Deep 6 FaWtL

[Freehold DM]

Tacticslion wrote:

Also, after yesterday, his lifetime of disdain for plain, white rice has evaporated. He was asking for more, today. Poor guy.

Plain white rice FOREVER! IT IS THE BASE OF GOOD NUTRITION!

[Freehold DM]

I AM THE BASIS OF GOOD NUDITY!

[gran rey de los mono]

NobodysHome wrote:

lisamarlene wrote:

Okay, so for the big damn hippies that go off the grid, how does that work?

(I mean, personally I'm just holding out for my own "Mister Fusion" units powering my home and my car with garbage, but until that day...)

As Vanykrye said, you need:

(1) Storage for when it's dark
(2) A power "sink" for excess power generated

The Road Warrior-esque "fortress with a bunch of flickering lights on the outside" isn't a bad idea; just funnel the excess power into a bunch of incandescent lights, which are HUGE energy sinks. You'd just need circuitry that said, "once power exceeds this level send all the rest to the lights", but such technology has existed nearly as long as power grids have, so it's not hard to build. I suspect that modern systems just have something akin to a space heater set off from the battery a bit because if you ever want to burn power, just setting up a pointless heater is a great way to do it.

It's just a lot more complex so it's either "build it yourself" or "pay a lot more".

You funnel the excess into giant spotlights to taunt the suckers who don't have power.

[Scintillae]

Beep Beep

Two students stand with a tape measure across the hallway at about chest level
Student A: It's a roadblock! laughs as the other students irritably limbo beneath
Me: Yeah, sure. walks straight for the kid holding the end of it, grabs the tape, walks until he loses his grip
Students A&B: stare

[NobodysHome]

Linux Update: It's been a few days now, but I finally seem to have gotten it to the point where I want it:
- The RAID array is recognized and mounted on startup
- The networking issues seem to be resolved
- I have a tools panel at the top of every monitor

So, I'll admit, it probably took me 10-15 hours to get Linux installed and working the way I wanted it to on this machine.

BUT... it should now work beautifully for the next 10 years, without monthly psychotic updates coming in, breaking things, and changing my settings.

Fingers crossed!

[NobodysHome]

Entertainingly enough, last night we did An Evening with Victoria Price (warning: That's a Facebook link, even if I set NoScript on it), and part of the swag was a signed copy of Vincent Price's first cookbook, which includes "Carbonnade of Beef", a recipe for... a potato-less beef stew to be served over mashed potatoes.

Providence provides!

(And yes, I've flagged everyone's recipes here for future explorations. I do eat a LOT, you know! Practically every day!!!)

[NobodysHome]

Since power is on everyone's mind today (at least every Californian's), I checked my solar: We're into October, and still producing 20+ kWh/day, while our use is around 17.

So I'm guessing we'll start actually using power from the power company at some point in November, at which point I'm pretty sure we'll have enough of a bank we don't have to worry about it. It'll be interesting to see how it goes. (I get a balance report every month, and right now we have hundreds of kWh banked for the winter.)

[lisamarlene]

Limeylongears wrote:

lisamarlene wrote:

Woran wrote:

My voice has gone from 'raspy' to 'teenage boy'.

When I'm at that stage, I usually entertain myself (and frighten my children) by singing Marlene Dietrich songs in a purposefully bad German accent.

It's also normally a good time to do your best impression of Joe Cocker singing 'Up Where We Belong'

I tried a Barry White impression when I was sick once. It disturbed WW so much that he made me swear to never attempt it again.

[Baron Barrington de Whyte]

You should have told him to love you 'just the way you are', ooouuum baybeh.

[NobodysHome]

Power Politics:

So, in terms of our power outage today, it's all about privatization:
(1) PG&E maintains a massive maintenance fund
(2) PG&E is privatized
(3) Fund is looted to pay executives and shareholders
(4) No maintenance is performed
(5) Massive wildfires ensue
(6) With no money to perform maintenance, PG&E resorts to shutting off power to hundreds of thousands of people for days at a time (the latest estimate)

So privatization has turned us into an area where day-to-day power is no longer a reliable metric.

If pressed, I could probably come up with at least half a dozen more examples where privatization destroyed quality of service and price.

I'm curious: Does anyone have a counterexample, where privatization actually worked?

[Vanykrye]

NobodysHome wrote:

I'm curious: Does anyone have a counterexample, where privatization actually worked?

The health insurance industry in America is a wonderful example of privatization initiatives leading to a higher quality and more affordable long-term outlook oh my gods I can't even finish this with a straight face and my fingers are trying to leap off my hands hgap8anb ajpw.

PIYHQGa48hjsdihsr
ptq2
apbanwa3
P*^GGanqw
FREEDOM!!

[captain yesterday]

I hear getting your kid into college is way easier if you get a middle man to bribe the school then if you do it yourself.

[Vanykrye]

NobodysHome wrote:

** spoiler omitted **

In case people were confused by my earlier post on the subject...

No.

[Freehold DM]

lisamarlene wrote:

Limeylongears wrote:

lisamarlene wrote:

Woran wrote:

My voice has gone from 'raspy' to 'teenage boy'.

When I'm at that stage, I usually entertain myself (and frighten my children) by singing Marlene Dietrich songs in a purposefully bad German accent.

It's also normally a good time to do your best impression of Joe Cocker singing 'Up Where We Belong'

I tried a Barry White impression when I was sick once. It disturbed WW so much that he made me swear to never attempt it again.

let me know when you are sick again, I'll call you and we can redo that Simpsons episode.

[Rosita the Riveter]

NobodysHome wrote:

** spoiler omitted **

Spoiler:

You forgot the part where PG&E has no money because they got sued into oblivion for not doing that maintenance and because we passed a law saying they totally can be sued, and is now turning around and saying that, if the law is they can now be sued for not doing maintenance if that means fires start in bad weather, they'll just not provide the service in bad weather at all.

[Professor Farnsworth, Scientist]

gran rey de los mono wrote:

Freehold DM wrote:

lisamarlene wrote:

(I mean, personally I'm just holding out for my own "Mister Fusion" units powering my home and my car with garbage, but until that day...)

Now you have to design the mascot for Mister Fusion.

Wouldn't that be a cartoonified Christopher Lloyd?

Oh my! If you're trying to market a home fusion mini-power plant as scientifically sound, safe, and dependable, I'm not sure you'd want Judge Doom (Who Framed Roger Rabbit? spoilers) as the mascot.

[Batwampi]

gran rey de los mono wrote:

NobodysHome wrote:

As Vanykrye said, you need:

(1) Storage for when it's dark
(2) A power "sink" for excess power generated

The Road Warrior-esque "fortress with a bunch of flickering lights on the outside" isn't a bad idea; just funnel the excess power into a bunch of incandescent lights, which are HUGE energy sinks. You'd just need circuitry that said, "once power exceeds this level send all the rest to the lights", but such technology has existed nearly as long as power grids have, so it's not hard to build. I suspect that modern systems just have something akin to a space heater set off from the battery a bit because if you ever want to burn power, just setting up a pointless heater is a great way to do it.

It's just a lot more complex so it's either "build it yourself" or "pay a lot more".

You funnel the excess into giant spotlights to taunt the suckers who don't have power.

Or since it's fire season in California, you use it to power a Bat signal Firefighter signal giant middle finger-signal to PG&E.

[Scintillae]

Random thought of the day: sending out a virus named with_scissors.exe

Panicked IT professionals send out frantic emails asking people not to run it.

[TriOmegaZero]

Thanks I hate it.

[Scintillae]

More Proof I'm A Bad Person
"Next root is 're.' Before or again. Example words?"
"Rewind!"
"Repeat!"
"Pete and Repeat are sitting on a bridge. Pete falls off. Who's left?"
"Repeat!"
"Pete and Repeat are sitting on a bridge. Pete falls off. Who's left?"
"Repeat!"
"Pete and Repeat are sitting on a bridge. Pete falls off. Who's left?"
"Repeat!"
"Pete and Repeat are sitting on a bridge. Pete falls off. Who's left?"
"OH MY GOD STOP SAYING REPEAT!"

Did not think they'd fall for it after the first one.

[Tacticslion]

Tacticslion wrote:

Tiger and Bunny is so good. I’m upset it’s keaving Netflix, but at least I have this chance to watch it with the kids!

Daggum, I love this show. The attention to small detail is... fantastic.

I love that the show takes place in the late 1970s... and 1978, specifically. Like, they do that really well.

The style, the fashion, the date on the pin, which they'd teased from the outro of season one... and which becomes an important (if extremely minor) plot point in the end of the series.

It's... good.

Tiger & Bunny is not a perfect show. It has flaws and problems. But I really love it, and it works so hard to make itself great. I just wish it was able to stay available in Netflix.

[Drejk]

Vanykrye wrote:

NobodysHome wrote:

** spoiler omitted **

In case people were confused by my earlier post on the subject...

No.

Sort of.

In late nineties if you wanted to access internet in Poland you generally had to use dial-up modem via the national phone lines. Telekomunikacja Polska SA was a joint stock company of Polish National Treasure (that is, it is a stock company legally, whose stocks were owned by the National Treasure, a common form for various national companies here) - though later part of its shares entered stock market.

Somewhere in early 2000s, it started offering actual internet access as a part of its services, but at the same time, cable tv companies started to offer it as well, together with phone options.

The phone company offered a crappy service called Neostrada (I presume the name was coming from autostrada - highway) but it was often called Neostrata (Neo-loss) because of poor quality and poor conditions (like a ridiculously low limit of 30 GB per month).

(UPC was years ahead in quality of their internet over all the competition here for a long time)

Private cable companies offered much better services and in time, the quality of services offered by Telekomunikacja (which changed its name twice since that time during various merges and rebrandings) started offering decent (though not stellar) services.

Similar things happened to Poczta Polska SA (Polish Mail), when their quality of services improved when they had to compete with private mail and courier services - they lost their public contract on delivery of Court mail for a time to another contractor, though I think they got it back after improving their services (and blunders by the other contractor).

So yes, I have seen things getting better because of privatization, but it's not a magical efficiency button that makes things better.

[lisamarlene]

You know how I always say that pumpkin spice anything is evil and ought to be nuked from orbit, like cockroaches?

Yeah, about that.

Blue Bell, the great Texas ice cream company, makes a Spiced Pumpkin Pecan ice cream that is out. of. this. freaking. world.

And since it's October 9th and the high this afternoon is 88, yes, I did indulge. (But the high on Friday will be 59.)

[NobodysHome]

After my post I actually found a nice article in (of all places) Harvard Business Review that pointed out Rule #1: If there is no incentivisation towards the public interest, privatization will suck. But so will public companies. So the real problem is the failure of upper management to follow the public mandate.

Anyway... on to other things...

We are still receiving *NO* information from PG&E about the outage, which is unbelievable, since some areas will be without power for 5 days (including GothBard's mother, who lives in a rural area and gets her water from a well with an electric-powered pump, so she has to plan to be without water for 5 days).
However, the local sheriff's offices have taken it upon themselves to start making announcements as to what they've been told, and they say that our counties will go dark at 8:00 pm tonight.

Alameda county is supposed to get power back at noon tomorrow, but we're right on the county border and Contra Costa County has no such estimated restoration point, so it's still wait-and-see-how-long-you're-out for us.

[Freehold DM]

lisamarlene wrote:

You know how I always say that pumpkin spice anything is evil and ought to be nuked from orbit, like cockroaches?

Yeah, about that.

Blue Bell, the great Texas ice cream company, makes a Spiced Pumpkin Pecan ice cream that is out. of. this. freaking. world.

And since it's October 9th and the high this afternoon is 88, yes, I did indulge. (But the high on Friday will be 59.)

I love pumpkin spice, but have it only once a year, the first day of NYCC.

[NobodysHome]

Oh, and speaking of refreshing honesty, I have to admit, solar companies are really impressing me with their above-and-beyond forthrightness about the limitations of solar power when the grid goes off.

From the site I went to:
(1) "Honestly, just buy a generator. You can get a 7000W generator that'll power your entire house for $1000. And it'll be cheaper and more efficient than any other option you can buy, so why waste your money?"

(2) "If you really, really, really want solar during a power outage, it costs around $2500 extra to get this type of panel installed, that'll give you 2000W, and only during the day. Notice that? More than twice as expensive as the generator, less than a third the power, and it only works during the day. But yep, we'll be happy to install it for you if you really want the 'greenest' solution."

(3) "If you want to be zombie apocalypse ready, buy a battery pack. But it won't charge during an outage unless you have... you guessed it! A generator! So for $15,000 - $20,000 more, you can have an extra 1-2 days of power in case of a major outage. But environmentally it's WAY worse than that generator we keep mentioning."

(4) "No, we won't recommend a particular generator. That's not our business."

Just amazing honesty.

So yeah, I ordered a generator from Amazon. But only a 2200W one, not a 7000W one, because I don't figure I'm going to really need to run the dryer when I have a clothesline in the back yard and such.

One step closer to surviving the zombie apocalypse.

[Zombieneighbors 2.0]

Yeah, clotheslines are a real b#!@# to get through.

[Rosita the Riveter]

lisamarlene wrote:

(But the high on Friday will be 59.)

Oh, the weather finally gets tolerable around here right when I get on a plane to Seattle. I see how it is.

[Limeylongears]

NobodysHome wrote:

Oh, and speaking of refreshing honesty, I have to admit, solar companies are really impressing me with their above-and-beyond forthrightness about the limitations of solar power when the grid goes off.

From the site I went to:
(1) "Honestly, just buy a generator. You can get a 7000W generator that'll power your entire house for $1000. And it'll be cheaper and more efficient than any other option you can buy, so why waste your money?"

(2) "If you really, really, really want solar during a power outage, it costs around $2500 extra to get this type of panel installed, that'll give you 2000W, and only during the day. Notice that? More than twice as expensive as the generator, less than a third the power, and it only works during the day. But yep, we'll be happy to install it for you if you really want the 'greenest' solution."

(3) "If you want to be zombie apocalypse ready, buy a battery pack. But it won't charge during an outage unless you have... you guessed it! A generator! So for $15,000 - $20,000 more, you can have an extra 1-2 days of power in case of a major outage. But environmentally it's WAY worse than that generator we keep mentioning."

(4) "No, we won't recommend a particular generator. That's not our business."

Just amazing honesty.

So yeah, I ordered a generator from Amazon. But only a 2200W one, not a 7000W one, because I don't figure I'm going to really need to run the dryer when I have a clothesline in the back yard and such.

One step closer to surviving the zombie apocalypse.

Quite true. You're never going to win the wrasslin with a move called 'The Dryer'

Although I could be wrong...

[Woran]

Braaaaaaaaaaaaaains

[Tacticslion]

Woran wrote:

Braaaaaaaaaaaaaains

Prioooooooooooooons

[Sharoth]

~sighs~ Very political comment below.

Spoiler:

Once I get home, I will be deleting Diablo and Starcraft from all of my devices. Blizzard has screwed up one too many times. Hong Kong and Taiwan deserve our full support. So does Tibet and all the people being oppressed by China. Plus the multiple atrocities being commited right now by China. The organ harvesting is just one of them.

[Sharoth]

Woran wrote:

Braaaaaaaaaaaaaains

No! No brains! Brains are bad for you! Prions are always bad for you! So no brains for you!

[Scintillae]

Sharoth wrote:

~sighs~ Very political comment below.

** spoiler omitted **

Spoiler:

Did you see the push the internet is making to make Overwatch's Mei an icon of Hong Kong support?

[Tacticslion]

Prions: evil origami that turns your brain into evil origami.

[Woran]

Sharoth wrote:

Woran wrote:

Braaaaaaaaaaaaaains

No! No brains! Brains are bad for you! Prions are always bad for you! So no brains for you!

The chance of bad protein folding due to consuming brain tissue is actually very low

[Vanykrye]

Woran wrote:

Sharoth wrote:

Woran wrote:

Braaaaaaaaaaaaaains

No! No brains! Brains are bad for you! Prions are always bad for you! So no brains for you!

The chance of bad protein folding due to consuming brain tissue is actually very low

I'm still not eating head cheese. Just sayin'.

[Sharoth]

Scintillae wrote:

Sharoth wrote:

~sighs~ Very political comment below.

** spoiler omitted **

** spoiler omitted **

Spoiler:

~smirks~ Yes!

[captain yesterday]

I don't get why people suddenly care about China, they've been doing this for decades.

Not to be That Guy or anything, I just don't get all the hubbub all of a sudden.

[NobodysHome]

So, kind of cheesed, kind of pleased.

In spite of PG&E's own maps to the contrary, we weren't part of the power shutoff area. On the one hand, I'm happy because I didn't lose power and I'd made very few preparations in case I did (the generator I ordered is still a week away, so it wasn't for this blackout, it was more, "OK, that's one more thing I should really have in case of a major earthquake and I know where I can store it.")

On the other hand, they told thousands of people to prepare for 5 days without power, so I know dozens of people stocked up on ice, and many preemptively threw out their perishables. Such waste, all for a non-event.

With behavior like that, I understand a bit more the people who hear tornado, flood, or tsunami warnings and choose not to go anywhere. We get flood warnings on occasion, which is funny because we're about 50' above the base of the hill, so it would be one heck of a legendary flood to get us.

But the electrical grid shouldn't be that hard. "This circuit powers these houses. Put it on the map."
The fact that they can't even do that right is... sad...

[Freehold DM]

captain yesterday wrote:

I don't get why people suddenly care about China, they've been doing this for decades.

Not to be That Guy or anything, I just don't get all the hubbub all of a sudden.

Spoiler:

because we live in a world where mass domestic manufacturing has died a quiet, ugly death(although the occasional nationalist attempts to perform cpr), and nearly everything is made there. It's getting harder to cast a blind eye to what they are doing when you are passively financially supporting it.

wears white

sinks to knees

accepts miniature flaming bike from fritzy

beats self about head and shoulders with flaming bike

[Scintillae]

D&D club is going to start next Tuesday. Going to use it for character setup and such, which gives me an extra week to figure out an adventure to throw together.

[lisamarlene]

Freehold DM wrote:

captain yesterday wrote:

I don't get why people suddenly care about China, they've been doing this for decades.

Not to be That Guy or anything, I just don't get all the hubbub all of a sudden.

** spoiler omitted **

wears white

sinks to knees

accepts miniature flaming bike from fritzy

beats self about head and shoulders with flaming bike

Freehold gets cookies again.

[The Vagrant Erudite]

I spent last night smoking weed and tie-dying clothes while listening to classic rock, between rounds of patching my pants. I was born 30 years too late.

Also I bought a file cabinet at a thrift shop (a place I spend more time in than Walmart and the grocery store combined) that I converted into a sweet metal dresser. I love post apocalyptic style.

I plan on hitting up the Re-Store fot some windows to do some stained glass art with next weekend.

[The Vagrant Erudite]

Things I miss avout Florida:
1) Family
2) Friends
3) Publix Subs [though Kroger sushi mitigates this loss]
4) Nothing

[NobodysHome]

Wow... I managed to prove myself even more of a pessimist than Shiro this morning, and that's quite unusual (he always sees the worst in government).

His thought: PG&E did the extensive excess warnings to prepare people for when they do their inevitable maintenance on the lines, so everyone will be ready for the actual outages that will come over the next year or two.

My thought: Until its executives end up in maximum-security prisons doing time for murder 1, no maintenance will EVER be done on those lines: PG&E will raise the rates, purportedly to pay for this needed maintenance, the execs and shareholders will pocket the rate increase, the maintenance won't be done, and the cycle of stupid will continue.

Let's see who's right...

[Orthos, Recurring Evil Henchman]

My moneys on the more evil option.

[captain yesterday]

The Vagrant Erudite wrote:

I spent last night smoking weed and tie-dying clothes while listening to classic rock, between rounds of patching my pants. I was born 30 years too late.

Also I bought a file cabinet at a thrift shop (a place I spend more time in than Walmart and the grocery store combined) that I converted into a sweet metal dresser. I love post apocalyptic style.

I plan on hitting up the Re-Store fot some windows to do some stained glass art with next weekend.

Or, 10-15 years too late.

You just described our average October night from the 90s.

[Orthos]

Freehold DM wrote:

captain yesterday wrote:

I don't get why people suddenly care about China, they've been doing this for decades.

Not to be That Guy or anything, I just don't get all the hubbub all of a sudden.

** spoiler omitted **

But wait, there's more!:

In addition to what all has already been mentioned, the world is a shrinking place and what has been happening "for decades" decades ago was easy to not know about, overlook, or ignore as "that's on the other side of the world, it doesn't affect me".

That is no longer the case, on both fronts. It does affect us now, primarily as Freehold said thru our manufacturing and supply resources, and it is far from out of sight out of mind thanks to the global pervasiveness of the internet.

So now it becomes a question of whether you can willingly not choose to take at least some action without a weight on your conscience, as simply not knowing about it is increasingly not an option.

This comes at a particularly annoying time for me, as I was JUST discussing with Ebon a few days ago about how if WOW Classic does well Bliz announced they might make BC Classic and Wrath Classic servers and how tempting that would be for us in a way Vanilla Classic wasn't. Then this nonsense happened.

[John Napier 698]

Hello, everyone!