I say "Man Stuff" but when his little sister hits 11 next year she'll be coming out for pretty much all the same. Though we'll have to add in getting the hair and toes done (the girlfriend can handle that business) in addition to the shark fishing (something the girlfriend also will be handling).
Don't have kids, but the nephew is coming out for a chunk of the Summer. Last year list included:
home repairs
truck oil change/chassis lube/tire rotation
rope climbing courses
hot lunch meat w/melted, cheese sandwiches & scrambled eggs(how to make)
how to do a fresh OS software install
BF3
a day at Busch Garden doing a little height de-sensitivity training on all the roller coasters
shark fishing from a kayak.
This summer will be:
BF4
SCUBA diving
how to drive a stick shift truck(private roads for the win)
vehicle corrosion prevention, (pull all the plastic off and clean up any rust we find underneath)
how to apply do a plasti-dip and paint job
some bolt on off road vehicle upgrades
some electrical vehicle upgrades
more home maintenance
Busch Gardens again
how to operate and field strip various firearms, he already knows how, but he needs speed and some problem solving skills
how to grill
hit all the basic kitchen tricks such as Mac-N-Cheese/Ramon so he can feed himself
more ocean kayak fishing
If he is really lucky and I can get his mom on board and we can squeeze it in, maybe this year we'll include how to ride a motorcycle or a flying lesson
Actually to add to the douche-baggery they will still charge you sales tax if you buy the car and then try to immediately register it. Typically you have to own the car out of state for a year to avoid that.
Small business owners are just as big of crooks as the large business owners. Swap Senator with County Commissioner and you know who the checks are going to.
Who ever offers the best service at the best price is going to get my money. Buy American, buy local just because? I say Fuck No!
How hard is it to tell them, either end your nuclear program or we will?
47 minutes after Iran announces that they have a nuclear weapon a large mushroom cloud over Tehran will announce the cancelation of said nuclear program.
True but then in 2004 I couldn't buy or build a desktop machine as powerful as my smart phone.
It still blows the mind that we walk around with more computing power than was available in the 60's to NASA, and probably most of the rest of the US, in our pockets. That reminds me time to watch some youTube videos of a cat riding on a Roomba.
My 5Mbit service from Comcast is currently costing me $50/month, about what it was 10 years ago.
Do the math. With 3% annual inflation and you are still paying $50 for service ten years later?
You are actually paying about $36 compared to the $50 dollars you were paying in 2004 dollars. Not that I'm ever going give Comcast any props, but they are giving you the same service for less money.
Just like going large for just a quarter more, the base cost for each customer is basically the same whether they order 1 Big Mac meal or 5 of them. Comcast has some fixed costs whether you buy the base package of the "drink from the firehouse" bandwidth package. Seems that cost is about $50.
You want the big bump in bandwidth you are going to have to pay them more than the minimum. Typically you don't see any real nice jumps in speed until you get to the $75-100 packages. I've had $100 FIOS package for a while and they seem to be throwing more bandwidth at me every 6-12 months. My service is rated at 165/165Mbps officially, but speed tests show it somewhere closer to 190/190Mbps.
My motorcycle tops out at poky 187mph, but then again it only takes it 9 or so seconds to get there.
In a NASCAR or a Formula 1 race you might be right about 160 being slow, but this car is being designed for a race that is 12.4 miles long with 150 turns in it. I doubt there'll be much opportunity to get above 100mph much less 160.
It will shine in two aspects. Electric cars are not affected by altitude. Gas burners get weaker the higher they go, turbo and superchargers can only do so much high up in the mountains. The other place will be coming out of the before mentioned 150 turns. Electric cars may not be able to beat down gas cars for top speed, this is typically due to having only 1 gear rather than a lack of engine power, but they absolutely destroy them on the hole shot. It will have 150 opportunities to take advantage of that acceleration. The gas burners won't know what hit them.
You can speak out against the behavior of Blacks, Homosexuals or Women all you want in the US and no one will bat an eye,
I'm going to have to call bullshit on that one. You make any statement then you are a racist, misogynistic, homo-phobe. It is considered incredibly anti-PC to call out the various victim groups on their behavior regardless of how obviously it is and how constructive your critique is to the conversation it is without the hoards of angry apologists coming out of the wood work to tear you down over what a bastard you are for "blaming the victim".
The most fucked-up countries are the ones where somebody can use take arbitrary "offence", and use that office to attack somebody. E.g. the offence of "insulting a Muslim" in most Islamic countries.
Kind of like in the US if you speak out against the behavior or Blacks, Homosexuals, or Women......
Not in the military. President Obama signed the order the same time they took sodomy off the books. Kind of strange if you ask me. Hi I'd like you to meet my donkey, err, wife, err well very good friend donkey.
By the time the utility-scale solution comes on line your average home owner will no longer be interested in being a customer as there will be really no reason not to generate your own power, unless of course if things like force shields and personal home hadron colliders become popular.
As it is for less than $3000 I have enough solar power to cover everything but the largest power hogs. (AC, heat, refrigerator.) All my personal devices, tv, lighting, and water heating do just fine off of solar. There is no reason why most of the rest will not be converted in that 20-30 year window.
I give not a single flying fuck about how stupid the Chinese and Europeans are behaving when it comes to their subsidies. If they want to subsidize my giant American capitalist swimming pool filled of course with the tears from baby seals killed with clubs made of nearly extinct hardware from the devistated South African jungles that's their problem.
As far as the "whole passel" of laws I don't have to pull permits that are not required. The entire solar water system is run off of 12vDC, no permits required. The panel installation and the solar pool pump is 1 permit and electrical inspection, instead of the 3 or 4 I needed before. I am also getting to skip the wire run and trenching and the extra electrical box work. That all adds up quickly to the price.
1. When the grid goes down, so does your little micro grid. If you have sensitive needs, say for example a server farm, climate control needs, or medical life support equipment you never want it to go down.
2. The utilities charge you to have connections to the grid even if you do nothing but generate electricity. They charge ALOT to businesses. (Pissess off the crony capitalists aka Republicans and Democrats.)
3. Also if you have utilities coming onto your property you start getting into property right of way nonsense that gives the gov't or the utilities a way to butt into your business. (Pisses off Statist Progressives)
4. If you are not connected to the grid your power generation can't be taxed because they have no way of monitoring it, and you won't be forced to pay subsidies to pay for electricity social programs. (Pissess off the Democrats)
So why just hold out for angering republicans? I say piss them all off.
Then why do I have solar panels running my outdoor lighting, pool heater (water), and pool filter (electrical), without said gov't subsidies? Oh that's right it was cheaper when you start factoring in all the things I didn't have to payout to the county gov't in the way of permits, electricians, trenching equipment, copper wiring and the conduit to run it from the house out into the yard, etc, etc.
For a utility yes solar generated electricity makes little sense, but for the home or business owner it makes a great deal of sense. The farther from the grid you go the more sense it makes. With equipment prices these days anything more than 30ft from the house solar is on parity with grid electricity if you are willing to do the work yourself.
Then maybe, just maybe I can stop typing exclusively in sarcasm.
I was getting worried (my sarcasm detector has been offline since 1987). I thought there for a minute you might be the one of 9 people in the US that has managed to miss every single article about Tesla/SpaceX and did not know who Musk was.
how does anyone not account for that when they price out some grand new adaptation?
Kind of like say building disaster proof micro grids that are not under control by government sanctioned utility monopolies? I never understood the whole low IQ concept of "we have to save it for something more important, so we shouldn't use it logic because it might get expensive".
No we should use the shit out of it to drive the price up to the stratosphere so that the market comes up with either a cheaper way to produce it or more effective technology to replace it and meet the demand.
No, what I'm saying is that socialists try to buy things for a dollar and sell them for a penny and can't every seem to understand why they go bankrupt within 6 months.
ENRON was a bunch of thieves taking advantage of a bunch of socialists. There wasn't even the tiniest bit of free market involvement in that entire debacle.
You are conveniently leaving a few details:
1. PG&E was required by the State of California to provide power no matter what.
2. PG&E was not allowed by the State of California to change retail prices without the State's approval. This resulted in them being forced to buy and sell electricity at a loss until they went bankrupt.
3. ENRON's little scheme was a two part scheme. ENRON was nothing but paper. The entire company was essentially fake. Anyone holding their stock got ripped off. The other part was to take advantage of CA idiotic price fixing scheme to bleed both PG&E and the taxpayers of CA dry which they did for years. Everyone at ENRON was a criminal set on taking advantage of a situation created by the State of California not the market.
4. CA put itself in the situation where they had to buy power from outside the State since they killed off all but the cleanest natural gas power plants with heavy handed environmental regulation.
5. What little solar and wind power was available PG&E was forced to buy at an enormous loss. To add insult to injury, the Federal Gov't was heavily subsidizing wind farms through grants and purchase requirements, causing areas such as Tehachapi to sprout wind turbines like weeds forcing PG&E to buy even more power from them far above the rates charged to customers.
6. With the retail prices set artificially low PG&E customers gorged themselves on electricity priced bellow the market price. This accelerated the collapse of PG&E and resulting in the summer rolling blackouts which continued even after the State stepped in to bail out the now bankrupt PG&E.
So yes I called ENRON a side show, because California set itself up for failure, all ENRON did was take advantage of the very system that California had created.
ENRON could not have pulled off their theft without the utility monopoly created by California, the price fixing set by California, and the severe lack of in state power production, again created by California.
Enron was simply a rent seeking side show that didn't come to light until after CA was going broke trying to price control scheme. It wasn't the cause of it.
Sorry angry person, but us free market types have guns to shoot you non-free market types (Who are out rioting due to price controls causing massive shortages), not ourselves.
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I say "Man Stuff" but when his little sister hits 11 next year she'll be coming out for pretty much all the same. Though we'll have to add in getting the hair and toes done (the girlfriend can handle that business) in addition to the shark fishing (something the girlfriend also will be handling).
home repairs
truck oil change/chassis lube/tire rotation rope climbing courses
hot lunch meat w/melted, cheese sandwiches & scrambled eggs(how to make)
how to do a fresh OS software install
BF3
a day at Busch Garden doing a little height de-sensitivity training on all the roller coasters
shark fishing from a kayak.
This summer will be:
BF4
SCUBA diving
how to drive a stick shift truck(private roads for the win)
vehicle corrosion prevention, (pull all the plastic off and clean up any rust we find underneath)
how to apply do a plasti-dip and paint job
some bolt on off road vehicle upgrades
some electrical vehicle upgrades
more home maintenance
Busch Gardens again
how to operate and field strip various firearms, he already knows how, but he needs speed and some problem solving skills
how to grill
hit all the basic kitchen tricks such as Mac-N-Cheese/Ramon so he can feed himself
more ocean kayak fishing
If he is really lucky and I can get his mom on board and we can squeeze it in, maybe this year we'll include how to ride a motorcycle or a flying lesson
Actually to add to the douche-baggery they will still charge you sales tax if you buy the car and then try to immediately register it. Typically you have to own the car out of state for a year to avoid that.
Who ever offers the best service at the best price is going to get my money. Buy American, buy local just because? I say Fuck No!
47 minutes after Iran announces that they have a nuclear weapon a large mushroom cloud over Tehran will announce the cancelation of said nuclear program.
Send that message.
anything past that is a waste of time.
It still blows the mind that we walk around with more computing power than was available in the 60's to NASA, and probably most of the rest of the US, in our pockets. That reminds me time to watch some youTube videos of a cat riding on a Roomba.
Do the math. With 3% annual inflation and you are still paying $50 for service ten years later?
You are actually paying about $36 compared to the $50 dollars you were paying in 2004 dollars. Not that I'm ever going give Comcast any props, but they are giving you the same service for less money.
Just like going large for just a quarter more, the base cost for each customer is basically the same whether they order 1 Big Mac meal or 5 of them. Comcast has some fixed costs whether you buy the base package of the "drink from the firehouse" bandwidth package. Seems that cost is about $50.
You want the big bump in bandwidth you are going to have to pay them more than the minimum. Typically you don't see any real nice jumps in speed until you get to the $75-100 packages. I've had $100 FIOS package for a while and they seem to be throwing more bandwidth at me every 6-12 months. My service is rated at 165/165Mbps officially, but speed tests show it somewhere closer to 190/190Mbps.
In a NASCAR or a Formula 1 race you might be right about 160 being slow, but this car is being designed for a race that is 12.4 miles long with 150 turns in it. I doubt there'll be much opportunity to get above 100mph much less 160.
It will shine in two aspects. Electric cars are not affected by altitude. Gas burners get weaker the higher they go, turbo and superchargers can only do so much high up in the mountains. The other place will be coming out of the before mentioned 150 turns. Electric cars may not be able to beat down gas cars for top speed, this is typically due to having only 1 gear rather than a lack of engine power, but they absolutely destroy them on the hole shot. It will have 150 opportunities to take advantage of that acceleration. The gas burners won't know what hit them.
3 minutes of max acceleration is a lot of go time.
I'm going to have to call bullshit on that one. You make any statement then you are a racist, misogynistic, homo-phobe. It is considered incredibly anti-PC to call out the various victim groups on their behavior regardless of how obviously it is and how constructive your critique is to the conversation it is without the hoards of angry apologists coming out of the wood work to tear you down over what a bastard you are for "blaming the victim".
Kind of like in the US if you speak out against the behavior or Blacks, Homosexuals, or Women......
Not in the military. President Obama signed the order the same time they took sodomy off the books. Kind of strange if you ask me. Hi I'd like you to meet my donkey, err, wife, err well very good friend donkey.
I agree about industrial power, but I was talking about residential. Unless some crazy new fad pops up, home power generation will be quite doable.
As it is for less than $3000 I have enough solar power to cover everything but the largest power hogs. (AC, heat, refrigerator.) All my personal devices, tv, lighting, and water heating do just fine off of solar. There is no reason why most of the rest will not be converted in that 20-30 year window.
As far as the "whole passel" of laws I don't have to pull permits that are not required. The entire solar water system is run off of 12vDC, no permits required. The panel installation and the solar pool pump is 1 permit and electrical inspection, instead of the 3 or 4 I needed before. I am also getting to skip the wire run and trenching and the extra electrical box work. That all adds up quickly to the price.
Sarcasm on the fritz and they still give me a shitload of mod points to dole out. Funny huh?
1. When the grid goes down, so does your little micro grid. If you have sensitive needs, say for example a server farm, climate control needs, or medical life support equipment you never want it to go down.
2. The utilities charge you to have connections to the grid even if you do nothing but generate electricity. They charge ALOT to businesses. (Pissess off the crony capitalists aka Republicans and Democrats.)
3. Also if you have utilities coming onto your property you start getting into property right of way nonsense that gives the gov't or the utilities a way to butt into your business. (Pisses off Statist Progressives)
4. If you are not connected to the grid your power generation can't be taxed because they have no way of monitoring it, and you won't be forced to pay subsidies to pay for electricity social programs. (Pissess off the Democrats)
So why just hold out for angering republicans? I say piss them all off.
For a utility yes solar generated electricity makes little sense, but for the home or business owner it makes a great deal of sense. The farther from the grid you go the more sense it makes. With equipment prices these days anything more than 30ft from the house solar is on parity with grid electricity if you are willing to do the work yourself.
I was getting worried (my sarcasm detector has been offline since 1987). I thought there for a minute you might be the one of 9 people in the US that has managed to miss every single article about Tesla/SpaceX and did not know who Musk was.
Kind of like say building disaster proof micro grids that are not under control by government sanctioned utility monopolies? I never understood the whole low IQ concept of "we have to save it for something more important, so we shouldn't use it logic because it might get expensive".
No we should use the shit out of it to drive the price up to the stratosphere so that the market comes up with either a cheaper way to produce it or more effective technology to replace it and meet the demand.
ENRON was a bunch of thieves taking advantage of a bunch of socialists. There wasn't even the tiniest bit of free market involvement in that entire debacle.
1. PG&E was required by the State of California to provide power no matter what.
2. PG&E was not allowed by the State of California to change retail prices without the State's approval. This resulted in them being forced to buy and sell electricity at a loss until they went bankrupt.
3. ENRON's little scheme was a two part scheme. ENRON was nothing but paper. The entire company was essentially fake. Anyone holding their stock got ripped off. The other part was to take advantage of CA idiotic price fixing scheme to bleed both PG&E and the taxpayers of CA dry which they did for years. Everyone at ENRON was a criminal set on taking advantage of a situation created by the State of California not the market.
4. CA put itself in the situation where they had to buy power from outside the State since they killed off all but the cleanest natural gas power plants with heavy handed environmental regulation.
5. What little solar and wind power was available PG&E was forced to buy at an enormous loss. To add insult to injury, the Federal Gov't was heavily subsidizing wind farms through grants and purchase requirements, causing areas such as Tehachapi to sprout wind turbines like weeds forcing PG&E to buy even more power from them far above the rates charged to customers.
6. With the retail prices set artificially low PG&E customers gorged themselves on electricity priced bellow the market price. This accelerated the collapse of PG&E and resulting in the summer rolling blackouts which continued even after the State stepped in to bail out the now bankrupt PG&E.
So yes I called ENRON a side show, because California set itself up for failure, all ENRON did was take advantage of the very system that California had created.
ENRON could not have pulled off their theft without the utility monopoly created by California, the price fixing set by California, and the severe lack of in state power production, again created by California.
Enron was simply a rent seeking side show that didn't come to light until after CA was going broke trying to price control scheme. It wasn't the cause of it.
Sorry angry person, but us free market types have guns to shoot you non-free market types (Who are out rioting due to price controls causing massive shortages), not ourselves.
They had price controls at the customer level and market prices at the wholesale level. Guess what happened?
Yep that's right shortages, just like the last million times price controls were tried.