Grump grump. Come mid-October we might have our first frost. Hopefully not. First frost is usually mid-November.
I spent the entire afternoon in my main bank trying to get our online banking turned back on. My bank Comerica has been bought by 53 bank. When I walked in the bank, there was 20 people there trying to do the same thing. After two hours, the former bank manager helped me out, she was just demoted by the new bank manager from 53 bank. But, they lost all of the paperwork from the previous bank so I have to go back Monday with the other check signer, bring all of my corporate paperwork, articles of incorporation, authorizations, etc. And wait in a 2 hour to 4 hour line again.
They have promised me that they did not freeze the $120,000 in my bank account and that my checks written in the last two weeks will not bounce. Plus my payroll next Tuesday will not bounce and that the IRS can withdraw from my bank account.
We have moved to an incompetent society and a low trust society.
And this stuff is like the crazy guy that killed Iryna on the train. He’s on video doing the deed, evidence that he did it, and he walks because he’s not competent to be tried. ????
Comerica is some kind of merger thing from bank and s&l failures. Like BankOne from Momentum Bank into to MBank. And then into …. crap. Too much grift.
How did NCNB manage to buy Bank of America? Grift.
All I know is that Frost Bank is a Texas bank and has always been good to me. Since 1980 or so. Other than buying the scraps of First City after First City failed a second time…..
Mass. law says that by default, crazy people can commit murder without punishment.
Not exactly. I don’t think minimum 10 years in a high-security mental institution is less than punishment. There is no provision for her to be free on the basis of psychosis. Even to achieve that, her defense would have to prove beyond a reasonable doubt that she is “guilty, except insane”. Otherwise, guilty by the defense stipulation that she did in fact kill her children. If the holdout believed she was not insane, then he had a duty to refuse to vote with the other jurors.
Tuned by a movie tonight, El Dorado (1966), with John Wayne, Robert Mitchum, and James Caan. Directed by Howard Hawks.
The ingredients of Mississippi‘s hangover concoction are very surely in the scripted dialogue. Mississippi: “Johnny Diamond had a recipe. Let’s see. Cayenne pepper, mustard-the hot kind, ipecac, asafetida, and oil of cloves or was it? No, it was croton oil.” Bull: “Croton oil?! I’ll be a suck-egg mule. You know what that mixture’ll do to a fella?” Mississippi: “Guaranteed kill or cure.” The final ingredient is gunpowder.
Written by Leigh Brackett, science fiction author of the Golden Age, who wrote the first draft for The Empire Strikes back, but passed away before it went into production*. She co-wrote the screenplay for The Big Sleep, and did tree other John Wayne movies for Hawks.
A lot of Brackett’s work from the pulp era was republished by Ballantine and Ace in the 1970’s. Many of those volumes are quite reasonably priced on eBay, and I would recommend “The Best of Leigh Brackett”, published by Ballantine under the Del Rey imprint, and also as a book club hardcover.
*The story is that Lucas didn’t like the screenplay, and rewrote it twice before turning it over to Lawrence Kashdan:
Brackett and Kasdan (but not Lucas) were credited for the final screenplay. Brackett was credited in tribute despite not being involved in the final film.
Laurent Bouzereau, in Star Wars: The Annotated Screenplays, said that Lucas disliked the direction of Brackett’s screenplay, discarded it, and produced two more screenplays before turning the results over to Kasdan.[12] io9’s co-founder Charlie Jane Anders has written that while “It’s fashionable to disparage Brackett’s contributions to Empire”, “it’s not true that none of Brackett’s storyline winds up in the final movie—the basic story beats are the same.”[13]
For over 30 years, Brackett’s screenplay could be read only at the Jack Williamson Special Collections library at Eastern New Mexico University in Portales, New Mexico, and at Lucasfilm’s archives in California. It was officially published in February 2016.[14] In this draft, there is a love triangle between Luke, Leia and Han Solo. Yoda is named Minch, Luke has a hidden sister named Nellith, Lando Calrissian is Lando Kaddar, Luke’s father is still a distinct character from Darth Vader and appears as a Force ghost on Dagobah, and Han Solo, at the end of the script, leaves to search for his uncle Ovan Marek, the most powerful man in the universe after the Emperor Palpatine.
John Saavedra of Den of Geek website wrote:
Most importantly, you see that Brackett’s draft, while definitely in need of a rewrite and several tweaks, holds all of the big moments we’d eventually see on screen. We still get a version of the Battle of Hoth, the wise words of an old Jedi Master, the excitement of zooming through a deadly asteroid field, a love triangle, a majestic city in the clouds, unexpected betrayals, and the climactic duel between Luke Skywalker and Darth Vader.[15]
Brackett’s The Long Tomorrow is often left off of lists of post-apocalyptic science fiction novels, but in 1956 was the first novel written by a female author to be short-listed for the Hugo Award.
Kungflu damaged my sense of smell, and it seems like there are times when it goes pretty much offline. One of those times must have been when I tried a new-to-me laundry detergent called Persil. It reportedly got high ratings. I tried it and thought it worked well, then bought a 1.57 gallon when Sam’s Club had it on sale. Shortly thereafter I realized that I could not stand the smell, which seemed to be reminiscent of wet cigarette butts. Fortunately, the smell was only that of the detergent itself; wet clothes retained little of it, and it did not survive the dryer.
I finished off the large container today, and in the course of removing the cap (aka closure*, in industry parlance) and the dispensing spigot–stacks!–I was admiring the quality of plastic in the bottle, which was blue with a definite metallic although not pearlescent sheen. The label claimed that the whole package–bottle, spigots, and labels–were 50% post-consumer waste. It weighed 7.3 oz empty sans closures. Shame it can’t be recycled into another Persil bottle.
*There is a nomenclature that describes closures, and a few minutes online can be enlightening. A “ruler” can be printed out as an aid to measuring a bottle or jar to determine the size of a missing closure. There are many “standard” sizes, but similar containers tend to use only a few. Buying them is small quantities is expensive on eBay or elsewhere, hence my propensity for saving a few against future need. If you ever find yourself in a country store in Amish or Mennonite country chances are they will have a selection available by the piece for containers that get re-used, such as gallon and half-gallon glass jugs.
Odds have been monotone decreasing for months, with a new low of 7%.
Casual perusal of the article finds a short list totaling $76.5 billion of funds that have disappeared with no visible benefit.
All or overwhelmingly most are funds that came from the federal government. Little to no oversight, no accountability, and even though the grift has gone on for years, nothing seems to stop the checks.
Elon Musk has estimated that half the federal budget is fraudulently spent. There’s a big chunk right there. It’s way past time to shut it off. If states want to spend the money they can be accountable to their taxpayers, whose state tax bill would, what? Double? Triple? Quadruple if the funds came out of he state budget? How many indignant state-level Nick Shirley’s would pop up if citizens found that their very own money was being shoveled to grifters?
Don’t care if the dude was black. Totally irrelevant. She said she killed her kids.
Please read my post more closely. I changed my mind on the verdict, and I pointed out that I did it before I ever heard a word about the juror’s race. In other words, it was not relevant to my conclusion. My reasoning was based only on the terrible, terrible Massachusetts law.
Morally, she should fry.
@Gavin
Not exactly. I don’t think minimum 10 years in a high-security mental institution is less than punishment
I agree. However, that is not Massachusetts law. If judged Not Guilty by Reason of Insanity, she would be committed for 6 months. Then reviewed every year for an additional one year commitment. As a person whose “illness” only directs violence at her offspring, and who has no more offspring, she could certainly be freed in less than 2 or 3 years.
If it were a minimum 10 year commitment, I might view such a verdict as fair. Or at least, mostly fair.
“Nothing quite says popular justice like a good old-fashioned guillotine. Across the country, protesters have dragged around makeshift guillotines as they call for “radical” and “revolutionary” changes to our constitutional system. The symbol of the French Revolution remains a chilling reminder of how revolutions devour their own. What is even more unnerving than these prop guillotines is the increase in calls for radical and revolutionary changes—including the elimination or the packing of the Supreme Court, trashing the Electoral College, and doing away with the U.S. Senate—by establishment figures on the Left.”
“Today’s attacks on the American judiciary do indeed harken back to the rhetoric that raged before the advent of “The Terror” in revolutionary France—the rhetoric that gave rise to the kind of “mobocracy” that the Founders sought to avoid by designing our constitutional order as they did.”
“In reality, the attack on the Court as partisan is entirely disconnected from its actual voting record. It is a too-little-known fact that 44 percent of cases that come before the Supreme Court are decided unanimously. When you include nearly unanimous cases—those decided by 8–1 and 7–2 margins—that figure jumps to over 60 percent. It is also common for liberal and conservative justices to vote with colleagues on the opposite end of the ideological spectrum. In a case this year, for example, conservative Justices Thomas, Alito, and Kavanaugh joined liberal Justices Sotomayor and Jackson in the majority decision, while liberal Justice Kagan joined Chief Justice Roberts and Justice Barrett in the dissent.”
I did not know that 44% of the cases before SCOTUS are decided unanimously.
5. Those who have an opposing ideology are considered evil.
6. People actively avoid being near those of opposing ideology. Might move from communities or states just because of ideology.
7. Common violence. Organized violence is occurring monthly.
8. Common violence that is generally deemed by governmental authorities as justified based on ideology.
9. Opposing sides develop governing/war structures. Just in case.
10. Open War.
“I have maintained the Clock O’Doom at 9., but given the lower numbers on the indexes and the lower number of violence and censorship events, will likely lower the level next month if violence stays low. Beware: the number can climb quickly.”
“My advice remains. Avoid crowds. Get out of cities. Now. A year too soon is better than one day too late.”
You are correct. The references I had found were bills to amend the Mass. law to more closely resemble other states’ statutes. They were not passed. Unfortunately.
Book number three of a four book science fiction tactical romance series. I read the well printed and well bound POD (print on demand) trade paperback self published by the author in 2021 that I bought on Amazon in 2026. I have purchased the following book in the series.
On a far off colony world far in the distant future, the Federation and the Imperium are fighting clandestine battles in and around many of their client states. The usual problem is resources and land snatching. The terraforming of the planet 600 years before was never completed and people are needing more and more resources such as hydrocarbons and food.
“Jenna Brooks is a welder, and a fashionista whenever she can afford it. AJ is a former Special Forces spacer, who finds himself completely outside his comfort zone with her. However, terrorist bombs can overcome almost any divide – the hard way. When Jenna stumbles over a corpse wearing an important clue, she’s roped into a high-stakes counterterrorism operation to uncover a counterfeit fashion ring that’s funding the terrorists. As the trail of blood money and knock-off shoes starts leading closer to home, Jenna’s going to need all the help she can get to stay alive. AJ’s just the man to do that – but he’s after a lot more than merely her safety. It may cost her everything she’s worked for… and also her heart.”
The story is very fast paced and the characters are extremely likable. The history of the colony world and the various political entities is not explained very well but that was not necessary for the story to be good.
Trump’s top immigration official claims an internal investigation found that Congresswoman Ilhan Omar ‘married her brother’ and could be facing deportation.
‘We know that she married her brother to try to bring him into the United States,’ Department of Homeland Security Secretary Markwayne Mullin said of the Minnesota Democrat. ‘We know he lives now in London.’
He was speaking about the second man Omar married, who the Daily Mail has previously reported is Ahmed Elmi. Both are originally from Somalia.
She allegedly was still married to her first husband, Ahmed Hirsi, at the time of the second marriage, the congresswoman has told friends who relayed the account to the Daily Mail.
https://gab.com/SteveF/posts/117251793126669684
For truth.
Heroes
https://townhall.com/news/mattvespa/2026/09/11/flashback-the-fighter-pilot-who-was-tasked-with-taking-down-flight-93-n1891166
The EREVs do not have any mechanical connection between the engine and the wheels. The scheme reeks of desperation on the part of the manufacturers who have a pipeline full of crippled vehicles intended for the 50 MPG CAFE requirement.
Dodge is being kept alive on Durango sales, a design which dates back to 2011 and in the pipeline from the mid-2000s.
I’ve seen a number of “new” Durangos lately, including one in the lot at work, which is really surprising.
Wasn’t Ford going to offer what is essentially a generator for the Lightning, installed in the bed and resembling a large tool box?
IIRC, they even got a Patent for the concept.
78F this morning. Sun coming up.
Kid’s snack is made. I might nap just because I can.
n
https://www.dailymail.com/sport/othersports/article-16122115/julie-hanway-molina-alisoviejo-football-embezzlement.html
HOW THE F does a HIGH SCHOOL football booster org have enough money that she could steal $400K? They must have still been funding stuff and a non-zero bank account… That’s a crazy amount for a club to have.
n
… which caused great resentment far and wide.
On Hybrids. Can I say that my 4.5 yr old full Hybrid Honda Jazz (fit?) is a wonderful drive. The drive train is amazing, providing an electric car driving experience with the benefit of underlying petrol (gasoline) based power. I believe all Honda full Hybrids use variants of the same drive train technology – highly recommended.
@PaultheManc
Please share how you use it: miles per day, range, trips, etc.
I used to walk past the old UIUC nuclear reactor about 3 times a week in 1975-1976. I see they decommissioned it in the late 1990’s.
Good luck to them on developing small nuclear power.
Wow, @SteveF, your post on Gab seems to have drawn the attention of a mental midget.
He used the name John Galt, and I bet he’s incapable of actually reading Atlas Shrugged.
That number isn’t uncommon for a competitive band program that makes a trip to the Bands of America event in Indianapolis every other year. In addition to travel expenses, booster clubs cover the expenses of commissioning a program, building props, and purchasing costumes/uniforms for competition.
Our Booster budget was in that range when our kids were in high school with most of the money coming from concession sales at football games and a weird arrangement with a local “charity” Bingo room.
I‘m not saying I’m thrilled with the situation, but most band directors our age have the soundtrack from “Mr. Holland’s Opus” running through their heads, and they sell boosters on the concept of competitive band increasing their kids’ chances of admission to Fancy Lad U,
Yah, I noticed. It’s duh jooooos!
I have a Gen1(4l 5spd) and a Gen3, (3l 5spd 4×4) which I purchased intending to do a rear axle swap on my ‘94 B4000. I didn’t proceed because I found evidence the issue was the (auto) transmission in the ‘94. As for a bed swap, I didn’t swap it, but I pulled the bed off the ‘94 I think 3 times for access, it’s not that hard and only requires an engine crane and some ratchet straps rated for the weight. If you’re doing it on a hard surface, it’s easy to pull the bed away. In my dirt driveway, it was easier to roll the vehicle out from underneath. In any event, I would call that an easy job; disconnect the taillight wiring, unbolt the fuel neck, remove the 6 large Torx bolts holding it down and lift with the engine crane or what have you.
Once the box is off, unbolt/disconnect the springs, shocks, and brake lines and cables, jack up the frame. Pro Tip: have all the parts on hand. I constantly find I’ve missed getting fluids and gaskets for jobs, requiring Yet Another Parts Run™.
I think the easiest way to do the rear seal would be continue with disassembly, ie use a crib to lift the cab off the frame, and set it down on the back where the box isn’t, then you have access to pull the transmission and flywheel. Of course, this all presupposes you can do such things in your yard without official displeasure coming your way. I have that luxury; YMMV.
America is going to have to relearn retail. someone says around here, but also online.
I am down to my last two lightweight cotton Stafford pocket tees, nice for our humid fall weather.
So I went to buy a few replacements online. I even have the item number, so it would be easy, right? After half an hour I am going to admit defeat for this morning.
Even the manufacturer’s page just has an Amazon link that defaults to general tee-shirts. No, I don’t want a pocketless microfiber wife-beater by some offshore no-name…
John Galt. Nom de plume of T. Watt.
@drwilliams
My Honda Jazz Hybrid use is mainly daily, a number of 3 to 5 mile trips, with occasional 20 mile and approximately monthly 3 to 6 hour journeys. The Honda Hybrid system I feel is optimised to urban traffic, relatively low speed with lots of stop starts; in such use, the energy recovery through the hybrid system delivers very good fuel consumption and the electric drive delivers almost one pedal driving. I find it very comfortable on longer trips, but as these are high speed, the fuel economy benefits are much reduced (nearly all the energy is used overcoming air friction, so low drag is more important than hybrid).
Stafford was a JC Penney brand.
Penny’s will have to be rebuilt along with Sears, but I doubt that either corporate entity operating under those names will be able to accomplish the task.
The brands might survive under the new owners.
@EdH – JC Penney has an on-line presence. Try this page: https://www.jcpenney.com/s?searchTerm=lightweight+cotton+Stafford+pocket+tees
Even the “right” state schools are competitive anymore.
I noticed that the University of Florida no longer has the crazy GPA math which caused my sister to flunk out 30 years ago.
Gainesville must be relying on admissions requirements and Bright Futures to limit their numbers. I don’t keep up.
All right. Now I’m feeling a bit better. I have to get my sleep time more regulated… and regular.
———
This anniversary is always hard for me because I get so angry. And being exposed to the normal idiocy (it was a controlled demolition/fire can’t melt steel being the two most common) just makes my anger worse because the fucknuts divert attention from the real issues, thus playing right into the plans of any hidden puppetmasters.
———
OFD thought I had PTSD from being there in NJ 8 miles from Ground Zero, but I never thought so, just anger and irrational feelings, and it’s been 25 years and I can almost think about it without my eyes watering, so that couldn’t be right. I don’t want to feel less.
———-
I’ve been thinking, we left Vietnam in defeat and a couple years later we get the Arab Oil Embargo and the fall of Iran. We left Afghanistan in defeat– what’s coming from that?
What show of weakness got us 9-11? I am starting to think these guys sit around going “Look, they are just a dog with it’s tail between its legs, an old tired lion showing its throat… NOW is the time to strike!””Now is the time to defeat the great satan!”
They have no idea of size… or inertia.
n
@OldGuy: Thanks, but I already tried … no crew pocket tee’s in cotton.
@Edh – how about direct from Stafford? https://staffordtshirts.com/stafford-pocket-t-shirts/ with links to Amazon.
@OldGuy: Thanks, but I did try that … one non-pocket Stafford and a mixed passel of others. Hanes are utterly unreliable, size-wise, I’ve given up on theim completely.
If I’m ever down by the mall I will walk in and see. But almost everything is locked up so it is a PITA.
Ed, might I suggest nudity as a way to avoid frustration and reduce the cost of living? #FollowMeForMoreLifeHacks
In Japanese but subtitled: 9/11 Tribute
@OldGuy: Thanks, but I already tried … no crew pocket tee’s in cotton.
I use Lands End nowadays for these. Real hit and miss on inventory.
https://landsend.com
During my 2nd attempt at uni, another student told me “my dad has a CD with the evidence on it that it was a setup.” With a straight face. Without being able to explain what that evidence might be, or how her dad would have been on the distribution list, or why, if “everyone knows” she couldn’t bring it for our perusal due to “security.” I guess you might call that my personal wakeup about leftist idiocy.
In 2001 I worked in network management. I was on the phone to a client in Tower 7 when Tower 2 fell, and there was a palpable horror in his voice when he said “… it’s falling …” that has never left me. Then for about 3 weeks, we had daily reminders when network equipment in the basements ran out of power and dropped off the net.
And for some reason, I keep thinking of the quote attributed to Mahatma Ghandi; ““What do I think of Western civilization? I think it would be a very good idea.”
India gave the world suttee and Thugism, Islam gave us child brides and 9/11, China gave us opium and contaminated baby food. I don’t think Eastern civilization qualifies to teach us anything.
Then for about 3 weeks, we had daily reminders when network equipment in the basements ran out of power and dropped off the net.
— the pager archives are a very tough read, both technically, because of the way the messages are presented, and emotionally because some of them are people’s last words of love, and some are just too late.
One of the things that struck me as I read thru them is the slow and then cascading failures of infrastructure spelled out one automated pager message at a time. Systems start to go offline, network links drop, trouble tickets that will never be resolved are automatically generated. There was a lot of critical tech infrastructure in and under the buildings.
n
https://911.wikileaks.org/files/index.html
(I was carrying my skytel satellite pager at the time, and my messages home are in there somewhere. )
I don’t think Eastern civilization qualifies to teach us anything.
– don’t forget about foot binding. or the caste system
n
Heresy! Heresy I say! A politician saying something true?
I can think of four kinds of “ethnic cleansing”.
1 – Deport them. Ship them home.
2 – Enforce the law. “Sorry mate, we have eye witnesses and video of you stabbing the deceased in the neck. Come this way to the gallows.”
3 – Mass graves ala Stalin or whatever Pol Pot did.
4 – Civil War when the natives decide the government is worthless.
#1 is best. Send them home.
#2 will make the rest behave or self deport.
#4 is really bad for the government. Because when the invaders are done with, guess who is next?
And…. I don’t recall ever hearing of any voting to open the borders and to import the aliens.
It’s the time of the year!!!! It has been pushing 100f for a few weeks now. Pretty much no rain at all, not enough to make the grass grow anyway.
Right now it is 82f outside and fairly sunny and it’s raining enough to make puddles. Decent size rain drops with enough sunlight to make it look like diamonds falling from the sky.
Almost feels cold outside. Kind of humid but that’s ok.
Yeah, that’s literally the Eastern world in a nutshell. The West also had a class system, until several countries reformed under the banner of egalitarianism (the French gave us that much, then forgot it was supposed to include people outside Paris). Now the elites are trying to reestablish formal, legal classism in the erstwhile free world. People who already accept a class system are better allies, hence the importation of the third world.
Today I continued with the half ton repairs. The brake cable is now in and appears to be working fine. Next is probably wheel hubs, to eliminate low speed ABS activity and a set code for the left front wheel speed sensor.
Mohandas (not Mahatma; that’s a title of respect which that scumbag did not deserve) Gandhi regularly slept with twelve-year-old girls “to test his willpower”. I feel no inclination to care what he says about anything; it’s like a fat woman with a pierced septum telling me what a real man is.
India currently has more slaves than any other nation according to the 2023 Global Slavery Index. (Not the highest rate of slavery; India’s high total comes from a medium percentage of a high population.) On that basis, as well, I am not interested in anything that any Indian has to say on any matter of culture or morality.
And then there’s the open defecation. And the rape gangs. And the failure to comprehend the concept of hygiene when it comes to food preparation.
“Not a “Heartless White Man”: Vilified Clancy Jury Holdout Is Black”
https://thelibertydaily.com/not-heartless-white-man-vilified-clancy-jury-holdout/
“(WND)—The lone holdout juror on the Lindsay Clancy murder trial, a trial that ended in a mistrial because of the inability of the jury to be unanimous, was a black man.”
“That detail about the case appeared during an interview by CBS talk show entertainer Gayle King and one of the jurors.”
“Devlin said the age range was from 20s to 70-ish, there were nine women and three men, and all were white except the holdout.”
““All right, I’m very fascinated by the holdout juror learning that he’s a black man today. Can you just tell me his age? I’m very curious,” she said. Upon learning that he was in his 30s, King was astonished once again. “Oh, younger,” she added.”
There is hope for our nation.
Tonight’s movie was going to be Disney animated slop called Finding Nemo or an old James Cagney movie called Something to Sing About.
I went with the Cagney movie. Pretty darn good movie, too. Black and white. The focus was a bit fuzzy like the lens was dusty. Pretty great transfer from whatever to DVD.
Great audio…. like 5.1 surround and pumped into just left and right channels. Absolutely zero audio warbling like you hear in some old movies.
All I have is the UPC. 94933 20873 How that works on Big River is unknown.
Good movie. A keeper.
Nemo went to the discard stack.
Finding Nemo wasn’t terrible. Somehow, I find I like Albert Brooks, and Ellen Degenerate was typecast as herself.
Never felt an urge to watch it a second time, though.
Did you watch the movie first?
Anything Pixar before Steve Jobs died is worth the time IMHO.
If Apple buys any part of Disney out of the Bankruptcy proceedings, it will be Pixar.
“I don’t recall ever hearing of any voting to open the borders and to import the aliens. ”
There wasn’t one, and doing so broke all kinds of laws, up to and including treason.
Put Mayorkas on a poster under a “Wanted, Dead or Alive” caption.
Today, just before I found out the Clancy trial holdout juror was black, I changed my mind on the verdict.
Sure, I agree with him that she deserves to go to jail for the murder of her kids, but I finally read enough about Massachusetts law to realize the other 11 jurors got the law right.
Mass. law says that by default, crazy people can commit murder without punishment. There is a tiny exception to that, but the burden of proof is on the State to present enough evidence that the crazy person knew what they were doing was wrong. Additionally, that they were incapable of resisting the urge. Both of them. Evidence beyond any reasonable doubt.
So the jurors had to read her mind and beyond any reasonable doubt decide she knew, for certain, what she was doing was wrong, and also, for certain, that she couldn’t help herself.
If the Mass. legislature doesn’t rewrite that law to match the other 49 states, they’re stupid and crazy.
There’s just one problem with that… They are stupid and crazy.
As much as I like Summer and do not like Winter, because I’m fond of feeling my toes, I’m getting real tired of the daily high being 100 to 105f and no clouds for most of the last month.
And no breeze makes it miserable. That’s most of my complaint. No breeze.
The morning lows are 77f . Too warm and too humid to open the house.
Grump grump. Come mid-October we might have our first frost. Hopefully not. First frost is usually mid-November.
Yeah. White Man Burden.. Whatever.
No. But on your say so, I will give it a chance.
Did you watch the movie first?
Anything Pixar before Steve Jobs died is worth the time IMHO.
If Apple buys any part of Disney out of the Bankruptcy proceedings, it will be Pixar.
Just the volcano scenes in the fish tank are worth the movie. And then there are Gulf stream turtles, tubular dude!
Don’t care if the dude was black. Totally irrelevant. She said she killed her kids.
SHE ADMITTED TO DOING SO.
Guilty. Some dickhead lawyer leach scum tried to get her off for being crazy . She said she did it.
She murdered her babies.. Hang her.
I spent the entire afternoon in my main bank trying to get our online banking turned back on. My bank Comerica has been bought by 53 bank. When I walked in the bank, there was 20 people there trying to do the same thing. After two hours, the former bank manager helped me out, she was just demoted by the new bank manager from 53 bank. But, they lost all of the paperwork from the previous bank so I have to go back Monday with the other check signer, bring all of my corporate paperwork, articles of incorporation, authorizations, etc. And wait in a 2 hour to 4 hour line again.
They have promised me that they did not freeze the $120,000 in my bank account and that my checks written in the last two weeks will not bounce. Plus my payroll next Tuesday will not bounce and that the IRS can withdraw from my bank account.
We have moved to an incompetent society and a low trust society.
I have never been so mistreated in my life.
And this stuff is like the crazy guy that killed Iryna on the train. He’s on video doing the deed, evidence that he did it, and he walks because he’s not competent to be tried. ????
Rope. Or a shot.
Never heard of 53 bank.
Comerica is some kind of merger thing from bank and s&l failures. Like BankOne from Momentum Bank into to MBank. And then into …. crap. Too much grift.
How did NCNB manage to buy Bank of America? Grift.
All I know is that Frost Bank is a Texas bank and has always been good to me. Since 1980 or so. Other than buying the scraps of First City after First City failed a second time…..
“Ukraine’s jet-powered drone striking 800km deep inside Russia | Battle Plans Exposed”
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yGc6SOSEgMk
The next world war is going to be nasty. Or, the terminators.
Not exactly. I don’t think minimum 10 years in a high-security mental institution is less than punishment. There is no provision for her to be free on the basis of psychosis. Even to achieve that, her defense would have to prove beyond a reasonable doubt that she is “guilty, except insane”. Otherwise, guilty by the defense stipulation that she did in fact kill her children. If the holdout believed she was not insane, then he had a duty to refuse to vote with the other jurors.
Tuned by a movie tonight, El Dorado (1966), with John Wayne, Robert Mitchum, and James Caan. Directed by Howard Hawks.
https://www.moviemistakes.com/film1618/questions
Bull was played by Arthur Hunnicutt.
Written by Leigh Brackett, science fiction author of the Golden Age, who wrote the first draft for The Empire Strikes back, but passed away before it went into production*. She co-wrote the screenplay for The Big Sleep, and did tree other John Wayne movies for Hawks.
A lot of Brackett’s work from the pulp era was republished by Ballantine and Ace in the 1970’s. Many of those volumes are quite reasonably priced on eBay, and I would recommend “The Best of Leigh Brackett”, published by Ballantine under the Del Rey imprint, and also as a book club hardcover.
*The story is that Lucas didn’t like the screenplay, and rewrote it twice before turning it over to Lawrence Kashdan:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Leigh_Brackett
footnote 13 leads to:
https://gizmodo.com/they-mocked-her-science-fantasy-then-she-wrote-empir-489586578
which includes a lot of other material and more valuable links.
Rabbit holes. We gots ’em.
Add to the above:
Brackett’s The Long Tomorrow is often left off of lists of post-apocalyptic science fiction novels, but in 1956 was the first novel written by a female author to be short-listed for the Hugo Award.
Kungflu damaged my sense of smell, and it seems like there are times when it goes pretty much offline. One of those times must have been when I tried a new-to-me laundry detergent called Persil. It reportedly got high ratings. I tried it and thought it worked well, then bought a 1.57 gallon when Sam’s Club had it on sale. Shortly thereafter I realized that I could not stand the smell, which seemed to be reminiscent of wet cigarette butts. Fortunately, the smell was only that of the detergent itself; wet clothes retained little of it, and it did not survive the dryer.
I finished off the large container today, and in the course of removing the cap (aka closure*, in industry parlance) and the dispensing spigot–stacks!–I was admiring the quality of plastic in the bottle, which was blue with a definite metallic although not pearlescent sheen. The label claimed that the whole package–bottle, spigots, and labels–were 50% post-consumer waste. It weighed 7.3 oz empty sans closures. Shame it can’t be recycled into another Persil bottle.
*There is a nomenclature that describes closures, and a few minutes online can be enlightening. A “ruler” can be printed out as an aid to measuring a bottle or jar to determine the size of a missing closure. There are many “standard” sizes, but similar containers tend to use only a few. Buying them is small quantities is expensive on eBay or elsewhere, hence my propensity for saving a few against future need. If you ever find yourself in a country store in Amish or Mennonite country chances are they will have a selection available by the piece for containers that get re-used, such as gallon and half-gallon glass jugs.
Newsom’s Odds of Being President Just Plummeted
https://townhall.com/news/amy-curtis/2026/09/11/newsoms-odds-of-being-president-collapse-n2682819
Odds have been monotone decreasing for months, with a new low of 7%.
Casual perusal of the article finds a short list totaling $76.5 billion of funds that have disappeared with no visible benefit.
All or overwhelmingly most are funds that came from the federal government. Little to no oversight, no accountability, and even though the grift has gone on for years, nothing seems to stop the checks.
Elon Musk has estimated that half the federal budget is fraudulently spent. There’s a big chunk right there. It’s way past time to shut it off. If states want to spend the money they can be accountable to their taxpayers, whose state tax bill would, what? Double? Triple? Quadruple if the funds came out of he state budget? How many indignant state-level Nick Shirley’s would pop up if citizens found that their very own money was being shoveled to grifters?
@paul
Please read my post more closely. I changed my mind on the verdict, and I pointed out that I did it before I ever heard a word about the juror’s race. In other words, it was not relevant to my conclusion. My reasoning was based only on the terrible, terrible Massachusetts law.
Morally, she should fry.
@Gavin
I agree. However, that is not Massachusetts law. If judged Not Guilty by Reason of Insanity, she would be committed for 6 months. Then reviewed every year for an additional one year commitment. As a person whose “illness” only directs violence at her offspring, and who has no more offspring, she could certainly be freed in less than 2 or 3 years.
If it were a minimum 10 year commitment, I might view such a verdict as fair. Or at least, mostly fair.
I still think she should fry.
“Why We Shouldn’t Cancel the Supreme Court” by Jonathan Turley
https://imprimis.hillsdale.edu/why-we-shouldnt-cancel-the-supreme-court/
“Nothing quite says popular justice like a good old-fashioned guillotine. Across the country, protesters have dragged around makeshift guillotines as they call for “radical” and “revolutionary” changes to our constitutional system. The symbol of the French Revolution remains a chilling reminder of how revolutions devour their own. What is even more unnerving than these prop guillotines is the increase in calls for radical and revolutionary changes—including the elimination or the packing of the Supreme Court, trashing the Electoral College, and doing away with the U.S. Senate—by establishment figures on the Left.”
“Today’s attacks on the American judiciary do indeed harken back to the rhetoric that raged before the advent of “The Terror” in revolutionary France—the rhetoric that gave rise to the kind of “mobocracy” that the Founders sought to avoid by designing our constitutional order as they did.”
“In reality, the attack on the Court as partisan is entirely disconnected from its actual voting record. It is a too-little-known fact that 44 percent of cases that come before the Supreme Court are decided unanimously. When you include nearly unanimous cases—those decided by 8–1 and 7–2 margins—that figure jumps to over 60 percent. It is also common for liberal and conservative justices to vote with colleagues on the opposite end of the ideological spectrum. In a case this year, for example, conservative Justices Thomas, Alito, and Kavanaugh joined liberal Justices Sotomayor and Jackson in the majority decision, while liberal Justice Kagan joined Chief Justice Roberts and Justice Barrett in the dissent.”
I did not know that 44% of the cases before SCOTUS are decided unanimously.
Waiting for kid 2 to get back to school from her activity.
Kid 1 and W are back from their college visit.
Almost sat out with a tiny little fire, but now I think I’ll wait until after my taxi service.
n
“Civil War 2.0 Weather Report, Force Assessment”
https://wilderwealthywise.com/civil-war-2-0-weather-report-force-assessment/
5. Those who have an opposing ideology are considered evil.
6. People actively avoid being near those of opposing ideology. Might move from communities or states just because of ideology.
7. Common violence. Organized violence is occurring monthly.
8. Common violence that is generally deemed by governmental authorities as justified based on ideology.
9. Opposing sides develop governing/war structures. Just in case.
10. Open War.
“I have maintained the Clock O’Doom at 9., but given the lower numbers on the indexes and the lower number of violence and censorship events, will likely lower the level next month if violence stays low. Beware: the number can climb quickly.”
“My advice remains. Avoid crowds. Get out of cities. Now. A year too soon is better than one day too late.”
You are correct. The references I had found were bills to amend the Mass. law to more closely resemble other states’ statutes. They were not passed. Unfortunately.
“A Perfect Day, With Explosions (Combined Operations #3)” by Dorothy Grant
https://www.amazon.com/Blood-Oil-Love-Combined-Operations/dp/B09GD38N86?tag=ttgnet-20
Book number three of a four book science fiction tactical romance series. I read the well printed and well bound POD (print on demand) trade paperback self published by the author in 2021 that I bought on Amazon in 2026. I have purchased the following book in the series.
On a far off colony world far in the distant future, the Federation and the Imperium are fighting clandestine battles in and around many of their client states. The usual problem is resources and land snatching. The terraforming of the planet 600 years before was never completed and people are needing more and more resources such as hydrocarbons and food.
“Jenna Brooks is a welder, and a fashionista whenever she can afford it. AJ is a former Special Forces spacer, who finds himself completely outside his comfort zone with her. However, terrorist bombs can overcome almost any divide – the hard way. When Jenna stumbles over a corpse wearing an important clue, she’s roped into a high-stakes counterterrorism operation to uncover a counterfeit fashion ring that’s funding the terrorists. As the trail of blood money and knock-off shoes starts leading closer to home, Jenna’s going to need all the help she can get to stay alive. AJ’s just the man to do that – but he’s after a lot more than merely her safety. It may cost her everything she’s worked for… and also her heart.”
The story is very fast paced and the characters are extremely likable. The history of the colony world and the various political entities is not explained very well but that was not necessary for the story to be good.
The author’s husband has a very active website where he promotes his books and her books at:
https://bayourenaissanceman.blogspot.com/
My rating: 5 out of 5 stars
Amazon rating: 4.7 stars out of 5 stars (382 reviews)
Lynn
Hmm, will this finally get anywhere?
https://www.dailymail.com/news/article-16124497/Ilhan-Omar-blistering-fire-Trumps-security-chief-claims-married-brother.html
n
(posting here based on my guess that I’m at the current “end”
Three months until Xmas…
Good night all.