Now, as with any politician, he’s made some moves that i don’t favor, like one year there was a tax surplus, so he gave it away instead of giving it back.

Tim Walz during covid.

I saw that small businesses like restaurants wanted to close for the safety of their employees but the national chains wanted to stay open for profits. If individual businesses would have closed, they would lose business possibly forever. They needed the statevto mandate a closure to protect their employees and their ability to keep their customers. Walz declared a closure. I’ve spoken with almost s dozen local businesses who all feel the same.

Conversely, Walz allowed chiropractors to stay open because the state saw that they took some of the load off of the already overloaded hospitals.

Looking at all the bumper stickers and yard signs, he is quite unpopular, but I feel that he looked at the evidence (not the politics) and made a hard decision at the potential expense of his career.

Bonus, during covid, he had the best ASL interpreter on the press releases.

Obsessively. I’ve been driving German autos since college, including BMW’s and most BMW owners are jerks. The only exception is when I hung out with the local BMW club one summer. They drive crazy fast, but are some of the most courteous drivers on the road.

I’ve posted this elsewhere (skip to paragraph 21 for the meaty parts). The short version is that the US demanded that trade partners implement protections for US companies in exchange for trade deals. Those trade deals are no longer present, so why don’t the governments reverse the protections since the US isn’t holding up their end of the bargain anymore?

Americans get really upset when people go to the US and do things like they do in their home country, but also expect to be able to act like Americans in other countries. It’s a little arrogant or ignorant. Some people who who were even invited to study in the US have been deported for doing things that Americans do themselves, like protesting.

Whittle this story down to its core and you have, “guest in country breaks law and gets punished”. Is that really surprising? How about, “guest in country exercises rights of citizens and gets punished?”

I didn’t describe it correctly. I see people approaching the roundabout with their left signal on, leave it on until they take the 3rd exit. I’ll also see approaching with their eight signal on and take the 1st exit. The intersection used to be a standard perpendicular intersection with traffic lights.

It sounds as if you’re saying to signal left on approach indicating a merge, then signal right to indicate an exit from the circle. I can’t say that I’ve ever seen that in action.

Tell me more about the roundabouts and exiting. Are there left exits from a roundabout? Don’t they all circulate anticlockwise (when viewed from above)?

There’s a new roundabout in my town and nobody knows how to signal. I see people enter with left signal flashing and then they’ll take the 3rd exit (out of 4 total). I’ve always entered without a signal, then exit right with a signal.

Also, I’ve seen many people go around backwards. That’s a fun surprise.

I was going to post a link to Once A Month Meals (or is it Cooking?) but it looks like they charge a subscription now. A lot of sites have freezable recipes now.

Anyhow, it’s different than leftovers. Cooking lasagne? Make 4 trays. Burritos? Make 25. The key to freezer meals is to cool them completely before freezing and wrap it tightly or else you’ll get frost. For pasta, get those tin trays and use press&seal to store. For burritos, wrap in parchment paper, then foil as foil can stick to the tortilla.

Sometimes I think you’re right. Other times I think that couldn’t possibly be true.

I’ve studied many of the bigger wars and they’ve all mostly have been started by far less severe events. It’s scary that one person could wield all that power, unchecked and unaccountable.

It sounds like it’s time to build a bunker.

Canada’s boss move is to remove the intellectual property laws that the US asked for and let Canadian companies and consumers thrive again.

Canada shouldn’t retaliate with US tariffs

OK, since you mentioned the media, putting “gate” after any government scandal. Nixon’s scandal was involving the Watergate Office Building.

I’m having difficulty backing into parking spots with the mirrors set this way, too. I don’t do it too often, and I was hoping someone here had a solution.

Good point on motorcycles. I still look over my shoulder for lane changes, probably out of habit now.

I’m going to keep posting this every time I see a reference to US tariffs against Canada.

https://pluralistic.net/2025/01/15/beauty-eh/

The TL;DR is that tariffs would violate the NAFTA / USMCA treaty in which Canada agreed to respect US copyright law in exchange for free trade. No free trade? Canada doesn’t need to respect US copyright any longer and can become a flourishing economy of products to compete with US products that are massively overpriced. Think printer ink and other stuff.

I’d love to see nothing but PeerTube links in the fediverse. YouTube has become almost unusable for me.

TL;DR: I don’t really know.

My health care insurance does this too. I save some $50/yr to agree to a call from an RN to help me with my health condition(s). A coworker who formerly worked in health insurance told me that while they also help you to navigate the health insurance system and/or find cheaper care or whatever, you’re actully still talking to your health insurance company and not your doctor and so anything that you say is now on your health insurance record. This can be used to deny future coverage for an existing condition, dissuade you from pursuing more expensive (for them) medical treatments or to raise your company’s rates for certain ailments (for example, everyone at your company smokes, they’ll drop coverage for asthma).

The health insurance company doesn’t know all of your ailments simply based on the billing codes. You are protected by HIPPA. Your health insurance company can ask you anything and anything you say to them is not necessarily covered by HIPPA.

When negotiating a deal, make your offer, listen to the response and walk away (not rudely, just…you have somewhere else to be). The first one who calls back loses. This works well for buying a car.

Edit: oops, hit submit too quickly. I used this to buy an ATV long ago and many cars since. "I can spend $XXX (know this nunber before you start). . It’s a nice ATV, but I promised myself that I’d spend no more than $XXX. Thank you for your time. "

Can you elaborate on your last sentence? Is the US more or less trustworthy than alternatives?

I’ve been in earthquakes, tornadoes, a hurricane and a few floods. Also, ice and hail storms, many blizzards, thunderstorms and straight line winds. The tornadoes are always the most frightening.

The bigger of the earthquakes was just enough to move the dishes around in the cupboards so that when I went for a cup, a bunch fell out. The closest tornado hit a few streets over from where I lived and bounced, destroying every other house down one side of a street. The hurricane just blew sand around and covered the car in a sand dune. I lost several cars to floods and had to be rescued once.

I should probably go check out a tsunami some time to fill out my disaster bingo board.

Good point about our perception of reality. If we have drugs available to us that can make us perceive reality as not that bad (or even good), then what if it’s just a defect in our bodies that makes us feel like life isn’t worth living? If our bodies are simply defective in producing the mood balancing hormones, then depression or other mood disorders can be treated with medicines, no different than taking a Tums when we overindulge on Thanksgiving.