Lenny: Pfft, forget it, Homer. While it has been established that eggs
contain cholesterol, it has not yet been proven conclusively that
they actually raise the level of serum cholesterol in the human
blood stream. Homer: So one of those Egg Council creeps got to you too, huh? Lenny: Aw, you've got it all wrong, Homer. It's not like that. [a man in an egg costume creeps, then runs, away] Homer: You'd better run, egg!
umn the science behind the adkins diet is RIGHT ON.
Oh, it is? Wow, you'd better call up the scientific community, most of which largely calls it a sham : Apparently they're not aware that the magical "alternate metabolic path" (gag) of the Atkins diet is such a revolution.
My God, I just realized something! Red foods are the cause of all of our problems! I hereby launch the "Crimson Diet", and its regiment is to avoid any food that is red, and to tap your right ear 4 times at the crack of noon. The science is that red foods contain harmful obesitosins that are proven causative agents of obesity. Additionally, the psycho-eatomatic response increases 67.2% in the presence of red food. I've found that the transverse alternate intra-circulatory enzyme system is diverted clusteringly when red food is avoided, and this helps the dieter live at the peak of health.
P.S. I have noticed in this discussion that there is a grossly unbalanced moderation at play (anyone saying "eat right be healthy" gets moderated down, or skipped, and those saying "oh, poor poor me! Me and my thyroid condition just can't help it" gets a 5. How absurd, and shameful).
In authentic (i.e. not Westernized) Asian dishes, rice comprises the overwhelming bulk of the dish (hence high carbohydrates). In most authentic (i.e. not Westernized) Indian food, again rice comprises a large portion of the meal, coupled with (wonderful) breads. It is only when these meals are modified for the West that the meat content goes up (because we traditionally define our meal by the meat), the fat content goes up, and the carbohydrate content goes down. BTW: Vegetables and fruits are largely carbohydrates.
I'm in total agreement with you. The real focus on fats is primarily because fats have twice the calories per gram than carbs or proteins, but more importantly because certain fats (saturated and hydrogenated) are proven to be incredibly bad for the cardiovascular system.
I totally agree with you, actually: There was a time when simple scarcity of food and survival activity requirements kept us at the peak of fitness as a natural course, but as our lives become more and more sedendary (soon there'll be a lift that pulls you out of bed and sits you in your desk at work) we've reverted to a conservation attitude, and we're paying the price for it.
While I wouldn't hold the food pyramid up as an example of good advice (for example milk is pushed heavily, despite being incredibly high in the nasty sorts of fat, at least the non-skim variants), I would say that there are incredibly few people out there who really are aware and in control of their diets (though the numbers have just started to increase. Again I'll point to McDonalds and the fact that, because of a public that is finally becoming aware, was forced to introduce some healthy items): There is row upon row of chips, and one single "healthy" chip (Baked Lays, which is very hard to find as few stores even bother stocking it). At my grocery store there are dozens of ice creams, and a single low fat ice cream. There is a deli full of food, a cheese rack covering a whole aisle, fatty beef as a main course, etc. I would say that we live in a society where fat is a primary consituent of many of the meals out there, and it's very hard to avoid (ever try looking for healthy choices in fast food restaurants? It is VERY hard to do, and usually the items that parade as low fat are anything but). Many studies have detailed the fact that obesity has risen not as more people go on low fat diets, but rather as we become more and more sedentary, and meal portions continues to grow by leaps and bounds.
BTW: I'm not saying that the Atkins diet couldn't work (obviously it can if only because it makes one very aware of their diet, with more of a feeling of self-control), but rather that the real goal is awareness rather than some simplistic "quick fix". The science behind the Atkins diet is incredibly dubious, and is considered dubious by most nutritionists, but the results are something that no one can refute.
Yet, ironically, every single study of diets states that the Atkins diet succeeds specifically because the dieters found it easy to follow : It required the least change in their diet. Consumers Report recently did a diet study, and they actually rated the Atkins pretty high. Why? Because followers were much more likely to stick with it as it encompassed most of their favourite foods.
I was thinking more in terms of saturated or hydrogenated fats, but a look indicates that the Honey Mustard really isn't that horrible (4.5g of saturated fats), albeit far from good.
Since diets are for humans, and not for iron-willed Nietzschean super-heros who heed not the plaints of crude appetite, nor the pangs of hunger, a diet that doesn't work for the averagely-will-powered person is a pretty bad diet.
And my point was that "diets", in the traditional sense (meaning "instant consumption behaviour changes"), are almost always doomed to failure because of willpower cannot hold up to such a sharp change in personal habits (note that kids who are brought up eating healthy foods often persist in that habit, and continue to eat healthy foods. In essence if you have bad habits, blame your parents). The only likely to be successful approach is to become gradually aware of what you're eating (and substitute where possible), increase physical activity, and just get on with it. In a nutshell: Eat healthy and be active.
You know, your attitude betrays a fascinating, yet increasingly common, combination of ignorance and arrogance, that I'm struggling to come up with a new term for it. It's a combination of asshole and moron. Are you an assron or a mohole?
The irony, of course, is that my "you are in charge of your own destiny" attitude is far LESS common nowadays (coincidentally coupled with a ballooning Western public with obeisity rates bordering on an epidemic). Instead we live in a "oh, it's not your fault!" society that gives everyone an out. Again, I'll reiterate: There are people with thyroid disorders or other health problems that make it especially hard (there are people who exercise every day and eat reasonably, yet they still can't lose the weight), but on the other hand there are countless zero-activity gluttons who try to put themselves in the same league: It's absurd, and it's an offense and affront to people who truly are trying and aren't making headway. Obesity brings along with it such an unbelievable array of health problems, as well as professional problems (I believe I read that an obese professional is 28x less likely to get a promotion) that it is something that people need to get a grasp on.
BTW: A wise piece of advice I heard once went as such - "If you avoid it once at the grocery store, you won't have to avoid it dozens of times at home". The advice deals with things like chips, ice cream, etc: If you have the willpower to say no at the grocery store, then you won't have to muster up the willpower several times a day when you open the fridge, etc.
I highly doubt your scientific sampling. Firstly, there are very few "low fat" items in the grocery store (at best you'll see "reduced fat"), and those items are often on the cobweb coated racks. Secondly, a tremendous portion of our meals come from outside of the home, and the restaurant and fast food industries are HORRENDOUS when it comes to fat (McDonalds finally, grudglingly, introduced a couple of lower fat items. Other restaurants, such as Wendys, fool people into thinking things like their new salads are low fat when, for instance, the Honey Mustard dressing has a heart clogging 28g of fat).
Watch the "Lean Cuisine" aisle for a bit, and then watch the cookie and chips aisles...I suspect you'll see about 20x the traffic in the latter.
The only reason that `low fat' diets fail is because of a lack of personal willpower, and an absurd notion that one can turn ship overnight and change everything about themselves: If you grew up eating roast beef and butter soaked mashed potatoes, the idea that you'll switch to veggies and soy overnight is absolutely absurd. Yet that's the way that many people approach dieting (Countless sitcoms follow the story of "Jimmy got a warning from the doctor, so the wife now only feeds him spinach and oatmeal"). Anything that is approached with such immediacy is virtually always doomed to failure: The person at work who won't stop yapping about their new diet is virtually yelling out loud "I am going to fail". The guy who just started going to the gym every now and then, coupled with an improved awareness and self-control, and perhaps some good product choices (by making simple choices one can dramatically decrease your caloric intake).
The Atkins diet goes over well in North America because the standard North American diet just happens to be rich on fat, rich on protein, and short on carbs : Going on the Atkins diet is basically saying "Eat what you eat, just be cognizant of it". For "fatty", such a food awareness is a good approach because it's less likely to be perceived as "all or nothing": You haven't given up if you have a Big Mac or a steak. Yet at the same time there are countless very active, very healthy (probably in much better cardiac shape than the average Atkins diet fan) people living on zero saturated fat.
BTW: The saddest thing about the whole diet fad is that the lazy, gas pedal public perceives health as being merely about food. How far from the truth that is. Gaining some muscle mass not only makes you more capable of handling yourself, but it also raises your basal metabolic rate (muscles consume energy just to exist). If people just got off their sorry, lazy asses and DID SOMETHING their would be far less obesity among the sedentary population. I have no doubt that there are people who have hormone imbalances, but for every one of them there are about 4 who, between stuffing back a Big Mac and Super Monster Large Fries is crying about their poor genetics DAMNIT GET ME A BEER! Apart from the extreme outliers with physical handicaps, anyone who doesn't exercise at least 30 minutes every other day, and who eats with disregard, should realize that they are making their own bed.
I'm getting various Klez emails in my Hotmail at the rate of about 6 a day : Clearly these viruses are scanning the newsgroups as they are not coming from people I know or converse with (I use my Hotmail account as a reply for newsgroup postings, so I get about 60 spams a day). I find it humorous, and of the potential for conspiracy theorists, that shortly after Hotmail started selling memberships for expanded storage space, I started getting a warning every 2 days or so about running out of space : Of course I'd check my account to find that 90% of the space suckage were various Klez viruses (which Hotmail does not, at least up until yesterday, filter out. Again, warm up the conspiracy machine...).
It should be noted that only a small proportion of the messages contain "Klez" in the subject. I've seen it with subject lines that seem faintly related to newsgroups that I've posted in : SQL Server terms, HTML phrases, CSS selectors, etc.
Oh, and I meant to mention that no, it isn't just for XP. "Cygwin/ XFree86 runs on all recent consumer and business versions of Windows; as of 2002-05-12 those versions are specifically Windows 95, Windows 98, Windows Me, Windows NT 4.0, Windows 2000, and Windows XP."
One of the things I appreciate most about XP is the startup times: There is absolutely no doubt that from power on to logon is dramatically less with XP than 2000. It might not seem like much, but when installing software that requires several reboots (Visual Studio.NET, for example), this is the difference between amazingly irritating, and just a minor nuisance. Sometimes I boot my machine just to quickly sync my PDA, and again with 2000 I'd hit the power and go have a shower, but with XP I can do the sync pronto.
Apart from that the changes are marginal, though. One of the first things I did was to go to "classic" mode to avoid the horribly slow "good looking" desktop and start bar options. I also appreciate the fact that XP hides system tray icons that aren't changing : That is a HUGE pet peeve of mine -> Why does every shitty little trivial application these days feel that it's important enough to start on boot-up and stick a nuisance icon in the system tray?
Well if you looked at the page you'd see that, contrary to the Slashdot submission, it runs on all recent Windows versions: "as of 2002-05-12 those versions are specifically Windows 95, Windows 98, Windows Me, Windows NT 4.0, Windows 2000, and Windows XP".
The US is a republic because of a technical limitations of implementing a total democracy "back in the day" (not to mention that it was a "union"): This was no great foresight of the founding fathers, and in reality the electorate generally (I believe there was one deviation) exactly duplicates the voice of the people : If they didn't the system would be changed pronto. Democracy isn't perfect, but neither is an ivory tower "people who know better" type of system.
I find your angle regarding welfare interesting, and I'd say that it's a very short sighted perspective: Many of those people who are "incapable or unwilling" to contribute are there because of economic perpetuation (there is a caste system alive and well in the United States today), racism, or poor government economic planning (did you know that unemployment is intentionally kept inflated to keep inflation in line? You see, that helps out your retirement plan, but it doesn't help out the "unwilling to contribute"). If you refuse to cast them a line to help them while the system that favours you screws them, realize that many of them will logically decide to foresake your system and your rules, and they'll be the ones shoving a gun in your face to take your wallet, etc. These people WILL survive, and this ridiculous "well let them starve!" concept is absurd: Welfare is pretty damn cheap compared to a police state.
I'm not even commenting on the worthiness of going to Mars, but I find it sad that of all of the ridiculous government waste programs that you could pick on (SDI anyone?), you chose welfare : You a fan of Rush Limbaugh, by any chance?
Sidenote: Who knows, we might need to get to Mars quickly.... I have noticed dramatic temperature differences in the past decade where I live (20 years ago it was a rare day that it hit 30C here....now it's hitting 35C daily), and I find it odd how little commentary there is regarding this. The other day I caught a little scrolling piece of news that the US government has purchased and stockpiled $1 billion dollars worth of powdered milk (as a single purchase..meaning this is just one individual stockpile purchase)....
...who wanted to spend the money on welfare where it could buy them more votes..
Why don't you take a peek at the military or covert operations (i.e. NSA) budget some day, and compare that with the "welfare" money.
Of course, it's silly anyways: Your slant is that there's something dirty about politicians doing what'll "buy them more votes" (the welfare angle is pretty ridiculous in regards to that, btw, as lower income people have a dramatically lower voter turnout) is interesting: Is that what this silly thing called a democracy is supposed to be about?
NT 4 had time synchronization, but it came front and center with Windows 2000 (which automatically time sync with your domain controller, which itself should be configured to sync with a master authority) because of Kerberos as implemented in Windows 2000 and beyond : Time is one of the parameters, so if Bob's PC is 20 minutes ahead and his kerberos keys are by a different clock, security conflicts will arise (namely, his keys will be refused). Of course, anyone with XP can bring up the clock applet (double clicking on the clock in the system tray) and choose the Internet Time tab that allows them to change the server to a different one if they so desired (or disable it all together).
A lot of cases rely upon the slit in the bottom front (the spot where an optional fan can be installed) as an air intake, however this is totally defeated if you put your computer on a soft surface such as carpet: The carpet effectively plugs the intake. Anyways, putting the front of the case on something solid like a book, or a CD case, lifts it up and allows air to flow efficiently into the case.
Anyways, I actually love left-over pizza at room temperature, so I microwave it just enough that the veggies aren't so cold that they make my teeth hurt like hell...once it's got that slight warmth it's chow time.
Good for your convenience. We're not all the same, and not all of us can stand small intervals of time. Some of us actually have attention spans.
Ouch! Touche! Good one Einstein.
I'm not talking economics, I'm talking philosphy, and being whismical at that. If you didn't pick that up, perhaps you should be the one going back to grade school.
Sure.
It's only their fault they've gone backrupt and haven't managed their service properly. It's only their fault their network was a piece of shite after they severly oversubscribed and undermanaged it.
Yeah, that makes a lot of sense: They went bankrupt because they oversubscribed it. Oh, wait, simple logic says that that would be more cost effective and would actually make more money...bzzttttt...logic sensors exploding. Obviously they undercharged for the bandwidth and services that they provided, usually on the premise that once they got settled they could raise prices or create partnerships that would offset the losses. Again, if you think you have such a genius comprehension of the cost of bandwidth and connectivity, I'm sure there'll be lots of people who'll be happy to sign up for your always super fast, no limits $20/month system. Oh wait, that should be free.
Now, let me get this straight. You're saying that not only are they already losing money as it is, raising prices to keep in business, they are a bullshit cable company...now let's introduce true competition. Prices go down farther, they lose more money, and how do they stay in business then?
(I'm skipping the fantasy quote where you either put words in my mouth, or are errantly replying to a whole different post). Firstly, idealists such as yourself don't care about "real competition" : You want to see AT&T and TW be forced to hand over billions of dollars of infrastructure so that someone else can provide magical bandwidth for free. Barring that, your competitor will have to run cable to everyone's home, and I don't see that happening anytime soon. However, competition doesn't equal "same technology same method" : In my area right now I can get DSL, cable, high speed two way radio, satellite (including the uplink now), along with dial-up. Strangely, the prices all seem to fall in line, and none of them has a magical way of offering guaranteed round-the-clock DS1 speeds for $40/month.
I don't know about you, but when I come across an ISP advertising 24/7 always-on Internet access
There is a massive difference between "always on" and "always at 100%". Always on means that I can hop on my PC 7 seconds before the movie comes on to check if it's worthwhile on IMDB. Always on means ICQ can sit waiting for an incoming "Hey there!" message. Always on doesn't mean that I'll stream a 1.5Mbps video feed 24/7 just for the heck of it.
If they advertise high-speed Internet, one should be able to assume that it is high-speed.
Again, it is high speed : Yesterday I needed to grab a 48MB file, and in blistering fast fashion I had it and could use it in a convenient and usefully small period of time. Again, always on+always fast != suck data 24/7.
Second, you're philosophically hollow; I can see right through you. The Internet has become a public medium, and it always deserved to be one since the day Academia got involved with it. The only reason bandwidth isn't free is because most of the world still uses a monetary system. I, being biased towards a nonmonetary system, would whole-heartedly agree that bandwidth should be free.
Bwahahahahaahah. I think you need to pay a little more attention to that Grade 11 economics class. Nothing is ever free, regardless of the society (were things "Free" in the Soviet Union? Guess what: They weren't), but I won't bother explaining human nature to someone who's such a prophet.
I would say, though, that companies overcharge quite a bit. Do you think a bullshit cable company such as the only few cable companies offering Internet access would survive if the market were *truly* competitive?
Uh...yes? Ignoring the fact that about 3/4 of the high speed providers have gone bankrupt in the last couple of years (boy, they're just making money hand over fist!), for most cable companies high speed is a loss leader way to try to entice people to stay with cable for their TV needs (TV, a unidirectional spitting of 20% advertisements, which costs me more than my internet connection which people like you claim is overcharged....), rather than getting satellite (and alternately the phone company wants you to get DSL, because that'll remove the barrier to you signing up with their satellite TV plan).
I have a residential phone line that stays connected to another local residential phone line 24x7.
If you're connected to another phone that's service by the same CO, then it really isn't a problem: In essence you're using your local loop and their local loop, and a circuit in between. If, on the other hand, one of your loops is serviced by a remote CO, or a different CO all together, or the data has to go through a toll center, then Bell really DOESN'T like that: You're actually consuming 64Kbps 24/7 on their digital trunks, and again they don't have enough trunks to support everyone being on the line at the same time.
The only reason you can get away with it, so to speak, is that most Bells are highly regulated, and the government heavily restrains them from charging based on use, etc. However, if there were more people making dedicated connections (versus switched connections) then Bell would lobby for, and would get, changes that would allow them to charge extra to high users.
I don't think there's any question that a dedicated T1 beats out a cable connection if you have absolute requirements 24 hours a day, however you pay for that luxury (because the provider, usually the telco, has to have a T1 of bandwidth reserved for you 24 hours a day, and can't utilize standard switching to share the connection) : Usually about 20-50x more than a cable modem connection.
I also agree that cable modems definitely depend on the area, the types of neighbours you have, etc. I happen to live in an area, and my cable company has subdivided it such, that the moment I need a file I can grab it at a blistering 250KB/second with extremely good consistency. My connection has been stunningly reliable, and I've had incredibly few complaints. I'm not going to say that's the case for all cable modem users, but conversely I don't think it's fair for someone who has had a bad experience to cast their experience as the epitome of the cable modem experience.
BTW: How did you know that the DHCP server was down for hours a day? I don't even run a DHCP daemon on my box, it changes so infrequently, and it'd be pretty sad if your provider had a lease for less than a day.
Slashdot Mirror
Homer: So one of those Egg Council creeps got to you too, huh?
Lenny: Aw, you've got it all wrong, Homer. It's not like that.
[a man in an egg costume creeps, then runs, away]
Homer: You'd better run, egg!
Homer the Great
umn the science behind the adkins diet is RIGHT ON.
Oh, it is? Wow, you'd better call up the scientific community, most of which largely calls it a sham : Apparently they're not aware that the magical "alternate metabolic path" (gag) of the Atkins diet is such a revolution.
My God, I just realized something! Red foods are the cause of all of our problems! I hereby launch the "Crimson Diet", and its regiment is to avoid any food that is red, and to tap your right ear 4 times at the crack of noon. The science is that red foods contain harmful obesitosins that are proven causative agents of obesity. Additionally, the psycho-eatomatic response increases 67.2% in the presence of red food. I've found that the transverse alternate intra-circulatory enzyme system is diverted clusteringly when red food is avoided, and this helps the dieter live at the peak of health.
P.S. I have noticed in this discussion that there is a grossly unbalanced moderation at play (anyone saying "eat right be healthy" gets moderated down, or skipped, and those saying "oh, poor poor me! Me and my thyroid condition just can't help it" gets a 5. How absurd, and shameful).
In authentic (i.e. not Westernized) Asian dishes, rice comprises the overwhelming bulk of the dish (hence high carbohydrates). In most authentic (i.e. not Westernized) Indian food, again rice comprises a large portion of the meal, coupled with (wonderful) breads. It is only when these meals are modified for the West that the meat content goes up (because we traditionally define our meal by the meat), the fat content goes up, and the carbohydrate content goes down. BTW: Vegetables and fruits are largely carbohydrates.
I'm in total agreement with you. The real focus on fats is primarily because fats have twice the calories per gram than carbs or proteins, but more importantly because certain fats (saturated and hydrogenated) are proven to be incredibly bad for the cardiovascular system.
I totally agree with you, actually: There was a time when simple scarcity of food and survival activity requirements kept us at the peak of fitness as a natural course, but as our lives become more and more sedendary (soon there'll be a lift that pulls you out of bed and sits you in your desk at work) we've reverted to a conservation attitude, and we're paying the price for it.
While I wouldn't hold the food pyramid up as an example of good advice (for example milk is pushed heavily, despite being incredibly high in the nasty sorts of fat, at least the non-skim variants), I would say that there are incredibly few people out there who really are aware and in control of their diets (though the numbers have just started to increase. Again I'll point to McDonalds and the fact that, because of a public that is finally becoming aware, was forced to introduce some healthy items): There is row upon row of chips, and one single "healthy" chip (Baked Lays, which is very hard to find as few stores even bother stocking it). At my grocery store there are dozens of ice creams, and a single low fat ice cream. There is a deli full of food, a cheese rack covering a whole aisle, fatty beef as a main course, etc. I would say that we live in a society where fat is a primary consituent of many of the meals out there, and it's very hard to avoid (ever try looking for healthy choices in fast food restaurants? It is VERY hard to do, and usually the items that parade as low fat are anything but). Many studies have detailed the fact that obesity has risen not as more people go on low fat diets, but rather as we become more and more sedentary, and meal portions continues to grow by leaps and bounds.
BTW: I'm not saying that the Atkins diet couldn't work (obviously it can if only because it makes one very aware of their diet, with more of a feeling of self-control), but rather that the real goal is awareness rather than some simplistic "quick fix". The science behind the Atkins diet is incredibly dubious, and is considered dubious by most nutritionists, but the results are something that no one can refute.
Yet, ironically, every single study of diets states that the Atkins diet succeeds specifically because the dieters found it easy to follow : It required the least change in their diet. Consumers Report recently did a diet study, and they actually rated the Atkins pretty high. Why? Because followers were much more likely to stick with it as it encompassed most of their favourite foods.
I was thinking more in terms of saturated or hydrogenated fats, but a look indicates that the Honey Mustard really isn't that horrible (4.5g of saturated fats), albeit far from good.
Since diets are for humans, and not for iron-willed Nietzschean super-heros who heed not the plaints of crude appetite, nor the pangs of hunger, a diet that doesn't work for the averagely-will-powered person is a pretty bad diet.
And my point was that "diets", in the traditional sense (meaning "instant consumption behaviour changes"), are almost always doomed to failure because of willpower cannot hold up to such a sharp change in personal habits (note that kids who are brought up eating healthy foods often persist in that habit, and continue to eat healthy foods. In essence if you have bad habits, blame your parents). The only likely to be successful approach is to become gradually aware of what you're eating (and substitute where possible), increase physical activity, and just get on with it. In a nutshell: Eat healthy and be active.
You know, your attitude betrays a fascinating, yet increasingly common, combination of ignorance and arrogance, that I'm struggling to come up with a new term for it. It's a combination of asshole and moron. Are you an assron or a mohole?
The irony, of course, is that my "you are in charge of your own destiny" attitude is far LESS common nowadays (coincidentally coupled with a ballooning Western public with obeisity rates bordering on an epidemic). Instead we live in a "oh, it's not your fault!" society that gives everyone an out. Again, I'll reiterate: There are people with thyroid disorders or other health problems that make it especially hard (there are people who exercise every day and eat reasonably, yet they still can't lose the weight), but on the other hand there are countless zero-activity gluttons who try to put themselves in the same league: It's absurd, and it's an offense and affront to people who truly are trying and aren't making headway. Obesity brings along with it such an unbelievable array of health problems, as well as professional problems (I believe I read that an obese professional is 28x less likely to get a promotion) that it is something that people need to get a grasp on.
BTW: A wise piece of advice I heard once went as such - "If you avoid it once at the grocery store, you won't have to avoid it dozens of times at home". The advice deals with things like chips, ice cream, etc: If you have the willpower to say no at the grocery store, then you won't have to muster up the willpower several times a day when you open the fridge, etc.
I highly doubt your scientific sampling. Firstly, there are very few "low fat" items in the grocery store (at best you'll see "reduced fat"), and those items are often on the cobweb coated racks. Secondly, a tremendous portion of our meals come from outside of the home, and the restaurant and fast food industries are HORRENDOUS when it comes to fat (McDonalds finally, grudglingly, introduced a couple of lower fat items. Other restaurants, such as Wendys, fool people into thinking things like their new salads are low fat when, for instance, the Honey Mustard dressing has a heart clogging 28g of fat).
Watch the "Lean Cuisine" aisle for a bit, and then watch the cookie and chips aisles...I suspect you'll see about 20x the traffic in the latter.
The only reason that `low fat' diets fail is because of a lack of personal willpower, and an absurd notion that one can turn ship overnight and change everything about themselves: If you grew up eating roast beef and butter soaked mashed potatoes, the idea that you'll switch to veggies and soy overnight is absolutely absurd. Yet that's the way that many people approach dieting (Countless sitcoms follow the story of "Jimmy got a warning from the doctor, so the wife now only feeds him spinach and oatmeal"). Anything that is approached with such immediacy is virtually always doomed to failure: The person at work who won't stop yapping about their new diet is virtually yelling out loud "I am going to fail". The guy who just started going to the gym every now and then, coupled with an improved awareness and self-control, and perhaps some good product choices (by making simple choices one can dramatically decrease your caloric intake).
The Atkins diet goes over well in North America because the standard North American diet just happens to be rich on fat, rich on protein, and short on carbs : Going on the Atkins diet is basically saying "Eat what you eat, just be cognizant of it". For "fatty", such a food awareness is a good approach because it's less likely to be perceived as "all or nothing": You haven't given up if you have a Big Mac or a steak. Yet at the same time there are countless very active, very healthy (probably in much better cardiac shape than the average Atkins diet fan) people living on zero saturated fat.
BTW: The saddest thing about the whole diet fad is that the lazy, gas pedal public perceives health as being merely about food. How far from the truth that is. Gaining some muscle mass not only makes you more capable of handling yourself, but it also raises your basal metabolic rate (muscles consume energy just to exist). If people just got off their sorry, lazy asses and DID SOMETHING their would be far less obesity among the sedentary population. I have no doubt that there are people who have hormone imbalances, but for every one of them there are about 4 who, between stuffing back a Big Mac and Super Monster Large Fries is crying about their poor genetics DAMNIT GET ME A BEER! Apart from the extreme outliers with physical handicaps, anyone who doesn't exercise at least 30 minutes every other day, and who eats with disregard, should realize that they are making their own bed.
I'm getting various Klez emails in my Hotmail at the rate of about 6 a day : Clearly these viruses are scanning the newsgroups as they are not coming from people I know or converse with (I use my Hotmail account as a reply for newsgroup postings, so I get about 60 spams a day). I find it humorous, and of the potential for conspiracy theorists, that shortly after Hotmail started selling memberships for expanded storage space, I started getting a warning every 2 days or so about running out of space : Of course I'd check my account to find that 90% of the space suckage were various Klez viruses (which Hotmail does not, at least up until yesterday, filter out. Again, warm up the conspiracy machine...).
It should be noted that only a small proportion of the messages contain "Klez" in the subject. I've seen it with subject lines that seem faintly related to newsgroups that I've posted in : SQL Server terms, HTML phrases, CSS selectors, etc.
Oh, and I meant to mention that no, it isn't just for XP. "Cygwin/ XFree86 runs on all recent consumer and business versions of Windows; as of 2002-05-12 those versions are specifically Windows 95, Windows 98, Windows Me, Windows NT 4.0, Windows 2000, and Windows XP."
One of the things I appreciate most about XP is the startup times: There is absolutely no doubt that from power on to logon is dramatically less with XP than 2000. It might not seem like much, but when installing software that requires several reboots (Visual Studio.NET, for example), this is the difference between amazingly irritating, and just a minor nuisance. Sometimes I boot my machine just to quickly sync my PDA, and again with 2000 I'd hit the power and go have a shower, but with XP I can do the sync pronto.
Apart from that the changes are marginal, though. One of the first things I did was to go to "classic" mode to avoid the horribly slow "good looking" desktop and start bar options. I also appreciate the fact that XP hides system tray icons that aren't changing : That is a HUGE pet peeve of mine -> Why does every shitty little trivial application these days feel that it's important enough to start on boot-up and stick a nuisance icon in the system tray?
Well if you looked at the page you'd see that, contrary to the Slashdot submission, it runs on all recent Windows versions: "as of 2002-05-12 those versions are specifically Windows 95, Windows 98, Windows Me, Windows NT 4.0, Windows 2000, and Windows XP".
The US is a republic because of a technical limitations of implementing a total democracy "back in the day" (not to mention that it was a "union"): This was no great foresight of the founding fathers, and in reality the electorate generally (I believe there was one deviation) exactly duplicates the voice of the people : If they didn't the system would be changed pronto. Democracy isn't perfect, but neither is an ivory tower "people who know better" type of system.
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I find your angle regarding welfare interesting, and I'd say that it's a very short sighted perspective: Many of those people who are "incapable or unwilling" to contribute are there because of economic perpetuation (there is a caste system alive and well in the United States today), racism, or poor government economic planning (did you know that unemployment is intentionally kept inflated to keep inflation in line? You see, that helps out your retirement plan, but it doesn't help out the "unwilling to contribute"). If you refuse to cast them a line to help them while the system that favours you screws them, realize that many of them will logically decide to foresake your system and your rules, and they'll be the ones shoving a gun in your face to take your wallet, etc. These people WILL survive, and this ridiculous "well let them starve!" concept is absurd: Welfare is pretty damn cheap compared to a police state.
I'm not even commenting on the worthiness of going to Mars, but I find it sad that of all of the ridiculous government waste programs that you could pick on (SDI anyone?), you chose welfare : You a fan of Rush Limbaugh, by any chance?
Sidenote: Who knows, we might need to get to Mars quickly.... I have noticed dramatic temperature differences in the past decade where I live (20 years ago it was a rare day that it hit 30C here....now it's hitting 35C daily), and I find it odd how little commentary there is regarding this. The other day I caught a little scrolling piece of news that the US government has purchased and stockpiled $1 billion dollars worth of powdered milk (as a single purchase..meaning this is just one individual stockpile purchase)
Why don't you take a peek at the military or covert operations (i.e. NSA) budget some day, and compare that with the "welfare" money.
Of course, it's silly anyways: Your slant is that there's something dirty about politicians doing what'll "buy them more votes" (the welfare angle is pretty ridiculous in regards to that, btw, as lower income people have a dramatically lower voter turnout) is interesting: Is that what this silly thing called a democracy is supposed to be about?
Most cable modems run at 10Mbps, and are artificially capped to given bandwidths.
NT 4 had time synchronization, but it came front and center with Windows 2000 (which automatically time sync with your domain controller, which itself should be configured to sync with a master authority) because of Kerberos as implemented in Windows 2000 and beyond : Time is one of the parameters, so if Bob's PC is 20 minutes ahead and his kerberos keys are by a different clock, security conflicts will arise (namely, his keys will be refused). Of course, anyone with XP can bring up the clock applet (double clicking on the clock in the system tray) and choose the Internet Time tab that allows them to change the server to a different one if they so desired (or disable it all together).
A lot of cases rely upon the slit in the bottom front (the spot where an optional fan can be installed) as an air intake, however this is totally defeated if you put your computer on a soft surface such as carpet: The carpet effectively plugs the intake. Anyways, putting the front of the case on something solid like a book, or a CD case, lifts it up and allows air to flow efficiently into the case.
To unthaw it? So you want to freeze it again?
Anyways, I actually love left-over pizza at room temperature, so I microwave it just enough that the veggies aren't so cold that they make my teeth hurt like hell...once it's got that slight warmth it's chow time.
Good for your convenience. We're not all the same, and not all of us can stand small intervals of time. Some of us actually have attention spans.
Ouch! Touche! Good one Einstein.
I'm not talking economics, I'm talking philosphy, and being whismical at that. If you didn't pick that up, perhaps you should be the one going back to grade school.
Sure.
It's only their fault they've gone backrupt and haven't managed their service properly. It's only their fault their network was a piece of shite after they severly oversubscribed and undermanaged it.
Yeah, that makes a lot of sense: They went bankrupt because they oversubscribed it. Oh, wait, simple logic says that that would be more cost effective and would actually make more money...bzzttttt...logic sensors exploding. Obviously they undercharged for the bandwidth and services that they provided, usually on the premise that once they got settled they could raise prices or create partnerships that would offset the losses. Again, if you think you have such a genius comprehension of the cost of bandwidth and connectivity, I'm sure there'll be lots of people who'll be happy to sign up for your always super fast, no limits $20/month system. Oh wait, that should be free.
Now, let me get this straight. You're saying that not only are they already losing money as it is, raising prices to keep in business, they are a bullshit cable company...now let's introduce true competition. Prices go down farther, they lose more money, and how do they stay in business then?
(I'm skipping the fantasy quote where you either put words in my mouth, or are errantly replying to a whole different post). Firstly, idealists such as yourself don't care about "real competition" : You want to see AT&T and TW be forced to hand over billions of dollars of infrastructure so that someone else can provide magical bandwidth for free. Barring that, your competitor will have to run cable to everyone's home, and I don't see that happening anytime soon. However, competition doesn't equal "same technology same method" : In my area right now I can get DSL, cable, high speed two way radio, satellite (including the uplink now), along with dial-up. Strangely, the prices all seem to fall in line, and none of them has a magical way of offering guaranteed round-the-clock DS1 speeds for $40/month.
I don't know about you, but when I come across an ISP advertising 24/7 always-on Internet access
There is a massive difference between "always on" and "always at 100%". Always on means that I can hop on my PC 7 seconds before the movie comes on to check if it's worthwhile on IMDB. Always on means ICQ can sit waiting for an incoming "Hey there!" message. Always on doesn't mean that I'll stream a 1.5Mbps video feed 24/7 just for the heck of it.
If they advertise high-speed Internet, one should be able to assume that it is high-speed.
Again, it is high speed : Yesterday I needed to grab a 48MB file, and in blistering fast fashion I had it and could use it in a convenient and usefully small period of time. Again, always on+always fast != suck data 24/7.
Second, you're philosophically hollow; I can see right through you. The Internet has become a public medium, and it always deserved to be one since the day Academia got involved with it. The only reason bandwidth isn't free is because most of the world still uses a monetary system. I, being biased towards a nonmonetary system, would whole-heartedly agree that bandwidth should be free.
Bwahahahahaahah. I think you need to pay a little more attention to that Grade 11 economics class. Nothing is ever free, regardless of the society (were things "Free" in the Soviet Union? Guess what: They weren't), but I won't bother explaining human nature to someone who's such a prophet.
I would say, though, that companies overcharge quite a bit. Do you think a bullshit cable company such as the only few cable companies offering Internet access would survive if the market were *truly* competitive?
Uh...yes? Ignoring the fact that about 3/4 of the high speed providers have gone bankrupt in the last couple of years (boy, they're just making money hand over fist!), for most cable companies high speed is a loss leader way to try to entice people to stay with cable for their TV needs (TV, a unidirectional spitting of 20% advertisements, which costs me more than my internet connection which people like you claim is overcharged....), rather than getting satellite (and alternately the phone company wants you to get DSL, because that'll remove the barrier to you signing up with their satellite TV plan).
I have a residential phone line that stays connected to another local residential phone line 24x7.
If you're connected to another phone that's service by the same CO, then it really isn't a problem: In essence you're using your local loop and their local loop, and a circuit in between. If, on the other hand, one of your loops is serviced by a remote CO, or a different CO all together, or the data has to go through a toll center, then Bell really DOESN'T like that: You're actually consuming 64Kbps 24/7 on their digital trunks, and again they don't have enough trunks to support everyone being on the line at the same time.
The only reason you can get away with it, so to speak, is that most Bells are highly regulated, and the government heavily restrains them from charging based on use, etc. However, if there were more people making dedicated connections (versus switched connections) then Bell would lobby for, and would get, changes that would allow them to charge extra to high users.
I don't think there's any question that a dedicated T1 beats out a cable connection if you have absolute requirements 24 hours a day, however you pay for that luxury (because the provider, usually the telco, has to have a T1 of bandwidth reserved for you 24 hours a day, and can't utilize standard switching to share the connection) : Usually about 20-50x more than a cable modem connection.
I also agree that cable modems definitely depend on the area, the types of neighbours you have, etc. I happen to live in an area, and my cable company has subdivided it such, that the moment I need a file I can grab it at a blistering 250KB/second with extremely good consistency. My connection has been stunningly reliable, and I've had incredibly few complaints. I'm not going to say that's the case for all cable modem users, but conversely I don't think it's fair for someone who has had a bad experience to cast their experience as the epitome of the cable modem experience.
BTW: How did you know that the DHCP server was down for hours a day? I don't even run a DHCP daemon on my box, it changes so infrequently, and it'd be pretty sad if your provider had a lease for less than a day.